[can D/L remastered version at: https://soundcloud.com/kat330repost/i-shall-be-released ]
(Sisters and brothers, saints and sinners in the congregation of the Everlasting Light of Hope, please open your hymnals to p. 330 and join me in making a joyful, hopeful noise! :) 

First time I heard this song as rendered by The Band on "Music from Big Pink," it hit me like a hymn, and that's how I've always interpreted it. Here I've changed up the rhythm and added several keyboard and melodica tracks instead of my original guitar-picking version, but I've kept in my ending "A-men" chords.

When I realized how it was shaping up with this altered rhythm, I quickly caught the haunt of "Stand By Me." For a while I toyed then with the notion of mashing the two together in some fashion, but the project was already becoming overwrought with tracks. (Maybe someone else would like to tackle that?)

The end result here is sort of sloppy—my "ensemble" could be tighter and the harmonies could be truer—but JT convinced me that leaving as is rings more authentic and interesting. (Hope you're right, hunaja! :)

I Shall Be Released

Lapin ihmeellinen luonto and soundboard tinkerers

Music – guitar, bass, beats and synths - Petri of Lapin ihmeellinen luonto
Vocals – johns of soundboard tinkerers
Produced by soundboard tinkerers and Petri /December/January 2021/2022

Cornerstone - a long way out

It's a long way out / in the glare
the spin follows / as we go

ship on the horizon
moving in the eye
the whirlpool turns and churns
a sea of red and mud
the tossing waters burns

feeling introspective
things were only just OK
Then it turns to mud / bloody mud and dust [rust]

P-pushing the needle in / hush now/ for the sting
the mind thoroughly stalked / washed and brained
with the spin working overtime / overtime climbing feats
as feet slide underground

so hands auto-touch face / can't see a thing
uncomfortably dumb / I wonder why / there's a cry
blood full of razor blades and eyes full of blasting heat
cutting, wearing, bursting through those bloodshot eyes

we pass the cornerstone

we pass the cornerstone
circle around again

past the cornerstone
crumpled, on hands and knees

past the cornerstone
colourless, frayed and cracked

Lyrics by johns of soundboard tinkerers December 2021

Datum what? Ahoy there!

Cornerstone - A Long Way Out [Lapin ihmeellinen luonto and soundboard tinkerers]

It's been a minute since I composed a new piece—over six years as a matter of fact. Intervening was a call to political activism followed by a relocation to a new continent during a global pandemic. And because I had sold every bit of electronic equipment before the move to Finland, I was resigned to embark on no further recording or production work. Then in September 2024, I was struck with an idea to create a new novelty piece culled from a collection of my silly aphorisms and taglines. I had barely begun penning a stanza or two when I received a midnight visitation from The Muse, who generously gifted me with a memorable melody to match my title sentence. It was a solemn minor key, however, so I shifted lyrics away from my trademark wordplay toward a more somber composition. It soon evolved into a Latin rhythm but still sounded so melancholy, I decided I should make a point of ending my sad lyrics on an upbeat note. I had no wish to bring down anyone's spirits—including my own!—one solitary scintilla beyond wherever they landed at year's end. Plus after the election results for US, I was especially glad for that hopeful, major chord ending on I'm Friday's Child (IFC).

Since I no longer owned any synth equipment, I presumed new music production, if ever I returned to it, must rely on a collaborator for additional instrumentation and possibly for vocals as well. So after I had a rough guitar and voice part set for IFC, I immediately contacted my Nice friend, Damien Riba, for a piano habanera part. Monsieur Riba came through—brilliantly as ever!—with a habanera piano part in a delightful orchestration for me to use and post here, courtesy of Mangalyan Records. His arrangement accompanying my vocal includes piano, accordion, violin and percussion. Merci, Damien! [Check him out at www.damienriba.com and www.cinelovers.fr ]

To hear my own orchestration w/vocal: https://soundcloud.com/kat330/im-fridays-child  Unfortunately, I have otherwise run out of free time to post anything further whatsoever at SC. So for my own purely instrumental version of IFC, please find it at freemusicarchive.org/music/Kathleen_Martin or at my Bandcamp "Kathleen Martin" account.

Last but never least, multiple thanks to JT Lindroos for his great partnership in using the library's Mac software—I had only recorded vocals and synth parts in the past with a PC using Reaper software—and, as always, for his cover art contribution (photo of li'l Kat at 4 used). How appropriate then to release IFC to the world on January 4, 2025, which marks our Silver 25th wedding anniversary! 😊

😽 XXXOOO 🤗
Kat (a Friday's Child)

I'M FRIDAY'S CHILD

I'm Friday's Child living in a Wednesday world,
A world full of woe for me and any girl,
Who's loving and giving at the time of birth
And stays that way all her days on Earth.
I'm Friday's child living in a Wednesday world.

A Wednesday world can break a Friday heart.
This world of woe can tear that heart apart.
There was a time I seized the days,
They struggled free and slapped my face.
I'm Friday's child living in a Wednesday world.

A Wednesday world can crush a Friday's Child.
Can make her meek, and woe can drive her wild
With walls of pain built brick by brick,
A pincushion pierced prick after prick,
When a Friday's child living in a Wednesday world.

All Friday folk, let's forge a Friday world.
Each woman, man, all boys and every girl,
Who are loving and giving at the time of birth
And stay that way through their days on Earth,
Come Friday folk and make it a Friday world.
Yes, Friday folk can make this a Friday world!

--Kathleen Martin © 2024

IFC (orch. by D. Riba)

FMA Blog features Kat tracks: https://freemusicarchive.org/blog/kathleen-martins-new-tracks  This site is for music fans who think outside the boxy confines of genre labels. Find here and at SCannex my originals and covers on anything from felons to lovers, arranged for and performed on a variety of instruments, for sounds ranging from sweet to sassy and reedy to brassy; from lofty to lowdown and soulful to hoedown; from serious to silly and urban to hillbilly.

I am so grateful you are taking the time to listen to these self-recordings, many of which required an enormous amount of my time and effort to produce. If I also introduce you to a singer-songwriter you never knew, or if something I wrote or recorded brings a smile to your day, well, that's just the sweet icing on my aim-cake!

Hope you will seek out the original artists' versions of cover tunes unfamiliar to you and, please, share my sounds with any like-minded listeners. I also urge you to click on individual track titles to read my production notes and lyrics before or as you push play. Some notes are informative, some are entertaining and some may be neither or both. ☼:) Kathleen xxxooo