tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14678103.post-35380691544032085642008-02-26T16:16:00.007-05:002008-02-26T23:47:01.816-05:00We stopped somewhere in the south on the last tour to put my band in a motel and park our tour bus outside of it. On tour, Billy and I sleep with the dumpsters and the parking lot animals.<br /><br />I like dumpsters; you can throw garbage in them. And I like parking lot animals 'cause they have a hard time but they make the best of it. They're also fun to watch in the morning while I drink my tea and wait for the band to wake up and bring me oranges and little boxes of cereal from the breakfast bar.<br /><br />Sometimes parking lot animals are excellent: giant roaches, squirrels, peregrine falcons, snakes. Sometimes, they're just fine, like the morning birds that wake all southerners at dawn. Morning birds (there are many different kinds -- all they gotta do is wake up and start singing in order to fall into this category) remind me of my childhood in Georgia. I love lying on my bus bed and listening to them, wondering where the hell I am.<br /><br />Except the birds that sang to us this particular morning began singing at a time that was only <i>technically</i> morning, like three minutes past midnight or something. And they sounded awfully...agitated. We spent a restless night hoping they were okay and wishing they'd shut up even if they weren't.<br /><br />Somehow, they made it into a <a href="http://kristinhersh.cashmusic.org/downloads.php">song</a>.<br /><br />I especially like the hypnotic repetition in the first part of this track. Each instrument is playing its own loop; only the rhythm guitar and bass are playing together. The resultant cacophony is not as unsettling as you might think, given that your ear learns a bit more of each part as it goes by.<br /><br />The quiet part, I couldn't make quiet enough. I just pulled instruments out, then pulled out more until I had only sweet/sad left. Something about a "purifying sin" demands a certain amount of respect and, for a musician, that usually means <i>get out of the way</i>.<br /><br /><i>Morning Birds is <a href="http://kristinhersh.cashmusic.org/downloads.php">here</a>.</i><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/14678103-3538069154403208564?l=www.kristinhersh.com%2Fblog' alt='' /></div>Kristinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09808468387997174018noreply@blogger.com21