"WHERE SOME OF MY DREAMS BECOME REALITIES...AND SOME OF MY REALITIES BECOME DREAMS..."

July 3, 2009

What an amazing time this has been, unbelievably pleasant and upbeat! Sometimes I think I must be dreaming it all. As we speak my family and friends are gathering for a special 4th of July show of "Ecstasy"--we got a stretch limo n' everything. Yesterday I was joined by Lisa and Dina, 2 of the castmembers from the show for a fun interview on KPFK. The weather is great, the audiences love the show, we all love each other...Mission Accomplished!!! Ha ha ha...

Check out the interview here:

June 15 , 2009

My how time flies when you're having fun! Well, "Ecstasy The Musical" opened to 2 sold out houses and 99.9% good reviews...I've been on cloud 9 for the last two weeks not only from seeing my show alive but from the warm, enthusiastic reception it has gotten. But let the critics speak:

"Librettist-songwriter S. Claus' tuner is billed as "a groovy '70s musical." In this premiere rendition, the score, production design, choreography, and overall sensibility indeed evoke the high-spirited era of The Partridge Family, disco fever, and psychedelic revelry, and the show feels like a stylistic descendant of Hair, The Rocky Horror Show, and other vintage rock musicals...savoring the zesty songs, director-choreographer Kay Cole's ebullient dance numbers, and the vibrant efforts of a talented ensemble...The two lead players are accomplished triple-threat performers. DeLeeuw's neurotic sad sack is appealing, and Marinacci makes an impressive transition from dweeb to sex goddess. Buglione and D'Acciaro give standout portrayals in colorful roles, and Hancock has good moments. Kurtis Bedford's set, Susanne Klein's costumes, Matt Richter's lighting, and Diane Martinous' hair and wig designs are imaginatively rendered. Brent Crayon's music direction is superb."

--Les Spindle, Backstage

Click on the picture to check out the trailer I put together to advertise the show:

May 25, 2009

"Ecstasy," my dream musical project that I've been working on for over 20 years, is almost here! I can hardly believe it myself, the whole thing has been like a dream come true! The rehearsals have all gone well, the cast could not possibly be better, my director/choreographer Kay Cole is a genius, the crew is unbeatable and my amazing co-producer Racquel Lehrman of TheatrePlanners (and her amazing assistant Keiran!) are all demi-gods to me! I can't wait for opening night and hope everyone drops by to check us out! If you'd like to see the show, please check out my "Ecstasy The Musical" page by clicking here:

February 21st

Happy Birthday Charles!!! Here's a song just for you!:

January 1, 2009

Happy New Year!!! I cannot lie; I'm pretty damn excited about this year. June could very well be the "time of my life," literally. But more on that soon, it's still too early.

Meanwhile, my latest musical abomination. I tried to do something a little on the "downtempo" tip; of course, I chose acapella vocals from an 80's HiNRG song, so how downtempo can it REALLY be, eh? This one, like all my latest songs, was a bit of an agony to produce. Because I have so many new tools and instruments at my disposal I'm getting incredibly fastidious about how these things sound. The good news is I think they sound better than anything I've ever hoped; the bad is that it "costs" much more in time and energy, and I have precious little to spare these days, for some reason. I forsee putting all my latest songs together in a cd, ohh....maybe a year from now!!

At any rate, here is "A Little Love (What's Going On)" with vocals by Ceejay and the rest by me. If you want to hear the original, check the link below my version. Enjoy!

"A Little Love" original version

December 7 , 2008

Time flies...here we are at the end of another year and who knows where the last one went. I tend to resist "Christmas" these days, hasn't been so good in recent years but this year is turning out OK so far. Working on a new song but it's going verrrry sllllloooowwwly. Also have a new project in the works...the biggest one I've probably ever done. Too early to say much, other than it involves the link up in the left corner of this page, and if all goes well by next spring I'll be talking A LOT about it. In the meantime, here's my latest drawing. I'm aware that someone somewhere may find the theme of this slightly naughty pic "curious" at best (offensive at worst) but I'm finally in a place where I don't really care much. I had fun with it and I'm proud of it and thought I'd share it, even though even *I* don't know why I'm drawing faeries de-pantsing and emo skateboarder. Best not to worry too much about it, in general. Happy Holidays!

November 11, 2008

Here, by request, is the pic of me that I took last spring that seems to have gotten some attention for some unknown reason, ha ha...

October 26 , 2008

Halloween is almost here! It's been a great one this year. Yesterday I attended the "Thrill The World" event in Hollywood...the thing defies description so I made a video of it today! I wish the download quality was better but ahh well. Also, below that is the mp3 of the remix I did of the song, which briefly mashes in Herbie Hancock's "Rockit" and Midnight Star's "Freak-A-Zoids." This was a reeeeally fun project to do, worth wasting a Sunday for! Enjoy, and Happy Halloween!!

Click on the picture below to see "Thrill The World" (5 min)

October 12 , 2008

Been awhile since I've put anything up here (as if anyone would notice, ha ha) "Cirque Du Freak" is done--what a fun time that was. A lot of work, but the good kind. Now I just hope it gets released, and that all my stuff doesn't get cut out, as usual! As of Monday, after a nice 3-week hiatus, I'm on "Night At The Museum 2."

Meanwhile, I finsished another musical monstrosity...whew, this one was a doozy! I'd been wanting to do it forever but knew I couldn't unless I could get it right. My goal was to do an hommage to the funky/tacky early 70's synth songs, combine elements of all the stuff I love like Perry-Kingsley, "Popcorn," Billy Preston and even the soundtrack to "Tommy." My inspiration was a remix of the song "Kelly Watch The Stars" by Moog Cookbook and old Fatboy Slim tracks. I suppose it's actually a rip-off of those, but hopefully I added enough of my own touches to make it weirdly familiar but still original. Bonus points if you get all the references! It took a long time to get right and was really complex, and faults and all I'm rather proud of it. Hope you enjoy it! Next up, something downtempo...

June 28, 2008

I took part in an art show last weekend. Here's one of the drawings I sold, I called it, "The Frique Family Take A Vacation." I'm proud to say it even made my sister laugh, she's sicker than I thought!

Here's my latest musical monstrosity in the "dancey" vein--I built a song around the acapella vocals of "I'm In Heaven" by N-Trance--except for the vocals it's all me (well, and my synths and samples). The melody is stolen from an old song by Berlin, "Like Flames," which is also where the whistles at the end come from.

By complete contrast, and purley for any thrasther fans, here's one of my mom's favorites (ha ha), a high-speed, hardcore, "who needs cafeine when you have this" tech-nightmare called "Slaughterhouse." It's actually two songs, the second half is a cover of "Outlaw Man" originally done by the Eagles in the 70's. I've never actually heard the song as they did it--I recorded this guy singing in a music class, cut out his guitar and replaced it with "William Orbit"-esque synths, and changed the key from minor to major. And drowned him in reverb, of course! Take some aspirin and enjoy!

June 15, 2008

Good times! Things seem to be going strangely well, which always makes me nervous, ha ha. "Hulk" came out and was great, looks to be a big hit. Working on "Cirque Du Freak" and having a great time. Fun stuff going on outside of work and lots to look forward to. I'm going to be participating in an art show in 2 weeks--my first! Will anyone buy any of my silly drawings, I wonder? Not that I care much, but it'll be interesting all the same.

Lots of projects in the works but nothing really done yet--mostly I've spent my free time doing my drawings, which I'll share more about later when the show is over. My Youtube vids (see link below) seem do be getting a ton of hits, which is awesome. I have a new musical monstrosity in the works but until then here's an oldie but goodie--an old school techno-electro thing I did some years ago. I call it "Kozmic."

May 5, 2008: 1,000 VISITORS!!!!

I can't honestly believe over 1,000 people have visited this page. Who are you? Ha ha...well, at least half of them are me CHECKING my site for all the damn FLAWS in it. Ahh well. Thanks for stopping by, I enjoy knowing I'm infecting my madness on SOMEONE out there, mu hu ha haaaa...

"The Hulk" is done! There for awhile I was wondering if it was ever going to end! But, really, it was only about eight weeks and wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. My co-workers were awesome and I think the project is a good one--guess we'll find out in a month or so. Meanwhile I've been on a 5 week hiatus. It's been fantastic--the highlight, other than *sleeping in, going out every night and being a hedonistic slob* was going up to SF to visit my friend Charles at "Skywalker Ranch." He's working on the new "Indiana Jones" movie there. He says it's really good but that's about all he could tell me. The complex was really beautiful and peaceful, like an oasis in a desert or something. George Lucas knows how to live, I tell ya! No pictures were allowed but I wasn't there for that anyway. I just relaxed and enjoyed hanging out.

Meanwhile, I've been working my tail off on my usual mindless projects. I'm trying to put together a book of my drawings, I finished writing another novel I've been working on for no one to read and, of course, more musical monstrosities. Here's the latest:

I got the vocal acapella of Debbie Harry's latest single, "Two Times Blue" off iTunes. I had a loooong time to kick it around while I was working, so I really enjoyed finally sitting down and doing it. I used my Korg mini for the appegiator and "Reason" for the other sounds. You also may hear some wacky samples I snuck in: "Practice Music" from the soundtrack of "The Trip" is the goofy prolog and ending, "Windy" by the Association and "Guide For The Married Man" contribute the "bah bahs" and the bridge is "The Swinger" by Ann-margret! Not sure why I felt the go-go 60's belonged on this track and not even sure it's working but I like it a lot and hope you enjoy it too. Actually, I thought I heard it playing at "The Abbey" last night--hey, things move fast these days! Here's the track, which I dedicate to Francisco in Argentina, because he's crazy about Blondie (well, maybe not THIS song but whatever, ha ha):

So,I've also been busy posting my other tracks as videos on Youtube. We'll see how many hits I get...and how long until someone sends me a cease and desist order! Meanwhile, here are all my videos on Youtube for your perusal:

For the sake of convenience I've listed all the (free and downloadable, folks! I just do this for laughs, not for profit!) tracks I've put up so far WITHOUT all my annoying comments attached. If you want to know more about these songs, or my rants that I attached to them as I was creating them throughout the year, you can go to my old homepage (which looks pretty much like this one only more full!). First the songs:

Here's the link to my old homepage:

Up next: back to work on May 12th for..."Cirque Du Freak!" !!!! Until next time...