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David Benjamin Blower: 'The End' by The Doors
79 Plays8 months ago
David Benjamine Blower is a musician, poet, podcaster and writer. From the post-industrial melting pot of Birmingham, he has written and toured prolifically, gathering audiences 'round fires to find language for joyous life in a time of slow ruins. David has released more than 17 records, played festivals and lounges nationwide, and his third book, 'Messianic Commons', will be published in Autumn 2024. And when he’s not writing or making music, David’s favourite things are books, whisky, friends and his two children, Jesse and Rosa. 'Whatever you want to call David' says Outside Left Magazine, 'he remains one of the most singular and compelling music artists in Birmingham right now.'
Show Notes:
David Benjamine Blower:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/286u8X9g8zCa5OODERzaPX?si=GK6SD3uhQt-2ztJ8ycCOOg
Help us a grow a community of survival song listeners by joining us on over on Substack:
https://survivalsongs.substack.com/
'The End' by The Doors by can be found on our community playlist on Spotify along with our listener’s Survival Songs. Check it out and add your own!
This episode contains small portions of ’'The End' by The Doors. Survival Songs claims no copyright of this work. This is included as a form of music review and criticism and as a way to celebrate, promote and encourage the listener to seek out the artists work.
Find out more about The Doors here:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/22WZ7M8sxp5THdruNY3gXt?si=Eg-6VfsVRpaQH94fhQj2Bg
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Transcript
Introduction to Hosts and Podcast
00:00:01
Speaker
I'm Lydia. I'm Ed. We're friends with a playlist for everything. And it turns out, we both have one called survival songs. And he got us thinking, what are other people's survival songs? So we thought we'd find out. Welcome to Survival Songs. A podcast where each episode our guest tells us about a song that gets them through the best and worst of times. Sensitive topics might be discussed. So look after yourself. The show contains portions of copyrighted material. We'd love for you to support and celebrate the artists by streaming, downloading and buying their brilliant music. And go give our guests a follow on social media.
00:00:38
Speaker
Help us grow the community of survival song listeners by joining us over on Substack and add to our public playlist on Spotify. Links are in the show notes. We hope you enjoy the show.
Introduction to Guest: David Benjamin-Blower
00:00:49
Speaker
Hello, I'm Ed and welcome to Survival Songs. This week is my absolute pleasure to welcome our guest, David Benjamin-Blower. David describes himself as a musician, poet, podcast and writer. He comes from the post-industrial melting pot of Birmingham, has written and taught prolifically, gathering audiences around fires to find language for joyous life and times of slow ruins.
00:01:11
Speaker
David has released more than 17 records, played festivals and lounges nationwide and his third book, Messianic Commons, will be published in autumn 2024. When he's not making music, David's favourite things are books, whisky, friends and his two children, Jesse and Rosa. Outside Left Magazine says about David, whatever you want to call him, he remains one of the most singular and compelling music artists in Birmingham right now.
David's Survival Song: 'The End' by The Doors
00:01:35
Speaker
We're going to speak to David in a minute, but before we do, here's part of his survival song. This is The End by The Doors. This is the end, my only friend. The end of our elaborate plans. The end of everything that stands. The end.
00:02:02
Speaker
OK, so that was today's survival song from our guest David Benjamin Blow, who is with us now. Hello, David. Hello, Ed. Thanks for having me. Oh, thanks for being here. So um tell me, how did this song arrive in your life? Like, when did you first hear it? When do you first experience it? What was your reaction to it? it's It goes down to a mixtape. I i have ah ah had cool older sisters in the 1980s and my my sister Jo gave me and my brothers ah mixtapes. the the The slightly wider backstory is
00:02:37
Speaker
um I lost, ah we lost a parent, I'm one of five siblings, um and my mum died when I was five years old. um ah So we as a kind of cohort of siblings experienced this. um And then, um and then my And then our family changed, my dad remarried, and my sisters were ah fostered, ah sent to foster care. um So this mixtape was like one of the early things that came back once, um once our sisters weren't living with us anymore. And this mixtape just ah like, you know, your first mixtape, I listened to, listened to this thing over and over again. But they get the sound of that song.
00:03:29
Speaker
just became part of the, um you know, just part of the fabric, the weave of life. When I was I don't know, like a kind of 10 year old kids, um, you know, quite young, too young to be listening to, um, um, sort of out of control rock and roll music. Yeah. That's the story. I think so. So it's sort of a connection back to your family. Is that sort of, that's, is that one of the reasons why you sort of having siblings, we, we experienced things together. Um, as I guess everyone with siblings, uh, does in some way or other. So yeah, it's part of the, um, uh, the sheds, uh, you know, shared story of growing up, I guess.
00:04:07
Speaker
Where did the survival part of this come
Processing Endings and Loss Through Music
00:04:09
Speaker
into it? Like how does how does this become a survival song? Because obviously it's it's it's part of your core memories in terms of connecting you to your your siblings, but how then does it become like as an individual, become how does it become a survival song? Yeah, good question. And it it's um it feels like more of a song of defeat than a survival song. Yeah. um it It went into me in a certain kind of way because I guess I'd experienced a lot of, like,
00:04:44
Speaker
I'd experienced some losses kind of in a row over, you know, a handful of years. I'd lost a parent and then the shape of my family had changed. So i't I didn't think of it, you know, consciously that way at the time. I didn't think I was, you know, need to hold on to this song. because a lot of endings have happened or something like that. The one thing that's certain in life is that, um you know, anything could happen and that anything might not be good. ah So I think um that is the weird and slightly morbid way that this song helped. Yeah.
00:05:24
Speaker
Yeah, but in but in a way that what you're doing is processing right through that song, okay? is that might Does that make sense? It feels like, because you can look at it, I suppose, it's what side of the glass you look at that through, because if you, yes, you can say, well, there's kind of an overextenduation on the morbid in the end, but fundamentally what you're dealing with it is you're coming to terms with mortality, and you're coming to terms with the fact that things do end. And I think one of the things we don't necessarily do as humans very well is deal with endings. We, you know, look at the way we react when famous people die, even though they're 95, and we'll still lose our minds like it was a tragedy. It's like, they live till they're 95, that's some good going. It's like we don't really accept endings and it feels like
00:06:10
Speaker
through this song and through everything that's shaped. Is that fair to say that it's sort of like, that's that's how you shape, that's a way of understanding that and the ending is inevitable. And that's healthy. Yeah, i think there is I think there is something healthy in um finding language and symbols and words, and they say it's for endings and for loss. It's part of living. I'm i a musician and a writer now, and i'm sort of I've become sort of in my in my small world. tight Typecast is like a very morbid um
00:06:47
Speaker
making very morbid work to the point where someone asked once if they could hire me for one of my lament parties.
Balancing Endings and New Beginnings
00:06:57
Speaker
yeah um I suppose I've carried that um that but that purpose or ability or vision it you know through life whether well or not well. um that if people are interested in what I do it's because they want a space to sort of think about endings or think about loss in a way that you know you can live with. And is that in a way a really sort of like unique way to survive is that you survive by knowing there's an end right? They're actually going as hard as it gets this does end.
00:07:32
Speaker
I guess, well, the um the unhealthy side of it for me as I begin to um recover from my um childhood survival mechanisms is that, hey I mean, everything ends in a way, but also everything carries on. um And if you're if you're, you know, ah if I've survived by kind of just looking at everything at the island. i You sort of cope with the instability of things by just accepting the ending of things. um I don't know, I guess it's just a question of balance. There's also life, there's also newness, there's also ah beautiful surprises and unexpected things as well as, you know, um unwanted surprises.
00:08:18
Speaker
um So yeah, that that like inevitability is, well it can be ah a vice and a drug I think, you know, it's a bit like a hubris of certainty. Yeah. And how do you think that relates to this song then? And and how do you think you're processing all that through this song? Big question.
The Song as Meditation and Emotional Processing
00:08:38
Speaker
like Firstly, like the aesthetics. the like The opening sound. You've got the guitar creating this weird sound and the cymbals are just tinkling. There isn't a rhythm yet.
00:08:56
Speaker
And if it fited like, it's almost sounded to me like you're going into some weird temple. um And it's like a trance. um And there's something about the state of trance that the song has always put me in. Oh, that that enables a kind of feeling of resolution.
00:09:22
Speaker
enables me to stay still or to be still in an environment that feels unsafe and unstable and unpredictable and where where your body would want to panic, you know. Yeah, because it's less of a song and more of a meditation, right? You know, it's it's because it's a's it's a lot. It's 11 minutes, 48 seconds long. That's a that's not a short, you know, quick, bite-sized song. That's that is some time, particularly with one song. Right. So, yeah, it makes sense that it's that kind of meditation. um Yeah, it's like it it's like a dream, isn't it? It's like a weird dream. I suppose, yes I mean, maybe that's a way of seeing it. It's like a waking dream. we ah look I need to dream so I can emotionally process things that are difficult to process consciously. I feel like it kind of um creates a space where I'm able to do that without without being asleep.
00:10:14
Speaker
that Yeah, that makes actually makes loads of sense of that song, and especially in the context you're talking about. Me and Lid, you always talk about the kind of bit in a song, the bit, which you kind of go, oh, that's the bit. I'm waiting for that moment, that kind of like, you know, whether it's a lyric or it's like this there's a guitar movement or even all the drums kicking or whatever it is, is there a moment in this song which kind of really either takes you further into the the meditative state or it, you know, or just kind of really just brings you joy or physical, there's some kind of physical reaction. um One of our guests talked about how literally they felt physically moved by the song and that's, is is there a point for you with that one?
00:10:59
Speaker
Oh, the song is such a ah landscape. So much happens. There's a lot of time for things to happen, and it's such a long song. I think it's kind of an an an instrumental kind of breakout moment. um The song's begun. the There's been you know a couple of verses. that They sound almost like verses of a normal song. And then an instrumental um break happens is there suddenly a lull a quiet and then there's a drum roll and it's not like a drum fill it's like a drum roll there's not like a ah rhythmic quality to it and then crash and then the guitar does it's kind of soaring line upwards and it has this swell
00:11:51
Speaker
And it's like some of the violence that the song is talking about is allowed into the yeah into the space, into the trance um and swells into it so that you, you know, just enough so you can see it and behold it and cope with it. But then it just sort of drifts away almost as quickly. I'm just wondering how often you listen to it because it's it' been ah ah over 11 minutes. How often do you listen to this song? I feel like it'd be unhealthy to listen to it too much. Yeah, not loads. I mean, it's not like the, um oh, I need something. let's just Put it on um ah ah briefly before the next thing. um Yeah, so it's not like this ah regular return to sort of thing. I think it's a very, it's ah very occasionally and rarely that I visit that strange temple.
00:12:47
Speaker
Every now and then. um And and is it still do you still feel the same when you do, when you return? Yeah, that's that's one of the the puzzling things for me. um Yeah, music does kind of... do things over time, but I'm surprised that, you know, how easy it is to fall into the trance again every time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, thank you for sharing your brilliant survival song with us.
Where to Find David's Work and Podcast Promotion
00:13:16
Speaker
Where can people find out about your work and what you do? um I am a musician, so if you look for David Benjamin Blower, wherever you listen to music, Bandcamp is great for me. All the other places um ah work. You can find me in those places. um And then I'm a writer. I'm writing um on ah on Substack ah ah mostly these days, so you can find me there. Well, thank you for sharing your time and we'll hopefully see you again soon. Take care. Cheers.
00:13:49
Speaker
you We really hope you enjoyed the episode. If you want to support the podcast further you can choose to upgrade your subscription on Substack, but most of all we just love it if you told your friends about what we're up to. Thanks for listening.