Welcome to the fifth edition of #MattyMonday, the streaming debuts of songs from my new album “Meta Dada”. Get caught up on previous releases: 

Episode 1: Tracks 1 & 2: “Satan Gave Me Sunglasses” and “Media Casualty” 

Episode 2: Tracks 3 & 4: “In Our Coldest Time and “Mild” 

Episode 3: Tracks 5 & 6: “I Need Another Vice” and “Sunburn” 

Episode 4: Tracks 7 & 8: “Ode to Jove” and “Untrue & Not Enough” 

As always, the best way to experience the album is consecutively and on vinyl; records are available at Rock N’ Roll Land and Green Bay UFO Museum in GB, at Eroding Winds in Appleton, and online via my Bandcamp page. But hey, in this cultural economy? I’m glad you’re checking out the songs in any method. 

If you haven’t heard the songs before, I recommend listening to them first before reading all the context and lyrics. For those who have heard the music, I hope these posts add mad magnificence to your “Meta Dada” experience. 

We left off last week suggesting this album might actual start to stand for something—but what? I’ll tell ya what: falling for anything! 

Track 9: “Lust” 

Listen to “Lust” on Bandcamp 

Listen to “Lust” on Spotify 

The players 

Clarinet: Marc Jimos 

Saxophone: Steve Johnson 

Trombone: Bill Dennee 

Trumpet: Patrick Phalen 

Drums, Percussion: Ethan Noordyk 

Back-Up Vocals: Jaci Day 

Keys: Alex Drossart 

Movie Set: Ryan Eick, Ryley Crowe, Sam Farrell, Alex Drossart, Matty Day 

Upright Bass, Electric Guitar: Matty Day 

The session 

Wow, 11 contributors on this one. Granted it’s got three different parts to it. The main part being the rockabilly part, which is what we tracked first. Ethan was of course the man for the drummin’ job. As I wrote in the blog about “Sunburn”, he was the outstanding drummer for The Blowtorches. Good rockabilly drummers are notoriously hard to find, but somehow this guy just gets it: 

Speaking of The ‘Torches, we started this song after I’d finished my four-show run with them. Love how it timed out, what with my rockabilly chops being all tip-top. 

It was also after we’d debuted Hang Ten as a live entity and we’d begun putting some cool work into the band. We all happened to be in the studio, possibly to record “Won’t Say It”, when we grabbed the “cut!” scene/section mid song with all five members. 

The Dixieland jazz parts were one of the last things we did for the album, just on account of trying to get all the guys from Big Mouth & The Power Tool Horns together. Fittingly, if most uncomfortably, we happened to have those guys into the studio, with no air conditioning nor windows, on what was the most brutally hot, Bayou-like day of the summer. Here’s a clip of Marc, Steve, Bill, and Patrick tracking. Felt wild to have these pros contributing to this record. Sam had recorded Big Mouth before, so he wasn’t fazed. 

Alex, every bit his Big Mouth bandmates’ musical peer, had guided Marc on what we were going for, and Marc arranged charts for the quartet. Here’s a clip of Alex doing his part. 

The other aspect concerned all those wicked sounds woven into the tune. First, I did a pass or two just peppering it with vocal utterances—a Tony Joe White “uhhn!” here, a Roy Orbison “rowrrrr” there, numerous Bo Diddley “he-heee”s and the like—and Ethan did the same with the gaggle of percussion toys he’d brought.  

Jaci, as on the album’s other coincidentally four-lettered title, was game to record a number of vocal snippets, trusting we’d put them to good use. I also grabbed a couple recordings of my dog Batman and cat Foxy, whom I forgot to credit in the liner notes, sadly. (She died peacefully at age 18 later that year.)  

Then it was a matter of finding free sounds on the internet. In total I had ~30 sound effects, and mapped out a plan to place them throughout the song. Sam dropped them in, approximately at the intended places, and then for what would be the only time with my fingers personally “working the dials,” Sam showed me how to move the sound effects precisely where I wanted them. Ramshackling’s an art, I do declare. 

Uh, Matty, what’s the deal here 

If you’ve gotta ask, you might check your pulse! If the previous song was about declaring one’s own righteous liberation, this one answers that age-old query: “now what?” Well, whatever you want—with want being the ever-operative word.  

Granted it’s up to each of us to cultivate ourselves and our character to decide what we really want, but there’s no greater problem to have than the task of answering that question. We’re bombarded with round-the-clock bullshit we never asked for, threatening to diminish if not drown out altogether our desires. This song celebrates your innate urges from being extinguished. This album, as obliquely stated out of the gate, is not concerned with Christian morality. Again, though, trolling Christians is a ridiculous pursuit. I’m glorifying lust as an exemplary human impulse, one as gloriously powerful as any when properly applied. Presently, it’s as misapplied societally as it is prayed away. Celibate Christians are banging at exactly the same rate as those who simply lust after another kudo at the office, another episode to binge, another social media dopamine rush, another pathetic porn or weakening video game session—basically all the stuff covered in Track 2. Man, is this the most political track? What can I say, but after 2,000 years of self-suppression and guilt, and amid modern, post-Christian celibacy, and really, in light of the present “hard-on” for artificial intelligence, it feels like a very good time to celebrate our humanity. Such is my case for lust! 

Which is to say, that’s also my indulging in some revisionism. There’s no way all of that crossed my mind from the start. I simply came up with this while jamming on an upright bass lent by my friend Dan Kimpel, back in 2016. The Dixieland intro/outro came to me early on, too, perhaps from Gene Vincent’s “Bop Street”—which I totally wink to in the outro, with an additional dash of Alice Cooper’s “Alma Mater”. Then again I’d also done a strolling, descending intro on a rockabilly tune before, with Muddy Udders’ “Rage Red, Sorrow Blue”.  

The main part is like a mix of Elvis’ “Treat Me Nice” and T. Rex’s “I Like to Boogie”. With the sound effects and everything, I wanted to lean into a post-modern feel; it’s so, so difficult to capture a real ‘50s vibe—Eddie Clendening is the king of that—so rather than try I wanted to take this one the other way, and capture the lively spirit of rockabilly rather than the sound. I’d really gotten into The Polecats for a while and loved how they used ‘80s production techniques to make something totally unique. Same with the aforementioned T. Rex track from 1976, which gave me the idea to add a super bouncy electric guitar part throughout the whole song. There’s also some fairly spare lead guitar work going on the whole time, giving it this groovy guitar gumbo vibe, especially with all the other sounds and percussion. I purposely kept the guitar solo short to keep it out of that more traditional rockabilly structure. 

Lest you intellectuals believe yourselves above all this barbarism, note the lyrics laced with Latin, and Greco-Roman mythology. 

Final note on the construction: the sound of the clapboard/slate for the “movie set scene” is in fact a real one. Sam nailed the timing of that! 

“Lust” was actually nominated for a BAMMY Award, though it didn’t make it as a finalist.  

Still thought that was rather cool, in light of the song not yet being streaming, and although I have a hunch who nominated it, I still appreciated it getting highlighted. Alex, Sam, and I all found it to be a highlight on the album, with Sam, who admits he doesn’t even really dig rockabilly, saying it might be his favorite. 

Lyrics 

Although you gripe 

That he’s not your type 

You’re still thinking of him 

If you could just *ZAP* 

And be on his lap 

Wrapped inside your limbs… 

Ooh you’d be right there, 

Sweat in your hair… 

So close—it’s so unfair! 

…The hell you talkin’ ‘bout? 

We gotta good thing goin’ on! 

Yes I do know what’s drivin’ you nuts 

And I can give a get-well plan 

Starts with me and it ends with us 

And it’s called…well it’s called Lust! 

Try to deny, but you’re only gonna hate it 

Might as well die if you can’t appreciate it 

You’ve got a gift if’n if there ever was 

And it’s called lust—that’s right! 

Lust gonna drive you crazy 

Knock you right offa your nut 

Never cease to amaze me 

Gettin’ deeper with every cut! 

I’ll be candid, I ain’t afraid to say it 

If you can’t stand it, you might as well lay it! 

Brand-new wheels on the real-gone bus 

Buckle up: all roads lead to lust!! 

I like your parents, and I like you 

You’re low on dough but got a high IQ 

Compatibility like Mars n’ Venus 

Harmonious lust—amen! 

Talk is cheap if it don’t lead to nothin’ else 

I can’t sleep unless I get a little help! 

If that ain’t deep there ain’t nothin’ righteous 

In nomine corpus sanctus 

I’ll be candid, I ain’t afraid to say it 

If you can’t stand it, you might as well lay it! 

It’s a breeze, builds up to a gust 

Blow your mind: lust! 

Lust-a-baby, lust-a-billy 

Lust-a-boogie! In L-U-S-T we trust! 

Lust for life, and life for lust 

Track 10: “Lady Circadia” 

Listen to “Lady Circadia” on Bandcamp 

Listen to “Lady Circadia”on Spotify 

The players 

Drums, Percussion: Ryley Crowe 

Harmonies: Ryan Eick, Ryley Crowe, Sam Farrell, Alex Drossart 

Keys: Alex Drossart 

Electric Guitar, Acoustic Guitar, Electric 12-String Guitar, Whistling: Matty Day 

The session 

While Ryley wasn’t featured on Side A of the album he continues to factor in big time on Side B. I wanted him to drum this one because I wasn’t quite sure how I wanted it to turn out—“‘60s” is a very general term, but I knew he could help take it to wherever it ought be taken. 

That was kind of our approach through the whole song. Some touchstones would be older groups like The Zombies, The Kinks, and on the choruses, Milwaukee’s The Robbs, building up to where all five members of Hang Ten are singing together. Absurd comparison, but it’s not entirely unlike the members of CSNY singing on each other’s records. 

While the more obvious touchstones were classic ‘60s sounds, there’s again T. Rex (the lighter stuff like “Electric Slim and the Factory Hen”), but also a big Brit-pop influence on this one, too, between The Smiths, Oasis (“sunsheeeine”), and Suede, and as I mentioned on Into The Music (about 56 minutes in), The Dukes of Stratosphear/XTC.  

Other notes: Sam helped me to figure out how to do the arpeggios on his 12-string. That’s my mate Travis Pashek’s Gretsch once again in there, at least on the bridge; I needed that Bigsby to make it sound all weird. I succeeded in getting a wah-wah pedal into The Refuge once more. A line of Spanish adds to one additional foreign language being featured. Then at the end, I originally planned to do some whimsical vocal bits like at the end of this Smiths song, but the whistling was a nice tie back to the intro. 

Uh, Matty, what’s the deal here 

My first ever love song? Maybe. There have been a share about lost love, past love, heartbreak, loneliness, and frustration. Maybe “I’d Trade It All for You”, and even “Tingly Hot Chick” and  “Date With a Dead Girl” off of “Bloody Murders”, but those are all increasingly askew. I guess it makes sense to be more able to write about love the more I got to know it. Here the protagonist practically deifies his love interest. 

If this song isn’t quite as sure of itself as some of the other songs, though, I’m okay with that. Love songs should be a bit vulnerable, and by the end of it the song does find itself. Almost all the songs on this album feel that way to me, though. 

Lyrics 

I never knew it was sunny outside 

I’d skid along broke-down assembly lines 

Perpetual question marks, 

Central Park was never my scene 

Way too green 

For me there’d be no one, 

Not even illusion 

The clouds and moon, routine 

Suppressed in the shadows 

Where everything bad grows 

Then, on cue: my queen 

Lady Circadia 

Oh how I’d await ya 

When finally you came to romantic rescue 

I knew I’d need no other muse… 

I thought my heart had been played out 

I bid “adieu” to a barrage of doubt 

Whatever I thought I used to want, 

I needed you all along 

Dawn and dusk 

Love and trust 

With you there’s no pity, 

Just possibility 

A rosy pinky swear 

You lighten the abyss, 

My luminous goddess 

With gold cascading hair 

Lady Circadia 

My senses, I came to 

Since I’ve obeyed ya, it’s been so good 

(Shinin’ on, flyin’ on, and feelin’ brand new) 

Lady Circadia 

The stars coronate ya 

The crestfallen hate ya, they haven’t a clue 

(No they don’t, no they won’t) 

To dim to sing another tune 

Withering without her, fading in the shade 

Blighting in the nighttime 

I’m in retrograde and grim 

Without your warm rhythm 

Oh how you upgrade me, 

Sweet Lady Circady 

You’re my very sunshine 

You get my to see right, 

My vitamin D-light 

Revealing, concealing 

Heliocentric lipstick: I’m so optimistic! 

Lady Circadia 

A Literal Day Maker 

By nurture, by nature, 

Right down to the roots 

(Cheerin’ up, clearin’ up, n’ no longer blue) 

Lady Circadia 

Eres mi Dulcinea, 

My Freyja, my Phaedra, and my Peggy Sue 

(Wakin’ up, makin’ love, from mornin’ ‘til noon) 

Only gloom ‘til there was you… 

——————–

There we go, gang. Two tracks featuring Hang Ten and a boogle of others. Rounding out the three most traditionally structured songs of the album. 

As for the other related BAMMY Award nominations, “Meta Dada” is a finalist for Album of the Year, and I’m still in the running for Artist of the Year. Gnarly, gnarly stuff and super touching.  

Next week, the final of the three “Meta Dada” music videos!

-Matty