Under the Surface

There is a way that we know things "under the surface." Some people call it intuition. Or following your gut. Or instinct. I contend that this is a very real and extremely useful way of knowing. I like to call it "being honest with yourself." There are times I have failed to be honest with myself in relationships. If I had listened to messages under the surface I would have known that certain things would not work out. On the flip side, how many times have I ignored positive messages and missed out on amazing opportunities?

So how exactly does one tap into this way of knowing? I think a lot of it is about paying attention to feelings, something that men are not often encouraged to do. It is a skill we have to work hard at. Everyone feels, though. It is just a matter of noticing it, naming it, and giving voice to it.

Example:
About a year and a half ago, I was walking on Massachusetts Avenue in Boston and passed a (seemingly homeless) man. He was lying on the ground, backpack still on his back, and a couple people were standing around him. I do not know what happened, but it appeared the man had collapsed. I looked up and saw an ambulance approaching. The situation appeared to be under control, but I found myself compelled to stop and check. I fought the urge, however, and just kept walking. I was in a hurry. Had to get to class. It wasn't my business. What help could I offer anyway? It took all of thirty seconds for me to forget the whole experience. I went about my business as usual.

It wasn't until that night as I lay in bed that this melancholy enveloped me. The image of the fallen man came back and I felt terrible for behaving so apathetically towards him. It was too late to change my response to the situation, but the events and my actions rippled through my consciousness like a stone dropped in a pond. I brought the scenario to a mentor of mine, a psychology professor. His stance is that these kinds of situations are little mini "wake-up calls." We find ourselves in a nonordinary situation and momentarily "wake up" from our ordinary way of walking around in the world. Often, we return to our routines with little thought or consideration. But every now and then, we experience the ripple effect, these lingering waves of feeling which call us to make meaning of them.

"So what is the meaning?" I asked
"You get to decide."
"I guess I just don't know what to make of it."

After some thought, he offered a potential explanation that perhaps the lesson to take away from the experience is simply that I care, that people matter to me, and that I can be moved by other people's plights.

Up until this point, I had walked around in the world feeling disconnected, isolated, and a little bit cold. Unsympathetic. I let other people mirror that reality for me. A part of me, however, knew that I am really a compassionate person who cares deeply about the wellbeing of others. You might say that this reality lay under the surface. My experience with the homeless man on the street was an opportunity for this under-the-surface knowing to show up.

I encourage you to pay attention to the way feelings show up in your life. Listen to these feeling states and try to discern the meaning of them. It doesn't have to be some profound revelation. As someone much wiser than I once said, "Sometimes just the fact 'that you care' is big medicine."

YouTube

I think there are advantages to the ease of access we now have to music, videos, and information from around the world. I also think it's a travesty how many people do not seem to value art anymore.

I have never uploaded someone else's performance to YouTube but I certainly have watched other people's uploads. I usually justify it by one of the following reasons:

1 - I'm already a paying customer of a particular artist, so watching a pirated video or song here and there is no big deal

2 - This particular thing hasn't been released yet - or I haven't purchased it yet - but I fully intend to.

3 - This particular artist and the record label they are signed to already have bagillions of dollars, so I don't care if this is illegal or not.

I'm not saying these are good reasons. It's just how I justify it to myself.

Here's what happens quite often. A musical artist puts together some sort of release. They put up on YouTube one track or one performance from the release as a sort of teaser. You're supposed to watch it, see how awesome it is, then go buy it and watch the whole thing. But then some asshole fanboy gets a copy and uploads the whole thing to YouTube. Then the whole world gets to watch how awesome it is without actually supporting the people who put the time and effort into the product. It eliminates the need to purchase products and drives down the value of art in our society. This may save you money and time, but it is a travesty.

What REALLY pisses me off is when some schmuck takes advantage of other artists by stealing their videos, uploading them to YouTube, and saying, "Hey! Check out MY stuff, too!" It's just another example of how people can be lazy and still feel entitled to something. Also, by playing illegally uploaded music on YouTube, YOU are supporting this kind of mentality. Lazy and entitled.

It's one thing to try and share an artist you love with the rest of the world. But using them to promote your own crappy music is deplorable behavior.

I think we are lazy when we listen to music on YouTube. Personally, I still buy CDs because I think the listening experience is enjoyable and worth investing in. You don't go to the library to flip through books with pictures of paintings and sculptures. You go experience the artwork where it is installed and (hopefully) where the light hits it just right.

Please continue to use YouTube to search, explore, test the waters, and discover new artists. Continue to use it to enjoy art. Please stop using it to rip people off by uploading content you do not own. And please stop watching the illegal content that other idiots are uploading. And PLEASE boycott any person who uses someone else's hard work to promote their own shitty music.

I'm talking about this guy, who has resorted to uploading songs from the latest Devin Townsend DVD By A Thread. It may seem like a clever way to reach new fans. But it makes you an asshole.

Furthermore, if I ever see you host a party "DJ'd" by YouTube playlists (or Grooveshark or Pandora or anything of the sort), I will not hesitate to take a hammer to your precious computer. You can buy a new one with all the money you saved by not paying for music.

Creative Day

Diet on a creative day:

Breakfast: 2 fried eggs, 2 pieces of toast, 1/2 a grapefruit, 2 cups of coffee

Lunch: Coffee

Dinner: Peanut butter & jelly sandwich, 1/2 a grapefruit, dirty chai, 1 cup of coffee

Become

You will become
That which you are
If you decide
That's what you want

You get to choose
If you will lose
Do or do not --
There is no "try."

Intentional

Oh, to be so intentional with playing that even the mistakes are supposed to happen. This is the goal of all goals.

C.K.

Louis C.K. is a genius.

Every now and then I watch an episode of his show, Louie, on FX. I highly recommend it if you can tolerate lots of profanity and quite explicit references to sexual acts. What really sets this comedian apart, at least in my mind, is his ability to be ridiculous and absurd yet still speak about everyday truths of being a human being. And I mean...DEEP truths. They're just often disguised in the show as sex jokes or thoughts on masturbation - also a part of the human experience whether you like it or not (or whether you like seeing and hearing about it on a television screen).

ANYWAY, I finally got around to watching the season 2 finale tonight. SPOILER ALERT

Quick background. In the show, Louie plays himself, a single, middle-aged father who has a career in New York as a comedian. There are lots of father and dating themes in the show.

Back in season one, Louis meets a single mother, Pamela, at parents' night at their kids' school. They develop a friendship. They hang out while their kids have play dates and that sort of thing, but they're just friends. At some point in season two, Louie expresses that he has feelings for her. These feelings are not reciprocated -- anyone every been in that situation?

Anyway, so in the season finale, Louie takes Pamela to the airport so she can catch a flight to Paris. At the airport, she explains the nature of the trip. Her son had gone to visit her deadbeat ex-husband who has never expressed interest in having a relationship with his son. Now all of a sudden, the two of them have bonded and the son wants to be with his dad in Paris. So, Pamela is going to try and salvage the relationship also. She is NOT coming back. Louis is understandably upset.

He reminds her how her ex-husband is a "shitty person." This is just a "whim." She stands there and tells Louis to move on and get over her. She knows he has feelings for her, but she doesn't have them back. "You're a nice, guy Louis" but this will never work. Blah bla bla. You can't help but feel terrible for Louie as he stands there and says, "I will wait for you" even though she has NO intention of coming back. He starts to tear up, and that's the final straw for Pamela. She turns and gets in line for security. Then, there's the most awkward, hilarious, and heart-wrenching scene in television history as Louie watches her slowly make her way through the security queue. They can see each other every time the line faces his way. He just stands there and watches with tears in his eyes like a sad dog. Then he watches her climb an escalator...painfully slowly, I might add. At the top, she finally turns and waves. He just stands there.

She calls out, "Wave to me, Louie! Wave to me"

"What!"

"Wave to me!"

"WHAT! I...WHAT!?"

"WAVE TO ME!"

"Wait for you?"

"Yeah. Wave to me."

(this goes on for a while...)

Waving now, "I'LL WAIT FOR YOU, PAMELA! I'LL WAIT FOR YOU!"

They wave goodbye, not understanding the other. We then see Louie walking out of the airport with the faintest smile on his face. Poor guy.

Very little is clear in life, you know? There's always the baggage we carry. Feelings we feel for someone who doesn't feel them back. Information we lack or information we have but don't know what to do with. Communication that gets jumbled by distance and differences and misunderstandings. Life can be an absurd mess of random shit that we do our best to make sense of. Sometimes, we do a pretty good job. Other times, we fail abysmally.

Louis C.K. is really good at showing us the latter, a side of things we can often relate to (60% of the time, every time), and letting us laugh at it. It's ridiculous. BUT, we keep learning and improving. Life goes on...until it doesn't. All we can do is do our best in the meantime.


Incidentally, Season 3 of Louie premiers tomorrow night, June 28th, at 10:30 PM. Check out the official website HERE.

What am I supposed to do now?

Doesn't sound right when I put it out there.
Curious disconnect between my words
And their intended meaning.
What would it take to be a Meaning Master?

One who says what he thinks
Expresses what he feels.
Then, what if no one cares to listen?
What if the meaning is lost on some third party

Who inevitably fills in the spaces with a unique personal story?
Then I wouldn't be some ingenious crafter of truth
But telling a pre-existing story with different words
And my syntax.

Who is this fabled master of meaning?
A word weaver with utmost sensibility who knows what to say and how
Regardless of who hears and who listens
Regardless of who cares

Or perhaps the intended eyes and ears predetermine
Precisely what must be spoken.
Precisely what must be spoken?
An ancient tale with a new spin
Or an original one disguised as old?
Or the story is of trivial significance -


At least on its own.


The master inflects a tone of urgency
Underneath the surface
Something else is at work here.
The game is to prod and to point, but never to reveal...


Reveal me this: 


What is the purpose?
Who is hiding behind it all
Writing the rules of this game
Artists and poets and, hell, even scientists play?

No one.
Or everyone - doesn't matter.
The answer never got anyone anywhere
It's the question

What am I supposed to do now?

Proverb...

A little gem from a good friend of mine today (via text):

"Person who says it cannot be done must not interrupt person already doing it."

Little Sissy

3 months until my 23rd birthday. Weird. My Michael Jordan birthday.

I remember when my family took a trip to Hawaii and we had a layover in San Francisco for a few hours. We were wandering around the airport and found some shop that sold sports memorabilia. There was this Chicago Bulls cap I HAD to buy. (This was in my basketball days...and the days of Jordan). So I begged Mom & Dad for it. What a little pest I was. Eventually, they caved. Then I'm sure I lost it not too long after, just like they thought I would. Bummer.

I also remember losing my favorite stuffed animal, a dog named Fido. He was an awesome dog, and I loved him. One day he just disappeared. I never found him. I wonder if the neighbor's (real) dog got hold of him somehow. Or perhaps my dad didn't want to see me grow into a little sissy, so he saw to it that the dog was confiscated. I should ask him. I have no concrete reason to believe it's true, but I've run out of explanations.

Bad news for my dad:
I totally grew up to be a little sissy who listens to Taylor Swift and Katy Perry...for ENJOYMENT

Safe and Dry

I realized something.

Some of the very first recordings I did are actually really cool even though I didn't know what I was doing. I wasn't afraid of screwing up because there was nothing to screw up as far as I was concerned.

There's a middle period where recordings I was involved with sound really bad. This was when I was in the Music Production & Engineering program at Berklee. I was learning how to use more tools, thought I knew how to use them, and was afraid of screwing up. These recordings sound boring, safe, and dry.

Then, I began to transcend my "knowledge." The act of playing became fun again, and I started following my intuition rather than my intellectual "understanding" of the tools that I use. I am not really afraid of screwing up anymore because there's nothing to screw up. I use and abuse whatever tools I feel like using and/or abusing at any given moment. I have sonic "colors" in my pallet and am not afraid to paint.

I don't feel like I've fully achieved the transcending of my barriers, but I'm definitely putting myself in a good spot to do so. The next stage I want to be in is where the recordings create themselves and I just push buttons and move faders accordingly.

Sing Sang Sung

I'm taking a break here from tracking some vocals for one of my new metal songs, and it's got me thinking.

First of all, singing metal is something I am really good at and passionate about. The better I get and the more comfortable I am doing it, I feel more confused about it. Here's an approach to singing that often has something negative to say, whether it's pain, anger, fear, betrayal, hatred, regret, confusion...you get the picture. Well, those things are a part of life, so I don't have to go searching for bad things to happen to have something to write about. And normally, when something bad happens, it gets to me for a short period of time and then I forget about it. I wonder sometimes if all these terrible things are just lurking beneath the surface waiting for a chance to be expressed.

Then there are things that I am not over yet - things that keep me up at night and frustrate me to no end. Things that find me in my dreams. Things that flare up in me on the road when "some idiot" pulls out in front of me or goes too slow or changes lanes without signaling or what have you. Moments like those are when fragments of un-dealt-with aggression and anger and frustration at every time someone has every screwed me over get projected on some unassuming person. They're protected in their car, though, so it's only a bummer for me as my heart rate spikes and blood pressure rises and some part of me has to sift through all that junk and then suppress it again.

I am not an angry person. But I am fully capable of rage. I am an animal after all. We all are.

Which brings me to my next point: heavy metal is therapeutic. I can see how for some people it's an excuse to remain an angry, bitter, maladjusted adolescent well into their adulthood. But for me, it's about taming a beast. Emotion comes in pairs of opposites, equally capable of manifesting as elation as it is depression (and I have somewhat of a history there). My theory (based on personal experience and what I've learned in psychology) is that the negative stuff that gets repressed and forgotten often bites us in the ass later, like when I'm driving with "all those idiots out there on the road." Playing metal, and especially singing, is a way to embrace all those "negative" emotions - to OWN them. They are part of me after all. I feel like I can either be pathologically condemned to be angry, bitter, and depressed...or I can find ways to channel that energy into my art. Maybe it doesn't have to be a lifelong thing. Maybe I only need it now. Maybe I will be yelling into a microphone until the day I day. As long as I do, though, I want it to be a vehicle for positive change and personal growth.

So on days like today, when I'm singing about fresh and open wounds, it gets difficult. I have to "BE the emotion" as Melissa Cross (Zen of Screaming) would say, without succumbing to it. That sounds like it might be a lifelong struggle. Today I say this:

"BRING IT ON, MOTHERFU***ER!!!!" (followed by a smile that lets you know I'm being silly and playful).

Also, if you don't like metal...

well, fuck you :-)

Time

The last real quality time I spent with my grandfather before he passed was a little over a year ago.

I was doing research for my final project in Adult Development & Aging. We got to choose from a few different final paper options, one of which was a phenomenological study of "successful" aging. In other words, interview someone who has aged well. Sound vague and open ended? That's because it was. Grandpa - to me, anyway - was the epitome of aging well, so I decided to interview him and pick his brain and get to know him better all under the guise of this school project. You see, we had watched Tuesdays With Morrie in this same psychology class, and I had become fascinated with the idea of having a close relationship with someone who is older and wise. This project seemed like a good excuse to turn ideas into reality. So I went. I came up with a bunch of questions. I asked away. And Grandpa talked away. I got to hear all kinds of stories I hadn't heard before (and Grandpa told LOTS of stories, many of which had become very familiar in the family). I recorded it all.

But I never went back and listened to all of it. We talked for nearly three hours. I started to take notes on it and hash out an outline for a paper that I would never write. I realized that the questions I asked were for me, not for the project. Had I adhered to the syllabus, I would have ended up with a really cool project. It turns out I did not. I didn't have the information I needed for a 7-page (or whatever) phenomenological study of again.

However, I got to talk to Grandpa late into the night and take in the aroma of pipe tobacco and the dim, soothing ambiance of his basement den with dark green carpet. I got to look into his eyes as he shared stories and wisdom with me. We shared laughs. I feel like Grandpa and I had always been pretty close, but this was a new level of our relationship. Ask and you shall receive, right?

Those three hours were an enormous gift - a gift of which I do not feel worthy. Warning: this may sound weird... but when you talk to someone that old and wise and get to really be with them, I think that's as close as you get to being in a room and talking with God. There are things you can only learn with experience and time. The more open you are, the more you will probably receive. Then, you will have more to give back to your grandchildren...but that is beside the point. Those three hours were a gift. A divine gift, even. Life-changing. But that wasn't even the best part of the trip...

At this point, Grandpa was starting to wind down from old age. Sharp as ever, sharper than a nail, but winding down physically. He wasn't supposed to drive anymore, so I offered to run a few errands with him. We ran by the pharmacy to pick up some prescriptions. I offered to go in the store for him, but he insisted on doing it himself. You see, it brought him pleasure to still to do things on his own. It also frustrated him to no end when people grew inpatient with his slowness.

"It might take me longer because I'm old, but I can still do it myself, (dammit!)"

So despite the fact that I hated to see him struggling to get in and out of the car and was somewhat worried he might fall on the way in or out, I let him have it his way. He made a point of thanking me later for being patient with him. We had a mutual understanding. I was there to help out (or offer to help), and it was his choice whether he wanted to accept or not. Pretty fair for an old man who has to wear Depends and can't drive anymore. The least I can do is let him have the pleasure of picking up his own medicine.

After the store, he was directing me back to the house since I am not very familiar with the St. Louis area. I forget the exact circumstance, but I ended up missing a green turn arrow because I was unsure where I was going and was trying to decipher his directions, which were very mathematical. He was an engineer after all. "Turn left after (x) feet. Head southwest on such-and-such road..." So I hit the red light instead of the green, and in my typical 21 year-old fashion, in a hurry to get everywhere, I apologized. "Sorry we missed the light. If I had been paying attention better..."

Grandpa, whose stern disciplinarian ghost still haunts my 4 year-old self for knocking something over in the bathroom way back in the day, just turned and smiled at me.

"It's okay. We've got all the time in the world."

He then proceeded to direct me back to the house in what was definitely not the most efficient route. Certainly not the quickest. Absolutely not the shortest. We drove on some pretty roads past beautiful houses. He seemed to be just taking it all in. I get the sense, though he never shared with me, that when he was younger he enjoyed Sunday driving.

Why are you in a hurry all the time? Sometimes, you really just need to relax and take it all in. After all, we have all the time in the world.

One of these days, when you're ready, you'll go back and listen to the three-hour conversation with your grandfather. You'll be ready when you can stand the thought of listening to your impatient 21 year-old self attempting to meet Wisdom half-way. Fortunately for you, he was patient, kind, and gentle enough to meet you where YOU were (certainly not halfway) and put up with your questions and naivety. More than put up with, he actually enjoyed it.


How many countless opportunities have you had to approach Wisdom but did not? How many times could you have talked through the night in that smokey basement? How many phone calls could you have made to get just one step closer?

Being hard on yourself fixes nothing. Just remember, from now on, that time is precious.

AND we have all the time in the world.

Computers

Computers are driving me crazy. My MacBook Pro just died this past week. Logic board crapped out, apparently, and I don't have the funds to replace it. So I went and bought a hard drive enclosure and took apart the laptop to extract the hard drive, a process that required making a separate trip to the store to buy a special screwdriver, just for 5 little screws in the computer.

I'm fortunate in that I inherited an iMac last year from my dad's business (I guess they don't use Apple stuff anymore), so I'm not totally shit out of luck, just not very mobile anymore. And I've been having all kinds of issues installing recording software and Waves plugins. So right now, all the work I've been doing on my solo album has been put on hold.

It's times like these I must remind myself that every step of the journey is the journey. This break that I am taking from my work (which I did not choose) is actually part of the work that I'm doing. And I know when I get all this technological nonsense sorted out that I will return to my writing and recording with a renewed vigor and sense of urgency.

Until then...

Routine

Do you ever feel like you're off to a bad start in the morning? You don't want to face the day? You feel down on yourself? You're unhappy?

Try incorporating as much or as little of this into your morning routine as you want:

1 - Look at yourself in the mirror. No, don't just see yourself. LOOK AT yourself. Behold yourself.
2 - Smile. Behold your smile.
3 - Recite or sing to yourself any or all of "Firework" by Katy Perry
3 - No, but seriously.
4 - Say the following: "There are lots of people who love me." Repeat as many times as it takes for you to FEEL the truth of the statement.
5 - Smile. It follows naturally from step 4.
6 - Go about your day

Namaste

I was stopped at a red light in downtown Nashville today when I looked over and saw a "crazy person" at the bus stop. He was by himself, facing a blown up map of the bus routes but clearly not reading it. He was talking quite animatedly to himself and gesturing wildly. He would sort of turn his body periodically, not to look at passersby, but just as part of gesturing like some odd form of dance.

I am certainly no expert, but my initial diagnosis is schizophrenia, which tells me a couple things:

1 - This human's behavior was so odd I had to label it to arrive at an explanation.
2 - Anyone who does anything exceedingly weird or out of the ordinary in public (and is talking to themselves and seemingly unaware of the people around them) MUST be a schizophrenic.

(for the sake of this post, I will continue with my assumed diagnosis)

Schizophrenic is a word that I absolutely hate. It completely dehumanizes a person. This is why you might hear me use the phrase "person (man or woman) with schizophrenia." Language is a funny tool. The words you choose to call an object shape your view of that object just as your view of an object shapes the language you choose to describe it. You see how meaning is co-created here? When I or you or anybody else looks at someone and says he or she is a schizophrenic, I/you/whoever has just equated that person with his or her illness. Then, there is nothing left to say about that person. He or she IS their diagnosis. Now let's drug them up and lock them away because they are scary and I don't know how to deal with them and their crazy psychosis thankyouverymuch. It's easy to lock away a schizophrenic (we've been doing it forever). It's not as easy to lock away a human being (who may have a mental illness).

"Why do you care so much?" This is the question you might be asking me right now, so let me explain. This is just my belief. Deep in the core of every individual on this planet, we share something. You might call it a soul, the Holy Spirit, God, the matter or energy that makes up the universe... It doesn't matter, though the language you choose to describe "it" will ultimately shape how you view the world and other people and thus how you act towards them.

Side note: Maybe if we could show more compassion to others we could come to see life as sacred and other people as divine.

Besides, how different am I from a schizophrenic man? There is research indicating that heredity plays a key factor in the illness. So either I got lucky with the genes my parents passed on OR I have yet to experience the trigger that could ultimately lead me down the spiraling path to psychosis.

When I catch myself in the act of judging or shunning someone with schizophrenia, I am failing to acknowledge what the deepest part of my soul knows: there is not much difference between you and me. This failure of acknowledgement is lethal for the shunned and scorned and is nothing more than an illusion of safety for those of us who got lucky.

Compassion and Impeccable Language. Imagine what one could do if they made it their life's work to cultivate these things.

Just because it's there...

...doesn't mean you have to use it.

That's something I always try to remind people whom I'm recording. However, today I totally threw that idea out the window while recording my guitar:

5 Microphone signals (utilizing every mic I own)

3 Delay pedals...all engaged (in a feedback loop, no less)

My own rules don't apply to me.

Also, I need to get a real camera...

"eight year olds, dude"

I had some time to kill in Chattanooga the other day, so I ran by Rick's Guitar Room out in Hixson. The owner, Rick, used to be a co-owner of Picker's Exchange back when they had a store on Brainerd Road. It had been at least a couple years since I'd run into Rick...

He likes to tell this story about me:

I started playing guitar in the third grade. I guess that puts me at about eight years old. My grandpa had bought me my first guitar from a pawn shop, and I think I had to beg my parents to let me take lessons. Someone recommended Picker's Exchange, so we went and checked it out. Apparently everyone there, including Rick, thought I was too young and my hands were too small and recommended I wait a few years. But I was determined.

I started taking from this guy named George Holder. I would come in to the store about 15-20 minutes before my lesson, grab an electric guitar off the wall, and plug it in to one of the amps up on this stage in the corner of the store. Maybe at this point I had been taking lessons for a few weeks, so my knowledge was limited. According to Rick, I would just wail away on this guitar, strings ringing - probably out of tune - and it was obvious I had absolutely no clue what I was doing. But Rick says my face would light up, and he could tell that this little kid just might have what it takes to be a guitar player. And sure enough, week after week, he watched me slowly get better as I proved to all the old farts that I wasn't too young and my hands weren't too small. I showed them.


I've gotten to hear this story a few times over the years visiting Picker's Exchange and Rick's Guitar Room. It used to embarrass me. I did not want anyone to know that I had ever been young and inexperienced. I just didn't like to think of myself as a child, I suppose. However, this last time I got to hear Rick tell the story, I heard it completely differently.

Here was a kid with enough audacity (and balls, quite frankly) to plug in and go to town on the guitar, even if he had no clue what he was doing whatsoever. It was a completely foreign thing, this electric guitar contraption connected to an amplifier thingy, and eight-year-old-me was curious and excited about what it could do and the sounds it could make. And he didn't give a shit if everyone in the store could hear the godawful noises he was making. Obviously, they could hear.

And now, at this point in my life and in my music career, I have found that if I want to create anything of value, I am going to need to shed all of my adult inhibitions. This caring about what other people think or what I might sound like to them. This fear of playing a wrong note or playing with the wrong guitar tone or missing a cue or singing out of tune or just messing up in general. These are adult fears. The child fears that the excitement will somehow get taken away. As an adult, I am afraid I have taken steps to do just that.

I intend to live my life like a child in a sandbox. Playful. Deliberate. The perfect balance of handle-with-care and carelessness. Continuously architecting. Repeatedly destroying. And most importantly, not giving a shit who watches or what the hell they think.

Thank you, Rick, for helping to reacquaint me with eight-year-old-self.

"In my heart and in my head, not in my pockets"

I just read this story about a janitor who recently graduated from Colombia University. Since staff there can take free classes, over the years he earned a bachelor's degree in classics. I love the bit he says at the end regarding his motivation for pursuing a subsequent graduate degree...apparently not to make more money (how much can you make with a master's or PhD in classics anyway?)

"The richness is in me, in my heart and in my head, not in my pockets."

Pretty deep, for a lowly janitor. His attitude reminds me of this carpenter they wrote a book about once...

Fate

I had coffee with a friend this evening. Something funny occurred to me. I met this person for the first time when I was in 4th or 5th grade. She was probably about how old I am now (early 20's). Now we are friends.

(side note: both she and her husband were HUGE mentor figures in middle and high school. We played music together. They led my youth group for a while. etc. etc. etc....now we're good friends.)

Now, I don't know how many twenty-something's are out there thinking, "I want to meet some 5th graders. They'll probably grow up to be really close friends of mine." It's just odd how things work out sometimes.

I read an interesting book by James Hillman a couple months ago. It's called The Soul's Code. The whole book is based on an idea that each individual has a unique calling or purpose toward which he or she is living. Hillman calls it the "acorn theory." And rather than thinking of human development as "growing up," he constantly refers to it as "growing down." In each of us, according to Hillman, lies a daimon. The daimon chooses the conditions into which you are born. It chooses the people who come in and out of your life. The daimon is this divine, other-worldly entity that must come to terms with its Earthbound-ness.

It is widely accepted that our early childhood experiences shape us and mold us into who we will become. Supposedly, your personality is mostly developed in childhood and remains stagnant for most of your life (according to some theorists anyway). What is so interesting about Hillman's idea is that it flies in the face of our conventional thinking.

People mostly think about cause and effect. For example...I have a fear of redheads because my mom has red hair and she dropped me on my head when I was a baby. So and so did such and such; therefore, I now believe this or that and behave a particular way.

Hillman says, no, that's not the whole story. He says there is a spirit or soul or god or daimon or whatever...and rather than looking backwards on your life like a history textbook, it is more useful to look at your life as moving TOWARDS something (as opposed to from something or because of something). All of these formative experiences you had are not just accidents that resulted in the effects you are now stuck with. The YOU-that-knows, your daimon, your soul, God, or whatever-you-call-it CHOSE these experiences for a reason. That reason is your purpose and your calling -- your fate.

These are all tough ideas to swallow. I like to believe I am in control. I decide what to do. I, I, I, me, me, me. If Hillman has any shred of truth to his thinking, there is some underlying force or destiny that has brought me to this point. There are strange forces at work, and my "I" doesn't always get to call the shots. "I" didn't get to choose when, where, or to whom I was born. "I" didn't choose where we lived or moved or where "I" went to school. "I" don't choose who cuts me off on the road. "I" don't choose who screws me over or hurts me or hurts my friends. "I" didn't choose to be a musician. I was destined to be one.

"I" didn't choose to meet my friend when I was in elementary school, and she certainly didn't choose to meet me. But the more I'm alive - find me in forty years and maybe my thinking will have changed - I sense more and more that Hillman is on to something. These chance meetings and happenings...these "coincidences" that set the stage for the present and future: they may not be accidents at all. They might be the work of some unseen hand...some god or daimon that has a plan, some sort of purpose.

To me, that idea is equally as comforting as it is terrifying. But more frequently, I keep seeing "happy accidents" transform people's lives. I think there's a worldview that accounts for these as mere coincidence. That's fine if you think like that. But I sense a spirit or some sort of magic at play.

Yet no matter what, I am merely grateful that things have worked out the way they have thus far because I know good folks to drink coffee with.

Trains

Sometimes an idea just takes hold up there in my brain. These are the things that keep me up until the sun rises. I will gladly take the exhaustion in exchange for the gratification.

I used to make up every excuse not to get on that train. Now I hop on and go as far as it will take me.

Apples and Oranges

One thing I never quite understood was when someone would justify their lack of interest or inability to compare two things that are difficult - or not so difficult - to compare with the expression, "That's like comparing apples and oranges." Really, now?

Because oranges are orange. Apples are not.
There are more varieties of orange juice than apple juice at the grocery store.
An apple a day keeps the doctor away. An orange a day does not (at least according to legend).
Apples are firmer than oranges.
The skin of an apple tastes better than the peel of an orange.
They are grown on different trees in different climates...and THIS is the kicker.

Because THAT is how I feel about live recording versus studio recording. They are completely different animals grown out of different environments and intentions. Somebody might tell you comparing them is like comparing apples and oranges.

Let's suppose you go to a concert put on by your favorite band. Unless something goes abysmally wrong with the power, lights, or sound, I would say it is almost guaranteed you will enjoy yourself. IT'S YOUR FAVORITE BAND! You bought their album a few months ago and have been playing it in the car over and over on repeat. It's on your iPod running playlist. You listen to it in the shower sometimes. Okay, I might be talking about myself and not you here. So when they play track 7 off the new album, everyone goes nuts and starts dancing or jumping up or down (or running into each other and throwing elbows and fists, depending on the concert). Everyone sings along to all the words, even you, the guy/girl who doesn't like to sing in public. Your brain releases oxytocin, which is what happens when people sing and dance together. Oxytocin also happens to be associated with orgasm, sexual bonding, and is released during childbirth and enables mothers to breast-feed, which is all to say that oxytocin is a pretty serious chemical. So you had no chance when the downbeat of track 7 started. Even if the rest of the songs are mediocre AND the sound guy sucks AND the acoustics in the arena suck ass, you will come away from the concert with a positive experience, feeling like it was fifty bucks well spent (not counting the beer you drank at the venue...that shit was WAY overpriced). And unless you went to music school or have been playing an instrument your whole life, you probably didn't notice or care when the guitar player missed a note or when the singer was a little flat on that high note that he can't actually hit anymore or when the drummer started that one song a little fast or when the bassist stopped for a second to take a sip of whiskey.

Now let's say all of those things happened on the album. Everything was recorded live in a gymnasium with terrible acoustics. All the players are exhausted because they've been on the road for 200 days straight. The singer can't hit all the notes. Oh, and they're drunk and/or high (because that's what a lot of musicians seem to be when they're on stage). Are you going to buy that album, plagued with wrong notes and less-than-stellar sounds? There is such a thing as sonic quality. When we go to a live show, we forgive imperfections in that area. With an album, listeners are less forgiving. So yeah, the timing should be pretty damn close to perfect on everything. Everything should be in tune. Everything should sound more or less like what everything sounds like on similar albums being released by similar artists.

In art, there is a concept known as "canon," or a set of rules. For instance, in Ancient Egyptian art, there was a canon of proportions. All figures were drawn to the same scale (more on that here). Well, pop music has a sort of canon as well. Songs are "supposed" to take on a predictable form, be a certain length, have a particular sound. Recordings that don't fit the mold either go unnoticed or they become the "next big thing" or at least influence bands that go on to become the "next big thing." Just like in any medium of art, or in philosophy or psychology or cultural norms and societal standards. Every now and then something breaks through the status quo and becomes the NEW status quo. Exciting shit. I still can't believe women get paid less than men or that gay marriage is illegal for the most part OR that alcohol and tobacco are legal while marijuana is not. Sometimes the status quo remains stagnant for a looooong time. But it never remains unchanged. But I digress...

Side note: It's interesting that the art form of recorded music is extremely young (the wax cylinder was first used in the late 19th century) compared to writing, painting, sculpture, philosophizing (philosophy is an art as far as I'm concerned), drama, or live music. Now it seems in the world of pop music that the art of live performance is being adapted to be as close to recorded music as possible. In my opinion, that's a tragedy.

Earlier, I made it sound as though out-of-tune notes and other mistakes are a negative thing. For the most part, that is true...ish. But that theory doesn't account for the success of people like Bob Dylan. He's an easy, well-known example of someone who lacks what we might traditionally call a "good" singing voice. However, something about his tone and delivery works for his songs. Dylan will remain one of the great songwriters in history books for a very long time. The Beatles weren't always perfectly in tune either. By modern production standards, these would be considered mistakes. But I don't think anyone could argue that The Beatles are one of the most significant musical artists of all time. Certainly, no one can argue that those records sold a few copies. And they're still selling (thanks, iTunes).

So back to my initial point about apples vs. oranges. studio vs. live. Beatles vs. Nickleback. Yes, they are very different things. Sometimes I'm in the mood for an apple. Sometimes I'm in the mood for an orange. I never put an orange in my mouth and expect it to be an apple, but that doesn't mean there aren't parallels to be drawn or characteristics to contrast. The two actually go quite well together in a blender if you're in to the whole smoothie thing. For some people it's a texture thing, though. I get it. But anyhow, in the case of Beatles vs. Nickleback...well, let's just say it wouldn't be the end of the world if I gave up oranges for the rest of my life and only ate apples.

Blank Page

Nothing is more intimidating than a blank page(/screen), which is what I just had in front of me for quite a while. When I'm writing a song, it's often the first riff or the first line that is most difficult. The rest usually falls into place over time.

Sloan River Project is in the midst of undertaking a series of recordings. We officially sold out of our Live 2009 CDs at our last gig in Nags Head, North Carolina. We've been talking for quite some time now about making some "studio" recordings. After much discussion about how to proceed, we decided to take a DIY approach and put my college degree to good use (B.M. in Music Production & Engineering from Berklee). 

A couple weeks ago, we laid down drum tracks for 11 songs in the lovely city of Charlotte. Over the next couple of days I will be compiling the best takes and doing minor tweaks in the time domain. Then we'll spend a day or two overdubbing bass here in Nashville. After that, everything will start to fall into place. I will overdub some of my electric guitar parts. Meanwhile, some tunes will make their way to the west coast - thanks to the magic awesomeness of the internet - where Josh will lay down his acoustic guitar and lead vocal tracks. At some point in there, I will head to Roanoke to record Sam's acoustic guitar, lead vocals, and harmonies. I will finish up the electric guitar leads while stuff gets sent back to the west coast for Josh's harmonies. Ben and I will lay down our harmonies in Nashville. Then I will probably spend about a week mixing. We'll send files back and forth. People will chime in with comments and critiques. We'll touch up the mixes. Josh will probably master it. We'll once again send files back and forth until everyone is happy. Licenses will be secured for cover songs. Then thanks again to this magical "internet" thing, we'll have an album's worth of songs to release online.

Each step of the journey is the journey.