The Resurgence of 2017

So something happened at the end of 2016 and kicked into overdrive in January and February of 2017 for me. I started writing songs again! And, for once, I stopped trying to write an epic song every time I wrote something. Phil and I did yet another challenge, and by the end of January I had written 12 songs for that, leaving me feeling pretty good about myself. However, I decided to also participate this year in FAWM, and, in the theme of just trying to write without overthinking, I challenged myself to write literally at least one song every single day in February.

And I did it. 🙂 (I actually wrote two songs on February 5th, FWIW).

I’m not going to lie, I am only posting this post so I’d have a record of which songs I wrote in which order for future me to reflect on, but, admit it, you’re not reading this anyway!

Pre-FAWM:

  1. The Calling Of The Oomphad
  2. In The Midst Of All The Fuss
  3. The Tale Of The Acorn
  4. Love Is Stupid
  5. Expectations
  6. Big Words
  7. Don’t Make Me
  8. Still That Kid
  9. Trying To Tell
  10. Clinging
  11. For The Right Reasons
  12. The Only Thing
  13. I Was Only Being Me

FAWM:

  1. Blue Balloon
  2. Forever Lost To The Ether
  3. Mortal Enemies
  4. People Keep Dying
  5. Grue Pattibrand
  6. Waiting
  7. Mr. Calvarew
  8. Winning
  9. The Bottom
  10. Traffic
  11. Reluctant
  12. The Message Of Your Arrival
  13. The Tenth Turangalila Blues
  14. No One Noticed
  15. The Rain
  16. If I Were An Almond
  17. A Favorite Flower
  18. Smells Like Rain
  19. What I Called You
  20. Gone
  21. Bad Baby Ducks
  22. People Suck
  23. Effort
  24. Today
  25. Getting Old Sucks
  26. Out Of Hand
  27. Bad Luck Love
  28. Some Me
  29. My Last Song

Results of the 2011 Album Composition Challenge

Back in 2009, Phil Taylor and I challenged each other to make a new album.  The idea was that neither of us were producing enough material, so we invented the challenge to force us to produce something. The result for me was The Threshold of Omniscience, which contains some of my best lyrics and songs to date.  Given the success of that, we decided to make a new challenge this year.

We added a few more rules this time around.  We had from November 11, 2011 to February 12, 2012 to make a new album of 7-10 songs.  We also made a stipulation that one of the songs lyrics had to make the alphabet with the first letter of each line, and we both chose a theme and a list of words that the other had to use in the album.

For me, Phil chose the theme “a childhood memory/childhood memories” and the following words:  glib, quid pro quo, unambiguous, dichotomy, garish, permission, strategy, illuminate, blanket, mansion.

Once the album was done, we submitted the lyrics to one another and each of us chose the other’s album title.

So, with no further ado, I am happy to announce that the videos for Within The War Without Without The War Within are now live on YouTube.  (The playlist should be embedded below.)

Take a listen and tell me what you think!

High quality mp3s are also free to download on the album page.

Baz Hennessy Demos coming to YouTube

I am trying very hard to get the sound of Baz Hennessy into the ears of people who can help me with it. I tried the promotional video, but that got very little response. So, since everyone I targeted to play the full tracks to really seemed to like it, I decided I had no choice but to put the demos up on YouTube and hope to get promotion that way.

As of this morning, the first three tracks are live:

1.) Perception The Creator

2.) Deceleration From Stasis

3.) The Extraction

Please feel free to take a listen! I really want to turn this into a live stage production with choreographed dance and, obviously, live musicians, but I need musicians, production help, and especially some financial assistance.

Composition of “The Awakening of Baz Hennessy” is complete!

For about 2 years, I have had this “opus” album idea that would combine all my favorite musical points (mostly instrumentation) into a single genre.  I have wanted to do overdriven electric lead guitar paired with banjo for a long time, so that was the start, then I decided I needed to throw in marching band drums, slap bass, a french horn trio, an ocarina (which is just a flute for compositional purposes), and a reedy woodwind (in this case, the clarinet).  The finally requirement was that all songs would have 5-beat phrasing.

The idea finally solidified as a 7-track instrumental album that chronicles the evolution of the universe through this new genre that I titled “Baz Hennessy.”  About a year and a half ago, I discovered the Sibelius music composition software, and got underway.

The first track I wrote, “An Unexpected Rebuttal,” sat by itself for about 9 months, then over Christmas 2010 I finally got to work on “The Extraction,” and the last 5 tracks came about in the 4th week of January 2011.

As hard as it was, I sat on the compositions for a month — without even listening, then mixed down the midis as close as I could to get an ALMOST live sound.

I’m very pleased with the results, so please go check out the the lo-fi samples I’ve put on my website.  The album is called “The Awakening of Baz Hennessy.”

The next stage is to find an ambitious musical entrepreneur to finance the live recording and possibly performance of these compositions.  During that process, I want to add some tribal rhythms to the current blend of instrumentation.  I am shooting for doing all this by Fall of 2012.

If you happen across this blog, have listened to the samples, and are interested or know someone who might be interested, please contact me and we can arrange a full demonstration of the current recordings.

http://jeremytharp.com/discography/the-awakening-of-baz-hennessy/the-extraction/

Surpryzes: Let It Ryde RELEASED

The newest, most innovative, most awesome, most superlative, overtly hyperbolic album in the history of the universe and beyond has hit the internet.

You got it!  Pimp Daddy G Fly Shooky Shooky and DJ Funk Dizzle G Straddy Bang Bang (my alter ego) have finally followed up our debut EP “krackA krumZ” with a full, very insightful album: “Surpryzes: Let It Ryde.”

Check it out today.  If you can’t do it today, well that’s just crazy.  Do it.  Because you can.  And it rocks.

You can download a zip file the full album in mp3 format at this link: http://www.mediafire.com/?k6di2e7rt6k0rnj

Or just follow the album link and listen/download one mp3 at a time.

Bi-annual update whether I need it or not …

Many of you know I have left the band Town Crier (not that it was ever much to begin with).  I have been pursuing other projects as well, however, including composing 2 songs for the independent film “Legacy Dawn” which I finished earlier this month, my “innovative” instrumental project “The Awakening of Baz Hennessy“, and my death metal album “Avenge the Reaper.”

For Baz Hennessy, my plan is to complete the preliminary compositions this year (hopefully sooner than later), then conceptually comb over them in depth, then do crazy awesome recordings and release it officially sometime before the end of 2012.

Avenge the Reaper is little more than a collection of ideas, but once I’ve completed this phase of Baz Hennessy, I’ll get cracking on it full force.  The trick on it will be making myself a better guitarist, then having the patience for recording.  The plan is to have it ready for release sometime in the first half of 2012.

So there you go.  🙂

The original lyrics to “Endless Rain”?

First of all, no part of my current conscious self would really fathom that there are/were “original lyrics” to Endless Rain.  I was browsing through my file archives and I stumbled upon what I called “leftovers” — ideas I had come up with in songs that didn’t make the cut.  Oddly enough, I had apparently used this text file to originally pen Endless Rain, and there it was — a full song (properly punctuated which is an indication that I have “completed” a song), but completely unrecognizable.  I guess this can count as a notch in the span of my musical enterprise?

Anyway, I really do not remember these words.  I cannot even be certain that they went with the music as it goes now, but the chorus is exactly the same.  I would say these lyrics are much more direct (which is probably why I would have changed them) and much more deeply saddening …

So for you major fan(s) out there, a juicy morcel of the Jeremy Tharp historical archive:

I’ll sit here and watch your eyes a while
And hope the simple thought of them makes me smile
I just can’t fathom you not here one day
Nonetheless the time is here you’ll go away

I just told you goodbye for life
And every time I think of you I cry
Even when you see my face it’s not my pain you’ll find
The tears don’t fall on the outside

Endless rain always falls down on the inside
I escape always to burn out of my skin’s mire

Only your fate can save me
I want your hand to raise me
I can’t hold on, I’ll go insane
And I’ll drown in this endless rain

I’m heavy on the way you like to sing
And the way you laugh is everything
If there is one thing I couldn’t want more
It’d he way you look at the world

I’ll never know where I am or you are
And every thought about you will break my heart
I’m simply captivated by you
And lost in the hope of if you knew

Endless rain always falls down on the inside
I escape always to burn out of my skin’s mire

Only your fate can save me
I want your hand to raise me
I can’t hold on, I’ll go insane
And I’ll drown in this endless rain

Endless rain always falls down on the inside
I escape always to burn out of my skin’s mire

Only your fate can save me
I want your hand to raise me
I can’t hold on, I’ll go insane
And I’ll drown in this endless rain

Thoughts?