I’ve always loved David Garland’s songs, and have written about them many times. He’s still making them, and he’s got a new album coming out, Conversations with the Cinnamon Skeleton, that he’s made – believe it or not – with Sean Lennon, supermodel Charlotte Kemp Muhl, and English songwriter Vashti Bunyan. Whew. One song from it, The Long View, is up on Vimeo with a charming animation, pictured here. Even better, David’s moved into my neighborhood, so he’s about the only former denizen of the old Downtown scene that I get to rail against the new world order with.
Meanwhile, my son Bernard is hanging out with Downtown drone-bender David First, who was also his guitar and electronics teacher. Together with drummer Greg Fox (late of Liturgy and now in Guardian Alien with Bernard) and vocalist Kyp Malone, they’ve formed a group called New Party Systems, and have been concertizing in support of Occupy Wall Street, an extremely worthy cause. Here’s a video they made about the 99% and featuring some of them, including some of the protesting UC Davis students who agreed to be sprayed with whipped cream. Bernard was helping in the kitchen at Zuccotti Park almost from the beginning. I won’t hear any criticism of the movement, it’s a fantastic thing.
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