Sharp Music Bites at the Heart Strings

Great Grandpa Beebe not only wrote & starred in the movie, he also made the Soundtrack. We decided to sit down & talk about it in interview form.

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "It was always a dream of mine to put music to a movie"

InnerMonologue: "It seems Odd that since you've been alive for 107 years that in that time you have never attempted the soundtrack..?"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "Oh i've attempted making movies many times, always to be thwarted upon the eve of the execution & initial start of shooting.. We even shot an entire music video & then right before we could get to the editing floor we lost all of the reels in a fire!"

InnerMonologue: "Yikes! the universe was blocking you for some reason huh?"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "That's what i'd like to believe.. It's also meant so much more now that i've finally accomplished the goal after all these years! The real meaning of this film hits me right at the center of my spiritual center, in fact my Editor/Director of Boston Lettuce Brad Walton constantly mentions how whenever I mix the music into the visuals it seems to sync up instantly.. I'm basically just operating on instinct, it's an educated guess really. I know how each song goes & i know the feeling that each song has.. It is rather coinicendental that the TIMING of the music seems to hit at all the right moments in the context of the film though.. it feels right so we go with it."

InnerMonologue: "Dang, you're a supernatural beast channeling something..??"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "i do meditate a little bit, the winter before i wrote the film i was meditating a lot & i even talk about it in the film because in the argument that the script was based on the girl told me that my meditation practice was hokey & dumb.. or something to that effect.? You know how memory effects your perception."

InnerMonologue: "you seem to place yourself in situations that challenge you musically"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "precisely, I get bored easily, so i approach the music in new ways every time. I for a while early in my music career i would place myself emotionally in bad situations to, i think, purposely cause suffering.. self sabotaging relationships, avoiding anything that would be considered the EASY route.. Suffering is one of the best ways to learn, & then writing became my therapy or way to catharsis in order to categorize or an attempt to explain my troubled soul in the hope that others could relate to the lessons. Life isn't that complex, we're all going through the same lessons. The problem with this method of writing is the complete self-destruction it causes."

InnerMonologue: "So how did you pull yourself back from the brink??"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "Well, It naturally occurred during my most guilt ridded venture I almost reflexively reacted in way where i pulled back from any relationship.. Which also has it's own depressive emotions which populate the world of willful refraining from your natural instincts. Physiologically it can be devastating which has it's own set of challenges.. It makes it more difficult to write or literally do anything else. But you definitely have something to write about."

InnerMonologue: "seems like a precarious spot to stand on the planet?"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "Luckily now i'm so weird that my heart gets broken regularly.. hahaha! maybe that's everyone? I don't know? I laugh when i'm embarrassed or nervous.. I laugh alot."

InnerMonologue: "so how did you get out of the cycle of writing about the tragic? How did you write these instrumental songs for the soundtrack??"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "I approached them for many angles, there was a long moment when i was learning drums.. I normally only play guitar, keys, & banjo, for the most part.. I used to be in a semi-permanent drum circle on Kent State's campus, but i never was extremely proficient at the drum kit. But once i buckled down it really only took about 6 months to figure out how to best arrange the drum parts based on the music. Sure, there are really hundreds of angles to focus a song on, but when you are blindly playing drums without the context of what music you're about to set on top, things get interesting fast."

InnerMonologue: "That's how i heard that you wrote the main theme song to the movie, the song that's in the trailer..??"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "Absolutely, I was listening to some old blues album & was listening to how they were playing drums & then a bunch of accidents later that night the song was done! It was amazingly simple. So simple in fact that i thought i could make more tunes with that method, with hit & miss success after that point. after about 3 months i started to write from the melody again, usually from the guitar. I could sit down with the drums & the guitar going back & forth.. Then i could find the NATURAL amount of times to do specific chords or riffs within the songs & then write the changes.. I actually inked up a physical chart on a music stand to sit in front of me as i recorded the drums so that i knew what i was doing!!"

InnerMonologue: "Would you say that you're approach of songwriting has shifted from a angle of self-destructive suffering into the methodology of simply showing up & putting in the HARD WORK?"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "It's been a tremendous shift in focus, yeah. It's night & day.. I've always written about one to two albums of material a year before.. but now i can almost write on demand! As long as i show up & hit the record button that week I can usually knock out one to 4 songs a week on average."

InnerMonologue: "Wow! That's impressive! Where does the inspiration come from now? Or does do you just pull the songs out from the clear blue sky?"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "Any of a thousand points of light really. One day i remember heading to the studio & thinking, "Ok. I'm gonna just make the SIMPLEST beat possible & see what happens" I've been playing music for so long that now what happens is whenever i pick up an instrument for the first time that day i write something new musically. But THAT day in the car ride on the way over i was listening to NPR on the radio & they played some type of Celtic music & i thought, I can play that! So i did. About half way through the movie Boston Lettuce you'll hear what sounds like war drums & some bouncing melody on an electric keyboard that in "my head" is very Celtic! lol."

InnerMonologue: "Tom Waits used to have a rule for his musicians tracking with him that they weren't allowed to listen to any music the day of the recording so that what they were do was the most original that it can be.. Does that make sense to you?"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "most definitely! I love Tom Waits. Anything the guy says is heavy.. it's almost as if his mouth has a filter that filters out everything that doesn't have major GRAVITAS. If it isn't said from his heart or his head his mouth doesn't work!"

InnerMonologue: "So True. Welp, i love man, keep rolling with all the best!"

GreatGrandpaBeebe: "Likewise, brother that lives in my head, peace!"