Chit-Chat Check-In #105 Transcript

Hello, this is your Captain speaking.

I’m in the process of packing the Starship Casual for our sort of semi-yearly West Coast jaunt. Play some shows at Largo, visit some family, and it happens to be Christmas and Hanukkah. I honestly don’t know if there are other holidays right now. Is Kwanzaa happening right now? Does that change? I really don’t know, and I probably should. I apologize. But, if that’s what you’re doing, then I am 100% sending you my best wishes and wishing you a happy peaceful holiday.

Anyway, I have recorded a fair amount of covers for Hanukkah. I’m gonna celebrate by putting eight songs up. I think four or five today and then on the last night, I will put up another three or so. Three or four. Just to be in the swing of things.

First song, I think, will be “Silent Night.” Classic Hanukkah song about baby Jesus. Not written by Jews. One of the rare Christmas songs not written by a Jew. Written by some Germans. Some Christian Germans in the early 1800s. Written for guitar ‘cause apparently the organ had been flooded, so I guess a pastor wrote the lyrics and he took it to a guy who knew how to write music and he wrote a melody for a guitar. And I’m not playing that, I’m not looking at sheet music, but it’s my version of it. It’s an undeniably beautiful song.

I’ve always been touched by the image of people traveling across the desert to meet a baby. That just seems really whimsical and sweet. “Let’s go meet this baby.” I dunno, pretty cool. Whatever you believe, I think that that’s a cool, I dunno, tableau. I’m gonna use the word tableau. Look at that. I don’t even care if it’s wrong.

I found out a word I’ve been using a lot is wrong. I’ve always said that when someone, when a pastor or a religious scholar has their view of the universe and how their theology works, it’s their “cosmology.” I don’t think that’s true. I think that that’s not the right word. I think it’s “cosmogony.” So, there’s that. Which I’m just admitting. And if you read any interviews with me where I’ve said that and you’ve thought, “Wow, did he have a rabbi who was also studying to be a barber or a hair stylist?” you would be forgiven for thinking that I—I dunno, I was confusing people, I think.

And, to be honest, I haven’t even really looked it up. I just read the word “cosmogony” the other day, and in the context, I thought, “Oh shit, I’ve been using the wrong word for that.” But who knows, maybe it means both. But I’m not gonna look it up. I’m too busy packing and chit-chatting with the Starship Casual people presently.

Ok, I did a Meat Puppets song, “Climbing.” It’s one of my favorite songs, one of the formative records of my life, Meat Puppets’ II. A lot of people my age were changed by that record.

I did “Requiem” by Killing Joke, another lovely holiday message. Not sure why, I just wanted to figure out if I could play it on acoustic guitar. So I’m sharing that, even though it has really intense lyrics that don’t sound quite right in my mouth. I don’t know if I’ve ever sang the word “depravity” before, and I think you can tell when I try and sing it. Also, “cattle for slaughter.” I don’t know if that’s a phrase I’ve used.

And then I did a song called “Wish I Had Not Said That” by J. J. Cale. That’s kind of been on my mind because we played in Tulsa, and, you know, there’s a deep connection between J. J. Cale and Tulsa and I think [on] something I posted that week somebody had mentioned maybe we should do a J. J. Cale song, or I should. And so I did. And I don’t know if it’s one of the more well-known ones but I think it should be. My friend Bill Hader turned me onto that song not that long ago, because I was just more into the earlier records and that’s a somewhat mid-period or later record that had probably scooted past for some reason. I had my head in other places. But it’s great, you should listen to the real recording. It sounds so—I don’t know, his style is really singular. And I love it.

And then the last song is “Hard Rock Bottom of Your Heart” by Randy Travis but it was written by Hugh Prestwood, who I don’t know much about, but he wrote some other hit songs in the late eighties, nineties—Crystal Gayle’s song, “Something About the Sound of Something” [“The Sound of Goodbye”]. I’m not really helping you right now. If you look up Hugh Prestwood you’ll find some of his other songs. I don’t know if I’ve ever fallen in love with any of his songs as much as that one. I mean, Randy Travis’s voice is just undeniable and at the time, back in Uncle Tupelo days, listening to country music and liking it when country music sounded like country music, even though it was modern, Randy Travis seems like he could’ve sang country hit songs in any period. Although there’s not enough auto-tune on his voice for the current landscape of country music, which I’m not against, I’m just making note of it. But it’s just such a great song. And I was reminded of it for some reason recently just trying to think about songs from a certain period of my life for something I’m working on, and I listened to it and it’s pretty amazing how much I feel like I took something from that song, that one song. I hear it in the last Uncle Tupelo record, like “No Sense in Lovin’.” I hear something I took from that song in a lot of things on A.M. Maybe not something people would connect me to at all, which is the fun of it. I think one of the lovely things about music is you don’t have to get permission to be moved by something and inspired to make your own shit, [inspired] by something that, I don’t know, theoretically wasn’t made for you, or aimed at you.

Alright, this is a lot. This is a long Chit-Chat. Mark’s got his work cut out for him. So I should probably stop before it gets too long. And I’m not really talking to the Starship folks anymore, I’m talking to you, Mark. I love you. Alright, carry on, everyone. You too, Mark.