14. Spirit Duplicator
This equipment is old and it keeps getting older.
It was left on the porch and it's covered in leaves,
and it's out in the elements, out in the wind.
But I'll make it see use again, make it bear fruit again,
chase out the squirrels and brush out the needles,
reclaim all the spirit of the spirit duplicator.
This equipment is old and it keeps getting older.
It was born to be useful, born to be functional,
made to repeat itself blue in the face.
But I'll make it see use again, make it bear fruit again,
chase out the squirrels and brush out the needles,
reclaim all the spirit of the spirit duplicator.
In the Skypad days I was going to a magical place called SCRAP a lot to get the supplies for my homemade CDR packaging. There was an employee there who realized that I was excited about anything with the word "master" in the title, so she'd save things for me like Language Master cards, spirit masters, etc. I forget if I got the titular spirit duplicator (or, if you prefer, fluid duplicator) from her or from mimeograph master Dan H., but in any case, I had a manual ditto machine and several gallons of flammable methanol in my basement. It just needed a little work to make things work right. Unfortunately, I'm just about the least mechanically inclined person ever, so that never happened. I got a good song out of it, though. I was able to spirit-duplicate some covers for a Yuma Nora album using a bit of brute force.
I recorded this album in the basement of the decaying house that I shared with Joanie and Chris. It was small and falling apart and next to the freeway. That basement was the darkest place in the world, and I holed up in there with a Language Master, an amp with snakeskin tolex, a 12-string guitar, and a garage-sale electric piano on which only a few keys worked. The house was too small for three people and a cat, so we took off for our next location not long afterwards. Now that decaying house is a pot dispensary. Of course.
Every track on the album named after this song featured the Language Master in some prominent role. It's one of my favorites. Maximum brittle sound.
