Art and pressure.
It was the year we first started getting songs in
movies. I was on a snowboarding trip. End of the day. Totally exhausted.
Message on my cell from the girl who placed our song in Legally
Blonde:
"hey max, we're working on music
for this scooby doo movie, we're soliciting theme songs from a bunch of writers,
would you like to send one in?"
I start
feeling all mission impossible, like my cellphone will self destruct after 30
seconds. I feel important. I make my snowboarding tripmates listen to the
message on speaker. I've had songs in movies, but I have never been asked to
write for a movie. I am going places! I am important! They asked me! I have
got to get home RIGHT NOW! I have got to start writing because I have important
stuff to do. I have got to get on a plane RIGHT NOW and get to my studio. This
is my big break! I am so important that I get yanked off of snowboarding trips
to write songs for movies. They need me! Right now! Clear everyone off this
plane! (small aside here... they ask a lot of people and usually if they don't
use your piece you don't get paid, it's very
common.)
So. Now to write a new scooby
doo theme song in 3 days.
Got some
friends together, whipped up some music, some melodies... now I have to write
some lyrics. These have to be good lyrics mind you, this is my big break, I
really have to impress these people. This is my only chance. They think I can
do this, I can't let them down. They hold the keys to the kingdom... well the
magic kingdom anyways.
And that's where
I got stuck. I am rusted shut stuck. I rack my brain, I watch scooby doo
cartoons, I think and research and gnash my teeth and for the life of me I can't
come up with anything good enough for my magnum opus, my hello to the world, my
musical calling card, my golden ticket that will earn me the good life. I am
stuck. blocked, cramped. I felt like I was at the flying J bathroom needing to
number 2 and everyone is on the bus waiting already, late for the show. I am
crabby because I am under SO MUCH PRESSURE and everything... the whole world..
depends on this.
And then the
crash.
What was I thinking? How could
they have asked me? The best people in the world are writing for this? Why
would I think I can outwrite them? Who am I kidding? They made a mistake
asking me.. they thought I was someone talented. How did I even get this far on
my crappy ideas? I am at the olympics ready to compete, but I'm on the jamaican
bobsled team. I am exposed! A fraud! A failure! My one chance and I am
completely lost! My dream slipping away before my eyes; fame, fortune, the
house in the hamptons all sliding through my fingers as I watch the seconds on
my clock counting down towards the deadline, like the timer that releases the
sharks with fricking laser beams on Austin Powers. Tick tock and I have nothing
as the second hand marches inexorably forward, each tick as loud as gunshots in
the silence made by the absence of my
creativity.
This is a deadline that yanks
the curtain aside come monday and reveals me naked because I cannot
sew.
And then Rex Carrol stops by to
borrow a piece of equipment.
"Well yes Rex,
come in, I can loan you this equipment, but I can't tarry long with you, because
I am about important things, you see I have been asked for the scooby doo movie
and I really have to get back to it...how's it going you ask? well I am a
little stuck on the lyrics to be
honest."
And then Rex said the magic
words:
"How hard can it be? Scooby doo,
Saves the world, Has adventures in a van, blah blah
blah."
And of course he was right. I was
trying way too hard.
To end the story, I
wrote some lyrics, much along the lines of what Rex suggested and of while I was
fond of the song, they ended up using a song by some other guys... you might
have heard of them, I think they're called outkast.
:)
It was all for nothing. All that
drama and tension and unhappiness... in my head. I didn't get that movie but I
did write a song for legally blonde 2 and went on to find my groove and all
that, although I would repeat the above process as the stakes got increasingly
higher. About the worst it got was when Steve Lillywhite was handling the
Aerosmith record and asked me to submit a song for that. I cramped so bad on
that one that I actually missed the first deadline. There is no more horrible
feeling than hoping he'd forgotten he'd even asked you and then hearing this on
your messages:
"Hello max, Steve
Lillywhite here, I've got a meeting with Sony and Aerosmith in a few hours and
hoping you've got a song that will make me look very good in my
meeting."
Like a disgraced yakuza, I had
to call and offer to cut off a finger for my profound failure, although I got it
together enough to submit a couple songs the next week, one of which Matt and
Dave and I wrote that Steve did love, although Aerosmith did not. Ask me why I
did not save the message where Steve called me, very excited about the song from
the airport having just heard it on his laptop. The answer is.. because I am
stupid. Steve was very supportive through the whole thing and honestly... he
could not be a nicer guy. He's really a sweet guy.
So moral of the story is;
It is impossible for me to create great art.
It is only possible to do art. Some of it is good, some of it is not, but I can
only write what comes out and the best stuff tends to come out when I'm not
under self imposed pressure. It helps to do lots of art. Then you have the
numbers in your favor. When I find myself winding up again, losing perspective,
trying to write the music that will bring peace to the world and end poverty, I
just tell myself...
"how hard can it be?
Scooby doo saves the world, has adventures.. blah blah blah."
Posted: Mon - January 22, 2007 at 03:09 AM
