From: owner-shindell-list-digest@smoe.org (shindell-list-digest) To: shindell-list-digest@smoe.org Subject: shindell-list-digest V10 #52 Reply-To: shindell-list@smoe.org Sender: owner-shindell-list-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-shindell-list-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk shindell-list-digest Wednesday, March 25 2009 Volume 10 : Number 052 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [RS] Clara the Mule ["MICHAEL MARMER LINDA MARMER" ] [RS] Gethsemani Goodbye [Lisanne ] Re: [RS] Gethsemani Goodbye [Janet Cinelli ] Re: [RS] Not Far Now [Chris Foxwell ] [RS] Gethsemani Goodbye [G Evans ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 24 Mar 2009 10:51:18 -0400 From: "MICHAEL MARMER LINDA MARMER" Subject: [RS] Clara the Mule Someone wanted to know the meaning in the song about Clara the Mule, as I do not have that email anymore, but I think they did not care for the song overall. I might be wrong. What is the song about? Why a mule of course and nothing more to it. Mules are stubborn, as the famous saying goes, "Stubborn as a Mule" as Clara is giving the person in the song a hard time by not going in the direction that the person what's Clara to go. Mules at one time in America and in other countries, as I know this list is worldwide, where the backbone of transportation, farming and industry. Mules pulled many canal boats in the US and elsewhere. So why did Richard write a song about a mule, since they are no longer used in our world. It is possible that in Argentina where he lives they are still used in farming and other areas of that country. And yes, there is the saying that "all roads lead to Rome" as the way Clara is going and the way the person wants her to go, they will eventually get to the actually point of a destination. Mike Marmer Germantown, MD ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 24 Mar 2009 11:35:46 -0400 From: Lisanne Subject: [RS] Gethsemani Goodbye > I so totally agree with your assessment of Gethsemani Goodbye! I have driven > my daughters crazy, listening to it over and over again. I, too, love the > way RS' voice goes from high to low, and the gentleness and warmth of it. > And that guitar just sings! It blows me away. The way it echoes his voice > inflections... I was surprised no one else mentioned the song on the post. > > I also have spent some time trying to figure out what he's saying. Mostly, > to me, it seems to be more about his own regret. But, of course, there are > usually layers of meaning in RS' music. > > Bottom line: I am not doing it justice here (I am usually very articulate, > but it's 5 am,) but I am also so viscerally moved by this song, I can't stop > listening to it. It is so beautiful, it almost makes me cry. I might > compare it to "Wisteria," which is one of my all-time favorite RS songs, and > which I usually yell out to him when I see him playing live. Just wanted to > let you all know. > > Best, > Lisanne > > > > Lisanne Elkins-Hahn, LMT > Balance Bodywork > 914.319.4375 > Balancebodywork.biz http://www.balancebodywork.biz/ ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 24 Mar 2009 10:03:59 -0700 (PDT) From: Janet Cinelli Subject: Re: [RS] Gethsemani Goodbye I too like this song and to me it sounds like a straight-up apology to the person who wanted to go on this trip. Because of the narrator's impatience, anger, stubborness,(couldn't he just ask for directions??) they don't get to go. I think I wrote about this song in an earlier post. I like the play on words about having gone too far. I'd like to comment on Richard covering Dave Carter's song, The Mountain. At first, I was so-so about it but now I love it. I especially like the piano bits that come in from time to time. It reminds me of Dave. Janet - --- On Tue, 3/24/09, Lisanne wrote: > > I also have spent some time trying to figure out what > he's saying. Mostly, > > to me, it seems to be more about his own regret. But, > of course, there are > > usually layers of meaning in RS' music. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 24 Mar 2009 19:25:14 +0200 From: Chris Foxwell Subject: Re: [RS] Not Far Now On Sat, Mar 21, 2009 at 11:43 PM, John McDonnell wrote: > I did have one gripe: "Get Up Clara." What is going on in this song? I > find it irritating. Its some kind of itinerant Roman doing what? Is there > nothing more than an elaborate play on Roam/Rome? > > Hey John, hope everything is better for you lately. In replying to your question of just wtf is going on with "Get Up Clara," I'm going to reach back a year or so ago (almost exactly: March 5th, '08) to a post I made, describing a recent WUMB interview with Richard. I've copied the bulk of that post here. It directly addresses your question, though naturally without really answering anything. I've placed in bold print one especially relevant sentence in the last paragraph. - ---------------------------------------------- Most of Richard's comments were directed towards the narrative component of his songwriting, and his tendency to want to have everything "mean" something, have a point, or multiple potential points. He said that he is a little weary of writing "beat-you-over-the-head" narratives, that progress from A to B to C, etc. Ditto for writing songs that have distinct "points," be they obvious or subtle/symbolic. He said that "after all these years," he has come to the conclusion that if you have a good melody and a solid chord progression, it doesn't matter in the *least*--emphasis his--what the lyrics are, or what the song is about. Kind of a radical comment, to my ears at least, from an artist whose songwriting and storytelling are among the tightest and most finely-tuned in the business. Richard then went on to comment on how difficult it is for him to write "pointless" songs, tunes that are descriptive instead of narrative, and how his brain always tries, relentlessly, to find the overall point(s): what the last lyric means, how it logically constructs the following lyric, and why it should do so. He is in a mindset nowadays where he appreciates songs that are descriptive rather than narrative, that paint beautiful pictures rather than (necessarily) telling beautiful stories. He and Dave then discussed Bill Staines and Michael Stipe in this vein. The latter was especially interesting to me; Richard said that fifteen years ago he hated Michael Stipe's songwriting, because it just didn't make sense to him, *there was often no "point" within the songs, but that now he is coming to appreciate them more and more, and perhaps pursuing a similar style in his current songwriting*. Dave then went on to compare this to Jackson Pollock, suggesting that there is a similar appreciation there, where people can love Pollock's work while being totally mystified about its overall point. Richard bowed out of that discussion, though, claiming not to be a visual person in that way and having little to contribute. - ---------------------------------------------- So, I guess Clara might simply be a case of the cigar just being a cigar: just a cool little story about a Roman, his mule, and those scary Roman backwoods territories. There might not be much more to get from it...conditioned though we are to look for more! Chris - -- "We were born in a dark age out of due time (for us). But there is this comfort: otherwise we should not know, or so much love, what we do love. I imagine the fish out of water is the only fish to have an inkling of water." - --J.R.R. Tolkien ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 24 Mar 2009 20:26:04 +0000 (GMT) From: G Evans Subject: [RS] Gethsemani Goodbye Chris said (re Gethsemani Goodbye) "I may be predisposed to react thusly to those intervals, by an earlier association; those *exact *intervals appear in another song I know, and produced--or evoked in time--a similar reaction in me. I have no idea which song this is, or by whom, or even in what genre; I just know that there is one" I haven't heard the album yet (still waiting for the UK embargo to be lifted! Fish Records will be mailing them out later this week) However the one verse clip I've listened to on the Fish website puts me in mind of Peter Gabriel for some reason. Have another listen to 'Mercy Street', Chris. I'm not saying the songs are particularly similar...far from it. But for me the melodic construction and mood on Gethsemani is very 'Gabrielesque'...maybe it's another of his songs I'm thinking of ("Don't Give Up" ?) Talking of Peter Gabriel...possibly my favourite song of his (Father, Son) would be ideal fodder for a Shindell cover...if anyone doesn't know this one head on over to iTunes for a quick listen. Well worth 99c (or 79p) of anyone's money! :-) Gerry ------------------------------ End of shindell-list-digest V10 #52 ***********************************