Also known as Sturnus vulgaris, European starling and starling.
I cannot recall a time before two days ago that involved seeing this bird. It could be the first time I’ve seen one and, seeing as it’s an introduced species, I am concerned about its appearance. It could be nothing to worry about; I don’t know.
Anyway, I took a few photos of the bird including the one below. Whilst it was on the bollard I made sure to take advantage and capture what I could.
I hope you enjoy.
One listen and I think I fudged it a bit.
This gives an idea of the song but what I wrote is really limited. There was plenty of room to drift off into imagery and I didn’t go for it which is a shame as it would’ve made for much better writing.
BLKSMIITH’s “Satellite From Days Of Old, Lead Me To Your Access Code” is from 「DIGITAL TWIN」.
I hope you enjoy.
—
Saxophone flutters and slides over a morphing beat and soft synth. There is a calm that remains once the beat takes over in full.
The beat is rapid and flickers, and it is there and aggressive, but it also is calm. It seems to keep changing and shifting without losing its sense of self or control. For a moment it drops out and leaves the synth and sax and its a moment of greater calm, perhaps, but then it comes in and it pulses away with the synth.
The beat pulls back to something just as steady but less consuming whilst the sax changes itself to something familiar further along, as does the synth. It does not last too long, however, and the main patterns are soon returned to and all that aggressive calm also comes back.
Once more the beat changes for a moment, becoming more staccato in form, but once more for only a brief moment before it continues on, but only for a brief moment once more as it stops, leaving the sax and synth to close at the song’s end.
Another photo in The Blue Mountains, but of a more urban scene.
Maybe this is moody and intense; maybe it isn’t. I don’t know. I know it’s not stark, and I know that I like how my pushing the shadow removed a lot of detail, leading to something that is perhaps atmospheric when taking into consideration how massive the clouds appear.
This is my submission into Leanne Cole‘s “Monochrome Madness” for this week. Participating is pretty straightforward and something I recommend. If you do, then include the tag “monochrome-madness” in your post. If not participating, then at the least check out Leanne’s photography as well as what other people submit.
A lot of what people are submitting will likely end up here.
I hope you enjoy.
Right now I’m in a place I didn’t think I’d find myself in for a long time, and much has changed whilst little has changed. It’s a lot like how I remember it, but there are differences and some of those differences are nice. I think.
Sitting here, thinking about what I see and thinking about the exciting blandness of it all, and thinking about how there are things here that I remember and don’t remember, and looking at some stuff that makes me wonder about other things and all of that other stuff that I could crap on about at length but won’t as there is no point.
Wondering what it was that was the starting point of my distaste for this space, but it doesn’t matter. I am here and soon I will be getting up and going as there are other things that require my attention and all that other stuff. You get the idea.
So I’m sitting here and I’m beavering away so I can try and get this written all out and I’m getting distracted which is something I need to stop, but I don’t want to. I want my mind to wander and I want to let it wander and go all over the place, but that is not the best thing. Don’t care, but should care. Just wondering as to the point of my continuing to sit here.
Wondering about many things.
See now I feel as though I’m out of the metaphorical gas and there still are quite a few hours before I head on home, but I’m doing this and maybe in doing this I will be less distracted and find some focus and then move toward the next thing, whatever that may be. Of course that may not happen; I might just pat myself on the back after this and then collapse into a pool of self-deceit, but then again I may not.
I think I was trying to work toward making a point earlier, but I dropped that and now I’m just writing whatever, so it’s the same as usual and perhaps that is not the best thing in the world.
So anyway, this is a space that I’m not a fan of but right now I am here. I don’t have to be here but I chose to be here, and so my being here is my own fault, and that’s okay. It’s not a bad place, but I do worry about running into people I don’t want to talk to, but if that happens then it happens. That’s life. Gotta be pleasant, gotta be polite.
Well, I don’t, but I should. It’s better to not be an asshole, even if you want to be an asshole. Even if other people are shitty it doesn’t mean you should be shitty to them.
Then again, maybe you should, but to be honest I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think there are better ways to navigate undesirable situations.
The time it took to write five-hundred words: 06:25:84
This was another bit of a struggle. I ran out of steam part of the way through because I didn’t try to expand upon what I was writing. Ended up doing so toward the end but it felt wishy-washy to write and perhaps it also reads that way.
Written at university.
Not much to say about this one.
I think a sense of vastness comes through here, and the clouds create a sort of enclosed feel to the whole thing. Their shadows push focus to the centre, or at least roughly around there whilst preventing the overall space from feeling empty.
I hope you enjoy.
I took this photo last week after missing a particular photo I wanted to try and capture due to my not paying attention to it needing to be taken around first light rather than the sunrise.
Alas.
Anyway, I like the colouring in this one. I think it’s at a point where if you didn’t know it could be mistaken for sunset. I also think it works with the sense of spatial disconnect.
I hope you enjoy.
One listen for this one, and of the three Antoine Dufour songs I’ve written about today, I feel this was the easiest. Perhaps that is due to having warmed up a bit, or maybe it’s due to having a sense of less happening in the song. Not sure.
Antoine Dufour’s “Life in Technicolor” is from Convergences.
I hope you enjoy.
—
There’s a vague sense of something there. It is faint, but it gradually fades in, shimmering, shining and quickly comes into full view. Fragile and flickering and producing wonderful tones and soon the full range comes into view, and there’s a beauty to this.
Wonderful is the collage of sounds and space without cluttering, and they move around each other, slowly and quickly, and breathe. They hover and float and seem utterly still and utterly in motion, and they fade out perhaps too soon. They fade as though only a brief flash, showing all with little time and become a vague passing; a fleeting memory.
Silence lingers and stretches much like a perceived nothingness, but it is space for the sounds to continue past their disappearance, and eventually that silence stops at the song’s end.
One listen here and I feel I did a better job of covering the song than I did with the previous writing. Still, there’s something that’s missing the mark, though I’m not sure what.
Antoine Dufour’s “Cold Day” is from Convergences.
I hope you enjoy.
—
Delicately guitar seems to descend until it finds its steady rhythm. Soon more strings enter and underscore with a thin grove. It continues on until a sense of changing rhythm comes in then raises and seemingly shimmers. Through here notes are interwoven into the space and fragile calm seeps into the sounds.
A return to the opening movement and the quiet holds. Still and steady it comes through and the quiet is outside, but there is a warmth and perhaps a smallness within it all. Once more the rhythm changes and merges with the space. The silence becomes important to the sound and it’s all pretty and still. There’s an appreciation, perhaps.
The guitar grows lively and there’s peace here and there, but perhaps there’s a melancholy. Perhaps there isn’t and it’s all just snuggling further into warmth, or at least looking for it, and as it happens the guitar seems to grow even more so lively. Perhaps it gets a little frantic, but before anything is revealed it pulls away and grows soft once more. It moves into the opening movement once more and it continues on, perhaps as a framing for the whole piece, and it continues on as such until the song ends.
One listen here.
A few weeks ago I decided to write about three of Antoine Dufour’s songs and then I procrastinated. I’m not sure why I allowed myself to be hesitant; I think it might have to do with concerns surrounding my general ability to write and Dufour’s approach to guitar music.
This morning I decided to just dive into writing about these songs and, whilst I think part of my hesitancy was unfounded, I don’t think I’ve done this particular song justice. It’s very much surface writing but not in a way that gives enough of an idea of the song.
Antoine Dufour’s “The Drive Within” is from Convergences.
I hope you enjoy.
—
A certain joy and rising of energy starts coming through in gentle, yet striking pulses. The quiet surrounding the guitar allows it to fill out as much as necessary, and it drives on forward. It is the focus but it doesn’t feel that pressure; it runs free and runs forward, blossoming and flourishing in small moments that linger large.
A sense of pause as the melody shifts to something seemingly more minimal and here another sense of certain joy comes forward. It is perhaps different, though still continuous of what came before. It is a growth that presents a counterpoint but it does not cut into what has come. It continues on and it walks forward, and there is a warmth that remains. It is consistent.
The guitar allows its sounds to dance and move and spread whilst remaining contained, and everything continues on, flowing and moving with a controlled freedom, and in its last notes it keeps that feel, and the song ends.
I thought the last time I shared a photo of this space was last year, but apparently it was 2020.
Anyway, this was taken a couple of weeks ago. I was hoping there’d be clouds in the valley, didn’t get that but still got a shot I’m mostly happy with. It was dangerously windy on that particular morning so I took a few quick shots before heading off. It would’ve been better had it been safe to set up the tripod and shoot using it, but it wasn’t and so I went with quick rather than taking my time.
This is my submission into the two hundred-and-fifty-eighth Lens-Artists Photo Challenge. The theme for this one is “Fences“.
The host of the Lens-Artists challenges cycles weekly between the following people:
Week 1 – Tina
Week 2 – Patti
Week 3 – Ann-Christine aka Leya
Week 4 – Amy
Week 5 – John Steiner
Week 6 – Sofia Alves
Week 7 – Anne Sandler
Week 8 – Donna
Week 9 – Guest host
Dawn Miller of The Day After is guest-curating this one. The rest of July is also guest-curated and the themes have been announced in advance:
July 22: Dan Fenner of Departing in 5 Minutes with “Unbound Summer”.
July 29: Janet Webb of This That and The Other Thing with “Overlooked”.
I recommend participating in the challenges as they provide a fun way to interpret theme. If not participating, then at least you should still check out what others of the Lens-Artists community are submitting.
I hope you enjoy.
Stupidity Hole 