Part II

nick maybury
not the generic standard
names—nickmaybes--gene simmons' advice/ nicky may, nikki may, or NM---if you were a brand what
would you be---and isn't a sound a nameless thing, a wordless song?
What's been new this year with nick maybury . . . when we spoke before I was writing for a fun little
hollywood website, now defunct or in disrepair—a learning avenue---what's new is a lot of things—we
could only guess or hope last january—a UK tour with oregon to LA band gran ronde---lollapalooza
with perry ferrel---austin's south by southwest—montreal---vegas---miami's music fest---small blues
gigs in venice with speedway---and the classic blues revival with dave lamar and lisa harriton---guest
spots with andy clockwise in the spaceland july 09 residency---studio work with skinny streets---sound
factory---studio work with electro-genius Kaskade aka . . .---what else? What I want to know, almost
irrelevantly, is when we can get a real wikipedia article up on Nick maybury—and when will we see
him on bigger stage or solo/collaborative work of his own orchestration? Music? Silence?

When I found nick last january it was on recommendation of D. Henry Fenton, a talented folk rock
artist with new zealand—aussie--north carolina roots. Henry told me, exclusively, you know nick's
been picked up . . . and he's really, really good . . . a recent spate of good fortune around christmas
08 . . . and i'd seen nick play most likely with andy clockwise at spaceland . . . or at hotel cafe---and
then the Gibson solo guitar segment for the copperpeace launch party---a show which remains
emblematic of a secret sound . . . the sound of maybury unfiltered, a future of ambient
experimentation . . . I immediately asked, re influences: metal? Middle eastern? Celtic?
And I felt celtic atavistic adumbrations in a jungian sense: music of eons in psychic transmission from
dead forebears.

And as I write I imagine conversations---little snippets of wisdom---things nick said or wrote or

implied about the future of sound and the history informing new musical experiences.
I told my mother, a patron of the arts and music her entire life, about the aphorism heading up
maybury's myspace presence, “when the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will
know peace” and I wonder what nick sees to be the power of music to effectuate peace in the lives of
friends and strangers alike. At the recent 8-23-09 cinespace show, the very wordlessness of several of
the songs annd genre-hopping resonances which crossed from trip-hop to industrial to classical, celtic,
arabic sounds, bagpipe, U2, a little reggae even? Bespeaking to me of a fusion of different musical
languages much in the tradition of ravi shankar and the beatles world interludes or philip glass's
fostering of an international language—an esperanto of music—or david byrne's world music passions,
and pan-nationalism, panoptic views which are totally borderless, uninhibited, a global vision sonically
which erases divisions, borders, and synthesizes something universal in vision---a music of peace,
postwar, postgreed, postrace, postgender, posthate . . . .
why the maybury sound helps revive my latent utopianism---how sounds could change an outlook or
supercharge the neurochemical dopaminergic reactions leading to feelings of enlightenment, ecstasy—a
greater mystery of musical genius, the art of propaganda, and history of mysticisms and the
philosophies of mind control and religious obedience.
Proficiencies aside, the language of melody . . . and how it came to conjure ambiance—like an “opium
den in prague” as one prescient twitterer noted about the lollapalooza perry ferrel set—or in the opium
dreams of coleridge and the damsel who on a dulcimer played---the music exstasis of scriabin---music
and the occult---wordless songs and the LA song---about the gritty life in an unknown city with
material exigencies pressing from all around---i wonder what are the unknown songs---unknown or
secret to a few---crafted at the 3am guitar ramble---or secret files---secret recordings, ideas---and I
think of the diligence and application of beck hansen putting every song to tape---no matter how
“totally confused” or jagged, nightmarish, gritty and unfinished and---what he said of the transmission
to others and the originating point non-essential---but the influence exerted on peers, and creation and
creativity the greater essence . . .art's power to affect others, and die, in “planned obsolescence.”
to think of Mink—nick's old band, and the hoards of adoring fans in Japan---or thunder from heaven's
vision, and cam powell's application and orchestration . . .
and the desired collaborations . . .
shay raviv of violet vision . . .
kaskade . . .
the studio genius of dustin mosley, a mystery unto himself of application . . . drive, studies, a near-
death roadtrip experience, the survival of a team, the click revenue of music future, trent—at least you
are alive---and NIN making a stir at the palladium . . . radiohead's promise not to release another
record . . . but the stray mp3 hitting the information superhighway “these are my twisted words” . . .
polyphonic, venture capital, MAMA and the death of the music industry . . . ironic wise words of
maybury april: “there is no music industry” and the irony of his very clear work in such non-existent
industry . . . . and the power of bands to have such an effect on such a large number of people . . . just
as the recording industry began to crumble . . . and the RIAA emerged as a frankenstein of the
graveyard of dead technologies to haunt our digital futures with moneywars of litigation and
cyberstalking, and a creepy assault on a consumership . . . at which point love of music became a
crime, consumers at knifepoint of the old pushers . . . the non-monetized youtube . . bootlegs and
hometapes and the $675,000 mixtape . . . and the old ways, the old tuesday release and hitting tower
records at 8am to buy the first pressing of the ominously titled OK COMPUTER , napster busy being
born, or dying
and music future in the hands of sigur ros and local live scenes everywhere anywhere or in the secret
music of hollywood locals like nick maybury . . .
beautiful sounds echoing some sound of the ocean, and flight and fear of mortality, and love or peace
the only thing left worth communicating . . .
the recording imperative . . . and gift to futures and unknown unborn souls . . .
music from the maybury music box and dreams of the future of laptops and music, lights, colors,
sounds, and sonic luxury recalling debussy or ravel's bolero, or tricky's maxinquay . . . hunger for life
when so much gets eaten up by the smoke around us . . . the eco-destruction . . . and the green festivals
of the future with music of peace . . . fighting the hunger and and war killing people off by the day . . .
know less now than then . . .
except that “guantanamo is for lovers” . . . thank you “DR,very offended”