Closing Walls and Ticking Clocks

Man, it really feels like we're racing against the clock right now... not enough hours to work on all the thing we want to have ready before the weekend!


Last night I was back in the Hudson Valley, cleaning the house and getting ready for the arrival of my family. The house is big... takes a good few hours to get it all covered. In the midst of all that (and looking for old photos/video with Sarah), I forgot to complete my blog post for Monday! You'll have to take my word for it, but I did have this video clip saved in my drafts yesterday... so I did have something prepared and underway (I'm going to go ahead and date it for July 9, anyway). 


This Coldplay song, "Every Teardrop is a Waterfall," will forever be linked with my engagement--I had it on a mix tape that I played that evening in September as we rounded Niagara Falls, and the urgency of it perfectly matched that feeling of racing against the clock and the excitement over what was yet to come.

There seems to be a ongoing association with deadlines and Coldplay's music for me... a few years back I was invited to film a portion of a very intimate concert they gave at the Avalon (now the House of Blues) in Boston. I got the word very last minute, so I hopped in my car and drove the couple hours from the Berkshires to Beantown... unfortunately, my Mapquest took me out of my way, and I missed the opening songs I had been invited to record... disappointing, but I did get to see the rest of the show for free, and that was a good time. 

SWAPed In, SOULed Out

Peace! Great photo from the 2011 SWAP year-end show
(with my media display in the background).
Photo © Jonathan Wesikopf. All rights reserved.
http://goodpoets.tumblr.com/page/6

I spent the day on the farm today, working on the Spoken Word Almanac Project poems I have committed to finishing for their mid-year show... It's a good thing I didn't agree to do all of it, because creating visuals for even just a handful of poems is taking longer than I expected... it may have something to do with the fact that I can't do something half-heartedly... when I'm being creative, I tend to pour all my soul into it... but I'm not getting so hung up on every last detail this time around... because I can't afford to spend the time. Keep it simple, soul boy.


Speaking of soul, there are a couple of interesting covers I heard today... One is Willie Nelson doing a version of the beautiful Coldplay song "The Scientist." Willie has such a vulnerability in his voice, and it's an interesting take on the tune... I first heard this in a Chipotle commercial, and was immediately drawn in (of course, the original is just a classic song): 





After taking a couple mile run later in the day, I happened to hear this next song on the radio...I had no idea that Otis covered The Beatles! The man never disappointed... he was just in a class all his own: