Homegrown Radio 11/26/10

Happy Friday!  I trust all of our Stateside friends had a happy Thanksgiving yesterday.   Now that Friday is upon us, it’s of course time for Homegrown Radio, & sad to say, it’s out final go-round with Bernie Jungle.  As far as next month’s Homegrown Radio goes, that’s a bit up in the air, but I hope to have an announcement on that by Sunday.  Also, don’t forget that the Banjo Feast will continue tomorrow & Sunday.

But for now, here’s Bernie talking about this month’s song, “Louie”:

some of my songs are fiction
but this one, like Josie, is simply real life events set to music
i guess i had a colorful life growing up in the backwoods of western PA

and if Louie ever hears this song, i hope he takes no offense, but laughs along with the rest of us and memories of our crazy times growing up

maybe a song that some of your listeners can relate to

hope you all enjoy the song, it's been a pleasure

Happy Thanksgiving !

Bern

We’ve enjoyed it too, Bernie—thanks!

Homegrown Radio 11/19/10

Happy Friday!  It’s time for some Homegrown Radio with Bernie Jungle—so let’s see what Bernie has to say about this week’s song, “Penny:”

this was recorded on a home computer by Scott Greiner a few years ago
and features Kathleen Gacek on vocals, recorded on my laptop live
that is, after trying it with overdubs we had to just sing together into the same mic at the same time

but then quite a few overdubbed vocals at the end just for fun

hope you enjoy

I know you will enjoy it!  & a quick reminder: you can purchase Bernie Jungle’s solo cd on CDBaby right here.

Homegrown Radio 11/12/10

Hi folks, & happy Friday.  It’s time for some more Homegrown Radio with Bernie Jungle, & let’s get right to it!  Here are the lyrics & Bernie’s back story to his song “Josie”:

Josie
Josie drives a school bus every day, I can hear her tire chains
I was hoping for a day at home today
Josie doesn’t have to say a word, only look up in the mirror
That’s enough to make you shut your mouth and wish
She’d watch the road

Josie, Josie

Josie driving sixty miles an hour, where the limit’s twenty five
It’s amazing that we’re still alive
No one ever puts their body parts, out the windows of her bus
Josie knows just how to drive, the fear in us
And watch the road
I wish she’d watch the road

I’m so scared I think I’m going to die
Trees fly past just inches from my eyes
And I wish I had another cigarette
But I left them in my gym bag on my bed

Josie Josie etc.

Josie sits at home in panty hose
With a sandwich and a beer
She can hardly wait to go to sleep and steer

Josie is a true story about a bus driver I had in Western Pennyslvania in the late sixties and through the seventies taking us to school through grade school and high school. She prided herself in getting us there, even when most of the other bus drivers went home.

This song was written while looking back at her from the vantage of our tenderloin apartment in San Francisco when Kathleen and I arrived in 1995. It is indeed an old song, but has never been properly released. This version was recorded and mixed by Scott Greiner, who so generously recorded a bunch of my songs a few years back. They’ve gotten a little lost in mix-down but I hope to put them all out soon, in some form or another, so here’s one way eh? Most-excellent drumming by Adam McCauley.

Also, I must say that I intended to write new material each week and I tried, and did succeed in finding forgotten song parts and working up lyrics for some others, but nothing but new lyrics just didn't come. What did happen though was that I’ve been more involved in songwriting that I’ve been in a long time spending all my free time doing so. I’m grateful for that. Nothing really came together this week that I’d like to share but hopefully next week. So for now, an old but rarely heard song of mine, and I hope you all enjoy.

Thanks for all your kind words on last weeks song!

Thank you, Bernie!  Hope you folks enjoy this great song!

Pic of Bernie Jungle in the graphic is by Amy Snyder

Homegrown Radio 11/5/10

Happy Friday, folks!  I’m very excited about this month’s featured artist on Homegrown Radio, Bernie Jungle.  As I mentioned last week, Bernie is an extraordinary guitar player, as well as being a gifted singer & songwriter.  Bernie Jungle has always been in demand for his musical gifts, & has been a member of many bands—these include Warm Wires, The Lipsey Mountain Spring Band, The Great Auk, & Thunderbleed, AKA Blind Vengeance.  You can purchase his solo cd 4 Songs  on CDBaby here, as well as his cd with Peter Altenberg, Slumped Forward; & you can hear Bernie’s work with Carrie Bradley (also of Homegrown Radio fame!) right here on The Great Auk’s MySpace page.   You can also read Bernie's interview on the Robert Frost's Banjo Musical Questions series at this link.

Let’s see what Bernie has to say about this week’s song, “Sifting Through:”

it's a song about looking at the past and also about forgetting that we're aging

started when i saw a photo of a friends' brother who had passed away
in the picture he was probably 14 and had this amazing glint in his eye
started to think about that and other old photo's that i've got
and about how when growing up,  a friend of mine thought that when a plane flew really high in the sky
when you can't hear a sound but only see the con-trail
that it meant that someone had died
(we were both in probably 3rd grade when he told me that while we sat on a swing-set looking at the sky)

that has always stuck with me and finally made it into a song

and the rest of the song is about attraction and aging
and about being confused about falling in love

Here are the lyrics:

Sifting Through
If only the glint in an eye of a photo from seventy-two
If even a splash of that red from the fifties
When a plane high above in the sky
makes you think of the ones that you knew
I’ll be sifting, through


There’s time to be lost
And time to make sound with the bones in your body
This river has cost you dear

He sent her a poem through the air to her eyes but she didn’t receive
Then he looked in the mirror, and finally agreed
He was thinking that hearts can be had, and behave and beholdenly be
He was thinking of hearts, while drifting at sea

There’s time to be lost
And time to make sound with the bones in your body
This river has cost you dear

If only the glint in an eye of a photo from seventy-two
If even a splash of that red from the fifties

©2010 Bernie Jungle
 
Intrigued?  Here’s the song!



Pic of Bernie within the graphic is by Amy Snyder