12.27.2009 A week of recording under our belts here in Tromso's Arctic quiet. The Disciplines album has done a lot to take shape. We've been playing 8 songs live on a regular basis, and a couple more songs were pretty much fleshed out tho not quite ready to play live. So, despite the fact we had two days off for Xmas, we recorded the music for ten songs, and I sang vocals on six of those. The studio exists in a space, built as an add-on to a building that is owned by the city and devoted to cultural activities. There's a cafe (dormant in winter); a music school, a film production company/post studio, various artist studios, etc. Of course, except for one evening of laughter and the smell of gluhwein, we've not seen evidence of anyone else in the building, it's sensibly abandoned for the holidays--art can wait. Well, one night when I was cleaning up the kitchenette, I was totally startled by the security guard who comes and does a walk thru in the night, then moves on to other buildings on his watch. Oh, and I went in the cafe one morning, and there were people in there. And, not being able to tell if I was the ghost, or if they were, my presence at the counter enacted not one iota of acknowledgment. Eventually, everyone walked out. I followed, the cafe was locked up, and all dispersed--again, I was treated as if invisible, and its possible I was. Now, despite the fact it's a kind of artistic center, the building itself is a classic in functional Norwegian dowdiness. For Norwegians it's all about what you have in your head, man...the green walls, creepy vinyl flooring, metal kitchen surfaces all serve a greater purpose, which is to survive in this Queen Maud Land which might otherwise chomp up and ruin a more precious, filigree'd edifice. The studio, added on many years after the main building's construction (more on that in a minute) is relatively cheery--we have hardwood floors here, and in the control room, modern, pleasant lighting. The main room is very big, with extremely high ceilings, roofed in corrugated metal, like a warehouse. Huge ducts and fluorescent lighting in those ice cube tray fixtures above, but with proper rheostat adjustment you can make it feel acceptable. Curtains ring the main room to control audio reflections, there's a big old Kawai grand piano, and, thanks to me, a tacky yellow ironing board. The band lives in the main building (they have a common foyer, from which we also access the tiny kitchenette next to the studio entrance) in a small apartment on the 2nd floor up. The apartment has three beds in two rooms, plus another kitchenette and a tiny bathroom. Typcial of Norwegian bathrooms, the shower is in the corner, and is only distinguished from the rest of the bathroom by a shower curtain that follows a rounded square track in the ceiling. Water hits the vinyl floor and spreads out--it's your duty to squeegee the water towards the drain after you finish your shower. Like I mentioned, there are three beds--and I was the last to arrive. So, when all four of us are here, I sleep in the studio, first on the couch, and lately on an inflatable mattress that our engineer, Jon Marius, brought over. I was using Ralla's and my coats to cover myself--more recently, I have borrowed a duvet. Things are looking up. The main building was built as a hospital sometime in the 20th century. Tromso built a bigger hospital later, and this place became a sanitarium for TB victims, esp. children. Those children, it turns out, were not treated well. The treatment back then was to strap them permanently to a bed, and if they cried--stuff their mouths. No joke--there's been lawsuits as the grown kids come to grips with the medical atrocities committed upon them. Now, it's been a cultural center for a long time now--the place does not have the vibe of Rigshospitalet or the Overlook Hotel. Well, not enough to freak me out, anyway--and I am very easy to freak out. I sleep two floors away from the rest of the guys, and am usually the last one up, puttering around, setting the dishwasher in motion, going for a last pee. Then laying down in the control room, with the sliding doors partially open to the big room--all night the fluctuations in the heating system causing all kinds of skittery noise. Again, no ghosts have offered their advice or admonitions despite my presence, so I guess the place has pretty well been exorcised--or the amateur phantoms simply outdone by the multiple blasphemies of art. Most days start of with negative double digit temps (in Celsius--roughly eqiuvalent to single digit positive temps in F). Tho we are on the positive side of the winter solstice, that doesn't give us much to work with yet. It's patently, palpably dark til about 9.30 each morning, and completely dark again by 2 in the afternoon at the latest. On clear days, which are most of them, thankfully, the orange glow of dawn proceeds directly into the the orange glow of dusk in an unbroken display of the promise of the sun's return--in tease fashion. Twilight is a couple of hours long, the perfect chemical blue that I associate with late summer nights is the dominant color. Now, we don't have much in the way of windows here, and the 'front' windows at the entry, actually on an obscure side of the building that faces a steep hill, don't afford any views of all the phenomena I just described. It's important to get some light, but many days it's much easier to just sau screw it and stay indoors. This pretty much means I am sleepy and groggy much of the time. The body just doesn't have a reason to start itself up. So, in our Apollo-Soyuz-esque microverse, we plug away on our music, and write more when we run out of stuff that we know. Then, Christmas came and work stopped. Baard and Ralla had flights home on the 23rd, but Bjorn and I worked that day. So, no way to get home for me. On the 24th, we were taken in my Pernille Sparboe, whose EP I produced at the same studio as we're working in now, back in May. She took us for Christmas dinner at the home of her sister and family, and on the 25th, we hung out at her flat (which has a great view of the sunrise/set) and dined on lutefisk. It was a lifesaver, but I was still extremely homesick. My headspace was somewhat weirded out by the fact that on the 23rd and 25th I watched two horrifying films that use isolation to terrifying effect--"The Cube", which is an early work by Muppetmaster Jim Henson, that is as far from fuzzy cuteness as you can get; and "Funny Games", the Austrian version, Michael Haneke's first version of his exploration of violence and our relationship with it in the media and the arts. Bleak no doubt...haaaalp. Tromso on the 25th December was absolutely locked down, nuclear winter style. Only the local gas station/convenience store was open, and it was so intensely forlorn in the city that we felt compelled to go there and just check it out a bit. Oddly, there was someone hard at work on the 25th in the shipyard, where big fishing boats undergo repairs--a power tool was clearly being put to some purpose in one of the vessels in drydock. As much as we needed a little breather, and as lovely as Pernille and her family were for taking care of us (and I can't thank them enough), I was glad to be back at work yesterday--I needed a sense of purpose to be this far from home. Progress has resumed, and it feels good. I've been writing yesterday, my brain may be starved for photons but it keeps sparking on. Love KS Tromso, NORWAY 12.19.2009 VIENNA, 12/14 I was out the door only as everyone else was starting to wake up around the house...but actually well rested enough to not really need to sleep much more. Yes, I fell asleep on the plane, a little. But it wasn't the usual amount of fatigue. In all the days I'd been at home in the previous couple of weeks, I was actually catching up. However, getting up at 6 this morning was initiating a process where the need for more catching up would catch up with me soon enough. I landed at 10.30, and was met by my friend Christian, (now *Doktor* Stiegler) who had put togheter tonite's show. He got me in a cab, and took me to the Hotel Furstenhof, my usual address in Vienna. I was pleased to find that my portrait, taken last year, now has a choice spot as you head up the main staircase. No time to nap, I dropped my stuff, turned up the heat in my room, headed next door to the Westend Cafe to have some grilled calf's liver on salad, and back to my room. It was about 21 F, so I didn't really have the nerve, or the body fat, to endure much. Christian collected me and we headed to FM4, where I taped a radio session and interview. Ben Martin, my bandmate for this show and my 2007 full band show, had volunteered to help me out as well, and we did some new songs of mine duo style, plus 'Birds' by Neil Young and 'Oslo' by the D's. Eva Umbauer gave us quite a lenghty interview, which segued into a lively debate on the guilt or innocence of Amanda Knox...then it was time for soundcheck. The Kunsthalle Project Space is a glass box subdivided into smaller boxes inside--the largest being a very popular restaurant, the smallest being some kind of mini gallery. There are two medium sized galleries and one of them was devoted to my show this evening. Tho' they have musical performances there quite often, it's not actually designed for that--there's no stage, no acoustic treatment of the room, and the PA as it turns out is pretty dog-eared. My band for the evening was one Daniel Leschka on drums; one Stefan Fallmann on bass; Ben Martin on guitar and some vocals; and Georg Tran, aka Landscape Izuma, on guitar and some vocals. I played guitar, harmonica, and piano. I had sent ahead almost all the songs I'd written since Soft Commands, about 7 of them, and these guys had done a great job learning them, and filling out parts from the minimal demos and making the songs into...realized pieces of music. In addition to this ambitious program of new songs, we also did some of my older songs, "I Believe In You" by Neil Young, "Solar Sister" and a smashing version of "Waterfalls" by TLC. I was joined on my duet song, "Doesn't It Remind You", by able duetter Mariles Jagsch and on Waterfalls by Paper Bird. All performed marvelously. A rather grueling soundcheck/rehearsal to learn a 17-song set, with songs that I had certainly never performed before, so...a lot to dig into, but it came together. Tom the sound guy was not so happy with things, he has been struggling to get a better PA in the place, but I felt OK about it. Unf., in the show, the PA proved Tom right, and did a lot of crinkly crackly stuff. Mic connections were bad, and I was hopping off stage to gaffer tape things a couple of times...but, it added a goofy drama to the whole thing. My 8th solo show in Vienna since the release of Soft Commands, on a Monday night, and people actually came. I opened the show with a long monologue, then we kicked off with "110 or 220V". It was poorly lit, it was awkward, and it was totally what I'm all about. And lo and behold, it turned into a really good show, consistent with my previous Vienna showings without doubt. Climaxing with a very rousing version of "Waterfalls" and a long rap about a cosmic canary that may or may not contain the universe. VIENNA, 12/15 They have the good sense to serve breakfast at the Furstenhof til noon. I was up at ten tho, and by afternoon I was shopping (nothing exciting, just stocking up on toiletries before all my upcoming travel was underway) and listening thru the songs I needed more work on for the A Life A Song A Cigarette show that night. This was their big gig, since the release of Black Air, the album I produced for them last year. It was a radio broadcast and sold out live concert in the Radio Kultur Haus, the theater at the Austrian National Broadcast network (ORF). The band--already a 5 piece--was to be augmented with three more string players, two horn players, and a keyboard player. I was joining in to play some guitar and sing vocal parts that I did on the album, plus sit down at the nine-foot Bosendorfer for a couple of numbers. Again, an ambitious program that required a lengthy soundcheck. And, like the night before, it was worth it. I sang two duets with Stefan, the singer/guitarist--both acoustic numbers, with parts that were originally sung by female singers, so quite challenging in terms of range. And I sang on some rock numbers too. BTW I highly recommend the album! In the encore we did a cover of Nick Cave's "The Ship Song" and after being very careful to play the ALASAC songs perfectly (it's really awful to *know* the gig is being recorded) we could loosen up a bit on this cover, and...woah. I really let go and sang like crazy. Woah. I don't even *know* the song very well...but it was in me that night! All in all I was very proud of ALASAC and what they put together, it was a total command performance, and they assembled a great cast and brought the songs to life marvelously...I was really glad to be a part of it. The RKH has a cafe next door, so we were able to have a drink after the show, and there were folks there like Toph from Trouble Over Tokyo, and other local musical highlights of Vienna's indie scene. Nice people to see. Then I had to get out of there, and sleep a bit. I was up at 3.30, you see, as my flight was at 6. Oh my. I did sleep well on that flight. Let's put it this way, my flight was so early I was home before Dom & Aden were out of bed. That night I went to see Kurt Vile play an excellent set at Le Scopitone, (where I'll be performing in March 2010), much more detailed and sophisticated sounding than the wail and drang at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple last month (I liked both shows). Kurt gave me his "Constant Hitmaker" CD which is excellent. I spent the rest of the week just doing family things, but also finding a ton of things to organize in the worlds of the Disciplines, the Posies, Big Star, and my solo work--I am not exaggerating, things were piling up in an incredibly ominously good way. 2010 is booked, more or less. On Friday nite I went to see Lippie play a rather autodestructed set at a tiny place near my home called La Loge. In trying to find it, I first entered an art happening, and a Christmas-cheer enhanced Flairs which was fun, then I found La Loge next door, as Lippie commenced to break her equipment, burst a balloon, seem to be about to fall of the tiny podium (what was meant to be a stage)...it was demented, beautiful, a mess, and genius. Everyone loved it, too. I think she was horrified, or at least she acted that way afterwards, but...it didn't matter. Now I'm in Norway, having flown up here today. As I left my home this morning, saying goodbye to my family and knowing I won't see them until NEXT YEAR I thought...what the hell am I doing? Holiday travel means delayed planes and as such today was no disappointment, but I got here, and Joel, who is assisting Jon Marius on the engineering of these sessions for THE DiSCiPLiNES second album, was a cheerful sight to see at the airport, and feel good about being here...it's kinda isolated, even in terms of being relative to Tromso. When I arrived, the other Disciplines were already here, set up and getting sounds ready. We ran thru a song, and it sounds really, really good. I was depressed, I'll be honest, to leave my home after such a good stretch of relatively unbroken togetherness (going to Vienna for 48 hours hardly counts when compared to doing back to back tours and recording projects for weeks at a time). But the guys, and Jon Marius, and Joel, and some smoked salmon made me feel better about spending the holidays in Ice Station Zebra. I will make this effort worth it... Love KS Tromso NORWAY 12.13.2009 I made it home to Paris Sunday, we dropped Dani's rental car at Orly airport, and his the guy putting on his show that night picked us up and dropped me at home. I had every intention to attend his show, but not long before I was set to go out, I had some stomach troubles, and let's say they prevented me from straying too far. I was in for the night. I had thought I had gotten over it, and was walking to the metro, when disaster threatened again...so that, as they say, was that. The rest of the week was spent at home. Working on new music, taking care of all the things I don't have time to do working and touring non stop (doctor, dentist, equipment repairs etc). Meals at home and at neighborhood spots--with the family, or once, on my own when Dom was working and Aden was with her nanny. I drank more and ate more and exercised more and slept more and read more and just enjoyed what was essentially my holiday break. I also sequenced the albums for the Sad Knights and Oh, Libia! in anticipation of their mastering dates this month, and approved the master for the Twice album. I spent time shopping Sunday in the market near our place, running into Xavier B. (Tahiti 80 etc) always nice, we are neighbors of a sort, equidistant from this market but in opposite directions. There were evenings where after putting down my book or newspaper, I let Aden fall asleep on me, while I paid minimal attention to some American B movie dubbed in French. Good to catch up a bit. My favorite discovery from this time is a film called 'La Antena' I read a review of it in the Stranger, and it sounded intriguing. I asked about it while in Argentina, where the film was made (directed by a guy named Esteban Sapir). There is a great store for DVDs and movie memorabilia in Buenos Aires called Cine Si, which I dropped in and asked the proprietor, Julieta, if she had the film in stock, she didn't but said to email her in a month or so. And so I did, and she had it, and it was sent to an American address I use--the shipping and DVD in total was about $15. With this little pause, I had time to watch it, and what a surprise it turned out to be. Part Fritz Lang, part Alphaville, part City of Lost Children, part Eraserhead...a fable in black & white that takes place in a wonderfully realized, imaginary city. it's essentially a silent movie, since the main part of the plot concerns the fact that an evil media baron, who controls the only TV network, has managed to steal the voices of all the citizens. So, when the people 'speak' there are words, text, emerging from them or floating around them, all in very imaginitive ways. My DVD menu showed that English subtitles were available, but in fact, they didn't work for some reason. But that didn't matter. What Spanish I know was absolutely sufficient to follow the story--it's told much more with the action than with the words. All of this is accompanied by a brilliant score by Leo Sujatovich. In fact, the opening sequence is a wonderful ballet of hands 'playing' a typewriter in time to elaborate piano music. Really an incredible marriage of images, design, and music throughout the film. So many nice details, too--the cityscape is in fact a model, about 75 small buildings--and shots are filmed among them and greenscreened--for example: they would move a tiny camera down and around the streets, and then from the camera's perspective, sumperimpose the hood and hood ornament of a car, and voila--you are sure the car is driving thru the city--not even noticing that you are looking out the window of the car at a miniature world. It's hard to describe--but it's a seamless integration of sets, locations, and models. And actors of course! Highly recommended. You can get it on DVD in the UK, like here at amazon.co.uk or you can order it from cine si. the film was released a couple of years ago, and I know Mr. Sapir is working on a new script, I truly look forward to what comes next from this amazing team. Love KS Paris 12.06.2009 This week has been a productive one, in a very different rhythm than usual. No working for other folks, just working on new music. Going for so long without a writing break (I mean, I seriously haven’t had a writing retreat in a couple of years) means that access to that place where songs come from is highly available...I just turn off my thoughts and get out of the way, and my subconscious has been working on whatever equations it has been working on these months, and starts spewing forth results. A bit lecture-y, too--like “dude, you’ve been ignoring me, and I have some things to let you know”. So, by stepping out of the way, so far some 4 really good songs have come out of it. My last work, a tambourine part for the Bob Wilcox record I’d been working on over the weekend, was done and I could go on to writing. However, the end of solitude, solitude that I desire so very much, is the death of a thousand cuts--no need to say, that the end of a heavy period of work, 3 solid months of record making and touring, means that there’s a LOT of unfinished business--doctors to be seen, guitars to be repaired. I started Pilates classes again to take a forward offensive against the holiday lethargy (as if I’ll have any). And of course my family should get some of me too--I’ve been head down in work for months, and I’ll be leaving in a week and half for essentially 2 solid months of work, travel and touring in time zones distant enough from CET as to be almost absurd. Better get some airtime on the Hubble, that’s how far away I’ll be. Also, Twice, the band I’ve been working with much of this fall, had a listening party for their album, and this was in conjunction with a show in the bar Truskel, near to the studio where we made the album. The place was packed, and I was honored to be asked to join them onstage, singing and playing tambourine (things I definitely didn’t do on the song in question, but it was fine). I had a few nice ovations just for the concept of being the producer of the album (even tho almost no one’s heard it yet--it’s still being mastered). It was playing at the studio, where people went after the show for champagne, snacks, and a LOT of smoking. CLERMONT-FERRAND On Saturday, after spending the morning and early afternoon at Aden’s school for their holiday festivities, I headed to Gare de Lyon (luckily the torrential downpour that had trapped Dom & I earlier had stopped) and boarded the slow train for Clermont-Ferrand. I was glad to have some down time, to sleep, read, all that. Listen to a bootleg of the REM show I saw in Seattle in 1986... Upon arrival, I met up with Gaylord, who put the show together. He also released the Dani Llamas record that I played on, and Dani was playing this show too, driving from Bordeaux that day. Gaylord took me to the venue, La Puy de la Lune (a ‘puy’ is a well, and I think there was a Puy de la Lune there, many things around the bar are also called ‘Lune’, so it must have been quite a landmark). Dani was there, by now, and soon arrived St. Augustine, who I had played with at my last show in C-F, the 2006 blockbuster at the Coop de Mai. Francois, as he is really known, had a cellist with him today, and they played together seamlessly. The Puy de la Lune music room is a tiny basement, lit with soft blue lights, that fits about 50 people, and that’s how many we had. Even though it was December, it was soon hot down there--there were some bright lights pointed at the performance area, a tiny raised stage in the arches of the cave, which during my set, I asked to borrow someone in the front row’s sweater, and unscrewed the bulbs. The club was so small that we didn’t use a PA. The digital piano, which was built into a wooden frame to make it resemble an acoustic piano, had its own speakers; the small amp Gaylord rented amply supported my guitar and St. Augustine’s acoustic. The cellist, who had a great medieval French name--Edewige--and Dani’s acoustic guitar, needed no amplification. Voices were unassissted in any way, just singing into the air, and you could hear everything just fine. My kind of place. Everyone played about 45 minutes, I managed to squeeze and hour long set in there just under the curfew. I also joined Dani for the last songs of his set, playing parts in theory based on what I did on the record, but in reality adapting the local circumstances to the music--I played piano and sang. In my set I played guitar and stood inches away from the front row, and then took to the piano. Playing mostly my new material plus a few oldies, including ‘Please Return It’ on the piano. I even debuted one brand new song from my writing week...it went over very well. Because I was pressed for time, my show had a nice manic edge to it, not unlike my show at the Apolo in Barcelona a couple of months ago, that also had to fit into an hour-long format. I’m not used to that short of a show, you know I like to play like Springsteen, but actually, it really works. It’s so easy to only have to sustain the energy of a show for 60 minutes, it makes me put quite a bit more intensity into every vocal... After the show we crashed at Gaylord’s place, and he fed us and took great care of us, and now I’m in the Berlingo with Dani and his g.f. Sylvia, driving a few hundred clicks to Paris...and over a week free from shows, which will be devoted to writing time yet again. Love KS A71 to Paris

The latest release by Ken Stringfellow is a split EP with Spain's Muy Fellini, featuring never-heard-before music incl. Ken's take on Bob Dylan, released by King of Patio records in Spain on Oct 8, 2009. Order it directly from Muy Fellini here www.myspace.com/muyfellini 10" VINYL ONLY!!! Subscribe to the RSS feed to keep up to date on all things KS! older news : 8/3/2003 05/01/2004 - 06/01/2004 06/01/2004 - 07/01/2004 07/01/2004 - 08/01/2004 08/01/2004 - 09/01/2004 09/01/2004 - 10/01/2004 10/01/2004 - 11/01/2004 11/01/2004 - 12/01/2004 12/01/2004 - 01/01/2005 01/01/2005 - 02/01/2005 02/01/2005 - 03/01/2005 03/01/2005 - 04/01/2005 04/01/2005 - 05/01/2005 05/01/2005 - 06/01/2005 06/01/2005 - 07/01/2005 07/01/2005 - 08/01/2005 08/01/2005 - 09/01/2005 09/01/2005 - 10/01/2005 10/01/2005 - 11/01/2005 11/01/2005 - 12/01/2005 12/01/2005 - 01/01/2006 01/01/2006 - 02/01/2006 02/01/2006 - 03/01/2006 03/01/2006 - 04/01/2006 04/01/2006 - 05/01/2006 05/01/2006 - 06/01/2006 06/01/2006 - 07/01/2006 07/01/2006 - 08/01/2006 08/01/2006 - 09/01/2006 09/01/2006 - 10/01/2006 10/01/2006 - 11/01/2006 11/01/2006 - 12/01/2006 12/01/2006 - 01/01/2007 01/01/2007 - 02/01/2007 02/01/2007 - 03/01/2007 03/01/2007 - 04/01/2007 04/01/2007 - 05/01/2007 05/01/2007 - 06/01/2007 06/01/2007 - 07/01/2007 07/01/2007 - 08/01/2007 08/01/2007 - 09/01/2007 09/01/2007 - 10/01/2007 10/01/2007 - 11/01/2007 11/01/2007 - 12/01/2007 12/01/2007 - 01/01/2008 01/01/2008 - 02/01/2008 02/01/2008 - 03/01/2008 03/01/2008 - 04/01/2008 04/01/2008 - 05/01/2008 05/01/2008 - 06/01/2008 06/01/2008 - 07/01/2008 07/01/2008 - 08/01/2008 08/01/2008 - 09/01/2008 09/01/2008 - 10/01/2008 10/01/2008 - 11/01/2008 11/01/2008 - 12/01/2008 12/01/2008 - 01/01/2009 01/01/2009 - 02/01/2009 02/01/2009 - 03/01/2009 03/01/2009 - 04/01/2009 04/01/2009 - 05/01/2009 05/01/2009 - 06/01/2009 06/01/2009 - 07/01/2009 07/01/2009 - 08/01/2009 08/01/2009 - 09/01/2009 09/01/2009 - 10/01/2009 10/01/2009 - 11/01/2009 11/01/2009 - 12/01/2009 12/01/2009 - 01/01/2010 01/01/2010 - 02/01/2010 02/01/2010 - 03/01/2010 03/01/2010 - 04/01/2010 04/01/2010 - 05/01/2010