Everyday I Write The Book

Don't tell me you don't know what love is

When you're old enough to know better

When you find strange hands in your sweater

When your dreamboat

 Turns out to be a footnote

I'm a man with a mission in 2 or 3 editions

& I'm giving you a longing look

Everyday I write the book

Chapter 1, we didn't really get along

Chapter 2,  I think I fell in love with you

You said you'd stand by me in the middle

Of Chapter 3

But you were up to your old tricks in

Chapters 4, 5 & 6

The way you walk

The way you talk, & try to kiss me,

& laugh

In 4 or 5 paragraphs

All your compliments & your cutting remarks

Are captured here in my quotation marks

& I'm giving you a longing look

Everyday, everyday, everyday

I write the book

Don't tell me you don't know the difference

Between a lover & a fighter

With my pen & my electric typewriter

Even in a perfect world

 Where everyone was equal

I'd still own the film rights

&be working on the sequel

& I'm giving you a longing look

Everyday, everyday,

 Everyday I write the book

Elvis Costello

1983

Born On This Day- August 25th... Elvis Costello

In sheer number of albums, the artists best represented in my music collection would be Tony Bennett, Paul Simon Frank Sinatra, The Police & Sting, k.d. lang, Van Morrison, & at the top of the heap would be Elvis Costello. I was crazy for him from the first listening of Alison from My Aim Is True in 1977.

Declan Patrick MacManus was born on this day in 1954. He is one of my most favorite & important musicians, with many of his huge catalogue of tunes speaking personally to me.

Costello has straddled the genres of punk, new wave, rock, pop, pub rock, traditional Irish, classical/symphonic, art song, country & soundtracks. He certainly has been prolific with 39 albums in 33 years. I used to sing Alison for auditions for shows with rock scores, & it was always included in my cabaret act in the 1980s. I modestly have to say that I feel it is one of my best numbers. I admire Costello's songwriting skills & I am zany for his singing with that hoarse little catch in his voice.

Costello is, decidedly, not gay. He is married to jazz artists Diana Krall. The couple lives in Vancouver BC.

Favorite Elvis Costello songs are too difficult to narrow down, but: Watching The Detectives, Shipbuilding (with a trumpet solo by Chet Baker!), Almost Blue, A Good Year For the Roses, Everyday I Write The Book, She, & God Give Me Strength. I could rhapsodize on & on, but I will just share one with you. This is the best cover of a country song ever.



And, of course, Alison: (You really sing it sometime. Just ask.)

Every Day I Write The Book

I know that Summer does not start until the solstice on June 23rd, but to me Summer begins on Memorial Day Weekend & ends on Labor Day, like bookends. This Summer, I plan to do a great deal of reading, a favorite activity at Post Apocalyptic Boehemia, along with whole lot of writing.

Nothing is quite as lovely as a book in the back garden or reading at the beach on Sauvie Island, spread out naked on a blanket, with a thermos of Vodka Lemonade.

Today I meditated on & recorded a list of 10 Books That Changed Me. Would you care to share your list, please?

The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

The Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving

Tales Of The City by Armistead Maupin

A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood

Flesh & Blood by Michael Cunningham

United States by Gore Vidal

Pentimento by Lillian Hellman

Myself Among Others by Ruth Gordon

My Dog Skip by Willie Morris

Mississippi Sissy by Kevin Sessums

Words To Live By

"We need to make books cool again. If you go home with somebody & they don't have books, don't fuck them."
John Waters

Don't tell me you don't know what love is

When you're old enough to know better

When you find strange hands in your sweater

When your dreamboat turns out to be a footnote

I'm a man with a mission in 2 or 3 editions

& I'm giving you a longing look

Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book

Chapter 1 we didn't really get along

Chapter 2 I think I fell in love with you

You said you'd stand by me in the middle
 of Chapter 3

But you were up to your old tricks in
 Chapters 4, 5 & 6

The way you walk

The way you talk, & try to kiss me, & laugh

In 4 or 5 paragraphs

All your compliments & your cutting remarks

Are captured here in my quotation marks

& I'm giving you a longing look

Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book

Don't tell me you don't know the difference

Between a lover & a fighter

With my pen & my electric typewriter

Even in a perfect world where everyone was equal

I'd still own the film rights
 & be working on the sequel

& I'm giving you a longing look

Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book

Elvis Costello

1983

An Anthem For Our Time?

Ray Of Light

August 16th. I find it difficult to comprehend that August, my favorite month, is half way over. I have been training myself to “be in the moment”, so I will enjoy each summer day for what it has to offer. Today is the 5th day of a Portland style heat wave with temps above 95 degrees. The rest of the country swelters with temperatures this high, but Portland has low humidity (the so called “dry heat”), & cool nights. Not so bad. We close up the house early in the day, & it stays cool, & then we open every door & window in the evening. But it is truly hot, & the dogs sack out on a cool floor & the Husband attempts to keep the crabbiness at an acceptable level (it is rough being in intense pain in 95+ degrees). The Weather Channel forecast this day as- "Brilliant Sunshine". I am now considering changing my Radical Faerie name from Honey Buckitt to Brilliant Sunshine.

 On this day in 1962, Ringo Starr replaced Pete Best as drummer for a new band- The Beatles. I love The Beatles beyond all measure, with a soft spot for Ringo, who I think I resemble. My 1st album, purchased with my own money was Meet The Beatles in January of 1964. He is profoundly underrated as a drummer, & who can resist the vocals on Octopus’s Garden?

On this day in 1977, Elvis Aaron Presley checked out. Presley is regarded as one of the most important figures of 20th century popular culture. He had a versatile voice & crazy, nutty success encompassing many genres, including country, pop, ballads, gospel, and blues. He is the best selling solo artist in the history of popular music. Nominated for 14 Grammys, he won 3, & received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award at age 36. I loved him & shed a tear on the day he died. My favorite Elvis song is Suspicious Minds:

On this day in 1958, a very talented & slightly hairy little Italian girl- Madonna Louise Ciccone is born. I am fascinated by & I appreciate anyone who is self invented & then manages to keep it going for decades by constantly reinventing. She is the world’s best selling female artist & one of the most famous people on the planet. It is my understanding that the Gays love her. I know I do. My favorite Madonna song is Ray Of Light.



The Post Apocalyptic Bohemian is finishing up the last touches on his memoir- Jockstraps & Vicodin: The Early Years. I am moving on to the next project, a reflection on my current state of attempting to find myself. I will become wealthy & successful, & I will wear cute tops. I am going to travel the globe in a quest of self- discovery, specifically to cities that have cocktails named after them. In my travels, I will discover the true pleasure of nourishment by drinking Manhattans in NYC; the power of the spiritual with Champagne in France, and, finally & unexpectedly, inner peace & balance with a Bellini on a beach on the Lido in Venice. I will make out with James Franco & Javier Bardam. I will have my picture taken in postcard perfect locals. I shall call this slim & extremely shallow vehicle of self absorption: Drink Drink Sleep. I have high expectations that it will make me a bundle, & that a film version will soon be in production with Bradley Cooper playing me.

Your host, surrounded with love from WCK3 & Edmond. I seem to have embraced full on Beardom.

In my own mind I look like Daniel Day Lewis, & then I see a photograph & I am struck with the revelation that I actually come closer to late career Marlon Brando. Maybe the new book should be titled: Whiskey Pizza Love.

Just A Little Burt

I put together a custom music mix every month, & I will also produce a mix for special days & holidays. These mixes are quite the hot commodity in my circle. Independent of each other, I had a request from WCK3- “Stephen, I loved the April Mix. Thank you! But, you know… I am in the mood for a little Burt”, & the husband requested- “Steve, I would love to have just a little Burt to listen to when I have the house to myself. It would really help my mood.”  Even Little Jake wanted a little Burt. What a pleasure it was to listen to a big chunk of the Burt Bacharach/ Hal David catalogue, attempting to choose just 17 for the Just A Little Burt Mix.

Burt & I have quite the relationship. It started in 1959 with Heavenly, recorded by Johnny Mathis (there was a lot of Johnny Mathis in my parent’s album collection). A little 8 year old Stevie grooved around the house, dancing & singing to the Shirelles- Baby, It’s You. I would croon Don’t Make Me Over into my brass candlestick microphone, brushing my Beatle Haircut bangs out of my eyes, as I watched my uncannily mature performance in the bathroom mirror. As a youth, I couldn’t get enough of Dusty Springfield doing I Just Don’t Know What To Do With Myself & The Look Of Love (& the Sergio Mendes version!).

In my teen years I stayed with my Burt & Dusty, but Dionne Warwick joined my album collection. What song could be more perfect for 1967 than What The World Needs Now Is Love?


Burt Bacharach has never left my listening orbit in the past 50 years. In the 1980s, I took to singing- I Say A Little Prayer  at auditions for shows with rock or pop scores. I could sing the hell out of it, & Burt's songs are not easy to sing. I thought I was being so cutting edge & ironic to sing this great Bacharach song without changing the gender. I got me more attention than parts.

No other Bacharach work is more meaningful to me than his 1998 Grammy winning collaboration with Elvis Costello- Painted From Memory. It is just one of those albums that came out at a perfect time in my life, when I needed to hear it. The collaboration started with God Give Me Strength, a commission for the 1996 film Grace of My Heart, a terrific movie about the Brill Building songwriters. The 2 master craftsman of pop expanded the project to this full album, the first for Costello after an absence of 2 years, & for Bacharach after an absence of 21 years. Lyrics & music are credited to both Bacharach & Costello, but I can really feel, to some degree, the melodies are by Burt & the lyrics by Elvis.

God Give Me Strength (along with God Only Knows by the Beach Boys) is a song that holds real power for me. It was a time & place where the composition just spoke to me, as if the duo of Bacharach & Costello knew my life or had read my diary. I find the entire album enthralling, magnificent,& sweeping. It has all the usual Bacharch touches: unusual chord progressions, striking syncopated rhythmic patterns, irregular phrasing, frequent modulation, & odd, changing meters & great climactic effects.



Possibly inspired by his new partner, Costello's lyrics hit new highs on this album. He explores the familiar themes from interesting new perspectives. This House is Empty Now has the narrator walking round an empty home, left alone by his partner & looking to face life alone, remembering the times they shared in their now deserted home. This House Is Empty Now, with Burt on baton & piano, & Elvis on vocals is absolutely sublime, & a true high in the art of the song. The lyric- "Does the extinguished candle care about the darkness?" is almost tossed as an aside, yet it is absolutely heartbreaking. This song is the perfect bookend to Hal David & Burt Bacharach’s towering masterpiece- A House Is Not A Home.


The title track- Painted From Memory, suggests that eventually even the faces of those we loved will fade from memory. I Still Have That Other Girl is about an affair that is doomed before it starts, but I read it as about the Husband & my 1st dog- Baby, who died at the time that we were listening to Painted From Memory. I wanted her to know that I would never forget her, & that she could never be replaced in my heart. The Sweetest Punch.

Mr. Bacharach, looking good in his 80s.

We all can use a little Burt. To make us feel & to make us remember. It always helped that he was & is still, a real dreamboat. He turns an astonishing 82 today. Happy Birthday, Mr. Bacharach!

One More From Elvis Costello

I have spent a number of rainy days with a little whiskey & conjuring up some tears because of this impossibly beautiful & angry song by Costello & Burt Bacharach... literally asking for God to give me strength, including the day that our first dog- Baby died in 1998.

Happy Birthday to Elvis Costello!

In sheer number of albums, the artists best represented in my music collection would be Tony Bennett, Frank Sinatra, The Police & Sting, Van Morrison, but the top of the heap would be Elvis Costello. I was crazy about him from the first listening, which would have been Alison from My Aim Is True in 1977. Declan Patrick MacManus was born on this day in 1954. He is one of my most favorite & important musicians, with much of his music speaking personally to me. Elvis Costello is married to jazz artist Diana Krall. He has straddled the genres of punk, new wave, rock, pop, pub rock, traditional Irish, classical/symphonic, art song, country & soundtracks. He certainly has been prolific with 37 albums in 32 years. I used to sing Alison for auditions for shows with rock scores, & I modestly have to say that I think it is one of my best numbers. I admire his songwriting skills & I am zany for his singing with the hoarse little catch in his voice. Favorites are too hard to narrow down, but: Watching The Detectives, Shipbuilding (with trumpet solo by Chet Baker!), Almost Blue, A Good Year For the Roses, Everyday I Write The Book, She, & God Give Me Strength. I could rhapsodize on & on, but I will just share one with you. This is the best cover of a country song ever!



And, of course, Alison: (but you really should hear me do it sometime. Just ask.)

Sulphur To Sugercane

I have very eclectic taste in music. I am crazy about Lady GaGa & I am zany for Alison Krause. I love to listen to Tony Bennett & I dig Iggy Pop. The first 20 Artists on my Ipod: A-Ha, A.R. Rahman, ABBA, ABC, Adele, Aerosmith, Al Green, Al Wilson, Alains Moressette (not exactly sure why), Alicia Bridges, Alison Moyet, Amy Winehouse, Andrew Bird, Andy Bell, Ani DiFranco, Anita O'Day, Annie Lennox, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Antony & The Johnsons, & Aretha Franklin.
This is my favorite new song (for the moment). Elvis Costello rates the second biggest selection of individual CDs by any artist in my music collection. He is not gay & today is not his birthday.