Reptilian Brain Machinima Re-Mix

Settling in with Stephen Sondheim's brilliant new book Finishing the Hat for the holidays after uploading version one of my Reptilian Brain music video featuring images remixed from Machinima artist Lowe Runo: Reptilian Brain_version_01.

Re-mixing Mania

I'm having fun with the Prelinger Archives. The site allows you to download copyright-free film clips, so I patched together a bunch of old home movies from the 1938 Worlds Fair and used it as a music video for my "Unemployment Polka," now on YouTube.

I am also stitching together a bunch of animated "Machinima" characters for a new song called "Reptilian Brain." Robots, aliens, girls and guitar players all go into the mix.

Stay tuned for completion!

New Songs With Lonnie Gordon in Mind

I'm working up songs featuring lyrics by high school buddy Jim Ferguson for British soul singer Lonnie Gordon. Before contacting me, Ferguson reached out to Gordon, who's a pretty sensational singer as you can and hear from her YouTube clips .

Unemployment Polka Music Video

I had fun this weekend with found footage from the copyright-free Prelinger Archives: I've posted a music video today for Unemployment Polka as featured in my musical in progress Wrecking Ball. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LzL4jvF3q4

New York City rules

Flew to New York to play some songs for BMI Musical Theater Workshop. Afterwards, I walked from Word Trade Center neighborhood north to Washington Square Park, site of an LSD trip I'd had several years earlier. The parade of humanity, needless to say, was overwhelming and fizz-popping reminder of what I miss the most, living in Los Angeles: people, walking

Dog bite, BMI, Car Dent, Big Wired Traffic

August update: I got bit by a dog - - my own sweet Huck - - the other morning. A rival dog off the leash came racing over to attack us. I got between the two, and Huck accidentally took a piece out of my calf. Ouch.

Oh, then I had an allergic reaction to echinacha. I've been taking it ever since a great Method actor (Sopranos) told me it prevented colds. I forgot to shake up a new bottle and choked, eyes tearing, coughing, all that. So, no more echinachea. I supsect it of being a placebo type thing anyway.

Then I posted Wired.com's most popular "gallery" story in July, and took the Amtrak down to Comic-Con and had pork chops with my editor at a restaurant that supposedly used to be Wyatt Earp's whore house. On the train back, I sat across from French director Michel Gondry and his girlfriend.

Last week I found out from BMI in New York that I'm a finalist for their musical workshop. I go there Sept. 8 to audition.

Watching "Mesrine" tonight, about French criminal. Gripping stuff. The guy channels young robert De Niro.

Songs and Blow-Out Preventers

I had been picturing the month of May as a chance to wheel out 30 of my tunes online. I did go ahead and do that with my 30 Songs in May page. But mostly, I obsessed over Container Domes, Blow Out Preventers and Top Kills. I used to live on Pawley's Island, South Carolina, so I know first hand about the hypnotic beauty of the wetlands. Responding to images of the Gulf oil spill, I yelled at the TV so much I got hoarse. I called all my "representatives" and ranted to their poor phone-handlers, and sent emails, and twittered about the government's Katrina-like sluggishness.

Anyway, I've spent Memorial Day Weekend with a cold. Whee!

Bummer: Talented "Wire" Writer R.I.P.

David Mills died this week from a brain anuerism. I interviewed him a few years back when he was producing a TV series called King Pins. On his cluttered office in Burbank, California. Nice guy, smart and loved music. He had a blog which will give you a good idea of his interests.

It's weird when somebody I've done stories about kick the bucket. Heath Ledger, gone. Had a really funny bunch of stories from Jon and a few months later, he drops dead. Allen Ginsberg, over the phone, always a high point as was Frank Zappa.

Rockin Video from the Archives

Okay, uploaded my first YouTube video this weekend. Ex-ODD guitarist sent me a DVD of the band in Chicago, i figured out how to use this iMovie editing software, onverted a clip into a movie file and threw it up there under the desparately named flamewidget channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/flamewidget

Fairfax Feedback

Got some useful feedback today from Alice and Norman Tulchin this afteroon after they listened to my 16-song Fairfax CD over the weekend. They've produced a ton of Broadway shows including Kristen Scott Thomas' Seagull couple years ago. I'm also awaiting a critque from Rokko Jans, composer for the Tony Award winning troupe Chicago Shakespeare Theater. wrote a few songs for one of Rokko's musicals a few years ago.

Musical, Done. . .

I wrapped version one of Fairfax, my musical about teardowns, a cranky grandpa, his two feuding sons and the beautiful woman they both adore. Sixteen songs, burned to CD as I kept one eye on the Superbowl, tell the story: Five rockers, four character songs, two ballads, a waltz, a polka, a duet and a couple of reprises. Next up, I'm sending the thing out and see how / if people like it.

The Week in Rock, Sci-Fi, Musical

Intense week: Sunday, Jody Durham, ex-roadie from The ODD, came by during a visit to L.A. He now runs tech stuff for Chicago's Oriental Theater - Dream Girls in February! - - but used to schlep speakers and lights for my band. Favorite memory: me, in losing battle to a dead-of-winter cold, too hoarse to sing for a club gig in Iowa City. So I moved my mouth to a whole set's worth of songs while Jody, unseen offstage, did the actual singing. Fooled 'em!

Then I saw Book of Eli and reviewed it for Wired.com.

Found out midweek that my childhood buddy Dale Shewalter died. A true wild child, Dale grew up to create the Arizona Trail.

Thursday, singer Vikki Gurdas laid down soulful vocal tracks for my Fairfax: A Musical duet One Plus One.

And Friday I walked a couple of blocks to the Aroma Cafe in Studio City to interview 22-year old actress Alessandra Torresani. She's the star of a new sci-fi series, Caprica, and is a real ball of fire. The enthusiasm of youth - - whew!

I don't know why but I get a kick out of this google translator tool.

From my new musical Fairfax, I typed in the lyrics for the song Keeper of the Flame (you can hear it over at the Fairfax site: hughhart.com/fairfax)
Here's how the lines came out after getting translated into Italian, then to German, and back to English:

View from the window
Roller blind
Keeping debris
See what you locate
There is a bird cake
You want to use your name
Do you have to dig into the situation
A little 'more
The guardians of the flame

Open floodgate
Tear off the ground
Reveal damage
Lift the hinges off the door
They feel a lot cheaper
They want to know who to blame
They would practice a bit better
For the guardians of the flame

Bathe my bitter heart
Break me in two
Shine your iight shaken
Show me
Apologies
I will correct
To help you

They want to be beside her
They want to stay in the game
You should burn a bit more brighter
For the guardians of the flame
About the level of fruit
She's shivering in the rain
Take a little of my fire
Oh yeah
Keeper of the flame