NOTE: THIS TRACK HASN'T BEEN MASTERED YET, AND SO YOU'LL NEED TO TURN YOUR SPEAKERS UP A BIT.

For a long time, I've wanted to try one of those "southwestern desert rock" songs (sometimes called "desert noir"), like the band Calexico has done for years. I finally went down to the studio last week to give it a try, and this is the results. I ended up going for a bit of the "spaghetti western" flavor to it, too. Hope you enjoy it. The track will come out on my next "regular" album (as opposed to the "heavy music" album I'm also working on now), which will be called "Collapse, Cha Cha Cha."

Betrayal At Belmont (c. 2024 Walter Ehresman)

Walter Ehresman: electric & acoustic guitars; 5-string electric bass; keyboards & key percussion; electronic percussion pads.

Produced by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San MIguel de Allende, Mexico.

For my official releases, please click here: https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/

p. 2024 Walter Ehresman. Snipe Bog Records. All rights reserved.

NOTE: THIS TRACK HASN'T BEEN MASTERED YET, AND SO YOU'LL NEED TO TURN YOUR SPEAKERS UP A BIT.

I wrote this new song in June. It's called "Arguments No.s 1-42", and it was inspired by my neighbors who--like clockwork every evening--start screaming at each other. They've been doing it now for 8.5 years that I know of (and I suspect many more), and I can't imagine that they have anything new to argue about. I was thinking that if they would number each circular argument that they each hurl out each night, then they could just argue by referencing the corresponding numbers, and then it would be more efficient (and I wouldn't have to hear as much every day). We've all known for decades now from Douglas Adams that the answer to "life, the universe and everything" is 42, but this couple will never be that together......

My good friend and neighbor Mike Duncan, who is a retired Nashville super-picker as well as a great singer/songwriter, joined me in the studio for this one to layer some rich, sumptuous background vocals (8 tracks of Mike!). Muchisimas gracias, Mike!

This is my first song with a guitar in open-C tuning (and only my 3rd open tuning song overall), and so this was a fun experiment for me.

Arguments No.s 1-42 (© 2024 Walter Ehresman)

You smashed your glass on the floor,

and shouted “Again, 34!”

--In the hush that fell in that living room hell, the world knew we’d all heard this before.

“22” was all I could say;

All the formulas past showed the way;

--We’ve reduced it to math, never stray from the path—build the sandcastle up for the day.

[chorus]

“You must admit 14 is true!”

Not compelling in all past preview;

“No. 8, everybody can see—

so why won’t you accept it from me??”

The solution I’ve found, from our years going ‘round—the answer must be 43……

43.

Efficient, in all this exchange;

Too concise to allow hints of change;

--But it’s cold comfort now, in these circular sounds that have frozen our hearts into place.

She screamed “38 is so clear!......

A truth all good people can hear!”

--I just held up a sign with a bold No. 9, and she saw our mute future was here.

[chorus]

Walter Ehresman: lead vocals, acoustic & electric guitars, 4-string acoustic/electric fretless bass, electronic percussion pads.

Special guest--Mike Duncan: background vocals.

Produced and engineered by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

For my official releases, please click here: https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/

p. 2024 Walter Ehresman. All rights reserved. Snipe Bog Records

NOTE: THIS TRACK HASN'T BEEN MASTERED YET, AND SO YOU'LL NEED TO TURN YOUR SPEAKERS UP A BIT.

I'm in the middle of writing and recording tracks for my upcoming "heavy music" album, which will come out under the name of The Last Chingon and be titled "Heat Death Coda." This new piece is my first attempt at writing a song from scratch in Spanish (albeit with a couple of translator programs online). I dreamed the story of the song, along with the general feel, then spent a couple of hours the next morning getting the lyrics together. I knew it was going to be in the "beauty and the beast" style of metal.....with beautiful, strong female vocals in the lead, with some male "growl" vocals in there as well in a sort of conversation. The lead female vocals here are from the wonderfully talented Spanish singer Esther Asulito, now living here where I do in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

This song is about a woman who, in her youth, loved the bad boys and spurned the nice ones, only to find herself years later still in the relationship with a man she now knows as simply cruel. This song has her find her self-respect, the will to speak out, and the strength to get out.

Special thanks to Esther, who was a real joy to work with in the studio, and to my friend Edgar for reality-checking my Spanish in the lyrics.

Tu Amor de Espinas (Your Love of Thorns)

(© 2024 Walter Ehresman)

[voz de mujer/woman’s voice]

Lo que parecía fuerte de niña, ahora

(What seemed strong as a girl, now)

se desenmascara como crueldad;

(is unmasked as cruelty)

Envié a los chicos buenos lejos cada vez

(I sent the nice boys away every time)

y sonreí para mis adentros, a sabiendas

(and smiled to myself, knowingly)

Pero nadie diría que merezco esto—

(but no one would say I deserve this)

frutos oscuros de mi locura juvenil;

(dark fruits of my youthful folly)

Como mujer, reclamo mi propio respeto,

(As a woman, I reclaim my own respect)

y camino orgullosa hacia una luz femenil.

(and walk proudly toward a feminine light).

[chorus]

[voz de hombre/man’s voice]

Hiciste un juramento, y eres mía!

(You took an oath; you are mine!)

No hay nada más que discutir.

(There is nothing else to discuss)

[voz de mujer]

Tus propias palabras demuestran la verdad;

(Your own words prove the truth)

y ahora, seguramente debo volar;

(and now, I must surely fly)

[las dos voces juntas/both voices together]

Las cosas no pueden seguir así.

(Things cannot continue this way)

[bridge]

[las dos voces juntas]

Qué son estas cadenas que nos encierran

(What are these chains that lock us)

durante generaciones en estos ciclos?

(for generations in these cycles?)

¿No hay forma de salir de verdad?

(Is there no way to truly step outside?)

[voz de mujer]

Con un velo cubriendo nuestros ojos,

(With a veil covering our eyes)

Caemos en el furioso torrente de la vida,

(we fall into the raging life torrent)

y desperdiciar años finitos, todo se ha ido;

(and waste finite years, all gone)

Debemos reclamar los años que nos quedan.

(We must reclaim the years that remain)

[voz de mujer]

¡Me corta con tu amor de espinas!

(You cut me with your love of thorns!)

Walter Ehresman: vocals; guitars; 5-string electric bass; keyboards & key percussion; drum machine programming; sequencing. Special guest: Esther Asulito--vocals.

Produced by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

For Walter Ehresman solo and band releases, click here: walterehresman.bandcamp.com/

p. 2024 Walter Ehresman. All rights reserved.

Purchase download/unlimited streaming here: https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/album/cassandra-cursed

This song was influenced by latter-day Utopia, which is unsurprising given Ehresman's lifelong love of Todd Rungren. Aside from the obvious power pop element, and the extensive use of synths, you can hear the Utopia influence in Ehresman stepping out to try new and more complex vocal arrangements.

He tells us: "This song is about something that I think we all face, to some degree--trying to have our reactions to people and situations be in the "now" as opposed to being controlled by traumas from our past."

These Strings (© 2023 Walter Ehresman)

We all want personal autonomy

--control our actions in the “now’;

Holding fast in each calamity

--looking forward still somehow.

No one perched above the stage

--slyly pulling on our strings;

No one writing on our page

--trying to tell us when to sing.

And so we go and flow, although tempo is slow as we bestow these changes--on ourselves;

And try to hide the scars inside, as we deride the glorified outrages

--that we tell.

[chorus]

What to do with these strings?

I’m so vigilant to keep them off of my back;

Now I can’t see a thing,

but I feel them stretching backwards into my past;

What to do with these strings? What to do with these strings? What to do with these strings?

Just play.

I tell you that I will always be

--here with you in the “now”;

And I’ll never stop my work on me

--‘cause you deserve no lesser vow.

Walter Ehresman: vocals; keyboards & key percussion; electric rhythm & slide guitar; 5-string electric bass; talking drum; drum machine manipulations.

Produced & engineered by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

p. 2023 Walter Ehresman. All rights reserved. Snipe Bog Records

Purchase download/unlimited streaming here: https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/album/cassandra-cursed

This album closer is one of the most ambitous pieces Ehresman has ever attempted, and one of the most succesfull. It shines a light of hope and peace, after some of the darker themes in the preceding songs, and features what may be the most emotional guitar playing of his career.

Ehresman tells us: "I've been talking about how this new album is unique in that all the songs on it came to me in dreams.....Whereas, in the past I've just had a few dreamed songs sporadically here and there...... This particular dream was about a scenario where the consciousness of all the people who die on a certain day on the planet come together and host an ecstatic meeting with their loved ones, having one last opportunity for the departed to communicate their deep feelings before their essences dissapites forever. I'm a lifelong atheist, but I thought this was a nice idea."

"I think the seeds were planted for the song when I listened to a Todd Rundgren interview on YouTube before I went to bed that night......He was talking about how, as a kid, he was obsessed with fireworks and got to know the men in his town who did the annual big shows on the 4th of July, etc.......They showed him a piece of equipment called 'the finale rack,' which was the special rack of fireworks used for the big finish of each show."

There is a strong Pink Floyd influence here, but the song is not derivative. Rather, it takes the approach and turns it into something new and uniquely Ehresman's own. If you know his past work, you can't see how anyone else would have written something like this. A very emotional, uplifting and satifying end to the new album.

The Finale Rack (© 2023 Walter Ehresman)

With a blaze of light, we bring down the curtain;

Leaving all that we have, leaving nothing unsaid;

Sharing all of the love, so you can be certain

of the place that you hold

in the depths of our souls,

and to help ease you into new sightlines that lie ahead.

Please don’t cry, and please raise up your eyes;

Reach up into this light, as it folds back the night;

We could only be here

with the ones we hold dear—

merging hearts one last time in explosion of brilliant insight.

Be joyful for us as we lay all these burdens down.

Walter Ehresman: vocals; electric, acoustic, slide & Ebow guitars; 5-string electric bass; keybaords & key percussion; electronic percussion pads; drum machine programming; sequencing.

Produced & engineered by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

p. 2023 Walter Ehresman. All rights reserved. Snipe Bog Records

There are a couple of stories to tell about this one. I wrote these lyrics last November, right after the election was called for Biden but with Orange Head refusing to acknowledge it. I've felt compelled throughout my life to study politics and human behavior (the former just being one manifestation of the latter), and at this point, as I project what is likely to happen to American society, I fear it will not be pretty. But I still need to allow myself to enjoy moments of good news, like Trump being un-assed out of the White House, and the Dems somehow taking the Senate. And that's what the lyrics of this song try to express.

Around that same time, I watched a documentary on Joni Mitchell. I had only had a passing familiarity with her and her work prior to seeing it, and I was struck by how (among other things) her use of alternate guitar tunings really breaks her material out of standard song forms and makes it sound fresh and harmonically interesting. And so I resolved that I would take my first real stab at writing a song in an open tuning, and "Pinhole of Light" is the result. It's in open 'G' tuning, capoed to the 3rd fret.

I had no idea, when I started putting the music together, that: a) the song would be almost 9 minutes long; and b) that I was going to have to create maps to match all these guitar chords I was making up......a keyboard map for those chords, bass note map for the bass guitar, etc. Since I don't read or write music, this was certainly an adventure and definitely not like anything I've done before. It took a week to get it all mapped and recorded, but I'm glad I went down this particular rabbit-hole......Like Joni says it does for her, it sure knocked me out of my own musical patterns and personal cliches, and I was able to get something that is harmonically dense and a bit abstract (at least, by the standards of what I've done before), while still being fairly sparse overall.

Purchase streaming/download of the track or the whole album here: walterehresman.bandcamp.com/album/songs…om-the-crux

Pinhole of Light

(© 2020 Walter Ehresman)

My mind whirls in endless contingencies

--I think I know why it does;

We all deal with our childhood vagaries

--find ways to cope beyond the cause.

But in between charts and the diagrams

--demanding all my precious time;

Sense to notice when a light breaks in

--Sense to let that moment shine.

Not looking for Zen repositioning

--with neurons all wired anew;

And can’t live with blinder conditioning

--my heart only beats for what’s true.

But there has to be time to see forests

--while studying bark of the tree;

And there has to be time to hear promise

--of letting our hope out to feed.

That pinhole of light deserves attention;

Just a pinhole of light deserves my time;

Got to program my sight to scan my horizons

--tune perspective tonight.

It may not change our projection of our arc in the fullness of time;

But our happiness rests in these moments stolen from ominous signs.

Just yesterday, I heard conditional news

--it was good, for as far as it goes;

And I had to look up from contextual views

--to appreciate when bad men go;

So sad at the lack of capacity

--for change in the name of us all;

But at least I could widen acuity

--spot that thin shaft of light when it falls.

Walter Ehresman: vocals, guitars, 4-string fretless acoustic/electric bass, keyboards, Irish bouzouki.

Produced and engineered by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

Snipe Bog Records.

p. 2021 Walter Ehresman

From the 2021 Walter Ehresman album, Songs From the Crux.

The day after watching the yahoo riot/coup attempt on January 6, 2021, I was still so angry about it that I felt I had to write something, and so this is it.......Wrote it that Thursday, spent Friday and Saturday recording it, then mixed it down Sunday.........I can't say the process made me feel any less angry about the whole ugly situation (and the attitudes that led to it), but I did feel some sense of release in letting those feelings out.

I've done quite a bit of spoken word pieces backed by music over the years, and have been a big Gil-Scott Heron fan since first coming across his work back in the late '80s. And I dig a lot of electric-Miles Davis, too, and am a huge fan of Norwegian cutting-edge trumpeter and sound designer Nils Petter Molvær. And there's no doubt that these influences can be heard in "Behold the American Yahoo."

Purchase streaming/download of the track or the whole album here: https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/album/songs-from-the-crux

Behold the American Yahoo

(pondering Trumpian thugs sacking the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021)

(© 2021 Walter Ehresman)

Walter Ehresman: narration, keyboards & key percussion, guitar, groove box manipulations.

Produced and engineered by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

Snipe Bog Records.

p. 2021 Walter Ehresman

--from the 2020 Walter Ehresman album "Global Search Party." https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/album/global-search-party

Another song featuring nylon-string Spanish guitar, this melancholy acoustic ballad has a late night Mexican feel to it. Sparse and haunting.

Ehresman recalls: "One night last year, I dreamed the lyrics and music to the chorus of this song, and when I woke up I finished writing it and started recording.......My friend Rolando tells me is has a bolero feel.......It's a song about trying to scrape together a romantic connection amidst the losing global battle against the robber barons."

For the Sense of No Sense at All

(© 2019 Walter Ehresman)

The message said we were overrun;

Falling back on all sides;

The Barons’ men have us out-gunned;

Leaflets fall from the sky.

Communications are compromised—

official lies on TV;

All reserves have been mobilized—

but will they answer our plea?

We know we cannot surrender;

We know some lines should not fall;

But hold me tight, and we’ll dance through the night

for the sense of no sense at all.

A soldier cries that it’s no use,

as they wheel him away;

Another says they’ll be no truce,

‘cause money must get its way.

But still we fight every morning;

And we fight through the day;

But deep in the night lies the warning

of human nature’s true face.

Walter Ehresman: vocals, classical guitar, acoustic/electric fretless bass, chimes.

Produced by Walter Ehresman at Snipe Bog Studios, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

p. 2020 Walter Ehresman. Snipe Bog Records.

all rights reserved

--from the 2020 Walter Ehresman album "Global Search Party": https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/album/global-search-party

The title of this song is fairly self-explanatory. But while the subject matter might be serious, the groove is infectious.......this is party funk, all the way.

Regarding the lyrics, Ehresman tells us: "I lived in Austin for 34 years, watching the real estate vampires strip it and kill it, and now after living in San Miguel de Allende for over 5 years, I'm really seeing the same mentality here.....Bulldozing every open space to build 'luxury condos' that block out the sun.......And after seeing one too many of those rapacious projects started here, it induced this funk song in me."

"I am particularly dazzled to have been able to cajole San Miguel's hottest underground singing group, The Green Space Boys, to join me for background vocals on this one.......their sublime contribution hearkens back to wonderful, subversive vocal groups that joined me on past albums over the years, like The Hip-Waders, and The Wobbly Choir......such great talent........such a wild, dark energy."

The Money People Ruin Everything

(© 2019 Walter Ehresman)

Searchin’ for that chillin’ place to lay your head in righteous space;

Soak it in—the price is right, the people nice—it’s paradise.

Then one morning—what’s that sound? The spoilers have all come town!

The money people ruin everything

--Gonna rip up all the natural green;

The money people ruin everything

--Luxury condos for a gentry scene.

Seems our life is chasing down these pockets greedheads haven’t found;

But you sleep with one eye open, waiting for that shoe to drop;

You could bust your gut from hopin’; developers—they will not stop!

The money people ruin everything

--Real estate vampires wall-to-wall;

The money people ruin everything

--Time to grease up another city hall.

The money people ruin everything

--Come on, brothers, let me hear you sing;

The money people ruin everything

--Swarm of locusts with their lame-ass bling.

Walter Ehresman: lead, background & Levi Stubbs vocals; guitars, keyboards & key percussion, synth bass, sampling, sequencing, drum machine programming.

Special guests: The Green Space Boys (Mike Duncan/Rob Ramsey/Ron Van Dyke)--background vocals.

p. 2020 Walter Ehresman. Snipe Bog Records. All rights reserved.

From the new (2018) Walter Ehresman album "South of the Wall": https://walterehresman.bandcamp.com/album/south-of-the-wall

A song I wrote and recorded that's dedicated to Walter Becker who, as you know, was one half of Steely Dan and who died last year. I think the pretty jazz melodies came from Fagen, and the grit and lyrics about faded hipsters came from Becker. I knew I wanted to do a tribute song for him. On the "Two Against Nature" DVD, he and Fagen are in the back of a limo, driving around the streets of New York City, talking about (among other things) the difference between a schmuck and a schmendrick. So that gave me the hook into this little ditty about.....you guessed it......faded hipsters, who despair at their loss of cool in a scene where they may well never have been cool to begin with.

See the video here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsZtxshMHMM

It’s Schmendrick Time (And That’s OK)

(© 2018 Walter Ehresman)

Down on the boulevard, it’s seen a better day,

but the price is copacetic so we moved in Saturday;

A case of Shaefer for the friends who took the call,

and a measure of mood lighting for the writing on the wall.

The games we’re playing are all lacking in cache’—

the retro insufficient to appeal to kids today;

We walk the nightlife in a demographic haze,

and we wreck the cool of places while we dream of yesterday.

[chorus]

Well, it doesn’t bear thinking, and it’s best to look away;

And we’ll never make 5th Street if we carry on this way.

Indulge in introspection, and we can’t go out to play—

‘cause it’s schmendrick time (and that’s OK).

[break]

There was a time (at least we’ll say there was)

we set the latest fashion, and left a trail of buzz;

In the chronicle of lifestyle—No. #1;

What fun!

Our sun

Will never

Set.

Don’t get out much, now the tide is on the turn;

With endless shut-in options, and potato chips to burn;

The signals that we get—impossible to spurn;

Our rejection from the in-crowd is a savage thing to learn.

Walter Ehresman: all vocals, electric & acoustic guitars, keyboards & key percussion, vocoder, electric sitar, chimes, groove box programming, sequencing.

For past releases, see here: www.walterehresman.bandcamp.com; www.cdbaby.com/all/snipe

p. 2018 Walter Ehresman. All rights reserved. Snipe Bog Records.