The most famous example of this phenomenon was executed by The Doors in the original, analog version of their studio recorded "Riders on the Storm." This finally gave it all away to me. Morrison goes through his throaty lyrics, never failing to send us into a dream world (you can hear a time-delayed whisper echo in the background), and as he finishes, the Fender Rhodes, soft cymbals and guitar begin to converse, preparing for the extended jam that makes the song a soundtrack for moments in our lives. There is a clear and unmistakable popping sound as the musicians move off into their groove. It sounds, like a bottle being uncorked. You feel time shifting gears just before the haunting guitar and electric piano take off down the road together. Every time I listen to it, I feel the top of my head opening up as things are rearranged.

You can't find the same thing on the digitized and re-mastered version of the album in CD form. They took it out. Now there is just a very subtle silence leading into the song's coda. Maybe after Morrison died they figured they didn't want to give away the secret anymore.

 

Journal Entry 213: Cecil Miller

I have had several talks recently with friends who seek to examine the role of chaos in life — particularly in the business environment. These thoughts and notions are important especially in consideration of resource utilization — energy and waste issues in particular. But it also got me thinking about a new angle on chaos. The idea at the moment is simple but highly pregnant: it is the idea of rhythm. Has this been looked at before? What is rhythm anyway? And how do we translate the physical notion of rhythm to human interaction, and, say, the work culture? And is there room for personal growth and psychological improvement through better control of rhythm? And, then, what and where is the Zone we hear about and read of in sports; how is this related to rhythm?

When rhythm works — when it works and only when it works — you can tell that it works with regard to a cultural system, a group of people, an institution even. If all the actors are in rhythm, it always shows.

But what is it? Do we have rhythms in common with each other? Can we transmit or perceive each other's rhythms … along with a lot of other personal characteristics (smell, taste, feel [electron transfer], the way we dance, our patterns of speech, the simple way we walk)? Clearly, those without rhythm will not be on the same wavelength as those with it. Can this, in fact, explain at least more of why people don't seem to get along … whole cultures even? Two completely incongruous rhythms in the same space.

And then there is the idea of music as having transcended itself through technology and having arrived at a level where it is no longer the control of tone and timber and volume, of the basic elements of sound, it is now the control of energy. Energy in rhythm would seem to be a very good thing to have as a goal.

 

Journal Entry 217: Cecil Miller

There's so much of life that we don't understand, so much of the mind. What if all that hysteria and mayhem that the Beatles caused, Michael Jackson, even David Cassidy and Rick Springfield, were just people acting out what was going on deep down inside, below consciousness, below words, below awareness; the confusion that finding true release can surely create. True release! Those people — John, Paul, Janis, Michael, David, Norma Jean, Rob, Jack, Elvis, Jimi, Jeff Buckley, and so many others — through their art and performance, their transferal of what we cannot speak and be aware of consciously, those people touch that which is real and true, the answer to the question of immortality, the essence that actually is the kernel soul of which we are all made.

It should be no wonder that the insanity rock stars bring forth comes into play and shapes our world the way it does. Rock and roll goes into the heart of each of us and touches our sparkling pure selves — sexual, aesthetic, spiritual and intellectual. It comes through by amplified energy that is perfectly hooked into Time, primed by rhythm.