Mountains in the Moon
May 20, 2008
A new phase has begun for Krista Vossler and Friends. While continuing to play the occasional show on my own, Luke Kalloch and I have begun collaborating as Mountains in the Moon. For now, we are working on already existing songs in our separate catalogues; we hope to eventually begin writing songs together. Luke is a musician of many talents and hails from Maine. Both transplants in Austin, we feel we have much to communicate to the music scene here.
I will continue to update my website (www.kristavossler.com) and Myspace page with information about my whereabouts and shows, but feel free to check out Mountains in the Moon for information on my collaboration with Luke. As for this blog, I think it has run its course, as I have been receiving lots o' spam and have not made time to blog in awhile. I think I may eventually relocate to Blogger, but we'll see. I haven't talked this over with the creator of Wimpkiller, and I plan to, but I think he is knee-deep in either pre-wedding planning or post-wedding bliss, so that conversation may have to wait. I know that he himself has given up the ol' blogstone, as he liked to call it, and I'm feeling more and more like I should follow suit. Again, if you want to keep track of me, feel free to check either of my two websites. Granted, I may not be as candid as I am with you all, but it's something, right? My blog in its current state will stay up for awhile, as I need to copy and paste some things for my records. I've really loved blogging at times, and I am quite sad to give up this particular blog with its particular ties.
Mountains in the Moon East Coast tour begins September 15, 2008.
Cheers!
Krista Vossler
I'm getting old. My neck hurts from our bout of football throwing in the park; my spiral is not as good as it used to be. We used to turn heads, my sister and I, on the beach as we threw.
Tonight all the teeth on the right side hurt when I swallow room temperature water. At first I thought I had a cavity, but no one gets cavities on all of their teeth on the right side of their mouth, do they? Off to WebMd for no answer. Once again my symptoms don't fit in the little box of the human body they provide for the seeker. I'm hoping it's stress related; who knows?
Marketa and Glen won the Oscar--they should have. The song has been ringing in my ears all day; I have vowed to listen to The Frames or the Swell Season for the rest of the month, nothing else. I jumped up from the couch and squealed when they won. Maybe that's why my teeth hurt.
Tonight I watched my neighbor's kid for five minutes while Blake drove his mother to the corner store to get some milk for baby. He should be talking by now, but he only babbles so we played hand games and giggled at each other through the mesh of his playpen. I imagined someone breaking down the door and demanding his drug money; I lost my breath for a minute and wondered if he would hurt me in front of the kid.
The tour is shaping up...slowly. I am waiting on someone in Galveston to proclaim us gig-worthy, Gretchen and I. For the most part we will sing for our supper--or for tips--or both, but I doubt we'll be pulling a tidy sum from any of the shops. It's hard to earn money from coffee shop gigs, but we've got to start somewhere and we're not going far. Though I'll miss Easter at Holy Trinity, I hope this mini-tour will give us time to get to know each other again--and give me time to spend in silence with God. I need some quiet, I think, as hard as it will be to be away from Blake.
What I most look forward to in March is a trip to my grandmother's condo. She lives on a small island on the gulf side. Home to some of my most poignant memories, it is the only physical home left that existed before we left for China. I can smell the long hallway past the shared washing machine and dryer--shells and salt and air freshener. The view from her porch is stunning--bright blue water and pink skies seemingly all the time. I remember walking down that beach before a thunder storm, Alicia trotting beside us, worried because Dad had told her lightening strikes small people first. I think he thought it would be a good laugh, but it left her in tears. He was struck with the appropriate remorse.
On this beach my brother was stung by a stingray--after he'd turned lobster-red in the sun. I don't think I've seen him very happy on a beach since. We played whiffle ball at low tide and catch in the waves. Mom dragged me on morning runs over semi-soft sand; my favorite part was the post-run dip in the surf. Sarah bonded with uncles and I roamed the beach wishing I had a boyfriend with whom to share my deepest musings. Why do the Vosslers never have dates, I thought. How important I will feel the day I finally bring someone to the reunion--unfortunately, our last reunion was at least five years ago, two years before I would meet Blake.
I wrote poetry in the morning by myself, on the rare mornings that Grandma would sleep in till 7. I'm sure the poems were juvenile and full of pious self-pity. All-you-can-eat pancakes on the beach would lull me out of feeling sorry for myself until I realized how much I had eaten. Too many sausages, I would moan. I'm so fat! And now we have to take the family photos! Those matching shirts were too much, really, and the last year, in Chicago, we scrapped them all together, choosing instead wax lips and fake mustaches.
As I struggle to write lyrics of any interest to anyone, I was thinking I should write about the things in which I am interested right now, the domestic comforts that make my current state fulfilling. Folding laundry, baking, cooking, ordering the cabinets, sitting down with our neighbor and practicing our language skills. You see, I so enjoyed making those Valentine's Day cookies and the reaction we got from them. Luke loved them, as did the little girl next door, Blake's co-teachers and my boss. She ate them for breakfast, lunch and dinner, as did I. As a result of that--and having broken my pinky toe two to three weeks ago--I have gained five pounds. Though I weigh less than I did as a college freshman, it's taken too long to get to a healthy weight that I feel I need to get back there again before my time runs out, whatever that means. I guess that just means that I want to start a pregnancy on less fat, rather than more. Not that we're allowed to try for that kind of thing. The insurance I have is just that: insurance. In the event that we get pregnant by accident, the insurance will pay for anything over $10,000. The only time I ever had $10,000 was when my grandmother passed away. I unfortunately spent it all on a clunker of a Ford Taurus which I would drive to Houston and leave for dead and a laptop that wore out in two years. Talk about bad investments. I used to blame my father for this--he maneuvered the purchase of the car, but without him I would never have bought a car in the first place and my first move to Texas would've been impossible. The rest, mere $100s, was used to pay for my many trips to reconnect with friends upon reentry into American society and to supplement my meager income as a part time golf shop girl while I lived in York, depressed and vowing to never run again.
When I am old, I'll still remember that November. Our first real conversation about love and loss and the realization that you were free. December you were of age and took shots to prove it, watching cartoons and laughing. By February I had lost hope and included you on a long list of names spelling out my doom, but you risked my Lenten countenance to ask me to dance. Through green lights, pizza nights, long drives I wooed you and you me. The ides of March came and went and I vowed to give you up. Then, miracle of miracles, my tell-tale heart gave me away and you...you claimed me.
Last night I found that one of my CDs is being sold on E-bay. Someone in Santa Monica feels they no longer need my music and to make a quick buck is attempting to sell my eight simple songs for $16.00, four dollars more than the highest price I ever charged for my CDs. (Note: at this point I am selling CDs at shows for $5; in a town of musicians peddling demos, it seems that my lofty $10 price tag isn't going to cut it anymore.)
First lesson: I shouldn't be Googling myself. In my struggle against pride, this only feeds the fire of self-satisfaction or self-deprecation, depending on what I find.
Second lesson: In the event that I do Google myself in a moment of weakness, I shouldn't take to heart what a former hired hand might say about my music ("artsy fartsy, girl vocaled tori amos esque style stuff") nor should I be mildly depressed over the fact that someone in sunny California is selling a CD of mine.
Reflecting over this led me to remind myself of my reasons for playing and singing. As much as I crave critical acclaim--what is critical acclaim, really, and whose critical acclaim am I seeking?--this is not why I got into this whole thing. I will have to fight this small but very fierce part of me until I die: the part of me that wants to be the best in the eyes of everyone--the baristas at the coffee shop, the gatekeepers of the Austin music scene, the emo kid in black at the back, the old drunk guy in the front, the other musicians who are too busy to watch me play. I've said this before--unfortunately, I have to keeping saying it to keep it fresh in my mind: it matters not who hears and likes what they hear, it matters not how much money I'm making, it matters not what the knowledgeable think. The reason I write, sing and play is simple--I play to encourage people, to let them know they are not alone, to make them think about the things they hide. I don't have any control over the words and music that leave my lips--no control over the impact they will make. So be it if I end up playing for the bums and drunks in the small dusty corner of Austin; if I remember correctly, playing for the down and out on the boardwalk in NJ was what sparked this fire in me in the first place. I must get back to my roots.
It's easy to be seduced by the glitz and glitter of fame in this town. Sure, we're supposedly a bunch of eco-sensitive hippies and devil-may-care good-for-nothing success stories, but people care very much these days about how and for whom they look, and I'm as guilty as the next guy of wanting to impress.
At Emo's Lounge we stand at the rail and watch transfixed as Alex Dupree and The Trapdoor Band play their hearts out for a rowdy, gum-smacking, alcohol-guzzling crowd. At times Alex's words are lost in the din, then ring out like shots from a gun. He is the prophet of 6th Street tonight--his words are true and life-giving--most of us in the moment can't absorb what he's saying. But perhaps in the quiet of her room tonight, the gum chewer on her cell phone will recall a line: "The world we know will pass away. The world will change and stay the same," and she'll wonder what it means. Maybe she'll follow the trail to truth, maybe she won't, but Alex's words are out there--he has done what he was born to do.
Alex is a challenge to me, a reminder that sometimes success the way I see it--the way the world sees it--isn't what I ought to desire. I want to be satisfied with the guy who clutched his chest in thanks or the inebriated gentleman who stumbled over for a hug--I want to be full of gratitude for the kind hearted café owner who heard something she liked and booked me for two hours on Friday. So what if I never play Emo's or Hole in the Wall or Cactus? I want to burn out in giving myself away, regardless of how the selfish parts of me clamor for recognition.
So screw the plans for the new website, the lack of money for a CD project, my inability to write a decent bio. I fling myself to the wind to be blown about then set down gently to sow a song or two.
Who's with me?
