Mystie Chamberlin (aka “Just Another Folk Singer”) “The Musician (Mama Says)” scratch demo recorded 10.21.11 @ Lucky Ray’s Studio, NYC by Mark Suall.Vox and acoustic guitar by Mystie Chamberlin.Played Jumbo Butterfly Bubinga Daisy Rock electric acoustic.
Filed under Are you ready to rock?, audio, Media, Post A Day / Post A Week, Soundcloud
"Absolut coffee" snapshot @ brunch, 05.30.10 @ Uptown Lounge (1576 3rd Ave. b/t 88th and 89th St., NYC). Hipstamatic iPhone print by Mystie Chamberlin (Lens: Kaimal Mark II Film: Blanko),
Over the past four and a half years, I have accepted that my body thrives on stress. It’s as though my body realizes I will have an extended weekend away from traditional responsibility and decides that this an acceptable time to become sick. Since paid time off is scarce, I find this physical decision thoroughly unagreeable. Although my diet consists mainly of stress and caffeine, I’ve managed to find a few ways to regulate (well, regulate the stress anyway…I’ll work on the coffee next year).
Writing in my journal and composing songs are my two favorite ways to relax. I appreciate my writing workshops and my writing peers. I eagerly anticipate our sporadic assemblages, fueled with words and wine, when and where we are all driven by the desire of wondering if we have anything worthwhile or interesting to impart. Once a story or song is transcribed from my mind to the paper or the computer (or communicator, ie. phone), I obsess over the editing process. I cherish when a word I initially chose for simplicity’s sake is replaced by something suitably descriptive. I celebrate each word and it’s sound.
Together with composing song lyrics, I unwind by playing guitar (pun intended). Twisting the chrome tuning keys and pressing down on the bronze strings is more cathartic than punching holes in my head. The misery of sometimes not having the fine motor muscle memory needed in order to craft what I auralize frustratingly, yet determinately, drives me to excel.
I still get goose bumps when I strike a string and from the sound that emanates, even when it is discordant (sometimes, especially when it is discordant). I even enjoy practicing scales; challenging my fingers to move faster or slower is satisfying. Some people might say I’m easily amused. Continue reading
Filed under Post A Day / Post A Week
photo by Nathalie Baverstock
Although I enjoyed the remainder of my visit in New York on that Fourth of July weekend 2005, I felt something was lacking. I regaled my wistful tale of an ill-timed relationship much to the distaste of my friends, who were already displeased that I had stood them up. When I returned to Chicago, I believed I was the unluckiest girl on the planet since everything that consumed my life preceding that fateful weekend afterwards seemed foggy and insignificant. By any conventional judgment I should have been happy. I received a promotion, a pay raise, and an award at work, yet I desired to run away.
I worked to save up money to travel. Motivated by hope, I mailed my unused passport to the Secretary of State to be amended. Finding work became an obsession. I trained for my new day job position with my supervisor until she had to train for her new position. Afterwards, I completed my usual tasks of taking photos for slides to be used in mostly art history classes, sending the film out to be developed, and retouching and digitizing the returned slides in Photoshop. Then I returned to the suburbs and toiled on my freelance commitments. I organized my own extensive concert photography collection and edited two stop motion photography music videos, From Now On for Kill Hannah and Depression Glass for Cameron McGill and What Army. I ran on a treadmill twice a day at the gym twice a day to keep moving, because if I thought about my life, I would admit that I existed, but I was not living.
The bumper-to-bumper snail’s-pace commute from Bensenville to Chicago slowly was extinguishing my will to live. I despised rush hour, complete with blaring horns and obscene gestures, but accepted it as a necessary evil since I conformed to business hours. Knuckles white, I clenched the steering wheel and desperately hoped not to get rear-ended or shot. If I kept the window up and turned on some music, I had time to daydream. I hungered to attend a Jesse Malin concert in New York and to finally travel around the world. Mostly, I yearned to temp fate by visiting this star-crossed stranger.
Months passed, and only a few emails and photos, brief updates detailing the monotonous reality of our daily lives from 4000 miles away, kept me optimistic. Nevertheless, the messages were saturated with sentiments such as: “I am so happy that the last person I met on my travels was you. Our chance encounter will really leave a lasting impression on my whole trip,” “I was at work and just thinking about this time last week, and when I saw you.” All of them signed with “hugs and kisses.”
I sent him sentimental song lyrics that reminded me of our encounter, and confessed how I wished I could journey back with my British girl friend who was returning to Surrey from her New York vacation. He replied:
“I have missed you. It’s kind of strange because we only had a day together, but looking at your photos…we would have so much fun together!! It would be really cool if you could come to stay here when your friend goes home.”
Honestly, I could not afford to travel. I was swimming in debt. I kept a suitcase filled with unpaid bills and paperwork to fill out for deferment and forbearance requests in the cab of my truck. I needed to find a small affordable studio apartment in the city. I had begun the aforementioned new supervisor job, but my did not get paid for a few weeks. My skin was more pallid than normal save for the dark, puffy circles around my eyes. Most days I dragged myself around in lethargy, resigned to the idea that life was as good as it was going to get. Everything I fancied was fantasy. I was not special. Any idiot could fall in love. Any idiot could take a photo. Any idiot could relate to a song. I questioned if I had lied to myself all year since I did not feel as independent as a year prior. Every day I became more withdrawn, preferring the company of my journal to humans. Every weekend I became more dysfunctional, erasing all emotion with cocktails. My composure was bent to its breaking point. I reasoned that I needed to get away or risked becoming a mean, bitter person.
That October, I secretly purchased a flight to London. I was scraping to survive, but scheming. If I had to throw in the proverbial towel and be one of those 30-year-olds who moves back in with her parents and gets a job at Starbucks for the benefits, I was determined to have one last grand adventure. When one has nothing, one has nothing left to lose.
Fate must have had some pity looking down at me, and she must have seen what a sad sight I had become. She spun the stars, and with the support of my boss and my friends, I was on a plane bound for London.
First, I was almost not admitted into the country. Apparently there is an asinine rule stating one must carry the address of the place where one is staying (which, of course, I did not since I am not a planner). After about 20 minutes, I persuaded Customs to allow me into the UK with little proof that I was not some young-crazy-vagabond criminal. Continue reading
Filed under the Blues
On Independence Day weekend 2005, I was working in the Image Collection at DePaul University’s library. Students and teachers were away celebrating their holiday. My boyfriend and I had separated, and although I accepted, along with my friends, that our parting was for the best, I felt desperately alone. I had recently turned 27 years old and impulsively dyed my hair denim blue. Blue was the perfect manifestation to reflect my temperament at the time. I liked to color my hair when I needed a change. It was an easy way to transform into a different person in roughly one hour. However, the alteration was always ephemeral, and eventually I started itching to break free of, well, everything really.
As I sat in the empty office that day, I felt a familiar itch. I daydreamed to myself with a silent sigh, I could leave and no one would even know I was gone. Then, somewhere, a light bulb illuminated. I COULD LEAVE, AND NO ONE WOULD EVEN KNOW I WAS GONE! I shut down my computer, turned off the fluorescent lights, marched out of the office, and fled the library. I drove home, grabbed a small suitcase, flung in a handful of whatever was on my bed, and strolled out the door.
I hiked downtown from Ukrainian Village, directly to the Amtrak train at Union Station. I purchased a round-trip ticket to New York City. The ride was approximated to last 18 hours due to a route through upstate New York, but I did not care. I was doing something! I was going somewhere! I rationalized the journey by reminding myself that my mate from Surrey, UK was visiting New York, therefore the least I could do was convene with her.
From the instant I entered the waiting room, the following events could have been the plot of a Richard Linklater or Michel Gondry flick. Trains were delayed, and travelers, probably returning home from holiday, were mulling around with large packs. One cherubic boy, dressed casually in a T-shirt and baggy, jean shorts, caught my eye. He was sitting on the floor about a yard ahead of me in line and lounging on one of those sturdy travel/hiking backpacks with an aluminum frame.
Ordinarily, when I traveled via train, I effortlessly got an entire aisle to myself, but this trip was an exception. Once I boarded all but a few sparse seats, in my coach, were claimed. I would be fortunate if I could locate a place beside someone who would not flirt with or aggravate me, I thought. My eyes frantically searched for a woman, since she would feasibly solve one concern. I saw an opening alongside a shaggy blond mop of hair and hurried to the neighboring seat’s occupant.
“Is this seat taken?” I asked before even looking at her.
As it turns out, she was a he. In fact, he was the same youngster I noticed in the waiting room. He shook his head, but made obvious to me by his expression and general demeanor that he had also desired to have an aisle to himself. Whatever! At least I knew he would leave me alone, and I would not be distracted, since he was not my type (not that I have a type, but if I did, he would not have been it). I pulled out a copy of Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, a book I had checked out before I left the library. I pulled my portable CD player (remember CD players?) out of my bag, put on my headphones, and pressed play.
For the following four hours, I either read chapters of the James Joyce book or listened to Embrace’s song Madelaine on constant repeat. Just a few weeks prior on June 30, 2005, the day after my birthday, Embrace performed at the Double Door in Wicker Park in Chicago. Somehow, I got roped into doing grassroots marketing for Filter Magazine in preparation for the show. While I was shoving things into my suitcase earlier that day, I chucked Embrace’s Looking As You Are EP in with my luggage. From the first measure of Madelaine, I was in love. Finally, the CD player battery was about to die. I put away my materials and planned to take a nap.
Two elderly women entered the car at the previous stop and sat directly across from us. They watched a comedy on DVD without headphones so everyone could hear the movie, and they guffawed uproariously. I sank low in my reclined seat attempting to ignore the noise, but found no immunity. Suddenly, a loud snore sawed through the amalgamation of sounds from a row somewhere behind mine. I looked up at my blond neighbor, who also appeared disturbed.
I abandoned my vow of silence and solemnly stated, “Just so you know, I toss and turn in my sleep. I might, unintentionally, slap you.”
He glared, and I noticed his blue eyes (like mine).
“I also snore VERY loudly,” I said in the same earnest tone.
A smirk spread across his thin lips. And with an English accent, he forbearingly stated, “I’ll kill you.” Continue reading
Filed under the Blues
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