CIRCMIX1
It turns out I liked the mix I did yesterday, after all. This song has a long back story to it. Lemme see if I can put it as succinctly as possible.
This song is the next song in the album about possession; I'm singing from my own point of view and introducing myself as a character. Last week, Timmy and Bobby sang about liking Willie Nelson - this week, I'm singing about liking Linkin Park. Like, my discovery of Linkin Park made music feel whole for me - like, wow, I finally found a band that really does it for me, that makes music extra-special meaningful for me. (That's a true story).
But there's another part of this narrative that blows my mind. See, I've been working on the idear of healing my ancestral traumas through my art. There was this thing that happened last week: See, when I was a kid, I had this mental representation of a particular family from a long time ago. It was just this random image of a family singing around a fire that would pop into my mind, from time to time. It occurred to me last week that maybe that mental picture was was actually my ancestors from a long long, longggggg time ago. As in, these people're indigenous people from Europe - people from the time before Rome came along and did a bunch of conquering.
So, one night, I asked one o' those ancestors to bring me a song in my dreams, but only if she thought it was a good idear. I'd gotten the idear from dialogues with my unconscious that "I need to sing with my ancestors" in order to heal all those ancestal traumas. So, I figured, hey, let's have them send me a song, and I'll record it. But, again, I told my ancestor to bring a song, only if it was a good idear, in her view. Then I went to sleep, and when I woke up at 4:30am on Wednesday morning the hook of this song was going through my head!!! The dream was of these older women, singing it around a circle of fire on the ground. Yeah, it really blew my mind.
So, I made it into a little ditty about my ancestors encouraging me to listen to Linkin Park, because ancestors - who I'd imagine would have my best interests at heart - would want me to listen to music that's good for me. Linkin Park is good for me.
Carl Jung worked a lot with the image of a circle. He said it was an archetype in the psyche that represents the Self, which is the whole of your being. The self could also be your soul and God and stuff, too. So, a dream about a circle would, according to Jung, be a dream about the Self - or myself - possibly at the soul level. Jung might even say it was a significant dream because of that (but he ain't around for me to ask, so I don't know for sure).
On a side-note, Jung might actually be an ancestor of mine because some of my family was named Jung, back in the day.
I sampled myself playin' banjo in this song. I haven't used that banjo in years. But I figured a banjo would go with the blue-grass-y sound of this song, and all that. And then, as an added bonus, I can tell people I recorded a song about Linkin Park that has a banjo in it. Everyone will think I'm cool because I recorded a song about Linkin Park with a banjo in it.
Oh yeah, the first rap part in the very beginning consists of me apologizing to a song I wrote in the past that sounded a lot like an earlier version of this song. But then I changed the melody and it no longer sounded like that song. But I left the rap part in ,anyway, cuz the idear of that song being a death song and then this Second Song also being a death song was kinda nifty.
The lyrics are:
Fuck, now I must apologizeTo the song I wrote when I was wise
It's a song that did come for my last breath
Now this second song is also for my death
Nobody else made a circle for me:
A circle, a circle, circle, circle
I am Becky, and I'm pesky
I like drinking and songs-singing
From a Park whose name is Linkin
And I'm really scared
Music was all long and boring
Smoking bongs, and I was snoring
Linkin Park, like rain, came pouring
Stuff that made me care
Nobody else made a circle for me:
A circle, a circle, circle, circle
This culture made us dumb and stupid
Ancestors have come like Cupid
Shooting Linkin Park into my soul
They said that it is time to listen
To songs that shine like things that glisten
Like a circle, it will make you whole
A circle of fire is round like a tire
A circle, a circle, circle, circle
Nobody else made a circle for me:
A circle, a circle, circle, circle
A circle is a thing that will make me whole
It's a tree, with singing rings, and it's nature's soul
What are my ancestors talking 'bout? I'm not sure
It's a circle, for sure, but I feel like a turd
There's a stinging in my heart, it is off the map
I am singing in the dark, and I feel like crap
And I'm thinking Linkin Park, they will make me clap
They'll come singing, like a lark, and my feet will tap
Nobody else made a circle for me:
A circle, a circle, circle, circle
Here's another player thingy, in case the one above doesn't work on your portable electronic devices (the one above works good on my phone, but not on my iPad or computer, and this one works good on my iPad and computer).
Addendum: Here's another mix of the song with both of the player thingies. The vocals are just a wee bit higher in this mix.
CIRCMIX2
Here’s another addendum - I wrote this on Facebook when I posted a link to this song, but I realized I wanted to put it here, as well, because Facebook ain’t always the best, in terms of keeping stuff for posterity.
In case you missed this here little ditty: I got the message from my unconscious: “You must sing with your ancestors.” That night, I had a dream, in which those ancestors sang this song. I guess I cain’t take credit for writing this song cuz my ancestors brought it to me.
But, then again, I cain’t take credit for writing any of my songs cuz the songs, themselves, are their own selves. They’re just bein’ nice to me by coming to me and saying, “You can record me.”
In any event, there’s a weirdness to this time period we’re living in. There’s a weirdness during these covid and ecological collapse-y times, in which living as a member of this species is changing on a qualitative level. I feel that weirdness when my ancestors show up and say, “You gotta sing this song.” What I mean by that is, it feels as if there’s some urgency in that statement.
I dunno if other people’re feeling this. Are other people feeling this - the feeling that it’s a time to heal a bunch of ancestral trauma? That some freaky-ass transition is happening to our species that makes it extra-special-important for us to rectify things? I’m having trouble trying to figure out how to put all this into words.
And maybe it’s just me bein’ weird.
But, in any event, I don’t think it’ll do any harm for me to record a song that came in a dream in order to heal some ancestral trauma. The worst thing that could happen is: my ancestors sit there shaking their heads, while I fumble around with rapping and banjo music.
