Category: my music & performances

my songs and shows

DIVERSIFY

I had my appendix out a few months ago and when I got home from the hospital there was a card signed by a bunch of my coworkers. On top of that, they pooled $70 and pledged it toward my next song on Patreon. I was so touched. So I wrote a song for all the folks I work with fitting as many names and division acronyms in as I could.

It’s the Division of Diversity and Community Engagement (at UT-Austin), so I called it DIVERSIFY, and spelled it out imagining everyone singing it with me as an anthem. This week we had our all-division staff meeting and I had a chance to sing it to over 200 collegues. As you can see below, it was a lot of fun and folks got into it. Listen to the the studio version on SoundCloud.

DIVERSIFY

D-I-V-E-R-S-I-F-Y
Don’t you know that if you want to grow got to diversify
D-I-V-E-R-S-I-F-Y
Don’t ya know that we’re here to show it to the university

I’m not just talkin bout color
Not just talkin bout race
Talkin bout gettin out of your bubble
And seeing it another way

Talkin bout your teachers
Talkin bout your staff
I’m talkin bout your leaders
You do the math

Talking globalization
And what will keep us strong
’bout difficult conversations
That help us get along, making us strong

D-I-V-E-R-S-I-F-Y

Sherri’s got the plan
Betty Jeanne’s gonna teach
Stella got the research
Simon gonna do IT

Ralph is gonna hook you up
Tatiana is doin the books
Helen and Heidi are holdin it down
While Milly and Thais are spreadin it round

Leslie’s got the story
Ron’s got design
J gonna make some web sites
Virginia got write some lines

Erica is on the board
Dr. V. is on the scene
Ruth has got the proof
Hannah’s got the VIP

Susan is writin the points
Patrick is takin it on
Jennifer is runnin it right
Leonard is fatherin sons

Maurice is puttin it on
Suzanne is writing it down
Robiaun’s making friends in high places
Angie’s putting smiles on all the kid’s faces

D-I-V-E-R-S-I-F-Y

We got the MEC and the GSC
with a space where you can truly be
LCAE, LCSP and NLP
gonna keep em goin to the university

The OIE and the CCRT
gonna make sure we got some equity
The triple A, B, PE and the HFSA
gonna make sure we got all kinds of faculty

The SSD got our ADAA
The UIL gonna run the race
The HOGG keepin us mentally healthy
The CEC gonna rock the East

The RFL is gonna find you funds
CDSI gonna make you rich
The LCCE gonna sign you up
The SJI make you an activist

D-I-V-E-R-S-I-F-Y
Diversify your money, diversify your mind,
D-I-V-E-R-S-I-F-Y
When you get out of your comfort zone you’ll know what it is to be alive

Map of Sweet Spots for Outdoor Concerts in Austin

Here is a map of sweet spots around Austin where I like to play outdoor shows. My favorite spots are natural amphitheaters, secluded stages, echoey places, like beneath bridges. I look forward to adding places I’d like to play and starting maps for other cities like D.C. and San Diego.


View Map of Sweet Spots for Outdoor Concerts in Austin in a larger map

I used Hannah’s pic of me from my concert in Calhoun courtyard as my map pin. I’m a pinhead!

Jason Molin playing in Calhoun courtyard

Joy’s Song

Let me tell you about a song I just wrote for someone I appreciate and admire. It’s a Valentines Day song.

A few years ago I ran a Kickstarter campaign to raise money to make my second album, FOK DUB. For $100 you got a custom song. Here, finally, I am delivering a song to Joy Haynes, a fantastic artist in her own right, that I know from high school. (Check out this wonderful documentary she produced about a psychiatric hospital in DC.)

custom song for $100She wanted a country song with the chorus: “I’d rather be doing nothing with you than something with someone else.” So I asked her for a list of things she likes to do and here’s what she gave me:

  • play games (boggle, scrabble, cards)
  • drink wine
  • travel
  • eat out
  • act junky (that means watching tv on the couch in my pajamas snuggled under a blanket)
  • go on long walks
  • sleep nine hours a night
  • listen to NPR
  • listen to country music
  • go to any live event (sports, music, theater)
  • read
  • drive with the windows down and the heat on
  • tailgate
  • have intense, life inspiring conversations
  • guffaw
  • go to photo exhibits
  • concoct conspiracy theories
  • keep my feet on the ground and my head in the clouds
  • never run out of things (toothpaste, milk, whatever)
  • did I mention drinking wine!?!? 🙂

What a great list! I put it all into a song, we went back and forth about the ending a bit and viola! Here it is on Soundcloud:

I’d Rather Be Doing Nothing With You (Than Something With Someone Else)

I like to play scrabble on a Saturday night
Go to a game, stop for a bite
Or we could go to a show at this theater I know
I like play cards and I like to drink wine
Put em together with you it’s divine
Let’s take a long walk, sit on the dock
We’ll talk and not talk, then talk and not talk
Cause I’d rather be doin nothin with you than
Something with someone else

I like to cruise around with the windows all down
Feelin the beat with the heat on my feet
There’s always some toothpaste at my place my friend
Intense conversations, inspiration to lend
When you’re not around NPR is my friend
When I’m sick of the news it’s country music again
Or sitting on the couch watching TV
Actin junky in my PJs is OK by me
But I’d rather be doin nothin with you than
Something with someone else

Wander with me to the new gallery
Look at the walls and tell me what you see
Feet on the ground and our head in the clouds
Guffawing along a little too loud
I got my sweet nine of sleep last night
So I’m ready to go, lets find a good show
Conspiracy theories we’ll make up a few
As long as I am doin nothin with you
I’d rather we just threw a party for two
Than rendezvous with somebody else
Let’s me and you, no switcheroo
Yes I’d rather be doing nothing but you
Than anything with anyone else

I’m Not Gonna Try To Change Anyone But Myself

This song is the realization of several visions I’ve been trying to bring together: It’s a mantra. It’s reggae, it’s dub. It’s got a killer horn section. And it achieves a sort of introspective spirituality I’ve begun chasing a lot lately.

It’s the second song I’ve posted with horns arranged by local legend Mark “Speedy” Gonzales, and by far the most far out song from this session as you’ll hear in the second half when the horns take turns playing through a delay pedal that I was operating. This song shares  the same long, repetitive structure as Lub Dub. I didn’t realize until we were recording it that it is a sort of continuation of that instrumental, this time with meditative lyrics.

I’m not gonna to try to change anyone but myself
I’m not gonna to try to change you, I’m through
I’m not gonna to try to change anyone but myself
I’m gonna try, I’m gonna choose my truths

believed em when they told me i could do, anything i choose, i put my mind to
now it sounds cruel and funny as i’m runin out of time and money
so much less in within our control than I knew in my youth, but now i know the truth
we don’t choose what we believe for a long long time, but when we do it’s divine
I’m not gonna to try to change anyone but myself…

we’re all in way over our heads, taking our meds until we’re dead
thought that there was something i could say but it doesn’t work that way, so i’ll save the cliches
i could waste my time trying to change your mind, by why? it’s written in the sky
no one wants to hear what you think they should do, we just want someone who’s true

I’m not gonna to try to change anyone but myself…

so, i go out and i sit in the sun, close my eyes, turn my hands up the sky
i sit real still for a while, breath real slow, forget everything i know
i see the world as it will be, without me and my misery
unconsciousness connects me to everything else and for a second i get let go of myself

I’m not gonna to try to change anyone but myself…

—
Jason Molin – vocals and guitar
Gray Parsons – drums
Doug Snyder – bass
Mark Gonzalez – trombone
Dan Bechdolt – sax
Kevin Flatt – trumpet

IMAG2349 horns2