Blaine L. Reininger Patreon feed

M'aidez

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 08 May 2026 10:13:09 GMT

It's May. May Day was last week, but I started this piece then. I found a voiceover I had done before and decided to stick it in. It worked out pretty well. I asked AI to transcribe what I was saying, and it did. Turned out to be a classic Buddhist text, translated to French. Hope you like it. I also found some nice clarinet solos from Epiros in the north of Greece, played in their evocative and melancholy mountain style.

M’Aidez (from Majjhima Nikaya Sutta)

Il comprend toutes ces choses telles qu'elles ont réellement et ne les laisse pas s'immerger dans son esprit. Ainsi, il ne se laisserait pas griser par le gain ou accabler par la perte, griser par la gloire ou accabler par l'indifférence, griser par les louanges ou accabler par les réproches, griser par le plaisir ou accabler par la douleur. Ainsi, débarrassé de ses désirs et de ses craintes, il sera libéré de la jeunesse, du vieillissement et de la mort, du chagrin et des lamentations, de la tristesse, de la peine et du désespoir, il sera libéré de la souffrance assurement.

He understands all these things as they truly are and does not allow them to sink into his mind. Thus, he would not be intoxicated by gain or overwhelmed by loss, intoxicated by glory or overwhelmed by indifference, intoxicated by praise or overwhelmed by reproaches, intoxicated by pleasure or overwhelmed by pain. Thus, freed from his desires and his fears, he will be freed from youth, from old age and death, from sorrow and lamentation, from sadness, pain and despair; he will be freed from suffering, assuredly.

Tajine de Vitrine

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 26 Apr 2026 17:38:17 GMT

Like many of you, I was fed videos of this canadian band playing fascinating poly rhythmic microtonal instrumental looper-based pieces while wearing polka dot papier mache heads. Inspired, I whipped up this piece, an homage if you will. Tajine de Vitrine.

Butterfly (More music from Ivanov)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 10 Apr 2026 16:00:27 GMT

Welcome to April, my friends. I can keep posting songs from the recently concluded production of Ivanov and still have room for more. This one is one of my faves and forms a musical subtext for the entire conclusion of the play. Note the incidental voice of Mr. S. Dali at the end, voicing his favorite surreal cry. More music to come.

Photo by Karel Jarek

A Festive Day (Ivanov music)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 18 Mar 2026 09:36:17 GMT

Here is a tune written for a scene in the play where Ivanov is about to embark upon a doomed marriage. Poor ol' Ivanov, the avatar of the melancholy Russian 19th century aristocrat. In the meantime, everyone is dancin'.

photos Karol Jarek

Grim Reaper (more music from Ivanov)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 16:30:17 GMT

Here is another one of the songs from Ivanov. The Grim Reaper. One of the 7 songs I wrote for this show.

SONG No 5: “The Grim Reaper”

Stanza 1

THE MUSICIAN plays and sings with Anna Petrovna

So hard and tender, your arms so gentle

Your darkness deepens, head-on collision

I’ll let you inside, won’t be judgmental

But promise, darling, it’s all just a vision

Stanza 2

Oh mercy doctor, eternal brother

I’m dead already, so please don’t bother,

Hello, grim reaper, my youth’s lament

At last, release me. My time is spent.

Hello, grim reaper, my youth’s lament

At last, release me. My time is spent.

THE MUSICIAN plays and sings the second stanza again, this time with Borkin, Shabelski and Lebedev

Oh mercy doctor, eternal brother

I’m dead already, so please don’t bother,

Welcome, Grim Reaper, to this event.

Just release me. My time is spent.

Slave to Your Honey Eyes (Ivanov Music)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 12:09:58 GMT

Since October, I have been working on a play for the Municipal Theatre of Piraeus called "Ivanov", one of Chekhov's earliest works. Director Yannis Houvardas, former director of the Greek National Theatre asked me to write 7 songs using his lyrics for the production. Here is one of them. I will most likely continue to post these songs and will ultimately want to release them on a physical product.

I perform those songs nightly until April 3rd as a member of the cast, even speaking lines, wearing a costume and moving around onstage (as actors tend to do). This work has dominated my runtime and will continue to do so until it finishes (or I do.)

Hanumantra

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 02 Jan 2026 18:17:18 GMT

Here is my first offering for 2026. As I was working at this, Hanuman began to appear in the idea matrix. So, I included him and changed the working title to include his august simian presence. Happy New Year. Jai Sri Hanuman

Sri Guru charana saroja raja nija manu mukuru sudhaari
Baranaun Raghubara bimala jasu jo daayaku phala chaari

Having polished the mirror of my heart with the dust of my Guru’s lotus feet
I sing the pure fame of the best of Raghus, which bestows the four fruits of life.

Jaya Hanumaan gyaana guna saagara
Jaya Kapeesha tihun loka ujaagara

Hail to Hanuman, the ocean of wisdom and virtue,
Hail Monkey Lord, illuminator of the three worlds.

Xmas Blooz

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 24 Dec 2025 11:17:14 GMT

Ho ho ho. Merry merry xmas xmas, friends. I have posted this before but I am doing it again. Xmas Blooz from the soundtrack for Nick Triandafyllidis' 1996 telefilm "The Overcoat", in which I played Santa Claus. All kinds of contentment be thine, o patrons mine.

I Sing About Blue

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 15 Dec 2025 11:07:05 GMT

Behold, I bring to you glad tidings. It is December, the holidays are upon us and the year is about to limp home. Here is a strange wee tune, featuring some hustling hillbilly wannabe country singer and a dense fog of synthesizer atmos. (I think this character is called "Tennessee Blaine"). He sings about blue.

Mercurial

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 11:08:09 GMT

My new brew is about the idea of being mercurial — that quick-changing, unpredictable side of human nature. It’s about moods that flip without warning, moments of sudden inspiration, and the strange beauty in never staying the same for long. The word comes from Mercury, the god and the metal — fast, slippery, always moving.

MERCURIAL

And they live at the bottom

and they sleep in the autumn

and their sins are forgotten

and the cotton is rotten

and they sing in the darkness
and they drink from a thermos

and they sleep in the daytime

and they burn in the furnace

and they’re you and they’re me

and they’re wild and they’re free

and they’re washed out to sea

and they’re blind as can be

and they’re caught in a dream

not as strong as they seem

and they’re gone like a breeze

and they cure the disease.

Helmholtz Field

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 03 Nov 2025 17:24:49 GMT

Let us begin November with this atmospheric etude, named after the important German scientist and jack of all trades Heinrich von Helmholtz. What's that you say? Who's that? Follow this link and know all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_von_Helmholtz

I named the piece before I really knew anything about him. He had some interesting things to say about music as published in his book Sensations of Tone, a foundational work on music acoustics and the perception of sound. If you listen closely you will hear me read a couple of quotes from him, or not. He is pictured here surrounded by Helmholtz resonators, devices to calibrate and tune instruments. Thanks for your attention to this matter.

Cybernetic Cowboy (Live 1978)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 30 Oct 2025 12:37:03 GMT

Back in the early days of Tuxedomoon this song was part of our live show. It dates from a vanished time when humor was part of our aesthetic, back before the misery took over. We wore masks and other stage gear and played it with a tape backup.

Steven Brown sent me this live version, recorded at some unknown location and I pass it on to you as a final post before October 2025 recedes into the mists of time.

photo from TM video sessions at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs Art Week, 1978.

CYBERNETIC COWBOY

Well I went down to the transport

Gonna get my new power pack

Well I miss the earth, I miss my body

I ain’t never goin’ back.

Lord, they stuck me on this cold planet

With a herd of robot beef

Ain’t no whisky ain’t no women

Lord I caint git no relief.

I’m a cybernetic cowboy

And I sing my cyborg tune

On my cyborg palomino

Underneath the cyborg moon

My skin’s made outta plastic

And my butt’s made outta steel

And muh boots is electronic

They got lasers in the heel

I sit here on the prairie

Watchin’ TV and eatin’ beans

Drinkin’ coffee from my thermos

Readin’ Martian magazines.

I’m a cybernetic cowboy

And I sing my cyborg tune

On my cyborg palomino

Underneath the cyborg moon

I shot a man out on Pluto

So they stuck me on this rock

An’ they took away my precious body

Made me a walkin’ alarm clock.

I’m a cybernetic cowboy

And I sing my cyborg tune

On my cyborg palomino

Underneath the cyborg moon

Blaine Reininger 1977

Hadron Ron Ron Ron

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 18 Oct 2025 08:50:38 GMT

Greetings, friends. I guess I have been a bit absent this month. This is because I have been working hard composing music for my new theatre collaboration. More on that later.

Here is a confection that has been hiding in a corner of my outbox for a few weeks. A bagatelle, a caprice. The singing robot keeps his own counsel, while I sing a chorus of "Hadron ron ron ron" (a reference to 'Da Doo Ron Ron' by the Crystals https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0dikX80Ed8 ). That is that.

Full Bucket

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 09 Sep 2025 10:19:03 GMT

Here we have a kind of neo Berlin school groove hosting a vocal by a close harmony band of brothers from old time Hawaii. Kind of cheery. Slooshy* well, my droogs.

*(clockwork orange speak for "listen")

Bozo Town

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 02 Sep 2025 10:44:01 GMT

Welcome to September. Let us begin with this strange whisky blues. The lyrics come from an old notebook of mine, written in 1986 back when I was still drinking. I have put my AI resources to work here, asking the machine to sing my lyrics in a certain style and key, using another app to isolate that vocal and playing (or programming) the rest myself. As usual, the illustration is also AI generated. There you go. I love this stuff. Always have. Voici les paroles.

BOZO TOWN

My drink is speaking to me

It says “let me in let me in

Let me back in”

I hear the blood rush in my ears

Let me in let me in let me in

We’ve got plans for you, kid

We wanna stretch you on the rack

I’m your sympathetic bartender

Come back come back come back,

Jack.

Al-ko-hol

Tie your balls around your ears

Al ko hol

Just give me a few more years

I’ll take you down to bozo town

I’ll make yo’ head go round and round

Al ko hol.

Brussels, 1986

Liminal

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 23 Aug 2025 11:16:03 GMT

Hey kids. Here is my latest, a kind of bowiesque pop outing. The lyrics are based on the theme of the word and the state of "liminal".

Hey kids. Here is my latest, a kind of bowiesque pop outing. The lyrics are based on the theme of the word and the state of "liminal". I confess, this word was new to me until recently. Thanks to that wellspring of information, ChatGPT I now know and feel it. This what the oracle say

Liminal comes from the Latin word limen, meaning "threshold." It refers to a state of being in-between — not in one place, stage, or condition, but not fully in another either. It’s essentially the borderland between two states of being.

Liminal

I am tiny before the earth
Weird and entrancing against the land
poisonous amongst the flowers

A temple made of sand

With what memories
such a man
leaves his home
unable to return

liminal
cut deep
criminal
no sleep

scared thirsty
saying goodbye
no words left

this lost man
stops for a while
penniless nameless
crossing the frontier

liminal
no form
criminal
reborn

I can tell it now; I can

Sing this brutal prophecy

Yes, I'll swim back to that river

Yes, I’ll sink into that sea

Bone Lanterns.

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 16 Aug 2025 11:28:00 GMT

August is upon us. Has been for some time. The various heat waves here in Athens have slowed me down, but I keep on. This tune began to call

August is upon us. Has been for some time. The various heat waves here in Athens have slowed me down, but I keep on. This tune began to call out for Indian sounds as it developed, like a sauce simmering on the stove calls out for spices. Perhaps you can tell by the title and the accompanying graphic that I still haven't given up on AI for creative purposes, in spite of some of the stupid imagery that crowds our screens.

WARM DUST

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 23 Jul 2025 12:41:38 GMT

Here is my first post for July, a bit late, but I had a show earlier this month and less time for composition. This is another example of my

Here is my first post for July, a bit late, but I had a show earlier this month and less time for composition. This is another example of my sound tracky output, what my pal Coti said was "not quite classical, more like tv themes".

Dig it.

Icarus Crane

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 17:45:19 GMT

I was browsing through some very old notebooks a while back and came upon some lyrics that I thought would be useful. I tried writing a song

I was browsing through some very old notebooks a while back and came upon some lyrics that I thought would be useful. I tried writing a song around them a few years ago, but never really liked it. I decided to plug them into the groove I was cultivating and pruning last week and I like the results. Here it is.

I WEEP

I weep, I weep

In the weeping hour.

Feels so good to feel so bad.

Hot fat tears roll down my shirt

Good and evil making me hurt.

I weep, I weep

At the slightest thing

Some old movie

Some true book

A tragic life, a righteous man

Extreme beauty

Justice and truth

Words of heroes

My lost youth.

Every book that I read

Every film that I see

All these fictional people

THEY AIN’T NOTHING LIKE ME

I can’t seem to think about the others out there

I’m stuck on myself

No one else can compare

18/6/1986

Brussels, Belgium

IT'S HERE! New album released!

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 17:33:15 GMT

Hey gang. The new album "Nine Times" has now been delivered to Walter at Klanggalerie and is now available from his site.

Here is the link and a "teaser" excerpt for your shopping and listening pleasure.

Order at:

https://www.klanggalerie.com/gg504

Full tracklist: 1. Alles Wissen 2. First Day 3. Home On The Strange 4. Instazone 5. La Ville Avec Un Fleuve Enterré 6. Mirror Man 7. Some Sequencers Are Bigger Than Others 8. Nine Times 9. Pain Perdu 10. Tat Team Asi 11. Two Sheds 12. Temper Tantra 13. Messidor Lojban 14. Witchcraft Of Failure. Price: € 20,-/copy incl. worldwide shipping.

Normalcy Bias

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 02 Jun 2025 16:12:08 GMT

I was consulting chat gpt about a phenomenon called "normalcy bias" that I had heard about somewhere. It defined it thus: Normalcy bias is a

I was consulting chat gpt about a phenomenon called "normalcy bias" that I had heard about somewhere. It defined it thus:

Normalcy bias is a cognitive bias that leads people to believe that things will continue to function the way they always have, even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. It's a form of denial that helps individuals maintain psychological comfort in the midst of deteriorating conditions—social, political, environmental, or economic.

After defining, it asked if I wanted it to write a song about it. I paused, then replied "Why not?" It gave me a few proposals, none very good and I had it start again. Finally, it coughed up some words I could use. I fed them into an online text reader, recorded the output with Audacity and stuck it into the neo 90's stomp I had been laboring over. This then, is the result. Let's get normal. It's fine.

NORMALCY BIAS

nothing’s wrong
the lights are dim by design
sirens are jazz now
casual, ironic
played backwards on loop

the baker sells air
wrapped in wax paper
people queue at dawn
just to perform hunger
for the camera they hope is still working

two men argue in a burning elevator
about grammar
someone is live-streaming
someone is still collecting rent
someone is painting the blackout green

"we’re fine"
"we’re fine"
"we’re fine"
"we’re—"

we’re fine
we’re fine
we’re—

Cadillac Nights (1994)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 23 May 2025 09:22:25 GMT

In 1994, I began to work with a group of producers and DJ's from Cologne. They were Dr. Atmo (Amir Abadi), Ingo Schnorrenberg, and producer Michel Pagenstedt. We did some marathon sessions in Mr. Pagenstedt's (Pagi) studio which resulted in a CD for Peter Kuhlmann's label FAX 49-69/450464 and later for a Sony side label called Dance Pool. We had some fun, did a couple of live shows and probably sold one or two. I never know if anyone ever hears this stuff I do. Here it is for you now, in all its 90's techno glory.

Himmel Über Athen

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 04 May 2025 17:11:49 GMT

It's May, my friends. I just got back from tour, but I still found the energy to finish this piece. Sky over Athens.

April Rain/Strange World

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 13 Apr 2025 09:08:55 GMT

Here is a foot stompin' concoction whipped up as part of my daily praxis. It features the mutated voice of Art Linkletter (only aged Americans will know the name). Lots of plugin messin' about. This is my idea of a good time.

Miraloi for Tzitziki

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 07 Apr 2025 10:28:13 GMT

March 26, 2025, our beloved baby boy, Tzitziki, 12 years old, passed over, leaving his heartbroken parents behind. He occupied an oversized place in our family life. He had an amazingly solid character, more present, affectionate and communicative than any cat I have ever known.

His name, Tzitziki, is the Greek word for Cicada. He was named that because the people who rescued him found him clinging to a tree in Athens' Platia Koumoundourou.

Ram Dass, my main spiritual advisor, said

“When someone we love dies, it is as if a part of us has been torn away. And yet, if we can allow ourselves to move through the pain rather than resist it, we begin to see that love does not die.”

I wrote this piece minutes after the vet told me of his passing, playing keyboard through my tears.

A miraloi is a traditional Greek song of mourning.

He always knew when I was going on tour, and didn't want me to leave.

Shruti Frutti

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 10:11:47 GMT

I give you my first piece for April, an atmospheric bricolage on the theme of near death experiences.

Starchopper

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 06 Mar 2025 20:36:04 GMT

Here is my most recent work. Atmospheric and solemn. Loosely based upon an epic dream I had the other night.

Mindful Shoes

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 16:36:54 GMT

Here it is, March again. It's "Clean Monday", first day of Orthodox Lent, and people are flying kites. I post this retro dance number, follo

Here it is, March again. It's "Clean Monday", first day of Orthodox Lent, and people are flying kites. I post this retro dance number, following where the white oompa loompa of inspiration has taken me. I also asked the oracle, the AI genie, to give me some "buddhist disco lyrics for a funky groove." This it did. Here it is.

Mindful Shoes

Stillness in the urban scene, Mindful breaths, a soul pristine. Letting go of all I know, In this moment , watch me grow

Feel the beat, the inner sound. Peace and funk are all around. Move in silence, let it be.

Dance beneath the bodhi tree.

Lotus blooms from muddy ground, beauty in the lost and found. Empty thoughts, a clear insight, groove into the dharma light

Feel the beat, the inner sound. Peace and funk are all around. Mindful in these funky shoes, on the path to truth, got nothing to lose

Step by step, the middle way, balance keeps the doubts at bay. Impermanent, the world unfolds. In the now, the truth is told

Feel the beat, the inner sound. Peace and funk are all around. Mindful in these funky shoes, on the path to truth, got nothing to lose

Sun Shower

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:45:08 GMT

I will close out February with this track, many churning midi phrase generators and found audio, mutated voice by me and some violin. Sun showers are my favorite meteorological phenomenon.

Busy Feet

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 07 Feb 2025 12:56:22 GMT

I like to mess around with sequencers and note generators. I like to work with unforeseen results. It's the way of the tao, say I. Here is one such for you all.

Happy New Year, Dorothy

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 05 Jan 2025 16:47:29 GMT

Happy New Year, o patrons. To mark our passage into another grim year, I am posting this tune (again),

It was the opening theme from my April/May, 2015 work in Geneva for Theatre Grütli's production of "Angels" by Alexandre Simon and Cosima Weiter, featuring Pierre-Isaïe Duc.

Shingle Bells

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 22 Dec 2024 18:27:34 GMT

Christmas is upon us yet again. This tends to happen every year around this time and this year is no exception. With that in mind, I give you a Xmas cookie and wish you all a joyous solstice festival of lights.

How Wonderful (welcome to December)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 06 Dec 2024 09:32:48 GMT

Greetings, friends. Back from tour, I begin to warm up my composing muscles. I have a while to indulge my favorite activity, our next gigs look like happening in April. I will keep you posted. Here is the latest exercise for your listening pleasure, atmospheric, containing some fiddle.

Ash and Bone live in Paris, La Cigale 1987

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 30 Nov 2024 12:48:13 GMT

Greetings, friends. I will squeeze in this post as the last one for November. Excuse me if I am posting archive stuff, I have been quite busy touring. Now, with the hectic Italian tour behind me, I can resume my composition and post all new confections here for my noble patrons.

Here, we have a live to cassette recording from 1987 in Paris, a few days before the show which ended up on my live album. My live band, all-time best, consisted of Alain Goutier on bass and guitar, Klaus Klang on keyboards and back up vocals and Daniel Wang on drums. I called us "Linear B" which is an anagram of "Blaine R" and an ancient Greek language from the Minoan civilization.

Ash and Bone first appeared on my Night Air album, a nostalgic adieu to Tuxedomoon, remembering a photo session we had done in Ean English churchyard while recording "Desire". Strangely enough, instead of a lawn, the graves were covered in crushed green glass.

Here is a photo of me from the time, wearing my "undertaker suit".

Uneasy Listening "Honey Light"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 11 Nov 2024 13:46:08 GMT

Welcome to November, my friends. For now, I will avoid the orange elephant in the room because it is too depressing to contemplate the results of the recent u.s. election. Instead, I will post some tracks from my early 2000's album "Uneasy Listening" which you may or may not have heard. If not, welcome. If so, here it is again.

This album was recorded live in Athens in 1999, in a period that now seems like a golden age. My friend and frequent collaborator, Coti K. and I wrote these songs quite quickly over a two week period to prepare for a show in the Psirri district of Athens. These songs feature my early use of a random text generator called "Fiction Magician" which featured heavily in my later work, both as lyrics and full-blown prose.

Coti was playing his new Nord synthesizer, a state of the art wonder at the time. Here is one song that I thought particularly successful. "Honey Light"

Radio Moscow soundtrack "Night Street, Lone Pianist"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 25 Oct 2024 11:31:14 GMT

Greetings, all. Here is another track from that same film soundtrack, maybe you've heard it, probably not. I was particularly pleased to include this track in the film, since it was the first public release of a recording made in my rudimentary 90's home studio in our Brussels attic.

Radio Moscow Soundtrack "Nightride"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 17 Oct 2024 12:10:46 GMT

Here is another post from Radio Moscow, "Nightride" which played during the opening credits of the film. I remember how proud I was when I saw the film in 1994 at the Thessaloniki Film Festival on the big screen.

Here are a couple of stills from the film.

Radio Moscow Soundtrack "Ambient Hell"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 06 Oct 2024 11:20:47 GMT

Welcome to October, friends.

In 1994 and 95 I worked with Nicolas Triantafyllidis on his first feature film "Radio Moscow".

I played a role in the film and composed the soundtrack. This work changed my life, in that it was key to our re-location from Brussels to Athens in 1998.

The soundtrack was issued on CD, pretty much exclusively in Greece and part of it was released on LTM records. The harder stuff, like this song here, got pretty much shelved and forgotten, though I often heard some of this music being played in the Athens Metro.

Here is a link to the imdb page on the film

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114219/

Ca Brule (It burns)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 15 Sep 2024 22:07:00 GMT

Here is a piece I wrote just after the big fires in Athens in August. No symbolism or evocation intended, just a way to mark the time.

September Song Live

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 02 Sep 2024 10:44:25 GMT

Kalo mina, my friends. Happy month as we say here. I will start the month off with this all inclusive post. We present the wonderful Kurt Weill tune as interpreted by me and my friend Tilemachos Mousas in about 2008, live in Piraeus. It's a long long while, from May to December, but the days grow short when you reach September.

The Winds of August, conclusion. "Bwana, him dead"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 21 Aug 2024 11:47:16 GMT

I close out the month with the final installment in our saga, perhaps forming a narrative, probably not. Thanks for your attention. See you next month.

The Winds of August, part 4. "Lamberti"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 20 Aug 2024 11:22:52 GMT

Our intrepid explorers encounter a sinister talking head in the jungle. Its creator was apparently Italian.

The Winds of August, Part 3. "The Leopard Cult"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 19 Aug 2024 12:58:43 GMT

Our story weaves its non-linear way through some timeline with some chronological points of reference or other. There might even be a linear thread in there as well.

The Winds of August Part 2 "Witch Woman of the Rock" "

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 18 Aug 2024 13:18:26 GMT

Here is the second chapter in the Winds of August cycle, as promised. "The Witch Woman of the Rock"

The Winds of August Part One. "Snake Woman Sleep"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 17 Aug 2024 13:15:24 GMT

A few years ago, as the hot and sometimes deadly winds of August blew through Athens, vacated by Greeks bound for the islands, I began a series of audio cut ups based upon a defunct radio serial I found online. As Athens is once again emptied and the winds blow flames, I will post the entire series here and see how it goes. Here is part one "Snake Woman Sleep"

Nine Times

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 15 Jul 2024 17:29:30 GMT

When I started out working on this tune, I called it the first thing that came to mind. I have found that this usually saves me trouble later when it's time to find the "real title" and often influences the direction of the work. In this case, after I was satisfied with the mix, I googled "nine times" and discovered that there was a Mardi Gras club in New Orleans called Nine Times, for the Ninth Ward of the city. Good enough, I muttered. So here it is.

Alles Wissen

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 06 Jul 2024 21:09:49 GMT

Here is a kind of Krautrock vehicle, using a German translation of some old lyrics of mine.

ALLES WISSEN

Ich höre dich lesen, ich sehe die Sonne

Du bist ein Engel, der strahlt

Ich möchte deinen Namen im Wind hören

Und ich möchte alles über dich wissen

Denn ich muss mehr erfahren

Du bist ein Engel, der strahlt

Ich möchte deinen Namen im Wind hören

Und ich möchte alles über dich wissen

Und ich möchte alles über dich wissen'

Ich treffe dich unter der Straßenlaterne', sagte der Kapitän, und er war verschwunden."

Ray Ray

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 03 Jul 2024 08:55:31 GMT

Greetings, mes amis and welcome to the month of July. I will start the month by posting this soundtracky pop culture derivative bit, Ray Ray. As has become usual in my compositional activities, I started by finding some new soft synth plugins, this time starting with a synth from Tone2, called Ray Blaster. From this, I derived the title, Ray Ray, referencing an episode of "Friends" where Rachel encounters an old friend from college who calls her "Ray Ray" . It turns out, they had shared a kiss while drunk. Hotcha. With this in mind, how could I resist taking an audio clip from YouTube and cutting it up into the soup?

You will hear Winona Ryder say "Oh my god! Ray Ray Green?!" and then "Poor Ray Ray" when she discovers that Rachel's marriage had not worked out.

There it is, gang.

Home on the Strange

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 19:37:28 GMT

Well, I went ahead and recorded a vocal on this song so that I can post it before we leave for Italy. The lyrics for the verse were lifted from a You Tube interview with Michael Richards, the American comic who played Kramer on Seinfeld and was one of the first cancelled comedians of the recent era. I just took them down and liked the sound of 'em. The chorus, I wrote.

On the violin solo I made some use of the Eventide H9 stompbox that was recently gifted to me by old friend Lee Self, himself a subscriber to these proceedings. Here it is. Home on the Strange.

Home on the Strange

the Fool, the ha-ha soul, the clown at large

It’s outrageous! Irrational! Part of the Fool’s kit. Let’s go wild!

Anger is still around, it’s the color of my fur.

I’m there in a club making war on my fellow man.

the damage was inside of me.

Home. Home. On the Strange.

Devise and derange

Home home on the strange

All things must change

me in front of the ancestral home in Pueblo, Colorado, 2003

Thin End of the Wedge. BLR and Billy Currie, 1995

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 06 Jun 2024 10:23:01 GMT

In 1995, after having met in the context of the German film "Freispiel", Billy Currie, keyboarder and violist of Ultravox and I began a collaboration. We met in my attic studio in Brussels on several occasions and recorded some songs and sketches that we wrote together. We were somewhat constrained by the primitive nature of my gear, recording to a strange Sansui 6 track cassette recorder and mastering to DAT, but the results hold up pretty well.

We took our songs on a short German tour, promoting the film, and we even played in London's garage, as support for English steel guitarist B.J. Cole.

I give you, for the first time, one of those songs, "Thin End of the Wedge" featuring Billy Currie on viola and keys, me on vocals, guitar and keys.

Freispiel Film link

https://filmfestival.cologne/en/filme/freispiel

Pain Perdu

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 24 May 2024 16:41:19 GMT

Hello, my friends. Hope you are all well. I'm back from tour for now and ready to rock. I have been working on this tune this week. "Pain Perdu". This is the French name for the sweet we Americans call "French Toast". Lost bread. A clever way of saving stale bread. The female vocal, a French text reader program gives us a recipe for Pain Perdu while I belabor a metaphor about bread and mortality.

An interesting note here is the fact that the drums on this track are provided by my brother, Mike Reininger, long-time ringo-type drummer from Pueblo, Colorado (coincidentally enough, my home town as well.) He's a rock steady guy, solid in the groove.

There it is. I will try to get in some more posts before me and George are off again. We play a festival at Campobasso, Italia, June 21.

Pain perdu

Mélanger les oeufs entiers avec le lait et ajouter le sucre en poudre.
Poser rapidement chaque côté des tranches de pain sec dans le mélange pour faire imbiber.
Mettre le beurre à fondre dans la poêle et y faire dorer le pain.
Retirer et déposer sur une feuille de papier absorbant.
Déguster recouvert de sucre glace.

nous sommes du pain perdu

pain perdu continus

pain perdu, my friend

pain perdu without end

Shelley/Hellas Live November 2021

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 20 Apr 2024 11:45:04 GMT

In 2021, I was invited by Greek composer, Kornilios Selamsis, to participate in a 3 day performance of music performed by its composers in honor of the bicentennial of the Greek Revolution of 1821. My contribution, "Shelley Hellas" was composed especially for this event, using an extract from Shelley's epic poem "Hellas". For the performance, I was accompanied by a 14 piece ensemble conducted by Kornilios Selamsis. The performance took place in the depths of the Coronavirus Pandemic, and though a few people were absent because of illness, we carried on and had an excellent time of it.

Here is my live performance. This song in its studio version may also be found on my recent album "Ocean Planet."

My Funny Valentine live 2008

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 10 Apr 2024 14:33:04 GMT

To start April (a bit late) I submit a live recording of a "standard" from circa 2008. Featured on guitar is my old friend Tilemachos Moussas, local jazz wunderkind. Look for more live recordings this month, since I am kind of busy preparing for the Italian gigs coming in May and June.

Con amore.

Blaine

Jongles Bougies

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 18 Mar 2024 11:26:49 GMT

For this track, I pulled out all the plugins, all the MIDI sequencers, all kinds of random content generation. It still proved stubborn until I got my phrase generation systems up and running, pasting the resulting phrases into text readers, recording that audio with Audacity, vocoders, reverse reverbs, you name it.

I have always been in love with the kind of random verbiage found in Tristan Tzara's ideas, William Burroughs' cutup prose. I have found current AI apps to fall short of this kind of surreal comedy. I prefer to work with more primitive apps that use Markov chains and other mathematical algorithms to generate their poetry. Then I intervene as editor and contributor. Those who know my work will see this everywhere. Here you go.

(Sorry to say that I forgot to save the lyrics, so you will have to listen carefully.)

(The prompt for this image was just "frozen androids speaking into microphones.")

Pleasantville

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 16:11:55 GMT

For my next offering, I give you this orchestral number. It turned out to be a bittersweet theme song for something like a 1960's TV drama about a small American town. Full of hidden scandals, secret passion, leafy green streets. You know. That's why I chose a couple of photos of my hometown, Pueblo, Colorado, in the 1960's, showing the now vacant main street and the long-shut cinemas.

MIRROR MAN

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 03 Mar 2024 11:37:28 GMT

Καλο μινα. Kalo mina, all. Good month to you. March is upon us, spring is coming.

Let's begin with this up-tempo number on the subject of rebirth and reincarnation. Why not? And here are the lyrics for your perusal.

MIRROR MAN

I don’t need to be born again

I don’t want to be born again

NOW YOU SEE ME

NOW YOU DON’T

I’m jumpin in

I’m fallin out

Not this again!

What’s all this about?

I COULD LEAVE NOW,

BUT I WON’T

ROUND AND ROUND AND ROUND WE GO

WHEN WE STOP, NO ONE KNOWS

ROUND AND ROUND AND ROUND AND THEN

LOOK OUT, HERE I GO AGAIN.

Ich muss nicht wiedergeboren werden

Ich will nicht wiedergeboren werden

JETZT SEHT IHR MICH

JETZT TUST DU ES NICHT

Ich springe rein

Ich falle raus

Nicht das schon wieder!

Was soll das alles?

ICH KÖNNTE JETZT GEHEN,

ABER ICH WERDE NICHT

3645 Market

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 28 Feb 2024 11:45:41 GMT

I close out February with this very recent oeuvre d'art bricolage. I have named it in honor of the tuxedomoon residence in San Francisco 1977-80, though it doesn't really evoke those delirious and creative times. I call it that because I started down this path by buying and using a wonderful emulation of the classic Roland CR 78 drum machine from Cherry Audio. Once we in tuxedomoon acquired one of the physical boxes it pays tribute to in 1979, it became an integral part of our sound, as it did for many others. (After its demise, Steven Brown donated it to the Brussels musical instrument museum.)

The still image you see is from Steven's collection of his Super 8 films, "Tuxedomoon, the Super 8 Years."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8DJ-Dg4gVM&ab_channel=diomidistsakiris

It may also be of interest to note that the vocoder voice which features here is that of James Joyce, rabbiting on about some damn thing. Who knows? More interesting to me is the knowledge that the vocoder plugin I used, the Orange Vocoder, finally meets with my approval for ease of use and good results. I have tried most of them, believe me.

See you in March, now almost upon us.

Noise Reduction

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 05 Feb 2024 12:30:22 GMT

Moving on in February, here is my second confection. Once again, I'm pastiche-ing found audio files together over my home-made beats and turning the results loose here. I have also used one of my voice processing plugins to follow one of the vocals and produce a MIDI bassline from that vocal track. We continue with an extract from a poem called " Get your ass in the water and swim like me" about the sinking of the Titanic. Also, mushroom chants by the original magic mushroom shaman of Mexico, Maria Sabina. I guess that's enough ingredients in the soup. Here you go.

Autonomic Wasteland

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 01 Feb 2024 09:04:15 GMT

Greetings and welcome to February. Kalo mina, as we say here in Griechenland. Good month. This month, I give you a jaunty number, featuring excerpts from Eliot's "The Wasteland", cunningly processed by various auto tuning plugins, and a happy go lucky chorus of Blaines singing "Shabba dabba doo". That oughta hold you until my next post, already mixed and ready to go.

Trench Coat

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 08:31:45 GMT

I had intended this piece to start off the month, but I was struck by Covid, so I held off. Now feeling better, so here it is.

Here we see diverse elements including clips from an interview with me, some more examples of the lojban language and some japanese talking presented over a retro house background. (Or something). Pump up the jams.

Aperol Witzer

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 13 Jan 2024 18:55:58 GMT

Here is a vintage synth type piece of bombast, a shadow of Zimmer, Vangelis, you get the drift.

At the last minute, I folded in a voice recording of Aleister Crowley, intoning "The Call of the First Aethyr" in the Enochian language, a language invented by John Dee, alleged to be "the language of the angels". https://enochian.fandom.com/wiki/The_Aethers

The middle bit uses a voice recording called "Zatirlikali Lirlyuki" by Psycho-Futurists Group, a Russian pre war avant garde group.

Now you know more about the piece than I usually divulge.

As has become common here, the title refers to the name of the vst plugin which kicked off the whole mess, a freebie called "Aperuit Musical Drone Synthesizer" (available free here https://puremagnetik.com/products/aperuit-mystical-drone-synthesizer )

Following my new normal, I decorate this post with a couple of bespoke AI images, which may or may not have something to do with the piece.

Kali oreksi.

Blaine

Insta Zone

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 06 Jan 2024 18:17:14 GMT

Today's post has AI all over the place. It's all AI'ed up. First off, I downloaded a midi phrase generating plugin called "Insta Composer" which coughed up an interesting chord progression. I put it to use, mixed it up, then went to Microsoft's "Copilot" AI entity. First I asked for a "title for the theme of a retro-future sci-fi series containing the word "insta" which was my working title for the tune.

This is what I got:

You want me to generate a title for a science fiction tv serial with a retro future vibe and the word insta. That is a very specific request, but I will try to use my creativity and random juxtaposition to come up with some titles. Here is an example:

Plot: Insta-Zone is a mystery series that revolves around a portal that can instantly transport anyone to any location, but also leads to the discovery of a hidden dimension and its mysteries. The portal was created by a brilliant but eccentric scientist, who disappeared after testing it on himself. His daughter, a journalist, teams up with his assistant, a hacker, and a detective, to find him and uncover the secrets of the portal. Along the way, they encounter various dangers, puzzles, and surprises, as well as other people who are interested in the portal for different reasons.

Setting: Insta-Zone is set in a retro-futuristic version of the 1970s, where technology is advanced but also has a vintage and nostalgic aesthetic. The portal is located in a secret laboratory in a remote island, but it can transport anyone to any place in the world, or even beyond. The series also features various locations and scenarios that are related to the portal, such as historical events, exotic cultures, natural wonders, and parallel worlds.

I then used that as a prompt for some images, which I decorate the space with.

There you have it, friends. Insta Zone.

and finally

Tat Tvam Asi

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 31 Dec 2023 17:57:53 GMT

Tat tvam asi is a Sanskrit phrase, meaning "That art thou". It affirms that we as individuals are one and the same with everything that is, all blended in with Brahman, the great totality of being. So, there it is. Look no further.

I chose this tune, finished today, over another candidate as my kickoff for the year. Happy New Year, oh my patrons, I am looking forward to another creative year, piling up the tunes, fulfilling my purpose before I go.

Two Sheds

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 16 Dec 2023 22:18:38 GMT

Here is a piece I wrote after acquiring the means to have a two monitor setup in my studio. The title refers to a famous Monty Python sketch called "Two Sheds Jackson". I have placed my two sheds on Mars, just because.

I acquired a new plugin from Moog, a bass synth called "Mariana" which I used to generate the bass, naturally.

You may see the Monty Python sketch at this link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLjS3gzHetA&ab_channel=thebrat307101

Platform

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 11 Dec 2023 17:14:12 GMT

Here is the latest from my December results. The working title, "platform" got me to thinking about how gigging around the world these last 50 years has involved a lot more travelling around than actually standing on a stage performing. And so, I have some space to complain. Here it is, a bright poppy number for your holiday consumption.

Happy Christmas, Mary.

First Day

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 09:00:04 GMT

I was sitting in a local cafe with some friends, chatting amiably, when the subject of computers came up, as it often will with a certain type of musician. I was lamenting the slowness of my system, how it lacked sufficient RAM to host my new Cherry Audio synths, when my friend George Skordilis said "I can get you a refurbished computer system for less than €500". He then proceeded to do just that, and it was only €300. And it is excellent.

Here is the first song to issue from that system. My prompt for the AI picture illustrating my efforts was "A painting in Japanese style of the Japanese gods setting out on a quest". I think it suits the music well.

Phone Home

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 01 Dec 2023 10:00:04 GMT

Here is a piece of nostalgia for the future of another timeline. By the time this gets posted, I will be installed into my new system, not without bidding a fond farewell to the old boy, faithful and productive.

"Angry Noise" new music for a film, country rock styleee

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 15 Nov 2023 12:22:24 GMT

This week, I have been working on a song for a scene in a new film by Aliki Danezi-Knutsen. The scene had been filmed with a track from 16 horsepower in a kind of country rock style at a certain tempo, so I was obliged to work up an original song in the same style(ee). Here it is. I got out all my guitars and even took the mandolin down from the wall for this one. The lyrics are a bit less AI-esque than usual, more to the point. I am quite pleased with how this one came out.

Triffid (a memoir)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 02 Nov 2023 18:04:41 GMT

Perhaps I should have waited to post this, but what the hey. I say that this site is derived from my "compositional praxis", so here's some of that there praxis. This is an atmosphere suitable for a cheap sci-fi horror movie or video game where angry sentient plants invade Brussels. I also like the AI image that the title revealed.

I stumbled across a synth plugin called "Synplant" that is very rich in possibilities. This is my first outing on that synth, but it promises to be very useful. Check it out for yourselves.

https://soniccharge.com/synplant

September Ember

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 02 Nov 2023 12:03:11 GMT

Greetings, all. Here we are at the beginning of November again. Me and George just finished our big tour for 2023, the "Ocean Planet Tour". Since April, we have played 21 shows in 8 countries. In October we went to Italy, Spain, Austria, the Czech Republic and France. It was fun and exhausting, as tours tend to be.

Now, I start off the month with this perky little tune, incorporating Shaman voices. Perhaps we need some Shamanic wisdom in this dark time. Maybe a big dose of ayahuasca is just what the political "leaders" need right now.

The Witchcraft of Failure

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 25 Sep 2023 14:21:15 GMT

As a result of my efforts to remix some choice tunes from the past couple of years, I now present this one. The rumor is that a new studio album on Les Disques du Crepuscule is in the works for next year. Consider this an appetizer.

Flux Capacity

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 08 Sep 2023 18:27:10 GMT

For my second post of September, I give you some Steely Dan-ish stuff featuring a voiceover by fluxus artist named Robert Filliou, whom I had never heard of until I wrote this song. I just downloaded his voiceover, together with many others, for precisely this use, weaving in to a piece I was working on. I like the results. To further complicate matters, the bridge gives you some more glossolalia, an evangelical preacher "speaking in tongues" as he is moved by the Holy Spirit. Find out more about Robert Filliou here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Filliou

Burning Rain (remixed)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 02 Sep 2023 20:16:23 GMT

I will open the September posts with this new mix of a song I wrote (and posted here) a couple of years back. You see, I am planning a new album for Bandcamp distribution of songs that were passed over when making up my latest couple of albums. These songs are mostly uptempo, loud, often kind of rock, the sort of things that my record companies and collaborators don't tend to go for. I do, however. Look out for the album later this autumn. For now, give a listen to this one. I am pretty pleased with how it has come out.

"Ice Tea" bonus track for August

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 22 Aug 2023 18:48:59 GMT

Every once in a while, I follow the tracks I have laid out to a place where free jazz plays, a vision of my room in hell, being prepared for me in the ironic punishments department of Hades. Some of you may recognize the "easter eggs" I have planted here for you. Don't marvel too long at the furious shredding I do here, we used to call it "varispeed" back in the day. Nice.

"Small Hadron Collider" sounds of the bardo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 21 Aug 2023 10:38:09 GMT

Here is an "experimental" piece, an atmosphere, an ambience, you get the drift. If you have 5 and a half minutes to spare, immerse yourself in the hypothetical sounds of the bardo to help you through when you find yourself there.

"OHO" A symphonic evocation of August 15

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 15 Aug 2023 10:54:38 GMT

Here is an orchestral type celebration of August 15th, the deadest day ever in Greece. Everything closed, vacant streets, a kind of paradise for a couple of hours.

"Blind" (A Tuxedomoon re-imagining)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 11 Aug 2023 15:12:56 GMT

Greetings, friends. As I was working on this guitar festival, getting out and playing most of my guitars, a remembered Steven Brown lyric kept surfacing in my mental stew, the Brussels Plan K era haunted dirge "Blind". Many of you may know it, a companion piece to "Egypt", composed and recorded in Plan K, the re-purposed sugar factory that housed concerts from all of the interesting 80's bands where we were resident in 1982. This is not that. This is something quite different. Envigorating. I decided to mix this lyric into the stew and loved the results. Lend an ear, o my patrons.

The original song may be heard here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKVCfDJMQSI&ab_channel=50%27sSleaze%2C60%27sEase%2670%27sCheeseFromLondon

Ghost Festival

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 14 Jul 2023 10:37:31 GMT

Here is a piece I almost forgot, intended for a July posting called "Ghost Festival". It was not originally intended to connect with the previous post "Elegy in July" but there it is anyway. Here is a quote from wikipedia about ghost festivals.

Prompt for the AI images was "ghost festival in Brussels".

The Ghost Festival or Hungry Ghost Festival, also known as the Zhongyuan Festival is a traditional Taoist and Buddhist festival held in certain East Asian countries. According to the Chinese calendar (a lunisolar calendar), the Ghost Festival is on the 15th night of the seventh month (14th in parts of southern China).

In Chinese culture, the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar is called Ghost Day and the seventh month in general is regarded as the Ghost Month, in which ghosts and spirits, including those of deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm (diyu or preta).

further info at the link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_Festival

Elegy in July (nothing in particulate)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 14 Jul 2023 10:16:20 GMT

July is an emotional month for me. There are birthdays and anniversaries that stir up my heart, fill me with mixed emotions. There is my own birthday on the 10th (1953), this year marking my 70th year on earth. There is also my son's birthday on the 19th (2000), and the anniversary of my marriage to Maria on the 27th. Perhaps most fraught are the anniversaries of the death of my first wife, JJ on the 15th (1998) and now that of Peter on the 17th (2017), just two days later. As this piece emerged, I decided to dedicate it to their memories. I miss them both, though they visit me often in dreams.

(They are pictured here in Bologna, 1981).

"Felt Like Me" Welcome to July

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 02 Jul 2023 09:23:43 GMT

Welocome to July, my friends. Here is your first post for this month. I got out my violin for this one, had to turn off the air conditioner to record, then right back on. The title refers to the recent practice of putting a piece of felt over a piano's strings to get that muted, dramatic sound so prized by composers like Max Richter or Nils Frahm, etc. I recently acquired a very promising sample library for just such a sound and this tune is one result. My AI prompts for these images all had to do with a green felt piano in the rain.

the feltmakers

Joseph Beuys felt-wrapped piano

Voulez Boulez (bonus track for June)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 23 Jun 2023 18:51:41 GMT

Here is a track I have been working on the last few days. It emerged as a sort of 20th century serial music tribute, given to me by grain synthesis and Kontakt sample libraries.

About the title, an older track of mine bore the name woulez boulez, so I made it even more French, not to say that I was ever such a fan of old Pierre Boulez. He did, however, found the IRCAM which was key in blazing a trail for electronic music in the 20th century. I just couldn't resist the pun, you see. Check him out at this link

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Boulez

Here is an AI image, generated from the prompt "Pierre Boulez meets a minotaur at Pompidou Center".

Orphic Melon

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 17 Jun 2023 20:11:15 GMT

I will close out the month of June with another filmic endeavor. I got out my viola for this one, something I don't do often enough. It's just so easy to do everything from a keyboard without having to set up microphones, or even to stand up. But hey. Sometimes I think the viola is more suited to my temperament than violin, sweetly melancholic, baritone. Maybe some day I'll tell you what the title is an anagram for. The AI prompt for this image was "Orpheus in the underworld carrying a melon."

Still Too Jung

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 20:31:43 GMT

Here is a bit of bricolage which started with an audio recording of Jung speaking about death. And we took it from there. You decide.

Grainy Day in Athens

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 11 Jun 2023 21:16:11 GMT

Welcome to June, o friends. As usual, I got a kick start in my work by finding a new and interesting plugin and took it from there. Here we have a granular synthesis plugin called "gRainbow" which seems very fruitful, you just load in one of your samples and it delivers innarestin' results quite easily. It was also actually raining here today, so my pun holds water. Here is the link for the vst plugin for those who go for that sort of thing. I am also quite pleased with the Bing Image Creator as a source for the images I use here. The prompt here was "grain synthesis on a rainy day in my office"

https://bboettcher3.github.io/grainbow

Canal Street (Tuxedomoon rehearsal montage)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 25 May 2023 20:41:16 GMT

Hey again. Here is another of my montage-remix-remakes derived from Tuxedomoon rehearsal sessions, this one also mastered by our good friend Alessandro Cardellini, our soundman from all those tours after 2000.

La Repris (novachord)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 20 May 2023 09:52:42 GMT

Greetings, friends. Here's your working boy, back from tour, relaxing back into my compositional routine. Here is the most recent bagatelle, reminiscent of 1960's French films. I have used images generated by AI to illustrate my post. Because. Just because. The novachord, by the way, was an early type of polyphonic synthesizer, invented in 1939 (!), used extensively in films, since Hollywood productions were the only ones able to afford one. I have used a plugin from Cherry audio as a jumping off point here, my usual modus operandi. More info here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novachord

La ville avec un fleuve enterre

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 25 Apr 2023 16:18:43 GMT

Earlier this week, I did a podcast for a guy name Jack Stafford, called "podsongs" where I interviewed James Nice, CEO of Les Disques du Crepuscule, old friend, old veteran of the Brussels music scene in the 1980's. The premise of this podcast was to do a zoom chat and then write a song "inspired by the chat". Here is the result, nostalgia for those heady, melancholic days in Brussels as it was, buildings still black from 19th century coal, rainy, grey, poetic. I wanted to sing in French. Below are the lyrics. (Thanks to Gilles Le Guen for French language assistance.)

La ville avec un fleuve enterré

Voilà la ville avec un fleuve enterré

Qui coule sous les pavés

Ciel de plomb

Bas en dessous de la place dorée

Bruxelles des années 80

Dans le vidéo bar branché où

Sans un sou sur la rue

Des superstars inconnues

En longs manteaux noirs

Je suis assis sur une rive lointaine

Savourant ce chagrin ancien

Perdu dans la musique

Déformé par la musique

Posant dans le cimetière

Debout sous la pluie

A city with a buried river

Here is the city with a buried river

Which flows under the cobblestones

leaden sky

Low above the gilded square

80s Brussels

In the trendy video bar or

Without a penny in the street

Unknown Superstars

In long black coats

I sit on a distant shore

Savoring this ancient sorrow

lost in the music

Distorted by the music

Posing in the cemetery

Standing in the rain

Argent Vite (Tuxedomoon rehearsal montage)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 16 Apr 2023 11:08:03 GMT

Happy Easter (greek brand). For my first post back in the saddle after my long exile in the world of theatre, I will post this montage I did (a while back) from unreleased tuxedomoon rehearsal recordings and radio interviews. We had thought to use this as the seed for a new tm project, and we still might.

Ishtar Sez

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 22 Mar 2023 08:33:28 GMT

Here is a fairly goofy little confection I amused myself with on one of my days off from theatre board trodding. It features a prayer from the goddess Ishtar which is cited as the earliest mention of the living dead, or zombies, in literature. It goes:

If you do not open the gate for me to come in,
I shall smash the door and shatter the bolt,
I shall smash the doorpost and overturn the doors,
I shall raise up the dead and they shall eat the living:
And the dead shall outnumber the living!

Who is Ishtar?

She is the goddess of love and sexuality, and thus, fertility; she is responsible for all life, but she is never a Mother goddess. As the goddess of war, she is often shown winged and bearing arms. Her third aspect is celestial; she is the planet Venus, the morning and evening star.

Bonus Track "Whack a Mole"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 18:38:03 GMT

Here is a bonus I worked up on my day off from the theatre, "Whack a Mole". I called it this because of the frenetic, cartoon-like pace that began to emerge as I worked on it. I even downloaded a handy audio library of vintage cartoon sound effects from the good old Internet Archive. In case you don't know, here is some background information on the title:

WHACK A MOLE:

The practice of trying to stop problems, etc., that repeatedly occur in an apparently random manner; also, the act of dealing with such matters in a piecemeal manner without achieving a complete solution.

From whack +‎ a +‎ mole (“small, burrowing, insect-eating mammal of the family Talpidae”), from the arcade game Whac-A-Mole which involves quickly and repeatedly hitting the heads of mechanical moles with a mallet as they pop up from holes.[1] The name of the arcade game was coined in 1977 when it was first sold in the United States; the original game released in Japan in 1975 was called モグラ退治 (Mogura Taiji, literally “Mole Extermination”).

Trying to get rid of spam e-mails is like whack-a-mole: as soon as you delete one, another appears.

Alternative forms Whac-A-Mole, whac-a-mole

The link for the cartoon sound library:

https://archive.org/details/WarnerBrosSoundFXLibraryCD1

Chord Organ

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 19:28:22 GMT

I found a cool little 32 bit plugin that simulates an old Magnus Chord Organ. This instrument gave people many hours of pleasure by being simple to play and accompany songs in the home. Plus the sound was wonderful and evocative. Bowie used it to great effect in "Memory of a Free Festival", par example. Here is some fairly wacky lo-fi bricolage for your Valentine's Day 2023.

No Vacancy

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 09 Feb 2023 12:19:03 GMT

Here is a wee atmosphere I whipped up during my days off from the play, including the one caused by the actors' strike.

Windy Outside Live in Oslo, 1986

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 07 Feb 2023 12:53:03 GMT

Here is another track from my 1986 concert at the Renegat club in Oslo, a famed venue that now sits beneath the train station. I am joined on this occasion by my friend Lee Self on guitar and soundman Luc Gerlo, responsible for the good sound quality. This song was part of a suite of tunes I recorded with New York minimalist composer Mikel Rouse, available as a Crammed Discs "Made to Measure" album called "Colorado Suite". The titles of the rest of the songs were anagrams of this title, true to minimalist principles of note assembly.

Me in front of the old homestead, 2003

Ocean Planet New Album

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 30 Jan 2023 16:26:11 GMT

I will close out the month of January, at the last minute, with a bonus for you all. Since I played Piacenza on my October tour, I have been talking with a certain Max Marchini who has a record company called "Dark Companion Records". He wanted to issue a CD with some of my new material, much of which has already appeared here on Patreon. So, we will do it. It will be called "Ocean Planet" and will be available to buy in about March. Here is an advance excerpt, the title track, mastered for inclusion in this collection.

The cover art is from a drawing by my wife, Maria Panourgia.

Chemise Grise Live for Theatre

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 09 Jan 2023 20:48:36 GMT

Hello, friends. Here is a recording I made for the rehearsals for our Camus play. It is a live and stripped down version of "Chemise Grise", the song from my album "Wounds and Blessings". This song, you might know if you bought the album and read the liner notes, was written to commemorate Peter Principle's passing, talking about the grey flannel shirt which he wore most of the time, including one last time.

The Misunderstanding (Sketch 1)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 26 Dec 2022 18:25:58 GMT

Here is a sketch for the play I'm working in, The Misunderstanding by Albert Camus. I am playing this tune live on guitar, several times during the performance. That's what I do. My character is called "The Old Man" and I am that. An old man who plays guitar. Look for new posts in the new year.

E'Knows Something (But E's Not Telling Us)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 02 Dec 2022 21:24:07 GMT

Welcome to December, alles. Glad you could make it. Here is a tune that appeared in the last couple of days, now I'm sending it on to you.

Soon, I will start working in the theatre, composing music which I will perform live as a character in a play by Albert Camus, The Misunderstanding. It will be directed by Iannis Houvardas, former director of the Greek National Theatre. This will mean that my time will be somewhat limited, but fear not, I would never desert you, my faithful patrons.

Mystery and Confusion Live, 1987

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 29 Nov 2022 18:40:30 GMT

It's been a tough month, my friends. Just after I got home from my excellent October tour, I contracted some damn virus (not covid, but no fun either) which has been subverting my cell life for almost a month now. On top of that, just as the symptoms were receding I got a toothache and the old veteran molar had to be yanked free of my mortal coil. Today, I'm feeling good for the first time this month. A good time for this post.

I will close out this month of November with another live track from that Paris concert at La Cigale, the closest thing I ever came to a solo hit. Once again, we can savor the tightness of this band and wish we had a better recording. I have done what I can with my mastering skills. See you in a few days when we hit December.

a pic of the time.

Teenage Theatre, Live at La Cigale Paris, 1987

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 23 Nov 2022 12:01:21 GMT

Here is another track from that much loved live set in Paris, back in the 80s, with Linear B, my wonderful band of the time. Alain Goutier on bass and guitar, Daniel Wang on drums and Klaus Klang on keys and backup vocals.

Japanese Dream Live, 1987

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 10 Nov 2022 12:47:14 GMT

Hello, my friends and beloved patrons. Here I am, sorry to have seemed absent for a while. I was on tour, which was great fun, played with my buddy George to much acclaim in Greece, Italy, and finally the old hood in Belgium. I came home, only to get hit by some kind of virus, (not covid, thank buddha!) Now today, I feel almost human again so I will post something I have been meaning to post for a long time. It is a live recording of "Japanese Dream" from La Cigale in Paris, 1987, probably the best show with my lineup of the time, called "Linear B" (an anagram for Blaine R. and an ancient version of Greek).

The band here is composed of Alain Goutier on bass and guitar, Claude Ongena on keyboards and backup vocals, and Daniel Wang on drums. I am singing and playing keys and violin. It is a pity that the only recording I have was a cassette recording from the house. I have tweaked it a bit, but I wish I had a really good copy to share with you. Here it is. I will post more from this show soon.

Off Centaur

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 18:47:35 GMT

While I'm between shows on this Autumn tour, I worked up this extravaganza. As usual, I got my start from a new plugin, this one a most excellent one from Cherry Audio called "Graindad". I have also made extensive use of some lofi plugins from various places. Random input becomes reality if you want it to.

Rhythmizer October

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 05 Oct 2022 10:54:35 GMT

Hello, friends. For my first post of October, I submit this peppy number, featuring the voices of Paramahansa Yogananda and another Whatsapp vocal from Steven Pagnotta, perhaps my oldest friend on earth. Yes, I have known this guy and his family since I was 6 years old, when his brother and I thought we were pushing down the school because we saw the clouds moving above it. Be of good cheer, friends, listen in good health and security.

(I will have to stop naming my songs after the vst plugins that help bring them forth. This is a fine midi generator called "Rhythmizer", info to be found here

https://www.futurephonic.co.uk/products/rhythmizer-2

Temper Tantra

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 22 Sep 2022 08:15:41 GMT

Here is a song that was waiting for a vocal. Suddenly, one of my oldest friends, Steven Pagnotta of Boulder, Colorado sent me a Whatsapp message with a vocal recording attached. It fit, with a bit of tweaking and here is the serendipitous result.

Martian Dawn

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 10 Sep 2022 10:13:50 GMT

Here is your first post for September, an "airy" kind of tune, kind of happy go lucky. More coming.

Apricot Season

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 23 Aug 2022 11:13:04 GMT

Here is a kind of cinematic, or even telefilm soundtrack. It was earlier this year, the apricots were coming in, I was eating some while recording this. That's all you need to know.

Iris

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 13 Aug 2022 10:58:26 GMT

Here is a darker wave, washing up on the shore of windy hot August.

Kemeo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 01 Aug 2022 10:45:28 GMT

Welcome to August, friends. Let us begin with a peppy little tune, a kind of classic rock/soul groove, using some harvested folk rhymes.

KEMEO

In old Minnesota the folks all go

Sing-song kitty, cantcha kem-eo

Sing it high and sing it low

Sing-song kitty, cantcha kem-eo

Sing it high and sing it low

Sing-song kitty, cantcha kem-eo

Whatcha gonna do when the rain don’t fall

Corn grows small instead of tall

And whatcha gonna do if the snow don’t stop

Drifting around that silo top

Sing it high and sing it low

Sing-song kitty, cantcha kem-eo

A ram sam sam, a ram sam sam

Guli guli guli guli guli ram sam sam

In old Minnesota the folks all sleep

Underneath a quilt that’s twelve miles deep

Made from the skin of an old banjo

Stuffed with the feathers of the buffalo

A ram sam sam, a ram sam sam

Guli guli guli guli guli ram sam sam

Diva Drone

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 10:28:53 GMT

Now, I submit a slightly darker piece, a nod in the direction of 20th century modernist music. Here is an example of "sprechgesang" lifted from a diva on youtube, in the post modernist pastiche tradition.

Sprechgesang (German: [ˈʃpʀɛçɡəˌzaŋ], "spoken singing") and Sprechstimme (German: [ˈʃpʀɛçˌʃtɪmə], "spoken voice") are expressionist vocal techniques between singing and speaking. Though sometimes used interchangeably, Sprechgesang is directly related to the operatic recitative manner of singing (in which pitches are sung, but the articulation is rapid and loose like speech), whereas Sprechstimme is closer to speech itself (because it does not emphasise any particular pitches).

Some Sequencers Are Bigger Than Others

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 09 Jul 2022 09:58:55 GMT

To celebrate my own birthday, (July 10, 1953) I continue setting wisdom texts to music, here choosing the good old Tao Te Ching. May all you Tao surfers join me on your dharma surfin' safari.

SOME SEQUENCERS ARE BIGGER THAN OTHERS

If you want to become whole,

Let yourself be partial.

If you want to become straight,

Let yourself be crooked.

If you want to become full,

Let yourself be empty.

If you want to be reborn,

Let yourself die.

Look, and it can't be seen.

Listen, and it can't be heard.

Reach, and it can't be grasped.

Colors blind the eye.

Sounds deafen the ear.

Flavors numb the taste.

Thoughts weaken the mind.

Desires wither the heart.

The Master observes the world

But trusts his inner vision.

He allows things to come and go.

His heart is open as the sky.

Messidor, Lojban

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 02 Jul 2022 16:36:01 GMT

Welcome to July, o noble patrons. I will start us off with a retro-disco Fantasie, featuring lyrics sung in Lojban. What is Lojban? Glad you asked.

Lojban is a logical, constructed, syntactically unambiguous human language created by the Logical Language Group. Lojban is proposed as a speakable language for communication between people of different language backgrounds, as a potential means of machine translation, and as a tool to explore the intersection between human language and software. (wikipedia)

Also, about Messidor:

"Messidor was the tenth month in the French Republican Calendar. The month was named after the Latin word messis, which means harvest.

Messidor was the first month of the summer quarter (mois d'été). It started on 19 or 20 June. It ended on 18 or 19 July. It follows the Prairial and precedes Thermidor". (wikipedia)

I include the text I sing from, for your guidance and amusement.

This lady will pay for everything

ti poi ninmu cu ba te vecnu ro da

ti poi ninmu cu ba pleji fo ro da

Would you like to dance with me?

.aupei mi'o dansu

xu do djica lo nu mi'o dansu

.e'o mi'o dansu

I love you

mi prami do

Melting Ice (Prajnaparamita)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 08 Jun 2022 21:08:33 GMT

I started at the very beginning (a very good place to start) attempting to replicate Martin Rev's pulsating sound, eventually settling on a distorted Farfisa with a trance gate plugin to provide the pulse. As the layers began to pile on, like a reversed onion, I began to think that the text to sing would be the Heart Sutra, the Prajnaparamita Sutra. So that is what I did. And here it is.

Heart Sutra

Form is no other than emptiness.

Emptiness no other than form

Form is only emptiness

Emptiness only form

All things are by nature void

They are not born or destroyed

Nor are they stained or pure

Nor do they wax or wane.

No eye or ear, nose or tongue

No color, sound, smell or taste.

No ignorance or end of it,

Nor all that comes with ignorance.

No withering, no death,

No end of them.

Nor is there pain

Or cause of pain

Or noble path

To lead from pain.

GATE GATE PARAGATE. PARASAMGATE, BODHI SVAHA!

Heart Sutra, Sanskrit Prajnaparamitahridaya-sutra (“Discourse on the Heart of the Perfection of Wisdom”), in Mahayana Buddhism, an extremely brief yet highly influential distillation of the essence of Prajnaparamita (“Perfection of Wisdom”) writings, much reproduced and recited throughout East and Central Asia.

True to its title, this short sutra goes to the heart of the doctrine it summarizes. In the space of a single page (some versions adding an introductory and a concluding paragraph), in words ascribed to the bodhisattva (“buddha-to-be”) of compassion, Avalokiteshvara, the Heart Sutra discusses the doctrine of “emptiness” (shunyata), which is the nature of reality. The process of death and rebirth (samsara), the suffering (dukkha) that one experiences while knowing that one may die, the effects of past actions (karma) that bind one to samsara, the skandhas that constitute a sense of selfhood, the ephemeral and microscopic dharmas that constitute phenomenal reality—all are revealed to be devoid of permanence, and thus “empty.” Awareness of such emptiness leads to release (moksha) from samsara and to the wisdom that precedes enlightenment (bodhi).

Waiting for Tuna

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 05 Jun 2022 10:58:26 GMT

Back to Reaper, I've been working this one for a few days now. Check what happens when Terry Riley meets Satan in a 1950's guidance film about parties. "This here's a devil party. It's where the other parties go to die".

Bitwit in the Bozosphere

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 02 Jun 2022 07:40:47 GMT

When I bought my new master keyboard, I received a download coupon for "Bitwig 8 Track". I was curious, so I got it. It turns out that Bitwig is an Ableton style DAW, even created by former Ableton employees. I let curiosity get the better of me and spent the better part of a week learning how to use Bitwig. I wrote a couple of songs, which you will hear on Patreon. Now, I have given up. My usual DAW, Reaper is far far superior. Bye bye Bitwig.

Say Bones

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 11:34:00 GMT

This is a song originally commissioned for a theatre piece, featuring bits cherry picked from a text by Samuel Beckett called "Worstword Ho", containing the famous exhortation to "Try again. Fail again. Fail Better."

Environs

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 10 May 2022 08:47:23 GMT

I present you with a montage, a soundscape in the fine old 20th century tradition of Cage or Stockhausen, disparate elements fused for your mental parsing. Onward, o my patrons.

Bis Gems

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 05 May 2022 09:50:14 GMT

Here, we hear the results of incessant transformation of found vocal loops. What were originally just female voice loops for R&B type applications, attain a sort of Bulgarian polyphonic choir cast. Don't tell anyone that "Bis Gems" is an anagram of "Big Mess".

Firefly

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 02 May 2022 11:39:43 GMT

Let us start the month of May with a big ol' slice of prog rock pie. Why not? Maybe we need to add a bit of epic splendor to our puzzling situation. Firefly.

Elvis in the Bardo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 24 Apr 2022 11:55:43 GMT

I started this piece, working my library of Bollywood samples and my new "break tweaker" beatmaker plugin, but decided something was missing. Pursuing various avenues of randomness through the interwebs, the spirit of Elvis appeared and I just had to go with it. Elvis speaks from beyond.

S.D.P.S.G. (some dumb plugins, some good)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 18 Apr 2022 17:18:26 GMT

Here is a new churnin' urn of burnin' funk, fresh from my plugin harvesting online. Some plugins are dumb, some are great. When I'm trying them out, a path forward is revealed.

Sometimes, as with the Bollywood samples I have employed here, I even have to spend some money. Life is good.

Decency

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 06 Apr 2022 20:01:41 GMT

Here is a new piece of busyness to start your month. As I often do, I have just named this piece after a new soft synth I acquired called "Decent Sampler". Thus...Decency.

Shelley:Hellas Live 20 November 2021

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 20:14:33 GMT

Here is the live recording of the song I wrote for the "Greek Songbook" event held this past November at the Stavros Niarchos Center here in Athens. I was asked by Kornilios Selamsis, a local wunderkind composer to set words from Shelley about Greece to music, in honor of the 200th anniversary of Greek independence. This was the result. I am accompanied here by a group of very skilled musicians to good effect.

Here is a Polaroid from the publicity for the event.

The Musos

Spyros Tzekos (clarinet)

Dimitris Gogas (trumpet)

Spyros Vergis (trombone)

Nikos Metallinos, Vangelis Karipis (percussion)

Vangelis Baliousis (drum set)

Gogo Xagara (harp)

Katerina Konstantourou (piano)

Mislav Rezić (guitar)

Sofia Efklidou (cello)

Dimitris Tigkas (double bass)

23:00

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 16 Mar 2022 14:26:06 GMT

A soothing atmosphere that I started working on at 11 pm one night and finished at the same time the next.

In Spite of Lions

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 12 Mar 2022 21:02:26 GMT

Well, friends, welcome to March. Here is a more upbeat piece for y'all, seeing as how the news is so relentlessly nasty and all.

Chug Groove

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 28 Feb 2022 12:38:01 GMT

I close out the month with music I wrote for a short animation by a Belgian director in 2020. I also did a voiceover of a text he wrote. Much later, when his film finally surfaced, I was surprised to find that he didn't use my music at all and didn't tell me. He did use the voiceover. Now, I have spliced the two together for your February listening, apt sentiments for the evil events of the last week. (Image by Martin Wittfooth)

Dukkha

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 22 Feb 2022 10:35:00 GMT

Continuing with a slightly more piquant Weltanschauung, here is a piece which emerged as a commentary on the 1st noble truth of Buddhism, "dukkha", life innately contains suffering. (Of course, the other 3 noble truths provide a way out of suffering, and Buddhism itself is a path to profound happiness, but that is a conversation for another day, another month.)

Duḥkha (Sanskrit; Pali dukkha) is a term found in ancient Indian literature, meaning anything that is "uneasy, uncomfortable, unpleasant, difficult, causing pain or sadness".[9][10] It is also a concept in Indian religions about the nature of life that innately includes the "unpleasant", "suffering", "pain", "sorrow", "distress", "grief" or "misery."[9][10] The term duḥkha does not have a one-word English translation, and embodies diverse aspects of unpleasant human experiences.[3][10] It is opposed to the word sukha, meaning "happiness," "comfort" or "ease."[11]

The word is commonly explained as a derivation from Aryan terminology for an axle hole, referring to an axle hole which is not in the center and leads to a bumpy, uncomfortable ride. According to Winthrop Sargeant,

The Great Water

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 13:51:14 GMT

Here is a rather somber atmosphere for you all. Call it expressionist. (The image is my wife, Maria, onstage a couple of years back).

Stochastic Friendship

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 11:03:16 GMT

Here is a little bagatelle to start off our month of February. Just a romp through stochastic fields revealed to us by a random midi sequencer called "Stochas". Kalo mina, my friends.

Tappeto Blu

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 21 Jan 2022 21:47:20 GMT

Here is an atmospheric piece which Maria may or may not use in her new production, but which can serve to soothe those pandemic-weary brain cells. Blue Carpet.

Incantations

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 18 Jan 2022 18:20:46 GMT

Here is some of the music I have been working on for my wife, Maria's new production of Shakespeare's "Troilus and Cressida" for the Greek National Theatre. I have been featuring guitar in this music. She heard me in my office twanging away on my new Les Paul day and night and decided this was the way to go. Here is the image from her posters and such for the show.

Mercurius Retrogradus

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 10 Jan 2022 18:41:44 GMT

Here is an atmospheric piece I named after the synth plugin I just bought, Mercury from Cherry Audio. I named it after Mercury in retrograde and translated it to latin just to sound cool. (By the by, the voice you hear belongs to Aleister Crowley, mumbling about some voodoo crap or other.) Here is some info about this phenomenon I acquired online:

Simply put, Mercury retrograde is an astrological phenomenon that occurs when the fast-moving planet Mercury—which takes 88 days to orbit the Sun, as opposed to Earth's 365—seems to slow down. ... During Mercury retrograde, Mercury appears to move "backwards," from West to East.

The planet Mercury is associated with communication, information, electronics, travel, and clear thinking. So, when it’s retrograde, we have to be ready for a slowdown in all of those areas. Things break. Projects stall. We lose things. Breakups happen. Schedules are thrown off.

The first Mercury retrograde of 2022 begins on Jan. 14 and lasts until Feb. 3 in the signs Aquarius and Capricorn. Mercury retrograde re-enters Capricorn on Jan. 25, letting us revise the story from the end of December and beginning of January. This is a time of reflection and reassessing who and what we align with.

Ciga Ciga

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 01 Jan 2022 12:46:07 GMT

We will start the New Year with this twanging guitar number, which puts me in mind of Colorado, my native land. Ciga ciga (σιγά σιγά) is Greek for "slowly slowly" a very common expression generally used to calm situations and people down.

Here I am outside the ancestral home in Pueblo, Colorado, 2003

Christmas 2021 (Silent Blight)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 16:48:28 GMT

So, we limp forward into another Christmas season, as one plague year follows another. I give you a familiar tune in a minor key. We persevere, my heart friends, as we must, becoming portals for the light of loving awareness to shine forth into our twilight world. Ho ho ho, bros and sisses, love, life, light and happiness to you all.

"Limboland" with Minox

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 11 Dec 2021 18:31:58 GMT

Here is another collaboration, with the Italian band "Minox" (Mirco Magnani and

Marco Monfardini from Pistoia) recorded circa 1987, never released, but always in my memory.

Keen-o "The Mystic Barge"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 11 Dec 2021 17:06:25 GMT

Here is another of my collaborations which you are likely unaware of. This time, I was invited to Italy around 2002 by Arlo Bigazzi, brother of Giampierro Bigazzi of Materiali Sonori, our longtime record company in Toscana, to play and sing on some tracks by Arlo Bigazzi, Roger Eno, and Pierluigi Andreoni. It was a splendid time in Toscana, down the road from Sting, and I wrote and sang some delirious verse, played some violin, you know how it is.

The Wedding

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 11 Dec 2021 12:04:23 GMT

Here is a track you almost certainly have never heard. It was recorded live in Cologne, circa 1994, again with my friend Jurgen Dahmen and his band, called "Trance Groove", . I am on vocals here, channeling some spontaneous verbiage that they took to be "The Wedding" and released on their CD called "Paramount".

Please (2003)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 24 Nov 2021 18:18:19 GMT

Here's another find from my forgotten pre-Maria days. Please.

Feel Like I'm on Drugs (2021 remix)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 24 Nov 2021 17:57:23 GMT

I was going through some ancient data CD's (what are those?) and found some work from the period 2003-2006. I was just learning how to do digital audio, was working mostly on headphones, my son was just learning how to talk. This piece is rich in autobiographical detail, sampling as it does, Steven and Peter in Cagli while recording "Cabin in the Sky", especially Peter's manic laugh and my son banging on a plastic guitar. Expect more in this vein.

Zira Reprise

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 17:02:13 GMT

Back in 2001, I spent several months in and around Faenza in Emiglia Romagna in Italy. During my stay, I met a local singer-songwriter named Gianluca Lo Presti who had a studio in the country. We got together and did some recording, resulting in a CD called Sun and Rain. You have probably never heard of it. This is an extract, named after Gianluca's dog.

Manic Man "King for a Day"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 13 Nov 2021 18:24:40 GMT

This month, I will post some collaborations and releases that have probably flown beneath your radar, Greek releases, Italian releases, German releases, not widely known.

We begin with a track I'll wager none of you have ever heard. It is from my 1997 soundtrack album for Nicholas Triandafyllidis' telefilm "The Overcoat" called "Manic Man", released primarily in Greece. It dates from a fairly dark period in my creative life, just before leaving Brussels for Athens, sitting in my tiny attic loft with pieces of the ceiling falling on my mixer, fighting bi-polar depression (hence the title of the album).

"To the Green Door" Live in Neuss, 1993

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 31 Oct 2021 16:30:23 GMT

I will close out the month with another track from my live show in Neuss with Jurgen Dahmen. It is "To the Green Door" from my 1989 album "Book of Hours". The lyrics to this song come from an interview with a paranoid schizophrenic that I saw on the BBC. This version is probably the only time this song was performed live.

Polar Orbit Live, 1994

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 28 Oct 2021 10:11:20 GMT

Since I had a very agreeable performance in Cologne last weekend with pianist Jurgen Dahmen, I decided to post this live track from a show we did together in his home town of Neuss in 1994. The song became part of the soundtrack for Greek director Nicholas Triandafyllidis' film of that same year "Radio Moscow".

Freispiel "Simple Advice"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 21 Oct 2021 07:54:46 GMT

Saturday, October 23, I will go to Cologne to play a short show before the screening of this film, which I also played in, from 1994.

The song I am posting, almost certainly unknown to you, my patrons, was a 1994 collaboration between me, Arno Steffen, and Jurgen Dahmen associated with this film project. I will perform it before the screening of this film, probably for the first time ever.

The songs I recorded with Billy Currie, posted previously here, were a direct result of this project. Though I didn't play with Billy in the film, I met him in that context. We met in Brussels and recorded new songs in my attic studio, later touring Germany together in support of the film. The project eventually self-destructed and has only re-surfaced now as part of the Cologne film festival.

"In November 1993 the Cologne Stadtgarten was the venue of a unique musical project: forty musicians of different generations and styles (Krautrock, New Wave, electronic music, world music) came together in small groups to play jam sessions without any provisions or stated goals. This brainchild of Cologne's musical Jack of all trades Arno Steffen and director Burkhard Steger features among others: Jaki Liebezeit (Can), Peter Hook (New Order), Billy Currie (Ultravox), Andrew Gill (Gang of Four), Sven Regener (Element of Crime), Gudrun Gut (Malaria) Blaine Reininger (tuxedomoon)and many more."

https://filmfestival.cologne/en/filme/freispiel?fbclid=IwAR3Ki-G5cFqjbYmlrZgu6mSNXhx3u8u6kDsDN6GzdoBQ5AkOyi0r8zj9aP0

Wounds and Blessings Teaser "I Inhabit the Dunes"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 07 Oct 2021 11:48:21 GMT

Here is a little taste from my new Double album "Wounds and Blessings". Check it aus and then go buy.

The New Blaine L. Reininger 28 track album "Wounds and Blessings" has arrived! Order CD and/or digital download at:

www.lesdisquesducrepuscule.com/wounds_and_blessings_twi1255.html

"Wounds and Blessings is a brand new studio double album by Blaine L. Reininger, the Colorado-born composer and founder member of avant-garde music group Tuxedomoon.

Wounds and Blessings is a collection of 28 new tracks organised into 4 distinct suites. While all the music is performed and produced by Reininger, featured guests include his Tuxedomoon colleagues Steven Brown and Luc van Lieshout, as well as former Indoor Life member Bob Hoffnar and Reininger’s Greek guitarist, Tilemachos Moussas.

On this expansive double set Reininger employs all the tools in his current arsenal, from AI-assisted lyrics to sampler bricolage, to violin and guitar virtuosity, a vast array of computer plug-ins and effects, and a trompe l’oeil assortment of 20th century avant-garde compositional methods.

"When I’m working," explains Blaine, “and a piece begins to reveal itself to me, I always follow where it leads. It becomes clear that it requires a violin, or a guitar, or lyrics. Whether it should be harsh or serene, orchestral, or entirely electronic. So it is with this new collection. Also, in the vocal songs, the subject of mortality has surfaced time and time again, albeit in a lucid manner and without becoming morbid, or fearful. I’m pleased with the results, and grateful to have the means to write every day and present my music to you.’

The album is produced by Reininger, with mixing and mastering by long-time collaborator Coti K. Cover portrait and booklet photography by George Geranios."

Shelley: Hellas

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 04 Oct 2021 11:37:11 GMT

Greetings, my esteemed and noble patrons. Welcome to October. Kalo Mina, as we say here in Hellas. Apropos of that, I was recently commissioned by a local composer to set some of Percy Bysse Shelley's enormous poem "Hellas" to music in honor of 200 years of Greek independence. The resulting song is to be performed at the Niarchos center together with several other such pieces in diverse styles, ranging from orchestral to folkloric, to whatever form this one is. I set it before you now for your autumnal enjoyment.

SHELLEY: HELLAS

Breathe low, low
The spell of the mighty mistress now!
When Conscience lulls her sated snake,
And Tyrants sleep, let Freedom wake.
Breathe low--low
The words which, like secret fire, shall flow
Through the veins of the frozen earth--low, low!

CHORUS:
Life may change, but it may fly not;
Hope may vanish, but can die not;
Truth be veiled, but still it burneth;
Love repulsed,--but it returneth!

If Liberty
Lent not life its soul of light,
Hope its iris of delight,
Truth its prophet’s robe to wear,
Love its power to give and bear.

CHORUS:
Life may change, but it may fly not;
Hope may vanish, but can die not;
Truth be veiled, but still it burneth;
Love repulsed,--but it returneth!

Birthday Song Live in Paris 1987

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 21 Sep 2021 10:22:29 GMT

Here is a live recording from La Cigale in Paris in 1987 with Alain Goutier, Daniel Wang and Claude Ongena in the band, just before we did the Live In Brussels recordings.

Les Ondes

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 07 Sep 2021 19:53:45 GMT

Today, I give you a tone poem, or a brief fantasia, a respite from these times.

Weird September

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 03 Sep 2021 15:23:38 GMT

We begin the month with a dramatic flourish. After all, it's been a weird damn couple of years, non?

Bubble

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 28 Aug 2021 12:25:58 GMT

Here is an effervescent little piece to close out our August. Will I see you in September? (or lose you to a summer love?)

Cycle Shots

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 23 Aug 2021 07:32:12 GMT

Here is this week's stew, cooked up from wild ingredients gathered from internal and external mental sources, internets, exhortations from vst plugin companies posted daily on my pages.

Parnitha

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 11 Aug 2021 18:24:31 GMT

Here is a hymn in praise of a local mountain, recently aflame.

Rise Above (I Kneed This)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 06 Aug 2021 11:43:23 GMT

Here is my first confection from my convalescence, something to take my mind off my knee, perhaps to amuse and delight you.

Obscure Sitcom

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 18 Jul 2021 19:08:08 GMT

Moving along, I was enjoying the narrative in the last post so I decided to follow that path. Some "found" (appropriated) audio pasted over my tune, assembled in a pseudo-narrative manner and there it is.

The Stonecutter (Grainy Day)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 16 Jul 2021 12:14:15 GMT

Here, I give you today's results, some dramatic urges illustrating an old tv tale.

Helm Met

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 13 Jul 2021 17:08:25 GMT

Here is a big ol' thumpin' 4 on the floor stomp. I started down this path, as suggested by the "helm" synthesizer plugin and had to continue. Those are my rules. Dance to it, if you like.

Cross the Great Water

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 26 Jun 2021 11:55:34 GMT

I close out the month of June with another selection from my 1995 Brussels attic sessions with Billy Currie.

Missing

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 16 Jun 2021 19:46:21 GMT

Here, I read a buddhist text over some evocative sounds manufactured with a granular synthesis plugin, mostly derived from guitar.

MISSING

“Know all things to be like this:
A mirage, a cloud castle,
A dream, an apparition,
Without essence, but with qualities that can be seen.

Know all things to be like this:
As the moon in a bright sky
In some clear lake reflected,
Though to that lake the moon has never moved.

Know all things to be like this:
As an echo that derives
From music, sounds, and weeping,
Yet in that echo is no melody.

Know all things to be like this:
As a magician makes illusions
Of horses, oxen, carts and other things,
Nothing is as it appears.”

-Samadhi Raja Sutra

Vital Statistics

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 11 Jun 2021 15:17:06 GMT

Here's a wall of sound for you, product of the last couple of sessions. We had a thunderstorm today so I recorded it as well and stuck it into the mix.

Parc de la Villette (another fine Messiaen)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 07 Jun 2021 21:11:49 GMT

To begin our June, I have uploaded this impressionist-style piece, celebrating the amazing park at La Villette and my many happy memories of it, and evoking all the French composers of the last century who have inspired me.

Ocean Planet

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 27 May 2021 10:20:56 GMT

Now, we close out the month with this respite from tension, this calm island in a sea of troubles.

Chonyid Bardo: The Vision of the Wrathful Deities

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 23 May 2021 19:38:38 GMT

After death, in the Chonyid Bardo, one is presented with karmic illusions. On the first to seventh day one is presented with the peaceful deities: from the eighth to the fourteenth day one is presented with the wrathful deities. Carl Jung says in his commentary on the Bardo Thodol,

“The Gods are archetypal thought-forms belonging to the sambhogakaya. Their peaceful and wrathful aspects, which play a great role in the meditations of the Tibetan Book of the Dead, symbolize the opposites. In the nirmanakaya they are the positive and negative principles united in one and the same figure.”

I Used To, Part Two (La Llorona)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 16 May 2021 16:31:46 GMT

I continue my dark voyage through my old neighborhood by telling you why I was afraid of the river.

I Used To

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 07 May 2021 10:28:43 GMT

Greetings, all. Welcome to the month of May. First off, I present a tour of my old neighborhood, a bit dark, dusty, like fading photos of the old school.

I Am an Old Poem

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 25 Apr 2021 16:13:20 GMT

I will close out the month of April with this brand new song. Got some fiddle, some guitars, some mandolins, and even some ukulele working with my voice on this one. Some delicious melancholy.

I am an old poem

I am an old poem, but not yet over

I am that poem that comes undone

I am that poem that is never finished.

I am that poem that was never begun.

And this poem is a new poem.

When I wrote it, my heart had known

the sadness of old poems

and I was neither child nor grown.

Here are the loves that I remember

Here are the places I have been

I wear the maps to those wounds and blessings

Here in the scars upon my skin.

Bulletin Meteo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 09:27:40 GMT

Here, I have casually nicked one of David Lynch's weather reports for LA and played it over some vaguely foreboding atmospheric music.

Cunbus

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 09 Apr 2021 18:42:54 GMT

I have recently been playing with granular synthesis, particularly with a plugin called "the mangle". This result is a fairly dark atmosphere, using sounds derived by granular synthesis from samples of the cunbus I have hanging on my wall and a battery powered fingernail buffer held over guitar pickups.

Olla Kolla

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 03 Apr 2021 10:57:19 GMT

Tout va bien. Alles geht gut. Saul Goodman. Some optimism for April. Warum nicht?

Mezzo Cammin

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 17 Mar 2021 21:07:34 GMT

When I start working on these pieces, I always try to start small, atmospheric, minimal. Then, I get caught up in the process and I follow the thread, getting bigger, more complicated. So it is here, in this Neo-prog romp, getting bigger and thicker and more prog as we go.

I also found a poem which I thought suited, "Mezzo Cammin" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. It is read here by a young contestant named Madison Lukomski in an annual poetry reading contest called "Poetry Out Loud".

MEZZO CAMMIN

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Half of my life is gone, and I have let
       The years slip from me and have not fulfilled
       The aspiration of my youth, to build
       Some tower of song with lofty parapet.
Not indolence, nor pleasure, nor the fret
       Of restless passions that would not be stilled,
       But sorrow, and a care that almost killed,
       Kept me from what I may accomplish yet;

Though, half way up the hill, I see the Past
       Lying beneath me with its sounds and sights,—
       A city in the twilight dim and vast,
With smoking roofs, soft bells, and gleaming lights.—
       And hear above me on the autumnal blast
       The cataract of Death far thundering from the heights.

Thirsty Barcarole

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 14 Mar 2021 13:29:56 GMT

Here is a narrative synth piece which features the voice of Drunvalo Melchizidek. This is a guy I encountered very early on in my online days, searching on Alta Vista or another obsolete search engine for " weirdos who believe in crazy things." I really just liked his name, but further inspection led me to his writings about the Planet Nibiru, aliens, UFO's, wacky derivative spirituality, you know the drill. You can check him out for yourself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunvalo_Melchizedek

Happy Is He

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 07 Mar 2021 20:22:30 GMT

For this pentatonic track, I chose lines from a Greek poet, Giorgos Seferis.

Giorgos Seferis

Upon a Line of Foreign Verse

Happy is he who has made the journey of Odysseus. Happy if,

as the journey loomed,

He felt the sturdy rigging of a love, stretched taut inside his body like

the veins where the blood booms,

Of a love with unbroken rhythm, invincible as music and undying,

because it was born when we were born, and whether it dies when we do,

we do not know, and it is no use trying.

The Days Gone By

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 01 Mar 2021 20:40:02 GMT

We enter March 2021 in a nostalgic mood, marking a year of lockdowns, quarantine, diminished horizons. Seeking a title and a lyrical hook for this almost finished piece I happened upon these lines by James Whitcomb Riley, a mainstream American poet of the last century. Based equally on content and rhythmic concerns, I went with them. Here they are.

O the days gone by!

When the bloom was on the clover, and the blue was in the sky,

And my happy heart brimmed over in the days gone by.

Silver Pants

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 15 Feb 2021 19:58:13 GMT

I continue messing with my new Ovox plug-in, following where it leads, and whipping up some surreal lyrics using some of my stable of fine random generation apps.

SILVER PANTS

A pink t-shirt with a picture of a garbage man on the front.

a shirt and a telescope connected to a pyramid.

a silver pair of pants connected to a flute

A cube of copper in a blue bottle

a balsa wood tape recorder

an ironing board signed by a demon

A checked t-shirt with 8 arms

A silver pair of gloves

38 molecules of honey

One scratched model of a chicken

Some swords joined to a speaker cone

A model of Sao Paulo inside a pencil case

A tin sculpture of Houston the size of a pair of pants

a silver pair of pants connected to a flute

A cube of copper in a blue bottle

One of Those Things

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 13 Feb 2021 11:09:19 GMT

I have been fooling around with a powerful new plugin from Waves called Ovox, a "Voice-controlled synth and vocal FX processor". It has been too expensive to buy until now, but seeing that it was on sale I jumped on it. Early results proved so interesting, I decided to mix it up and post it without much further development, using my first vocal take.

(If you are interested, here is a link. I don't work for Waves, but this is really good

https://www.waves.com/plugins/ovox-vocal-resynthesis#ovox-next-generation-voice-controlled-synth )

Begin Your Day, Winnie

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 11 Feb 2021 11:39:07 GMT

I have often quoted Winnie, heroine of this play when starting a boring or futile day. "Begin your day, Winnie". I find this to be an appropriate mantra for these locked down Netflix-binging days we now find ourselves inhabiting.

Happy Days is a play in two acts, written by Samuel Beckett. Winnie, buried to her waist, follows her daily routine and prattles to her husband, Willie, who is largely hidden and taciturn. Her frequent refrain is "Oh this is a happy day." Later, in Act II, she is buried up to her neck, but continues to talk and remember happier days.

Patchouli Tap

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 01 Feb 2021 12:56:10 GMT

Welcome to February, my friends. Here is your first post for the month.

The starting point for this song were the words "Patchouli Tap" and I followed it down from there. When reading "Brave New World", which I have done many many times, I was often struck by the fact that the characters had perfumes flowing on tap in their homes. When Bernardo Marx visits the savage reservation, he realizes that he has left the eau de cologne tap running in his apartment, costing him a fortune. Similarly, when the Savage's mother lies dying in hospital, she leaves the patchouli tap dripping. I read from "Brave New World" and the voice at the end is that of Huxley himself, talking about the visionary world we all seek.

Patchouli Tap

…she remained in her bed, with the radio and

television always on, and the patchouli tap just dripping, and the

soma tablets within reach of her hand—there she remained; and yet

was infinitely far away…

on holiday in some other world, where the music of the radio

was a labyrinth of sonorous colors

where the dancing images of the television were

the performers in some indescribably delicious all-singing feely; where

the dripping patchouli was the sun, was a million

sexophones, incomparably more,

and without end.

Aldous Huxley “Brave New World”

Razor Girl

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 29 Jan 2021 11:09:39 GMT

To close out the month of January, a song about a failed and painful affair. It is from a live show I did in 1999 with my friend Coti K. here in Athens at a vanished club in Psirri. It was released in 2002 on a CD called "Uneasy Listening" by Russian sculptor and friend of Tuxedomoon, Oleg Kuptsov, now deceased. Although I generally don't populate this page with material that has been released to the public, I figure the odds of you having heard this one are fairly slim. If you are interested, the album is also available on my bandcamp page here. https://tuxedomoonblr.bandcamp.com/album/uneasy-listening

Anything else you fancy up there can also be yours for a 10% discount with the discount code "blrpatreon2021".

Stile Pinguino

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 24 Jan 2021 17:15:18 GMT

Here is another track from the sessions with Billie Currie, featuring the two of us on violin and viola, in the style of the Penguin Cafe.

"Thin End of the Wedge" with Billie Currie, 1995

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 22 Jan 2021 16:20:23 GMT

In 1995, I began some songwriting sessions with Ultravox keyboarder and violist, Billie Currie in my attic atelier in Brussels. We had met through a failed film project called "Freispiel" based on jam sessions between various artists who had recorded with Conny Plank. The project featured sessions with the likes of Jaz from Killing Joke, Holger Czukay, Karl Bartos from Kraftwerk, Billie Currie from Ultravox, and me. (I had only recorded with Conny Plank in the context of my friend Lee Self's band "Montanablue").

These sessions with Billie were recorded onto my strange little 6 track Sansui cassette recorder and mixed to DAT. The results were surprisingly good. This song is one of about 10, never released and only heard by a very few people before. I will eventually release them properly, but here is a taste.

Magnetic Flux (chissa')

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 07 Jan 2021 20:01:41 GMT

Welcome to 2021, my friends. Here is your first post of the New Year, pure pop for pure patrons.

Magnetic flux (Chissa’)

How many hushed tales

would speak thunder?

How much nervous flesh

Would kindle desire?

How many hollow tears

Must serve nothing?

Who knows?

Wer Weiss?

Chissa’?

Qui sait?

How many fresh gods

were born in the shadow?

How many failures

were success in disguise

How many sweet kisses

In the dark?

Who knows?

Wer Weiss?

Chissa’?

Qui sait?

How many times must we stumble and fall?

How many times will we lose our way?

How often must we start over?

Who knows?

Wer Weiss?

Chissa’?

Qui sait?

Stormfront

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 27 Dec 2020 11:47:28 GMT

We close out December (and 2020) with a processional hymn, all things, all events, all people marching away into the distant past with our ancestors, with the pyramids, with all that has faded away.

Togu

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 18 Dec 2020 10:30:12 GMT

Here is an unapologetic vintage synth voyage, all constructed with the noble plugins of Togu Audio Line, or TAL. TAL is a Swiss software concern which makes excellent synthesizer emulations and effects for free or for muso friendly prices. Here, I use TAL-U-NO-LX, the Juno emulation, TAL-J-8, the new Jupiter 8 emulation, and TAL-MOD, as well as the excellent TAL-DUB-X delay plugin.

Here is a free plug for them
https://tal-software.com/products

Remote Viewing

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 04 Dec 2020 11:59:08 GMT

Here is a tone poem featuring some violin and some e-bow guitar. Loosely titled after the CIA technique of "remote viewing".

"Remote viewing (RV) uses a mind technique that allows remote viewers to see people, objects and events at a distance. Remote viewing was first used by the CIA as the ultimate spying technique."

https://paranormal.lovetoknow.com/Remote_Viewing_Interview

"Night and Day Live" Kalo Mina

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 02 Dec 2020 11:59:41 GMT

Greetings, friends. Welcome to December. Things should get better. They better get better. To start the month off, I favor you with a live recording from 2008 with my pal Tilemachos Mousas on guitar. Cole Porter's old reliable tune, Night and Day.

Blessings upon thee all.

Slightly Rusty

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 17 Nov 2020 17:28:53 GMT

I present some densely packed film noir music for your diversion, for night, fog, and too much hair gel (or not enough). Roll it.

"Harvest Moon" Bonus Track

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 10 Nov 2020 21:09:30 GMT

I got out my viola to play on the track that presented itself the last couple of days. I thought we could all use some soothing, a demonstration of another frame of reference, less fraught, more serene. I decided to make it publicly available to patrons and non-patrons alike. Voila, mes amis.

Busy Busy

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 09 Nov 2020 16:50:50 GMT

Conlon Nancarrow, Edgard Varese, and the Legendary Stardust Cowboy, run through the MIDI generator blender, served up quivering on a post-punk vinyl 45.

100 Sad Fingers

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 05 Nov 2020 11:58:52 GMT

We start the month off with this big production I have been hammering away at this last week. Perhaps it will serve to take our minds off other matters threatening our serene equanimity.

A Hundred Sad Fingers

Today he dreams a vague perfume

a mortal laughing memory

fading in the strong red light.

He inhabits this mystic flesh

He has a hundred sad fingers in the morning.

He enters smiling into the shadow

Like a child surviving in the rubble

All is dream and life and love and death

DESIRE, ECSTACY

INFINITE ENERGY

DIVINE POETRY

TEMPORAL SYMMETRY

Lonely Neurons

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 18 Oct 2020 10:53:20 GMT

A snapshot of my inner monologue. Brain crosstalk. Lonely neurons firing in the void.

Pleyel Harvest (The Miller's Tale)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 15 Oct 2020 11:04:17 GMT

Here is the result of a clash between a random tone generator based on one used by Eno and a reading of Chaucer's "The Miller's Tale" in old English, with some atonal violin as a garnish.

"Un Giro"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 07 Oct 2020 10:46:27 GMT

Here is a "cinematic" piece, created with some excellent new plugins I acquired, free gifts from the fine folks at Spitfire Audio. "Un giro" is Italian for a walk. Pictured here is my wife Maria taking a walk on a beach in Normandy.

"Faded Chaos" and Welcome to the October Country

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 03 Oct 2020 11:01:09 GMT

Welcome to October Country, oh my patrons. Here is a galloping instrumental, featuring a voice over by Man Ray, and many elements, probably too many. That's how I roll, gang, wretched excess is my middle name.

"Unbirthday"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 23 Sep 2020 17:46:13 GMT

Here is a tune to mark the autumn equinox, melancholy in that September kind of way. Also, it's not my birthday, probably not yours either.

Surge, Yo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 04 Sep 2020 11:10:16 GMT

For this track, I return to my use of glossolalia samples, upbeat, groovy, sort of Residents stylee.

Georgians In My Mind

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 02 Sep 2020 21:42:57 GMT

Here is a big old jamboree with a kind of Bollywood vibe. It finally emerged, though it took some time.

"Last Friday"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 09:33:32 GMT

Welcome to September, o my esteemed patrons. Here is an autumnal sort of instrumental, in happy anticipation of cooler temperatures, in nostalgic remembrance of Septembers past.

"Tundra", A Treatise on Agoraphobia

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 14 Aug 2020 10:43:21 GMT

I give you a fairly dark confection here, featuring voices from interviews with two emotionally disturbed women, an attempt to deal with lockdown issues and confusion, and my own tendency towards agoraphobia.

Cafe in the Trees

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 12 Aug 2020 09:38:20 GMT

Now, a pleasant cinematic interlude, loosely inspired by a recent visit to a local cafe.

"Sun Package" feat. Bob Hoffnar on steel guitar

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 07 Aug 2020 10:40:35 GMT

Here is a poignant instrumental, rendered even more so by the addition of some pedal steel guitar. The steel is wielded here by old San Francisco friend Bob Hoffnar, former bassist of Indoor Life, multi instrumentalist now resident in Austin, Texas.

"Chemise Grise" Kalo Mina August 2020

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 01 Aug 2020 10:01:54 GMT

Greetings, friends. Welcome to the dog days. August is upon us again, though this August is decidedly different from those past. Courage, mes amis, courage. Here is a tune I am quite pleased with, another Memento Mori, whose underlying message seems to be about the temporary nature of our time here. As usual, I guess. Here are the lyrics for your perusal.

CHEMISE GRISE

Your hidden self

And your laughter now exposed

your eyes remain open

but your mouth is closed.

A bag of bones

leaps into the unknown

to take another road

not knowing where the light came from

or what it showed.

VIEILLE CHEMISE GRISE GISANT SUR LE SOL

VIEUX ROI MORT, QUI DESCEND LES ESCALIERS

I am a blur of mud, pain, and song

I am a sameness of daily bread.

a clock that makes its own time

and disintegrates instead

I am a circus of ice and fire

through the midnight of desire

Mumbles through the prayer.

Preaching to the choir

VIEILLE CHEMISE GRISE GISANT SUR LE SOL

VIEUX ROI MORT, QUI DESCEND LES ESCALIERS

(Old grey shirt, lying on the floor

Old King Death, coming down the stairs)

Arnold Lovecraft

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 18 Jul 2020 10:02:55 GMT

Here is your final post for July, a fairly dark and modernist confection, the result of experiments with a handy little MIDI plugin called "cthulhu" (hence the title). A Venn diagram of the intersection of Arnold Schoenberg and H.P. Lovecraft.

Tuxedomoon "Deadzone" Exclusive

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 17 Jul 2020 10:15:46 GMT

Here is a sound collage I made from two Tuxedomoon rehearsal recordings from 2012, and an interview for German television in 2007, overdubbed and mixed by me in 2020. Apt on this third anniversary of Peter's passing. This pre-release mix is only available to you, my beloved Patreon patrons.

I have a few more like this, perhaps they can become an album project.

"Quarter Teen" Bonus Track

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 14 Jul 2020 10:48:10 GMT

Here is a free track featuring Steven Brown on saxophone and Tilemachos Mousas on guitar, which turned out very well, in my opinion. I couldn't wait to mix it and post it for all to cast their ears upon. Available to the general public.

Nicht So

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 07 Jul 2020 17:32:58 GMT

Here is a club hit for the Bardo. See what happens when I open up a free pack of vocal samples and get busy mutating. See how I can use Tilemachos' guitar track in another track. Also, lots of nice sci fi synths.

Ask Tyrell

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 05 Jul 2020 09:27:54 GMT

Here is an electro-funk groove that includes the kitchen sink. We got vocals from an American housewife channeling some English spirit guide, a recording of me and my son scat singing in 2010, a mobile greek watermelon salesman (Karpouzia!) , some soloing on the formerly free Korg Kaosillator phone app, and featuring some sterling guitar from my old friend and collaborator Tilemachos Moussas.

Kalo Mina. "Slipstream"

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 01 Jul 2020 09:56:43 GMT

Kalo mina, everyone. Good month, as we say around here. It's July, so here is the first of my posts, "Slipstream". It is a perky little groove, featuring a steel guitar, with a high velocity vocal extracted from an interview I did for some website, wherein I declare my (still undiminished) allegiance to better living through technology.

"Trials, Tribulations" Bonus Track for June

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 08 Jun 2020 17:08:40 GMT

Yes, dear friends, brethren, sisteren, I have decided to put this track up for public listening, just because. Lend us your ears, you can have 'em back right after.

Here are the words, so you can follow along.

Everything slows, nothing is predicted
in those soaked modernities of whirlwind
like pollution in wintry eyes
we see that the whole world is a dark, insulating cocoon
a vast, silent, and unknowable infinity

a dark hole in the mind.

But in the next generation, the world becomes more beautiful, more alive.

As time
stamps it out every day
all things become more alive.

Everything slows, nothing is predicted

I saw, after the tsunami
and the fire

after the great flood
and the earthquake

after my life

I had this vision
from the past
In the future I will look back to this time

To the very ends of the universe

Then be still.

Swamp Thing

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 02 Jun 2020 19:22:04 GMT

At the time I wrote this song, I believed that I had seen a ghost in our Brussels apartment and I tell the tale in this song. It is another tune I unearthed from my attic mixes of 1994-97 in Brussels, forgotten in a drawer for many years, like the Swamp Thing himself. Here, I exploit the Ibanez wah wah pedal given to me by a Dutch cowboy singer named Herman Brock. He also gave me the bass I used on many other recordings of the time, a blue Squier bullet bass.

Duello Campionatore

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 02 Jun 2020 11:09:31 GMT

Some vaguely ominous reports from the Bardo.

No News is Good News

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 02 Jun 2020 10:32:43 GMT

Here is a calming wee confection, perhaps to help you digest the foul stream of sludge coming out of America right now.

Visions in Fire

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 31 May 2020 18:11:53 GMT

Here is your first post for June.

I had decided to go through some of my old DAT tapes while the machine still worked and the tapes were still intact. Here is a song I re-discovered among the many forgotten ones on those tapes. I recorded it in my little attic home studio in Brussels in 1994.

I was surprised at the quality I was able to achieve with the gear I had at the time. I had a strange 6 track cassette recorder from Sansui, a gift from Nikos Triandafyllidis' father Harry Klynn. I had my SH 101 and a Boss DR 660 rhythm machine, a Roland S-10 12 bit sampler, and a Korg 707 keyboard, a Kawaii General Midi sound module and some fairly crap speakers. All of the MIDI was a big chain of midi thru, controlled by an Atari 1040 ST. I mastered to a Sony DAT Walkman that I received as payment for recording a song by Michel Polnareff for a French compilation project.

This song was even retro in 1994, hearkening back to the future, 80's style.

(cover art Maria Panourgia)

Ca Va Bien (bonus track)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 15 May 2020 18:57:52 GMT

Here is a fairly unhinged track, featuring the voice of noted Dada poet, Raoul Hausmann. A bonus for my patrons, just because.

Symptomatic

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 12 May 2020 15:42:40 GMT

Here is a strange little piece that snuck out of a corner of my psyche and emerged on my computer. There is a sampled girls' choir. There is an Hungarian train station. There is a piece of an interview with a schizophrenic. There is even some violin playing.

drawing Maria Panourgia

Obscured by Choice

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 05 May 2020 16:53:06 GMT

Here is some nice minimal piano tinkling with some synthetic girls singing, generated by local AI.

Ride the Flow of Time

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 03 May 2020 16:28:43 GMT

Here is another in a series of camp sci-fi inspired tracks.

"The future enters into us, in order to transform itself in us, long before it happens."

Rainer Maria Rilke

and

“How many things have been denied one day, only to become realities the next!”

Jules Verne, "From the Earth to the Moon"

Asphaltdschungel

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 02 May 2020 16:07:50 GMT

Kalo mina, friends. Happy month. It's May. May we all find our way through these trying times. Here is a fairly wacky groove. It's kept me busy. More to come, for sure.

Shrimpy Town

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 21 Apr 2020 13:36:53 GMT

Here is a shiny new/old school electro romp through the cabbage fields of my mind. It is free to listen and acquire. Dig my pontificating from an interview at the beginning. Check these lyrics.

Gonna buy some black magic

Gonna buy a black box

Gonna buy me some shrimp

And some white cotton socks

In this shining shrimpy town

Ca Ira, I Guess

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 17 Apr 2020 16:56:53 GMT

Ca Ira, Es wird gut, andava bene, tha einai Kala, I guess. I suppose. This peppy little number showed up and I followed the thread where it led. I hope everything turns out well.

Isolation

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 11 Apr 2020 11:30:32 GMT

Some atmosphere from quarantine, perhaps capable of rendering it more serene.

Indra's Dream

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 07 Apr 2020 15:08:45 GMT

Here is a piece which emerged as I was learning how to use a freeware sampler called Tx16wx. I was rooting through the back alleys of my own work, inserting tracks and outtakes from other songs into the sampler. As it began to emerge, it took on a kind of dreamy beauty that I thought called out for some violin.

I decided to call it "Indra's Dream" since Indra, like all of us, once found himself enmired in an illusion, unable to remember his own divine nature. The gods, rotten bastards that they can be, killed off all his family to remind him who he really was. I can't imagine he was very sincere in his thanks.

Once, Indra, the king of all gods, came to earth seeking pleasure. He chose the form of a pig because generally, in terms of physical pleasure the form of a pig is considered best. He found himself a beautiful female pig, married her and produced dozens of piglets with her. Over time, he got very deeply involved and attached to them.

The gods waited patiently in heaven thinking it was a short pleasure trip but when Indra did not return for a long time, they came down and saw this whole pig-business in progress. They tried to reason with him to give up the pig’s life and return to the heaven. But Indra was so deeply involved and attached to all this, he just grunted and left!

The gods then decided to kill one piglet hoping that the tragedy would make Indra realize his true nature and return. For every piglet killed, Indra clung to the remaining ones harder. Eventually, the gods killed all the piglets.

But Indra got busy producing more children. Then the gods thought that Indra’s real attachment was his wife so they killed her. Now he was greatly distressed. Soon, his pig friends and relatives suggested he take another wife. And the whole pig-business started again.

The gods were now completely at a loss with this and Narada, the wise sage who was passing by and happened to see all this said, “Why did you kill his wife and kids? His attachment is to his body. Destroy the body”. So, the gods cut his body into two halves and Indra came out and said, “What the hell am I doing here?” and returned to heaven.

The bondage with the body is deep. That is the source of all attachments.

Roll Off the Edge

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 04 Apr 2020 13:48:37 GMT

(NOTE: I just received Luc van Lieshout's tracks intended for use in this song. I have duly worked him in. It has worked up just fine.) Incorporating the fabulous (though expensive) Waves Ovox vocal processor, trying to get some things done before the trial period expires. These lyrics mostly generated by AI, though edited and assembled by me.

Korton Speaks

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 01 Apr 2020 21:22:17 GMT

Here is a synth romp to start our locked down April. Suitable as a theme for a science fiction cartoon or sitcom. It features the voice of a Rev. Short, who channels an alien entity named "Korton". I have also enlisted the assistance of a sample library from the BBC Radiophonic workshop and a quite convincing Stylophone vst plugin.

Newbs Defending a Staircase

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 29 Mar 2020 17:35:09 GMT

I'm uploading a new mix, once again featuring old pal, Luc van Liesthout on his horn. Let it roll, newbs!

Let's close out March with some enclosed shreddin' by me as I explore some of the plugins and software made available for free from companies to keep us musos amused during the lockdown. Gesundheit, y'all.

D'accordo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 26 Mar 2020 18:28:57 GMT

D'accordo. I agree. Here, a driving sort of Isaac Hayes instrumental. I had to resist putting in a wah wah guitar. Many sequencers at work, truth be told. In this way, I welcome some new patrons.

Poor Gen

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 19:26:04 GMT

Luc just sent me his contribution to this track and I was so pleased, I mixed it quick and uploaded it. I am excited enough to offer it for free.

Repos Forcé

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 17:38:17 GMT

Here is some free listening from the Blade Runner universe, granted to thee in your fraught confinement.

Last Exit to Brussels (Feat. Luc van Lieshout)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 12:57:52 GMT

Here is a curiosity from 1998, given to me by my friend Luc van Lieshout, erstwhile trumpet player in tuxedomoon. We did this piece together shortly before I left Brussels for Greece, one step ahead of the sheriff and the landlord. It made me wish we had done more. As things have worked out, we are now gigging together and further online collaborations are in the pipeline exclusively for my Patreon subscribers.

The Artwork of Bees

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 29 Feb 2020 17:55:21 GMT

Here is your first post for March, its title lifted from someone's Facebook post about bees working outside the box. Herein lie some lovely juicy chords interacting with some other juicy voices.

Rows, Budd

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 25 Feb 2020 16:32:53 GMT

Some serene noodling which inspired me to get out the old fiddle and fiddle along. A leap year freebie for the listeners.

Talk to Your Plants

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 17 Feb 2020 16:31:10 GMT

Here's the next post for February. When the muse talks, I follow where it leads, even if it leads me to some floor stompin' techno trash. Use it for your Zumba workout.

No Hans

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 15 Feb 2020 11:24:04 GMT

A sweeping cinematic confection, named after a certain composer who lends his name to many plugins.

Betty Don't

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 07 Feb 2020 16:31:28 GMT

Sometimes a new shipment of plugins shines a light on the way through the forest. Some loopy filmic, minimalist phasey moments here for you.

Hold My Hand

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 04 Feb 2020 16:47:05 GMT

Kalo mina, sports fans! Welcome to 2020 leap month, February. Here is a funky bricolage to start your month.

Sur Scene

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 14 Jan 2020 15:54:07 GMT

Stay on the scene. Like an atmosphere machine.

Pluie en Bas

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 09 Jan 2020 17:50:15 GMT

Souvenir of a rainy day and the arrival of someone or something unexpected.

Cahiers Noirs

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 06 Jan 2020 16:35:44 GMT

Some sentimental strings from the new house.

Ce Que Je n'ai pas Dit

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 03 Jan 2020 21:09:07 GMT

Your first post of the new year, a theme for a 1960's French cop show if Beaudelaire was a 1960's French cop.

Omport Strings

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 26 Dec 2019 18:45:39 GMT

Here is the last post for 2019, some pulsing violins to see out the old. See you all in January. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year.

The Push

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 03 Dec 2019 19:29:11 GMT

Atmospheric and strange, just right for that foggy melancholy in the depths of winter.

Der Ferne Klang

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 03 Dec 2019 18:22:43 GMT

Some serene results from an enocounter with a fine cello library.

Guests From the Future

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 03 Dec 2019 18:08:18 GMT

It's December. Kalo mina, everyone. Good month, as we say here in Greece. Here is one of my first tunes for this month, a snappy krautrocky sci-fi synth and guitar number, designed to help you shake off that seasonal affective disorder. More in the pipeline.

Quiet Time

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 21 Nov 2019 11:54:15 GMT

An ambient bagatelle or amuse gueule from 2014, now submitted for your amusement.

Timely Visions

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 20 Nov 2019 21:16:35 GMT

Atmospheric, suspenseful, incorporating my favorite shortwave interference.

Irreversible

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 15 Nov 2019 10:29:57 GMT

An atmosphere conducive to the contemplation of the non-linear nature of time. Or, listen while washing dishes.

Timelines

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 05 Nov 2019 21:29:43 GMT

First piece for November, hot off the press, just finished today, wrote it last night. Multiple timelines, converging on yesterday.

You're Lucky You Got This On Tape

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 19:57:16 GMT

A fresh batch. Some guitar shreddin' moving perilously in the direction of jazz.

Remembered Landscape

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 09:21:38 GMT

A nostalgic outing, brought on by autumnal emotions and by having acquired some tasty new plugins.

Take This Waltz

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 18 Oct 2019 09:47:35 GMT

A companion piece to the previous post, commissioned at the last minute by Aliki Danezy Knutsen for her current production "Reigen". All due respect to Lama Cohen Rinpoche.

Here It Is

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 15 Oct 2019 17:38:55 GMT

Local theatre director, Grigoris Hatzakis asked me to record a version of a Leonard Cohen song of my choice for use in his current production. I chose this song. I always thought that this song pretty much summed up our existence here in Samsara. I have posted an image of the Buddhist wheel of life attesting to this opinion. I have gone kind of late night FM radio on the production here. Now it's yours.

Piano 5

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 19 Sep 2019 10:31:33 GMT

Here is a piece from my archives, recorded in my attic in Brussels around 1995. The piano sound comes from an old Roland S-10 sampler, recorded on a strange Sanyo 6 track cassette recorder, mixed to a Sony Dat Walkman. I digitized the recording from the DAT, which had survived travel through time and space.

Nameless Teeth

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 13 Sep 2019 16:33:29 GMT

A symphonic electronic outing, suitable for dramatic revelations on the silver screen. The title was generated by one of my apps, don't blame me.

Night Snakes

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 10 Sep 2019 20:06:13 GMT

An epic filmic exercise, featuring the voice of Paramahansa Yogananda.

Eye and Eye

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 04 Sep 2019 10:31:25 GMT

Here is a piece from 2015, with an island flavor. Only today I found out that the Rasta phrase "I and I " refers to the mystical notion that our consciousness contains both a higher and a mundane version of self. Yes, I and I agree.

Kalo Mina! September Song.

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 01 Sep 2019 10:28:14 GMT

Free! Here is a live recording from 2008 with my buddy Tilemachos Moussas. I wrap my pipes around Kurt Weill's classic. (more art from Maria Panourgia, my baby.)

Occult Simplicities

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 30 Aug 2019 16:06:44 GMT

The freebie for August, a mambo incentive to drink my kool-aid and become my patron. Whaddaya gotta lose?

Tinnient

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 24 Aug 2019 16:40:45 GMT

The winds of August, sounds from my palette.

Phantom Intuition

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 24 Aug 2019 16:17:26 GMT

Some vaguely menacing atmosphere to read the news by.

Goby Life

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 09 Aug 2019 12:23:16 GMT

Some more violin and e-piano grooves with some poetry in the basket.

GOBY LIFE

invented harmonics sumptuous mirrors

Belgian mummy fever.

Jesus come running like a yeast iguana

street meat mouthpiece

reborn dead in dark hell hootchy-kootchy.

Because I love you, inside the water and next to the ice.

Because I love you

On the hairy earth

Outside the crimson ears of the jungle.

The green and manly goddess meets the old red warrior

Returns to the homeland of the leaves

what is this movie waiting for?

I tell you it is waiting for

skeleton shards of silk in the forests of glass

suspended like a mist
outside the dull sorrow of the wasteland
A celestial copper sphere!

Feed Notion

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 05 Aug 2019 16:27:33 GMT

Kicking off the month of August with some violin and some nice new synthesizer plugins.

Lips of Oblivion

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 12 Jul 2019 14:58:18 GMT

This track is from a 2010 collaboration with Herve and Thierry Mazurel of French band "Jack the Ripper" called The Fitzcarraldo Sessions. I wrote and sang the lyrics here. As with the previous post, this is some good stuff which you probably never heard before, now released to my beloved Patreon supporters.

Lips Of Oblivion

the western wind
it came blowin' in
and it wrote a fiery line
on the sea

It was a glorious day
on 'Frisco Bay
and the sun began to shine
through the trees

a stranger came a-riding
his horse was the whole world
his hat it was the sky
a banjo on his knee

Not of this world
was he
Not of this world
are we

he rode through time
he rode through illusion
past the shadows of life and death
up to a man and a woman
lost in an embrace
he said "come with me"
come with me

So I said "Come outta that room.
Bring your suitcase
And your gun.
Don't say a word.
Shut up and kiss me.

she said "all of this, and nothing less"
on her breasts
in her thighs
lips of oblivion
I see you with my skin
I take you in
wrapped in my skin

Lips of oblivion
lost in the universe of her eyes
he who's lost his mind
will be left behind

Ray Potato

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 12 Jul 2019 14:29:01 GMT

This track is from a 2011 collaboration I did for a project with Strange Attractor:
Niels van Hoorn and Richard van Kruysdijk. I always liked the results and regretted that they remained unheard for the most part. Here it is for my loyal Patreon subscribers.

All odorous beneath the rain. Under what skies the foreigner makes his way. Remembering old times lost in broad daylight. Memories of water. I am violet over the grave.

This is not my home. This cannot be my home. This never was my home.

Under what skies the lover wanders aimlessly. Before help could come.

Awake! The demon shall flee all red before the water. Shining hesitant on the edge of the world. The next life waiting. To what end the refugee.

Take another road in a different light. The fool keeps going, trusting, grieving. A long way from home. An empty address book. The other come singing in a different light.

This was not my home. This could never be my home. This never was my home.

When I held the river in my hand. Drew up its threads into my palm.

credits

from Anatomy Of A Tear, released September 5, 2011
Music: Van Hoorn / Van Kruysdijk / Reininger
Words: Reininger

Blaine L. Reininger: Vocals, Violin
Niels van Hoorn: Bass Clarinet, Tenor sax, Field Recordings
Richard van Kruysdijk: Synths, Hammond Organ, Samples, Programming

The Peccadilloes Live 1979: Marlboro Theme

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 10 Jul 2019 11:57:46 GMT

Here is another example of the Peccadilloes caught live at San Francisco's Mabuhay Gardens, playing the music for our favorite smokes.

The Peccadilloes Live 1979: Modular Neurotics

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 10 Jul 2019 11:49:13 GMT

The Peccadilloes were a "pickup band" I formed for fun with Peter Principle, Michael Belfer, and Tuxedomoon manager, Adrian Craig to play at the Mabuhay Gardens. We wore cowboy hats and had foam cacti onstage. We tried to tell people we were from Texas. I remember Peter, in his Queens New York accent, trying to convince some guy from an East Bay synthesizer band that he was from Houston. I think that the backup vocals on this track are from Peter, a rarity indeed.

Rhodes Guitar

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 19 Jun 2019 20:17:44 GMT

A pleasant little sketch, featuring a Fender Rhodes plugin and a guitar, waiting patiently for me to pay attention to it, now yours. (Drawing by Maria Panourgia).

Alster Shore

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 19 Jun 2019 19:40:56 GMT

An audio impression of the serene lake in Hamburg's Center, a nostalgic souvenir of the time I spent near there working with my friend, Lee Self and the many circumnambulations I did on my bicycle.

Homer and Hardy go Hawaiian

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 01 Jun 2019 18:15:47 GMT

An overlooked little morsel, tribute to my old record company bosses.

Uno

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 01 Jun 2019 18:00:49 GMT

A filmic mythic journey from the archives, this should have been posted in May, but I've been busy.

Mystery and Confusion Live in Oslo 1985

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 25 May 2019 19:00:25 GMT

Another track from the live set at the now-defunct Renegat club in Oslo, 1985, featuring Lee Self on guitar. I think the photo included with this post is from the live video of the show, broadcast on Norwegian TV at the time.

Three Buttons

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 22 May 2019 10:40:31 GMT

Here is a bright retro tune, lyrics gleaned and edited from an ancient notebook, instrumentation evidence of my recent Steely Dan infatuation. Look out for more May uploads, I haven't been neglecting you all, just busy.

The Witchcraft of Failures

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 01 May 2019 19:29:38 GMT

Here is the freebie for this month, a funkadelic encitement to become my patron, or a reward for your continued patronage.

Witchcraft of Failures

I require

unlikely rhythms and postures.

modern bright outrage endured,

modern assumptions dissolved.

the violent sights,

the labored sounds

Familiar demons spin

the witchcraft of failures

Lost poets bind

the mystery of moments

to the insults of age.

The caustic waves play

on lesser crucifixions

Cajun Sunset

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 28 Apr 2019 10:57:28 GMT

Some impressions of a place I've never been, a home recording circa 1996.

Drip Drip Drip

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 24 Apr 2019 09:19:31 GMT

Something from 2013 with a vocal recorded in 2003, huddled under a tree in the garden , singing into a mini disc recorder in the rain. Drip drip drip.

Superstitious Cornbread Blues

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 19 Apr 2019 16:03:23 GMT

Here's me in 2014, singing some found blues lyrics, shreddin' some blues on the guitar.

What Use Live in Oslo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 06 Apr 2019 10:40:01 GMT

Another track from the live recording at the Renegat club in Oslo in 1985.

BLR Live in Oslo, 1985

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 20 Mar 2019 12:03:21 GMT

I just relocated these recordings of my live show in Oslo at the Renegat club (now demolished and the space occupied by the train station). Erstwhile friend Lee Self features on guitar. This track posted all access and free, to entice and tempt you to come on board the patreon train and help keep me in feta cheese.

Mystic Rodeo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 19 Mar 2019 10:23:17 GMT

Another outtake from my 2009-11 sessions in Hamburg with old pal, Lee Self.

Twilight Fields

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 15 Mar 2019 21:19:13 GMT

Some automatic writing from another universe. Crepuscular atmosfera.

Snow On My Head

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 13 Mar 2019 10:58:01 GMT

An outtake from my 2009-10 sessions in Hamburg with old pal, Lee Self.

My Funny Valentine Live 2008

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 12 Mar 2019 20:54:25 GMT

From the first live show with my buddy Tilemachos Moussas in Pireaus.

Curse of the Leopard Cult

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 19 Feb 2019 08:50:42 GMT

Another episode of my cut-up and soundtrack for the obscure vintage radio series "Moon Over Africa".

MOON OVER AFRICA

Not much is known about the radio series Moon Over Africa. It is thought to be a South African radio show which aired around 1937 or 1938. There are 26 episodes lasting 15 minutes each. Since nothing is really known about the series we are not sure if there were episodes which aired before, or after, these 26 episodes.

The 26 episodes follow an expedition led by Professor Anton Edwards as they search for the missing city of Atlantis. They follow the directions of a shrunken head which speaks the ancient language of the people of Atlantis and run into many strange dangers in the African jungle.

From the Old Time Radio Researchers Group. See "Note" Section below for more information on the OTRR.

Je Retournerai

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 18 Feb 2019 18:12:55 GMT

A freebie for you, my little chickadees. On the subject of re-birth and return. Thank me by subscribing.

Je Retournerai

From earth to sky

From wind to clay

From north to south

From night to day

Je Retournerai

From down to up

From out to in

From life to life

From yang to yin

Je Retournerai

this transparent moment

behind the moonlit evening like sand

my heart moves from demonic to cordial.

the warmth of your body gives it honor

Lonely early light of day
cracks at the walls of my house
transparent leaves of ancient rotten clay.

Sometimes a piece of the wind
petrifies like a soul in my heart

Je Retournerai

From here to there

From bed to hearse

From wet to dry

From bad to worse

Je Retournerai

Don't Forget of Me

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 06 Feb 2019 21:40:07 GMT

Some EVP recordings weave in and out of an ectoplasmic setting. (One of the phantasms says " Don't Forget of Me". Another says "Be Dead". oo-ee-oo)

Wikipedia says

" Within ghost hunting and parapsychology, electronic voice phenomena (EVP) are sounds found on electronic recordings that are interpreted as spirit voices that have been either unintentionally recorded or intentionally requested and recorded. Parapsychologist Konstantīns Raudive, who popularized the idea in the 1970s, described EVP as typically brief, usually the length of a word or short phrase."

Local Hell

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 03 Feb 2019 11:49:01 GMT

Some dance music from Maria's 2016 production of "The Master and Margarita"

I Weep

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 01 Feb 2019 07:18:42 GMT

An 80ish confection, written with lyrics from one of my journals of the period, ushering in the new month of February.

Luchamos Por Nuestra Cultura

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 16 Jan 2019 21:03:16 GMT

Some nostalgic synthesizers enlisted in the cultural struggle with some synthetic voices from the Brave New World.

Objets Trouvés

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 13 Jan 2019 19:25:30 GMT

Some bricolage and diverse outsider types. Wolves. Coyotes. You know.

Moscow Nights, Disco

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 12 Jan 2019 16:25:09 GMT

My arrangement of the classic Russian song as used in my wife's 2016 production of "The Master and Margarita", done up disco stylee.

Captain Midnight Returns

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 11 Jan 2019 21:05:12 GMT

A theme for an imaginary sci-fi serial set in the year 2019.

Beschwöre den Krampus

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 31 Dec 2018 12:47:31 GMT

Summon the Krampus. A New Year's present from me to thee.

Jingle Hell

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 25 Dec 2018 11:33:01 GMT

Here is a wee Christmas gift, from my 1997 soundtrack for Nicholas Triandafyllidis' TV film
"The Overcoat", after Gogol. It is also now available from Les Disques du Crepuscule at

https://lesdisquesducrepuscule.com/ghosts_of_christmas_past_twi158cd.html.html together with Christmas tracks from the likes of Tuxedomoon, Durutti Column, Paul Haig, Winston Tong and other Factory Benelux luminaries.

So Now, Little Man

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 19:23:55 GMT

A warning about the dangers of drugs from some Christian woman in Texas, over some vintage synth work.

September Song Live 2008

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 22 Dec 2018 20:29:59 GMT

A recording of the Kurt Weill classic, recorded at the very beginning of my collaboration with
Tilemachos Moussas in Piraeus.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Batman?

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 22 Dec 2018 19:23:55 GMT

A version of the big bad wolf passed over for use in my wife's production of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"

Wiener Blut

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 20 Dec 2018 11:25:31 GMT

My arrangement of Strauss' chestnut for use in Aliki Knutsen's production of "Reigen".

Hermetic Transition

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 27 Nov 2018 19:44:55 GMT

The workings of the coaxial multiverse and some violin playing. Free to all comers.

Violent Angels Breed

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 17 Nov 2018 21:29:31 GMT

Some algorithmical poetry, over epic strains, reflecting , as if by design, the current state of affairs. (Art Maria Panourgia)

Violent angels breed

ancient problems

the separation of men,

the passion of bastards.

The setting winter sun,

All the huddled country’s greatest sons,

black evenings in forgotten schools

the world cannot end.

I am a brick of

midnight and obscurity

a rarity that writes its own mythology

My skeleton sulks

without the collusion of my mirror.

While the wrongness howls.

I Feel Good, Bay-bee

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 17 Nov 2018 18:25:33 GMT

I experiment with a virtual vocalist plug-in called alter ego. This is fun.

Satin Sheets

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 06 Nov 2018 12:39:54 GMT

Some retro mood music to hear with the one you love.

Entracte

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 03 Nov 2018 09:33:46 GMT

The first post for November, a cinematic or theatrical interlude, loose in the world, awaiting a context.

Autumn Shore

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 17:10:14 GMT

Summer vanished, a chill in the air. Sweet melancholy.

Ire and Choler

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 16 Oct 2018 17:24:15 GMT

More recent theatre work. The two words in this title (for those who don't know) are synonyms in English for anger. This piece could also be called "anger management". I wrote it when I was pissed off. As my father used to say "It's better to be pissed off than pissed on."

Elegy

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 11 Oct 2018 20:33:32 GMT

Here is another song from my recent music for Aliki Danezi Knutsen's production of "Reigen". She asked me to set Rilke's First Duino Elegy to music. Here it is.

From Wikipedia:

The Duino Elegies (German: Duineser Elegien) are a collection of ten elegies written by the Bohemian-Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926). Rilke, who is "widely recognized as one of the most lyrically intense German-language poets,"[1] began writing the elegies in 1912 while a guest of Princess Marie von Thurn und Taxis (1855–1934) at Duino Castle, near Trieste on the Adriatic Sea. The poems, 859 lines long in total,[2] were dedicated to the Princess upon their publication in 1923. During this ten-year period, the elegies languished incomplete for long stretches of time as Rilke suffered frequently from severe depression—some of which was caused by the events of World War I and being conscripted into military service. Aside from brief episodes of writing in 1913 and 1915, Rilke did not return to the work until a few years after the war ended. With a sudden, renewed inspiration—writing in a frantic pace he described as a "boundless storm, a hurricane of the spirit"[3]—he completed the collection in February 1922 while staying at Château de Muzot in Veyras, in Switzerland's Rhone Valley. After their publication in 1923 and Rilke's death in 1926, the Duino Elegies were quickly recognized by critics and scholars as his most important work.[4][5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duino_Elegies

Gloomy Sunday

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 04 Oct 2018 09:50:28 GMT

I recorded this song for Aliki Danezi Knutsen's current staging of Arthur Schnitzler's 1897 play "Reigen", or "La Ronde". Since the play is set in turn of the (20th) century Vienna, I wanted to find a song whose roots were in the atmosphere of Austro-Hungary and conveyed a sufficient decadent angst. I think I found my match. Here is a quote from Wikipedia's entry

"Gloomy Sunday", also known as the "Hungarian Suicide Song", is a popular song composed by Hungarian pianist and composer Rezső Seress and published in 1933.

The original lyrics were titled Vége a világnak (The world is ending) and were about despair caused by war, ending in a quiet prayer about people's sins. Poet László Jávor wrote his own lyrics to the song, titled Szomorú vasárnap (Sad Sunday), in which the protagonist wants to commit suicide following his lover's death.[1] The latter lyrics ended up becoming more popular while the former were essentially forgotten. The song was first recorded in Hungarian by Pál Kalmár in 1935.

"Gloomy Sunday" was first recorded in English by Hal Kemp in 1936, with lyrics by Sam M. Lewis,[2] and was recorded the same year by Paul Robeson, with lyrics by Desmond Carter. It became well-known throughout much of the English-speaking world after the release of a version by Billie Holiday in 1941. Lewis's lyrics referred to suicide, and the record label described it as the "Hungarian Suicide Song". There is a recurring urban legend which claims that many people have committed suicide while listening to this song.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloomy_Sunday

Alter Ego

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 16 Sep 2018 11:18:38 GMT

Your alternate reality for today. (art by Maria Panourgia)

Mandolin Sunday

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 10 Sep 2018 12:42:15 GMT

A souvenir from a distant Sunday when I got out the mandolin.

New Carpet

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 07 Sep 2018 17:01:26 GMT

A piece to mark both the arrival of a newly cleaned living room rug in 2015, and the realization of a new 'tapis', the audio layer upon which ambience lies.

La Voix de JC

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 06 Sep 2018 18:20:17 GMT

A choral homage to a voice from the last century

Jinx 2018

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 05 Sep 2018 10:39:18 GMT

To welcome September here is a freebie, a remake of the tuxedomoon classic "Jinx" which I undertook for a local theatre company.

The Online Etymology Dictionary states that 'jynx', meaning a charm or spell, was in usage in English as early as the 1690s.[3] The same source states that 'jinx', with that specific spelling, is first attested in American English in 1911. Jynx/jinx is traced to the 17th-century word jyng, meaning "a spell", and ultimately to the Latin word iynx, also spelled jynx, as 'j' and 'i' are the same letter in Latin.[4] The Latin iynx came from the Greek name of the wryneck bird, iunx, associated with sorcery; not only was the bird used in the casting of spells and in divination, but the Ancient Romans and Greeks traced the bird's mythological origins to a sorceress named Iynx, who was transformed into this bird to punish her for a spell cast on the god Zeus.

Drone-e

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 28 Aug 2018 11:42:45 GMT

Some atmosphere, yours for nothing to encourage you to subscribe, at long last to my patreon concern. For these low low contributions, you can keep food on my table, pay my electric bill, sustain me, float my boat. Ignore the subliminal messages "subscribe...subscribe....subscribe..."

ビールバレル (birubareru)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 28 Aug 2018 10:49:10 GMT

A vintage synth romp through the recent past.

Cold Skin

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 27 Aug 2018 10:53:49 GMT

Some evocative and dark soundscape action for you all.

I Got God Now

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 18 Aug 2018 14:38:35 GMT

This track, passed over for inclusion on "The Blue Sleep" was performed as part of the Swiss production "Angels" in Geneva and La Chaux de Fonds in 2015

Cloudscomin

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 17 Aug 2018 16:23:32 GMT

Wishful thinking from the heart of the 2018 summer. Clouds coming.

Witch Woman of the Rock

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 30 Jul 2018 19:06:26 GMT

From a series of soundtracks and montages I did a few years back from a 1930's South African radio show called "Moon Over Africa"

The Names of Rain

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 08 Jul 2018 10:48:58 GMT

A new installment in a new wave of songwriting.

Parvis St. Gilles

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 06 Jul 2018 07:31:49 GMT

A Belgian-inspired minimalist ode to an open space in Brussels.

`Retro Boy

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 05 Jul 2018 20:41:11 GMT

Mix in some FM synthesis, some SID chip emulation, some Japanese anime voices and walk backwards.

El Dilema del Vampiro

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 27 Jun 2018 10:42:06 GMT

The Vampire's dilemma. Like everyone else's but only at night.

The Tomorrow Clock

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 24 Jun 2018 11:34:14 GMT

A little gem from 2011 for my beloved patrons.

Ludicrum Ceremonia

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 22 Jun 2018 19:29:15 GMT

An outtake from my music for Aliki Knutsen's production of Camus' "Caligula" for the Municipal Theatre of Piraeus. My original idea was to build a Kithara, or ancient lute, but I went with a sampled one in the end.

AT LAST I HEAR THE SINGING APE

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 19:11:31 GMT

I liked this one a lot too, so I share it for free as well.

Indra's Net

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 18 Jun 2018 09:59:51 GMT

The great net of being, all things connected. Some violin playing too.

I Inhabit the Dunes

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 16 Jun 2018 09:29:32 GMT

Hot off the song press, a freebie.

Berlin C'est Ca

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 28 May 2018 09:20:04 GMT

A nostalgic romp through cold war Berlin.

An Implied Mazurka

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 28 May 2018 08:53:31 GMT

Triple time terpsichore.

Possible Nocturne

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 28 May 2018 08:19:57 GMT

Another result of my Reaper lessons. Possibly a nocturne. An aid to repose.

DON'T FEAR

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 13 May 2018 09:12:05 GMT

Here is the first fruit of my immersion into the Reaper DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) software. I think it will be worth the effort.

Conversion

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 09 May 2018 08:18:36 GMT

Here's a freebie. I celebrate conversion, whether from one religion to the other, or from midi to audio.

Muro di San Valentino

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 09 May 2018 07:46:34 GMT

First offering for May. Valentine's wall.

Fractal Motion

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 10 Apr 2018 19:35:46 GMT

Some more recent work, exploring the DADGAD guitar tuning.

Flat Process

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 07 Apr 2018 16:44:13 GMT

Another fresh track, just working on it here Saturday before Orthodox Easter, April 6, 2018.

Page of Wands

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 05 Apr 2018 11:16:52 GMT

April is upon us, oh friends and patrons. Thank you for your continued support. I give you this new piece, hot off the press. I let the tarot name it this time. The working title was "chooba chooba".

Prix de Vincent

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 15 Mar 2018 13:07:48 GMT

Hommage a Vincent P.

Amore Latino

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 14 Mar 2018 22:10:48 GMT

A groove from the early days of the millenium.

Cumbia Tyropita

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 14 Mar 2018 18:36:35 GMT

Some earnest local wackiness to ease the transition into daylight savings time.

The Master and Margarita

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Tue, 13 Mar 2018 10:37:09 GMT

The love theme from my wife's 2016 adaptation of "The Master and Margarita" for the Greek National Theatre. I played Woland, the devil, in this production, by the way.

Guitar Sketch

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 18:04:49 GMT

The February sketch, for the discerning few. Some violin, too.

My Funny Valentine

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 17:45:12 GMT

From a live show of jazz standards I used to take around in 2007-10, featuring Athens jazz guitarist and good guy, Tilemachos Moussas.

Bobo

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 17:18:15 GMT

A head-banger from 2006, early days in my studio.

May the Fork Be With You

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 25 Feb 2018 12:23:47 GMT

Some earnest soundtrackizing with a cinematic flair.

Koffer

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 24 Feb 2018 19:04:38 GMT

Another track from Albrecht Hirche's film "Madchen in Koffer"

https://albrechthirche.wordpress.com/madchen-in-koffer/

Supermarket

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 24 Feb 2018 18:51:01 GMT

From my friend Albrecht Hirche's film "Madchen in Koffer". Featuring the vocal stylings of Albrecht Hirche.

https://albrechthirche.wordpress.com/madchen-in-koffer/

Mars Rover

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 11:28:56 GMT

In celebration of our intrepid robot buddies. A freebie, folks.

Say It

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 10:51:47 GMT

Atmospheric abuse of a circuit bent speak n' spell in remembrance of my role in "Agamemnon" by Aeschylus. ("Say it!!!" I would shout. Then I would walk across some scattered rags to my doom)

Day Off

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 10:42:06 GMT

Some earnest sid chip nonsense to celebrate a rare respite during a busy season last year. (Drawing Maria Panourgia)

Looper Sketch

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 31 Jan 2018 18:48:43 GMT

Fulfilling my obligation to my $10+ patrons to upload a sketch, this fiddle jam from last year.

Fused

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 31 Jan 2018 15:45:02 GMT

Speaker's corner rants over a bed of frenetic fake fusion jazz.

Atencion

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 31 Jan 2018 13:42:23 GMT

EVP voices and radio intercepts in this hive mind artefact.

Volca

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 31 Jan 2018 13:29:22 GMT

A celebration of the little Korg synth.

Jazz Hell

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 14 Jan 2018 18:19:57 GMT

Some of the soundtrack from my room in the Hell Bardo. All jazz. All day long. (Image Gary Larson)

Revealed

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Thu, 28 Dec 2017 16:24:50 GMT

Some atmosphere, moody but not sad.

Bob Cobbing

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 27 Dec 2017 11:20:10 GMT

A freebie, to tweak your interest, reward you, give me something to do between Christmas and New Year's.

Uno (for the new year)

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Wed, 27 Dec 2017 11:05:51 GMT

Here is a bright little minimalistic excursion to lift those holiday blues.

The Island of Dr. Funk

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sun, 17 Dec 2017 11:05:48 GMT

Some atmosphere of intrigue and mystery.

Interludus

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 08 Dec 2017 21:34:00 GMT

For the beginning of December and since you have been so supportive so far. This piece was composed for use in our production of Caligula, but not selected by the director. Still sticking to my use of Cithara sample, keeping it Roman.

Phil 'Er Up

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 27 Nov 2017 08:00:00 GMT

A quasi-minimalist tip of the cap to the mighty Phillip Glass, et cie.

Time and Space

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 24 Nov 2017 16:28:38 GMT

Here is a retro synth thing I did a while back for possible inclusion in my wife's production of "Master and Margarita". It was passed by, forgotten by all, including me UNTIL NOW. Happy Thanksgiving, if that means anything to you.

Snake Woman Sleep

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 20 Nov 2017 19:10:41 GMT

From my August 2016 series of soundtracks to the found South African radio drama "Moon Over Africa".

looper sketch 1

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 20 Nov 2017 18:49:50 GMT

Here is a violin improv on my jam man looper. Just keeping up the chops.

Grow Old Among Strangers

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Mon, 20 Nov 2017 08:02:00 GMT

Some pulsing strings and orchestral type simulacra. Suitable for the cinematic moments of alienation in your life.

wavy sez

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 18 Nov 2017 18:54:45 GMT

Ram Dass speaks about Wavy Gravy, my old boss's husband, patriarch of the Hog Farm, clown saint acidhead. A fragment.

First One's Free -Celestial Ray

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Sat, 18 Nov 2017 13:56:19 GMT

Here is a public post just so you have something to listen to while you decide how much you're in for.

Master and Margarita

johnnyharpoon@gmail.com (Blaine Leslie Reininger) — Fri, 17 Nov 2017 21:22:39 GMT

Theme music from the 2016 Greek National Theatre Experimental Stage production of "The Master and Margarita", directed by Maria Panourgia.