Archer Music: Recent Episodes
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You read too many signs Become lost in all directions Twist outside the lines That never seem to lead you home Across a bridge of sand We gaze out on the wasteland Styled by our own hands We close our eyes and pray How to justify the hunger With the light inside each … Continue reading Nothingness →
Drowned River Blues Yeah you know I’ve been driving Down that snow covered road Black ice sent me reeling sideways Somewhere colder than I’ve ever known Round that bay road never could escape Lost on that drowned river plain Girl you pray for my poor mortal soul But I won’t be feeling no … Continue reading Drowned River Blues →
Turn It On Tonight Watch the sun go down Shadows all around you The wind dies down Seems everything’s changed Turn back if you have to I know you don’t want to You know this could be your only chance So turn it all around Now the stage is set Everybody’s in their place … Continue reading Turn It On Tonight →
The Capitalist Fool with bells on his hat carelessly juggles irreplaceable glass spheres, and with a sick grin on his face, drops the one marked Fukushima.
If you're lost in the shattered city You can always sing the blues If you're lost in the shattered city You can always sing the blues There is no better way, nothing else will do When you've got the blues Like I've got the blues for you
Could be illusion, or maybe it's real In the back of your mind it's not what you feel Deliberate confusion, fail by design An infinite jest or a storm warning sign
Live through the moment, thrill to give in Double or nothing, you lose if you win
Even Cross Eyed Snake Oil Salesmen Sometimes Get The Blues
Surrounded By all possible realities We wait, breathlessly For one, or another And which one Matters not As this life Or that death This moment Or that Bleed on Each one Meaningless Yet each one The center Through which all else Must pass And therefore Irreplaceable … Continue reading Irreplaceable →
You laughed out loud At all the wrong times In the movie The local town-folk Turned away Staring through hair We ran for the parking lot I lost you In the halogen trails You were replaceable Most any night But not that one Not the night That you laughed out loud At all the wrong … Continue reading In The Play →
"You Won't Find Us There" is a Rock Opera about the human costs of anarchism, socialism and capitalism existing together against a backdrop of events at the Toronto G20 demonstration.
(Traditional – by Dominic Behan – Arranged and performed by David Archer, Toronto ,2010) or here or download other file types including wave and ogg vorbis here: Internet Archive Download mp3 (right click) Crooked Jack Come Irishmen both young and stern With adventure in your soul There’s better ways to spend your days Than working … Continue reading New Video For Crooked Jack →
First mix of the title song of my new rock opera “You Won’t Find Us There” which, as writing and recording continue, is turning out to be a look at the human costs of anarchism, socialism and capitalism existing together against a backdrop of events at the Toronto G20 demonstrations.
I continue to work on my Toronto/G20 Rock Opera “You Won’t Find Us There” and hope to share parts of it soon. I call it a Rock Opera for lack of a better term – and oh yeah, because I have become totally re-inspired by listening to the work of my main man Pete Townshend. … Continue reading You Won’t Find Us There →
(Traditional - Lyrics by Dominic Behan - Arranged and performed by David Archer, Toronto ,2010)
Crooked Jack
Come Irishmen both young and stern With adventure in your soul There's better ways to spend your days Than working down the hole I was tall and true, all of six foot two When they broke me across the back By a name I am known, and it's not my own
No they call me Crooked Jack The ganger's blue-eyed pet was I Big Jack could do no wrong And the reason simply was I worked hours on and on I cursed the day I went away To work on the hydro dams Of hopes and fears and blood and tears Caught up in a shuttering jam They say an honest toil is good For spirit and for soul But it's for flesh and blood me boys They want you down the hole
Any Way You Want To A very slow love song Any Way You Want To – (3:39) Music and Lyrics by David Archer Download mp3 (right click – save target as) Lyrics/Notes “Any Way You Want To” was originally included on my first complete solo effort “Underground Sun”. It’s a very slow love song and … Continue reading Any Way You Want To →
Joy Of Life Joy Of Life (3:29) – Underground Sun 2004 Music by David Archer Violin composed and performed by Sandra Swannell Download mp3 (right click – save target as) Lyrics/Notes
Your Spirit Will Never Die There’s always something more… Your Spirit Will Never Die (3:27) – Underground Sun 2004 Music and Lyrics by David Archer Download mp3 (right click – save target as) Lyrics/Notes Your Spirit Will Never Die I saw silver trails in the sky While I was busy killing time A falling coin, … Continue reading Your Spirit Will Never Die →
“Whatever Happens” by The Blue Assassin The rest of us just better hope and pray that the revolution will be televised….. Whatever Happens(2:51) – The Blue Assassin Music and Lyrics by The Blue Assassin Download mp3 (right click – save target as) Lyrics/Notes Whatever Happens These words are written, not carved into stone Five … Continue reading Whatever Happens by The Blue Assassin →
Bombs Falling/Nowhere To Go is set in Gaza – I take a neutral political position on Israel/Palastine and honour all civilian victims of war. Bombs Falling/Nowhere To Go A Gaza Bombing Sound Collage Bombs Falling/Nowhere To Go – (4:01) Music by David Archer. (Unauthorized) text by Jawad Harb Download mp3 (right click – save target … Continue reading Bombs Falling/Nowhere To Go Video →
Bombs Falling/Nowhere To Go is set in Gaza - I take a neutral political position on Israel/Palastine and honour all civilian victims of war.
Irreplaceable
Surrounded
By all possible realities
We wait, breathlessly
For one, or another
And which one
Matters not
As this life
Or that death
This moment
Or that
Bleed on
Each one
Meaningless
Yet each one
The center
Through which all else
Must pass
And therefore
Irreplaceable
rapid and ineveitable way as it was being assembled and could not exist at all were it not for that fact.
The words – and to be honest, the entire emotional content - are from Gaza.
But I truly believe that same emotional content could be from anywhere.
The voice – though computer generated with an Indo/Asian accent – is meant to be anyone and indeed becomes the voice of a Universal Motherhood as well as fear, love and acceptance, anger and courage. That fear, love, acceptance, anger and courage all belong to Jawad Harb, his family and neighbours and all those who have lived and died these same ways.
The first sound – the bass drum – is the impossible violence of what can be – but will not be altered from it’s white hot, black heart of despair and anger and hatered and destruction.
The guitar is the onlooker, alternately relentless and hesitant, charging forward and pulling back, but determined, for once, to stand witness to the truth.
The childs cry is from a train station in North America and by its very sound represents something we all know in our hearts.
The air raid sirens are from Israel and are the voices of warning coming from all those who have experienced the history of terrible violence and oppression.
There is an unknown Turkish man reading poetry way back in the mix toward the end. He represents the voices of people that no longer have names and will never be heard.
Then the awful, terrible sound of explosions – lifted from a YouTube copy of CNN’s live coverage of the bombing of Baghdad - like murderous, demonic laughter ripping darkness into your soul, stealing fire from heath and heart and blazing hatred and anger, hatred and anger, hatred and anger across the sky and the flesh and the bones of innocent children. Deafening, hideous, sickening thunder and lightning torn from humanity’s darkest recesses, dripping bloody, putrid venom and poison onto everything that means anything to anyone.
The bottom end of the piano is the rock of the earth, the heat of technology and science, mankind through our collective history, evolution and religion, and the hope and hopelessness of time moving on. The high end of the piano represents the tears of the witnesses, the sorrow, the sadness, the pain of knowing, the guilt and remorse and the anger at helplessness in the face of such an storm, such an onslaught.
And it’s when I go back and listen, when it’s late and I’m alone and my ability to resist is at it’s lowest, and the acceptance and the understanding of why the wolf must tear at the throat of the deer stares back at me from the mirror, I ask myself ”how can such things as this come to be?” And I fear that as I say those words out loud, someone else will say to me “How dare you presume to create such a thing, you who know nothing of this.”
As thousands of Iranian people take to the streets in pursuit of justice and democracy, I am once again stunned by the courage and passion of those who must take such risks as they seek to attain that which we in the West seem to have forgotten we possess.
Loon Theory humbly supports the students and people of Iran as they strive to take their rightful place in this world.
Imagine how the entire world would benefit if one of the worlds greatest cultures were able to free themselves from the parasitic and dangerous yoke of religious and totalitarian oppression.
Loon Theory humbley supports the students and people of Iran as they strive to take their rightful place in this world.
Imagine how the entire world would bennefit if one of the worlds greatest cultures were able to free themselves from the parasitic and dangerous yoke of religious and totalitarian oppression.
We could probably include everything this crazed loon has ever uttered, but I think we'll go with this recent answer given by former V.P. Dick Cheney when Face The Nation's Bob Schieffer asked the question "Did President Bush know everything you knew?"
Cheney's bizarre, all too comprehensible response:
I certainly, yes, have every reason to believe he knew -- he knew a great deal about the program. He basically authorized it. I mean, this was a presidential-level decision. And the decision went to the president. He signed off on it
This just gets weirder and weirder.
War Zone We drank vodka and vanilla coke It was awful but we got drunk As we knew we would Later, you were sick But I imagine you don’t remember As the sirens screamed As the bombs began falling You cried out in your sleep (if that’s what it was) And I … Continue reading War Zone →
A strange, stormy night of recording in a creepy one hundred fifty year old building.....
Sacred Tree Written during the Iraq invasion. Sacred Tree (2:37) – Underground Sun 2004 Music and Lyrics by David Archer Download mp3 (right click – save target as) Lyrics/Notes
This Hubble picture, an amalgamation of "50 separate exposures through a yellow filter, totaling about 17 hours of exposure time, plus 30 exposures through a near-infrared filter taken over 10 hours."
Fascinating article by Jay Rosen on the role the press plays in determining a universal narrative and how the Internet works as an opposing force to the atomization of the audience and the regimented dictates of the acceptable sphere of discourse.
I have few rituals in my life, but the morning coffee ritual is almost sacred. I don't drink all that much - between two and, at the most, five cups a day, always early in the day. Coffee in the second half of a day will keep me up at night.
The most memorable cup of coffee I've ever had was in Toronto's Sutten Place Hotel lounge. (believe me, not my usual style hang out) It was a Sunday morning. The coffee was served in a translucent china cup to the the sound of a live classical pianist. The server was a beautiful young woman blond wearing one of those real looking tuxedo tops (bow tie, tails) with these tiny little black shorts.
She appeared both exotic and classy to me that day.
What an awesome picture.
Cheers.