FAWM: "Analogue Camp"

Analogue Camp

2 weeks ago by @jonmeta

Analogue Camp

jonmeta

00:00

Liner Notes

#folk #guywithguitar #acousticonetake #nodigital

A couple of months ago I wrote down the title 'Analogue Camp' and a few lines that didn't make it into the song. I wrote these lyrics on Feb. 2nd, and the music today. Recorded in one live take (after a couple false starts when the dog was singing along).

It's got a few inspirations. One was listening to a podcast with author Jonathan Haidt ("The Anxious Generation") about the generational damage from digital addiction. Another was an English class I taught about five years ago. My students were two high school girls. In September I asked about their favourite activity over the break. Both told about places -- a mountain camp, a seaside music festival -- where they went several days without a mobile phone. That was their best summer memory.

The other goes back to a year or two before I got my first mobile phone. We moved from the States to Salford (UK) in the middle of winter, into a terraced house with no furniture and no heat. No car. But there was a public library nearby. So we spent most evenings in front of the little gas fireplace, reading children's stories aloud: all the Roald Dahl books, and most memorably Arthur Ransome's "Swallows and Amazons" -- about kids who spend the summer sailing and camping in the Lake District with practically no adults around. The book famously begins with a telegram from their absent father giving them permission to go off on their own, with the laconic, "Better drowned than duffers. If not duffers, won't drown."

Lyrics

At Analogue Camp there’s a wood and a lake
And acres of meadow and sky
All of them live in the pictures I take
The pictures in my mind’s eye.

At Analogue Camp there’s no time to look down
And nobody would anyway.
At first you'll be anxious to get back to town
But soon you'll be begging to stay.

CHORUS:
Nobody wants to go home
Nobody wants to be found
Nobody wants to stay safe on the shore
Cause only a duffer would drown.

At Analogue Camp there’s no scrolling till dawn
And nobody’s cruising for follows
All of the hunters are Amazons
And all of the sailors are Swallows.

At Analogue Camp we’re a musical crew
With bongos and two old guitars
And songs in a style that your grandmother knew
For singing out under the stars.

CHORUS

So all of you addicts bent over your screens
That nibble like zombies your brains:
Get out and discover what analogue means
You’ve nothing to lose but your digital chains.

CHORUS

Comments

@greengrassgirl 6d

Great title! Lured me in. Analogue Camp sounds wonderful. My favorite line: “And songs in a style that your grandmother knew.” 😀

@jinx 1w

I really feel this song. I was lucky enough to be part of the last generation (more or less) to have a fully analogue childhood, and I'm so deeply grateful for that. Your song expresses so perfectly my feelings about it. Love the Ransome reference (I read those books during my analogue childhood, too!), and the line "songs in a style that your grandmother knew" touched my heart.

@nancycunning 2w

I teared up reading your liner notes. My kids both went to analogue camp for a few weeks most summers, and it meant such a lot to them to have that time where no one had phones. They'd still give them up if everyone else would too...And yeah, I could use an analogue camp myself...There's a feeling a little bit like a Stan Rogers song about being on a ship that feels just right.

@hbusse 2w

Relevant for these times indeed! “Nothing to lose but your digital chains.” Precious few spaces like this song describes anymore - we’re all subject to those digital addictions these days. Anyways, I like this song a lot and the “campfire”-y musical setting is just right.

@coolparadisoMod 2w

I think analogue world be a wonder! Fat chance, the addiction is too deep. Nice song John

@lowhum 2w

Just listened with 11 months Ecatherina and we both seem to be certain of the positive message and inherent bounciness of the piece! Camp analogue 4ever!

@philnorman 2w

I want to go!

Some of my fondest childhood memories are of my summers at camp, and then as as a camp counselor as a young adult.

Robert Anton Wilson wrote about the exponentially shrinking time it takes for the sum total of hum knowledge and technology to "double." Like, we've gone from home computers being a novelty to the sum of all human knowledge in your pocket just in my lifetime. Lamenting of the effects of media (and propaganda) is not new, from the printing press to the radio, to tv, to social media. But the accelerating pace means there's no time to really think deeply about it, I think I'll just post a video of the world burning and read the top comments.

That said, I sure do enjoy sharing songs around FAWM's digital campfire.

So yeah, I want to go! And the simple truth is nothing is stopping me except my own brain. Great song!

@mikeb 2w

I want to hear the version with the dog singing along! LOL
I very meaningful song in today's face-stuck-to-the-phone world. Reminds me of days (long past) when I would camp for the weekend and no one would know any "news" while there - and no one cared. It all would wait until we got home and saw a newspaper or turn on the tv.

@davidtaro 2w

Sign me up please! We're just at the stage where our eldest has had his phone for a year or so, and the younger is a year or so away from being entrusted with one. I think your paranoia makes you yield "so that they can contact you if they're in trouble" or, more specifically, "if he comes home from school and has forgotten his keys". But I really dig that 'only a duffer would drown' line, because it blows a big hole in those arguments. Ah well. If you set up Analogue Camp, let me know...

(I should add, the song is great! Very sing-along-able and fun from start to finish. Guitar tone sounds great, very 'woody' and warm.)

@melissacapezio 2w

Goosebumps! Take me away to Analogue camp please! I think about this all the time- wishing I could disconnect more- but never have I had the beauty of it explained so perfectly! So many wonderful lines in this song- 'nothing to lose but your digital chains" WOW, YES! I want to break free! "Songs in a style that your grandmother knew" made me tear up- simpler times, tangible, real activities. Really truly love this one! You've set the bar high!!!

@moonshadow 2w

Its a great one take song, You have a catchy Chorus there,

@billwhite51 2w

i am going to play this every day for estrella until she gets the message. i have been trying to help her break the addiction to screens. you lay it out so clear. i like the simplicity of the music and your warm vocals. imagine the positive effect this song would have if all the children were singing it.

@skullkevin 2w

I want Analogue Camp to be real. A pang of nostalgia for what we used to be without our phones. I like the sentiment behind this. You've captured the essence of what it's to be like where our minds aren't captivated by the spell of technology. We have front row seat through our phone to watch people and communities fall, but we have a choice to whether we stay for the encore. And so Analogue town is available to us all if only we stepped away and touched grass