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Tiger in a Lifeboat (tm) by fluffyasbestos by cchaplin [Email]

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SONG STATS:
Hits: 1014
Comments: 14
Votes: 3
Plays: 156
Last Played: Nov 28, 2008 - 04:04:41 PM
Downloads: 44
Fans: 7
Uploaded: Dec 19, 2007 - 04:40:57 PM
Last Updated: Dec 19, 2007 - 05:07:07 PM



Description:
Matt Briggs - otherwise know as fluffyasbestos - recently posted a great short story on his homepage called: Tiger in a Lifeboat ™, which I really liked. So I asked Matt if I could try adding some sort of soundtrack to the narration, and he kindly accepted.

Well it was great fun working on this, even though I might have gone somewhat overboard with the music, and the volume I think is too overbearing in parts. But hopefully the spirit of this fascinating little tale remains intact.

Lyrics:
The main problem was that the tiger would either eat the child in the first half-hour of the show, or the tiger would act like a big house cat until it starved to death. The desired effect of the show was that the cat would behave like a house cat with the inevitable, intended promise that it would eventually, freak out and eat the boy. The boy through cunning and guile had to survive -- not that the boy would survive because he had bonded with the cat. This was the problem they had uncovered after going through several hundred test boys -- that is boys without any clear identifying information that they had bought on the streets of LA. Four hundred bucks could buy a functional seven-year or eight-year old. They preferred English speakers, but many of the boys spoke Spanish. One boy spoke a haunted babble they could not identify but thought might be Linear Pict X. Thirty of the boys died within minutes of getting launched in the test lot with the tiger.
They tested five tigers -- and this became a problem, too, because the tigers that learned to kill continued to kill (and got better at executing the boys) and so the producers learned that once a tiger did the kill, it would keep killing. And this became part of their thought process in putting the boys in the boat with the tiger. They would have to have a supply of tigers, as well.
Of course, all of the boys had to die because no one could know how they had perfected the show. It had a lot of problems, this show. It was a delicate balance to get it to work.
Yann Martel had to be contacted and he threatened to sue if they went ahead with the show. The public domain idea, he said, was a boy and a wild cat. A boy and a tiger in a lifeboat, I have that copyrighted. If you do this, my lawyers will contact you. So they paid him a half-million dollars for the rights and threatened to say they would call it “Yann Martel’s Tiger in a Lifeboat,” playing both to his ego (like anyone even knew who this guy was) and his pretension, what kind of literary guy was he if he’d originated a reality cable show?
Reality was played out anyway. This was a last ditch effort to get some interest behind the show. Early one morning in a warehouse in Burbank, they launched the boy and the tiger in the lifeboat, and waited.

Hardware:
Matt's voice, my Yamaha Keyboard

Software:
Emu Proteus, East West Orchestral Pro, BDF Drums
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Well... &mdash 12/20/07 - 01:27:58 AM
That was certainly different. What a fantastic story and your percussive backing works extremely well. Thanks for the listen.
Cheers
Len



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Thank you lengold, &mdash 12/21/07 - 03:33:56 AM
it it a great story: surreal, funny, cruel and sad. I think Bunuel could have made a film of it.


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I used to... &mdash 12/20/07 - 05:10:45 AM
...write music for Children's Theatre productions a long time ago...

...this is the like that...but in a very, very macabre way...

...XXX rated Children's Theatre (Violent Content)...

...Very well conceived, performed, and produced, cc...

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XXX &mdash 12/21/07 - 03:36:30 AM
You know, it's funny because I've been asked to write some music for a children's theatre production next year, so Tiger in a Lifeboat (tm) presented itself as an ideal opportunity, if only to see whether I was capable of it.


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You are... &mdash 12/21/07 - 06:00:08 AM
...quite capable...

:)

Enjoy your holidays...

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I didn't expect... &mdash 12/20/07 - 06:22:24 AM
to like this sooo much... It appears that we are sacrificing our youth to ratings anyway... what's a few more?... you know, we must maintain our commercial viability...

I love the disjointed childrens music iin the back ground... like a sophisticated version of pee wee's playhouse...

all just perfect

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You're spot on ! &mdash 12/21/07 - 03:51:49 AM
We have a TV programme in the UK called "I'm a celebrity get me out of here" which looks like it's fast going to end up becoming a version of Tiger in a Lifeboat (tm)


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Sweeeet &mdash 12/20/07 - 04:34:40 PM
I think I read "Life of Pi" at one point. I'll have to jog my memory...

Wonderful words, well spoken. The music really makes a beautiful addition!

Doug

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Life of Pi &mdash 12/21/07 - 03:42:54 AM
I have yet to read "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel, or, maybe I should start with "Max and the Cats" by Moacyr Scliar ?

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I read Life of PI &mdash 01/20/08 - 04:39:19 PM
very good book, reads like a folk tale of sorts, the ending of course is a shocker

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Music to Words &mdash 12/21/07 - 11:57:21 AM
It is amazing (to me) how CChaplin managed to improve on the original reading by subtly sequencing some of the lines and opening up (with space) my reading. I tend to, as a reader, barrel on through. I also had not heard this piece in the way it is presented here. Although I don't think he changed the reading much, it points it in a direction I hadn't really been thinking about. And the music moves it into a completely (better) realm. I have been trying to work out how to integrate a spoken word performance to music. In general I have this grand plans of doing exactly what happened with this piece and then when it comes to actually working with a musician, the musician plays some songs and I do some reading. This points to the way (to me) without being too much like a knock off of some Beatnik thing.

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Tiger in a Lifeboat &mdash 12/22/07 - 04:33:44 AM
Matt, your story is so vivid with imagery I could really hear the music when I first listened to you read it. The spacing of the sentences was - selfishly - to be able to fit in some of my stuff. But I soon realised it had a great timing effect, and could add some suspense. I love the last sentence in the story… for me, it's a bit like the freezing of a frame in an action scene, a bit like the ending of the movie "Gallipoli" where Mel Gibson is frozen in mid run.

Thanks for the possibility of collaborating.


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Matt &mdash 12/22/07 - 02:31:47 AM
dark twisted disturbing and funny! Great musical accompaniment. Cant wait to play this to my life - she'll love this.

Great collab

steve

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My Life ! &mdash 12/22/07 - 04:36:19 AM
If that's a typo, it's such a lovely one !

Thanks for stopping by.

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