ode to meds

look, a psychiatrist! oh yeah, seeing a psychiatrist pays off.

meds will give you solace
meds will give you strength
meds will fill the gap when you are kept at arm's length
meds will keep you sheltered
meds will keep you fed
meds will tuck you in when it's time to go to bed
there's no need to cry when it's time to go to bed
for meds will keep you steady
focused yet aloof
meds will never let your demons break out through the roof
lullabyes and battle songs
warm and pretty sweaters
books and tea and friends
dead wise old men of letters
whatsoever they can do, meds can do it better

dear mr. anderson

[open letter to ian anderson of jethro tull]

if you should ever read this letter i will be a bit embarrassed, but it will mean i got somewhere.
i love summer. quite a random and commonplace thought to share, but bear with me. the realm of summer is one of terrifying unhingement from routine that forces me into all manner of epiphanies. so it is that i have been overflowing with hopeful and ardent creativity lately. i've felt my brain expand into accepting the idea that i can come to read musical notes and wield the classical guitar to places uncharted.
i called my boyfriend the other day, to speak of my numberless new ideas, of how i want to write a song structured like a catholic psalm, of how i'd like to play with classical pieces even though jethro tull's done it before. he let out a chuckle that conveyed matter-of-fact amusemet at a recollection he seemed to take for granted. at your 2007 sibiu gig, he told me, you referred to those works as porno jazz. yay, funny. since i've made a vow to keep the levels of drama-queening and self-deprecation down for this blog, i'll just say at the time, by my own bloody hand, i was pining away penniless, pressed, and without serotonin, in the desolate arms of my life's very worst summer ever. and thus missed said gig. the memory, or lack thereof, since i wasn't there, hit me so hard i cried. especially as i realized that back then i wasn't even fully aware of your music's boundless gracefulness, complexity, effervescence... nah, bleedin' coolness best describes it, i believe.
so here i am, searching my musical soul and finding that if i had to choose one and only one musician in this world i'd want to be like, it would be you, mr. anderson.
please swear to me you will stay in shape, stick with the band and come back to romania so i can attend your gig, meet you and perform with you. [yeah, swear to me!]

thank you for your time.
your schizophrenic disciple,
leechu

academia blues

i've finally, finally, finally put together a number of songs i'll start recording soon, if that bitch self-love gives me some of that good ol' you-can-do-it. i might even make a self-released first record that will one day become a sought-after fan item - kitchenware instrumentation, hand painted cardboard sleeves, you know the drill. and for the heck of it, i've made a small folkish intro song to the bunch, called folktales.

which playfully disclaims the truth value of my songs in relation to my experience. whence i developed a theory. god, i miss school so much. i miss forcing myself to read a required minimum of literature and then teeming with ideas for essays i'll never write. i miss my theories. my kooky, rewarding, way-too-beautiful-to-be-disproved theories. my literary, linguistic, cultural revelations. i miss being radiant from the light of them. asking questions and giving answers in class. i kick and curse at the thought of you, but academia - we're not done, so sweetly not done. ok, that's not the theory.

theory: songwriting as the eventual printing of folktales - stories of past experience, orally transmitted from one former self to the next and thus altered inestimably before they're recorded. [woot, schizophrenia!]

no problem, you can write a song right in the middle of the life-changing hangover, fight, sex, epiphany, whatnot. but where i come from, that'll be a bad song.

i must show gratitude beyond my beloved words to mr. [not that] james brown the teacher, coolest foreign man ever to call romania home, for the course on english and scottish ballads that has:

• opened my eyes to folklore [of other countries and my own];
• narrowed down the meaning of folk;
  
• bettered my understanding of song;
• acquainted me with inspiring stories only rivalled by the bible and shakespeare;
• thus strengthened my belief in metaphor [and showed me the metaphoric potential of a narrative];
  
• expanded the horizons of my songwriting, creativity and intellect altogether;
• made sense [a rare commodity in undergrad education];
  
• been lots of fun.
  

hey, where was i when they were filling in those evaluation sheets?!

oh, academia...

three friends

i've come to realize my own idea of my musical, lyrical and vocal influences is somewhat distorted. sure, there are things i want to influence me because i think they're cool. and then there are those that just do. today i finished writing a song that, for the first time in a while, satisfies me in all the above respects. and have been reacquainted to these guys in the process:

the blues
once upon a jolly good time i wanted to be jack bruce. i used to feel the bluesiness propagate through my entire body like a warm quiver when i sang. then i got on my high horse of exquisite poetry and never again came up with a tune i'd wanna sing. i thought deep lyrics just didn't go with the blues. that's only correct to an extent that amounts to nothing in my pursuit of a voice all my own. and hell, look at jethro tull. no. look at jimi effin' hendrix.

the bible
i ain't no christian rocker chick. more like the catholic goody two-shoes turned porn star. but i ain't no crucifix defiling tori amos either. i just always find myself making analogies with the bible. if i do think it the book of books, it's because it has so many brilliant metaphors and parables. for me to use in songs. like such as go in peace [on saviours gone to pieces], blame it on the snake [my very own twist on genesis], rengashi [japanese for renga poets, which is a sort of brueghel's icarus to a landscape of jesus talk]. and somewhere in there, like duh, the absolutely irresistible pillar-of-salt thing. [i promise these songs exist.]

the buckley
i totally forgot. and that's what true influence is all about. it permeates your very artistic core and stays with you long after you've stopped obsessing about that particular songster. years after you last had them in your playlist at all. good lord, yes. today, those bluesy and theological vibes brought him back to me: jeff buckley, he whom i emulate unwittingly in my every croon and wail. the regina spektors and thom yorkes i added later are really just shadows on his water.

now seriously

i was shirking chores, doing what's truly important. giving birth. or rather midwifing, if i am to be more exact about the merits of my craft, this here piece of wisdom:

[...]
they're still playing on the sinking ship
*
and postmodernism once reared
its ugly head
and pounded art till art bled
and now they both lie dead
while their offspring, inbred
grows untended and unfed
[insert fitting adjective] like visions of an acid trip

deformed, i was going to say. or malformed. or ill-formed. or something to do with form gone bad, 'cause that's the downside to postmodernism and lacking in genetic diversity. but hey, i've never done acid. at twenty-two. sad but true. boo hoo hoo. so how do i know what i'm saying? what if it makes you see the most flawless ballerinas draped in lettuce riding art nouveau furniture come to life? but i wasn't about to drop the trip rhyme that had so kindly been sent to me from idealand [i know what i do or don't want to drop]. and i wasn't dropping acid either: weed - too meh, hard drugs - too nope.

so i thought, why not call friend x. who's done acid and ask them how it is. maybe i can find a word that both describes an inbred baby and an acid trip. which would be ideal and is possible. it's why i love words. they make bite-sized ideals possible. and then it dawned on me.

now seriously: i've had a revelation. and it may make some go "duh!", but that's what makes it a revelation. and one that has suddenly and prodigiously cured and cleansed my songwriting mind of sick questions like: "am i a snob?", "am i stuck up?", "am i following blindly where joanna newsom's taking it too far?", "is she taking it too far?", "will i get laughed at if i'm funny?", "am i belittling my music if i crack a joke?". it was getting to me, 'cause my lyrical persona had used to be quite the ham and at some point she became jerky. pun unexpected but intended nonetheless. by its own inner dynamics. it's why i love words.

said revelation in bold so i never forget:
i should never take mySELF too seriously, but always treat my WORK with uncompromisingly if ludicrously thorough seriousness. jamie will be proud. now i'm going to call that friend.

p.s.:
that's what i'm talking about, pink floyd. when you go naming your song "san [and not saint] tropez". that's what i'm saying, regina. when you go naming your song "bon [and not bonne] idée". and thinking you'll get away with it. 'cause it's so hard to look it, pardon my french, the hèque up.

and that's where my writing songs in japanese comes in. in the zone where dictionaries aren't any real help very often.

but no, seriously.