Lookingglass Folk

[mdlbear]

My former band, Tempered Glass, has fallen apart in a shower of jagged shards. Naomi and I intend to keep making music together, and we're pleased to announce that we are now a duo called Lookingglass Folk. We are hoping to pull off our first concert at Conflikt next year, taking advantage of the year's worth of planning and hard work we put into it as Tempered Glass.

The next two months are going to be a wild ride for the two of us, but the concert we're putting together is going to be worth it. I'm going up the weekend after next for a rehearsal; we'll know then whether we can pull it off. If we do, it will be something special.

We'll see you at Conflikt. Give us a listen.

Comments

[mneme]

I hope it goes well, and will be at the Conflikt concert!

[(Anonymous)]

I wish Lookingglass Folk well. But I feel like I'm doing so from the curb, where I've been kicked to, and set next to the trash.

I also gather that this means you have no desire or intention of continuing to make music with me under any circumstances. That hurts too.

I think I'll go cry (some more) now.

sad!Cflute

[mdlbear]

You gather incorrectly, Cflute. I really am willing to continue making music with you. But you and Naomi aren't going to be making music with one another any time soon.

If your relationship had ended on friendly terms, we could have kept Tempered Glass alive. Not this way. Both Naomi and I felt that, as a duo, we needed a new name.

[sheistheweather]

Looking forward to seeing you both there. I will update your band name in my list. :)

[mdlbear]

Thanks! It's not a total certainty that we'll be able to pull off a concert, but I think it's the way to bet.

[sheistheweather]

I'll keep you on the schedule unless I hear otherwise.

[chaoswolf]

Don't think you'll need a webmaster...but speaking of Conflikt have you remembered to book the room?

[mdlbear]

Yes

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Best wishes and good luck to Lookingglass Folk.

You know, in addition to what I said before, there's also the idea of the "people in the mirror / the people in the crystal" going on here.

The more I think about it, the more cool layers the name has.

[mdlbear]

Thanks!

Yes, the possibilities are almost endless. Antimatter, telescopes, magnetic mirror fusion reactors, stereochemistry...

Also, the cool mirror gateways in Cocteau's "Orpheus" and Phantom of the Opera. Oh, yes.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

May you heal and comfort each other by making music together...

[jcbemis.livejournal.com]

what ace said

[mdlbear]

Thanks!

[mdlbear]

Excuse me? It's abundantly clear that you want to have nothing to do with Naomi ever again. She feels pretty much the same way, and on top of that doesn't feel safe around you. And Tempered Glass was, above all, Naomi's inspiration -- it's not for nothing that we called her our artistic director.

If you want to perform with me occasionally, that's fine; I'd enjoy that. But Tempered Glass is broken. I miss it -- we were a good group.

And I'm glad to see that you're still reading my LJ -- I don't want to lose touch with you.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

"I can't breathe!!!"

"Good! I hope you suffocate, you little bitch!!"

So long as that is the most recent information I have about her intentions regarding me, I won't feel safe around her.

[mdlbear]

This. I heard the crazywoman say that she was just trying to keep you from hurting her. Bullshit.

It doesn't matter what she thinks she did. It doesn't even matter what she did, because abuse is defined by what the abused partner feels.

It doesn't matter one tiny bit what justifications she can pull out of her arse. If she hurt you, that's abuse. Every damned time she exploded at you and scared you was abuse. Abuse isn't defined by what she thinks she did, but by what you think she did.

I really hope she can accept the fact that she abused you, and get some help for it. I want my friend back.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

For a long time, I didn't think it was abuse because it was only verbal. The few times I brought up the word, she reacted so terribly to it that I backed away, declining to say what I believed in order to keep the peace. It means a lot to hear you validate it, even in retrospect. Thank you.

[mdlbear]

I remember bringing it up myself once, a year or so ago.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Yes, and you got the same reaction I did.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

I should follow this up. It was truth, but it was truth spoken in anger, and is therefore what I mean but not all of what I mean.

I never wanted Tempered Glass to break up just because cflute and I might, on other occasions when it looked as if we might be breaking up in a more civilized fashion. I can be friendly with and even friends with my exes, and I figured I would have no trouble working with this one. That was shattered by the way cflute chose to end things; I cannot work with someone I cannot trust with my safety, let alone my life. But if things change, if she chooses to take responsibility for what she did and work to get well from whatever is wrong, be it PTSD or disassociative identity disorder or whatever else a good doctor -- preferably a psychiatric hospital -- says she has, and then, when she's allowed by the court, wished to put a working relationship back together, I'd be happy to try again.

We were good. I didn't realize how good until I heard Tracy Grammer performing "The Gentle Arms of Eden" with a flute onstage with her that didn't hold a candle to the arrangement cflute designed, and the whole didn't sound nearly as good as we have. And that was the original artist! I'd love a chance to try that sound again, I simply will not do it with either of the first two "voices" that mdlbear heard on that phone call.

If the third one comes back to run the show, I'm still here.

[mdlbear]

This. I'd love an opportunity to revive Tempered Glass. But until and unless that happens, I'm not going to settle for Short-Tempered Glass or Broken Glass, a former trio with one person missing.

Lookingglass Folk will stand on its own four feet. It will owe a lot to Tempered Glass, just as Tempered Glass did to Tres Gique, but it will be its own thing. If Tempered Glass comes back, I'll be in two different bands.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Yep, this. I have no problem with working with you more often, with or without someone else. :)

[mdlbear]

I heard at least three voices on the phone Tuesday night: a scared little girl who I wanted to reach out and hug; a vengeful, bitter, crazy-woman; and, for a few precious seconds, the CFlute I once fell in love with and who, I think, is in desperate need of help.

I'm almost afraid to talk with you again, because I don't know which of those three is going to be in charge when I do.