Almost all the songs on this album contain keyboards, guitar, bass, harmonica and percussion. I play all instruments (except percussion, which I achieve by creating and/or modifying percussion loop segments). 1. Black Lily -- In 2008, Father's Day was coming up and I was thinking about my own father, Frederick Dyer, who had died four years earlier. In 1951, when he was quite young he had published a small book of poems, titled: The Black Lily. It was his only book of poems and most of them are very short. (He had started off wanting to become a novelist, playwright, and poet but, instead, ended up writing management-related books. For example, he co-authored, with his brother, several books, including: Bureaucracy versus Creativity, 1965. ) I had always liked a number of my father's poems from The Black Lily. I got the idea that I might be able to create a tribute to his memory by combining a few of his short poems to form lyrics to a song. Here are some of his poems (some very short) that I adapted to produce the resulting lyrics for my song. The Black Lily: Roses and roses we planted. Bloomed the black lily. Absence: With you, there were days and nights. Now there is only time. Night Fever: Restless, I go outside. There the wind blows, with a strange cold fever. Second verse from: The Whole World Be Thy Grave: … The whole world will be thy grave. The sky and cloud its headstone. Last verse from: Lanciotta to Francesca: Keep a promise, break a vow and I shall be in hell and tell the Devil how. First verse from: Alexander's Corner: A crooked moon, a twisted wind, and one more wave upon the sand … The Flood: Winds ruffle the night, rain rattles the dark; the black sea pounds on the long shore. And the dark foam rises within me. Unfortunately, my father died before I started creating music CDs but I hope that (if he's out there somewhere listening) he approves of portions of his lyrics appearing in this song. 2. Fire Storm -- Besides the Black Lily song, this is the only other song I have composed to honor my father's memory, by combining/adapting verses from a number of short poems appearing in his book The Black Lily (© 1951 Frederick C. Dyer, Exposition Press, Hicksville NY). Here are some of my father's poems, that inspired the lyrics for my song Fire Storm: Wrack: Fragile! Yet she bent far without breaking and remains: twisted. It Is an Ancient Story: I gave you my heart to hold. How then are your hands bruised? Last verse from: Forfended: Talons for tigress. Venom for asp. Covin, the maiden, woman is guile. Ernest Dowson: In the corners of my pleasure lurks a shadow, sinister and low. In the music's pretty measure, lurks an oboe, menacing and low. Encounter: After the taut string, the broken cry. As such things are -- so I learned. No fool I, this time, this time. Second verse from: Rephaim: Within my skull my thoughts hang like bats and feed on dust, until they dry up and rattle. 3. Nothing Slows -- I had the music to this song long before I came up with the lyrics. The lyrics may seem very simple but, ironically, it took a long time to come up with them. 4. Fall Bound -- I had composed 3 nice musical themes and arranged them into a melodic structure. Now I had to find lyrics to go with the various themes. For some reason I became interested in the question of what kinds of actions can be composed with themselves. For example, you can say: "I hope that you hope ..." but you can't really say: "I walk that you walk." You can say: "You know that I know ..." but you can't really say: "You buy that I buy." So I started writing a love song that would use self-composable actions and this constraint helped bring about the lyrics for this song. 5. When Pigs Can Fly -- On Topanga Canyon Blvd. in Topanga, CA there is a wooden statue of a large pink pig, with out-stretched wings, perched on top of a tall pole. I enjoy seeing that pig whenever I drive by, because it implies that the impossible might be possible. One day, while driving by that statue, the idea came to me in which the singer tells a young woman that he'll never love her until "pigs can fly" (or until "hell freezes over", etc.). Later, he realizes he must be falling in love with her because such strange events start happening. I hunted on the web and discovered, luckily, that there is actually a small town (in Norway) named "Hell" and so "Hell" could actually freeze over. 6. Love's Castaways -- I decided that I didn't like the lyrics to the original song "Your Eyes I've Looked Into" (on my 2nd CD: Our Unwinding Time). They were so personal that (as I later realized) no one would know what they were about, so I wrote new lyrics. Musically, I also made changes by adding a key-shift and a chorus. 7. I'll Say It Nice -- With just a melody I would mumble random words whenever I sang it. Over time, an idea formed about two people who desire each other but don't quite trust each other (I know a young, just starting-out couple who are in this situation.) 8. EarthSong (Revisited)-- I wrote this song back in 1970 (first Earth Day) but never published it. It first appeared on my CD: Nothing Seems Like What It Seems (2006) and was nearly 7 minutes long (which is too long). The new arrangement is shorter; has a key-shift in the last third of the song and the lyrics have been changed in multiple places. 9. EarthSong II (Revisited) -- The first arrangement appeared on my 4th CD (Compli-intricated Life). This new arrangement includes two key-shifts and so has more musical variation. 10. Every Now And Then -- I was listening to a retro-music radio channel while driving home and a kind-of Latin sound was playing. That sound inspired the music to this song. 11. Her Karaoke Man -- A reviewer of my 1st CD (Nothing Seems Like What It Seems) said that, on one of my songs, I sounded like an "overeager karaoke star". That comment inspired this song, which consists of fragments of different melodies and lyrics that I made up. I then inserted some allusions to various groups (e.g., Righteous Brothers, The Beatles, Roy Orbison, Queen, Bob Dylan, Jethro Tull, Eric Burden and The Animals, etc.). 12. Under the Microscope (Revisited) -- This song first appeared in my 4th CD (Compli-intricated Life). In this new arrangement I have altered some chords and parts of the melody (and also some of the lyrics). I enjoy offering new arrangements of prior songs to the listener (that's why my CD contains 14 songs.) By the way, when you hear the word "Dermatophagoides" -- that refers to a class of tiny mites that eat dead flakes of human skin. 13. Shade on Shade-1 -- This is an instrumental piece. It has a number of minor chords (which gives it a melancholy feel; thus the title). It contains harmonica, guitar, bass and keyboard. 14. A Cantar In Falsetto -- This is a humorous song I wrote in Spanish (the only song I have ever written in Spanish). In Italian, the term "in falsetto". In Spanish, the term is "en falsete". Both terms are used in the song. For those who don't know Spanish, here is a translation of the lyrics: To Sing in Falsetto: My friends gave me the brutal challenge, of singing in a high, loving falsetto. They gave me, jokingly, a small booklet, with lectures on enchanting falsettos. They lent me, to capture my spit, a dickey, because I have a powerful, slobbery falsetto. I told them "Quiet!" That now I will sing in falsetto. Now, to be a singer is my only challenge, but I have to achieve it, using falsetto. So they raised up a thick hedge, to give them protection, against my falsetto. I boasted that no dimwit grandson can duplicate my false falsetto, That no one has managed to give birth to a fetus with my type of flu-like, screechy falsetto. Then, I tried to sing a duet and began with a dual-cry falsetto. I think that I have a falsetto, nice and full, and clear! I understood that it's easier to pass through an eyelet than to sing in a high falsetto. I decided it's easily possible, this falsetto, but only after becoming a great horseback rider. Now, friend, watch out! Get away! Because I am about to sing in falsetto. Oh, the poor guy stayed and got mixed up in it. For that reason he died from my bewitching falsetto! Nowadays I sing in falsetto, but only when seated on the toilet! Ay! Ay! Ay! ...