The Marriage of Clowns is an eleven-minute spoken word piece, written and performed by Michael Rothenberg and set to the baroque musical subtleties of Alex Walsh. The result is a slow groove through a high-strung wavelength. It's simple storytelling set against the backdrop of psychedelic imagery, as if John Prine was playing center ring at a Barnum & Bailey finale. Loud in its shyness, the piece channels you directly into a love story flowing with both confusion and relief. —JP
Alex Walsh is intriguing rock, fleshy and nervy roots rock that defies replicas. His sound might be a little like Elvis Costello's, T. Rex's, and the Replacement's, but his own arrangements of hooky lyrics makes it lock, stock and barrel uninfringeable. A romantic rambler who relived his Paris musician songwriting experience in San Francisco, he's now fulltime at the Musicians Union Local 6, playing locally. His Bronx Summer of Love birth and move to San Francisco, consequent trailing after his dependably relocating father and experience in suburbs of New York and Mississippi, developed a seasoned playwright and songwriter. West Coast Performer Magazine raved, "Veering expertly between Westerberg styled smart-guy rock and classic Brit-inspired pop, this is the kind of disc that radio programmers should glom right onto. Each of these tracks is well produced and, thanks to a remarkable roster of musicians, rendered eminently listenable." He's not going to take you to yoga camp or church and his attitude, like a steel reinforced road weary loop track, explains why he's won Best Performance from the WCS and is one of the best songwriters to emerge out of the San Francisco songwriters scene of the 00's at Cafe Du Nord, Tongue & Groove, and Red Devil Lounge. His deliberate observant-to-a-fault posture and thump-back stack of tinted tracks about relationships as vivid illustrations of 'been there and loved it' on the most recent Light Another Candle are contagious. Bio observations by Maria Halyna.
Check out Alex's web site at www.AlexWalsh.net.
Michael has been an active environmentalist in the San Francisco Bay Area for the past 25 years, where he cultivates orchids and bromeliads at his nursery, Shelldance. He is a poet, songwriter, editor and co-founder of Big Bridge Press and Big Bridge, a webzine of poetry and everything else. He is also co-editor and co-founder of JACK Magazine, a literary publication that relates to, but expands beyond, the beat generation.
He has published several poetry books: What The Fish Saw (Twowindows Press, CA, 1984), Nightmare Of The Violins (Twowindows Press, CA, 1986), Man/Woman, a collaboration with Joanne Kyger (Big Bridge Press, CA, 1988), Favorite Songs (Big Bridge Press, CA, 1990), The Paris Journals (Fish Drum, Inc, 2000), Monk Daddy (Blue Press, 2003), and Grown Up Cuba (IL Bagatto Press, Amsterdam 2003). He is also the author of the novel Punk Rockwell (Tropical Press, 2000).
Editorial projects include Overtime, Selected Poems by Philip Whalen (Penguin Putnam, Inc., 2002), David's Copy, Selected Poems by David Meltzer (Penguin, 2005) and As Ever, Selected Poems by Joanne Kyger (Penguin Books, 2002). He is presently working on the selected poems of Ed Dorn (Penguin, 2006).
His songs have appeared in Hollywood Pictures' Shadowhunter and Black Day, Blue Night, and most recently, TriStar Pictures' Outside Ozona. Other songs have been recorded on CDs including: The Darkest Part of The Night by Bob Malone, Difficult Woman by Renee Geyer, Global Blues Deficit by Cody Palance, The Woodys by The Woodys, and a soon to be released CD by Johnny Lee Schell.
"The Marriage of Clowns" remained on Unlikely 2.0 for one year, then was removed for reasons of space and copyright.
You will need an MP3 player to download the music, such as the free Winamp.