Coffee and cake in the Release Room

Love in Wartime    
2017 Song by Janine Levinson & Jose Freitas
Vocals and Piano, Janine Levinson
Synth, Production, Mix & Master, Chris Moscatiello

There you are across the dance floor
Standing as tall as a tree
I know you are all I could ask for
I'm hoping that you’ll notice me

Mama says I should be modest
And not compete with other girls
With lipstick a shade past their virtue 
Always refined and demure

Oh wink at me please and I'll drop my hankie
My seams are straight and you're so handsome
I'm gonna wait and I'll send you letters
When you're away 
You'll be so brave

You're the kind of man I've dreamed about
Almost as strong as my dad
And “almost as handsome,”
My mother would say
But we'll agree to disagree on that

So wink at me please,  
I'll pretend not to notice
But then I'll smile, cause you're so handsome
They dropped the bomb as I dropped my hankie
I’m gonna wait,
And you will save your heart for me.

Love In Wartime

Spray Tan Apocalypse: A musical Journey through the seemingly meteoric disintegration of U.S. politics 2016-17

It's about time someone spoke directly to us
Not at all like any others that have come before
It's about time someone fed us easy answers 
And it's about time someone promised us the world...

It's about time someone started spouting nonsense 
It's a goldmine of ideas that we can get behind
It's about time someone dismissed limitations
And it's about time someone promised us the world...

Forget compliance, f*ck the earth, what has your caring ever done for us?
Forget the future, take the cash and f*ck the science that's been stopping us.
We've been angrily waiting...

Just suppress those nagging doubts
Don't look too close and it will all work out
Take your daily dose of fear
And bow your head before the biggest mouth
Ya got Trouble Right Here
In America...

Trouble Right Here

Tourist season
Waves rolling in
Boardwalk dining
Twelve-hour shifts

Know my way round the kitchen
Been here for three years
Take care of the tables
Appetizers and beers

I got a stack of applications
From the manager
He said, pick some winners
When I seen her

Name on the paper
Local address
Here for the summer
Be my guess

Past employment
She used to work here
Much to my enjoyment
Whenever she was near

She had a certain wiggle
I guess I had a certain strut 
She let me see those dimples
On the side of her butt

She always made it clear
She had a steady somewhere
Studying law
But that didn’t mean we 
Couldn’t get together
Midnight booty calls

The summer before
The summer before last summer
I was her man
But there was another
The summer before
The summer before last summer
We broke like a wave, she went away

Big decision
And positions to fill
Her application
Keep or kill?

It’s three years later
My how time flies
It’s against regulations
But why shouldn’t I try

She always made it clear 
There was a steady somewhere
Studying law
But that didn’t mean we 
Couldn’t get together
Midnight booty calls

I took her application
Pulled it out of the pile
Folded, in my pocket
Personal history file
I’ll look at it later
Regret it all again
But I’m just a dumb waiter
So I’ll sing it again, sing it again

The summer before
The summer before last summer

The Summer Before The Summer Before Last Summer

“My Silver Unicycle” began as the first track Blankets and I made together in 2009. It was originally planned to be an instrumental track since I was tired of recording vocals and wanted to make an instrumental set that combined neopsychedic rock with hip hop. “Love is Called to All,” which I released as an open collaboration track and David Lee Louthan recently added vocals to, was the second instrumental track Blankets and I recorded for the set. I decided to add vocals to “My Silver Unicycle” approximately 3 years ago, probably after completing “Let’s Do It (All Over Again)” with Weighty Tree. I never released the track because I decided I wanted to focus on releasing collaborative tracks with people active in the  SoundCloud community. Eventually I couldn’t access the original stems to “My Silver Unicycle” due to old DAW issues and this track just sat there in limbo. I decided to release this track now because I can’t seem to complete any new tracks. Lol. So there ya go. 

The photo is taken from a party I had at my old house. I used to invite all my musician and artists friends over and we would play live music, paint and draw on the wall, read poetry, and cook together. It was fun.  

Huge blessing to Blankets for all the music we made together, a lot of which still has never been released on any platform. And big thanks to Russell Sinfield at the Chaos Cookhouse for mixing and mastering this track on the quick style with only an instrumental stem and 3 of my vocal stems. It was originally supposed to be lo-fi any ways. 

Blankets: Bass and Guitar 
https://soundcloud.com/allergeist
Couch King: Production, Arrangement, Lyrics and Vocals
Russell Sinfield: Mix and Master
https://soundcloud.com/russell-sinfield

Lyrics 

Let’s all take a ride
On my silver unicycle 
We can get on together 
On my silver unicycle 
Let’s all take a ride
On my silver unicycle 
We can get on together 

You can say I am lazy baby
Maybe a little hazy but having a good time
I’m have a good time
But I’m having a good time

Hop on board 
We’re all just board 
Just give it a shot 
We’ve all been ignored 
Tried it the old way
Got no reward 
Did our way
Still deplored 

I don’t care sit and stare
Disbelieve and yell and stare 

We’re all just trying to figure it out

Let’s all take a ride
On my silver unicycle 
We can get on together 
On my silver unicycle 
Let’s all take a ride
On my silver unicycle 
We can get on together

Blankets and The Couch King - My Silver Unicycle (Chaos Cookhouse Mix)

life is just a flash in the pan and moves so fast with time and then its gone.
after the rains the skys clear and the sun will always shine once more

now all beliefs will fall like leaves
and summer will turn to be received
a sudden glimmer from where the darkness came
where spirits kissed and slow embrace
angel of the east that fell from grace 
[in loving memory of Polly and kak channthy]
written and recorded by jim manser march 2018

Flash In The Pan

Progressive Retro-Pop: guitar pop & rock with psychedelic & folk-ish tendencies.
“...slacker pop with an Anti-Folk edge for the anti-Trump movement” - Nightshift magazine
“Brilliantly lyrical, darkly funny”
"Ray Davies channeled through the prism of peak-era, mid-90s Blur...""Majestically Jangly" - New York Music Daily
Lucid Culture says "(Ian Roure is) a sort of missing link between Ray Davies & Robyn Hitchcock"

Trouble Right Here

Dada Paradox