The Djembe Man

Sometimes I find myself scared of my dreams.
It makes me scared of sleeping. It makes me stay up late
drinking and thinking and avoiding drifting away.
Last night I went to bed early and drifted into the land of dreams.
I found myself greeted by a very smiley man. I was in an African instrument shop.
I started by playing the djembe and he asked me why I was so fascinated with the djembe and told me that he had many other instruments that made even more interesting sounds.
He kept bringing me instruments to play.
There is a drumshop/African instrument shop over on Union Street and 4th avenue. I have been meaning to go into it for months. I want to explore the use of alternate instrumentation, specifically African instruments for the third album.

I know, first things first, I have to polish up the 2nd album, package it and finally share it with the world.

but for now, here are some of the sounds in my head that will be shaping some of the upcoming music.

The Right Foot

not the left foot,
the right foot. That's the one you're supposed to be starting this year on. Do you have your list or are you too cool for a list? I personally don't believe in them.
You probably believe in them, but then again, You're reading the rant, so you're probably absolutely perfect and in no need of change.

I'm going to make a rough resolution, just to get you started. Yes, I know we're already 8 days into the new year, but most people like me are procrastinators and you probably all got drunk on New Year's which means you started your year passed out in a pile of your own sick with ripped stockings and a missing pump next to a naked midget name Raul. Sorry, I know midget isn't politically correct. Please forgive me. Anyway, it's not me. It's you...oh no. wait. That's not right. It's not you. It's me. ok, so if I had problems, ya know, things I need to work on, well, I would sit down to write one of those listy thingies and it would go something like this...

1. Eat more butter and or things with butter
2. Smile More & Generally Be less guarded
3. Get more sleep
4. exercise more
5. drink less
6. listen more
7. talk less
8. save more
9. spend less
10. Become conversational in the French Language

Alright, so over the next week, let's talk about these 10 items, starting today with Item 4. Some of you may think that item 4 is in direct conflict with Item 1, but I strongly disagree. Anyhoo, here's the rant's very own exercise guru, Richard Simmons. Today he's gonna show us all how we can sweat to the oldies. There isn't a better way I could imagine losing that spare tire, than doing choreographed dance routines with Richard Simmons.

a parade, three martinis, scissors and a stray cat

Yesterday the alarm went off way too early for even strong coffee to remedy.
K and I rushed to the train to the port authority to join the dredges of society and catch a bus. We got there with no time to spare and piled on to an Adirondack Trailways beast bound for New Paltz where I was set to perform for their gay pride celebration.

I did a short set (3 songs)
1.Fishnet Sailor
2.Flapjacks
3.Walking Song

If you've never been to New Paltz, it is indeed a magical town or village as they call it. It is a town at the epicenter of the marriage equality movement in New York, a cause in which I have been very involved for the last couple years. K and I met last year on May 19th, when I was performing at the Marriage Equality March in Brooklyn. He was filming the event for the NYC LGBT center's television show. It was love at first sight, literally. I told my friend Marc that K would be my boyfriend before I had spoken to him and before he had seen me. It's funny that he is the one who approached me.

So we marched with a group of high school students, had some weird herbal alternative to coffee at a hippy dippy artist collective coffee shop. You know the place. There were white kids with dreads wearing tie-dye and drumming outside. The smell of patchouli was wafting out into the street.

I spent way too much time in the sun yesterday and being the whitest thing short of albinoism, I find myself irregularly burned today in the places where I failed to slather on the SPF 50. I need to be fitted for some sort of gauze sun condom before I'm allowed to brave the elements again. Thus is the curse of being a pigmentless creature. My ex-roomate Piia used to call me Robster the Lobster.

We got back to the city way later than planned due to some sort of traffic calamity in New Jersey. I had to cancel a rehearsal with Jeff for the Zipper show. We've been rehearsing a lot. It's interesting to have piano on top of some of my songs. I'm so used to being a lone entity that it feels like a new de-virginizing territory to explore.

We met up with Laura for a drink after the exhaustion of the day. A drink turned into 3 martini's...sheesh. For some reason I didn't really feel the effect as much as I should.

We got home and I began cutting K's hair. I've only cut his hair twice, and both times have involved booze. One would think the combination of scissors, alcohol and the close proximity to my boyfriend's face might be a bad idea, but somehow it works out. Though I haven't seen him yet today, I do believe I did a good job.

We have been seduced by a stray cat. We started feeding her out of pity and now it looks like we may be adopting her. Am I ready for the responsibility of keeping another creature alive? Is this the stepping stone towards adopting a Chinese baby?

This morning, the cat broke into the apartment by destroying the screen on the window. She wasn't looking for food but rather companionship. She curled up next to the bed and woke me up by purring.

Ugh. I hope she doesn't have some sort of flee and/or mite infestation, rabies, scabies or some other cat pestilence. She's very cute and has a sweet nature. We have been calling her Isis. she looks Egyptian. It's fitting. I'm so not ready to be a father.

Habits and Addictions

Most of us stumble through life on crutches of various types. For some it is booze and cigarettes. For others it porn and pixie sticks.

I would say that I have an addictive personality, but I think that to be human is to be drawn to addiction.

I lived with a girl who ate a very strict diet, obsessive. She would steam greens to go with her long grain rice and miso soup. She would criticize me with her nose held high as I fired up the skillet for fried pork chops and butter drenched mashed potatoes. Secretly she had a stash of twinkies and ding dongs in her room. She would binge on sugar and chocolate full of preservatives and then sob alone in her room, consumed by her secret sin. I would find the wrappers, little clear pieces of evidence exposing her daily crimes.

When I was 24 years old, the floor fell out from under me. I wanted to die. After 4 1/2 years, my relationship was over. I had lost my job. I was broke and felt so desperately alone. I found that drowning my sorrows in booze was the only way that I could bare to even breath the air. Every little thing brought me to tears. I screamed. I stayed in bed all day. I played my guitar on the street for loose change to buy food but more often a drink. I needed something, anything to numb the pain. I thought my life was over.

Slowly, with time all wounds heal leaving scar tissue that is tougher than the soft untouched baby skin that was there before the trauma. I am covered in scars. It is a blessing to have been cut deep. As I have healed, my drinking as gotten more and more manageable but has still been a crutch, a way to numb. I think that there is a comfort in habit. There is something soothing about a cigarette and a beer to calm the nerves. It is nice however to take a moment and experience clarity.

I think that I will always be a drinker. I don't know if I would have been able to make it through some of the trauma without a bit of numbing. I know that if I hadn't been able to express myself with song, I would be dead. I'm addicted to music. It is my #1 addiction. Everything else is habit.

I had quit smoking 3 years ago after a pack a day habit that somehow crept its way back into my life recently. Today, it is 9 days since I have had a cigarette and almost 3 weeks since I've had a drink of alcohol. Oddly, It's been calming. I feel very zen and upbeat. It's nice to step away from my habits for a while.

I'm not standing up in front of a group of people in an awful VFW hall basement with flourescent lighting that gives everyone a hue of sickly green. I'm not reciting the serenity prayer or gleaming with pride that I was given some sort of pin, the human equivillant of a dog biscuit for learning a new trick. I have merely sent my liver on a vacation as it has served me well in many a war and deserves some recouperation before being sent into battle again.

I'm thinking of going back to Yoga. Apparently it's what I'm supposed to do now that I have become so centered and filled with clarity, free of habits and addictions.

A trip to the Swanson-Lowry Bed and Breakfast

We drove up to Simon and Jason's country home on Friday for Easter. It is this beautiful 200 year old house nestled between a pond and a dairy farm in upstate New York. There is a fireplace, no cellphone service and a real sense of peace and quiet about the place. It's the perfect spot to drink wine, eat num nums and sleep much too late.

On Saturday we went to the market to buy groceries, wine and pick up a salmon which Jason was preparing to poach via the kindly influences of Martha Stewart using his newly purchased fish poacher. We made a visit to the pond to look at the fish, who gather near the edge hoping for crumbs as tadpoles wiggled around in the water. We watched a woodpecker brutalzing a tree.

We returned to the house and boiled eggs for coloring. The kit came with one of those wax pens and in an adorable display of affection, Simon, Jason, K and I all wrote sweet little love notes on eggs. "I love K" "Jason and Simon 4ever" "Robert is hot" "I love Jason"...if you need a little bag to vom in, let me know. When the eggs emerged from their little plastic dye buckets our secret love notes were revealed along with an egg on which I wrote "jesus is risen" with a little cross.

In the evening we were joined by Lauren, Linda and Kyle and had a Roast with green beans, Yorkshire pudding and my famous wasabi twice baked potatoes.

After a lovely dinner, we sat by the fire until the consumption of wine and brandy turned the kitchen into a disco party. There are photos. If not too embarrassing, perhaps I will share.

On Sunday I made bloody marys and observed and occasionally helped with the preparations for an exceedingly delectable brunch centered around a highly pampered fish cooked with much love and care. I did not want to leave for the city, wishing we had one more day in the country,but alas, all good things must come to an end. With food in our bellies and the warmth of holiday cheer in our corroded hearts, we piled into a car and returned to the urban jungle.

Thank you to Simon and Jason for inviting us into your home and providing the utmost hospitality.

The Rant gives the Swanson-Lowry Bed and Breakfast 5 out of 5 stars.

Ho Ho Hooters (a Christmas backbLOG)

She swirled her purple pen across the napkin, signing her name with a heart and caressing it as she delicately placed it near the edge of our table.

"Hi, My name is Sasha, and I'll be your Hooters girl for the evening. Can I get you something to drink to start off?"

I never thought I would hear these words coming out of anyone's mouth let alone on Christmas day, let alone at Hooters. Yes, you read that right. Hooters.

I took off for Topeka Kansas with my father to catch a 4:30 showing of Sweeney Todd on Christmas day. We were on a tight schedule and our plans were thwarted after my father was pulled over by a police officer for speeding. The officer only gave him a warning seeing as it was christmas and all.

We got to the theater 15 minutes late and the next show wasn't until 7:25, so we had two hours to kill. We discovered that everything was closed for christmas including McDonald's which shocked me. I thought for sure that they pumped out artery clogging mystery meat 365 days a year.

Split between going to Denny's and Hooters, I chose the option that involved hot wings and booze.

I expected to see women writhing on greesy poles, oiled up like roasting pigs, bits of flesh and torn edges hanging as old men drooled and stuffed dollars into cleavage and crevices like a reverse ATM machine.

The reality was much more pedestrian. Hooters is a "family" restaurant or so it seemed on christmas day. It was no more scandalous than a Brooklyn dive bar. The food was good. The waitress was nice. Yes, she was wearing a santa hat. Yes she had a nice "rack" and a low cut neckline. I highly recommend the wings, so if you stop through Topeka, say hi to Sasha. Let her wet your napkin with her purple pen. Tip her well and tell her that Robert sent ya.

Music Video Magic!

I stayed up late last night with Mr. Carpentier and K to watch the Premiere of Open Wide on Logo.
I stated in a previous blog that I don't usually get too excited about accomplishments. It helps me to avoid
a crash and burn following the sugar rush.

Well, Last night, sipping on champagne and watching the video air on national TV, broke through my calm unaffected status and turned me into a squeeling kid, running around with my hands above my head.

If you missed the video last night, I recommend you check it out at the most random location one could imagine my video being posted....
CMT's Website. Your eyes are not deceiving you. That does indeed stand for Country Music Television.

If CMT is not quite your taste,
VH1's website is always a viable option.

The world is full of magical possibilities and choices! Oooh, so the 2nd album is almost done. I go back into the studio on Tuesday for my last session before the studio closes its doors.

not biting my tongue- Amy Winehouse

A friend kept telling me a few months back

"You have to hear Amy Winehouse. She's incredible."

So I decided to listen to her music. I purchased her music and put it into heavy rotation on my ipod. I even performed Back to Black at a Kitt & Kaboodle show.
btw, she was incredible.

I say WAS, because she IS a mess. I understand that there is a great deal of pressure when you go from complete obscurity to becoming an international superstar, but...



Dear AMY,

You have been given an opportunity. So many musicians work their asses off for years and years without ever achieving a fraction of the success that you have. You cancel your shows after people have purchased tickets to see you. These people are supporting you. You show up to shows so drunk that you don't know the words to your own songs and you can barely even stand. You consistently perform at the level of a drunken sorority girl at Karaoke night. You not only spit in the faces of your fans by doing this, but you spit in the face of every musician who would kill for the opportunity you have for your music to be heard. You have a serious drug problem. It's not cute anymore when you're singing about not going to rehab when you are the one person in this world who really needs to go to rehab. It is painful to watch you falling apart when you are so extremely talented. Please go to rehab. Please have the decency and respect to show up to venues capable of performing when people have paid to see you. Please pull yourself together and make more great music or quit wasting our time.

Sincerely Yours,

Robert German

The Really Strong Hurricane...AKA Katrina

Sometimes the simplest things in life are the ones that bring us the most pleasure.
I enjoy a good fried shrimp Po' boy sandwich and there is a little place in Rehoboth Delaware that I always visit for their excellent Po' boys.

Marc, K and I all went to enjoy the pleasures of po' boy, but this time something on the menu struck me as really really really WRONG. There is an alcoholic drink called the hurricane and this restaurant decided to create a drink for their menu called the Katrina, a hurricane with more alcohol or as the menu promised something horrible like, will knock your socks off or drown your sorrows, something just wrong.

After the very excellent sandwhiches I decided to speak with the owner. I was very polite, telling her how much I enjoy her establishment and the delicious cuisine, but that I find a drink being called to Katrina to be really insensitive and inappropriate.

Her response was that I need to lighten up. I told her that in fact I don't need to lighten up and that she wouldn't name an entree the 9-11. People lost their lives in a horrible catastrophe and that the drink shouldn't be on her menu. She again told me that I need to lighten up and I decided to say goodbye or rather just walk out of her restaurant. (I did pay before doing so)

Call me crazy, but there are still people living in FEMA trailers, if you must have a tragic drink, I recommend something where the wounds have healed a bit, like the "Titanic-Iced latte" or the "Pearl harbor fried oysters."

Alone with 8 million

From time to time, generally though not exclusively with the changing of seasons, I feel blue and alone. There has been this weight in my chest for about a month now. It is the weight of undeniable and monumental loneliness.

During these "blue periods" I step back for a second and laugh. How is it that one can be sifting through a city crammed to the gills with people, 8.1 million to be fairly exact, and feel alone? I ride subway cars, sardined with business types in their finely pressed and starched suits, rushing to the important jobs that make the world keep on turning and churning. These people make the decisions to buy and sell and play chess with companies and people. If you make under $100,000 a year, consider yourself a pawn.

One thing about New York is that things are constantly shifting and changing. My favorite place to get a sandwich in NOLITA before it was even really called NOLITA by anyone other than realtors, bread and butter, is now a Cuban restaurant. My favorite German Pastry shop is god only knows what. I just know it closed. My very first gig was at a bar called "the rising", which is now a Mexican restaurant. My very first open mic was at a bar which is now a clothing store.

This change also applies to people. I think New York is a really hard city to forge and maintain lasting friendships. Someone can be your best friend one day and then the next day, they move to another neighborhood, still in the same city mind you, and you never hear from them again. I think of Astoria, well queens in general... It's like a foreign country to me. I never go there and I have no reason to do so.
Friends have moved to queens and have never been heard from again.

I guess at times I wish there were something I could hold onto like a rock, but although New York is built on Bedrock, it feels more like sand. The tide comes and goes and sweeps people away and brings them back or they get caught in the current and are lost forever.

I was having a beer with my friend, Carrie, the other day and ran into a group of friends. One of these friends has just acted weird towards me for almost a year now. This occasion was no different. I can't fully explain in words, but I had confronted him about how hurtful he was being. He is someone who I have valued so deeply. Well, all of the group said goodbye to me when they left, except for this friend. He went outside and acted as if I didn't exist. It cut me to the core. God, I am a stupid sensitive little creature.

I think this experience sent me face first into a puddle of blue. The one good thing I can say is that I do have a remedy for the seasonal blue periods. It's my guitar, black Swan. Last night we had a really in-depth conversation about the end of the summer and I ate Ecuadorian chicken and rice and contemplated buying a ford escort. So, I am not alone after-all with 8 million. I have black swan and fatty chicken and in the end, who could ask for anything more?



photo credit- Carrie Thomas

czech please!

After a rather long and grueling day, I decided to stop into a local bar, cheers if you will. I sat alone at the bar. Few patrons had arrived and I was happy to be solitary and write in the little black book that I carry everywhere with me. So I lamented about loneliness and pressure and everything good and bad and ugly that had transpired through my day and week.

Just a note:::: I know the owners of this bar pretty well and they were sitting across the bar with a guy I had never seen before. I paid little attention to this.

So, I drink my one glass of wine and was preparing to leave when the bartender approached me.

"The gentleman at the end of the bar would like to buy you a shot. His name is Joe and it is his birthday"

I wanted to politely refuse but decided to just go ahead and take my medicine instead of insulting birthday Joe. So, I said that I would have a Lemon Drop shot and down the hatch it went. Now, I grabbed my coat and my bag and prepared to leave, but I thought I should thank dear Joe for making me feel obligated to take a shot and of course to wish him a happy birthday.

I go over and say my thank you's which turns into him throwing a fifty dollar bill down on the bar and saying shots for everyone....everyone being the 6 people in his vicinity. I say..oh hell, why not, it's the guy's birthday. He obviously doesn't have friends. They aren't here. I should oblige. So I do. Another lemon drop shot down the hatch. I still just want to go home. Joe by the way is from the czech republic. I start talking with him as he keeps throwing fifty and hundred dollar bills down on the bar and buying shots for anyone with an open mouth and a rotten liver. I'm starting to see double. I don't like shots. I don't like to do shots. I just wanted to have one glass of wine, go home, play my guitar, and sleep like an angel.

Instead I'm here with Czech Joe destroying brain cells. So, I ask him a question....a very simple question.
"What do you do?"

his answer=" You don't need to know"

I still do not know what he does, but I have a horrible feeling that it involves breaking kneecaps for a mob boss of some sort....ugh. Is there a czech mob?

So, of course the next thing out of his mouth is

"I want to go home with you"

I say "No, You're not going home with me. I don't take guys home with me. I have a boyfriend"

his response= "I will buy hotel room. I pay"

my response="I'm not going to a hotel with you"

his response=" not hotel. Motel. I pay for motel. You go with me. I pay"

my response=" I'm not going to a motel with you"

The next sentence out of his mouth was something about me using him for booze and that I'm a slut.

I pack up the little dignity I have left and go home.



God help me.

Remixed, Lonely, and Blue

At times I think of myself living in a world that is black and white in rooms filled with too much smoke, perched atop a piano singing the blues. The audience is filled with people who are dressed to the nines in a way that was just everyday clothing if you lived in my film noir world. I hear the clinking of the ice in their drinks. I am this enigmatic figure, the singer.

I am blue because that is what I am. I probably drink too much and maybe I have a problem with insidious substances. The counter culture of the grainy black and white world welcomes me yet I look down on them and I don't quite fit in the audience with their neatly pressed suits and flower-pinned lapels.

After my weekly engagement singing my songs of heartbreak and longing, I step off of the stage and ask the bartender to give me my regular, a scotch on the rocks. His name is Jimmy, because it just seems appropriate. He's heard it all. His face is stone. His heart is velvet. I know nothing about Jimmy. He's all ears, but doesn't get involved. I probably once had a crush on him but realized that like the Berlin wall, he's too tough to crack and too tall to climb.

After my third scotch, Jimmy asks if he can call me a car. I refuse and walk down the empty streets alone. I quite possibly should have used the bathroom before leaving the bar and have to duck into a dark alley to pee. There's a blind man playing the saxophone and I throw him a nickel. For some reason I envy him. A black cat crosses my path. I think nothing of it.

I reach my small apartment in a bad part of town, climb the stairs sloppily running my fingers against the cracked paint, intentionally making pieces crumble and fall onto the rotten wooden steps that creak with every step. I collapse into bed, alone, so alone. A part of me needs this loneliness. Another part of me so desperately craves love. I have resigned myself to be alone, a tragic enigmatic blues singer who smells of smoke and scotch and of dark alleys.

They will find my body two days after I die and wonder if it was suicide or murder or an accident. The papers will write about it. People will claim to know the answer. Big flash bulbs will pop and newsies will yell "read all about it".

So, I have taken my baby and given it to others to twist and mold and paint as they please. I now have two remixes in my hands which will be part of something soon to come. It's exciting and scary and different. I'm a protective mother who doesn't like to let others hold her baby. I'm learning that she can walk on her own and I have to let her play with other children for her to really be a part of the world. It's so hard watching them grow up.

Maybe I am not fit to raise my baby, but I pushed her out and I feel her with me, still inside me moving. She will always be there. When I'm up on stage, singing the blues with a flower in my hair, she is sitting there up past her bedtime, smiling up at me. I have probably corrupted her, but someone had to do it.