Coursing #21 -- Fulfilling Promises

By request from a few editions back, here are two selections from Juliana Luecking.

• Juliana Luecking - Sistahood & Guppy (from "WordCore Vol. 5," Kill Rock Stars, 1993)

• Juliana Luecking - Follow Misty Follow (from "The Pre-Moon Syndrome Post Summer (of Noise) Celebration," Sun Dog Propaganda, 1990)

Juliana is a poet and preacher, a visionary and dreamer, a humorist and commentator.  I first heard her collaborations with the Holy Rollers on the Simple Machines' "Wheel" single, but these are superior efforts.  I am particularly fond of "Misty," a live performance recorded at the old DC Space during a week-long festival in 1989.  The circular storytelling and echoed themes are worthy of the wandering bards reciting chapters of the Iliad from memory.

And for a horse of a very different color...

• Chrisbald 96 -- Double 9s (from "The Pre-Moon Syndrome Post Summer (of Noise) Celebration," Sun Dog Propaganda, 1990)

No, this is not a love song to Wayne Gretzky.  It was the last Ignition song ever written (and then recorded by one of the successor bands, a tradition of sorts in the Dischord camp).  "Double 9s" has a great syncopated beat and a driving guitar that should have been totally huge.  Too arty for the grunge kids, too heavy for the pop kids, this is a song that just found itself in the wrong time and perhaps the wrong place.  I can't keep myself from doing a little whirling-dervish-pogo thing whenever I play this.  Take it for a ride and see what you think.