This is a short-story I wrote as part of the Motueka Writing Group WHAM (Write Here At Motueka) in 2024. It is set in a dystopian future where ink is at a premium. It was begun as a dialogue under the title 'Stealing Names' which was a theme I thought of during one session after one of our writing companions, Colin Clough, had told stories about stealing identities, or faking names, back in the 30s and 40s when passports weren't as vigorously vetted, and going for trips around the world on ships. His stories were always fascinating, and some of them got collected in the following book: The Tap Dance

This story functions as two sets of monologues:
Part 1 is a customer speaking directly to the assistant at the waiting room; and Part 2 is the manager speaking directly to the customer.

Here is an audio recording of my story 'Premium Ink' narrated by myself. Enjoy!

A great, positive, discussion about the fall of professional reviews and the rise of online reviews. 

Comment section is pretty funny too...

A rare occurrence for my YouTube channel is for a video to get over 1000 views. While my 'Dark Souls III - Dragonslayer Armour with Eygon of Carim summon [NG]' video has received 8.7k views since I uploaded it 9 years ago, this little ditty of a folk song I wrote while I was relief teaching in my hometown of Gisborne/Tūranganui-a-Kiwa on the East Coast of the North Island in Aotearoa, comes in second with 1.7k views. 
 
A bit of a surprise, really, considering the song is in two odd time signatures, usually only found in Classical Music or Progressive Rock songs. The verses feature and 11/8 rhythmic figure based around E and a slide into C#m9, that descends down through A, Amaj7, and F#m as the verse progresses through the lyrics. The chorus is a simple 7/8 using basic A, E, and B chords. Although this entire structure works, more or less, like binary composition (A, B), with 4 reiterations, the lyrical contents of the verses help to progress the song forward. 

Starting with the title 'Hello Morning' the lyrics describe a protagonist rising at dawn, embracing the sunlight and bringing flowers to the windowsill for the sun to bring its light into their world. This embracing of the world continues on, first with the partner and reassuring them that 'Love will never let you down', then to a cobblestone path, the metaphor for life's journey; and finally, the day has passed and the protagonist looks up at the stars, to consider them as friends while bringing 'telescopes and observant eyes' to gaze and let the light of the stars into their world. 

This last verse is, in all its simpleness, is what I like the most about the song. A journey from dawn to dusk and meeting the darkness with the light that is offered, and accepting it as a friend. In other words, whatever troubles are in your life, there is always light somewhere that can be found and love embraced. 

It is a simple song, with odd time signatures rooted in a rhythmic feel, proving songs don't have to just be in 4/4 all the time, or in standard song structures; that they can have odd twists to their foundations and structures, and still be appealing to many listeners. 

When I first started writing songs, I felt a certain affinity for song structure. I always had a sense of understanding form and seeing how it could be manipulated out of its verse/chorus patterns. Partly, if not mostly, I think this came from Led Zeppelin, who never felt it necessary to supply a chorus with vocals (When the Levee Breaks, The Wanton Song), or having new/different lyrics for each chorus repeat (The Rover). My songs from 1993 all the way to 2016 would often tweak the standard song form: suddenly inserting the upcoming bridge riff between second and third verse before the second chorus (Oh Joyous Song), bringing in the guitar solo after only the first chorus (I can Feel), shortening a song to just 2xVerse/bridge/chorus/verse/guitar solo (Coattails). Helmet were another band who had an obvious influence in this department. A typical Helmet song structure is: verse/verse/chorus/bridge (or solo)/chorus - bringing songs down to bare necessities and never overstating their point.

Learning about Sonata Form in my composition studies from 2004 through to 2006 allowed me to take a brand new look at the verse/chorus structure, but flipped around in an A/B form, with the development section replacing what I understood as the guitar solo section of a song. While my first two symphonies were mostly failures (the third movement of the first pushed way beyond my capabilities by attempting a Sibelius-like composition), they did teach me a lot about sonata form and how to use, reuse, and develop each theme. 

I even took this straight into a guitar composition that I wrote in 2013's 'A Minor Sledge'. Another tweak: here I start developing the second theme during the repeat of the exposition, and it is this early development that transitions the themes into the new key for the "official development" (the coda transposes the last part of the development into the original key). The jazz guitar piece 'This is Yours' (2014), uses standard sonata form (although, a slight tweak, in that it develops, mostly, one particular section of the second theme instead of the first theme).

Back in 2004, I was having issues with a musician friend who couldn't commit to band work, and I dramatically proclaimed that I was going to quit music because nothing ever worked out for me. My guitarist friend who I was starting a rock/metal band with, laughed, and said "You can't quit music. Even if you tried, I'd come over and visit, and you'll be scrawling notes and ideas onto your bedroom wall." 

Years later, I did quit music. When I had no more songs to write, I really had no more to give to music, and put the guitar away for about five years, and only really played occasionally when I walked into music shops. Of course, my bandmate was right: I did always go back to musescore and see what i could make of some ideas. Usually the results were atrocious, and the pieces got filed with titles like 'Mr Stubbs sucks, again', 'the reason why you don't do this' ... etc. Last year, while writing The Falling City (finished and soon to be released digitally, if no publisher can be found), I did stumble across some ideas and wrote a piece for a chamber sextet, with Bassoon as lead instrument. It's okay, not great, but it serves as a completed piece. 

I have since been playing guitar again for the last three years, realising I should never have put it down - I lost all my thumb strength and much of my shredding speed (although I never mastered sweep-picking, I was pretty quick with multiple hammer-ons), and have only got both back in small doses now. This String Duo here, like the cello theme from the third movement of Three Orchestral Scores (2006), began on guitar. A simple, but interesting idea, that, even after the key change, I could not think of how to develop it further without it just being looped (I don't have a loop pedal). So, I transcribed it to string quartet, starting with cello, and then adding the viola part. However, it seemed pretty contained within these two instruments, and I soon deleted the two violins. Although I'm not a fan of Mozart's String Duo's, I had dabbled a little in Duos with other instruments, but never completed anything with any true degree of success. I actually feel like this Viola and Cello Duo is a success (whether people like it or not, is another issue...), and it takes the sonata form again, and tweaks it by not repeating the exposition, but repeating the development only, while also adding a transitional third theme. 

I am now working on a fugue for this duo as the second movement, using two themes that have come out of this Allegro movement. 
 

• 14/03/26, Ōhaupō 

"It's too dark to see the landmarks..."

26 Years ago I was living in Auckland living out the worst days of my life. Clinical depression had destroyed every sense of self and made me a victim to all that I believed life had inflicted upon me. Proving myself a failure at life, I even proved myself a failure at trying to commit suicide, and sunk into a void of what felt like endless repetitions of depression, going to work, coming home again, rinse and repeat. 

I had nothing to cheer me up, but I had this album to keep me company through it all.

Thank you Mark Sandman for your beautiful visions, words and music.

And thank you always to the wonderful musicians who helped create the Morphine sound with Mark: Dana Colley, Billy Conway, and Jerome Deupree.

"You're a bedtime story,
the one that keeps the curtains close.
And I hope you're waiting for me,
'cause I can't make it on my own." 

Simple!
Just visit your local library and fill out a REQUEST FOR PURCHASE form available at the desk, or click the link online.

With inflation rising faster than wages and salaries, it's no surprise less books are being bought. And with the rise in cheap(er) audiobooks and ebooks, it's even less surprising that these would be an alternative purchase method.

But libraries still love you. And bookshops still love you.
And both want you to come in browse, buy, or take out on loan.
And authors still love you when you support both libraries and bookshops.

But if you do find that supporting an author with money that is better spent on groceries and house bills isn't possible, one of the best ways of being supportive is through library loans.

Library loans give a clear indication that there are readers available for this book, and this author is worth paying attention to. Even more so than reviews, since reviews can either bolster or weaken, and in some cases destroy, an author's reputation. Reviews are definitely helpful, even when they're negative they still bring attention. But if a review is time and thought beyond your cup of tea, then the next best thing, if not the best thing overall, is to just walk on into your local library and get their book out on loan. Even if you don't read it. No one's going to know, and it really doesn't matter; just the act of getting the book out shows that it's a book worth having in the library.

But what if the book isn't already in the library?
Simple!!
Just ask at the counter if they can order one of the author's books in. If you can't get into your local library, visit the website and click the online REQUEST FOR PURCHASE link.

No author expects you to put money where you can't afford to put money. It is a great privilege just to be read. And having one of our books in the library available for enthusiastic readers to have the choice to read, is the next best thing, and just as helpful!

✍✍✍📖📚📚🛋🤓
Kia kaha

"As the ivy climbs along the walls, so must the pen along the paper."
For to tell one's story, in prose or poetry, one must dissolve time of its weight and fly free through the syntax of memory.

Rain outside is travelling sideways. Loose branches have dropped from trees and scattered across the lawn, wires dangle from powerlines, and the cat remains hidden in some corner of protection where an old shed depletes its life amongst sawdust, old battens, and upturned concrete sinks. An entire tree has been felled by this cruel wind, relentless and bitter to it’s subjugating end. 

Here was summer . . . for a few days. And then it was the madness of autumn sprung upon us. Autumn without the colour. 

We wait for February now. Where December was once known to have sprouted beach umbrellas and backyard barbecues, it is February that brings the promise of sunshine in these years of climate changing seasons.