Desert Memoirs Part 1

As my time in the desert is becoming more and more distant, the memories get a touch of reverb on them, the people, the smells, the sounds and the sights are all like a distant and beautiful experience that has strengthened me in so many ways.   The beauty was the tempo of life there, nothing rushed, you get whatever you need, it just takes a little time, there is nothing rushing you or throwing you down an escalator.  In Buenos Aires of course, but not in the North and in the middle of a mountainous spine that runs all across the American continents.  

Vastness, eternal vastness for as far as the eye can see.  Stars you could reach out and touch if you could climb a little higher.  The procession of the constellations, how the moon would rise and fall in symmetry.  We say the Days had no name there, but the moon gave us our clock.  We would build up to  a full moon, and know exactly when its rising and falling and crescent.  On a full moon you could see like it was a pale early morning, moon shadows of the dark desert landscape filling the ground.  The mountains all around, silhouetted with pale moon light.  

Then when there is no moon, there is no light.  Just blackness in front of you we had to walk from the studio without a lantern sometimes and you never knew where you were stepping.  There is so much harsh forms of life there.  Because the conditions are extreme, the life around around it grows to live from it.  Everything is sharp, thorny, dry and does everything to protect itself.  The sand is everywhere, the floor is sharp stones and thorns of all shapes and sizes, and the wild life still runs wild.  A herd of donkeys will come and wake you in the night, horses will dart past your window and poke their long faces in, wild boar like animals that go for the chickens and have little hands and fingers.  I never found out what it was called but I seen a picture of one that Nizha’s friend had to kill with a hammer!  Lots of dogs, foxes, snakes, big spiders, lizards, scorpions, ant nests every few steps.  If you ever kept your feet still, the ants would start crawling up your shoes.  You got used to it by constantly tapping your feet to any sound you could hear.

After 2 months of being there, feeling so isolate and away from everything, writing a lot of songs and jamming lots with Niz we started to realise we could have a studio with the gear we had.  Niz had an old computer with a quite decent onboard sound built into it.  A good set of studio monitors, a nice box of cables and adapters.  We just lacked a microphone and mixer.  We borrowed an SM57 from Nizhas friend and it was the best sound with a mic I have ever recorded with.  It was plugged into a Dictaphone to give it gain, and then into an auxillery cable into the computer.  It really was a beautiful sound, and 90% of everything recorded was going through that mic.  

Once we had the studio it felt so great, something to invest our days in while we were here.  I always believe that isolation is the perfect ingredient for creativity.  And here we had perfect isolation.  It was in a little shack about 70metres from the house.  It had a bed in there, a power supply and lots of insect and lizard friends.  Bit by bit we made it into our studio, started recording and getting better and better quality and ideas with the recordings.  Niz and I became a true songwriting partnership.  Working well with eachother, screaming at eachother of course, but that’s the way it should be.  I would sit and watch in awe and love as she would write out some staves and come up with magnificent string arrangements for the songs.  She would put perfect harmonies on, and not be satisfied till she got it right, which she always would.  

We became like one in the studio, her ears mixed with mine, everything I have ever lacked and wanted in music I felt with Niz we had it together.  She would stop me rushing things, and we would take time to get it right.  I would insist on getting things finished and seeing them through.  We just worked well together and the studio allowed us to really make use of us being there.  It sometimes seemed like it was meant to be, how everything just fell into place.  We would drink some mate, take a flask of tea, have a little smoke and immerse ourselves in the songs, as perfect isolation will allow you to do.  The mountains don’t ask you to keep your voice down, they empower you to sing with all of your heart.  We wrote on our white board ‘Sing like it’s your last day on earth!’ ‘  We felt really inspired together in this place and I fell in love with Niz even more so.  I remember thinking ‘If I had of met Niz in the studio and worked with her as a musician, I would have fallen in love with her right there and then’.  She is so feisty, and determined to get it right.  I love everything about her and the studio side especially.

Juan, the legend that he is, managed to get hold of a motorbike for us.  It was a little red Italian chicken Chaser.  The first time I rode it through the mountains I felt it was the best day of my life.  It really was amazing.  It broke a few times, like a lot of stuff there does and he would rip it open, take it apart and fix it, lift it and do his best to get it working.  He is a man that truly never stops; there is so much strength in him that it inspires me incredibly.  I would ride through the mountains on this bike with Niz on the back singing to her, and feeling the beautiful 2 winds in my face.  There was a hot wind and a cold northern wind that would meet and you would feel them both as you rode. It was a great sensation.  

We would ride the 3 miles to the nearest town and get a few different bits from each shop.  Potatoes here, cheese there and so on.  I kind of missed very clean supermarkets at times, as the flies would be crawling in and out of pumpkins, all over the meat and you had to look for the good batches of fruit and veg as a lot of it was turning bad.The smell of raw meat in the hot sun will always stay with me.  But you could always find the good stuff, you just had to look and Niz was great at finding the ncie stuff.  Choice was very limited, but Niz cooked amazing meals with whatever we could get hold of.  The cost of living was perhaps a little cheaper than here, but not that much.  The cigarettes were 80p for 20, you couldn’t get hold of any tobacco unless you went 300 miles to Salta.  But everything found a way.  Whatever I ever wished for, I would get.  It sounds strange to say that.  But it’s true.  Especially when a little smoke would turn up at the perfect time and  Juan would come back from his travels through Argentina with the 5 litre bottles of Vino and bananas from the North, oranges from the South and so on.

No chemtrails.  Everyday the skies were clear and blue, sometimes overcast and sometimes a few plane trails.  But nothing like the dirty skies of Europe.  A burning sun, howling winds full of sand and everywhere there was sand.  It would get in through closed windows, the studio floor was often caked with a whole layer each morning.  It would get in your skin, eyes, hair everything.  I remember seeing an old man once just after a dust storm and his brown skin like leather, with sand in the wrinkles.  His shoes and clothes all had that yellow layer of dust that blends you into your surroundings.  

One of the most magnificent experiences ever was watching a lightning storm on a few occasions.  Lightning would fill all the skies around you, no rain but thunder and these constant flashes that were like electricity strobe lighting the mountains all around you.  I would watch in awe at the skies ripping open and the huge streaking lightning bolts.  Once a lightning bolt hit the house, blew the wiring case off the wall and left us without power for a few days and without water for a month!  The thunder ripped the sky above us, the house shook and then within a second this flash that caused this big bang!  I just held Niz close and we waited in wonder and worry for it to pass.

All the water was drawn from 70metres under the ground by the river that flowed nearby.  It was much different water to any I had known.  Very heavy, your hair would stick and be straight after a shower, you felt it on your stomach when you drunk it, but it was nice.  When we went the month without water, we would fill lots of bottles up at the nearest village, and bring them back.  Not waste a bit of it, re use anything we could. Try to flush the toilet only once a day.  It was a hard test, but it brought Niz and I even closer.  

Our little kitten, Haku was also such a joy and beautiful energy to have round.  Niz saved her from the garbage abandoned.  We made it our mission to make her strong and get her prepared for life in the desert.  And she loved us so much, she would jump on my shoulder sit with me on my lap for hours in the studio, happily purring away.  It’s making me a little sad writing this, as not long after I left for Europe the desert took her and she never returned.  But I know that the beautiful energy she was so full of will return to the universe and come back into the world.  We really loved that little kitten, so did Chihero the other Cat at Niz’s.  They would snuggle up and lay together on the bed, he with his arm around her for hours.  Their story is a beautiful love story aswell.  He wouldn’t let her in at first, and was quite moody and distant but she was persistant and won his heart and we would see them laying together and our hearts would melt.  Rest in peace my beautiful Haku.

Nizha’s mum, who is a philosophy master, a brilliant poet and singer songwriter came into the studio after we had finished our album and recorded the most wonderful songs.  To see her sing so passionately full of life and love and wisdom in her lyrics, it made me love Nizha even more.  You can tell a lot about the girl you are with by knowing her parents and Nizha has such wonderful strong, creative and beautiful parents that it made me sure I will grow old with Niz and love her for as long as I have breath.  Niz would translate to me her Mums lyrics and they were so deep and profound I was so happy to record them with her.  Normita, Nizha’s mum has the most amazing smile full of positivity and a contagious laugh so full of happiness.

Her Papa, Juan is also a special soul in this world.  Everything is so positive, always muy bien and he eats his meals like it’s his first and last with a beautiful appreciation.  He is a great man, and even with my bad Spanish we would communicate well, we said it was telepathic when I would know he needed a Vino Con Soda.  Wonderful people in a wonderful place, and being with Nizha in her home land made me love her so much.  I am so happy that I went there, and didn’t just wait for her to come back to Europe.  She looked after me so well, and Argentina became a part of me just like Nizha is a part of me.  I took a big risk by heading to South America with a one way ticket to a girl I had just had the best summer with.  But it seems when you take a big risk, you get rewarded with the most incredible experiences.

The house in San Carlos is also the home of the most beautiful grandest collection of coffee cups in the world from all around the world.  For years Normita has collected espresso cups from everywhere.  They are lined up perfectly on shelves around the kitchen, each one with a story to tell.  I used a few of them sometimes for an espresso and I held them so tightly and carefully, petrified something might happen to them.  I must admit, it did make the coffee taste gooooood.  I have already been collecting some for her here to take back when we go again.

We also played a nice few little gigs at this wonderful wine bar that is owned by one of Nizha’s good friends.  It has the most beautiful green colourful garden, Columbian coffee, an indoor part with a wood fire, so thoughtfully decorated and built with so much love.  There were pictures of the Beatles all around, lyrics from Dylan.  It is a very stylish bohemian place.  Right next door was the hostel that they owned also.  We would stay there when we played and it felt like a little holiday night out for us.  We would go to our favourite Lomita house and I would have the best steak sandwhich of my life.  It was a foot long bread with tender good steak wrapped in cheese, with a fried egg or two, salsa sauce, tomatos, ham and other lovely stuff.  Combined with the Cerveza De Salta it was a perfect combination.  After our food we would go to the Wine bar called ‘Ombu’ which is Tree in Spanish.

They were always quiet gigs, the acoustics of the room were so perfect.  Whenever we played there were only ever a few tables in the room but we loved it!  I would rather play to a handful of people who really enjoy and listen to your music rather than a room full of people talking over you.  We would leave some envelopes out on the table with saying donations for the band and we always did really good from that.  One night 300 pesos, which is a lot!  Niz was singing a lot more in the sets, we had learned some old classics like ‘After you’ve gone’ and ‘All of Me’ and we were singing so well together.  We naturally harmonise with eachother in so many ways, and we enjoyed some really nice gigs at Ombu.  Nadine and Fede are wonderful people who built the whole place themselves and Fede loves to grow many things. The roof of the outdoor area has grape vines running all through it, so you just reach up and eat the best grapes you’ve tasted.  It is a garden that’s like a little green paradise in the middle of the desert.

I miss it all so much, and just wish Nizha was here with me now.  And she will be soon, I am working hard and saving good to get her here and I know that the universe is in motion to bring her here.  I went there to marry Nizha, and I did.  I feel with all my heart she is my wife and partner in every way.  The desert bonded us so closely and though we may not have the paperwork for it yet, we are as close as 2 people can be.  Why not download our album we made in love and help bring her one step closer?