TomFlannery.com

As you may know if you keep up with my ramblings, I’ve been fumbling around with the piano lately. I’ve always wanted to play, but was hampered by the obvious.

I didn’t have a piano.

I do now because my 9 year old is a bit of a prodigy. At least to my ears. She got so good so fast that we broke open the piggy banks and leveraged the credit cards. All worth it. I love listening to her play. It’s just a wonderful sound she makes….and she does it so effortlessly. She can put a complex piece of music into her memory-bank in a few days and rid herself of the sheet music. And when I have questions, she’s there to answer them. Last night she gave me a quickie course on the sustaining petal. I was abusing it relentlessly and am now much less manic.

So now when the house is quiet (which happens on occasion), I have no ready excuse to not sit and tinker. I learned some chord shapes by searching google, and in a few weeks could plod along with simple things that to the untrained ear at least sounded vaguely musical.

So now I have a new batch of songs. Kind of a hodge podge of pop songs and Guthrie-esque societal rants and gentle laments and just plain weird shit. As usual I have no money. So recording them with a band is out. I usually make my records solo with an acoustic guitar. I’ve got a recording machine, set up 2 mics, and just play. I don’t overdub anything because I never had to patience to learn how to work the machine the right way. So what you hear on my records is what I sound like. If I make a (not so grievous) mistake or a car drives by and blows a horn or my dog sneezes, you hear the mistake or the car horn or the dog sneezing….sometimes all in one song but I try to keep that to a minimum if possible.

Last night I sat down at the piano with a new song called “Can You Hide Me” and searched for a melody. I found one and it sounded pretty good.

Hmmm.

Maybe I could record the new songs…..you know…..on the piano.

I recently picked up a copy of Mike Scott’s latest, called “In a Special Place”. It’s piano/voice demos of the songs that eventually appeared on the Waterboy’s “This is the Sea” record.

Scott is a great songwriter. A wonderful guitarist. But nobody ever said he was Benmont Tench. There’s no “bad” notes on the record or anything like that. It’s just very rudimentary playing. You can almost feel him searching for the right keys. Sometimes his timing gets thrown off. But I thought the performances were lovely. In many cases, I prefer them over the bombastic arrangements he gave the songs on “This is the Sea”.

It made me think. Maybe I could do this.

I’m still not totally convinced. I have moved the recording machine and the mics upstairs next to the piano. And I have been playing more and more, trying to get my chops up. But I’m still a bumbler. My bad notes make my dog’s ears stick up. One time they made her bark. That’s a bit disconcerting to say the least.

But there’s something so expressive about the piano. Even if you don’t play that well, it can still sound good.

And I’d like to try something I’ve never tried before. If I’m going to fail, I’d much rather not fail at something I’ve done already.

Ok, so I’ve almost talked myself into it. But not quite.

We’ll see how it goes. Drop me a line if you’re so inclined. I’d like to hear your thoughts.

In a bit..

–tf

I’m told the world will begin to end on Saturday. Or something like that. The swell people will slip out of their clothes and float up into the clouds. The rest of us are doomed I guess……left to pick up the pieces and to await eternal damnation. This will take approximately 5 months. No idea why so long, unless it’s just a lot of paperwork and stuff. The actual end of the world is set for October 21st, 2011, which messes up Halloween for my kids….but I hate Halloween so the date is fine with me. Plus, at least I can watch half a season of college football. The Pros will be on strike. Great timing guys.

I imagine they’ll be lots of real estate available all of a sudden. There’s some nice houses I’ve got my eye on. With pools and killer landscaping and lots of privacy trees. I hope the owners don’t disappoint me by being craven sinners. My friend and frequent writing partner Mike Stevens says he wants a tractor and some root beer. Mike’s always been a modest guy.

I looked into this rapture thing and found that if you’re one of the chosen and you just happen to be driving 80 miles and hour on route 81 you’ll be lifted and your car is pretty much on its own. How much of a suck-fest would it be to get run over by a riderless car? You’ll need a helluva lawyer. At least we know they’ll be lots of them still around when it’s over.

This was supposed to happen a while back but the rapture people admitted that they miscalculated the date. A simple mathematical error. You’d think with something as important as the end of the world they’d get the formula right.

But this time they’ve nailed it. They promise. 1844. 1914. 1981. 1988. 1989. 1992. 1993. 1994. All mistakes. Sorry about the inconvenience.

It’s all supposed to start with an earthquake in New Zealand. I’m writing from memory now but I’m pretty sure it’s New Zealand. This will happen early Saturday morning (New Zealand time or EST I do not know), and trigger a chain of cataclysmic events that promise to be quite nasty. I checked Saturday’s weather and they’re calling for sun and temps in the 70s….hardly an armageddon-like forecast. But they’ve been wrong before.

My daughter has a softball game on Sunday but the coach says he’ll cancel if he doesn’t have enough players. He did say he’s got no worries about the unavailability of umpires.

Most of us I expect will sleep through this. I don’t think people floating off into the sky will make a lot of noise, unless they’re scared of heights and start screaming. I’m certainly not going to set my alarm, in any event. I don’t want to hear insufferable Bible-freaks taunting me from above on my only day to sleep in.

Sunday mass will be interesting….since anybody there by default is doomed no matter how much repenting they do. Day late and a dollar short you might say….the ultimate in wishful thinking. And lots of dirty looks for the priest. I expect a lot of looting and mayhem and fornication and boozing and people going off their diets. I’ve decided I’m not going to cut my grass anymore. One good thing is no more Fox News, since they’ll obviously all be gone to the good place. We’ll be stuck with Dan Rather to narrate it all. I’m guessing the Home Shopping Network will have t-shirts and hats to sell by the evening. They’re pretty fast off the mark.

I just hope we don’t lose our internet connection.

In a bit…

–tf

I was half asleep in bed with the TV on. I heard a voice say Bin Laden was dead. I didn’t really wake up. It was strange. I thought I was dreaming.

I woke up early this morning and drove my daughter to school (she missed the bus, a truly unpatriotic way to start the week). I had the Ipod playing in the car. No radio.

Then off to work.  Pulled up facebook (isn’t that what you do when you get to work?) and there it was, every post I saw. Bin Laden really was dead. Crowds were piling up at the White House and in Times Square and at Ground Zero…..waving flags, chanting. Jubilant.

Obama gets the credit for being in the right place at the right time. That’s how politics work. If Reagan “freed the hostages”, then Obama “killed Bin Laden”. Some major political hay for the Democrats. That birth certificate thing suddenly seemed even more goofy than it really was. Fox News is practically dribbling on itself, not sure what to say, like they are trying to hold in an enormous shit. To gloat would make Rush and Beck mad. This was supposed to happen 10 years ago you see. With a real American in the White House. Not some non-white Kenyan socialist with the sinister middle name pretending to be Hawaiian

But still, “ding dong the witch is dead” and all that. And good fucking riddance. A lot of good men and women have died trying to bring this bastard down. Vengeance is never pretty but sometimes it feels pretty damn good. He can’t be too dead for me. Bring on the pictures. I hear he was shot in the head. I hope he knew it was coming and crapped his robe.

So now what? Not sure. Bin Laden may be more dangerous now that he’s dead. He’s an idea now, and not some living breathing thing. Dare I say, a martyr. When religion makes people batshit, as it generally does, you can’t expect rationality when you cut the head off the snake…..because rationality was never there in the first place. Those who kill because they truly believe a man in the sky wants them to are notoriously difficult to reason with. Muslims aren’t alone in thinking their deity considers them swell and everybody else suitable only for target practice. All the major religions teach this…..er……exclusivity. The most radical of muslims just happen to do god’s work with more panache lately. It’s fucking madness.

So I don’t see militant islamists suddenly being cowed over Bin Laden getting plugged, anymore than millions of catholics suddenly realizing that canonizing a man who harbored pedophiles might not be a good idea.

But radical muslims. We’re on them, yes? Remember, they think when they die there are 100 virgins with legs spread waiting for them. So blowing themselves up and taking a bunch of heathens with them is not always un-appealing, especially when earth-living consists of dirt floors and sipping cold tea with guys who stone women to death for not covering their eyeballs. Sadly, I think the killing will continue. It may even spike for a time. People who kill for religion have always been very PR savvy. One must get the message out when the cameras are around.

I was in NYC this weekend. I’m not big on the crowds and the $7 pints and all the horn blowing, but one thing I do like about NYC is that nobody really gives a shit what you look like or what you sound like or how you dress. You walk down the street and you’re pretty much ignored unless somebody wants to rob you or convert you to Scientology. I like not being judged by weirdos. I really like anonymity in the midst of Times Square and the fact that taxi drivers will run you over regardless of your religious beliefs….or lack thereof. New Yorkers tend to stand out when they’re outside of New York, so it’s ironic that they’re invisible otherwise. This is as it should be. NYC is pretty much a judgement free zone, unless of course you drive airplanes into her buildings. Then she gets pissed and short-tempered. Sounds about right to me.

As an uber-liberal, it feels kinda squishy for me to be saying I’m glad a guy got a bullet in the brain. But I am glad. A stain has been wiped away.

I do hope we don’t go overboard with the chanting and the “god bless america” stuff though. It will be said that this will, temporarily at least, “bring the nation together”, which is horseshit of course. Our nation is way too big to be brought together by any one thing. When Bin Laden’s body is dumped into the sea, the poor will still be poor and the rich will still be rich and the ideological pin-heads will continue to drive the national discourse by driving a big wedge into smallish-minds. Boys will continue to die in Afghanistan. Fear will return and we’ll be back to Obama’s DNA and Trump’s comb-over and $4 gas prices in a few days.

But for today at least……the world feels just a tad safer. Let us revel.

In a bit..

–tf

Yea, it’s late. And no, I’m not asleep. I’m very predictable that way. The house slumbers. I sit at the kitchen table typing these words to a soundtrack of an old Pistoleros record. The Tempe scene has dusted me, and I’ve got a just released Roger Clyne and the Peacemaker’s record on stand-by….along with the back catalog of the Gin Blossoms, a band led by a pop genius who wrote enough brilliant 3 minute songs to keep his former band together nearly 30 years later. They’re still paying the bills. When you play guitar, that’s success let me tell you.

Hopkins wasn’t much good with success, although he was a genius at drinking his liver into saying “no mas”. So one night he jumps the wall at yet another rehab facility and procures himself a handgun. He goes back to his apartment, lays on the bed, and blows his head clean off. Sucks for us. A guy who can write a song as fucking brilliant as “Found Out About You”, a picture perfect pop song with no flaws. None. Every note, every word, every guitar figure and that bass line, perfection. The guy is barely 30. It seems to come easy. A song like this is monstrous because it sounds so…simple.

But life got Hopkins. It’s a bitch that way. Booze was the blood the ran through his veins. He could not face the world without it. His fingers would shake. He could not play the guitar until he had a few belts. So a few hours later he’d be ready to play. His fingers nimble and his hands ready to dance up and down the frets. Except now he’s laying on the floor. It’s a delicate balance and Doug always seemed to get it wrong…..to tumble over the wire. He was, or could have been, our own Brian Wilson. We could deal with all the sauce if he’d just get off the floor long enough to write something like “Lost Horizon’s” again. Or something like “My Guardian Angel”, an absolute stunner he wrote for the Pistoleros. You’ve never heard it. I feel bad for you, because the song could change your life. Some pop songs can do that. Hopkins could write those kind. But he couldn’t look them in the eye when they were done. I think they scared him because they were so….accessible.

I’m getting old. I’m not much interested in pop songs that won‘t change my life in some way. I need my life changed, if only to not feel as old as I really am. When I listen to Doug Hopkins’ songs, for 3 minutes at a time, I feel just like he did. Probably not good considering the bullet in the head thing, but I’m really talking about the other stuff. The surge of youth. The desperation of it all. The uncertainty. The fear that drove him through his binges. Wanting to get in on the record. “If you don’t expect too much from me/You might not be let down”

Shit, that’s me! How did he know?

“The past is gone but something might be found/To take its place..”

Yes, something. But what? I suspect Hopkins had some answers but was too damn weary watching the band that fired him singing his songs on David Letterman. Fired for being a drunk, the very thing that enabled him to write songs like “Lost Horizons”, “Hey Jealousy”, and “Found Out About You” in the first place. I mean….with lines like “drunk drunk drunk in the gardens and the graves”….shit, what do you expect? A teetotaler rapping with Dr. Phil? These songs are the bile from the morning after. This was pain covered up by the jangle. Everybody hummed along to a series of 3 minute suicide notes. I do it still. I don’t feel bad about it. Hopkins did what he could do with his extraordinary gifts, and then he decided to fuck off on his own terms. I can’t feel that bad about that. He’s given way more to the world than most. And I’ve always admired those who go out on their own terms. Doug Hopkins said what he wanted to say and drank what he wanted to drink. So what if he was still in his early 30s. He wanted out. He’d done his bit. And now others were reaping the rewards. Who could blame him really?

Can you?

Ok, maybe a little. I wish he was still writing songs like this. For me. Selfish bastard that I am. I want to write songs as good. I haven’t yet. But I’ll keep trying.

In a bit…

–tf

I thought it was Noel Gallagher’s “Wonderwall”.

It’s not….although it’s as close you can get to perfect without being perfect.

Doug Hopkins’s “Found Out About You” is perfect.

In a bit…

–tf

Time to swim in the stream of un-consciousness.

Well, still playing around with the words. All sorts of ’em. Half a first draft of a new play is done. Have 8 new songs in various shapes and sizes in the notebook. Keeping up with the “Riding Both Rails” essays. I’ve been devouring Irish fiction again, and living human hours, which means sleep is now possible. Bad habits have been curbed slightly, at least for now. Ipod overflowing with new stuff. Foo Fighters and the Drive-By Truckers both getting lots of spins lately. Greg Pope, The Hold Steady, Bob Mould, Lucero, Dropkick Murphys, Punchine. New Paul Simon is wonderful, as is the latest Social Distortion. BoDeans have a new record coming in a few months, which always makes me happy and glad I chose the guitar as my primary time-waster. Speaking of which, I’m still messing around with the piano as well, although I’m not in any danger of being able to fire off any Andrew McMahon tunes anytime soon. I can say I’ve mastered the G to Em change…..and I can play a mean C and D. In other words, I’m pretty much tapped out learning-wise. The rest is repetition and tedium and knowing when to call the session player when paying for the studio time. It does make a glorious sound though, the piano. And it looks splendid in my house. I can play a mean version of “Racing in the Streets” even when I’m sober, and played “Thunder Road” in the midst of my recently departed Uncle’s church viewing….although nobody was really paying attention, which is how I got away with sitting at the piano at the side of the altar in the first place. He died suddenly at the nursing home, just as I discovered the home had a slightly out-of-tune piano in their break room….and thus was planning some tinkling for the residents. He may have seen what I was up to and figured the time was right. My family is very concerned with appearances you know. Been a tough last 12 months. Lost some friends along the way, which is a pity but when I look back a lot of my friends were assholes so it’s just as well. The core remain though, and it’s them I sing and play and write for. I got into the whole Facebook thing, against my better judgement but then what else is new. By now I’m sorta addicted to the minutiae of other people’s lives, which is of course the important stuff for the rest of us. Nobody wants to read about your divorce or your new baby. We want to know what you had for breakfast and when you’re getting your car fixed. Facebook is sorta the ultimate in creepy narcissism. Plus it’s a wonderful way to offend a whole lotta people at one time….and find out what old girlfriends are up to. I hear they even made a movie about the guy who invented the whole idea…..some really creepy narcissist who’s now worth about a billion dollars. I never saw the movie. The last movie I saw was one of the Harry Potter ones. I went with my kids and they didn’t want me to sit with them when I kept asking who the guy with the beard was. I guess I was supposed to know. At least I picked the movie where the guy died. His name was “dumb” something or other, and he was annoying in a upper-class twit of the year sorta of way. Speaking of which, there was a night last week when I could not sleep so I sat up until dawn watching 6 hours of Monty Python, trying not to wake the house laughing at the Minister of Silly Laughs and the Fish Slapping Dance. I dare you to try it.

In a bit…

–tf

New songs. Hell, it’s been almost 2 months since “Edward”. What else am I supposed to do? Work?

Writing on the piano this time. Bear with me.

In a bit..

tf

My father died shortly after 2am on March 30th, 2010. My sister was with him at hospice. We were keeping a vigil on a rotating basis. We knew the end was near. Most had already said their goodbyes a few hours earlier. But we were determined he was not going to die alone. It’s a fear we all have isn’t it?

I was sitting up on my couch….dozing. My head jerked awake…and once I caught my bearings I sent a quick text to my sister. She replied that things were the same. A few minutes later she called me. He was gone.

It happened just like that.

I was numb. Like a robot I went to the closet and put on my coat….then slipped into the car and out into the street. Back to the house I grew up in. I spent the night in my old bedroom and was awoken by birds outside my window.

Alzheimer’s is a cowardly fucking disease, and it continues its grisly march through our family. It doesn’t kill. It slowly ravages the mind and the body, allowing something else to bring on death. In my father’s case, his organs were shutting down. And he simply lost the strength required to breathe. It was a horrible thing to watch, and in many ways the end came mercifully quick. His fight with Alzheimer’s had lasted more than 5 years. He gave no quarter. He raged….sometimes growing so frustrated by what it was doing to him that he’d pull his hair. Or pound on the side of his head with an open hand. Hard. He knew. Parts of him the disease could never touch. He knew. And to me there’s nothing more tragic than that. But Alzheimer’s is a fixed fight. The outcome is determined in advance.

So now it’s a year later.

He’s never far. I often think of how he’d respond to this or that. Or what path he’d suggest I take. He had the ability to point out the right path, knowing that I’d choose the wrong one, and then help me up and brush me off when I went back to him asking for directions to the location he suggested all along…without saying or even implying “I told you so”. Not sure how he managed it. I must have driven him half mad over the years. But he’d say, “I’m proud of you”. And all would be right with the world. Nobody else can do that.

He taught me how to be a father. What greater lesson can a man learn? He also taught me that being a great father doesn’t guarantee that your kids are not gonna make you cringe at times. I’m Exhibit A. But if I can do half the job he did, my 2 girls will keep my cringing to a minimum.

We become torn when terminal illness invades. One one level I can’t be truly sad that he’s gone. For him to live as he’d been living was a form of torture. Just when does the “sanctity of life” become perverted? When your options are reduced to unbearable pain or drug-induced oblivion, what then? I won’t go into the whole religious argument, and I’m certainly not suggesting anything draconian here, but there’s something to be said for allowing our loved ones to go through pain that we’d never subject our pets to. Something to be said indeed….although I’m not sure what it is.

So, it’s been a year. Sometimes it feels like he’s been gone a few days. And sometimes I have a hard time remembering when he was here at all. When I could call him. Laugh with him. Learn from him. Alzheimer’s took most of him from me long before his last breath. It robbed him of what he wanted to say but could not find….and where he wanted to go but could not get to. It forced this man who had always taken care of others to allow others to take care of him. And for certain, surely terrifying moments, those “others” were complete strangers to him. Even when they were us.

Tonight will be hard. When 2am rolls around I do wonder if I’ll wake suddenly again. Or if I’ll even be able to sleep at all. What jerked me awake that night a year ago anyway? I like to think it was Pop saying goodbye.

Maybe tonight, he’ll say hello.

–tf

Just a bit of info on what’s been happening.

“Edward” is out and about and doing quite well. I’m pleased with the reception the record has received. I’m very happy with the songs, which all seemed to coalesce at one time….so I thought it only proper to record them all at one time. The record wasn’t planned at all. In fact, I’m still stuck on the record I was planning, and remain afraid to let those songs go. Not sure when they’ll see the light of day. The way my mind works it could be next week or 2014. Flip a coin.

In other music news, my self-taught piano lessons continue. I’ll never be confused for Liberace (in more ways than one), but I’m getting to where I don’t make others cringe when I play. I’m faking it quite well actually. All I really want is to be able to use the piano to write songs, and I’m nearly there. When the guinea pig is written, my plan is to drag the recording machine upstairs and take a crack at recording it. Throw some good vibes my way please.

In theater news, my play “Colorblind: The Katrina Monologues” recently won first prize at the Pennsylvania Association of Community Theater festival. It now moves on to represent the state in the Eastern State Festival next month, with the winner of that heading to Washington DC for the national festival. Who knows? I’ve got a great cast and a great director and know enough to stay the hell out of everyone’s way.

My play “Go Irish: The Purgatory Diaries of Jason Miller” (co-written with Rodger Jacobs) recently finished a successful short run in Camden, NJ and will head to off-off Broadway at the end of April and the beginning of May. It ain’t glamorous, but it is the Big Apple, so what the hell. It’s where every playwright wants to be, ultimately. I’ll worry about the digs later.

My blog with co-conspirator Mike Stevens continues uninterrupted….mostly because I badger Stevens unmercifully when he doesn’t post. It’s a lot of fun, and it keeps the fingers and (to a lesser extent) the mind limber.

I’ve got lots of future plans and if I wasn’t so good at procrastinating I’d be working on them now instead of writing this. So onward I go…

In a bit…

–tf

Reviews

Tom Flannery’s latest collection of songs ” Edward” has this singer/songwriter scratching his head in pure wonderment…  Every time this guy writes something down and begins to sing, the listener is taken into a different dimension.. From the opening song We Deserve Better Than This, to Sleepin’ In,  Mickey Mantle, and What If What I Want Is Not Enough… With every melodic track, you can’t help but feel for the characters he has created, and the unique dialogue they have with each other.. How many lives have you lived Thomas ??
—Ed Appnel (singer-songwriter)

“Tom’s vast prolific and topical lyrics put together with the great melodies on ‘Edward’ , once again, shows he is a musical force to be reckoned with “.
–Shawn Z (singer-songwriter)

His latest venture, Edward, is Flannery at his best: whimsical, poignant; at times heartbreaking and scathing. In a nutshell, Edward does not disappoint and certain tracks, most notably “We Deserve Better than This,” “Wallflowers” and “Without a Girl,” rank among his finest work. These tunes prove once again that Flannery is deserving of a much wider audience.
–Bruce Janu (Award Winning Filmmaker)

The latest incarnation of this ever-evolving writer is a rock album for the active listener.  You bring the bass and drums.  Tf brings the lust, anger, resentment, and desire.  Solid melodies and, as always, solid storytelling.  It’s easily his most accessible and entertaining collection.
–Josh Pratt (singer-songwriter)

“Once again Flannery defies you to pigeonhole him… a life-long folkie’s unexpected rock record with a whispering understated delivery.  Hard not to keep this one on repeat!”
—Lorne Clarke (singer-songwriter)

A singer/songwriter worthy of the title. Memories put to music then played at an intimate party on a comfortable Saturday night. The kind of party where someone says, ‘Tom, tell us a few stories about life and those times that are ‘a fadin’
—Mike Stevens – WNEP

“The bars are closed, the streets are empty, and these songs filter through the walls. Tom Flannery’s new recording is small town film noir. After listening I had to grab my guitar and try to write a new song. And that’s a compliment. Good stuff.”
—Michael Jerling (singer-songwriter)

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Download Edward for FREE here