This was something that I started hearing around the springtime and it has stayed with me since.  You might find it interesting.  Whether it makes for a chill work beat or even something that calls for deeper contemplation.  Or maybe something in between.  In any case, hope you enjoy and here's to a productive road ahead.

funky april beat

This is a song I've had with me for a while and I think I'm still working on it but I don't want to be sitting with it any longer as I need to keep moving now.  And besides I think much like the hero of the song, it needs to be out in the world to continue on its way.

Jude & Lucy

This is a piece I originally composed in June, or something around then.  I've since remastered it that it's now all the more ready for some mood listening and contemplative tuning.  Happy Thursday, friends.  -Ren 1.11.24

Bigfoot On A Rainy Day In June

Kaspár

this is something new. original composition  I don't have the lyrics yet and it's a little rough around the edges, but this is phase 001_ also thinking about the 100th birthday of Marlon Brando and be it resolved this is Marlon Brando Day in Los Angeles and whereas we sing  "I only want to be with you" it's springtime in the city of Angels

Sunday Blues Proper  4:4:24

The Raven.Vine is where things get made.  And she has returned from the American night.

Flight Of The Raven - 41124, 4.29 PM

Happy New Year friends.  To be played with action.  Doesn't have to be loud, but steadfast and true.

Street Sonata in B Minor No. 1 real

Music and Lyrics by Ren Michael

When I see your lover baby
When I see your man
You know I'll never go under honey
Someday you'll understand
That I'm your boy
Not your toy
I walk both day and night
To even the score
More and more
Can't get you out of my mind, girl
I'm your boy

I tie my shoestring laces lady
The ones from the summer pond
You came to me with your graces baby
Tell me whose side you're on
Will you ever leave me?
Stop teasing me?
You smile and you keep me in
You're like a dream
Eternal queen
Can you calm the storm within?
Will you let me in?

Make a claim oh child
While the sun still shines for the day
Make a claim oh girl
You drive a man insane
I'm just a boy who's stuck on you 
And I've walked all these lonesome avenues
I've lied awake too many nights 'neath the light of the moon

I'll hold you close you know
I'll only take care of you
I ain't got much money to blow
But you know my word is true
And girl you know I
I'm your guy
What I got can't be destroyed
And through it all
I'll stand tall
A white knight who'll fight for you
Girl I'm your boy
Not your toy
I walk both day and night
To even the score
More and more
Can't get you out of my mind, girl
I'm your boy

Girl, I'm Your Boy

I hope this finds you well.  We’ll talk more soon.  Keep a weather eye on the horizon.  Lyrics below.  

“Who Profits?” is now available on all music platforms. So you can hear it on your service of choice. Add it your favorite playlists, and spread the word. --> https://linktr.ee/renmichael

P.S. If you like the song, share it your friends!

--

"Who Profits?" 
by Ren Michael

I need a good friend
Who goes on more than instinct
You follow the river,   
To greet the eyes of the sphinx
As chairman of the board
Try and sell me the drink 
With talking heads on the phone
Telling me what to think
I know I move slow
I’m only trying not to blink

Ask yourself who profits 
Off the nations divide
Ask where they’ll be 
Should their great war arrive
Though they always insist 
They’re just true to the time
Don’t expect to find them 
Serving on the front line, 
Don’t expect to find them
Even lingering behind

Though you know what I’m saying,  
Have we known it all along? 
Does it take some great brain 
To see right and see wrong?
Friends, lovers, sisters and brothers 
Each of us a pawn
Turned against one another 
In a continuous con
In an ongoing game 
Of “Which Side Are You On?”

Like many years before
So long as your poor,
Whether white or black, 
You’ll be the first out the door
To the sound of the drum
Ramming speed at the oars
They’ll start with the young
And shove their face to the floor
From the highest rung
Guess who keeps score

Look up and you’ll see ‘em
In their penthouse they hide
Like an eye in the sky 
While we make enemy of ally
Though they’ll always insist 
They remain on your side
Look to who profits 
Off of the nations divide
My friend look to who profits
Off the nations divide

Just look to who profits 
Off of the nations divide


By the river in the night...
 
We’ve got the numbers on our side
Tell me, are we alive?
Are we ghosts in the light?

Now is the time.  Now is the time.

Now is the time.  

Who Profits?

Everything has its appearance on the surface.  The city reveals itself at night.  In the darkness you can see a little more of what is underneath, even though it remains just a hint at most. 

A suggestion.  A feeling.

If something is knocking on the other side of what you can see, you hear it that much better in the night. Possibly because at night, you have it more to yourself.

002 Dark City

By Ren Michael

I walk the old town tonight
I know the walls remain hollow
I’m a prisoner, a rat in a cage
and the nights, they conquer every day
and I dreamt I broke free of this maze
I walked out into the night and I stayed
and for the first time I felt the grace of the falling rain

neath the light of the moon
I wait for my evening bus
to take me for a few, with you, through time and space
awake! Awake to the distant valleys of my dreams
until my eyes open to the morning and I regress to sleep

do my eyes cast a shadow over my soul?
as I write these checks and post my stamps?
oh to put it all down now and break through the wall
and you and me, we’d breathe in that promised land
close your eyes now. take my hand.

Dark City

Coming in through the radio.  Everything has its appearance on the surface.  The city reveals itself at night.  In the darkness you can see a little more of what is underneath, even though it remains just a hint at most. 

A suggestion.  A feeling.

If something is knocking on the other side of what you can see, you hear it that much better in the night. Possibly because at night, you have it more to yourself.

002 Dark City

By Ren Michael

I walk the old town tonight
I know the walls remain hollow
I’m a prisoner, a rat in a cage
and the nights, they conquer every day
and I dreamt I broke free of this maze
I walked out into the night and I stayed
and for the first time I felt the grace of the falling rain

neath the light of the moon
I wait for my evening bus
to take me for a few, with you, through time and space
awake! Awake to the distant valleys of my dreams
until my eyes open to the morning and I regress to sleep

do my eyes cast a shadow over my soul?
as I write these checks and post my stamps?
oh to put it all down now and break through the wall
and you and me, we’d breathe in that promised land
close your eyes now. take my hand.

The lady at the counter says it's time for me to roll, but that I already knew.  She winks and we say our goodbyes. We'll meet up again tomorrow night.  The other rooms are on the second level.

lofi blues 001

this is something I've been working on for a little bit now and it's a theme that I think could go in a few different directions especially if you close your eyes or take a little into the night.  still ironing out the edges but let me know what you think.  dig_

ghosts in the garden

0058 when the rain comes in, it brings with it a new beginning.  wishing you a strong and reflective weekend.  keep moving and keep listening.

new rain

here is lofi bleus 001 with more space in the beginning a d more space all around.

lofi blues slight extended

I've got a new sort of thing in the works, or a set of things that bring me back to a place I strolled through not so long ago.  I'd like to stop by tonight and hang out there again for a while longer this time, maybe find an empty booth in the far corner where I might stare out the window as a light rain begins to fall in the city as I order a coffee.  They've just brewed a fresh pot.  

a presentation of night themes

Music and Lyrics by Ren Michael

Well I can’t sit still
Thinkin’ of you still
Walkin’ way from me
Way up on the hill
And I tried baby
Yea you know I tried.
You sent me a letter
Just the other day
How I done you wrong
I’d never find a way
You could not explain
When you said that I was gone.
So when you come back to this town
When you search around,
When you call for me baby
You know you won’t hear a sound.
Cause I’m gone baby, I’m gone
I’m breaking away searching for my dawn
No I won’t say that I’ve done you any wrong
Baby I’m gone. I’m gone.

Well I wear no disguise
Look into my eyes
You say I should apologize
And you demand your pay
Lay claim to what I owe
Is that some kind of joke?
No honey I’ve paid my dues
With this game I’m through
I’ve walked alone before
Done just fine, thank you
So go ahead flip your hair
I’m sure someone will care
Did you think that when you came back here
That things would be the same
No folks will talk of how I done cleared
And they’ll celebrate my name.
Cause I’m gone baby, I’m gone
I’m breaking away searching for my dawn
No I won’t say that I’ve done you any wrong
Baby I’m gone. I’m gone.

When I was a boy
Fresh out of school
You held out your hand
And gave me all your rules
Now here you stand
Tell me what you think I am.
So go ahead lay down your rose
And wear your best clothes
And keep calm your fire
May you never tire
May you dream baby
Of all your sweet desires
But when you wake up in the morn’
When you look up to the sky
The gods may hear you loud and clear
But you know I won’t be near.
Cause I’m gone baby, I’m gone
I’m breaking away searching for my dawn
No I won’t say that I’ve done you any wrong
Baby I’m gone. I’m gone.

I'm Gone

DARK CITY

A: I’m caught between love and contempt. 

O: Choose love, lean into it.

A: Well look to where we worship. 

O: What do you mean?

A: What do we endorse with our time and energy and money?

O: You tell me…

A: Every time you turn on that tv, or open up that phone and just accept what some face unseen has chosen for you to know or to hear, you endorse that unseen face.  You endorse power— 

O: That might be, but—

A: But when you step out into environments unfamiliar and listen, really, to others and you do it all face-to-face, and take an interest in what they feel and and how they think and their experience…well, nobody can really curate that, can they? 

Because for all their current power, when you step out into new worlds or rather into the wider world, whether overseas or out of state or just up the street, the dealer cannot adjust in time to meet the power of your will, of your own mind to think for itself. 

O: So is this how you choose love over hate? 

A: I think we can get serious about how we want to live, or at least how we want spend our time. Don’t trust the phones or this page or me. Trust yourself and your own mind, especially if it’s a curious mind.  And when you think you know everything, that’s probably a sign to step outside your cabin door and back into nature.

Boulevard II. from "(Re)Gen by Ren Michael"
© Ren Michael 

Boulevard

boxcar yards: a man with a guitar
wearing a suit and putting out pictures

he's talking films
from a cafe, secluded

in the shadows
over rainsoaked
streets in Vienna

a violin’s heard up the way
‘cross the river,
black and still
as night reigns
in the early 21st century

a new
_primordial dawn
fast approaching

on the move, songs capture the raw. main influences include cinema, the natural world and many sounds of the city. The songs are never done as each recording is a snapshot of life in constant motion.

for fun he walks (with his dogs) road trips and catches old tv shows, baseball games and comic books. 

POEM pieced together 25 August, 2022_

The idea 
for this SoundCloud 
soundstage is 
that of an open workshop 
where listeners 
will be able to listen 
to sounds 
images 
and concepts 
being worked on (shopped) 
and some of them 
may be finished 
while others may not 
but they are being born 
continuously and 
they can make of it whatever 
they choose, but 
may it haunt their houses pleasantly 
for the idea of creativity 
to me is that nothing 
is ever really done
but only constantly being made  
for the greatest thing about music 
is that it can’t be pinned down and is open 
to greater interpretation than the other forms 
and even lyrics written 
by the greatest lyricist 
can be altered and moved around 
to give it a more varied dynamic 

but anyway in talking about the occasional 
blood on the tracks 
I am getting slightly off track 

so what I really mean to say friends 
and newcomers alike 
is welcome 
we’ve got popcorn 
sandwiches 
beer, red wine 
and ice-cold water 
salud.

-

Your friend,
Ren Michael

Ren Michael

Pinned to spotlight

Popular tracks