Snapsounds
I. STREET SOUNDS
The flat, echoless hooting of the pigeons with their raggedy andy button eyes.
The constant beeping of a broken mini ATM set into the wall of a Mission Street establishment, the kind that never works and never gives you the right amount of money.
The rising wail of a siren, each iteration building on the last, the Doppler Effect, then expanding, blossoming into concentric waves radiating off the Victorian houses and the hills of the Presidio and Golden Gate Park, like liquid, like waves sloshing between Twin Peaks and Bernal Hill. Sirens in harmony, different angles converging, a symphony of something is wrong.
A quiet splash as whiskey decants into a short solid glass.
Loud old men speaking a foreign language in the back of the bus, legs propped up on the rear-facing seats across from them.
The rattle of an old sedan, grey with dirty windows, as it grinds down the hill past the cherry trees whose pink blossoms are just billowing open in a puff of air.
The hiss as the train doors slide shut, the vibrations as the train starts again, glides down into the darkness of the tunnel.
Missionaries in nice clothes and ties preaching in Spanish on a sunny late afternoon on the street-level courtyard of the BART station, exhortations in a musical language you don't quite know but can get the gist.
II. MUSIC OF THE CITY
Musicians plying their trade in the acoustic convenience of BART station hallways, voices resonating off the polished floors and walls, steel and carpet and tile and dirt and change depositories. Acoustic guitars, saxophones, a soft fluid sound that permeates everything.
A street woman, mid-fifties, cut loose from the quilt of society, sits against a light pole, jangling change in a red plastic cup, calling everyone "sweetie" who passes. She has two small hoops ringing her nose, and a dark ugly mole on her right temple. Her words are a susurrus lost in the rumble of street noise, cars, phones, conversation, the change in her cup a heavy slosh of quarters, dimes, and pennies, money music dropping beneath everything.
Leaning against a pillar in the BART Station, down below street level, a bulky man in a beige sweater and long dreads pours out waves of sound from his saxophone, reading music from a stand, a folding black mesh laundry hamper on the floor before him, inviting recognition. The music is light and fills the air like the tide filling a cove.
Three happy people sitting on BART, knit caps, baggy clothes, dark hair tightly curled, clumped, knotted, braided. They pull out instruments of wood and horsehair-string, thrumming into the silence, as she starts to sing and the other man begins to slap his palms against canvas pulled tightly over an empty gourd. It's infectious, joyful, a counterpoint to the steady hum and whine of the train running through the darkness.
The flat, echoless hooting of the pigeons with their raggedy andy button eyes.
The constant beeping of a broken mini ATM set into the wall of a Mission Street establishment, the kind that never works and never gives you the right amount of money.
The rising wail of a siren, each iteration building on the last, the Doppler Effect, then expanding, blossoming into concentric waves radiating off the Victorian houses and the hills of the Presidio and Golden Gate Park, like liquid, like waves sloshing between Twin Peaks and Bernal Hill. Sirens in harmony, different angles converging, a symphony of something is wrong.
A quiet splash as whiskey decants into a short solid glass.
Loud old men speaking a foreign language in the back of the bus, legs propped up on the rear-facing seats across from them.
The rattle of an old sedan, grey with dirty windows, as it grinds down the hill past the cherry trees whose pink blossoms are just billowing open in a puff of air.
The hiss as the train doors slide shut, the vibrations as the train starts again, glides down into the darkness of the tunnel.
Missionaries in nice clothes and ties preaching in Spanish on a sunny late afternoon on the street-level courtyard of the BART station, exhortations in a musical language you don't quite know but can get the gist.
II. MUSIC OF THE CITY
Musicians plying their trade in the acoustic convenience of BART station hallways, voices resonating off the polished floors and walls, steel and carpet and tile and dirt and change depositories. Acoustic guitars, saxophones, a soft fluid sound that permeates everything.
A street woman, mid-fifties, cut loose from the quilt of society, sits against a light pole, jangling change in a red plastic cup, calling everyone "sweetie" who passes. She has two small hoops ringing her nose, and a dark ugly mole on her right temple. Her words are a susurrus lost in the rumble of street noise, cars, phones, conversation, the change in her cup a heavy slosh of quarters, dimes, and pennies, money music dropping beneath everything.
Leaning against a pillar in the BART Station, down below street level, a bulky man in a beige sweater and long dreads pours out waves of sound from his saxophone, reading music from a stand, a folding black mesh laundry hamper on the floor before him, inviting recognition. The music is light and fills the air like the tide filling a cove.
Three happy people sitting on BART, knit caps, baggy clothes, dark hair tightly curled, clumped, knotted, braided. They pull out instruments of wood and horsehair-string, thrumming into the silence, as she starts to sing and the other man begins to slap his palms against canvas pulled tightly over an empty gourd. It's infectious, joyful, a counterpoint to the steady hum and whine of the train running through the darkness.
Labels: music, random sounds
posted by Devin at 9:43 PM
1 Comments:
As if I didn't miss that place enough already! Thanks for the imagery - makes me feel like I'm there!
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