Song of the Morning: Psychedlics, Samples and James Bond

I know. I've been overly negligent in not writing so long. I wish I could say I had a good reason like finding the love of my life or even a bad reason like being at work. Instead, I have to settle for just not feeling up to it, as though my creative sap has dried up all of a sudden.

It hasn't just yet. As much as I love the winter (my favorite season), it needs some getting used to, and this is but the middle of autumn. So I'll trudge on with a few more bouts of dizzy spells and that'll be that, I expect.

This period has allowed me to be finally exposed to some good music from a few years back and some more recent work. Most seem to follow the trend of deconstruction, of moving away from the more traditional song writing styles into a more chaotic structure. Some, like The Avalanches, build on samples and the joining of bits and pieces into creating a new and sometimes strange or wonderful whole. Others, like Black Moth Super Rainbow, seem to build from the ground up, except that the ground is sometimes up or inverted or in some Alice in Wonderland styled caterpillar world that somehow meets a vision of a weed-clutching/acid-dropping San Francisco of the early 70' (that's what I got, and I don't do drugs).

And yet, the song that is haunting my mind these days is entirely simple in form and lyrics. I can't really explain why Shirley Bassey's "Diamonds are Forever" won't leave me be (those closing lines might have something to do with it). Maybe I need something as simple and clear as that song every now and again - the messages is clear, the lyrics are simple and logical and the melody is very catchy. Mostly, it had the good fortune to be sung by the powerful voice of Ms. Bassey - it has no choice but to be hurtled on over to the listener, so fitting in the traditional James Bond world settings.

As odd as it may seem though, wisdom can be found even in James Bond songs. Take "You Only Live Twice" (lyrics) for example (what a great title!). Again, in simple, perhaps a little corny but direct lyrics and presentation (Nancy Sinatra), you get the all too important place of love in your life as well as the rather lucid view that your dreams are also important, perhaps as important as the dull day to day existence sometimes mislabeled as 'life'. So, when you meet that strange dream, that risk called love, hold on to it. Who wants to wake up?

Black Moth Super Rainbow - Happy Melted City (from Drippers)

Black Moth Super Rainbow picture from their Last.fm profile.