Prelude to the Alchemist's Last Words: MKII

Ye Olde Style

In ancient times, people would get together in-person and work on things…together.

Ancient is a relative term.

I’m feeling rather ancient these days, especially because I am about to turn 45. Wait…I can now confirm; I’m 45.

You may be wondering—what is it like to be so old? Or, you may be wondering—what’s it like to be so young? Or, you may be thinking—I get it, I’m of a similar age. Well, if you know you know.

Speaking of ancient times, this song is a real life collab among friends who were in a band together about 14 years ago covering a song of a band that two of them were in about 18 years ago.

What’s old is new, what’s new is old, if you come back you may find us.

Here’s the original song: Prelude to the Alchemist’s Last Words by Everything Absent or Distorted.

We’d often played this song as an opener. There was a preset arpeggiator on Kuker’s little Alesis keyboard that I played during a rather long intro. In a way, this extended rewrite pays homage to the original live version. The catharsis of playing loud chords in the rhythm of Postal Blowfish by GBV (a song that we also covered) was always a treat.

I would not trade the world for some of those times on stage with actual energy and enthusiasm from the band and the audience. There were some bangers, such as; Red Rocks, opening for Devotchka at the Fox Theater in Boulder, and of course, Bastille Day¹.

One can’t mention the Prelude to the Alchemist’s Last Words without also mentioning The Alchemist’s Last Words. Beautiful song, great album. Highly recommended.

There was also the time we went on a “tour” to play a few NYC shows and stayed in an apartment with a “full-view” window into the shower from the living room. Big ups to Toshi².

The rewrite presented here—created by Joe Grobelny—features vocals from Kitty Vincent and some bass, bleeps and bloops from yours truly. We’ll call it a Miter/Unicorn Hits release available here on WMRT and eventually on the Unicorn Hits bandcamp.

Speaking of Washed Memoirs—me, Joe, and Kitty were once in a band together called Le Divorce. Here’s a track from ye olde days.

Le Divorce played some fantastic shows together. We opened for Liz Phair, Pains of Being Pure of Heart, played Red Rocks (I think we opened for a showing of Footloose, but I may be mistaken, regardless, happy anniversary to the classic film, Footloose), and a raucous show at South By Southwest.

There was the gig at CMJ in NYC where a sleepwalker came into our rented apartment in the middle of the night. The intruder somehow left his wet pants folded near the end of someone’s bed. He was a nice person and came back the next morning to find his wallet and apologize. Big ups to Toshi³.

Cut to now: another ye olde friend

Barry Osborne

and I helped Joe & Company/Unicorn Hits with some background vocals the other night. We’ll be doing it again and I’m being coerced into helping with some Joe and Kitty songs. Stay tuned to WMRT.

Magic Happening. Photo by Joe

I’m hoping to work on some additional IRL collaborations this year with some additional ye olde friends since we don’t seem to be getting any younger.

Here’s to doin’ it Olde Style.

COMING SOON!!!

Remember that ye olde show, Salon Du Monde, Fremont? Well, there is a soundtrack in the works and it is very close to being available on a very cool new platform for releasing creative work:

Metalabel

. The soundtrack amazingly features all of the musical artists featured in the show—which means it is great. We’re releasing it as a cassette(!!) and…well…more soon.

In the meantime, binge all episodes: NOW!

Until next time…my erstwhile precocious little smuggets…

RS

1. This post contains inside jokes

2. Inside joke

3. This is probably an inside joke