Caoineadh (demo)

I’m not a fluent Irish speaker. I didn’t learn Irish very well in school either. Any Irish I do have came from the fact that I was friends with Irish speakers, and joined a youth theatre group at An Taibhdhearc, the National Irish Language Theatre of Ireland, based here in Galway. Thus I will apologise if the lyrics of this little song are examples of terrible Irish. :)

It is one of two songs that I have written that have Irish language lyrics – the other one just has one section of the song in Irish, and the rest of it is in English. Interestingly, I never set out to “write a song in Irish”, it just seemed to happen both times.

This one was written when I was working as a barman in Club Áras na nGael (the Irish language bar here in Galway) and obviously being surrounded by Irish on a daily basis had some kind of an impact. It is one of the things I love most about Galway – it’s the only city I’ve been in in Ireland where I’ve heard people casually using Irish in day-to-day situations, e.g. queuing for the banklink, or sitting at a table in a café, or talking to their kids walking down the street. As much as the language can appear to be integrated in a tokenistic manner in some parts of the country, here it doesn’t feel like that at all. It really does feel like it is a part of the city – a small part, sure, but a definite one.

It’s only a wee little song, and I never finished off the lyrics or really figured out in my head where it’s going, but I demo’d it again there in the last few weeks to get it on record so I could sit with it and really hear what I want to do to the song. So, I guess it’s a work in progress at the moment and we’ll see what happens with it.

In terms of writing it – the melody came first, and the words kinda slotted into place at one point when I was playing it at the piano. The song was written at the same time as Maria, and both started life as piano instrumentals. I may yet record instrumental versions of both songs, as I’ve half a notion to release a little record of just piano instrumentals.

Caoineadh [demo] by misterebby

I got a new phone.

I just recently switched to an Android phone – the wonderful HTC Desire, and have been playing around with the camera on it, and two different camera apps so far. I was interested in seeing how it would compare to my old iPhone 3GS which gave me some great shots, and the Hipstamatic App was good for some interesting filters and the like.

But, I’ve been mostly pleased with the Desire’s camera, though the colours aren’t quite as vibrant as the iPhone’s camera were it seems. But the RetroCamera and fx camera apps have been really fun and versatile too, and add a lot of fun to the camera.

Here’s some shots of a beautiful sunset in Salthill, Galway this weekend:

It definitely gives good lens flare (which I happen to like. I also like taking photos into the sun as I have a soft spot for silhouettes.) I’m no photographer or anything, but it’s nice to have a portable tool that can record things I see with a decent quality for me.

Adam & Andy

I’ve been reading the Adam & Andy comic strip for about a decade at this stage, after first coming across it when the strip was hosted in the same place as my very first website (Fortunecity.com – circa ’99 / ’01 kinda time). It’s always made me smile, and the old longer format version of the comics were published as a book by the strip creator James Asal Jr. I bought a copy of the book back when it was first on sale, and my copy now sits comfortably well read in the shOUT! lgbt youth group bookcase where those two wonderful characters can bring a smile to the face of whatever young LGBT person flicks through it.

But, randomly enough, James namechecked me in one of the recent strips, for no particular reason other than my name being in his head after some recent photos I put up on my Flickr. But it really made me smile, and made me want to share the comic strip with you lot. I’ve been reading the little short strips about Adam & Andy for longer than I’ve ever read any other comic. Only A Softer World by the talented duo of Joey Comeau and Emily Horne comes close. While I enjoy a softer world for the dark humour, wit, and zombies (amongst other things), what I love about Adam & Andy is the fact that they’ve been the longest running gay couple in my own personal media consumption. They’re a same sex couple I’ve been reading about for about a decade or so, and I like to check in and see how they’re doing. The utterly normality of their existence is a very simple, clear message, and there’s something about the strip that just works for me. Dig into the archives and root around in the older stories. The website archive only goes back to 2006, but you can see the style of the old format comics in the previews for the book.

IQ – IndieQueer club night

From September 16th, Thursdays and Saturdays in the top floor of Dignity West will be taken over by my club night: IQ [IndieQueer], a club night aimed at playing music that you don’t get to hear in the usual gay clubs here in Galway.

Keep up to date on the facebook page, or twitter.

Facebook: IQgalway [IndieQueer]
Twitter: IQgalway [IndieQueer]

Rock – Indie – Jazz
Electro – Metal – Funk – Soul
Retro Classics – Punk – Alternative Pop

Paradise Dance Hall @ The Absolut Fringe.

This evening I was sent a link to the blog for this performance piece which is a part of this years Absolut Fringe. The post titled “// This One’s For You //” really struck me. I’ve seen some of the promo videos, and the piece features the partner of a friend of mine, so I’ve been aware of it for a little while now, but I didn’t know anything about this aspect of the piece:

“Please anonymously submit part of your story to a performance of Paradise Dance Hall; and release, hold on to, or acknowledge your ‘ghosts’.

Every time we perform Paradise Dance Hall, we will pick one name at random during the show, and then offer a dedication to the one[s] you haunt, or the one[s] who haunt you. It will happen live, and for one night only”

Co-incidentally, the day I was linked to that is also the day of Limerick Pride 2010. This is seemingly completely unrelated, except for the fact that last years Limerick Pride was the last time I hung out with a friend of mine before he passed away. We went for the weekend, having not seen each other in while. He helped out with shOUT! during the parade, and we had a brilliant time enjoying the festivities of Pride.

His passing was the first time a friend of mine has died, and shook me quite a bit. He’s been in my mind again lately, because of Limerick Pride, but also because I was switching cars and recalling all the memories from the old car: two major ones feature him strongly. It’s not the anniversary of his death, but it is the anniversary of the last time I saw him, and reading that post about the ones who you haunt/who haunt you really hit home more than I expected it to.

I guess sometimes you don’t even need to see the piece of theatre to have an emotional response to it. I wanted to get to Limerick Pride this year, but couldn’t for various reasons, so I think it’s only fitting to use this opportunity as a way of marking the year instead.

It ends with a mysterious bruise, a long-distance dance, and a swallow tattoo to guide you. It starts with the people you haunt, and the traces of those who left without explanation.

[…]

It will not be sentimental, but it might be beautiful.

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