Striking a Chord With the Other Side

 

Recently I had a the opportunity to interview the wonderful Amanda D. Paulson for my podcast, The AP Strange Show, wherein we discussed her theories about Paranormal Emotive Touchpoints. You can check it out here:

Part of the conversation involved one of the main "Odd Emotions" Paulson describes as being useful in contacting the Other Side- Nostalgia- and in particular how one might use media such as movies or music to provoke the feeling. Since recording, then editing and releasing the episode, I've been thinking in particular about how much music informs both the psychical and mundane aspects of our existence here on Earth. So, whether you've listened to the show or not (I humbly recommend that you do...) here's a few thoughts.

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Music and the industry around it is largely built upon happenstance. The music that resonates with you largely has to do with where and when you were born, your family or other early influences, and the culture surrounding you. In a broader sense, for songs and musical artists, there are many examples throughout history of songs that become surprise hits or seem to capture a moment in time outside of anyone planning for them to do so. Songs can have deeply personal meanings, as well as widely recognized importance. Sometimes a song can remain fairly obscure for decades, then suddenly become popular for its use in a movie soundtrack. Think of "Stuck in the Middle With You" by Stealer's Wheel, and how much of a boost that song got from being featured in an infamous scene in Reservoir Dogs. The strange path the song took into many psyches and into the collective unconscious, with additional grim meanings attached to it, is really pretty strange- and very similar to how synchronicity tends to work.

If you think too hard about synchronicity, you might come around to considering what causal mechanism exists behind it- if any. For the more puzzling and strong synchronicities, it boggles the mind to think about all of the events that had to take place in just the right order, at just the right time and place, so that they'd line up with where you are at that moment to appreciate it. Of course its easy to drive oneself crazy noting such things, but there are patterns out there. It's not always clear why and how, and as long as you have stable footing its enough to know that they're there.

When it comes to music and associated media, one is able to track possible meanings and moments in time in which a song, artist, or album would have been culturally significant. It's not always obvious, however, and examples that might fly under the radar can, perhaps, show how both mundane and psychical effects can be wrought from an unassuming song. In thinking about this, I came up with the example of a viral video from the dark ages of five or six years ago.

Given the disposable nature of online content these days, it's easy to forget some viral moments- and even easier to miss it entirely, especially if you avoid social media. But in fall of 2021, one man's selfie while skateboarding and sipping his juice captured a moment when so many people had their lives upturned by a worldwide pandemic. Something about this dude cruising along, in a short form video on a rapidly growing social media outlet, struck a chord with millions of people. It spawned imitators for months, and- pertinent to our subject here- drove up sales and streams of the featured song, Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams". 

No one could have foreseen that a hit songs from 1977 would suddenly become very relevant, least of all because of a context-free video of a man skating along swigging back cranberry juice, during a time of upheaval and anxiety for many. The song was already well known, of course, and held very personal meanings for people of all ages. For those who were around to hear it upon its initial release, it meant one thing, for others perhaps it was a song their parents loved. The album it comes from, Rumours, is considered a classic and seems to rise and fall in popularity with listeners around the world. Regardless of the personal attachments however, the song is seemingly imprinted now with a singular moment in time. A time of chaos and uncertainty, and an oasis of calm in the form of a carefree man "vibing" to it while skating along the edge of a highway.

Whether one believes in the psychical imprinting of the song and this moment, the mood it captured for millions left a mark- whether people remember why or not. It's entirely likely that this particular moment will be lost in the shuffle of online media to the point that no one will remember why they feel a certain somber wistfulness when they hear Stevie Nicks singing this song. Perhaps many of them were never aware of the viral video to begin with. I would contend that its irrelevant. The emotive imprint on the song is now mixed in, with the background vocals, like distant thunder in a rainstorm.

On a personal note, something I discovered about myself made me realize how sneaky music can be in how we respond to it. It connects various moments in time, and the order of those events becomes irrelevant because of music's ability to take one's consciousness outside of time itself. I'm reminded of the first time I listened to the album "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd, while up late at night sipping coffee and surreptitiously smoking cigarettes as a teenager in my friend's room. Hearing the synth-drenced main riff of "Have a Cigar" for the first time, while also experiencing the new-to-me chemical delight of caffeine and nicotine in tandem, felt revelatory. It felt like the coolest thing I had ever heard. 

Later on I began to learn guitar and write songs for myself, and noticed a pattern. Songs in E Minor, especially ones that relied on an E minor which adds the 9- the F#, to the chord. The dissonance from the added note with the minor third, the G, activated some part of my nervous system in ways I couldn't explain. "Have a Cigar" more or less outlines this chord in that main riff, and although as a teen it was a new song to me, it had a nostalgic feeling attached to it. In learning to play guitar, I would get pointers from my mother. She had played since her teenage years, mostly for her church, but one of her favorite songs to play was "Diamonds and Rust" by Joan Baez. It was her go-to song when she was warming up or just making sure her old twelve string guitar was in tune. When she showed me how to pick the intro to that song, and when I learned how to play the aforementioned Floyd tune, it clicked- it was the same chord. Something about that chord had stuck with me, possibly from the time I was in the womb. My mom had probably picked out those notes plenty of times while I was gestating, and the notes became a part of me. Even if this is too far fetched, I had heard the song as a small child and notably in the album version there is also synthesizer, which probably triggered the feeling as well.

 

"Diamonds and Rust" and "Have a Cigar" are very different songs. The connection isn't entirely obvious, and probably something I never would have figured out had I not decided to learn guitar for myself. Without any doubt, both songs and the chord in question hit tons of other people in their own unique ways, but somewhere between that F# and G note there exists a secret tone which unites a multitude of consciousnesses and moments in time. For me at least, the vibration of it connects distinct moments in my life in a bittersweet way- and I have little doubt that it connects me to other minds like the sympathetic strings on a harp. I'm sure that other music lovers and musicians could find their own examples, and hopefully this inspires you. 

*** Additional notes:

That last video is a song I wrote using the aforementioned EmAdd9 chord. 

I am not a big music theory guy. If I got anything wrong about how tones work, don't @ me as the kids used to say.

"Stuck in the Middle With You" has an additional weird story attached- for a period of a year or so I seemed to be living in an alternated dimension wherein that song was a little slower, sung in a different register, and lacking background vocals. It was unnerving, kind of a Mandela Effect moment, as I seemed to be the only one who noticed. Eventually it went back to normal. No idea what that was about.

When the Trickster Comes to Town

 

“There’s a sucker born every minute”, P. T. Barnum said. The original huckster, the carnival barker and showman of American circus history, is well-known to have said these words in regard to the money he made off of marks and rubes. The trouble is, he never said that- a detractor of his said that as a way of criticizing Barnum’s sensationalism and false claims. 

Would old Phineas have disagreed with the sentiment? Likely not, but the point here is that the Trickster spirit that animates and lives parallel to all hoaxes, illusions, and lies is so intrusive and all-encompassing it even permeates those things that everybody knows. When we think of the Trickster in terms of high strangeness, we run the risk of ignoring its presence in the more mundane realms. This is to say, the highly strange phenomena itself is but the exterior workings of the Trickster; what we do with it, what concepts we build from it, and how we ultimately synthesize the data is the really tricky stuff. Trying to pin down any particular event definitively amounts to playing three-card monte on a cosmic card table, and always walking away a few dollars short and mystified.

While we’re talking about cards, let’s look at the old 21 Card Trick for a bit of table magic. “Magic” in this sense relates to the stage variety, although this trick tends to fall more under “uncle magic”, common tricks a family member or bartender might pull out on a whim. We talk about stage magic as distinct from magical magic, and sometimes append a “k” to the end of the word so no mistake can be made, but let’s really look at the trick to see how tricky- and magical- it is.

21 cards are laid out in columns, face up. The “victim” selects a card without saying what it is, but indicates the column of seven cards and all of them are gathered, then redistributed in three columns again. Eventually Uncle Bartender will take up all the cards, spell out “Abra Cadabra!” and lay a card down for each letter, and wouldn’t you know it? The last card is the one the victim picked.

This is what’s known as a “self-working” trick. There is no real “trick” involved, no sleight, no palming of cards or manipulation. Just simple math. Mathematically, in ways I can’t explain, if you follow the correct order of operations with the columns and the laying out of cards, that last card will always be the one your victim silently selected. It may as well actually be magical magic. And why, I think it’s fair to ask, can’t it be both?

If we broaden our circus tent to a Bradburyan degree, and let in some spooky mysteries and curious creatures alongside the gaffs and stage illusions, we can see our assumptions about reality warp like a dwarf in a funhouse mirror. Everywhere one looks in Forteana, ufology, paranormal history, and occult magic claims one finds weird truths behind tall tales and only smoke and mirrors behind more cut-and-dry explanations. Sometimes a credible seeming explanation of an incredible claim, when interrogated, seems much less likely than the original claim itself- and often, those little things that “everybody knows” turn out to be fallacies. Through it all, there’s an air of mystery within the tent and without. Phantom odors of both popcorn and elephant dung simultaneously entice and repulse you as you weave your way toward the side-show.

If we move from the metaphor of this fantastical circus of the mind to the more literal and historical circus history, we might consider claims that Helena Blavatsky started out as a trick rider of horses in a traveling show after abandoning her first marriage. Whether this is true or not, the idea that the woman who would ultimately be the face of Theosophy, with its myriad influences throughout occult traditions culminating in all manner of New Age beliefs, had a carnivalesque origin story is oddly appealing and fitting. Similarly, much later, Anton LaVey would claim to have played organ for the Clyde Beatty Circus, all the while learning from the animal trainers and magicians there. While there is no proof of such a connection, outside of his claims, the performative and influential effects produced through his Satanic Church had a carnival barker quality. In both examples, keeping an open mind, one wonders where the show ends and the mystery begins. One gets a sense, returning to the metaphorical tent, that within it somewhere is a fortune teller who is actually a powerful soothsayer- someone with eyes sewn shut and yet with the ability to predict more than just illustrated men. Perhaps it wouldn’t be difficult to prognosticate where all of this leads us, as following our noses leads us either to the concession stands or animal stalls tracing histories of fringe belief and weird phenomena. It seems all of it is, after all, in the eye of the beholder, not the nose- and that whatever your preconceived biases, the investigation of the highly strange continues to be the Best Show on Earth. 

If you haven’t yet thrown up your hands in frustration, and are willing to further traverse the phantom fairgrounds, you might consider again the magician who deals with illusions and sleights. Often, these types are some of the best-equipped in evaluation of paranormal claims. John Keel, for example, remains an influential voice and to some investigators one of the best who ever wrote on the subjects of the highly strange, which is largely to do with his background in magic. Much has been made of magicians like James Randi or Houdini debunking claims of various phenomena, but this is only part of the story. There are also investigators like Loyd Auerbach or John E. L. Tenney, who both practice magic for the stage while being more open to an examination of the otherworldly. Still in our histories we see others, like the Davenport Brothers, who conjured spirits in seances with claims to legitimacy- and upon being found out, continued their performances as stage magic. It’s a small matter of saying it’s a show, “For entertainment purposes only”- but is it, ultimately? Or is it all a part of the Big Show in the Big Tent, all under the umbrella of the Trickster, still looking for that newly born sucker?

It’s all fun and games to conjecture, and fun and games is where we meet the Trickster halfway. There’s a crossroads outside of the fairground where we appear, dressed as Mr. Dark, to meet the Trickster. Down the road is a place where people are concerned only with what they can prove, and what authority figures tell them. This writer has no fear of offending these folks, since none of them will have read this far into these poetic meanderings. Those who seek proof, Disclosure, acceptance from the amorphous and ever-ill-defined entity known as Science in regard to their pet theories about ghosts, UFOs, monsters, and whatzits of all kinds celebrate when sitting congressmen talk about UAP or NHI. It’s a big deal, they claim, when our legislators are finally taking the weird stuff seriously! It might interest these people to know that in American history, legislators and even presidents have been open to or strong believers in all kinds of wild claims. It was a congressman who wrote one of the most influential books about the existence of and history of Atlantis, which would later inspire the aforementioned Blavatsky as well as contribute to all manner of wild beliefs. John Quincy Adams, the 6th President of the United States, approved a mission to discover and sign a treaty with the Mole People of the inner earth. Bringing it back home, Barnum himself served in the Connecticut legislature. The appeal to authority and the self-satisfaction of certainty as regards the various mysteries informing the Big Mystery is anathema to the equation, and only serves to illustrate how tricky the Trickster gets.

Perhaps the metaphor of the circus tent and the surrounding area along with the Bradbury allusions is a bit too dark and cerebral. The sinister carnival has been a useful theme for as long as we’ve had carnivals; the subversion of amusements and novelty betraying our confidences and thus instilling terror has its place, but there is a risk of putting too much emphasis on fear. It might be more helpful to think of high strangeness and the Trickster nature of it all as operating on cartoon logic. I’ve often said that in order to understand the weirdness of the wyrdshit out there, one should study the 1953 Merrie Melodies cartoon Duck Amuck. There are several ways one might take such a suggestion, but for our purposes here let us consider the investigator to be in the role of Daffy Duck. Daffy is keenly aware that he is painted onto a cell in a cartoon, awaiting direction from the mostly unseen animator. He accepts that anything is possible in his cartoon world, and further, that most of it is illusory. Despite this, he is still frustrated in his attempts to compromise with the animator who torments him. He finds himself transported, transformed into a motley beast, and even in conflict with his own double; even though he knows the trick, he can still be tricked.

The animator of course (spoiler alert) turns out to be none other than the ultimate trickster, Bugs Bunny. Bugs is a demiurgic stinker, casually toying with his feathered frenemy in the surprising reveal. It only makes sense that the legendary rascal would attain godlike powers after a lifetime’s experience traveling down rabbit holes… and the clowns of the circus, which we failed to mention early, are the real power in the Big Top. At this point the reader might think we’ve wandered into the realm of nonsense, which surely we have- after all, the whole premise of “going down rabbit holes” comes from a classic of nonsense literature. Chasing the White Rabbit down into Wonderland we find ourselves sitting for tea with the March Hare and the Mad Hatter, who asks us why a raven is like a writing desk. It might be the most appropriate question we’ve yet been asked.

In several Native American cultures, Raven is a Trickster figure, with his own motives and purposes. He is variously also a messenger, which corresponds to the ravens depicted in Norse mythology as associates of Odin. Much like the desk where tales of high strangeness are written down, dissected, and disseminated, Raven sends messages while himself also being the message in question. It’s tricky stuff, and accepting that you’ll be fooled is a step toward overcoming the frustration of not knowing. Laugh at thyself, from time to time, and learn to unknow.

It is significant that some of the wildest tales of the highly strange prominently involve children as witnesses. Think of Gef the Talking Mongoose, and his association with young Voirrey. Think of the young girls who took photos of the Cottingley Fairies, and all that resulted from them. Hell, consider the Fox Sisters and their outsized impact on the entire world once they conjured spirits through raps and knocks. Children are more readily accepting of cartoon logic, of the wider range of possibilities reality has available. They haven’t yet learned to abandon flights of fancy, through which fanciful things might filter through from another realm. Recently I had occasion to interview Paul A. T. Wilson, who shared with me what he learned from a woman who claimed to be the little girl from the now famous Sam the Sandown Clown story. Before long, I was receiving all manner of comments and messages picking apart Paul’s narrative, accusations of fraud and attacks on his character. It seemed so strange to me that these folks would so readily accept the narrative of the young girl, about her improbable encounter with a weird entity on the Isle of Wight, and yet spend so much time and effort finding reasons to reject any further story. Perhaps we’re more sympathetic to tall tales told from the perspective of children. There’s a purity there, albeit one that’s intrinsically tied to the impish impulses of youth, that we respond to out of nostalgia and empathy. It may also be the case that each of us knows there was a time when the monster under the bed posed a real threat, or that dragons were something to look out for or that the spooky old house down the road was the home of an old witch. Reality is more malleable for children because they see not with their eyes, but with an infinite prismatic kaleidoscope of probability. Raven delivers true visions to those who deserve to see what can’t be seen through normal eyeballs. Adopting a childlike view, where cartoons make sense and preconceived notions don’t prohibit one from entertaining wild ideas is a wild talent in and of itself. 

And so we’re back at the circus, standing at the platform next to Mr. Dark’s Merry-go-Round, weighing the risks of taking the ride…