Happy Boxing Day from the Manna Tease: The Fa-la-la-ing is Coming

Is today the day you're supposed to get two turtle doves? Also, why is the writer of that song so obsessed with giving birds to his paramour? They're kind of messy, high maintenance pets.

I never put up this other video we shot of my one-minute christmas carol, The Fa-La-La-ing is Coming. Until it comes next year, happy Boxing Day from The Manna Tease (please "like" us on facebooks!)

Lyrics & chords to "The Fa-la-la-ing is Coming" here. Goodbye.

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XVIII. Homeless Wassail

And here's the Manna Tease singing the song "Homeless Wassail":

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Homeless Wassail is a song by Ian Robb, but we heard it from a Christmas mix in a beautiful version by Finest Kind. The only cover on Spotify is by Broadside Electric. Here's our full Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)
Lyrics:

HOMELESS WASSAIL
(Ian Robb)
"Wassail, wassail,all over the town,
Our cup is white and our ale is brown"
But huddled on the iron grate
we poor and hungry curse our fate. 

No wassail bowl for such as these
No turkey scraps, no ale nor cheese,
This Christmas Eve our heart's desire
Is a bottle of gin and a trashcan fire. 

Good Christian, mind, as home you go
With dreams of holly and mistletoe
That the holly bears a dreadful thorn
For those who wake to a frozen dawn. 

Oh, where is He, that holy child
Once born of Mary, meek and mild?
And whither peace, goodwill to men
Now and forevermore, amen? 

All ye who dine with face aglow
In Reninensi atrio (in the Queen's hall---Latin)
Pray pause awile at pleasure's door
And sup some sorrow with the poor. 

"Wassail, wassail,all over the town,
Our cup is white and our ale is brown"
This cold and hunger, pain and care
Sweet Jesus Christ, it's hard to bear. 

copyright Ian Robb/SOCAN 

Chords as we play them:
amin G emin
amin emin/B C D
amin G emin
amin emin/B C D 

C G emin
amin emin/B C D
C G emin
amin emin/B C D

in Berlin

In Berlin, we couldn't resist singing the song "In Berlin," a work-in-progress from an upcoming song cycle (The Theosaur Slayer), which was inspired by my memories of Berlin, Nevada, (a ghost town that has dinosaur fossils) & the one of the reasons we went out to stay there. The melody is adapted from the folk hymn "Florence" (which mentions deserts & dragons), and the lyrics tell the story of a nameless boy who lives in the desert & discovers a monster in the abandoned mines.


Lyrics & chords:

In Berlin
D Bmin Emin7 Asus4    Bmin A D 

In Berlin, a ghost town in Central Nevada, lived a boy without any name. 

D Bmin Emin7 Asus4    Bmin A D 

He had built a shack out of broken bottles, a recycled gold rush claim. 

D D/C# Bmin Asus4 D Bmin A 

And in the nights when the desert’s frigid, his grandmother’s ghost would visit, 

D Bmin Emin7   Asus4 Bmin A  

And they’d sup on scorpion tail cocktails, & silently hide from the spirits.

And there was a hill to the East of the ruins that his ghosty Granny had warned, 

Don’t you ever go there, the pinyon pins round the mines is mysteriously burned, 

But being a boy with an tween’s free will & the imaginings of a devil, 

He was bored one Wednesday while out exploring, and he found himself on the hill. 

Down into the mine-shaft climbed the child, no one was there to watch him, 

And he lit a match in the ancient darkness, & wandered round with caution. 

A humongous monster was deeply sleeping, as if for millions of years. 

With the arms of a rat, & the wings of an eagle, & brobdingnagian ears. 

But they weren’t alone, & poltergeist who haunted far & wide 

Knocked some rocks on the supports, and a noisy collapse sealed off only the way outside. 

The monster woke & it gasped for breath, a ten thousand pound canary, 

And it grabbed the boy, burst through the earth, & they flew off in the fiery sky. 

©2011 The Manna Tease 

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Here are some more photos from our trip to Berlin:

Foo Fighters - Keepin' It Clean - Lyrics & Chords - Special Friends Around the Campfire, actual campfire edition

This amazing Gay-Truckers-showering song, "Keep it Clean" or "Keepin' it Clean," plays in the background of the opening of the Foo Fighter's music video to "Hot Buns" (2011). This summer, they famously rolled up on a flat bed truck in Kansas City & sang it to the Westboro Baptist Church "God hates fags" protesters, which might have been one of the best moments in American history.

The Manna Tease were camping in Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park in the Great Basin desert last weekend, & sang it around the campfire - it's a bit shaky, we were doing it fresh from memory & after a bit of afternoon bourbon, but here goes:

And for your convenience, here are the lyrics & chords we use:

C G C C7 

Keep It clean, my mama said keep It clean (2x) 

F  

Driving all night, got a hankering for something 

C A7 

Think I'm In the mood for some hot-man muffins 

D7 G Gaug 

Mmmm, Sounds so fine, yes indeed

Keep It Clean, my Daddy said keep it clean (2x) 

Ain't looking for a fight, ain't looking for trouble 

Howdy Mr Right have you met Mister Bubble 

Hey, put 'er there, ain't she sweet. 

F 

Rubbin' and a lovin' and a scrubbin' and a truckin' 

C A7 

Maybe if we're lucky just a little bear huggin' 

D7   G7 C F C 

Know what I mean, Keep it clean 

Rubbin' and a lovin' and a scrubbin' and a truckin' 

Maybe if we're lucky just a little bear huggin' 

Know what I mean, Keep it clean

Note: We added the augmented chord for spice, it's not mandatory.
The Foo Fighters sing it in G, which is very low, but here's approx. their chords if you wish:

G D7 G 

G D7 G G7 

C 

G E7 

A7 D7

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Jasmine Washington - The Manna Tease

Here's another new song for The Manna Tease, and a video of us practicing it on the rooftop this morning. I came up with this song driving back from Tahoe a month ago, with the obligatory references to William Blake.



Here are the lyrics & chords in C (we play it in Bb.)

Jasmine Washington

C amin G F
My mother bore me in the wilds of Maine,
amin emin amin G F C
And I am white, but oh, my soul is chartreuse.
C amin G F
My heart is healthy but my pleasure is pain.
amin emin amin G F C
My blouse is usually tight, but sometimes I let it all loose.

C amin G F C

I’m just a white girl named Jasmine Washington.

amin F

I’m a little white girl, a white girl.

emin amin G F C

These colors don’t run, girls just want to have fun.

amin F

I’m a little white girl, a white girl.

emin amin dmin

Deep ocean pearl, bright clouds unfurl.

F amin  G F C

Daughter of the sun, Jasmine Washington.

My father called me his rose of York,
Fertilized in manure, but lovely as the dawn.
The pig is filthy, but I’m as clean as cured pork,
And I am pure, arise my love, the night is gone.
I’m just a white girl, &c...

My boyfriend calls me his albino possom:
He is diverse, I call him America.
I’ll shield him from the shade so he can blossom,
And bear my curse, but I am naked beneath my burka.

I’m just a white girl, &c...


©2011 The Manna Tease

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New Illustrated Songs from The Manna Sustains: First Vision of St Olaf, and The Wind & Snow

The Manna Sustains will eventually be an illuminated songbook, but I'm putting out individual illustrated songs while I work on it. Original art by Grainne Proinseas! Here's First Vision of St Olaf:
First Vision of St Olaf, from The Manna Sustains - Illustrated Sheet Music
Feel free to download, print, & play around with as you wish. This song was posted earlier here with a rehearsal youtube video:


NEXT: First Interlude: The Wind & Snow.

The Wind & Snow, First Interlude from The Manna Sustains - Illustrated Sheet Music
And we have a new video for this song, too:


The audio for that video can be downloaded as a free mp3 here if you wish:

Thank you so much. Stay tuned for more illustrated sheet music & demo videos from The Manna Sustains. Please "like" The Manna Tease on Facebooks! & also Grainne Proineas' artist page.

Illuminated Sheet Music - What Mary Noticed from The Manna Stains illustrated digital songbook!

Another addition to our burgeoning genre of illuminated digital sheet music - "What Mary Noticed" from The Manna Sustains, an Epic Murder-Ballad Song-Cycle by The Manna Tease. This will eventually be a whole illustrated songbook illuminated by Grainne Proinseas, & we'll be dropping samples of individual songs as Scribd documents over the next few weeks.

What Mary Mary Noticed, from The Manna Sustains - Illuminated Sheet Music
Please download, print, and play around with as you wish. The Manna Tease singing a somewhat rough-around-the-edges rehearsal of this song into the youtubes:

Stay tuned for more illustrated songs! & more from The Manna Sustains. Lyrics to "What Mary Noticed" originally posted here. Please "like" The Manna Tease on facebooks here, & Grainne Proinseas here.

Introducing: Illuminated Sheet Music - Young Manasseh's Stains from The Manna Stains illustrated digital songbook!

And now, Grainne Proinseas & I are spearheading an initiative to spearhead the genre of illuminated songbooks. The Manna Tease's Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains, will be a fully illuminated songbook illustrated by Grainne Proinseas, and I'll release little excerpts of individual songs as we create them, practice the project, et cetera.
Young Manassehs Stains, from The Manna Sustains - Illuminated Sheet Music

Please download, print, and play around with as you wish. I'm deliberately keeping the score pretty vague, just the melody and chord progression, with the occasional instrumental melody. Additional verses can differ slightly in melody & syncopation, &c. Here's us singing "Young Manasseh's Stains" live:

Stay tuned for more illustrated songs! & more from The Manna Sustains. Lyrics to "Young Manasseh's Stains" originally posted here. Please "like" The Manna Tease on facebooks here, & Grainne Proinseas here.

First Vision of St. Olaf - The Manna Sustains song no. IV

First Vision of St. Olaf, Song no. IV of The Manna Tease's Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains!

...wherein our hero Special Agent Francis, having hitchhiked to Saskatchewan, meets a trucker whore named Elle Mary at a highway diner. They smoke a hookah, and Francis has a vision in which St Olaf advises him to seek the fugitive Young Manasseh in Mexico. Also in the same diner, a senior citizen named Lenore mysteriously dies after complaining about the restaurant's atmosphere.


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More from The Manna Sustains.

Lyrics:

First Vision of St Olaf

At a table by the door,
In a truck stop diner ‘bout a mile outside of Moose Jaw.
Sat an elderly lady named Lenore,
Moaning to her husband that her steak was somewhat raw.
Is it cold in here? I think I feel a draught....

At the next table over,
Was Special Agent Francis drinking Oolong tea.
For two thousand kilometers,
He’d been squished between to two chimpanzees
In a truck transporting monkeys.
Every time he had to pee, the chimps only laughed.

White hair down to the floor,
He thought he saw a goddess, or the oracle at Delphi,
When he saw the trucker whore.
She bid him follow her, & her name was Elle Mary.
She led him to a back room thru a small secret door.

She asked, would you like to smoke?
She lit up a hookah filled with donut-flavored shisha.
His internal senses awoke,
And in the rings of smoke saw a vision of St Olaf.
St Olaf spoke & the galaxies evoked,
Olaf danced & laughed, & the smoke became a storm,
If you want to find Manasseh, go where the winds are warm.

You must go to Mexico.
Go where dahlias grow,
Go where there’s no snow.
Go to Mexico,
Go where the warm winds blow,
Go where Charro’s apropos.
Fly South with the Geese,
Feel the breeze from off the seas,
Neath Paradise trees.
Siesta dogs with fiesta fleas,
Catch the dysentery disease,
Do whatever you damn well please,
Ay yi yi yi!

Francis emerged on the highway.
Exhaled from his mouth & stuck out his thumb due South.
Meanwhile, by the diner’s buffet,
Lenore fell over dead, her head in the basket of bread,
Lenore! her husband said, have you croaked or have you choked?
We need to call the law, oh, she said the steak seemed raw.
(But you & I both know, that the steak was perfectly well cooked.)

©2011 The Manna Tease

The Manna Sustains
An Epic Murder-Ballad Song-Cycle
by the Manna Tease

And the Lord said, I brought you into this world, and I can take you out. -Exodus 16.37

Prelude. The Wind & the Rain
Song no. I. Young Manasseh's Stains
Song no. II. On the Trail of Young Manasseh
Song no. III. What Mary Noticed
Song no. IV. First Vision of St Olaf
First Interlude. The Wind & Snow
Song no. V. Wha' Happened in Oaxaca
Song no. VIa. Who are you, Elle Mary?
Song no. VIb. Second Vision of St Olaf
Song no. VII. Pink Mary's Stains
Song no. VIIIa. Banks of Pontchartrain
Song no. VIIIb. Young Manasseh Complains
Second Interlude. The Wind & Mud
Song no. IXa. Arkansas City
Song no. IXb. On the Trail of Pink Mary
Song no. X. Pink Mary's Marriage
Song no. XIa. Chase Scene / The Spatula / Pink Mary's Death
Song no. XIb. The Manna Sustains
Song no. XIc. Pink Mary's Resurrection / Wha' Happened in Oklahoma / Who Are You, Elle Mary? (Reprise)
Song no. XII. Young Manasseh Remains
Hymn. Sacred Throne
Palinode. And I Will No Longer Smoke My Hubbly-Bubbly Solitarily

What Mary Noticed - The Manna Sustains song no. III

Our Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains, continues with song no. III, "What Mary Noticed." Here's us singing it on youtube:


What Mary Noticed, Song no. III of The Manna Tease's Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains!

...wherein Pink Mary, a 12-year-old girl who lives in the sewers, observes secretly the goings on in Arkansas City, including the machinations of Miss Masha, the mayor's mistress. Mary sees her purchasing Rohypnol from a contrabassoon-playing dwarf and surreptitiousness poisoning Young Manasseh & the Deputy Sheriff, Maple Seraph, who are having a lusty romance. That same chilly evening, the mayor mysteriously kicks the bucket, & Miss Masha succeeds him.

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The first two songs, Young Manasseh's Stains & On the trail of Young Manasseh, were posted on this blog here. More of The Manna Sustains on itwaslost.

Lyrics:

What Mary Noticed


As black as a galactic eclipse,
And as reactionary as a reactionist,
Is Pink Mary’s filthy face.
She thinks that it’s pretty neat
To live beneath the city street.
And she sees things from her secret space.


She noticed the Mayor of Arkansas City
Leave the City Hall at about 11:30,
With a woman who was not his wife.
The girl tripped over a napping vagrant,
Who was wafting nasty odors flatulently fragrant,
And out of her satchel fell a small switchblade knife.


The police would love to see what
Mary sees, but unfortunately,
She lives beneath their toes.
She wears a fleece to shield her
From the breeze, she fears that she will freeze.
As the sewer urchins know:
She’s already lost her nose.


The next afternoon outside an underground saloon,
Mary noticed a dwarf with a contrabassoon
Selling flunitrazepam to the Mayor’s mistress.
Then she saw the vagrant & a female officer,
Stumbling arm-in-arm down a dark corridor,
As he fumbled with the straps on her dress.


Mary saw the Mayor’s mistress see the strange pair,
And she watched them in the alley strip into their underwear.
And she slyly slipped on a skier’s mask.
The mistress crept up to the fornicating couple,
As invisible as a heaping rubble of trouble.
And she slipped the rufies into the vagrant’s flask.


The police would love to see what, &c...


That night it was pretty windy,
There was a cold draught slamming shutters all over the city,
And Pink Mary bundled up in her fleece.
In the morning, outside the Mayor’s mansion,
Cops & ambulances clustered neath the Kansas sun.
The Mayor was stone dead… with no sign of disease.


The dwarf took out his contrabassoon,
And played a sorrowful tune to the midwinter moon,
And Mary wept.
She noticed the vagrant & his lover flee town,
And the mistress put on her head the Mayor’s crown,
And Mary snatched the switchblade… from off of the City Hall steps.


The contra-bassoon played: baaah bah bah bah, &c...


©2011 The Manna Tease
"What Mary Noticed" incorporates the traditional folk tune "Sacred Throne," by Hugh Wilson (1800), (public domain.)

UPDATE: How about an illustrated songbook version of this song?

What Mary Mary Noticed, from The Manna Sustains - Illuminated Sheet Music

The Manna Sustains
An Epic Murder-Ballad Song-Cycle
by the Manna Tease


And the Lord said, I brought you into this world, and I can take you out. -Exodus 16.37


Prelude. The Wind & the Rain
Song no. I. Young Manasseh's Stains
Song no. II. On the Trail of Young Manasseh
Song no. III. What Mary Noticed
Song no. IV. First Vision of St Olaf
First Interlude. The Wind & Snow
Song no. V. Wha' Happened in Oaxaca
Song no. VIa. Who are you, Elle Mary?
Song no. VIb. Second Vision of St Olaf
Song no. VII. Pink Mary's Stains
Song no. VIIIa. Banks of Pontchartrain
Song no. VIIIb. Young Manasseh Complains
Second Interlude. The Wind & Mud
Song no. IXa. Arkansas City
Song no. IXb. On the Trail of Pink Mary
Song no. X. Pink Mary's Marriage
Song no. XIa. Chase Scene / The Spatula / Pink Mary's Death
Song no. XIb. The Manna Sustains
Song no. XIc. Pink Mary's Resurrection / Wha' Happened in Oklahoma / Who Are You, Elle Mary? (Reprise)
Song no. XII. Young Manasseh Remains
Hymn. Sacred Throne
Palinode. And I Will No Longer Smoke My Hubbly-Bubbly Solitarily

The Manna Tease Live at Adobe Books, 8 July 2011

Good morning. The Manna Tease played a small gig at a book store in San Francisco on Friday, and there are a few good videos of some of our new songs. What the HECK, I'm going to put them all up here, if you want to see the show.

We opened with the premiere of "Come to the Berkeley Bunghole," which is about our dream of opening a workingman's wine bar.



Lyrics & chords:

Come to the Berkeley Bunghole

emin

G bmin7 emin
It’s five o’clock in England.
C G G/B Cmaj7 amin9
Jupiter’s closed, but the Bunghole is wide open.
G bmin7 emin D Cmaj7 amin9 emin
There’s a place where the Reagan Administration never happened,
G bmin7 emin D Cmaj7 amin9
And Mama Bethany is always glad to see you again.

emin C G D

Come to the Berkeley Bunghole!

emin C G D

The workingman’s wine bar, the pauper’s pub,

emin C G G/F# emin

Your wallet’s empty, but your glass is full,

Cmaj7 amin9 bmin7 emin

Let’s tap this barrel! Let’s boogie in the club!

The graveyard shift is ended.
It’s Sunday Morning & BART hasn’t started,
There’s a place where the sadness of the street has been suspended,
And Mama Bethany is big bosom’d & big hearted.

Morning breaks in Tilden Park:
The idle rich are hiking with their labradoodles.
But in this place, the music’s loud and neon lights burn dark.
And Mama Bethany makes a mean cup of Ramen noodles.

Allons-y a la Bonde Berkeley!

Le café ouvriere, le pub indigents.
L'escarcelle est vide, mais la coupe est pleine.
On tape ce baril! nous boogie dans le club!

©The Manna Tease 2011

We did two songs from our Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains: Young Manasseh's Stains & Pink Mary's Stains.





This performance of "It's a Snoopy Snoopy Poop Doggy Ratty Rat World" turned out pretty good:



I did my song "Isa Bowman," the video's here if you care to see it, although the performance was a bit flawed. And finally, here's our much-awaited premiere of tomorrow's chart-topping single "Whoops! my bosoms come flying out!"



Lyrics & chords:

whoops! my bosoms come flying out!

dmin

emin C bmin A dmin
Wonderful suburbs, the roads to the safeway of this world.
emin C bmin A dmin
Stuffed in my tube top, my goldilocks shampooed, long and curled.
A G (emin)
As I fill my cart with seasonal fruits,
A emin G A
My top explodes all over the cantaloops, and

dmin C F A

Whoops! my bosoms come flying out!

dmin

Whoops! my bosoms! Whoops! my bosoms!

dmin C F A

Whoops! my bosoms come flying out!

Powerful pantsuit, the honorable senator from Nebrasker,
Storming the forum, never lack-lustre if her luck’ll last her.
I will muster all my brimstone & bluster,
Ask her how to bust this blasted filibuster, and

Whoops! my bosoms come flying out! &c...

Blast off & cast off into our culture’s future frontier,
Across the universe, headfirst in a shuttle shooting somewhere.
I am absolutely safe in my spacesuits,
But a blackhole ripple ripens my sexy spacefruits, and

Whoops! my bosoms come flying out! &c...

G A G A

Bosoms all over the place! - - - Bosoms all over deep space! ©The Manna Tease 2011

Thanks to The Matinees for arranging that "variety show" + poetry reading. Please "like" The Manna Tease on Facebook.