The Ballade of Nixon Tyme Chapter Twenty Three

Nixon Tyme needed to be specific with Gil on how he wanted to set about helping him. Since meeting up with him again after all these years, he wondered whether the recent, dramatic turn of events were some kind of signal that he should try and respond to. He thought back to the parting words of Jim, in Mykines...... 'Relax, then use your senses to read the signs.'

Until then, he'd never had to consciously '…...read the signs' too much. Life had passed largely as he'd planned it, and with little trauma. Since he'd bought his flat with Steevo, he'd never felt the need to move on, and his job was mostly free of any real pressure. Having eschewed the traditional career paths years ago, he now controlled how he wanted to operate. That usually meant three or four evenings teaching from home, and a couple of gigs a week, mostly at weekends. He was answerable to no one, except himself, and it also allowed him to indulge his other peccadillo.

Nixon Tyme never had a sexual relationship which lasted more than six months. That was the limit, he'd learned. The point of no return, the state between pleasantly heady or just plain pissed. It was, he thought, the Oort cloud of the soul, where once the line had been crossed, the gravitational pull on one's own independence ceased to exist. So, rather than have even one major relationship, Nixon contented himself with the temporal attraction of a girl in every town.

It had worked well up until now. Now this particular girl, in this particular town, had died and he'd effectively rubbed out any trace of her, he wondered whether he could ever live this way again. Even while he was still seeing her, he'd begun to question himself. He'd turned forty last year, perhaps it was that, or maybe Lucia herself, but nevertheless, even before events had led him here to Gil Riot's studio, he sensed his world was changing. He wondered about Jim Nielsen. He'd be in his mid fifties now. Would he still be changing his women as often as he cut his hair?

Nixon had never thought to ask back then. What would it be like to grow old this way? The signs then, pointed to change, radical change, and here he was, in a rare position, where he could indulge himself. Gil wanted from him, the very thing that Nixon took for granted.

He thought he knew how to write a song, but had never felt the need to really push himself before. Having already explained to Gil that he didn't want to take any glory, he could now just concentrate on doing his best with the songs, and take satisfaction in that alone. Gil, for his part, had saved him from what was a near, hopeless situation. Nixon doubted that great songs alone would be any guarantee of success, but still, it was down to him, to try and do the same in return.

“I want a week here alone”

“What do you mean ?”

“Well, if I'm going to attempt to write something special, I'll need space. Do you have any decent books ?”

“Books ?”

“Look, what do you know about song writing ?”

For the next twenty minutes Nixon launched into a subject, which although he'd never really explored in practice himself, he felt he instinctively knew. It was not something that could be studied academically. As with painting or the written word, study could advance one to a level of competence, but nothing could replace sheer instinct for producing work of original quality. Nixon knew that Gil didn't have this, and told him so. He could, however, play his part with the recording.

“You have an excellent studio here, but I want you to let go of everything you know about it. Forget all the presets, and manuals. Imagine it's day one. We are going to create a new sound, and I want you to use your ears to guide you.”

“First though, I'm going to immerse myself in some literature, and steal an angle. You see, before anyone picks up a guitar, we need to know, not just where we're heading, but where we've been coming from............”

“I have no idea what you're talking about”

“Okay, tell me five of your favourite songs”

Gil puffed his cheeks, and blew out.

“It doesn't matter, but look, whichever you choose, it most likely didn't come out of thin air. There will be a chain of events that leads to it. Most great albums have some kinda continuity. Take Bowie with Ziggy. It was a vehicle for an alter ego, so he married up space, alien lyrics, with more traditional melodies. Starman steals from Somewhere over the Rainbow. Life on Mars is My Way, get it ?”

“You mean he was a thief ?”

“No, not really, more of a magpie. A bit here, and a bit there, without it being obvious. Lyrics are harder, of course, but you still need to find a way of saying the same old shit but in a different way.........”

“Like....?”

“Think of any memorable song with a catchy hook.......Get off my Cloud, Hard Day's Night....what do they mean ? You sorta know, but have never heard it said that way before.”

“So you're going to steal some lyrics from some books ?”

“I might take the odd phrase, you know, and then use that to spark off the imagination. Come to think of it, our little seaside adventure could be useful. How about we call the first song 'Out to Sea' ?”

Gil didn't have any books, but fortunately for Nixon, Isabella, courtesy of Terrence Lake, had an extensive collection of exactly what Nixon was looking for. Isabella was less than enthusiastic about lending them, but at the same time, was curious why Nixon needed them.

“I'm looking for inspiration” he explained.

As arranged, Gil made himself scarce for the week, and returned to his chalet on the coast, while Nixon settled into the lodging house situated alongside the studio. Gil had still not explained any more about Isabella, but it was now obvious that they no longer lived together.

Nixon busied himself with his work. In all, he'd taken about twenty books, and rather than read line by line, he skimmed, scribbling down the odd phrase, sometimes just single words, names, or anything that took his fancy. When he'd filled up five pages of scribbles, he stopped reading and picked up some scissors. After cutting out each phrase, he then randomly started to try and piece them together again until something caught his eye. It was laborious, but slowly it started to come. Verse by verse, it was soon clear that his own subconscious had come into play when filling the gaps. A lot of it was obtuse, which was what he was looking for, but there was just enough, for anyone who knew, to understand.

After three days, he'd come up with seven sets of lyrics. He hadn't been out of the house since he'd begun, so he decided to take a break and go for a walk. In the courtyard, he wondered which way to go. He had no real idea where he was, so he turned towards Isabella's house and knocked the door. It transpired that there was a converted rail track, which passed not so far from the house.

“It goes for miles in both directions. How far do you want to go ?”

“Not so far, maybe half an hour. I'd like to clear my head.................Would you like to come ?”

Isabella looked surprised. She stared at him with her head tilted.

“I don't bite.......”

Within minutes they were strolling along the gravelled track. Shafts of sunlight burst through occasional gaps in the canopy of Oak and Chestnut. A small stream meandered alongside them, and glistened in the summer light.

“This is a beautiful place ….......You been here long ?”

“Gil hasn't told you about me, then ?”

And so Isabella filled in the story that Gil had never bothered to mention. She told him about her parents, the accident, and after all the years of solitude, jumping the gun with Gil.

“He's a nice guy, but I realised a long time ago that we weren't compatible. His music means everything to him. It always comes first. The irony is that now he has his studio here, it would be very difficult to move it without damaging his livelihood, so we're both kind of trapped.”

“Well I had an idea his music came first.........”

“Doesn't it for you, then.........I thought that you were the ex rock star ?”

Nixon smiled at the irony, and realised that Gil had obviously not told Isabella too much of his story. He told her all about his time in Hollywood, then of his travels. In fact, he told her pretty much everything, all except, of course, for Lucia's death, preferring to stick to the story he'd told Steevo about being on the run from a jealous husband.

“Well that's some story. At least you're honest about it, I suppose. Doesn't it get tiring, running around in circles like that ?”

“Well, it had crossed my mind lately, but what's the alternative ?” 

She smiled, but said nothing, then suddenly they were back at the house. They'd been out for nearly an hour, and he felt he'd broken the ice a little, but still found her hard to read. Nixon didn't see Isabella for the rest of the week. Their chat had inspired him though, and by the weekend, he had another six sets of lyrics down.

'Problem Thursday from the streets of beyond

where rotting despair has always belonged

If God's on our side there's a standard to bear

 but as long as I'm blind, I'm dumb, and I'm deaf

and I can feel the reaper's breath

with the sun in the east and the moon to the west.'

“That's brilliant, how do you come up with this ?”

“Never mind, it's nothing without a good tune. I think we might need a week or two to come up with something. Do you have any playing cards ?”

“You're going to chose the chords with cards ?”

“Partially. It's just to create a random element now and then. I think they used that idea for Heroes, which is strange because it was one of his simpler songs. Most of the classic seventies stuff was right out there. ….Even if it sounded simple”

Nixon then asked Gil to take some of his favourite songs, and write down the chord sequences backwards, or reverse all the minors and majors. They repeated the process over and over, until Nixon spotted something he liked. At first Gil didn't see how this method could produce anything original, but gradually he started to notice that Nixon seemed to know his stuff.

He was just looking for a spark. Sometimes just a couple of random chords would be inverted or de constructed to produce a riff, or a sequence, that when hummed against a melody, sounded vaguely familiar, but very definitely, original. This wasn't just science. Ever since the birth of rock n roll, most songs had leaned heavily on the three principal blues chords, known as the first, fourth and fifth. The trick was, without deviating too far, to introduce an element, be it lyrical or melodic, which would render it distinctive. That was the craft. Nearly every hit record contained at least three of the magic chords, but almost always something unique which set it apart. Nixon had seen this process at first hand with The Blueboys and their producer, but in his heart he'd known it all along, and it was only now, all these years later, that he'd actually explored the possibilities.

Within ten days, Nixon thought he had enough compositions to work with. The task of marrying up each set of lyrics with the music, seemed to pass with ease. By this stage, even Gil could start to see which pieces matched. Gil had become genuinely excited, that finally, he had something of quality to work with. Even the titles sounded interesting. Shining Star, Dirt and Dust, The Day That Zorba Died. All of them seemed too touch on some aspect of personal relationships, but with a twist, something that drew you in, but left more questions than answers.

Nixon had been clever in constructing the songs. He knew that Gil wasn't the most versatile singer, so instead, the songs were written to accentuate the lyrics, in an almost spoken word style, but with chord progressions that would still reference some of their favourite music.

The next step, was to match the song's key to Gil's voice. It was an important stage, and Nixon effortlessly tried out all possibilities in matching the two. It took a day, but finally, he had a set of songs that fitted him perfectly. Gil felt he couldn't have wished for more if he'd written them himself, and officially at least, he had.

“Now it's over to you, captain. Lets get this stuff recorded.”