This recording is lightly mixed and unmastered.
This song began before two strangers. The entire class was struck by Ruby’s performance during the second week of classes. Andrea was urging us all to work together and step outside the premeditated solo acts and begin incorporating the classwork, texts and classmates into our performances.
The Moldy Peaches are an interesting bunch for a topic divergence. A bit of sass and spit mixed with pop melodies and Kimya Dawson. An Olympia native, she has recently been performing around the U.S with Aesop Rock in a folk/hip-hop trio. The sound that they capture; a cocktail of New York style edge and PNW overcast days is exactly what I had envisioned for a collaboration with Ruby’s powerful and dynamic vocals. Her sound contrasts perfectly with the repetitive and accessible nature of the Ukelele.
I approached her after her performance to gather a sense of which pages of life’s book we were on. Of course she knew Kimya, of course she knew Aesop. It was easy. Somewhere soon after she sent me Sea of Love by Cat Power which is a cover of the 1959 hit by Phil Phillips. It was enough to draw my inspiration and begin a process of selecting a few poems from our class text Burning Cities. She said she covered this song well but I needed a sense first hand. Technology is a beautiful evil. Ruby sent me a video of her playing the song and I began plugging away at drums, ideas and lyrics. Never enough, never enough.
On our first meeting we were both pretty nervous as most are with these sorts of things. It really only took one run through. We had it almost perfectly. I ran through the tempo with Ruby and settled in so that the beat and Ukelele always synced up as she played. For this project I used Ableton Live to program and perform the piece. The drums that I used came from a personal collection of drum samples and sound samples. There was nothing else to program forward, only words and structure to compose. I threw out what I had written to start anew.
This text is a direct link to a video of our in class performance.
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Lyrics:
Come with me my love to the sea, sea of love
I wanna tell you how much I love you
(00:25s)
Do you remember when we met
that’s the day I knew you were my pet
I wanna tell you how much I love you
( 00:50s)
Everywhere I go I try to keep this cadence
I embrace your hands that unravel the days
It’s true I grew up in the midst of an ocean
that don’t mean I choose to battle the waves
The sea a never ending vast reflection
of watching the present moment as it turns to stone
and Our feet meet shore pulling us aptly apart
Water cascading as the sea slowly erodes
Really I wanna tell you how much I love you
The southern ocean bent inbetween two trees
Separate my self from the sand and the shore
Core masts in the sails of the wind as we leave
The boats move away like your hands yellow flickering
Megaphone bellows salutes to the city
Remembering, but did you forget
to remember when we met
Now I know the night did its duty
(01:40s)
Come with me my love to the sea, sea of love
[I wanna tell you how much I love you]
[Everywhere I go I try to keep this cadence
I embrace your hands that unravel the days
It’s true I grew up in the midst of an ocean
that don’t mean I choose to battle the waves]
The sea a never ending vast reflection
of watching the present moment as it turns to stone
and Our feet meet shore pulling us aptly apart
Water cascading as the sea slowly erodes]
[I wanna tell you how much I love you]