Musical Monday: Lost to the Wind.

Another of my more poetic pieces. I remember writing parts of this while waiting for piano lessons to start.

» Lost to the Wind

duration: 3:41
file size: 3.38 MB
written: 1995
recorded: 1995
instrument: Casio keyboard
recording medium: cassette tape
album art: Brain Food
lyrics:

Watch the wind a-blow outside
Branches waving helplessly
Arms open wide
Leaves torn from their roots
In a spectral shadow dance
Reaching out
Grasping for just one more chance

CHORUS:
Can't you feel the winds of change
And the questions that they bring?
In the unseen future
Is the past worth anything?
Patience, my friend
Her time is all but spent
And when it all blows over
Will she ever be the same again?
(When it) all blows over
Will she ever be the same again?

Feel the tears well up inside
Never should have felt this way
She cried and she cried
Two lives break apart
And are both lost to the wind
Float away
Never more to touch again

CHORUS

Turn away and leave my side
Leave me standing helplessly
Arms open wide
Turn away forever
In a spectral shadow dance
Leave me here
Grasping for just one more chance

CHORUS

Turn away and leave my side
Leave me standing helplessly
Arms open wide

Musical Monday Archive

A new "Buggy"! Kind of.

My comic, Buggy, gets an update today! It's not a new strip (sorry) but it's still really cute! I promise.

Birthday haul: the breakdown.

So here's the list of my birthday gifts for this year, and who gave what:

Anita: Ninja Burger (game)

Grandpa & Grandma Hawks: money spent on books: Star Wars: Jedi Shadow by Kevin J. Anderson, Shadow of the Giant by Orson Scott Card, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke, King's Dragon and The Burning Stone by Kate Elliott

Lane & Sarah: Taluva (game), The X-Files theme on vinyl record

Matt Armstead: Lucca Città (game), Transformers 2-disc DVD with Best Buy exclusive Robot Heroes figures

Matt & Becca: card table

Sam: Cheesecake Factory giftcard

Sarah & kids: The Else (CD) by They Might Be Giants, The Tick 2nd season DVD set

Tara: Scrubs 6th season DVD set (forthcoming)

Musical Monday: Just What.

A very old song, from the very beginning of high school. This is from back when I would sit down at night with my keyboard and headphones and crank out a completed song...or two. It takes me around 6 months to finish a song now, but the difference in quality is noticeable. I still miss those days, though.

» Just What

duration: 1:30
file size: 1.37 MB
written: 1993
recorded: 1995
instrument: keyboard
recording medium: cassette tape
album art: The Second Coming
lyrics:

We seem to tread on shaky ground
You say you don't want me around
But what am I supposed to do
When I fell so in love with you?

Is your condition so absurd
That you don't want to hear my words?
What am I supposed to say?
My love for you won't go away

Wait a minute, this ain't right
You say you want me from your sight
What else would you want to see?
I thought the one you loved was me

Something's wrong, this can't be true
You tell me not to talk to you
What else would you want to hear
Than words from him who holds you dear?

We seem to tread on shaky ground
Now you don't want me hanging 'round
What am I supposed to do
When I fell so in love with you?

And what exactly would I do
If you loved me like I love you?

Musical Monday Archive

29.

Happy birthday to me!

Thanks to Elizabeth, I already know what I'm getting as presents. (Having a 3-year-old is fun.) The party'll be Saturday, a joint celebration with Matt Armstead. Presents and friends and Fuddrucker's and games. Y'know, the usual.

Sarah's making me a steak dinner tonight. (Yum!) Grandpa and Grandma Hawks sent me some birthday money, some of which is already earmarked for the 4th and 5th Malazan Empire paperbacks. (Thanks, Grandpa and Grandma!)

I'm sure I'll have more to report later.

Some fun games.

A while ago, I added Militant Platypus games to my links section, but now I'm taking it one step further: I'm collecting links to all of my favorite MP games right here. This is mostly so that I can find my favorite games easily, but also so other people can discover (what I think are) some of the best games from that site. And here they are:

Musical Monday: Someday You'll Know What I Mean

To make up for missing last week's update, here's one of my longest recorded songs. (I would've said longest, but I actually checked, and apparently Seem beats it out by half a minute.)

» Someday You'll Know What I Mean

duration: 5:45
file size: 5.26 MB
written: 1996
recorded: 2003
instrument: piano
recording medium: computer
lyrics:

I thought we could be
Forever and ever, you see
But fate has the final say
And time can't delay destiny

CHORUS:
When you give your heart away
There's always a price to pay
Love ain't all it seems
Someday you'll know what I mean

I thought we could stay
Together, no matter what they'd say
But I didn't anticipate
Yesterday, until it was too late

CHORUS

I thought from the start
The two of us were never meant to part
And now I can only start
Gathering up what's left of my broken heart

CHORUS (x2)

Someday you'll know what I mean

Musical Monday Archive

The final product better be THIS good.

So they're working on the script for the 2nd Transformers movie, right? Apparently, a rejected draft was leaked earlier this month.

Read it here!

I loved it. I mean, I got goosebumps at more than one point, and it's just a rough draft!

But I do see why it may have been rejected:

1. Too many robots. The battling armies of Autobots and Decepticons envisioned would look amazing. No question. But I think it's probably just way too many to realistically handle, as far as constructing and rendering the CGI models. With computer animation, characters that show up in the background for just a scene or two still take an awful lot of work, and...well, when you read the script, you'll know what I mean.
   
2. What a downer. This script does not end happily. It's quite obviously geared to lead into the 3rd film -- which is fine. But it's very Empire Strikes Back because of it. The whole "all hope is lost, whatever will they do -- stay tuned for part 3!" angle really makes this film somewhat of a downer. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, I think (and probably every hardcore TF fan out there thinks) this movie would be absolutely amazing. However, the bleakness of this film might be too much, too soon -- especially after how comedic the first movie turned out to be.

Whatever happens, I just hope the real TF2 turns out to be half as good as this draft appeared to be.

Musical Monday: Say the Word.

I recorded about half of my third album at a friend's house my sophomore year of high school (The rest went unrecorded.) Everything was done in pretty much a single take, and as I don't consider myself to be much of a performer, a lot of the recordings, though quite clean and 'crisp', were fairly subpar, performance-wise, with a number of missed chords and flat vocals. Still, there are a lot of good songs from that session that I'd have a hard time reproducing now (due to a lack of notating my early music.)

Here's a song about loving someone who's not returing the feeling. Like a lot of my music, the emotions are exaggerated for dramatic effect -- the real-life basis for this song is a crush I had. I'm not sure who the "she" referred to in the chorus is, but I always thought it sounded good.

» Say the Word

duration: 3:39
file size: 3.35 MB
written: 1994
recorded: 1995
instrument: piano
recording medium: cassette tape
album: Kiss That Baby Goodbye!!!
lyrics:

I love you too much
To let you slip through my hands
To slip through my fingers
Like just so much sand
And why you persist on leaving
I just don't understand

CHORUS:
She thought we could do it
Do you think we can?
You're just a woman
And I'm just a man
And is love a game?
I'm not sure that I quite understand

I love you too much
To let you just walk away
To turn your back on me
For even a day
I don't know why I do
I just know I feel this way

CHORUS

Do I mean as much to you
As you mean to me?
My heart cries out to you
Can't you see?
If you'd just say the word
Then lovers we'd be
You could be the best thing
That's ever happened to me

CHORUS

Musical Monday Archive