The Digital Dispatch

From NOEBIE.net

Music

Peace Can Be Louder Than War

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In May of 2024 I learned about this cool project from one of my favorite bands, Merry Hell. They crowdsourced a choir for the recording of this peace anthem, written by Virginia Kettle.

Each of us (representing five continents) sent in audio of ourselves singing along, and the band mixed them all together to form the “1000 Voice Choir.”

The recording debuted on New Year’s Day and rose to the Top Twenty of the Folk Alliance International Folk Chart shortly after its release.

The message is timely, and timeless. Here’s a wish that “some with their minds unconsciously blind” will be awakened by listening.

Peace.

The Lokah Peace Prayer

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After completing the recording of the Cowboy Mahamantra I asked my wife, Claudia, what we should record next. Without any hesitation, she chose this ancient Sanskrit invocation of compassion and peace.

Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu

“May all beings everywhere be blessed. I devote myself to this goal.”

I set to work on the melody, and have been fiddling around with it for a few weeks now. This morning I did an impromptu Facebook livestream with what I have so far.

I’m still not very comfortable with the Spanish Guitar. 🙂

Look for a full recording of this one in the next couple of months.

In the meantime, here is my wish and blessing for you. May you be happy. May you be healthy. May you live in safety. May you be free.

New Recording: Cowboy Mahamantra

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About three and a half years ago, my wife needed a backing track for mantra practice. Being a musician, with a little bit of experience in audio production from radio and podcasting days, I recorded a very basic track for her. One thing led to another, and eventually Kirtan Music became a huge part of my life.

At some point, this melody came to me, and I decided to do my best to make a listenable recording of it.

The project began in earnest in mid-July of this year when I recorded the first acoustic guitar track. I finally wrapped up the final mix yesterday, and published the YouTube video.

Here’s a link to the post at Shyamatara Das with more information on the recording.

Today I’m in the process of distribution elsewhere, with the goal of making the song as widely available as possible. I have no illusions of fame or fortune, but I want to ensure that anyone can listen on their preferred music platform.

Some of the music platforms will not allow songs to be offered without charge, but I wanted to make sure that the song is available for free to anyone who wants it. So it has been uploaded to the Internet Archive, and can be found at this link. https://archive.org/details/the-cowboy-mahamantra

It’s also available on BandCamp, with any proceeds from that being donated to the Neem Karoli Baba Ashram in Taos.

If you use Spotify, you can pre-save the track here.

It should also be available soon on Apple Music, Amazon Music, Pandora, iHeart Radio and elsewhere.

I’ll either update this post, or add new ones when links to the other services become available.

I hope you enjoy singing along!

ॐ†

UPDATE: 2 November 2023

The song is now available on most of the major streaming services.

https://noebie.com/the-cowboy-mahamantra/

We Can Be Together

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This has long been one of my favorite Jefferson Airplane songs, and I love this demo version from Paul Kantner. It’s amazing that all of the harmonic and rhythmic elements of the song were there right from the start.

I wasn’t able to find proper guitar tabs for this online, but as nearly as I can tell, he’s dropped both E strings on the guitar to D, so I’m experimenting with that tuning this week.

For Katharina Jacob

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On this International Women’s Day 2016, we honor our departed comrade Katharina Jacob, who fought the good fight against the Nazis. Asked if the sacrifice was worth it, she said this.

The Resistance fighters put their lives on the line for humanity and peace. My husband fell on this front. I also followed my conscience and convictions. The decision was not easy. But to see wrong and do nothing about it? I had to be able to face myself and my children.

This beautiful song from David Rovics is a fitting tribute and remembrance.