Friends Making Good - Jon Mullane and John Rosborough, "The One That Got Away"

New music video by my friend Jon Mullane. It was directed by my old pal and fellow adventurer / bon vivant John Rosborough, who has worked on most of my projects over the years, and made me look better for being there. Kudos to everyone who was involved!

Paul Kimball

Horseshoe Heart

From my band's 1993 album Fields of Addiction. Always a favourite of mine, particularly these lines:

"Stare softly at this sudden leap of faith,

watch as I catch the wind and fly away,

no destination, just a landing."

Paul Kimball

Pop Matters: Radiohead, "Videotape"

"No matter what happens now
I won't be afraid
Because I know
Today has been the most perfect day I have ever seen..."

The best lyrics are always tricky things, open to myriad interpretations, but in this song, which is one of my favourites by Radiohead, I think Thom Yorke is basically saying: "no regrets, because it was worth it."

Words to live by.

Paul Kimball

Turned

"Caught, in the undertow of today,
you start to drift away
got no place left to stay.
Turned, from that which you have known,
to that which you've been shown
your world's no longer your own.
Listen, when their words come out,
don't know what they're about
but you follow 'cause they shout.

You can't tell right from wrong,
you don't know what's going on,
You can't see wrong from right,
all you see is black and white.

March, just another face in the crowd,
you chant their "truths" out loud
while you wrap your mind in a shroud.
Raise, your hand up in a fist,
and yell about what you've missed
you're told it's time to resist.

You can't tell right from wrong,
you don't know what's going on,
You can't see wrong from right,
all you see is black and white.

Lift, their flag high in the air,
convinced that you are there
to fight for your fair share.
Darkness, creeps up on our fair land,
you grasp it with your hand
it's all you understand..."

For almost a decade now, we've been told that Islamic terrorism is the great threat to Western society, when in reality the real existential threat, as demonstrated before 9/11 in Oklahoma City, and this past weekend in Norway, and every day in between through the increasing rightist political radicalization of larger and larger segments of our society, comes from right wing extremists, just as it did in the 1920s and 1930s. Yes, there is a link between those horrible, violent attacks, and the rhetoric of the right wing politicians and demagogues - it's important to always understand that the foot soldiers carry guns, but the real right wing terrorists wear business suits.

Paul Kimball

Letters to Orwell

"Jealous of your friends

and your easy conversations with them
I'm not a good listener
and I've never been.

Closed at the wrong time
you must wonder if I'm still alive
I wish I knew
do you?

Please let me know, let me know
will you stay with me here tonight
please tell me so, tell me so
and everything will be all right.

Unsure of every embrace
unable to read the look on your face
I fear the future
are you more sure?

Please let me know, let me know
will you stay with me here tonight
please tell me so, tell me so
and everything will be all right."

One of my autobiographical songs.

Paul Kimball

Pop Matters: Bronski Beat, "Smalltown Boy"

There have been a lot of songs to address various forms of hatred and bigotry over the years, but few have been as pointed, or poignant, as this 1980s classic by Bronski Beat.

Paul Kimball

All Afraid

"All afraid
alone, cemetery heart,

prudence hasn't paid

mistake from the very start,
and you sit and stare
and you sit and stare,

but there's no-one there

but there's no-one there.

All afraid
where do you go from here,

patience hasn't paid

can someone die of fear,
you sit and look around
you sit and look around,
every sight betrays a sound
every sight betrays a sound.

What are you so afraid of
what has brought you to this state,
where are your natural emotions?

You're such a sad, sad thing

you're such a sad, sad thing.

All afraid
you feel your back against the wall

caution hasn't paid

its set you up just to fall

You sit around with your rope

your sit around with your rope

one loose knot and no hope
one loose knot and no hope."

I think we're tying those loose knots in our metaphorical ropes, each and every day. The ones who use the real ropes are perhaps just a bit more honest about it all.

Paul Kimball

Pop Matters: The Northern Pikes, "Unimportant"

A thought-provoking pop gem from the great Canadian band The Northern Pikes.

No matter how different we may seem to each other in this life, we're all headed for the same end, and a final equality. In our shared "unimportance" lies a recognition of our true humanity - and the beginnings of an awareness of our our real importance.

Paul Kimball

Pop Matters: Steve Earle, "Jerusalem"

Most modern popular music is an intellectual and moral wasteland*, but there are "pop" musicians who still  work hard to make a difference, bards who sing about a better way and a better day, troubadors who raise important and thought-provoking issues - philosophers of the people.

Like Steve Earle...

Paul Kimball

* Don't misunderstand - there's nothing wrong with a good dance tune, from time to time, but that's not all that pop music has to offer.

The Art of Dying

Paul McCartney is my favourite Beatle, but when it comes to my more existential side, it's George Harrison to whom I usually turn. One of my favourite Harrison songs is "The Art of Dying".

I've always had a fascination with death, and what may or may not come afterwards. I think we all do, even if we won't admit it. The central question of human existence, after all, is whether this life is "it", and what that means for us one way or another. For the longest time, the idea that death might really be the end frightened me, but then one day my father said something to me, with his usual blunt common sense, that started me on the path of being free from that fear.

"Paul" he said, "it's nothing to worry about, because if there's nothing after this, then you'll never know, will you?"

Without knowing it, my Dad had gone all zen with me at that moment, and it resonated in a way that no sermon about the certainty of a life eternal ever could. The truth is that we don't know, and we can never know, until we get "there". And then, if there is something else, we'll know, and if there isn't... well, we'll still never know. So why be afraid?

Being freed from the fear of death opened the door to an actual consideration of what might lie beyond. I accept that oblivion is certainly a possible outcome, and that's a sobering thought (particularly when the left arm starts to tingle). But I also think that there might be other outcomes. As there's nothing I can do about the prospect of oblivion other than to try to live my life to the fullest, which I do anyway, it's those other possibilities that interest me, and that I explore, because perhaps there are clues in our lives, and the world around us, that might just indicate that there is indeed, as the pop poet Bryan Ferry famously wrote, "more than this".

"It is not more surprising to be born twice than once." - Voltaire

The truth is that we're all dying, each and every day. What lies beyond is unknowable... but it is not unimaginable, and that is a critical difference, because in the imagination lies the true "art of dying"... and the art of living.

Indeed, the two might just be the same thing.

Paul Kimball