TWIST: SONG BY SONG

A few people have been asking me where some of these songs came from so I thought I’d write it down. If not only to satisfy anyone else’s curiosity, but also to satisfy my own. I had no pre-planned ideas when I started this collection of songs that eventually became TWIST. It was definitely, always an evolving work in progress. I’m so proud of it, there’s nothing I’d rather write about than this rag-tag bunch of beautiful songs. So in chronological order, here goes……

"Heart and Bone"
I live part of the year in Cork, Ireland and the rest of the time I call the Southern California desert my home. Both are amazing
places. Yet, even with all their beauty and inherent inspiration, I occasionally find myself floundering in a deep, pool of writer’s
block. Now, I find that it is usually broken by the most innocent and unexpected occurrences. This was no exception.

For years I’ve worn the same two, silver charms around my neck…a bone and a heart. Two years ago I was making my regular run across the pond, and on the way, I stopped in Ohio to visit my friend Marti Jones and her excellent husband, Mr. Don Dixon, enroute to Europe. When I finally arrived in Ireland , jetlagged and sleep deprived, I snapped a cell phone picture of my necklace charms and sent them to her to let them know I had arrived safely in my Irish home. She texted back, “Hey! Heart and Bone would be a good song title.” Hmmmmmmm…..

The NEXT DAY, I drug myself over to my studio I call ‘the piggery’. Well, because it used to be a piggery. An actual PIGGERY.
Hence..the name. Anyway, I picked up my guitar and basically wrote “Heart And Bone” right then. Took me like two days. Felt good.

Now, a little background…Marti who is an EXCELLENT musician, has in the past few years, returned to her original passion which is painting. She always was an amazing visual artist, but was “sidetracked” by record deals and ‘Hollywood music-world’ because (drat!) because she happened to have the voice of a fucking angel. Not a bad problem to have, but it took her down a twisty path that veered away from her love of painting. Only for a while though, and now she’s thoroughly back at it. Thank God she sings. Thank God she paints. I’m obviously a fan.

The funny thing about “Heart And Bone” is that, while I was writing and recording it, unbeknownst to me, my husband had arranged for her to do a painting of me for my birthday. (Never mind the fact that the quote/unquote “portrait of ME” had a looming image of my husband included in it…but that’s another story). The cool part is, at the same time I was writing the second verse, “I feel like a Van Gogh sky…Thick and blue, deep and dry”, she was doing the painting. I put it off to magic. And good luck. It’s things like this that makes writing songs an adventure. Just can’t beat stuff like that.

Plus, I got to make my point about how I’m just not too sure about the saying, “It’s better to have love and lost, than never to have loved at all”. I mean, of COURSE it is, but then again it hurts so much to lose love, maybe it’s better to not have it in the first place. I don’t know. It’s like my theory on “Have your cake and eat it too”. That saying just never made sense to me. Oh, but that’s another story.

Suffice it to say, “Heart And Bone” definitely broke the dam of imagination, illuminating my twisty path for this new record. Good things seem to come when you LEAST suspect it.

“Fly Julie”

And then came “FLY JULIE”. I think of it as a tone poem. It has all my typical ‘star/moon/sun’ lyrics, and it’s definitely NOT a complex story, but I love it for it’s mood. Open and dreamy. Julie is someone you would do anything for. No matter what. Whatever path they chose to travel. However long it takes. You will love them until the day you die. This song set my head in gear for the rest of the batch. I decided every song would be from a very feminine perspective. About girls. Real or imagined. Honest as possible. Straight from the heart. As they say, “write what you know”.

“About A Girl”

Next, I received a beautiful, poppy melody from my pal Don Dixon. I loved it. Turns out it was a collaboration between he and his lovely wife, Marti. Now, people sometimes ask me to explain exactly HOW someone writes a song. I always explain that, for me, it’s different every time. Sometimes the words come first. Sometimes the melody. Sometimes they come at the same time. Sometimes I sit with a co-writer. Sometimes you do it by “mail”. It is always different for each song. There is ONE thing, however, that seems to happen with EVERY song. For me, it’s NOT divine intervention with angels whispering down from the heavens.

No, for me, it’s more like INSANITY. I call it ‘roothogging’. Like a hamster running on a wheel in her cage. Nuts. Over and over I play the chords. Until I can do it in my sleep. In this case, I added a little musical snippet myself and wrote the words for “About A Girl”. I thought this was appropriate, since I’d just decided that this whole record would be about girls. In fact, I decided to DRILL the obvious home, and see how many times I could actually SAY the word “girl” in 3 minutes without puking. I LOVE this song. It almost seems like it was picked from a tree. Like it was a big, red apple.

“The Lady’s Daughter”

“The Lady’s Daughter” is a song I’ve always wanted to write. When I was a kid, my Grandmother Effie, would take me to the park for a ride on the swings. She would sing an Irish nursery rhyme as she pushed. ‘Saw a bucket of water for the lady’s daughter, give her a ring and a silver pin and let the old lady go under’. At that point she’d run all the way under the swing pushing me higher and faster and I’d swear I was flying. I love that memory and never forgot the song. While I was writing for “Twist”, I got the idea of writing a song about her, and incorporating her ditty into it somehow. While I was writing it, her daughter (my Aunt Marilee) passed away. She was also always an inspiration to me. Sweet and wild and so beautiful, she taught me wonderful things like the proper way to make a left-over Thanksgiving turkey sandwich (WITH the stuffing and cranberry sauce). She also taught me the importance of saying “fill it up” 3 times under a full moon to receive good luck and money. And, of course, how to make a perfectly dry, vodka , martini. Yup..ALL the important stuff. The song somehow ‘morphed’ into being about Aunt Marilee AND Grandma Effie, which made sense since in reality, Marilee IS the lady’s daughter. I love them both. I think of them often. And “The Lady’s Daughter” is definitely written for those two beautiful women in my life.

“Monkey With A Flashlight”

Next song to hit my brain was “Monkey With A Flashlight”. I was just experimenting with different sounds and loops and having fun with this one. I wanted it to musically reflect the absolute joy of the feeling you get when you’re head-over-heels in love with someone. That feeling that is SO strong and compelling YOU SWEAR the other person must feel it as well. In fact, you think can practically SEE it it’s so strong. Thick, magnetic energy. Undeniable and absolutely consuming. I love getting lost in that.

“The Beautiful Child”

“The Beautiful Child” is also written specifically about a certain girl. I don’t have any children, and in keeping with the all girl
theme, I had the idea of trying to write a song about ‘the daughter I never had’. I started out with that idea in mind, but it proved too hard to imagine and it ended up being about a friend’s daughter. I’ve known this sweet girl since she was 6. She’s one of my favorite little chicks on the planet. Completely interesting and totally unique. I’ve watched her bob and weave as she’s struggled to grow up in a world that doesn’t really understand her distinct personality and point of view. Her parents are awesome and have given her the tools to deal with this crazy life. I found, by the end of the song, in trying to see life through her eyes, I was very much like her. I guess I do my own form of ‘bobbing and weaving’ and navigating through this nutty life. We live and die for love.

“That’s All”

“That’s All” is a fun little tune. Pretty obvious, but I am just attempting to underline the wonderful fact that not all women want someone who will drape them in money and jewels. All you need is love.

“The Speaks”

“The Speaks” is not necessarily about a girl. In fact, it’s about 3 boys. They are brothers and their last name is Speaks. All of them are, shall we say, peculiar. But isn’t everyone? My mother has a wonderful philosophy about how we should always attempt to ‘walk in other people’s shoes’. Don’t judge people too quickly. Accept them for what they are even if it doesn’t fit in with your idea of “normal”. Maybe even ESPECIALLY if it doesn’t fit in with your idea of “normal”. Anyway, doesn’t everybody have some quirky friends, that if you just open your mind to them and look at them with a little humor and love, they become more UNquirky? I certainly do. And this song could be a little auto biographical too. I am the Queen of Quirk. I like quirky.

“Bleeding A Girl”

“Bleeding A Girl”. Written about my beloved sister Teri, who happened to fall in love with someone who was falling in love with everyone EXCEPT her. We’ve all been there. A one-way, spirit cracking crush that doesn’t evolve into anything but longing and misery for the unattainable person. The best thing to do in this case, I think, is cut your loss. Easier said than done. Love cuts.

“Key To My Heart”

“Key To My Heart” is a collaboration between Marti and I. I thought this was a nice, sort of, tip of the hat to good old girl group pop songs. Lotsa harmony. We wrote this one long distance (via Flip video) and polished it up together in Ireland on one of her globe trotting journeys to work on this record. I guess you could say this one is an ode to finding a true love. You know, the perfect fitting, missing link in your life. The person that completes you. The one that you can’t even remember how you ever got along in life without them in it. Completely wonderful and much better than bitching about your significant other. It’s fun to be cornball every once in awhile, and no better person to do that with than Marti.

“Lost Cause”

I’ve always been a fan of Beck. I especially loved SEA CHANGE. “Lost Cause” is from that record and I covered it here for a few reasons. One, I love the song. It seemed to fit in perfectly with the mood of the record and so I recorded it. Also, when I first heard it years ago, I was on my way to a funeral for a friend of mine. She lost her life way too prematurely. Messed up on heavy drugs and heavy thinking, she couldn’t handle it anymore and took her own life. I can’t hear this song without thinking of her. The howling Irish church wind….the lonely wind chimes….life isn’t always a bowl of cherries.

“Bridie’s Eyes”

And finally, this song wasn’t exactly written last. It was sort of written all the way through the process of creating TWIST. Dixon gave me this beautiful, truly haunting melody, complete with rainwater dripping in the background. Perfect for Ireland where it is CONSTANTLY drizzling. There is a woman named Bridie who lived in a cottage just up the road from me. I saw her almost everyday as she would hike down the cliff to the sea to gather driftwood to burn in her stove. It was her heat and her entertainment. Her daily ritual. Her constant companion was her little dog Rose who was her best friend. She had the BLUEST eyes you can imagine. They actually sparkled. She walked with a little limp and always carried her crooked, little walking stick. One day she was walking by as I was playing around with the melody Dixon had written and it just seemed to be Bridie’s Theme song.

She was around 75 years old then. She had married late and lost her husband early. They only had each other for a few, wonderful years at the edge of that same cliff overlooking the sea. First she lost her husband, then she lost her home in a legal mishap, and so the neighbors took care of her . She moved into a tiny cottage just up the road, with her dog Rose and a rapidly fading memory. I knew her and loved her as everyone in our neighborhood did. She looked EXACTLY like my Grandma Effie who used to push me in the swing. (My Dad and Mom met her once. My Dad looked at her and immediately said, “It’s Ma!”). She slowly lost her memory and good sense and we all watched as she slipped into dementia. The gray sky, the broken heart, the loneliness…so Irish. I like to think that she still holds the memory of her husband’s love in her heart and her mind although everything else is fading. If the sparkle of her blue eyes means anything, you can still see the love they had.

So that, in a nutshell, is the story of TWIST. A collection of feelings and thoughts about women and girls whom I have known and loved. And who doesn’t love a girl?