Professionally manufactured CD in a cardboard 4-panel sleeve, including an eight-page booklet of lyrics, stories behind the songs and photos. Graphic design and photos by Brian Campbell.
Includes unlimited streaming of On This Shore (EP)
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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A curtain of dreams opens upon a scene of lovemaking by the undulant symphony of the ocean. The first verse comes from a poem by a friend found in the sand half a lifetime ago!
In the stillness of this place
you show me how
the rocks quiet and deep
sleep in round . . .
How they hold the sea
And guard the sky . . .
And open a curtain of dreams
And open wide before us a curtain of dreams
And open wide before us a curtain of dreams
(Spoken)
slumber here side by side hand in hand
I kiss your lips, hold you close
(sung) and enter new lands
downward through lips of surf
the simple fruit
jewel of a brilliant seed
in our salty tango
roseate moonsmash sonorous perfumes
undulent symphony
in our salty tango
roseate moonsmash sonorous perfumes
undulent symphony
The idea for this song came from a trip I took down The Gringo Trail through Mexico and Guatemala back in the mid-’80s. (That dates me; but why turn down a good date?)
On a beach near Puerto Angel in Mexico, I met and traveled for a while with a couple of disheveled but sweet-tempered fellows from New Jersey named Eric and Richard. Richard, a former teacher in his late 40's who had suffered a serious breakdown and psychosis, wrote stream-of-consciousness poetry, much of it incoherent (at least to me) that he kept in shabby notebooks. One lens of his glasses was cracked, and later on in the journey he lost them. He claimed that he preferred “to see the spectacle without specs”: in his visual blur he saw bicycle wheels in the trees and angels in the sand. A large man, he would impulsively stage improvised street theatre in Mexican villages in bad Spanish. In one village, the inhabitants were so spooked by his antics, both he and Eric were chased out of town by men wielding machetes.
Richard’s friend Eric, who was about my age, watched out for Richard like an older brother; at times it seemed he was as much Richard’s caretaker as his friend. He was sensitive, melancholy, read a lot and wrote poetry, some of it quite good, although he didn’t like almost anything he wrote. One time I found a poem of his on a scrap of paper in the sand in the hut they shared. I read it and was immediately impressed. He told me – rather, urged me against my protestations – to keep it. This I did, finding it in a notebook decades later. I’m indebted to Eric for most of this song’s opening lines, but I couldn’t adhere to his subsequent meanderings (believe me, I tried, because I like them). So I resolved it into something more explicit, easier to resolve into song. Here’s the original poem.
IN ROUND
The rocks quiet and deep
sleep in round
the sea
and guard the sky
open
a curtain of dreams
and enters
a clown man
of Byzantine
to sell you a book –
you look –
all is pale
in this moment of time –
the statues
are in gloom
avoided, outcasted
exhausted of automobile fumes –
we build
our bridges backwards
not to reach the other side –
the rivers, the rocks, the town asleep
the dogs bark war cries –
the night, the hammock, the stars
my blindness
my sight
all is one
in giving and taking
down by this seaside.
credits
from On This Shore (EP),
released December 1, 2020
Voice, guitar: Brian Campbell
Back vocal: Ema Jean
Sampled strings, arrangements: Martin Bennett. Recorded at Studio Loco, Montreal.
Brian Campbell is a song-poet, dexterous finger-stylist, and impassioned, heart-felt singer. A widely published poet,
Campbell has several critically acclaimed collections to his name. On stage he is relaxed and natural, an entertaining storyteller who spellbinds with his songs. He performs regularly, mostly in the Montreal area. To learn more about him, see campbellmuse.com...more
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