Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

I am aproximately ready for the morning; now I just need to a) get to sleep (which was planned for three hours ago) and b) wake up in time (I have to get from Baltimore to Gaithersburg way before gig time, to help set up the sound system). In the meantime, a curious earworm ...

I'm not sure how well this fits with what silmaril was saying earlier about how we imagine music, but it does have to do with the how my brain processes imagined/remembered music.

Most of the afternoon, I was hearing "Mis'ry And The Blues" by Charlie La Vere in my head. Now the only recording of it that I've ever heard, as far as I can remember, is the one by Jack Teagarden on his Mis'ry And The Blues album, but in my head I kept hearing it in Tom Waits' voice. Occasionally a bit of Cab Calloway or Satchmo would creep in, but it was mostly Tom Waits in my head. The thing is, Teagarden has a much prettier voice than Waits does, so why did my brain want to perform this substitution?

Actually, this is less strange than the complaint recently on That Mailing List from someone who had, stuck in his head, a William Shatner version of a song that Shatner had never actually recorded (and that was apparently contagious via email, 'cause someone else later echoed that complaint with a different song).[*] Though Waits' voice isn't as nice as Teagarden's, there's a certain emotional power to that growl, and the song has enough weary despair to it to fit on a Tom Waits album. And the melody sounds very Waits-like to me. (I don't know whether Waits was influenced by La Vere, or both were influenced by the same even earlier artists. I know which way I'd bet if I had to guess, but without a bit more education it's just a guess.) So at least there's some sense to what my imagination snuck in on me. And no, I'm not going to try to imagine Shatner doing this song.

But now I wonder whether Waits has ever covered this song.

And now to try to get four hours of sleep. Hope I manage to nap between the two concerts.

[*] The original complaint was prefaced with a Thomas Dolby quote:

"Memories of things That never happened
These are always
The hardest to forget."

"you know, penis size is to flirtation as hitler is to flamewars: once a guy says 'i have a big dick,' the honeymoon is over." -- merde, 1997-09-20

Okay, I can think of a handful of people on my friends list who really need to seee the Ringflute (a circular flute, simple-system, seven holes), so I'm not waiting until I have time to assemble a link-sausage entry to share this link.

Running late, but will be out the door shortly. Did not get enough sleep.