I’ve been listening to a lot of Cuban music on Pandora lately because trumpets. You cannot be in a bad mood when you listen to trumpets. I am a sucker for horn sections in songs so I chose Ring of Fire for today’s Carolaoke track. I added harmonies/backing vocals to this one and if you listen real closely (not that close), you’ll hear that Toby added his vocals (screams and shrieks) here and there. It’s Summer Solstice and if ever there is NEVER a time to record music in your house as a bird owner, this would be it. My birds have been off the hook crazed by the 24 hours of daylight lately. If there never was night, I’m convinced that birds would never sleep. Ever. Darkness is their Kryptonite and the only thing that makes them quiet. They are seriously like Gremlins and turn into monsters when the sun is involved. Like a child that was fed too much candy and caffeine all day. So today they had impromptu covered cage naps so that they would calm down the F down and I could finish recording. While listening to this ditty today, consider pretending that I’m singing live from a zoo festival.

Carolaoke Track: Ring of Fire

I’ve been immersed in watercolor these days and it took quite a bit to get back to that quiet place. While going through more of my artifacts upstairs, I came across this painting I did as a follow-up to the original “Bluebird of Happiness Verses Blackbird of Depression”. I forgot I added a second chapter to that painting and found it this week hiding upstairs in a portfolio I thought had been downstairs during flood times. This watercolor painting was done in 2008; my ongoing personal comment about the battle with happiness and depression. A busy airport with moods and thoughts coming from all directions and you’re the one directing it all into one place. Kind of like John de Lancie in Breaking Bad.

Today is a scratch track “sample” and not a full song. Why only a sample, Carol? Because some discoveries were made in the production of this ditty today. The “full album version” of this song is not available on iTunes as a karaoke track. Perhaps it’s a radio edit version, I don’t know, but it really threw a wrench in my Music Monday. After listening to other versions on iTunes, they are all the edited version and leave out the best part of this song which are these lyrics:

I’m gonna soak up the sun
While it's still free
I'm gonna soak up the sun
Before it goes out on me

Don't have no master suite
But I'm still the king of me
You have a fancy ride, but baby
I'm the one who has the key

-Sheryl Crow (Soak Up The Sun)

I am not in the headspace to Frankenstein the inside of this karaoke track today to match the music of the full album version (or even if I could for that matter) so I’m only offering a small Carolaoke sample today. As a lot of you know, I continue to try to make friends with summer this year; summer is making that difficult but I will still try. This song always makes me feel hopeful about summer.

Carolaoke Soak Up The Sun Sample

I mentioned awhile back here at carolkroll.com that I learned the hard way about not putting varnish directly on one’s paper collage without adding a medium to it first. This is a slide of the piece that came out of that hard (ridiculous) lesson. I see I spared the back of the piece that fate. This was a cheap framed 1930’s illustration that I picked up at the thrift store and then added collage to it. I think I also mentioned how much of an idiot I felt when I did this because my 20 year old self should have known better, but it’s all about the journey now isn’t it.

A long time ago, in another life, I would go out in the world to fairs, rodeos, random horse shows here and there and bring my sketchbook to practice gesture drawing. I’d try to make myself invisible with all the people around (headphones really helped block things out) but being around the animals made it all worth it. I’d schedule a whole day off from work just taking in the sights and sounds of all the animals and glorious fair foods. I’d do it every year and really looked forward to it. Here are a few sketches from my 1995 trip to the Wisconsin State Fair. My sketchbooks were upstairs and flood free I’m happy to report. I’m waiting for the collective crazy in the world to die down a lot more before I entertain drawing in public any time soon.