Max & Greeny - 'Letter to Jude'

[Greeny]

Warning - quite experimental 

This has evolved from a standard song to an instrumental, and now this. The letter concept is Max's, as was the idea to include the actual 'letter' rather than just the typewriter clacking away.

So I took excerpts of a letter that I wrote in a (mostly fictional) short story around 20 years and added it to the music.

Max hasn't heard it, so will be a surprise! (he did ask me to surprise him...).

Max is on piano, strings and sound fx and I'm on guitar and narration.

Dear Jude,

My time in Paris has almost come to a close. I did not find what I was looking for, but man, did I look – in every nook and cranny of those art-imbued streets, and deep inside myself too. Whatever I was seeking wasn't there. Perhaps it was never there. And I know for a fact now that talent isn't enough. And maybe love isn't either. The two most wonderful commodities in the world just don't seem to be worth a damn anymore. Except to us, maybe, and a few people who 'feel' existence rather than just pass through it like a car wash.
       
Please find the enclosed 300 euros, which I want you to convert at the earliest opportunity into nice grubby tenners and twenties. This is yours. You'll see why in a bit.

            It's time for me to go, you see. Away from Paris and away from painting. By the time you get this letter I will be gone. Found, like a porcelain–pale Chatterton, dead on this threadbare chaise lounge beneath a grimy garret window. Maybe I've gone through it in my head so often that I'm detached from it now. Just like you used to say that being a gravedigger detaches you from death.

I want you to celebrate with me but without me one last time. Take that money and spend it in Bradley's Spanish Wine Bar. Take a day off work and get hammered right up to the gills.

            By the way - it'll take a few days for this letter to arrive, and I'm shuffling off this mortal coil tonight. So if something goes wrong, I'll have to call you and tell you not to read the letter. But assuming that I haven't called, and that you ARE reading this letter, the deed is done, and I've had my last slap- up tea at Brasserie Lipp - Steak, oysters and a fine bottle of Margaux.

Don't waste a second old friend. Not a second.

p.s. Chagall was always better than Matisse.

[maxit]

Dear Tim,

next time you surprise me, could you please avoid making me cry?
Your friend,

MAx

[StephenM]

touching piece Tim and Max....

the letter with the typewriter clacking away was a neat idea....

perhaps the old friend would still look the other old friend up one day...

[Ted]

A very cool experiment.

I love how it suggests a much broader story, and a complicated relationship, without any of the details. Very well done.

[Hook]

I'm so blown away by this, it's absolutely incredible. Compelling & touching while being so unique and original. I love this!!
Rock on guys!

[Ted]

Two more thoughts on this:

I'm reminded that some novelists and screenwriters develop rich backstories for their characters that they never publish – only parts of the backstory are revealed in the novels/films (or maybe none of the backstory at all), but it makes the characters more alive. You've done that here.

Last year I read Paris in the Twentieth Century, the "lost novel" by Jules Verne. The main character is someone who discovers the "most wonderful commodities in the world just don't seem to be worth a damn anymore." What he loves; what he has devoted his young life to – art, literature, music – are not valued in the mechanized, industrial, futuristic world of Paris in 1960 (the novel was written in 1863 and finally published in 1994). I've been meaning to write (on my blog) about this, because the future dystopia that Verne's publisher found too ridiculous to consider has many similarities to our modern societies – we just don't recognize it as a dystopia.

[bruno]

I listened to this earlier - I love these style of piece. So very cool.
Great collab.
B

[Nelson]

Wonderful storytelling and the perfect musical accompaniment.
Love your piano playing Max, it's straight out of Shakespeare's day and  I like how some parts have the piano and typewriter going at same pace, brilliant touch.
Vocally it was an excellent / heartfelt performance of the monologue

Now that's entertainment, you guys are on a roll.

[tonyc]

outstanding work , i dont know where the words come from , just brilliant , i would never have thought to try something like this , superb just superb cheers tim.....tony cee

[Hilary]

Oh yes I absolutely love this!

I thought adorable and then it got dark