Paw was always quite the wanderer. Why just this morning he wandered onto Distrokid for distribution to a grand assortment of streaming services.
I enjoy the ability to write and record and mix and master and release a song in short order. A Cat Named Paw came to me on Friday afternoon whilst listening to a drum loop I had been experimenting with over a week or so. The drummer is Mikey Stevens, fellow UpTones cat and Lost Monkey Studios producer, on an UpTones track from 2007 or so, recombobulated for the purposes of my Berkeley Cat narration.
Per normal, the saga is available already at our beloved Bandcamp, and indeed the lyrics are also displayed there, for you literary cats.
Once when I was a wee lad, the great cat Paw did wander off for something like two weeks, and we were indeed sad, but then I found him quite by chance at Live Oak Park, about ten city blocks away from our home in North Berkeley at the time. He recognized me, and I asked him to follow me home for lunch and.. He did!
A free spirit, he. Our backyard on Josephine Street was a great playground for myriad neighborhood cats. Some domestic, some semi-feral, all doing their cat things and along the way, some of them adopted us. Fuzzy, in the song, our elder statesfeline, was a stray who hung out in our yard and won our hearts and stuck around for the rest of his very long life. He was with us for about 20 years and he was full-grown when he arrived, so, quite old for a cat. He had this unforgettable Buddha-cat quality, an utterly serene and peaceful being. I’ll share a photo of him below.
It was understood that if you visit the Dinwiddie house you’ll encounter cats, and when eventually the UpTones had our first practice there in 1982, indeed cats were there, collaborating. So here as I’m days away from turning 60, I made a ska song about cats - to which several people have asked, what took this so long?! Well I suppose like any cat I do things when I get around to them.
Short takes -
Check out Out of Myself—Songs of Peter Foley now available on Center Stage Records. I will write a blog post about this album a little later, but for now wanted to mention, as it just came out and IMO this is momentous. Peter Foley was, is, a great composer and friend, who left us too soon, and thanks to his wife and collaborator Kate Chisholm and their amazing and talented friends, a great collection of his songs are now ours to enjoy.
I did a wee interview with Adam Davis and Curtis Meacham on the History of LA Ska podcast. Here it is on the YouTubes and you can also find it on the various podcasty platforms I think. One On One Sessions: Ep 106: Bay Area Ska! Afterward of course I thought of some stories about our gigs with The Untouchables which I’d have liked to share, but alas so it goes, for another time. Shout out to Aaron Carnes whose book In Defense of SKA and the podcast that followed, seems to have inspired all kinds of worthy activity online and off. Aaron just recently retired from that grand ska chapter of his authoring life, and has moved onto new exciting subjects. You may follow his journey here - https://substack.com/@aaroncarnes
Now then. I’m going to float down a lazy river. Isn’t there a song about that? Perhaps there will be another.
Wishing you all a brilliant music and critter-friendly Catursunday,
Eric
