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Home of Michael Perry – Author, Humorist, Singer/Songwriter, Amateur Pig Farmer

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Michael Perry &
The Long Beds

Long Beds News

Long Beds Playing Tonight

Weather permitting (if there’s any doubt, Volume One will have an announcement on their site by 4:30 p.m.) us Long Beds will be playing at Phoenix Park tonight.  Can’t wait.  It’s always such fun.  This is part of the Sounds Like Summer Concert Series.  Be sure to come early and catch Cadence and our Amble Down Records label-mates Meridene (featuring a Hetzel!).

Afterward, we’ll be hauling our gear up the street to play an additional show at the MouseTrap Tavern. NOTE: MouseTrap listing originally had $5 cover, this event is actually FREE.

Thank you Organic Valley

Just in the door from the Kickapoo Country Fair, where I read in the Word Tent, and played a blistering hot (because of the sun, not my guitar-picking) set of music with the Long Beds.  Thank you, thank you to all who showed up.  Great fun and friendly folk at every turn.

An especially big organic thank you to Dane and the Organic Valley crew and volunteers.  The effort they put into this is prodigious, and we got to do the fun part.

And thanks to Charlene, who snapped and posted a couple of pics from the Word Tent.  And the Long Beds show.

Oh, and howdy to all the ladies on stilts…

Tiny Pilot Lyrics Added

Little while back I finally entered the lyrics for most of the songs on Tiny Pilot (excepting the hidden track available only on the CD version).  They’re here.  Of course the label master would want me to tell you that the poster/lyric sheet insert included with the actual CD also includes full-color photos of the recording session (including humorous captions) and little notes giving the background of each song.

Homeboy Harmonies

After I put up this post, a few folks asked about the harmonies on the title song from the Tiny Pilot album.  Most were supplied by Long Beds guitarist, keyboardist, and resident crooner extraordinaire Chris Ramey, who does not always croon.  As for the haunting vocals heard just behind the lines, “Tell me little mother’s son” and “Oh, this short, sharp life,” they were provided by friend, neighbor, and Long Beds guitarist emeritus Justin Vernon, who these days works on some side projects.

Listen: Tiny Pilot – Tiny Pilot

Between the Books and the Music

Sometimes people ask me if the books and the music are connected.  Sometimes, yep.  Amble Down Records compiled the following summary describing the connections from the Tiny Pilot album:

- The opening verse of “Edge of Town” is set on the highway overpasses described on pages 99-104 of Population 485: Meeting Your Neighbors One Siren at a Time (HarperPerennial).

- The album’s title song, “Tiny Pilot,” was written in memory of Perry’s nephew Jake, as described in Coop: A Year of Poultry, Pigs, and Parenting (released in paperback as Coop: A Family, A Farm, and the Pursuit of One Good Egg).

- “If They Give You Wings” is a song drawn directly from scenes in “Branding God,” the essay found on page 256 of Perry’s book, Off Main Street (HarperPerennial).  The song lyrics also include a Dylan Thomas sample.

- “Harry Was Right” (bonus song available on physical CD version of album only as track #14) is a song set in a real-life bar called The Joynt.  Perry’s readers will recognize the bar and its denizens from Chapter 13 of Truck: A Love Story (HarperPerennial) and may especially enjoy singing along with the bridge, which is a direct quote from the book: No…light…beer!

- Perry wrote the first verse of “Indiana” while driving from Michigan to Illinois on his Coop hardcover tour.  The song makes specific reference to “Seven A.M.,” the Edward Hopper painting that anchors Chapter 8 (beginning on p. 138) of Truck: A Love Story (HarperPerennial).

- The lyrics of “Cissy Moan” invoke Oxford, Mississippi (home of Square Books) and the writers Larry Brown, Barry Hannah, and William Faulkner.  The main character of the song is caught stealing books at “Lemuria” in reference to the actual bookstore in Jackson, Mississippi.

Printable .pdf here.

Tiny Pilot Songwriting Scrap

Came across a notebook page containing early notes toward the song “Tiny Pilot” from the album of the same name.

The lyrics as they were first scribbled out and marked up:

Tell me Tiny Pilot
about your short short stay
     thousand days
threads of thinning clouds
   flyin' around
thinnest thread of cloud
somewhere beneath the [thunder] of the diesel
                                & the smoke
                                is
                sound of the plow
                 rollin' the loam
oh this sharp short life
oh this thousand days
        shiny
oh that yellow airplane
fading over the curve
disappearing over the curve
of the earth

The final recorded lyrics after the jump (plus an explanation of the math):

(more…)

The Limits of Neil

Some of you have met Chris, the guitarist/keyboardist of the Long Beds.  He lays down the majority of our twang, despite the fact that his musical background is not so much country.  I attribute this to his general openness and omnivorous intellect.  Pretty much whatever y’got, he can play it or appreciate it.

Turns out he has his limits.  We were at a gathering of mutual friends discussing the joy of playing old vinyl records.  I started ticking through what I’ve been spinning on my grandma’s old console stereo recently: Waylon Jennings, Herb Alpert, Frank Sinatra, Charlie Rich, Neil Diamond…

At Herb Alpert his eyebrows bounced, but still he nodded along.  Until I mentioned Neil.  At which point his face screwed up like he just got a bad piece of brie.

I sang him a few heartfelt bars:

And the radio played like a carnival tune
As we lay in our bed in the other room

Peered deep into his eyes, now:

When we gave it away for the sake of a dream
In a penny arcade, if you know what I mean

Nothing.

Up a notch, and from the heart:

…If y’know what I mean, babe, if y’know what I mean.

Now he looked like someone hawked a loogie in his flan.

Imagine: Living life impervious to Neil…

Can you hear it, babe?

Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cheeseheads

It seems three lifetimes ago and in many ways it was, but once upon a time George House and I recorded some novelty songs in his basement.  I supplied the lyrics and ?lead? vocals, George supplied the band, backing vocals, and all sound effects.  Gotta say, this had all been long gone from my memory when I showed up to spend an hour live on air with George a month or so ago.  When he played some of those old tunes, I was flabbergasted.  He put them on a CD for me, so I figure over the next while I’ll leak a few out there.

Today I’m on the road, away from my home state, so I thought this would be a good place to start:

“Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cheeseheads”

Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cheeseheads

Thanks, George!