Office Suite — Transcript

Welcome to Earlobe Calming: A collection of desperate, vulnerable, and collaborative acts.

This is the Office Suite, a piece of music proposed by Lena Greenberg but the piece heard here today is not the way it started. Lena first reached out just after COP26, which they had been working on for their job at a climate-focused nonprofit organization, Their initial idea was for me to rewrite Todrick Hall’s song Nails, Hair, Hips, Heels to call out the disgusting stuff that went down at COP, the new title being Coal, Cars, Gas, Trees.

I wasn’t so keen to write a parody and, after thinking more about the post-COP frustration we both felt into context, Lena wasn’t so keen on the initial idea either. So we decided to pivot and focus instead on the frustration and dread of working at an organization that seeks to fight for a sustainable future but is still embedded in the financial and bureaucratic system that created the climate crisis in the first place, something we both had experience dealing with. I used our conversation about what ideas and images were important to include to come up with lyrics and music. After listening to my draft, Lena had the idea to include notification sounds from Slack and other software to evoke the ambient anxiety of a climate desk job.

I enjoyed playing with different instrumentation in this piece, introducing guitar and ditching the layered vocal and brass I gravitate towards for a single vocal line and just 1 or 2 trumpet lines. Let me know what you think of this!

For the finished piece Lena paid $50. So, after all that talking, please enjoy the Office Suite.

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[Music begins]

I. The Monster
The monster is my master
the winner never mattered
because whatever happens after
just feeds the beast

The monster is my master
each victory disaster
our grief and our laughter
behind a screen

Unseen and unfeeling
like movement robbed of meaning
while time unrealing
closes distance

but the urgency’s still there
the pull to slow down stop
and stay with this feeling
stand in this feeling 

Because the monster is my master
my carbon’s all been captured
all my energy and matter
working to keep me living the dream

so if the monster is my master
then let the planet be my pastor
slow me down, teach me to look around
and breathe

Because the urgency’s still there
the pull to stop and stare
and get to the healing
now stand in this feeling

Yeah the urgency’s still there
to make matter all the energy
we have to share

II. Doing What’s Right
How long do we have?
because I’ve spent all my time
fighting the bad guys
but we all look alike

How long do we have
until I feel the hot breath blow?
for our flimsy victories
just help the monster grow

In boardrooms and in courts
we’ve fought fifty years or more
so how long do we have 
to pantomime this war?

How long do we have?
because I’ve spent all my time
doing what was right
so how long do we have?
because I’ve spent all my time
doing what was right
so how long do we have?

III. Undercurrent
This field covers over the Earth
a protective layer demonstrating a kind of care
and there’s a movement below the surface
an undercurrent obscured
and there’s a movement below the surface
an undercurrent beneath the screen

Maybe how long is not the question
maybe how deep we’ve still to go
maybe how long is not the question
maybe how deep— 

[Music ends]

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If you’d like to propose a piece for Earlobe Calming you can do so at gabriel.town/earlobe and click on “C” for Create. I don’t have any projects queued up at the moment so if you have an idea you’d like to share let me know! I am not in any way above singing valentines so if you’re looking for something for a special someone you know where to go!

Alright, thank you for listening and thank you, as always, for your help.