Deconstructing Lyrical Mythologies: A Promise

I see so much amazing happening right now.    SO. MUCH.

This may be a very odd thing to read from me, especially at this time.  Especially because I’ve been spitting a million furies on my social media feeds.  Especially because much of my music is spiced with frustration borne of my own, sloppy relations with the menfolk.

Trump, Kavanaugh, Weinstein, Louis CK, and all the other fat, old pukes that can’t, for the life of them, understand how basic, human civility works.   What ARE women…really?

But let me assure you, I believe this is a good thing.   The Band-aids are coming off hard and bringing a few short-hairs right along with them.  Painful?  Yep.  But, to quote a character from one of my favorite children’s tales The Never-ending Story, “It has to hurt if it’s to heal!”

Women everywhere are stripping back the bandages that shield their raw and fetid wounds.   In doing so, we are also stripping off the coverings of what the menfolk did to wound.

Good.    Keep pulling.

Pull harder.

These pullings are revealing the depth of what it means to be under a patriarchal system.  It is crouching in every crevice of our culture and has been for hundreds of years.   We are ALL living it, and we are ALL (men, women, girls, boys, and every single human living on the entirety of the gender spectrum) oppressed by it.  In fact, I believe that ironically, the patriarchy is the MOST inclusive system out there.  Nobody is safe and we ALL suffer underneath it.    Yes, even the bloated old goats of the 1%.  They are the most miserable and fearful of us all.  Seriously, stop kicking us.  We are already down here.   sheesh…

The stories are being revealed in  the music industry, the tech industry, the gig economy…..new Hollywood AND old Hollywood!   Just check out what Molly Ringwald has been talking about lately.  Sigh…….poor John Hughes….

I want to help.    I want to keep this unveiling going until we have shined this light in every creepy-ass corner.

Here’s what I’m going to do to contribute: 

I’m going to lift the veil on some of the most beloved songs I know.   I’m going to destroy them for us so we can start writing them again.    I’m going to do so in the most loving and respectful manner that I can, so that when I do hear, sing, or play them in the future (and I will), I will do so with a new reverence that I have built around them for myself.   They won’t hold me in that awkward “I love this song but it makes me feel weird” limbo any longer.

Deconstructing Lyrical Mythologies will be my contribution to the lifting.

You will be able to find one song a month, deconstructed and/or re-imagined from the inside out.  I’ll probably share them on social media too, but they will all live here.

There is so much lifting we still need to do and we could use all the muscle we’ve got.  Lift wherever you feel inspired to lift.

I’ll start with Jolene by Dolly Parton.

Did I mention this is going to hurt?

I’m sorry.   I love you.

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