connexion: the selector

Submerged Series, Part Five (Bobbing Along the Surface Prior to Descent)

My life-raft, before it turned my new favorite shade of blue.

Sometimes my mind just won’t stop when my body does, keeping me from being able to fall asleep completely. I slip under for a moment and I can’t tell if I’m awake or not until the realization of an impossible circumstance shoots me above sea level again, sometimes gasping for breath, sometimes smiling and just exhaling as deeply as possible so that I may slip underneath the waves quicker.

Tonight’s private myth: having a conversation and seeing what the person is saying float from their mouth in formal logic symbols, like snowflakes or autumns leaves, dancing and gliding gently in the air as they fell to the floor where I could examine them more easily, helping me to better understand what the person was saying. I used to dream this all the time when I was in school, it is one of my favorite dreams.

I suppose this morning I’ll watch the sun rise.

Many thanks to Kozy for reminding me that I love this song more than many many others.

Download: Piano Magic - Halloween Boat
Buy the Album: Piano Magic - A Trick of the Sea

Songs to Send Across the Ocean, Part Nine

I collect birds of folded paper to string together and staple to my wall, to hang out my window like Tibetan prayer flags, to hand out as penance, to tuck wishes into, because

I have been pulled so tense these last days, I am a violin string twisted too tight, struggling not to snap.

Bad things keep happening and I am smiling, I am telling myself that it’s not important, my eyes are on the prize, I am rising above.

It is hard.

If I can confess, really all I want is for things to slow down, to cocoon up in my robin’s egg blue soft bed ocean, my perfect life raft floating in the middle of this fucked up solitary sea. Sometimes I pretend I’m not alone, I imagine what it would be like to be held gently, my nerves like birds’ eggs, delicate like Mujika Easel’s voice on Awaawa (Window), beautiful, light, shining, but most importantly not alone.

But pretending doesn’t make it so,

So.

I collect my little paper birds, and hope.

PS–Tuesday was The Selector’s birthday. Thank you for being here.

Download: Taylor Deupree + Eisi - Cloud, Light, Water (Fall), Awaawa (Window)
Buy the Album: Taylor Deupree + Eisi - Every Still Day

Pushing my own boundaries — I am at home with drones & waves of swirly dissonance that might be offputting to some. Lately I have been tentatively downloading some tracks whose weirdness is along a different axis: fractured, manic, sowing discord. This mix fits some of these together with older gems that fit in well with them.

Enjoy the sparkles but watch for sharp edges as you dance…

Songs to Send Across the Ocean, Part Eight

Dear,

I have become obsessed by robin’s egg blue and

Cara Cara oranges, I eat them 2 or 3 at a time, peeling them is the best part–

unwrapping a sticky sweet gift that drips down my wrists and

stays under my fingernails

and also I have fallen for my new lip gloss,

wet-looking and smooth-feeling, no flavor but almost sparkly

and I spend time distracting myself by re-arranging my bed over and over again, battling a fortress of pillows and silken sheets and

trying to find how to make my space the softest most inviting space,

but mostly

I miss you and am sending you more Deerhoof songs, wrapped up in paper birds and ribbon and sealed with the medicine for what ails you.

Soon, so soon
!
xoj

Download: Deerhoof - Chatterboxes, This Magnificent Bird Will Rise, Apple Bomb
Buy the Album: Deerhoof - The Runners Four, Reveille, Apple O’

Blind Mori night after night, sings with me
Under the covers, like Mandarin ducks,
new intimate talk
making promises to be together
till the dawning of Maitreya’s salvation.
At the home of this old buddha all is spring.

A thousand strands
of glistening deep black hair
in tangles, tangles,
all intertangled
like my dreams of you.

Download: Birds Are Singing but My Lover Won’t Return
Buy the Album: Sublime Frequencies, Cambodian Cassette Archives

Submerged Series, Part Four (Deep, a Different Kind of Water)

photo by henri cartier-bresson, sent to me by sean for valentine’s day

I am a Lemonade Bandit, waiting with a sour sticky kiss for you.

You speak in paintings, you’re an angel-crowned Kidnapper.

We smash up against each other, everything gets toppled, everything is upside-down,

and when we come apart I am left with bruised, candy-apple lips.

Happy St. Valentine’s Day, I love you.

Download: Zeena Perkins & Ikue Mori - Blue Moon / Sonic Youth - Dirty Boots / Ryuichi Sakamoto - 20 msec
Buy the Album: Zeena Parkins & Ikue Mori - Phantom Orchard / Sonic Youth - Goo / Ryuichi Sakamoto - CHASM

Amelia Series, Part Two

Today was beautiful, and the sun was warm on my throat through car windows and I could see all the way down Denny to the water and the Olympics that rose above it.

All I wanted to do was hide.

I just didn’t want to be out in the world, I didn’t want to talk to anyone, I didn’t want anyone to touch me or see me.

I wanted to disappear.

When I got home I laid down on my bed and tried to make the hurt go away, hugging myself, crying silently with my eyes closed.

Then, all of a sudden, I felt Amelia rubbing her face against mine, licking my eyelids (ew!!! but also awwwww) and patting my cheek with her paw. She crawled up around my head and started grooming me, as weird as that is, purring and licking my hair (ewwww/awwwww).

It was just so silly that I melted into a fit of giggles. I grabbed my camphone and tried to snap a few pics to catch her in the act.

What a sweet, and completely ridiculous animal.

Download: Max Richter - Lines on a Page (One Hundred Violins), Max Richter - Shadow Journal
Buy the Album: Max Richter - MemoryHouse & The Blue Notebooks

Two of my most played songs of 2005.

Ooh, darling…

There are so many stories tied to so many songs. I hardly have time to write even a few of them.

This one is for November 26, 1994 and all that went with it.