Mark Leslie is a writer, editor and bookseller who lives in Southern Ontario. In 2005, Mark joined the blogging bandwagon and started posting random thoughts and musings on writing, bookselling and being a father.
I received a neat look at my YouTube stats for 2020.
Nope,
I am not any sort of YouTube sensation but I'm enjoying putting out creative
content and some folks are resonating with it. (A pretty strong
parallel to the books and stories I publish - hanging out in that broad
mid-list realm)
Of course the most popular new video this year
was early on during the first wave of Covid-19, when Liz and I performed Stuck in this House Here with You, a Stealers Wheel parody of "Stuck in
the Middle with You"
I think we did even better on the less popular K-Tel spoof commercial - a medley of pandemic-inspired parodies. Still Stuck, Still with You, Still in this House
I was so thrilled to create a CHEERS parody (that I'm curious to try to do more episodes of throughout the winter), when I put out Mark's Tavern (because I so MISSED hanging out in bars)
One of my favorite all-time duets is "Islands in the Stream" written by the Bee Gees but made famous by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton.
We toyed with the lyrics, wanting to tell the tale of a couple that learns how to share their home workspace, and their often struggling home internet connection.
It was, to us, a nice parallel to the previous parody we'd done "Stuck in This House With You" where a couple comes to terms with being isolated together. Whereas that one was about personal relationships, this new parody would be about discovering that same respect for the other person's new "work from home" life.
We recorded it a few weekends ago, but we couldn't get over the fact that there were parts of the song that, no matter how many times we tried to re-record it (and trust me, we re-recorded it dozens and dozens of times), we just couldn't get it.
I tried to do some audio enhancement to adjust the lyrical tracks, to at least try to slightly mask my off-key caterwauling, but not even auto-tune programs could resurrect this "The Singing Dead."
Liz wanted to scrap the entire project.
She is a perfectionist. I take more of a "it's good enough, let's throw it out there and see if it sticks" kind of guy.
We clashed creatively. As we do. I relented.
I was frustrated; because I felt the song was pretty good. (And by that, I meant, the parody lyrics were pretty good. The singing - well, it was my singing after all, it almost approached what one might say "not too nauseating.")
But then Liz came up with an idea. A brilliant idea.
She said that there were parts of the main chorus that weren't that bad. She wondered if we could use that, and also create a few other songs and present them together in a medley format.
As we brainstormed further, the idea of doing a K-Tel spoof commercial arose. We must have watched about twenty minutes of those hokey commercials from the 1970s and 1980s.
Then we set about recording the different tracks, and Liz began scripting out how the corresponding video would work.
It's something that turned out not that bad, in my humble opinion.
I suppose the lesson in this creative exercise is that I had initially been wasting energy being frustrated with the broken egg yolks I had when I'd planned on preparing a dish of over easy fried eggs. It was difficult for me to see past that, until Liz, looking at those eggs, looked around the kitchen for a few other things to throw into the dish, to turn it into a marvelous omelette.
Hope that you enjoy this omelette, and also that the lesson inspires you to think to look around your own kitchen for how you might be able to do the same thing with your own creative projects.
(Oh, and the original title for this used the term "broken egg yokes" because I was trying to layer in a play on words. Yoke as in an alternative term for a joke. But then I changed it because I was worried the mis-spelling might be too confusing.)
She looked at me like I had just suggested we create a video tape of an intimate moment between us and upload it to Pornhub. That's because I'm the one in our relationship who is "all out there." Humiliating myself publicly is par for the course. Liz prefers to be the creative force "behind the camera."
But less than twelve hours later, she mentioned that she had some ideas for visuals that could go with the song.
You see, for years, she has been producing these amazing videos. Mostly in relation to her work. And the majority of the time she stays out of view of the camera.
Lately, however, she has had a bit more exposure, collaborating with a co-worker on producing a "morning show" style live show as a way of doing a combination of team-building, information sharing, and humorous distraction for her staff. It's a private show, meant for this specific team. But I've watched a number of episodes and, like so many of the things Liz does, I think it's fantastic.
So we started talking about how the video might look.
After relaxing one evening after watching a few episodes of the first season of Cheers, we did a dry run-through of a revised version of the parody lyrics to a karaoke version of the song.
Then yesterday morning, we went into our studio (okay, my home office where I record my podcast and do other video/audio related things as an author and book industry guy), and we did a number of takes, collaboratively revising the lyrics, then laying down the track.
We used the Ameritz Karaoke version of the song for the background track. Then we shot the video using an iPad, which Liz edited and produced right on the iPad using iMovie. After she finished, I imported the video into Camtasia 2019 to add the titles and annotations.
It was an awesome collaborative project. Yes, it was work, but for the first time in days, neither of us was spinning and spending the whole day either working or thinking and worrying about work stuff.
And perhaps also, more importantly, for the first time in days, we finally got a song stuck in our heads that has replaced the hilarious parody created by Brock Tyler of our Prime Minister using the words "speaking moistly." (Fun fact, BTW, the original lyrics of the song included a nod to that:)
"...and outside, the germs are crawling so moistly in the air - we say.....Please....."
It's enriching to collaborate on something creative and fun with the person you love. When you realize that there's nobody you'd rather be stuck in isolation with.
Here's hoping that the song inspires at least one much needed smile or laugh for you.
I recently added an extra episode to my normally weekly podcast.
It was a Thanks for the Inspiration episode. These are an attempt to acknowledge and say thanks to the people, places, and things that have helped to either feed the muse, or perhaps just to feed the very soul and makeup of the writer behind that writing.
In this bonus episode of the podcast, I thanked the creative spirits who have produced musical parodies about Covid-19 and the current global situation. Because laughter is important.
As I said in the episode . . .
Yes, these are dark times, but laughter is important.
It connects people. And laughter has been shown to actually stimulate positive activity in a person's immune system.
I know we're all scared, we're uncertain, we aren't sure what's coming, for us, and for those we know and love. Things seem to be spinning out of control. But we can always control where we focus and how we respond.
I choose love, compassion, and humor.
And I choose to thank all of these amazing creative people who took the time to spread their own passion, through humor, to help others find smiles and laughs in these trying times.
You can click here to check out the show notes, with the audio as well as links to the original YouTube videos, or you can listen to the episode using the built-in media player above.
Below are the original YouTube videos
Covid-19 - The Taylor's - Parody of "Come On, Eileen" by Dexys Midnight Runners
JJ Mason Taylor (The Taylor Family)
My Corona - Parody of "My Sharona by The Knac
Kevin Brandow, Lyrics by Chelsea Brandow
Quarantine - Parody of "Let It Be" by The Beatles
Joe Cron
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (with new lyrics!) Parody of "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" by Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke from the movie Mary Poppins
Daniel Matarazzo
One Week of COVID 19 - Parody of "One Week" by Barenaked Ladies
Pepper Coyote, Adapted original lyrics by @daniAwesome
My Corona Home - Parody of "Kokomo" by The Beach Boys from the movie Cocktail
Jon Pumper
Coronavirus Rhapsody - Parody of "Bohemian Rhapsody by Quee
I have always loved musical parodies, and I am grateful for the fact that these awesome folks, and so many others, are continuing to create brilliant parodies to help us with smiling and laughing in these most challenging and trying times.
Click the image above to see the original Tweet and Video. Or below to see it on YouTube.
It starts off with a woman sitting quietly in a living room and reading.
Less than a second in, a younger woman, her daughter, comes stomping into the room to the music of I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles) by The Proclaimers.
A montage then begins of the young woman dancing, following, and invading the personal space of her mother. The tension builds as the persistent dancing becomes annoying as the matriarch tries to continue going about reading or other household chores while her daughter dances up a storm.
It's funny, and, at one point you suspect it might become one of those occasional Saturday Night Live sketches that starts off funny, and then gets less funny as it goes on, and you regret losing those 2 or 3 minutes of your life to it, or how that sketch made the weekly cut.
But instead, it gets better.
Because of the confrontation that happens.
And the resolution.
As Twitter user lonliness points out, the "infliction point" or the "inflection point" - basically where the conflict happens, or there is a moment of dramatic change, the mother has two choices. (Writers take note of this critical element that happens in a story)
The mother makes the decision that turns this video from cute and amusing to brilliant.
And it's also a story about the beautiful infectious nature of smiling, laughing, and dancing together.
To a great song that immediately inspires dance.
And we all need a little bit of that sort of infectious fun.
I have long been a fan of Alicia Witt's music. Many people know her as an actor; but it's her music that I am fascinated with. And yes, she started her acting career in 1984 as a child actress in the movie Dune. Her television and movie credits are almost too numerous to mention with some of the TV spots alone including Friday Night Lights, Cybill, Twin Peaks and The Walking Dead.
The first time in more recent memory that I recall paying attention to Alicia was when she appeared, on perhaps half a dozen episodes of Law and Order as Detective Nola Falacci, the temporary partner of Mike Logan (played by Chris Noth) in the mid aughts.
It was a couple of years after that, I think, that I somehow stumbled upon her cover version of Paul Simon's You Can Call Me Al. Simon's Graceland is among my all-time favourite albums, and Witt's piano-forward stylistic rendition of the song made me sit up and take notice. I wanted to know who that was; and when I saw, I recognized her from Law & Order.
Alicia Witt in a still from her "Anyway" music video
At that point, I started to check out the self-titled album the song came from, bought it on iTunes and fell in love with the powerful song Anyway. (Her talent as an actress helps with the dramatic presentation of that video as well)
Since then I have been following along and purchasing all of her music. She is a fave of so many of the indie musicians that I adore.
Her song "I'm Not Ready for Christmas" which she wrote to accompany a Hallmark Christmas Romantic Comedy of the same name that she starred in, is among my favourite Christmas songs. (And not just because of lines such as "I don't give a sh*t how many shopping days are left" and "I need a f*cking holiday" - BTW, here's the "radio safe" version of that song if the explicit version is too much for your sensitive ears)
And not all that long ago, when I saw she was launching a Kickstarter for her 15,000 Days EP project, I knew I wanted to be among the fans who contributed to helping make it happen. (15,000 Days was a reference to her age at the time of initially planning and recording the album)
It has been exciting watching Witt in the lead up, the process and the forthcoming EP release, particularly since, as a Kickstarter supporter, I've had the pleasure of regular updates on how it was working. It was so fun to get a behind-the-scenes look.
A few weeks ago, the first single, "Younger" was released. And just yesterday, the official music video was released.
The song itself is a beautiful one and alludes to the incredible power, adventurousness and spirit of youth. Something that we all either lose, or allow ourselves to let go as we embrace the restrictions and cages and chains that apparently come with maturity. I have listened to it multiple times and I do quite love the song.
And then the video was released. And the video, directed by Paula Kay Hornick, adds in a heart-warming lifelong love story visual that brings out a unique flavour to the song. It opens with the brilliant magic of imagination and youth, which, on its own is pure and delightful, but then, as the video moves along, you see these children who have grown up, have married, had children, and have lost that magic they once had.
As the song and the story ends, I will admit to shedding a tear of happiness at the beautiful story, and I marveled at how, though I had already thought the world of the song, that the video could allow me to re-appreciate it on a whole new level.
Compilation of images from video for "Younger"
The song, written by Alicia Witt, Catt Gravitt and Tofer Brown includes these following amazing lyrics . . .
let's be honest it's not too late to fade away and disappear into the stars above the noise and rise the silence like a wave you have the choice to reveal the quiet that you're hiding in your voice
let's take the world and discover all we used to know.... I wanna find a way to the wonder, like when we were younger
It is a great look at the importance of so many of the things that make our youth so magical, which include open-ness, acceptance, imagination and all that comes with that. Perhaps the reason I write speculative fiction is my desire to want to continue to capture and share that sense of wonder I first experienced when reading that type of fiction in my youth.
Of course, part of the brilliance in this song isn't that it's "when we were young" but "when we were younger" - meaning it's never too late (which the song also says) for us to use any of our previous experiences, and not just the earliest ones, to learn and grow and reflect. After all, we always have that choice no matter how old we grow.
With these introspective lyrics that make one reflect back on the power and magic of our own pasts, with the beautiful accompanying music and the powerfully produced video, I have to say Kudos to the amazing collaboration of talent that made that happen.
And I can't wait for the rest of the EP's release and to enjoy more of Alicia Witt's incredible music.
