Todd Mauldin profiled by Good Men Project (click here to read)
Ain’t that something…
HAVE YOU EVER GOT CAUGHT?
I can’t quite believe it’s been so long since I posted something here. Where’d we leave off? That ukulele photo was from this summer, when the Hellbusters were out at Taylorsville CA… that was what, July?
I did a recap of 2009 over at hellbusters.net, so I won’t repeat that here… and this morning I’m thinking about the emails I get sometimes about the song “Guilty Blues”, the title cut from our 2007 record.
Most people who know me and our music know that the songs on “Guilty” were written when I was still an active alcoholic. We recorded it shortly after I sobered up, and I’ve remained a sober alcoholic since, and plan on staying so. Life is better.
Somebody sent me the above picture the other day and I had to laugh, to keep from crying.
uke
DDO Podcast Picks Up My DDO Song
Hey, Jerry at DDOCast heard my little DDO song and is including it in his weekly podcast. Very nice, very flattering. Check it out.
KILL TO LIVE ON DDO by Todd Mauldin
copyright 2009, Carriebear Publishing (ASCAP)
A little shout out to my DDO guildmates, who liked my “Cast Stoneskin” song so much. :) Click black bar above to play.
“BOOTS” poem by Rudyard Kipling, music and narration by Todd Mauldin
I got the strangest email a few weeks ago. A gentelman said he was searching the Internet for a spoken-word version of “Boots”, a poem by Rudyard Kipling, and my name came up on Google as having once produced a version. He went on to say that the file couldn’t be downloaded, and asked if I had another copy.
I did indeed have a copy, after a little looking. I did this “Boots” around 1999 or so, again back in the mp3.com days. It tuned out pretty good, I can’t remember if I ever released it on CD. But I must have posted it somwhere… so I went ahead and emailed him the file with my compliments. It was kind of flattering, after all.
He wrote back and said, while my verson was good, it wasn’t the one he was looking for. He said they used a spoken version of it, looped over and over, as psychological “torture” in a military training program he went through, and that’s what he was looking for.
So I guess we can infer from this that Rudyard Kipling’s poem “Boots (Infantry Columns)” is regarded as a form of torture, and that my version is a slight improvement on torture. Click the black box above, and see what you think.
CAST STONESKIN
Here’s one from the “archives”… meaning from a time I refer to as the “mp3.com days”. Once a long time ago I was a electronic/spoken word performer and had a little success on mp3.com. One of the “songs” on one of the cds I released back then (can’t remember which one) was “Cast Stoneskin”. Remember when the internet meme was going around in the mid 90s that Kurt Vonnegut had given this cool commencement address, which turned out to not be Kurt Vonnegut but rather a Chicago newspaper columnist, and that it was never actually given as a speech at all but as a column? And then remember how Baz Lurhman had a minor radio hit by taking that speech/column and having a guy read it over a cool semi-techno beat? Remember?
Ok, so there was this other version that started making the rounds on the internet shortly thereafter, a D&D (Dungeons and Dragons) version. A friend of mine (the Briguy) found it and suggested I make a song similar to the Baz Lurhman one using the D&D version of the speech that wasn’t a speech and that was also not written or delivered by Kurt Vonnegut.
Everybody with me so far?
Ok, so I recently found it again… and I’m posting it here. For my friend Briguy, and my friends in Dungeons & Dragons Online (DDO)… my Kill To Live guildmates.
Yeah, I’m 42 and I play Dungeons & Dragons Online. Go ahead and riot, I can take it.
The (in)Complete History of the Hellbusters in Photos
*Hi* So for those of you who are interested in such things, I have posted a hundred and something photos of the adventures of the Hellbusters from 2005 to the present… it isn’t toally complete but it features, among other things, photos from Memphis and Mississippi, the Sun Studio session, and gigs all over the place, including the infamous “Kilt Show”. Do check it out if you like. It’s on Facebook… so while you’re there, drop a friend request or something to me. Can’t have too many friends…
List of weapons that shoot other weapons that don't exist, but should
We here at Todd Mauldin Band/Hellbusters Worldwide Control enjoy weapons. That is not to say we use weapons anymore; we’ve sworn off killing things since we had to put our dog out of his misery with a shotgun in 2005. And no idle oath is this one of no killing, there’s a black widow spider living in the corner of my office here at Hellbuster Worldwide Control and I refuse to kill it. No killing is a Hellbuster tenent. BUT! We like looking at weapons almost as much as we like looking at new guitars and stuff.
Which brings me to this wonderful page from the Uncyclopedia.
DO by all MEANS check out this list of fine weapons… and DO by all MEANS take a look at #17: Rocket-Powered Chainsaw Launcher (our favorite).
I mean, if you need to get a late Christmas gift for somebody, or need a special gift for somebody, THIS is the kind of stuff to be looking for.
I mean, SERIOUSLY… who wouldn’t want #34: Enormous Bomb Composed Entirely of Smaller Bombs, Themselves, Composed of Smaller Bombs?
The Moth Podcast
PREACHING ABOUT STORYTELLING
Look, I love telling stories. I love to do it on stage and if you’ve seen me, or the Hellbusters, you may agree that I’m okay at doing it. But do this: go to the Moth page above, and sign up for their free podcast. It’s really wonderful. I’ve gotten so much inspiration from listening to the stories and storytellers in this podcast. The deal is, it’s live, true storytelling without notes. From pros and average Joes. So you’ll hear the professional pickpocket tell his story. You’ll hear the guy whose dad one day decided to be a farmer and ended up with a cow in his house on Thanksgiving. You’ll hear about the guy who started his pizza place with mob help. You’ll hear from the NYPD cop who arrested a dentist for knocking over ATM machines. You’ll hear a great one about the college newspaperman who invents and embellishes a protester called “Pieman” and ends up… well, I don’t want to ruin the end of that one.
You’ll also hear from Garrison Keillor, doing a great story, and also from Bill Clinton’s press secretary and also from a New York Yankee batboy’s first day on the job… oh they’re all great. Invest some time and listen in. The Moth Podcast, neighbors. Get to it! :)
About me
Todd Mauldin is a blues philosopher living in Reno, Nevada, who performs solo, as well as with his partner Jack Doyle as The Hellbusters.
The Hellbusters debut CD "Guilty" is available and fairly popular worldwide among those who like their blues hard, immediate, intimate and lightly cooked.
Todd Mauldin's solo show, featuring spoken word and hard country blues, is being performed infrequently to reasonably positive reviews.
For more information about the Hellbusters or Todd's solo show, contact tavo@hellbusters.net.
Hope you find something interesting among the bric-a-brac here. There's information about Todd's blues, art and opinions, as well as screeds and rants, video clips and music samples, bulls and scripture, and a large range of invective and hyperbole, both sacred and profane. Welcome and be well here, friend.
