learning and playing other people's songs (the music itself delivers the answer)

it is the anniversary of the peter, paul and enza gig. (sadly it looks like the trio is back on hold for the next little while). 

horsemouth is of the opinion that you have to change the songs you do. he has never seen the point in 'playing it like the record'. as a young guitarist he wishes he had engaged more with learning and playing other people's songs. he would have learnt a lot from doing that.  

the change with horsemouth comes when he starts playing guitar round at people's parties (and round the campfire). at that point it becomes pretty much pointless to do anything else other than sing songs that people know.

at the moment all collaborations are on hold. in theory howard should have more time after christmas but he also has a backlog of his own songs he wants to get on with (and songs where he plays guitar this time).  enza and howard are too overworked to be getting on with things, catastro/fille is stuck putting lyrics on one tune (that would probably be better off with wordless vocals). 

people have their own creative processes and are constitutionally not inclined to take horsemouth's (admittedly self-serving)  'advice'. horsemouth is in a 'tetchy' part of the year where he is frustrated with humanity. probably the only thing to do is to sit down and 'woodshed' and work out another round of songs to record. 

the bert jansch (LA turnaround) film has surfaced again. it's a great document. bert is remarkably graceless here, and not just to the dude from the monkeys. and yet the music is awesome. red rhodes (amazing pedal steel on fresh as a sweet sunday morning)  and the other session dudes come across as sensible and hard working.

in a way too much talking and hanging out is a bad idea (it just gives you more chances to get on each others nerves). horsemouth is a great believer in the idea that the music itself delivers the answer - as soon as you start talking about the music you just drown it out. when things work they obviously work, when they don't that too is obvious. 

horsemouth is not process oriented, despite his manifestly limited talents he is in fact results oriented (he loves the moment when it comes together). this (and a fundamental lack of musical knowledge) is probably why he can't play jazz. 

it is 30 years since the death of harry everett smith (avant-garde film maker and compiler of the american folk anthology). we are 22/23 days off the winter solstice (the darkest day of the year). he is still a fortnight or so off his booster jab. horsemouth is supposed to be at a conference on zoom this morning (but the link hasn't appeared).