Category: My Own Music

Commentary on my own songs.

Miranda – Keep the Cameras Rolling
Blog Post · My Own Music · Spirituality and Philosophy

Miranda – Keep the Cameras Rolling

Daniel KellyLeave a comment

With everything that has happened since the surreal inauguration of Donald Trump on 20th of January, I have found myself feeling paralysed and numb. The string of ridiculous Presidential Executive Orders this week has dashed any hope that maybe the election rhetoric was just puffery to get him elected.

As Trump surrounds himself with ignorant and dangerous extremists, it is hard to see any good in the coming four years for America or the world.

Petty and angry responses to the coverage of the inauguration, termination of the Acting Attorney General, Paula Yates, with terms like ‘betrayal’ has given any undergrad psychologist enough information to diagnose Trump with a narcissistic, paranoid, vindictive personality disorder. This is the man who now has his finger on the Nuclear Button.

This compounding week of unbelievable events unfolding has left me dazed.

It feels like all the voices of reason, compassion and tolerance are stammering incoherently. It is as though the scale of the insanity, the crazed support of a blinded and increasingly belligerent right-wing populace has left us speechless and despairing.

Usually when I see an injustice in the world, I can write a song about it. But the song that came to me this week is about the absence of a song, I have no words to suggest that we look at the positives or we maintain hope in the future revival of humanity.

We are not in new territory here, the consequence of demonising a portion of society can be starkly observed in the Jedwabne progrom in Poland, 1941. This atrocity wasn’t perpetuated by the Nazi’s, but by 23 Polish men who burned alive at least 340 Jews from their own town. It is not by accident that I pick this example from World War II. The comparisons between the rise of Trump and Hitler have already ready been widely made. Others have suggested Mussolini as a more fitting parallel, neither one bodes well.

Trump has demonised women, reporters, Mexicans, Muslims, environmentalist and I am sure I have missed many more. This type of incite to hatred has real, and often fatal, consequences.

Here in Australia the same rhetoric is coming from the One Nation Party, and has already been popularised by the UK Independence Party leading to the vote to leave the European Union. Five years ago, these groups with extremist views still existed, but they were on the fringe, with a tiny following. Now they are setting the agenda, drawing a sizeable following, and having centre-right parties borrow from their policies.

Humanity is undoubtedly undergoing a crisis of faith. Not religious faith, but faith in the principles of kindness, tolerance and honesty; principles that underline the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which is increasingly being ignored in favour of commercial and political interests.

Anyone who thinks that this is purely an ideological issue and part of the small swing from left to right that happens with democratic elections should look at the treatment of the members of the media that reported on the Women’s March held alongside the inauguration. Trump is set on ushering in the era of post-truth, alternative-facts and double-speak.

It is not that analysts, commentators and human rights activists are not pointing out the problems, it just seems that their words are lost in the wind of hate-speech and ignorance.

The one light I can point to is the behaviour of the US National Park Service tweeting about climate change in defiance of Trump (another great article). I suspect that a generation of young people inspired by Leslie Knope have joined the Park Service, and hold Leslie’s values as their own. Life imitating art in a glorious way.

As paralyzed as I feel, I must continue to record what is happening and how I feel about it, just like the last of the colonists on Miranda.

Wolf at the Door
Blog Post · My Own Music

Wolf at the Door

Daniel KellyLeave a comment

Amidst all the Happy New Year well-wishing I was feeling distinctly un-optimistic about the future of humanity. I tried to capture the feeling in this song, Wolf at the Door. I’m not sure if I have ever properly understood the meaning of the ‘wolf at the door’ motif, despite its extensive use in popular culture.

After all, wolves probably can’t open doors and if you are in a house with a door then you probably aren’t going to be scared of wolves. Wolves knocking on doors is a common theme in fairytales, such as the Three Little Pigs and the less well-known (in English-speaking culture), The Wolf and the Seven Young Goats. Given the dialogue and door-knocking, these are clearly cautionary tales for children using anthropomorphism.

These stories serve two purposes, firstly instilling a well-deserved fear of wolves if you are a young child, and, secondly, instilling a healthy fear of humans that knock at doors. There is no shortage of children’s stories where the wolf is the bad guy, Peter and the Wolf and The Boy Who Cried Wolf being just two examples. Incidentally, I remember first hearing Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf when I was only three, the wolf music still gives me the creeps.

The Wolf at the Door motif is often used in the context of poverty or starvation, which would suggest that the wolf in this case is a stand-in for a more intangible foe.

This experience got me thinking about other songs which have spoken about impending doom on a global scale. My list is by no-means extensive, and I would appreciate any additions in the comments. I am interested in the songs, why they came about and what, if any, effect they had on people.

Bad Moon Rising – Creedence Clearwater Revival

This was the first song that came to mind, and a little research revealed the fact that John Fogarty wrote this after watching The Devil and Daniel Webster. This 1941 film is about a farmer in dire financial straits who sells his soul to the devil and subsequently gets rich but alienates and enslaves his friends. Strangest of all, the protagonist has a desire to become President of the United States. Truth is stranger than fiction.

Not Dark Yet – Bob Dylan

As with most Dylan songs, getting an in-depth analysis of the song from the author is unlikely. I only have the lyrics to go on. The song could just be about a temporary depression relating to the particular girl that Dylan has received a letter from, but my feeling is that this song strikes at a deeper depression with the general state of 21st century society, especially given the fact that it was written in 1997 when millennial fear was building.

It’s the End of the World as We Know it – R.E.M

I may be wrong, but I think this song might fit in the same box as Billy Joel’s, We didn’t Start the Fire, where the author is saying that bad stuff has been happening for thousands of years and whatever impending doom you are fearing is probably insignificant. These songs were recorded in 1987 and 1989, just before the fall of the Berlin Wall and an end to the nuclear terror of the Cold War. Listening to both these songs as a teenager in the 1990’s, I loved them because they felt like two fingers in the face of the older generation, “this mess isn’t our fault”.

Across the Hills – Leon Rosselson
Eve of Destrucion – Philip Sloan
We Will All Go Together When We Go – Tom Lehrer

I have grouped these songs together as they all related to the period in the 1960’s when nuclear destruction was on people’s minds and the Vietnam War was dragging on. Tom Lehrer, in his usual acerbic style makes a joke of the matter, while Leon Rosselson paints a beautifully dichotomous dialogue between the optimist and the pessimist. I particularly love the phrase:

And it shall reap a hellish harvest
Make the desert of this land

I had always attributed Eve of Destruction to Barry McGuire, but it was written by Philip Sloan. It was interesting that the conservative Right in America felt strongly enough to attack the song directly, even claiming that the song aided the enemy in Vietnam.

I should say that I have no intent to minimize Tom’s contribution because it is funny. Humour has always been a way of coping with horror. Here is another great one from Tom about the subject.

Doom Further Back

I cannot think of any songs from before the 1950’s that relate to a feeling of impending doom about the future of the world. I know that comets and eclipses have had that effect on cultures for thousands of years, but I can’t find evidence that people sat down and wrote songs about it. It may be that television, the Internet and instantaneous global reporting have compressed our vision of the future in a way that previous societies have never imagined. It does feel like a weight on our minds that we could do without.

I must acknowledge the following websites as sources for some of the songs of doom:

http://popstache.com/features/listed/songs-for-the-end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it/

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=537428

Please post other suggestions in the comments.

Sisters of Yass
Blog Post · Folk Music · My Own Music · Spirituality and Philosophy

Sisters of Yass

Daniel Kelly3 Comments

I was asked to write an Irish song for an upcoming music festival. Often my song-writing requires a specific catalyst and the songs tend to come out fully-formed in a few minutes. In searching for a suitable subject for a song, I remembered one of the key Irish connections to our small town in Australia; that being, the Sisters of Mercy who came here in 1875 to set up a school.

My children go/have gone to the primary school that a group of Sisters from Rochfortbridge in County Meath, Ireland, started when they arrived in the town in 1857.

I should caveat my post with the statement that I am sceptical of the capacity for closed religious orders of monks or nuns to maintain a healthy lifestyle in the long term. Victor Hugo dedicates a significant part of Les Misérables to describing the dangers associated with these groups. As a society we have been doing some painful looking into the past on this issue, the Magdalene Sisters in Ireland being a key relevant example. That said, I have great respect and admiration for the courage of these nuns who travelled, on request, to Australia with the intention of doing some good through education.

The song that I wrote is a fanciful re-imagining of brave young(ish; Eliza Fielding was 41) women leaving their native home in Ireland and coming to this dry, brown, land with its mix of recently displaced native peoples, rough settlers and wealthy sheep-station owners. I chose to present the emotion of longing for their (much) greener home but also their desire to share a message of love (and mercy). I have chosen one anecdote from a historical website[i] article that describes how the sisters allowed the local aboriginal children into their classes, but were later forbidden to do so by the State Department for Education. In response, the sisters set up a separate classroom until the classes were eventually integrated.

I also know that the lives of the founder of the Sisters of Mercy order, Catherine McAuley, and one of the key sisters who came to Yass, Mary Paul Fielding, are still remembered at the Mt Carmel School through the naming of their school houses and the annual events that the children are engaged in. The buildings that the sisters built and later lived and taught in are still standing. St Augustine’s Chapel, in particular, has recently be renovated and used as one of the most beautiful venues for the Turning Wave Festival held here in September.

A more in-depth biography of Mary Paul Fielding is provided on the Sisters of Mercy website[ii], including the names of all the sisters who came to Yass. Mother Fielding, in particular, is buried in Wilcannia, far inland New South Wales, definitely qualifying as ‘under a sunburnt sky’.

I do wonder whether my song reflects the feelings in the hearts of the women that came here, especially the young postulants and sisters. Maureen Healy writes in Life out West, her article in the Australasian Catholic Record[iii] in June 2015,

“We pray with our Pope Francis that the Spirit of joy will return to our world, that we will recognise through the eyes of mercy that our children will benefit from the care and the concern of others, and that our elders will be honoured.”

With the way the world seems to be going at the moment, I admire her optimism. The history of the Sisters of Mercy in Australia and the economic and social circumstances that caused young women to leave Ireland and live a life of hardship and service all over Australia are fascinating. Sophia McGrath’s case study of the Parramatta Sisters of Mercy[iv], published in 1995 gives significant insight into this world.

A quote from the above article:

“In 1906 Sister M.Alphonsus Shelly, a pioneer Sister, wrote to Moran: ‘Father Murray CSSR has given a beautiful retreat to the Children of Mary in Surry Hills. It will, please God, be productive of great good. There is a true nursery of vocations there.”

The phrase ‘nursery of vocations’ gives some idea of how young girls were considered (or groomed) for entry into the vocational life. I wonder how many entered because of religious fervour which had been intentionally fanned, how many entered because of the challenges created by their social class and how many entered because, at the time, there were few other opportunities for women in the world other than being a servant-wife.

Sisters of Mercy at the Aboriginal Reserve in Yass
Sisters of Mercy at the Aboriginal Reserve in Yass [i]
[i] http://yass.cathzone.com/Media/Default/Page/history/mercynuns.pdf

[ii] http://www.mercyworld.org/heritage/tmplt-foundressstory.cfm?loadref=182

[iii] Healy, Maureen. Life out west [online]. Australasian Catholic Record, The, Vol. 92, No. 2, Jun 2015: 148-153

[iv] McGrath, Sophie. Women religious in the history of Australia 1888/ 1950: a case study, the Sisters of Mercy, Parramatta [online]. Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society, Vol. 81, No. 2, Dec 1995: 195-212

Women’s Day (Men stop being Bastards)
Blog Post · Folk Music · My Own Music

Women’s Day (Men stop being Bastards)

Daniel KellyLeave a comment

I wrote a song to express my sentiments on Women’s Day this year. I have included the lyrics below:

Women’s Day (by Daniel Kelly, 2016)

You pulled her hair in primary school,
Teased her ‘caus you thought it made you cool,
Laughed at her when she knew more than you

Girls can’t run, girls are weak,
Make them cry, don’t let them speak,
It’s really no surprise how we got here

Chorus:

It’s women’s day, it’s women’s day,
There has to be a better way,
To say the things still in my head
Let’s call it ‘Men don’t be Bastards’ day instead.

Took her on a date when you were fifteen,
Tried to squeeze her into your shallow dreams,
She was never gonna be the one you loved

It’s hard to know how to relate,
When all you’re ever taught is hate,
I wish I hadn’t lived with it so long

Chorus

When the children came, she stayed at home,
No women’s wage could pay those bills,
In a market made by men you’ll never win

They say you can always start again,
But only if you pay the price,
Your family, your dignitary and soul.

Chorus

More than a thousand years to prove,
The truth that we already knew,
There’s nothing that a woman cannot do

I wrote the song reflecting on the strong women I have known during my 39 years, and especially in relation to the treatment of women that I grew up observing as a child in Queensland during the 1980’s. Treatment which, to my shame, I emulated. It was not until I left home at seventeen and was exposed to the work of Tori Amos and a broader range of movies and television that I started to re-think the ideology that I had been raised in.

This blog post is about dissecting the origins of my behaviour and, hopefully, to let women know that there are men in society who value their contribution as complete people, rather than trophies, servants or sex toys. I’m also writing to encourage men to think about their attitudes towards women; where those attitudes come from and whether they are your own or imposed.

Why do we, Crucify ourselves
Every day, I crucify myself
Nothing I do is good enough for you
Crucify myself, Every day
And my heart is sick of being in chains
(crucify, from Little Earthquakes, Tori Amos)

The Little Earthquakes album, released by Tori Amos in 1992, had a magical property for me. It took an arrogant, selfish and condescending young male mind and rubbed my face in a thousand years of women’s suffering. I’m not ashamed to admit that I would often be reduced to a sobbing mess after listening properly to some of the songs on this album.

I’m not for a second suggesting that forcing every 17yr old male to listen to Tori Amos is going to solve the problem of gender imbalance, but for me it was a transcendent experience.

The social experiment, done by fanpage in Italy demonstrated with boys 6 to 11, that the tendency towards violence against women must be developed after this age. I’m not just talking about physical violence here, much of the violence against women is verbal and focused on how they look, how they feel and express feelings or how their interests and skills are trivial. Excluding someone from opportunity in society on the basis of their sex is violence.

The lyrics in the song above are all biographical. There were many beautiful young girls in my classes during school that I would tease relentlessly. Not playful teasing, but cruel verbal abuse. Even in my first years of university I would ridicule girls that social norms labelled overweight or unattractive. Girls who were considered attractive would be assumed to be sexually available and subject to a different form of abuse. How had society instilled such a shallow value system in me? I guess I could blame the fact that every storybook, television advertisement, movie and sitcom I was exposed to had the male hero exclusively pursuing a certain type of willing, beautiful, girl whose main purpose was to gush over said hero and fall helplessly into his arms. In my defence, I do not believe that very many young boys could resist an onslaught of this type if it is not countered by an alternate view in the adults and other children they are exposed to. This does not in any way excuse my behaviour or change the harm that was caused.

By the time I was finishing high-school, I ended up inviting a girl to the school formal that I had barely said five words to. My interest purely stemming from the fact that she looked like a singer who I had become infatuated with. As expected, things did not go well, and I was left confused when life did not imitate what I had seen on television and read in books.

I am angry at the way in which this attitude towards women sits at the core of Australian society. Unless a women chooses to forgo having children and is willing to endure harassment, it is unlikely that she will rise very far within her profession. This is evidenced by the average 18% pay gap [i] and means that when selecting top scientists, top doctors, top lawmakers, we are excluding between 5-15% of the available population, purely based on an antiquated idea that men are superior.

Other nations have moved on, providing in-workplace child care, flexible work arrangements and paternal leave. There is no logical reason for this absurd situation, yet in every field that women have fought to become part of, they have faced, and still face, a mountain of resistance.

If anything, celebrating Women’s Day in Australia is really just pointing to our failure. I encourage you to read the story of Rosmary Folett, the first female chief minister in the Australian Capital Territory. It is a story of triumph; her succeeding in doing a job she was highly qualified to do despite a wall of male ignorance and prejudice. However, the point is that she should not have had to, and how much better could she have done if time had not been wasted combating said prejudice? Enough is enough, it is time for balance to be returned.

He said you’re really an ugly girl
But I like the way you play
And I died
But I thanked him
Can you believe that
Sick, sick, holding on to his picture
Dressing up every day
I wanna smash the faces of those beautiful boys
Those Christian boys
So you can made me come
That doesn’t make you Jesus

(Precious Things, from Little Earthquakes, Tory Amos)

[i] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_pay_gap_in_Australia