this morning's ride in, part two

I was listening to Octopus Sock's RPM album on the way in. Good stuff. RPM's constraints seem to push some artists or songs onto a sparse stage with a bright spotlight in the center, where the something left unsaid still hangs in the empty spaces like a promise unfulfilled. An unadorned, beautiful young thing. The quality of that silence on Octopus Sock is intriguing and leaves me wanting to hear more.

On this and many other works with inexperienced or non-bass players playing bass that the bass lines divert from the root more often than "professional" recordings. This sometimes happens without the bass player even knowing it, I believe. I like that and wish I could teach myself to do that more often. Staying with the chord is so conventional and limiting.

As I was listening the garbage truck in front of me stopped in the right lane. I pulled around to pass quite gingerly. I wanted to make sure I wasn't going to hit a pedestrian that the garbage truck had stopped for in the first place. It was rainy and I couldn't see around the truck very well. I have been driving very conservatively lately, as if a child or deer will jump out in front of the car at any moment. There was no pedestrian today, and I imagined the contempt of the guy in the Camaro behind me for my pussyfooting. What would I say to him? "Yeah, well I'm a pussy that won't ever have to live with the guilt of killing a jaywalker." Huh. A pussy that never steps on it and lets the wind in his eyes, or strays from the bass note.