The Guild of Scientific Troubadours

SONG: Like Salamanders Do

SONG: “Like Salamanders Do” _{(To download: double right-click & “Save As”)}

ARTIST: grant.

SOURCE: “Regenerated legs no big trick for salamanders”, Reuters, 1 July 2009, as used in the post “If salamanders can do it….”

ABSTRACT:
If someone was to walk up to me and offer to replace any body part of mine with a new version, I still think I’d say, “My heart. I need a new one.” Not just because of the cardiomyopathy, either (although really, it’s hard for me to conceptualize the physical problems without the emotional history). A blastema is, if you’ve forgotten, the layer of cells that grows over a wound and eventually shapes itself into a replacement limb.

I spent last weekend in Miami, and there’s a certain genre of music that you still always hear in the chic eateries. It hasn’t changed much, even though over the last decade the restaurants with the lychee-grilled mahi-mahi and disturbing martini menus have mostly moved from South Beach to the Design District. It’s a kind of techno jazz thing with lots of reverb and vaguely Latin rhythms. This song isn’t that genre at all (I don’t think the cool Miami sound has room for lyrics like “my cells were embryonic” or “not maudlin, but modular”), but a lot of the parts kind of came out of it. If you’re going to sing optimistically about growing your heart back, it seems like that kind of music is the way to do it. I suppose I should have been using more drums and a guitar, but instead I stuck with the ukulele. Sounded right. Hope you like it.

Entered on 23 July 2009 at 6:48 in the Songs file | Care to make an observation? |  Print