We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Other Honey

by The Michael Character

/
  • Streaming + Download

    Includes high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more. Paying supporters also get unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app.
    Purchasable with gift card

      name your price

     

1.
2.
January 2019 03:34
January 2019 1. At high speeds it can feel like the car is about to come apart. Everything rattles. But closeness can still the clanking bits a little, can make gentle the thrashing tremors. 2. Night reached the hills first; they cast shadows on themselves below a goldfish sky and we traced the liminality with our little car, puttering between the matte fluorescence of service stations with the plus and super octane buttons blacked out and taped over and the dense woods that have not yet been felled, where the foundation of a new McDonalds will eventually find fertile ground for concrete roots. I probably wondered out loud about something vacuous; if so it didn’t matter enough to commit to memory; we left the thought on the side of the road, mundane refuse for a boring world to compost, and drove off in silence without use for an explanation. 3. In darkness, snow leaps from nowhere then disappears again, fireworks dissolving into the hurry we beckoned the gas with. It came on suddenly, God beat an old quilt indoors and commanded the flurries to blow through us; the dull shimmer of a crescent moon; a sunbeam through the window of an empty room; the snow banking and turning in familiar patterns; me remembering again that air is occupied space; thus the air around and between us as a barrier might be. 4. The intimacy index fell sharply before closing, but no one on the floor could pinpoint the problem. To some it was a mistake, a computational error that scaled quickly; others thought it was a market correction; you can end a date with a soulful exchange of saccharine kisses in a cutely contorted embrace, jockeying with the center console, but only in a bull market would every date end this way—a sure sign of a coming crash. On the days you sit at your desk, sedated into Internet oblivion, you will wish the Fed had raised interest rates earlier to cool the too-hot market, but who has the self-control to hold back when the intimacy is there, beaming like a smile outside of time, like forever, saying your name matter-of-factly and holding out a sure hand. We always say we saw it coming, we always knew better. 5. By the time we crossed back into Massachusetts we rattled. Perhaps we always rattled. I think it ends there, but it’s unclear. I wonder out loud about what it means to return to how things were, and I conclude that each time you throw a dart it makes a hole; no matter how slow you go; after a thousand bullseyes the red cork will crumble into a coarse turf on the floor, leaving empty space that perversely cannot constitute new holes. Perhaps this is what you meant when you said you couldn’t think about hanging out again just yet. Perhaps the next text will be a small broom to sweep up the turf bits of our bullseye; last call; a reaching finger to shut the lights. 6. “I don’t want to be strangers again” is what I said of you, alone in the shower. Is what I said of a stranger Off somewhere in her own time Hanging up tasks in her smokehouse Laboring over the flavors And doing the work Sequential & diligent Without pause Without Reply
3.
February 2019 1. I don’t know anything about cameras. Like I like taking pictures, but anyone can do that, albeit poorly In high school I occasionally referred to myself as a photographer Like I bought these three colored lenses for my low quality digital camera But I never used them for anything great “This picture could be green now!...or red?...” I never learned the craft. I guess you need light to see? Go figure. If you don’t have enough, the pictures come out blurry and dark. I was always frustrated by that; You can see things so clearly in reality but carrying those moments into the future takes patience, skills sharpened diligently on the rock of failure for years, And even then, sometimes you can still only barely make out the shapes. Like you have this box, this time capsule that you can fill with curated content, unrefined material for future memories, but when you go back to look there are holes in the bottom and nothing much is there; just a hue, impressions of space, things and not things, scrambled certainties. The longing brain fills in the gaps. 2. We bought disposable cameras on New Years Day. I pull out those darknesses from time to time Lay them out on my kitchen table You’re there in the cafe Only A Shadow Like the fucking Cleaners From Venus Song that was probably playing Hovering right in the foreground A ghost. A friendly ghost. There again in front of the post office I can’t see your face I know you’re there I remember that we were there We bought the cameras We drank coffee We walked The restaurant was too crowded We had a really nice day But I can’t see your face I don’t see you much at all anymore. Just a hue, impressions of space, things and not things, scrambled certainties. My longing brain fills in the gaps. 3. Today there was too much light. I held up one hand To block the sun And waved it A stiff oscillation And I called the shadow it cast my love for you So when I stopped waving It would be gone.
4.
March 2019 01:25
March 2019 I reread my poem from January and it doesn’t hurt anymore It felt like reading something old, encased in glass you aren’t allowed to touch Like a museum visit Once I stood in front of the Dexter Street Baptist Church where Dr. King preached in Montgomery and tried really, really hard to make a meaningful memory. I relaxed my body to hazard a meditative stare Deep breaths But all I could do was stand And know The feeling never came. Perhaps the lesson was in the mundanity. I broke veg and ate half a rack of meaty, center-cut ribs after we left the church. At the next rest stop I walked like I was underwater Rib speed My body struggling for every muscle twitch, every joint bent I embodied the heaviness I couldn’t feel By the next rest stop that heaviness was gone too.
5.
April 2019 01:23
April 2019 At high speeds it can feel like the car is about to come apart. Everything rattles. But that’s just how cars get under those circumstances. Even when you think the thing has ruptured The wheels have come loose and scattered like roaches in the light Twisted metal fallout and chipped plastic A coming apart so spectacular that no future archeologist would even guess Car Still you sit You’re fine White knuckling 3 & 9 On a side street in Denver The closest one you could find that looked pretty enough to be devastated in Then the phone call Another phone call This time the car was still, like death I guess I never really got over it. Until I figure out what it looks like to need a friend as much as I need you
6.
May 2019 03:39
May 2019 Early morning feel my belly bulge Disused sponge-eyes puckered in their holes In damaged ears it’s resonating “time to stand and fill some spaces” But I don’t wanna know How this shit unfolds without you Lonely summer Bakes a crust on me Aching histories underneath dead skin I know it’s you by the patterns of my phones vibrations I just can’t take this I make me sick I’m dipping out of the gig On the porch with the scenesters talking all this shit How they tripped on acid like I’m cool with it The late comers coming up the stairs I came here to breathe my own air So I’m out here waiting Now stuck for a while You inside patient With a kind smile
7.
June 2019 02:48
June 2019 When I think about being in the world About the loss, about the discovery, about the mundanity, about warm days, about coffee, and gin, and 8-ball pool, and loss, and loss, and fear, and 9-ball pool, and gin cocktails, about work stress, and caring a lot about the quality of food, and being a body in the world vs. having a body in the world, about a challenging book I just read, or a terrible thing a stranger just said, or space, or 10-ball pool, or the improbably gorgeous water of Walden Pond, or kicking back at a shore bar, or biking in the winter, bundled-up and soaked-through and stegosaurus-backed with kicked-up salt crystals and city grime, I realize I am thinking of you And I deny it And I deny it And I realize it again And it breaks me Like a fresh rack Like knocking ivories Cue ball coming in steep, from the long rail Three finger V-bridge from the cushion Zachy-style Perfect strike Perfect contact And I scatter And I’m not anymore But component parts And kinetic energy Potted, piece by piece, till death or cleared felt Perhaps Or if not, racked fresh again And I return to my thoughts, about being And about being in the world And about being with, in the world And am relieved to know It is okay Because you Are here In the world Too June 2019, pt. 2 When you see my posture You roll your shoulders back And get yourself right
8.
July 2019 05:10
July 2019 Summertime, and the living is so easy that it’s alarming. Send help. I indulge in the daily diner breakfast I drink my coffee slow I sip long, long after the plates are cleared And the mud and the mug have matched one another’s temperature And Julie runs my card, $6.40, two dollar tip And Julie gestures, lifting the pot with the brown handle A warmup pour? You bet your goddamn ass, hell yes! Summer! I read on the stone balustrade by the beach in the late morning I shoot pool at Flat Top at noon, any table I want A rack on the fast felt A rack on the table by the couch A rack on the table by the bar Read in the court yard on the polywood Adirondack chairs Work on the tan I grab an Oat ‘Tado at Pavement so I can use their nice bathrooms I exchange hellos with the homies and feel part of something I take advantage of the lunch specials at Oppa I go to the cafes that close before I get off work I get whatever latte so I can use the nice bathroom at that kinda whack spot in the old Masonic Lodge by the Common Goddamn those bathrooms are nice I struggle to save money I appreciate my lifestyle I resent my lifestyle I struggle to save money I embrace my lifestyle I struggle with my lifestyle I am my lifestyle I read by the Charles in the sun I read by the Charles in the shade I eat dinner between chapters I get to the gig, I get tired and I leave when I want and I don’t feel bad about it It’s summer, goddamnit. I go home when it’s time to go home Yes I’ll watch another episode of Chernobyl There’s only five episodes Save some for later I park in Central Square and walk towards the river, to the fireworks spectacular The lady on stage talks a LOT about the military I walk back I don’t need to see the fireworks The summer itself lights up my summer, exploding into colorful bands of my summer, gentle sparkling summers sprinkling into my summer’s summer SUMMER!!! I surprise you at your house And l know now again that we aren’t getting back together For real this time, as last Your neighbor’s fireworks make it hard to embody our sadness So we laugh instead They just keep going off. They hit a house I can’t tell if the smoke is coming from the house It hurts so bad But it’s so easy With you Even the heartbreak perennials poking their heads out of the soil for another round smile when they remember We’re still here We are still here In each other’s lives We look cute in our cutoffs We enjoy the weather We laugh some more It’s going to be okay. You go to bed, sweetly I drive home, sweetly Windows down I don’t relate as much to those sad Pup songs now And...No construction on 93 tonight A July miracle The neighbors are still up Glass of room temperature water Yes I’ll watch another episode of Chernobyl Damnit Summertime and the living is so easy it’s alarming I retroactively leave the hurt in snowy Maine in January I’ll develop the pictures eventually But for now, it’s tomorrow again And I crack open a new book Feet in the Charles in the sun Feet in the Charles in the shade And the poem continues And the poem continues And eventually I put it down for another lunch special Or another episode of Chernobyl Or another callback And I’ll pick it back up later I’m not worried We’ll still be here
9.
10.
For Elise & Steve on the Occasion of Just After Your Wedding The light hit all of us, but at our own angles— When the moon reflects off of Boston and onto the Charles, it looks like the all the middlingly sized skyline columns of light are pointing right at you, and it feels like that for everyone— That’s how it was when your light hit all of us The universal filtered through singular experience With no loss of latency Like a modern miracle, but ancient You didn’t write the vows for us, but witness was as good as baptism And we were all made holy by your love for one another See, even there—A Jewish service refracted through Christian iconography But we’re all on the same page here, I think Because it wasn’t just a union of two It was communion, like, with a capital C It was moksha We were together We were; together; because of you In that moment the only I that could be dis-aggregated from the beauty was as a strip of wallpaper in a room to house the most resplendent piece in an art museum; *I* became context for Whatever it is that you two have made for each other I called it love earlier and so did you so let’s leave it at that for the moment This is all to say that it was bliss to be reminded that love is an end unto itself And I hope to frame that knowledge, I hope to hang it by mundane nail over every door So We, like, capital W, We can renew ourselves in the unnoticed passings through of each ordinary moment with the lived memory of this, the day you gave the gift of your love to each other and held high the light to show us the way.

about

This album was recorded live, in one take, at Pink Noise Studios in Somerville shortly after 4:00pm on August 17th, 2019.

Despite being a record which consists entirely of poems set to a trio of like, I don't know, Improvisational Contemporary Classical Music or Jazz or whatever, this is absolutely a legitimate part of TMC canon. Take that!

Thanks to everyone who came out to the recording session, to the players, to Ben and Dan, and to everyone else who made this record possible.

credits

released September 7, 2019

Bansuri - Srishti Biyani
Poems - James Ikeda
Upright Bass - Max Ridley
Eugene Umlor - Piano

Engineered, Mixed, & Mastered by Benjamin Greer

Recorded at Pink Noise Studios in Somerville (thanks Dan Thorn!)

Opening Seltz Snap by McKinley Theobald

Most of the audible laughing by Amanda Lozada

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

The Michael Character Boston, Massachusetts

It's political music, whatever. Based in Boston, MA. Absolutely willing to drive very far to play for you and five of your vaguely alternative friends in your combination kitchen/laundry room. Hit me up. I'm fully serious.

contact / help

Contact The Michael Character

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

The Michael Character recommends:

If you like The Michael Character, you may also like: