I Write Songs for Barron's Christian Rock Album!
Did you know that each of the five children (even Tiffany!) of President Trump — mashed potatoes be upon his head — has his or her own dedicated PR person? I did not until a drizzly late afternoon on the January/February cusp when Mrs. Mendelsohn (she prefers the original, legal spelling) came up to my study, sultrily handed me her Google Pixel 9 Pro, and said, “It’s someone claiming to be calling from the White House.”
“Why, assuming this isn’t some vicious prank,” I mused, declining the phone, “did they not phone me on my own Google Pixel 6a?”
“Just bloody talk to her!” Mrs. Mendelsohn snarled. “I’m missing the episode of Motherland I’ve already watched four times.”
My caller, whose accent reminded me of Tiffany’s mom Marla Maples’, identified herself as Hayleigh something-or-other and said had been made aware of my having written some 150 wonderful songs of all sorts since my days as a C-list rock star in Hollywood. I was flabbergasted. I have dozens of songs on Soundcloud and Bandcamp and YouTube, and have been trying in vain for decades to get the world to listen to and praise them effusively, to no avail. When I publish a new song here on Substack, it will commonly elicit no likes, and even fewer comments. Sometimes I wonder why I bother!
But here was Hayleigh from the White House public relations department phoning to say that the youngest and tallest of the Trump progeny was contemplating a career as a singer of Christian rock, and was looking for songs, and did I have one he (whose name I spell Bannon because doing so is hilarious) might wish to consider for his forthcoming debut album.
The fact was that I had two! I wrote the earlier, “Finding Christ”, while lounging beside the swimming pool of my and Mrs. Mendelsohn’s three-star hotel in Miles-From-Anywhere, Sicily, in 2017. I later recorded it with Mr. Tom George singing for the Isambard Jones & His Orchestra album. (‘Twas aimed at a primarily British listenership, so Murkans are unlikely to “get” all the references. The composer apologizes.) I wrote the more recent, “The Jesus Who Loves Me”, later included on the Meet the Internettes album, at the tail end of 2019, while in Almuñecar, on Spain’s glorious Costa Tropical. Miss Zelda Hyde sang it.
I emailed Hayleigh both songs sharpish and lickety-split and began day-dreaming about where Miss Hyde and I might go on holiday with the generous advance against royalties the White House was certain to offer me, only to learn that Barron wanted co-composing credit for both songs, much as Col. Parker had once demanded that Dolly Parton agree that Elvis had co-written “I Will Always Love You”.
I said I’d think about it, but then it turned out I didn’t have to. Hayleigh had submitted my two songs to the person at the White Christian Council in charge of ensuring the non-blasphemousness of all recordings craving the WCC’s coveted Seal of Godliness. Hayleigh forwarded that (unidentified) person’s email to her about my songs.
“Are you f***ing kidding me?”
Another golden opportunity down the drain!