Four minutes and fourty-seven seconds...

this is day 6 of my progress backward into my youth, started on day 1 with Pink Floyd's 'A Momentary Lapse of Reason' and traversing their catalog from the top down.

Today brings me to 1973's Dark Side of the Moon, an aural road map of the path to madness. An amazing collection of songs by any standards, certified Platinum 15 times over, remaining on the Billboard album chart an astounding 741 weeks (that's a little over 14 years to you and me).

'The Great Gig in the Sky', the last track on side one (for those of you who remember 'albums' ) remains the most poignant 4:47 of my musical experience...a wordless requiem for mortality.

this 4:47 taught me all that music could possibly be...this 4:47 taught me the depth of human expression that could be contained in a single voice without utterance of a single word...this 4:47 still causes every hair on the back of my arms to stand up tingling...this 4:47 of the most profound wordless vocal performance ensured that all screeching-self-proclaimed-diva's that come after will fall hopelessly short of the mark.

beneath it all, beneath the swell and surge of instrumentation, between the rise and fall of session singer Clare Torry's august exaltation, somewhere around the three minute and thirty second mark lies the most terrifying words a stoned-out paranoid teen could almost here: 'if you can hear this whisper, you're dying'*...first time heard sent you scurrying for the turntable to back it up, crank the volume and play it again and again, making sure you heard what you thought you heard, making sure at all costs, that everyone had heard it.

as the stunned euphoria finally fades enough for you to realize that side one is over, the constant clack-clack-clack-clack of the needle stuck in the last groove, you flip the platter and a brilliant concept album works itself to sublime conclusion.

until tomorrow....

*it wasn't until i listened to Dark Side of the Moon on CD that i realized what that slight whisper was actually saying, "I never said I was frightened of dying."

a momentary lapse of reason

After another weekend of late nights spent at work instead of being spent on living, I was feeling my age, gray, tired, jaded...merged onto the parkway and put the iPod on shuffle.

and there it was...pink floyd's 'learning to fly'. the years melt away and i'm right back there, filled with youthful exuberance for the music that reached me, the words that i felt in my deepest recesses.

i can still remember distinctly the first time i heard this song...it was early september, 1987 and the beginning of my senior year at high school. the album had come out earlier in the week, but i hadn't picked it up yet.

i was always socially awkward...maybe it was related to the constant moving of my younger years, maybe that's just the way i was put together, in any case, making friends was not something i was gifted at...and as my wife is fond of pointing out, i've always been clueless when its come to girls.

it was a normal afternoon in mr nemith's physics class...labs were complete and we were filling the time while waiting for class to end. i had known justine bebko for several years, and we were sitting in the back of the room talking about the weekend...something about the way her foot brushed up against mine under the desk sent my head swimming with bloodrush...when the moment struck, i somehow managed in my ungainly way to ask her if she wanted to go to a movie on saturday, and she said yes, and gave me her phone number...thankfully the bell rang moments later, preventing me from exposing myself as tongue-tied, gawky, hopeless.

friday night brought with it a party, seemingly innocent in its presentation. i'm not sure how i got there...it doesn't matter...i'm not sure if i was invited...also doesn't matter. what matters is that i was there, as were many of the usual irregulars; bestfriend john maxwell, jay bream, mike benscoter, susan rollo, justine bebko, the inseperable carrie pearson and laura wilton, steve semantic with squadron of muddog tagalongs, gung ho jo and dean armageddon, others i couldn't place or can't remember. the party was at dave yolen's house somwhere in the backend of little ferry just off the greasy hackensack river.

things began well...as is my ill at ease nature, i was quiet at the start, clearly avoiding the eyes of justine, but the bottle of tennessee whiskey i brought opened up my mouth and senses. by this point the revel was in swing, and i was adrift in the rapture. and there was justine...talking with steve semantic, entangled on twister matt with dave, dancing with dean...mind you, there was nothing at all reprehensible in her behavior...but the fragile structure of my newly constructed social accomplishment was nudged, and teetered wickedly...i developed a raging sense of jealousy. took another swig of brown amber to wash it down but it was stuck in my throat.

at that moment mike benscoter grabbed me and dragged me to the television, blaring, as most were in the 1980's, mtv. and there it was...the new pink floyd, 'learning to fly'...kneeling reverently before the glowing shrine absorbed in the sonic saturnalia, wholly spiritual, mezmerized fully and completely for 4 minutes and 53 seconds...a lifetime it seemed.

sadly, the rest of the evening suffered by comparison...the more i drank in effort to right the collapsing structure, the worse it listed in the storm of envy...by the time justine cornered me and confronted me it was too late, and i was incapable of even speaking. in my utter self-loathing i put my head through the wall in the hallway, and justine left with many shouted words that i was too far gone to hear clearly or piece together.

i made to walk home, down the highway, across the hackensack river bridge and into ridgefield park, but susan rollo and john maxwell interceded, near dragging me into susan's car, and strapping me in, locking the door.

all the way home i swore incoherently, banging my head in emphasis against the back passenger-side window.

needless to say i did not call justine on saturday, and it was a long while before we righted the wrong and were back on good terms.

what is the point of this rant? just this...live, feel, breathe, love...and play that song that loosens the chains of adult years. play it loud.

yes...the names were changed to protect the innocent...but if you were there, you know who you are...and thank you for the best times of my life.

that voice again

this is the year. this is the year that i achieve...thinner, taller, healthier, more socially adept, successful, fun to be with. i've heard this before, i've said this before.

this is the year i'm honest with myself. better. this is the year i admit my failures. more to the point, this is the year i admit my poverty, my potential unmet, a lifetime of financial failure, promises unfulfilled, promise unrealized.

for years beyond count i've locked off who i really am for fear of what it might mean to those around me. for years i've closed off my mind, afraid of what i might find there. to borrow some words from a favorite song, "if i show you my dark side, will you still hold me tonight? if i open my heart to you, show you my weak side, what would you do?"

but the time has come at last to open up my mind, take a deep breath ready for the plunge, and embrace who i am, and who i was meant to be.

i haven't written a word since the breakdown for fear of stirring sleeping nightmares again. the medicines, the therapy worked, but too well and now i feel achingly unfulfilled with all my professional choices since. i need to try and go there again, at least to see if it's still inside me...at least to say i did, in fact, try....i'm picking my pencil up from where i left it.

this is the year i finish the novel.

in a hotel room on december the 17th

eyes irritated by the smoke and grime, i can’t quite focus...can no longer see you. can't quite remember how you smell, how your skin feels brushing against mine.

some 17 years of hampered ambitions clutter the neglected furnishings of this dingy stasis…motel 6. surrounded by swirling specters, thousands upon thousands of abandoned souls hoping to be reclaimed like some otherworldly lost-and-found...mostly lost, few ever again found.
threadbare armchair cramped in ill-lit corner vibrates sympathetically with thrumming heater...last feeble cry for attention...some recognition. i parenthetically acknowledge its existence and move on.
smudged full length reflection fights its way through the heavy air from across the room and for a moment i meet its gaze. ‘who are you, who are you this time’, tom waits sings to me from crackling lo-fi. where have you been all these years? was it worth the price they paid, this lurking behind scattered likeness? their pills took you away from me and only in the stale empty hours do i still catch glimpses of you.

vision clouded by the distance and time, i can’t quite focus...can no longer see you. can’t quite remember how you smell, how your skin feels brushing against mine. in lucid moment i accept that somewhere in the wilderness outside these oppressive, peeling walls there is a person i love more than all the pain, more than all the failure i covet. somewhere beyond this cage there is a person i call home.

this is a long road.... part 1

this is a long road that leads nowhere
(...and maybe I’ve got nothing left to say.)

A Brief History of the kidneythieves

From an outsider's perspective, the history of the kidneythieves is delineated, and possibly defined, by the bookends that are 'tea and apologies' and 'fake western vista'. Sad as it may seem, this may, in fact, be the case. Not possessing the objectivity that a true outsider would, the line between the ideal and the reality blur here for me.
Whether vanity, delusion, nostalgia or need for closure motivates me, I can't say for sure, but I'd like to try to expand the definition of the kidneythieves. I don't promise that my memories are concrete reality, or that others who were there would see things in the same way, but I guarantee that my interpretations are as accurate as my small brain allows. I'm also going to try to shed light onto the words I chose, again within the bounds of my recollection and perception, most of which have never been discussed in any detail, even within the band. It may be that no one cares outside of the band itself, or in fact within the band, but I will go on with the presumption that someone beside myself does care, at least to some extent. I have to...after all, that's always what it's been about...the presumption that someone is watching, someone is listening - I've always needed that audience, needed to believe that I was performing for something. That is why i was a kidneythief. That is why i, unlike others, cannot continue...cannot just play "for the fun of it". It was always about the audience, even when I occasionally deceived myself into thinking that they didn't matter, that I didn't care what the critics said, didn't care that no one was paying attention...like Tom Stoppard alluded to in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, when he wrote, "the play was three acts gone before we caught sight of ourselves, stripped naked in the middle of nowhere and pouring ourselves down a bottomless well..." when there is no audience, all purpose is gone.
On a basic level, 'tea and apologies' is a collection of songs about externals...about other people's issues, about society's issues, about people or things that didn't necessarily exist anywhere other than inside the heads of the people who wrote about them. Some were only vague themes that served as poor excuses to put words to music...all form and no function, a sawdust cake to coat with icing, full of description but describing nothing. From the opening chords of 'the dying season' through the pristine finale of 'salvation (dropping lemons)', this is a band seeking something but not really finding it, this is an album where the writing is the point, and not just a means to a point. This is not, in itself, a bad thing, and this album contains words that still touch me, images I can still see..."Pressing leaves at the tomb of Saint Anthony / fool dances across the marketplace, flower clenched between his teeth / think he knows his life is a comedy....dropping lemons as the people walk on by / the juggler in him smiles, knowing that he's messed up more than once today..."

At the other end of the spectrum, both temporally and thematically, is ‘fake western vista’. It remains an intensely personal collection of songs dealing with disillusionment, anger, loneliness, longing and an overwhelming need for something or someone to believe in. A direct result of, and reaction to, years spent fighting an uphill battle to maintain control and direction of a band in the face of commercial failure, growing disenchantment with the music industry and continual internal upheaval, all while trying vainly to gracefully shoulder the increasing responsibilities of the real world; family, finances and legal issues. Ultimately conceding to the seeming inevitability of failure, the song ‘endgame’ stands alone as a deliberate epitaph. Let me be as transparent as possible on this point – during the recording of ‘fake western vista’ it became clear that, for my part at least, the fight was over, I was done being continually torn in two. While half-hearted efforts were made to stop the hemorrhaging after the release of FWV and the departure of founding drummer Mike Pinchera, ‘endgame’ was specifically created to be a conclusion – anything that came after could only be considered a post-mortem.

I have no desire to end on a downbeat, so let me make it clear that, with the obvious exception of my marriage and the birth of my children, the greatest moments in my life came to me as a kidneythief.

Each cut on this collection is accompanied by notes in the track listing from Matt or I, adding background, motivation or other comments meant to give perspective wherever possible. Original lyrics are also included. A complete history is beyond the scope of this project, but I won’t rule it out under separate cover at a later date.

If I’ve neglected to say it before, thank you all for the best, and worst, ten years of my life.

Merry Christmas.

- Patrick Borrelli, Dec 6, 2006





Patrick has been talking about this project for years now. It would be an annual event around early November or so, when he would approach me – “Matt, this is the year I am going to get that audio history of the kidneythieves done. It’ll be a little Christmas present from me to everybody in the band” He barely believed himself as the words left his lips and I nodded with disbelief.

This past year things changed though and, whether inspired by the void left in his life from not performing and creating or just the internal nagging of a project incomplete, he got it done.

Several months ago Patrick told me that I would be getting involved with this on some level. I was happy to oblige his demand, though I don’t think I had a choice. My tasks here have been pretty much limited to handing over a garbage bag full of cassette tapes, representing nearly ten years of informally recorded material, and these pages of writing. This catalog represents hours upon hours of Patrick’s near-maniacal work sifting through literally weeks and weeks worth of recordings ranging from rehearsal babblings to full mock live-set recordings to working versions of forgotten songs to studio recorded music. The final product represents nearly one hundred percent Patrick’s work. I was merely along for part of the ride.

For me this process and indeed the finished product represent a chance to relive some of the experiences, situations, relationships and emotions lived through over the span of time it represents. Through these tracks I feel, again, the frustration of bandmates not feeling the same inspiration as me, the simple pleasure of laughing at stupid band jokes, the inspirational and unlikely development of music through the democratic workings of four separate and distinct individuals locked away in a room and the making of friendships that share a deeper thread of experience than could ever be anticipated.

It is these feelings that type the substantive text into the countless stories that are inevitably rehashed at each and every one of our gatherings.

Whether it is…..

Oscar standing over Patrick as he writhed in pain in the gutter of some Long Island highway telling him to “Walk it off, it’s just a cramp. Don’t be a baby….” (Patrick eventually spent the night in Winthrop Hospital in Mineola, NY and was miserable with a kidney stone for weeks)….

or Murph reading us an early review of ‘tea and apologies’ and how Patrick’s vocals are “bonoesque” only he reads it pronounced ‘es-kū ’ giving birth to a new vernacular in our language and years of ribbing for Pat for a single slip of the tongue…

or Mikey Pinch smuggling Coors Lights in his drum stick bag and sneaking sips during songs (damn, he dropped his sticks a lot!)…..

or Patrick interacting with the huge biker guys from some band from Ohio behind my father’s van at WE Fest. Big Biker Guy: “Cool Harley decal. Who rides?” Patrick: “His dad (pointing at me)” Exit Oscar and Matt stage right!

or Tom ranting angrily about monkeys in the recording studio with a venomous tone usually reserved for murderers and rapists….

or Peter’s racist tendencies and penchant towards submissive, Asian girls….

or Milt’s (Bill) squeamish wife at dinner out at our favorite Cuban restaurant – “I’ll just have a cup of coffee and some plain white rice, thanks”…..

or bumping into Darren four years after we kicked him out of the band at Happy Hour at Friday’s on Rt. 17. He walked up to us, “Hey, Matt, from the kidneythieves, right? I’m Darren. I used to play bass in the band.” Patrick asked me after Darren went on his way, “Who was that guy? You know him from work or something?” “No, he played bass for the band for three months!” …..

or that scary bald drummer guy who was actually a grandfather and attended one of our house parties with his girlfriend who attempted to get with every guy in the place. Eventually it got to the point where he felt the need to threaten some guy with a butter knife in the kitchen for talking to his woman…..

The music and lyrics of these songs, both completed and tragically incomplete, are the physical evidence of the lives we led those ten years. Though each song has its own personal life and set of both fond and bitter memories, it is the collection as a whole that makes me smile with thoughts of playing music and sharing life with my best friends.

Thanks, Patty B.

Enjoy.

- Matthew Spagnolo, January 16, 2007.

When we were thieves.....

A few years ago, i finally managed to fulfill my promise (okay, threat) to rummage through the innumerable boxes of DAT's, CD's, cassette tapes, scrawled notes, illustrated napkins, etc., and compile a comprehensive collection representing the work and history of the kidneythieves. To the elation of our tens of fans, i managed to put together a 6 disc package for release around Christmas of 2006, in no small part thanks to the assistance and encouragement of fellow kidneythief Matthew Spagnolo.

The package and its accompanying (monumental) liner notes saw limited release, predominantly to friends and family of the band, and others who contributed in some way to our success (or lack thereof). My intent was always to follow this release up with an online version of the compendium...but again, life being what it is, time passed without progress in that direction.

For the time being, and to get my head in the right place, i'll be serializing the written history in this forum, complete and unabridged (aren't you lucky.)

I expect the initial posting within a day or two, and subsequent issues to follow at similar intervals.

prepare to be bored beyond your wildest imagination....

errata ad infinitum

i haven't even begun to write, haven't once challenged this empty page...still there are already errors. grammatical, typographical, contextual....errors in intent, errors in judgement, inelegant choice of font, gutter, spacing...notenoughwhitespace or perhaps t o   o m   u c      h.

always there are errors, more than we'll likely admit. but the errors tell the real tale. the errors reveal the truth. a lifetime of errata, compiled, notated, filed away...this is the real life, this is how we live, these mistakes that shape and define us. care not for the intent. intent is vanity, intent is unsure perception, script not acted, words not chosen, thoughts not coalesced...these things are intent, these gossamer phantasms that would cloak all that is real.


intent has been slowing me lately. i forget how to write, how to think without constraint, without convention. in an effort to stir the fetid waters of my mind i'll be creating here, in the round as it were, as frequently as reality permits. i always did love an audience. watch, don't watch...just so long as i have the impression that there's someone out there....another pair of eyes, someone to validate that i do, in fact, exist.