Iris Leu and I are working on some really "out of the box" new songs. She is a classical pianist and cellist and she expands our options times ten. Once we found a melody and some lyrics to work with, the first thing she said was "Can we please not do the strumming guitar thing ? I'm so sick of that " To which I replied "Are you kidding me ? I've been waiting for someone to come along who would make strumming guitars SO, like, been there done that."

(Yeah, I have this dopey urge to run smack like that these days.) Well, wait 'till you hear "Good Place To Start". It not only sounds like nothing I've ever written before, it doesn't sound like anything I've even thought before...and there's more where than came from.

The Speaking Only Mother Tongue CD continues on it's slow trudge from concept to reality. Too much music I hear these days sounds far too fussed with and overly labored . I'm not going that route. My studies of Kabbalah ( Jewish mysticism ) show how all things start with the organic and every thing eventually returns to it. The further things get away from the organic...the more mechanisms that control, alter and process it, the less transcendent it becomes. That's not anti-technology at all; it simply means that this music needs breath, space, earth, dirt, chokmah; not electronic phutzing and decorating. Of course, I wouldn't expect say...Metallica, to take the same approach. Actually, their superb new disc St. Anger does a low tech turn that works nicely. As Jimi Hendrix wrote "Castles made of sand fall in the sea eventually.." which, to me, infers that human hands build, while the organic is molded into that which is aesthetic, but temporary. Should you have interest in Kabbalah, let me recommend Kabbalah: The Way Of The Jewish Mystic by Perle Epstein. It's one of about ten books I have on the subject and it's the most concise. It also does the best job of explaining the history of this controversial and powerful discipline (and yeah, I know Kabbalah is Madonna's flavor of the month. So ?)

One more thing. I've listened to Alice In Chains MTV Unplugged every day this week. Am I the only one who really misses the late Layne Staley's marvelous voice and Jerry Cantrell's crisp songwriting? They reach me in a place that very few songwriters ever have...the same one Jim Morrison used to. Just wondering.

shalom alechiem

Misha

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Last Updated September 19, 2008