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Hadn’t played with Pilgrim alumnus Chris Rossbach for a few years, glad we did. Rob and Chris met that day and magic happened, as it always does when you enter the listening space. This is the ever evolving “Drink the Girl” from a wonderful day at Freewheel Brewing Company.
My mother Sharon Peters passed away in December of 2021. My great friend and another mothering figure, Sandy Coulson (nee Galloway) passed away in July 2022. Over the past few years our whole world changed, our jobs, everything, between lockdown and international chaos and all that comes with getting older and more aware of how fragile, brief, and tenuous our lives are. I wrote this early in the lockdown and it resonates stronger and stronger the more I perform it. My great friend and co-writer Rob Morris has since added a beautiful accompaniment to this. Pilgrim singer Tayo Amos lent her formidable film production chops to the a lyric video I had animated. Enjoy, may it be cathartic for you. Love to you all, Nick August 11, 2022
High, lonesome days
Simple times, simple ways
Bless our little hearts, to keep it so
Away from boxes, lights, and cars, only stars
Push your back into to the earth
And lift for all you’re worth
Press you head into the dirt
Lean your head into the earth
Push you back against the ground
And lift, that high and lonesome sound
High, lonesome days
Simple times, simple ways
Well bless our little hearts
Rest your head upon the earth
And cry for all you’re worth.
I grew up in Southern California and always celebrate my many prodigal returns to San Clemente, San Onofre, San Juan Capistrano, you know, the “Salty Saints”. Growing up in the beaches and with water/surf culture does change how you handle life’s challenges. Tony Khalife helped out with the writing of this one as it grew while on our mini-tour this summer, adding a nice harmony line, and new refrains to the chorus. His upbeat syncopation on the guitar adds a sense of urgency to my laid back riff that I just love. I got to use my new Eric Johnson strat on the solo with a ‘73 twin reverb. Rowena Dodson played the premier of this tune at a “guit-together” run by maestro Rick Vandivier - straight off my charts on piano. Her natural flow with it really adds a nice tonal flavor to this mellow reminder that the only thing constant is change. That being said, some things stay the same, and Pilgrims Bobby Vega and Celso Alberti, are of course, the battery upon which the pilgrimage runs/
No foundation only flow
Offshore breeze pushin' me home
Where the redwood shingles are fadin' to grey
What we could hear if they could say
Salty saints, tanned and wild
Indifferent waves and the prodigal child
Humble steps, water and stone
No foundation, only flow
Slidin' through this golden age
Hope we don't slip right off the page
Now just because we ain't lost
Doesn't mean we ain't goners
We could melt a lot of frost
Before mama knows whats upon her
Sliding through this golden age
Sliding through this golden age
Sliding through
Sliding through
Slidin' through this golden age
Hope we don't slip right off the page
I've been lucky enough in this life to develop relationships with some superb folks. Tony Khalife is not the least, by far. I've been involved in recording projects with him since his first vocal record in 1996. In 1997, on my 25th birthday we recorded tabla/guitar for my first ever studio session at Blue Room Recording Studios. Suffice it to say as a teacher, friend, and now collaborator there is a lot of adventuring there. He and I now share co-writes a fair bit. His exotic rhythmic and harmonic sensibilities are balanced by my minimalist tastes and command of language. We've been sharing 1-2 week summer sabbatical musical recording/songwriting summits for decades but starting in 2016 we started co-writing in earnest. As of this writing, we've got 9 demos for his new record in the bag.
I brought this track to the table last year and he wrote some gorgeous inversions and played a solo for the ages to supplement my meditation on the state of America (and myself) in the summer 2017, namely post Charlottesville. It could be anywhere, anytime, though. Bobby added that feel that only Bobby has and glued it together and I waited until the anniversary of Charlottesville to put it to video and share it.
Dedicated to the spirit of Wilfred Owen (look him up), and if you like what you read check out Paul Fussell's pulitzer prize winning "The Great War and Modern Memory" to learn just how unhinged the 20th and now 21st centuries have become. Modernity is certainly interesting, to paraphrase the old Buddhist curse.
Somewhere between the minefields where only echoes dare to roam
I see my baby sittin' there reflecting, of course, close to the source
I come unhinged, love rescues me
And on the worst days one can imagine for this generation of maybe the next
I see my baby sittin' there reflecting, of course, so close to the source
I come unglued, love rescues me
We woudl give anything for a beautiful view
Yes, just about everything for a beautiful
I wrote this funk groove on acoustic guitar, brought it over to Celso Alberti to get a drum groove. It sounded great. Then Bobby came over and laid down a bass track and he played it in that inimitable Bobby way such that I went back and re-recorded my acoustic guitar track to blend with him seamlessly. His example of how to play my own tune was so devastatingly better, that I gave Bobby a co-write on this piece. Dubbed to a video with my kids and some of their their friends dancing and throwing the occasional "dab" move and it makes for just plain fun. As always, if someone uses this for a soundtrack or backing track, please be cool about it and credit us and donate to the Center for Biological Diversity an appropriate licensing amount.
Check it out, Bobby's stunning second take of "Drink the Girl". He did two takes only. Watch how he approaches live improv and be humbled.
One of my all time favorites. My guitar teacher Chris Rossbach showed me a riff in 1995/96ish that I eventually incorporated into one of my first decent songs. It was based on a Trey Anastasio "Tweezer"esque pull-off between a Dm7 and a G13. Invert an F chord over the Dm7 on the chorus with a funky backbeat and you've got yourself a backbone. Then, go to Martin's Telluride home in 2000 and write the bridge with Soul Patch bandmate Ryan McIntyre, playing off the arpeggiation of the original intro and modulating minor to major to mixolydian/alt. Record a timeless take on take 2 of ever working with drummer Jason Mendelson in November 2000 and watch the song become a favorite of critics like Dennis Cook, the SF Guardian, Soul Patch, Seconds On End, Nick Peters', and Pilgrims of Stoke fans. I just couldn't resist doing this one faster with my new engineering chops, my new acoustic mics from Peluso, with pro players Bobby and Celso, and then Hal McMillen just nailed the solos and let me produce him a little on the horn stabs during the chorus. When Tayo added her backing vocals, I first played her take 2 of Bobby's bass takes to impress on her how funky this thing was. She delivered in kind. Enjoy.
I was out gently musing, just the other day
With the muse dujour
"Where have all my heroes gone, have they gone away?
The world, it seems a little poor."
Well she looked at me, and smiled, and laid her hand upon my thigh,
"Don't you worry little boy, you're gonna miss our noon goodbye"
Did you spill the wine, or did you drink the girl?
I was out gently musing, just the other day
With a different muse dujour
"When a hurricane meets a hurricane, do they blow each other out?
Or do they make a little love, create a waterspout?"
Well she looked at me, and smiled, and laid her hand upon my thigh,
"Don't you worry little boy, you're gonna miss our noon goodbye"
Did you spill the wine, or did you drink the girl?
This song has now been recorded in various guises 4 times. First on Seconds On End's 2005 album Shadowland, then reggae style on The Left Hand Side, then dubbed out instrumental on The Left Hand Side II (7th Turn Woman Dub), and now here. Philospohy Dr. Peter Sawyer of the band Seconds on End turned me on to a book by Richard Tarnas, called "The Passion of the Western Mind" around 2002 or so. Tarnas examines about 2500 years of western male dominated philosophy, ending more or less with Nietzche (and suicide.)
All in all, it is a depressing tome, as modernism and post modernism tend to subsume to pointlessness (in the male dominated dialectic). However, in his epilogue Tarnas points out that we haven't heard from women yet. I couldn't agree more. Civilization will do well to adopt a more balanced outlook and to do so today's women must be empowered to and simultaneously left alone to grow into their powers (and make mistakes, just like we men). Hence, "woman, you've got to get yourself free, woman, you've got to let yourself be." I wrote the original riff on ukulele at Phil and Jane's land in Felton as an homage to scrapple (don't ask) which combined with some of my favorite lyrics I've ever written show off my irreverent and yet reverent style. I just love this version, especially the breakdown with Tony and Bobby "off the leash" as I lead them down a middle eastern influenced modal zone...
She never sings a song about heart break, such things do not come for free
Thought she whistles the tunes of her past loves, she'd rather let them all be
Today she sings a song of forgiveness, kicking pebbles as she dances it out
The click and clack of each one's approval, echoing words that make her want to shout:
Woman, you've got to get yourself free! Woman, you've got to let your self be!
Been a decade or more since she killed it, that goddamn TV
Electrons freed up for thinking, that's the way she thinks it ought to be
"Funny how we all become our heroes", she says, "or else we will fall."
"And as long as you're gonna join your heroes, why not outshine them all?"
Woman, you've got to get yourself free! Woman, you've got to let your self be!
Wonders of nature surround us, offering lessons that do coem for free
Each day in the mirror she sees them, intelligence, energy, integrity
Woman, you've got to get yourself free! Woman, you've got to let your self be!
I wrote this song during a major transition period in my life in Fall of 2003. I broke up with a woman 6 years my junior in a karmic replay of me breaking off a relationship with someone 6 years my senior... About 4 months later, personal tragedy struck two members of my band Seconds On End and the song took on newer meanings. The original was released on Seconds On End's second album "Shadowland", and is absolutely precious. I simply wanted to re-record this one (and a bunch of these) simply because I knew that with Bobby and Celso's work on these tracks the songs themselves might garner attention, plus I am a better engineer and better singer at this point than I was. The metaphor may be mixed from verse to verse, but the central idea is MORE relevant today than ever before.
I asked artist Sally Rayn to produce a video for this song and I was not disappointed. She had done the cover of Chris Rossbach, Joey Fabian, and Greg Thomas's masterpiece "Blueprint" back in the 90s. The video gets a little deeper with each viewing, kind of like the song, mixed imagery and all.
Full chart of the chords after the lyrics here.
The battlefield lies empty, on a sunny afternoon
and oh my friend, what you gonna do?
The battlefield lies waiting and yet the flowers bloom
and oh my friend, what you gonna do?
We've covered so much distance, oh my friend, my friend, I'll see you through
The bow slips underwater, under light of the full moon
and oh my friend, what you gonna do?
The stern splits asunder, fish dance among the gloom
Keep on treading water, my friend, my friend, I'll see you through
Cause the flowers, still bloom
Flowers, still bloom
All our leaders are scared, and the people too
and oh my friend what we gonna do?
And all our houses are made of cards, try to rise above the gloom
my friend, what we gonna do?
Keep on treading water, my friend, my friend, I'll see you through
Cause the flowers, still bloom
Flowers, still bloom
Flowers, still bloom
Flowers, still bloom
"Nimble" - This song originally debuted on my band Seconds On End's third Album "California Sky". I dubbed certain themes out on the second effort by The Left Hand Side "Nimble Dub".
Of course, this song's lyrics are source for this production's name "Pilgrims of Stoke."
In 2015 or so while working with my teacher, the amazing and talented Rock Vandivier, we formally charted the song (see below the lyrics). He was thrilled with the piece and so I asked him to sit in on a clean acoustic guitar version I was working up. He took it to the next level, immediately writing a (major third) harmony for the A mixolydian lines, quickly diving into the feel, and performing a solo that still moves me hundreds of listens later. Rick showed up with an acoustic guitar and was surprised when I asked him to bring out his Ibanez semi-hollowbody and play it through my Fuchs 50 Watt. We miked the room with a Peluso 251 and a Celestion 10" cabinet with an e103. The track works amazingly well as a duet, however, there is always room for bass. All vocals on the album feature that Peluso 251, a truly sweet workhorse mic, in the style of the Telefunken 251 (that the Beatles used on virtually everything).
Bobby came in a few weeks later and threw down, and well, he's Bobby Vega and we're not. Bobby went direct on this one, we used his open cables (lower resistance for a bigger sound). Enjoy.
The sky won’t hold me back
Gravity won't give me no slack
I’ll fly… …long as I stay nimble.
Nimble dance
Graceful as smoke
Quick on my feet
I’m just a pilgrim of stoke
Cause nimble is as nimble does
It is what it is and not what was
Nimble is as nimble do
Nimblin’ away my time with you
And like a redwood tree
A lazy pirouette up to the sky
Oh how I wanna be
Out there under the stars
and never asking why
Nimble is as nimble does
It is what it is and not what was
Nimble is as nimble do
Nimblin’ away my life with you
Nimble is as nimble does
It is what it is and not what was
Nimble is as nimble do
Nimblin’ away my life with you
The sky won’t hold me back
Gravity won't give me no slack
I’ll fly… …long as I stay nimble.
The sky won’t hold me back
Gravity won't give me no slack
I’ll fly… …long as I stay nimble.
The basic riff was written and composed under the canopy of the redwoods in Felton, CA at my dear friends Philip Degreen and Jane Wolheuter's land "Casa No Casa" during a time when I was regularly watching the sunrise in a sacred manner. Originally recorded and performed with my band Seconds On End on our second album Shadowland.
Quietly, he waits, for the sun
Quietly, he waits, for the sun
In the night of night when dawn breaks, and color is returning
In the night of night he asks, are you the one?
Hi, I'm Nick Peters, father, husband, armchair philosopher, musician, and chef. I have long subscribed to a philosophy whereby a life well led is actually art. Working in the realms of food and music I have been exposed to how the shared passions of music and cuisine help bridge the boundaries that still divide so much of the world. Some of us seek that thrill of discovery, or learning, of growth, and we (hopefully you) are Pilgrims of Stoke. I've met a few other pilgrims on the road and they all helped me put this together.
So, feel free to use this music on your films, to workout, to meditate, whatever, honestly, I just don't care. If you enjoy the album, please consider giving $10 to your favorite charity or environmental cause. If this makes some blockbuster film, please donate an appropriate music fee to the Center for Biological Diversity. I'm not in it for the money and every time I even think about adding that to the equation, it takes away my stoke. I have a nice day job, I have enough.
OK, so this blog will cover the source of each tune, lyrics, stories, whatever. Enjoy, stay stoked.
