Fri - June 19, 2009
dust to dust
This is my buddy dust. He stopped by and I volunteered him to stand under a new softbox I was testing. Dust is doing cool little videos with a d90. Well he was anyways. He just bought a canon 5dmkII which thanks to a recent software update now has full manual controls for video. No 24p yet though. You can see his work at dustbrandfilms. It's really amazing what he does with some decent ideas and a good aesthetic sense and very small budgets. Any man who rents a t-top firebird for a video gets my vote. Dust also is the musical genius behind mars ILL. I have probably $40k more gear than he does but his videos are just as entertaining as my videos. If not more. It's the mind behind the gear that counts. Dust built his own dolly. What he does with his tiny budgets is inspiring. Dust is charging into battle with a rusty butter knife and a lot of determination and he is winning. Don't buy his brand of butter knife, buy his brand of determination.
This picture looks a little different than my normal stuff cause well... I'm tired of my normal stuff. Ironically, it reminds me of my older stuff and my original style where I was cribbing off of yann-arthus bertrand. Right now I'm actually trying to rip off my friend Sarai who is getting gorgeous shots out of her hasselblad. I was hoping I could replicate the feel with my 5dmkII but so far, it's a pretty pale sad imitation of what she does. I've been tired of my photos for awhile so I've been reaching out to try other things, looking into medium format and black and white film e.t.c. You should have seen the look on my wife's face when I told her I was thinking about building a dark room... the house is already overflowing with gear stacked on top of other gear stacked on top of boxes that studio stuff came in. I need a man cave so I can get my crap out of the house. Which will then become a proper house/girl cave. (UPDATE: my wife informs me the term she prefers is "lady cabana"). If marriage is so great, why are most men banished to the garage?
What's funny, is that while I'm tired of my stuff, the people who are booking me don't want black and white or artsy TTV stuff... As an artist I tend to constantly innovate, I hate to repeat myself and while that's great for evolving, sometimes we lose perspective and we can walk away from our natural gifts. We undervalue anything we can do. I see it in bands all the time. I think that's partly why I don't take as many pictures anymore or blog them. Renay shared her blog with me last week and I'm not sure where she lives, but I found her photos fascinating because they are so different from my life. It was a good reminder that what may be old hat to me, might still be worthwhile to someone else. So I'm going to try to get back into the blogging thing, to include you guys a little more on what I'm working on, because even though I'm sick of it, maybe you guys aren't.
Posted at 10:53 AM
Tue - April 14, 2009
Less than perfect.
"you played a good
hand"
"no, i played a bad hand very well, there's a difference."
Before I made records, it was easy to be critical of music that I deemed less than perfect. I didn't understand that records are usually made under less than perfect circumstances. With unlimited time, budget and a perfect team, I'm sure a lot of records would be better. I'm not sure how many people get that, I'm thinking it's pretty much only sting and michael jackson...
When I first went rappelling, while I was in line to try it, I observed how everyone faltered at the first step, the part where you stick your butt out over the 8 story drop. I resolved to not falter, to cheerfully walk backwards right off the cliff face so as not to annoy the people like me who were waiting for you to grow a pair and hurry up so the rest of us could have a shot.
When it came to my turn, harnessed in and ready to go, I got a good look over the cliff face. Parts of my body that typically hang outside, retracted inside my body from fear. I think I may have whimpered a little. I took as long as everyone else to find the courage to step off the edge. It's easy to be critical when you're not the one hanging your butt out.
For the most part, you usually don't have enough budget to hire the orchestra you wanted, you don't have indefinite time to write that perfect 10th song and you would have an easier time herding cats with a straw then you typically do getting band members and label staff all on the same page. And that's on a good day. You're lucky if there's not at least one christian bale class meltdown somewhere in the process.
As you get close to finishing your first record, you start to realize that there's no button in the studio that makes your humble efforts sound more like the records you loved and rather than enhancing your performance, the studio only tends to shine a light on your flaws. A bit like discovering that a good photographer doesn't make you into a supermodel. You just get a nice picture of your funny looking face. (at least that's what happened to me.)
So having been through the humbling process of making a record, I now tend to be much less critical of all art. I understand that usually, what I'm listening to, someone worked very hard on and most likely, it is a gift from their heart. It's easy from the back seat to say you could have done better, until you get a chance to drive and you discover that man, it's harder than it looks. (a bit like being married that one)
I was briefly part of infuze magazine and the slogan there was "criticize by creating". I always thought it was a great ethos. Rather than spending our energy lamenting the lack of art we like, perhaps we should turn our considerable energy to creating it.
get out there. make art. be gentle with your fellow artists.
extra credit: the opening quote is from the whedonverse. which show? discuss joss whedon's fascination with strong female characters.
"no, i played a bad hand very well, there's a difference."
Before I made records, it was easy to be critical of music that I deemed less than perfect. I didn't understand that records are usually made under less than perfect circumstances. With unlimited time, budget and a perfect team, I'm sure a lot of records would be better. I'm not sure how many people get that, I'm thinking it's pretty much only sting and michael jackson...
When I first went rappelling, while I was in line to try it, I observed how everyone faltered at the first step, the part where you stick your butt out over the 8 story drop. I resolved to not falter, to cheerfully walk backwards right off the cliff face so as not to annoy the people like me who were waiting for you to grow a pair and hurry up so the rest of us could have a shot.
When it came to my turn, harnessed in and ready to go, I got a good look over the cliff face. Parts of my body that typically hang outside, retracted inside my body from fear. I think I may have whimpered a little. I took as long as everyone else to find the courage to step off the edge. It's easy to be critical when you're not the one hanging your butt out.
For the most part, you usually don't have enough budget to hire the orchestra you wanted, you don't have indefinite time to write that perfect 10th song and you would have an easier time herding cats with a straw then you typically do getting band members and label staff all on the same page. And that's on a good day. You're lucky if there's not at least one christian bale class meltdown somewhere in the process.
As you get close to finishing your first record, you start to realize that there's no button in the studio that makes your humble efforts sound more like the records you loved and rather than enhancing your performance, the studio only tends to shine a light on your flaws. A bit like discovering that a good photographer doesn't make you into a supermodel. You just get a nice picture of your funny looking face. (at least that's what happened to me.)
So having been through the humbling process of making a record, I now tend to be much less critical of all art. I understand that usually, what I'm listening to, someone worked very hard on and most likely, it is a gift from their heart. It's easy from the back seat to say you could have done better, until you get a chance to drive and you discover that man, it's harder than it looks. (a bit like being married that one)
I was briefly part of infuze magazine and the slogan there was "criticize by creating". I always thought it was a great ethos. Rather than spending our energy lamenting the lack of art we like, perhaps we should turn our considerable energy to creating it.
get out there. make art. be gentle with your fellow artists.
extra credit: the opening quote is from the whedonverse. which show? discuss joss whedon's fascination with strong female characters.
Posted at 03:30 PM
Mon - October 27, 2008
Do what you love.
I read an interesting article about the movie
industry and how just like in music, there are more movies and less people to
watch them. Budgets are getting slashed and the days of making a mediocre movie
and making the money back in dvd sales are over. The article ended on an
excellent point and I'll try to paraphrase it here. The author said that we
could no longer afford to make movies that seemed like a good idea. We could
only make movies we loved.
I think that applies to all art. There are so many choices now for entertainment; TV, cable, movies, videogames, tivo, slingbox, hulu, netflix, vimeo, facebook, myspace and whatever offer us 24/7 options. People have choices in what they spend their time on. The days of selling an album off of one good single and 9 crap songs are over. All the songs have to be good. We have to love ALL The art we make. We can't make records because they are trendy or because they are where radio is going. We should only be making art we love. When we put our passion into something, consumers can tell and they can definitely tell when we don't. They will only love it if we love it.
So if you make art, don't be halfway about it. Don't be trendy, don't be afraid, don't stop till it's something you love. There will always be a market for things that were made passionately.
I'd link to the article, but I've completely forgotten where it came from.
I think that applies to all art. There are so many choices now for entertainment; TV, cable, movies, videogames, tivo, slingbox, hulu, netflix, vimeo, facebook, myspace and whatever offer us 24/7 options. People have choices in what they spend their time on. The days of selling an album off of one good single and 9 crap songs are over. All the songs have to be good. We have to love ALL The art we make. We can't make records because they are trendy or because they are where radio is going. We should only be making art we love. When we put our passion into something, consumers can tell and they can definitely tell when we don't. They will only love it if we love it.
So if you make art, don't be halfway about it. Don't be trendy, don't be afraid, don't stop till it's something you love. There will always be a market for things that were made passionately.
I'd link to the article, but I've completely forgotten where it came from.
Posted at 12:41 PM
Fri - October 3, 2008
We need a montage
I have won over 1000 games of solitaire.
Now you're either thinking:
"that dude is good at solitaire" or "he needs a different game on his phone".
I play it when I'm overworked and I need to turn my brain off. I used to think I was really good at solitaire until I got a version which keeps stats. You would think I was really good too unless you saw the second line in my stats that shows I've lost 3000 games.
OK, I know, it's a lot of solitaire. My phone has wear marks on my screen where the cards are. Granted, it's an old treo 600 that I've had since they were cutting edge technology but still...
So here's the real point of this post. When we see people's work or art or music or olympic performance, we are seeing the 1000 games of solitaire they won. We don't see the games lost, the discarded art or the hours and hours of practice that went towards making something good into something amazing. All we see is the end product. It seems to spring out of an incredibly talented person fully formed, like point A to point B was just a step. But the truth is, almost everyone who got somewhere worthwhile put in a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get there. We just don't see it. In the words of Trey Parker, when you need to get real good at something real fast, you need a montage. Sadly in the real world, the montage runs in real time.
It's like the old joke about the man asking for directions:, "How do you get to carnegie hall?"
Practice.
Write your bad songs, shoot your bad shots, make your mistakes, put your time in, do the work so that when your moment comes and the world is watching, you have your good songs, your clean shots and your game is effortless. Remember, somewhere, your competition, is not taking the night off. They are doing their montage. Are you doing yours?
Now you're either thinking:
"that dude is good at solitaire" or "he needs a different game on his phone".
I play it when I'm overworked and I need to turn my brain off. I used to think I was really good at solitaire until I got a version which keeps stats. You would think I was really good too unless you saw the second line in my stats that shows I've lost 3000 games.
OK, I know, it's a lot of solitaire. My phone has wear marks on my screen where the cards are. Granted, it's an old treo 600 that I've had since they were cutting edge technology but still...
So here's the real point of this post. When we see people's work or art or music or olympic performance, we are seeing the 1000 games of solitaire they won. We don't see the games lost, the discarded art or the hours and hours of practice that went towards making something good into something amazing. All we see is the end product. It seems to spring out of an incredibly talented person fully formed, like point A to point B was just a step. But the truth is, almost everyone who got somewhere worthwhile put in a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get there. We just don't see it. In the words of Trey Parker, when you need to get real good at something real fast, you need a montage. Sadly in the real world, the montage runs in real time.
It's like the old joke about the man asking for directions:, "How do you get to carnegie hall?"
Practice.
Write your bad songs, shoot your bad shots, make your mistakes, put your time in, do the work so that when your moment comes and the world is watching, you have your good songs, your clean shots and your game is effortless. Remember, somewhere, your competition, is not taking the night off. They are doing their montage. Are you doing yours?
Posted at 12:11 AM
Tue - November 20, 2007
Mommy, where do baby songs come from?
If I haven't written in awhile, even a short while,
I forget where songs come from. I forget how to write. I wonder where the
songs I've written came from and I feel empty with no songs and no idea where to
start. I forget that the last time I wrote a song I had no idea where to start
either and that I certainly didn't start with a fully formed song. I started
with a big piece of nothing and I sat down despite my fear and my laziness and I
just started pushing play-doh around. I feel like I have no music in me and it
will be another wasted session of chipping away at rock to find only rock chips.
I sit down grumpy and distracted and halfhearted because I fear that I have no
talent and that I will be caged in this room for more frustrating failure,
letting people down.
But if I force myself to sit down and write, eventually bits and pieces of things that don't suck float to the top and I play with them and other people play with them and sometimes, quite by surprise a song snaps into focus and I realize that I like it because I am just playing it again and again and again.
It's hard and disappointing, filled with false starts, dead ends and orphan songs left by the wayside, but it's all worth it anyways.
The songs show up, when I show up.
But if I force myself to sit down and write, eventually bits and pieces of things that don't suck float to the top and I play with them and other people play with them and sometimes, quite by surprise a song snaps into focus and I realize that I like it because I am just playing it again and again and again.
It's hard and disappointing, filled with false starts, dead ends and orphan songs left by the wayside, but it's all worth it anyways.
The songs show up, when I show up.
Posted at 11:10 AM
Mon - August 27, 2007
Starting badly
I write bad music. I do. It's really awful. I
know some people sit down and amazing, original music just flows out of their
fingertips but, It doesn't happen that way for me. After I force myself to sit
down and actually write, after I've battled the demons of doubt and torn myself
away from the internets, I write bad music. I play listless things on the
guitar and hum listless melodies... all crap... all terrible... halfhearted
little things. I sound like a warbling frog with pitch issues. So I play my
half hearted same old same old chords and warble my frog voice over them with my
placer lyrics.... if you overheard me, you'd hear what sounded like a drunk
warbling frog singing complete nonsense.
And then, sometimes, a little glimmer of a melody comes through, something that might not completely suck and I play it some more. I try some variations on it. I record it on my phone. Sometimes if I play it enough, I hate it. Then I just forget about it. I go through a bunch of ideas like that. If I like the music but not the chords I try other melodies and vice versa. I have a little rough nugget of an idea and I hack it down a bit, trying to find the things I like and the things I don't. Then I start trying to marry it concepts I have kicking around. I have a huge file called "s-chick random thoughts" that I squirrel away all my song ideas in. I look through there and see if one of those ideas fits and can replace my placer lyrics. The placer lyrics themselves sometimes go on to be songs. When I wrote "Get Up", I just had this placer lyric: "if I get up, I might fall back down again" and it was the most ridiculous lyric but I wrote a song about it and it made beautiful sense when it was done. So I try to fit concepts to melodies and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. If I can shoehorn it in and it's not too awkward, I record it on my phone again so I don't forget. Drew Ramsey has told me about songs that India Arie recorded that started out with him singing on his phone. If we robbed producers of their phones we might find rough nuggets of great songs.
Then I eat lunch. Or call the fencing guy or whatever. Just get away from it. If it sticks with me, then I come back to it. I may venture to sing it for someone who may convince me not to throw it away. I take my tiny seed of an idea and have Tricia sing it. A lot of songs die right there as I discover that my idea was greater in my head than in my reality. If it sounds good in Tricia's voice, I start to fiddle with it some more. Having a guide vocal down gives me a roadmap for the song. It's like a synopsis. At that point everything helps the song or hurts it. I start to get everyone's input. Everyone starts to add their talents to the mix and I get excited because it starts to sound like real music. The girls weigh in on lyrics and melodies and harmonies and the guys play my crappy parts better and add sections to the song now that we know where the song is going. I listen to the song over and over and over. The things that are wrong start to bug me. I change them and make everyone else help me find ways to fix them. I smooth transitions, I tweak parts. I rough mix as we go and the song starts to take shape.
Legend says that when asked how he created the statue David out of a block of marble, Michelangelo said "It was simple, I just chipped away everything that was not David." And that is how I start to feel, that I am listening to the song over and over and smoothing away the parts that are not David. I'm no Michelangelo, but my creative process echoes his. My obsessive compulsive personality works well for me here as repeated listenings show me what is annoying about the song. It's like rubbing your fingers over wood to find the splinters you can't see. I keep working towards what we call "the superfunk", which is the point where everyone's head in the room must bob in time with the song. I have never achieved "the superfunk" but you can see it in action. Put on a copy of "Jungle Boogie" by Kool and the Gang or anything by James Brown or most Rage Against the Machine songs and you will see heads bob, even those people not consciously listening.
At this point, either we love the song or we are very frustrated with a problem we can't solve. Sometimes we just can't find a bridge that is as beautiful as the verse and chorus. Sometimes the parts don't seem to fit the melody. We put it away and come back to it later. If the song doesn't generate a strong reaction, it usually fades away and we stop working on it. But when the problems are solved and it feels right we get very excited and we love it. Then I take it to mix and hope that I didn't create any weird frequency issues that will make Reid turn to me and say "you meant it to sound broke and busted right?".
I always work with Reid because whenever Reid is done, my music sounds like "a real record'. Then it gets mastered. Then it goes out the public and we cross our fingers and watch sales. Then our manager calls us with news that we have our new song in yet another movie. And we celebrate like monkeys.
Then it starts all over again.
I believe it was Gene Simmons who said, that he writes 100 songs, out of those, he likes 10 which he plays for other people. Out of those, they only like 1. So his ratio is 100 to 1. I understand that. Music does not flow from my fingers like lightning from a God, rather music for me is born in the fields of labor where I turn over rocks and rocks and rocks looking for coal that can be forged into diamonds. When you hear one of my songs on TV, it is the product of many creative people and much time and sweat and tears. I write bad music, I really do, but if you write enough bad songs, magic is bound to happen.
Don't wait to be good, start now. Give yourself permission to make bad art.
And then, sometimes, a little glimmer of a melody comes through, something that might not completely suck and I play it some more. I try some variations on it. I record it on my phone. Sometimes if I play it enough, I hate it. Then I just forget about it. I go through a bunch of ideas like that. If I like the music but not the chords I try other melodies and vice versa. I have a little rough nugget of an idea and I hack it down a bit, trying to find the things I like and the things I don't. Then I start trying to marry it concepts I have kicking around. I have a huge file called "s-chick random thoughts" that I squirrel away all my song ideas in. I look through there and see if one of those ideas fits and can replace my placer lyrics. The placer lyrics themselves sometimes go on to be songs. When I wrote "Get Up", I just had this placer lyric: "if I get up, I might fall back down again" and it was the most ridiculous lyric but I wrote a song about it and it made beautiful sense when it was done. So I try to fit concepts to melodies and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. If I can shoehorn it in and it's not too awkward, I record it on my phone again so I don't forget. Drew Ramsey has told me about songs that India Arie recorded that started out with him singing on his phone. If we robbed producers of their phones we might find rough nuggets of great songs.
Then I eat lunch. Or call the fencing guy or whatever. Just get away from it. If it sticks with me, then I come back to it. I may venture to sing it for someone who may convince me not to throw it away. I take my tiny seed of an idea and have Tricia sing it. A lot of songs die right there as I discover that my idea was greater in my head than in my reality. If it sounds good in Tricia's voice, I start to fiddle with it some more. Having a guide vocal down gives me a roadmap for the song. It's like a synopsis. At that point everything helps the song or hurts it. I start to get everyone's input. Everyone starts to add their talents to the mix and I get excited because it starts to sound like real music. The girls weigh in on lyrics and melodies and harmonies and the guys play my crappy parts better and add sections to the song now that we know where the song is going. I listen to the song over and over and over. The things that are wrong start to bug me. I change them and make everyone else help me find ways to fix them. I smooth transitions, I tweak parts. I rough mix as we go and the song starts to take shape.
Legend says that when asked how he created the statue David out of a block of marble, Michelangelo said "It was simple, I just chipped away everything that was not David." And that is how I start to feel, that I am listening to the song over and over and smoothing away the parts that are not David. I'm no Michelangelo, but my creative process echoes his. My obsessive compulsive personality works well for me here as repeated listenings show me what is annoying about the song. It's like rubbing your fingers over wood to find the splinters you can't see. I keep working towards what we call "the superfunk", which is the point where everyone's head in the room must bob in time with the song. I have never achieved "the superfunk" but you can see it in action. Put on a copy of "Jungle Boogie" by Kool and the Gang or anything by James Brown or most Rage Against the Machine songs and you will see heads bob, even those people not consciously listening.
At this point, either we love the song or we are very frustrated with a problem we can't solve. Sometimes we just can't find a bridge that is as beautiful as the verse and chorus. Sometimes the parts don't seem to fit the melody. We put it away and come back to it later. If the song doesn't generate a strong reaction, it usually fades away and we stop working on it. But when the problems are solved and it feels right we get very excited and we love it. Then I take it to mix and hope that I didn't create any weird frequency issues that will make Reid turn to me and say "you meant it to sound broke and busted right?".
I always work with Reid because whenever Reid is done, my music sounds like "a real record'. Then it gets mastered. Then it goes out the public and we cross our fingers and watch sales. Then our manager calls us with news that we have our new song in yet another movie. And we celebrate like monkeys.
Then it starts all over again.
I believe it was Gene Simmons who said, that he writes 100 songs, out of those, he likes 10 which he plays for other people. Out of those, they only like 1. So his ratio is 100 to 1. I understand that. Music does not flow from my fingers like lightning from a God, rather music for me is born in the fields of labor where I turn over rocks and rocks and rocks looking for coal that can be forged into diamonds. When you hear one of my songs on TV, it is the product of many creative people and much time and sweat and tears. I write bad music, I really do, but if you write enough bad songs, magic is bound to happen.
Don't wait to be good, start now. Give yourself permission to make bad art.
Posted at 11:55 AM
Mon - August 6, 2007
Hope and Faith
Hope and faith seem related, but faith is the one
who stays when hope has left with a whimper. When hope gives up, faith rolls up
her sleeves and asks; " what needs to be done?". Faith is the strong one, she
does not have the luxury of self pity and despondent despair. Faith is what
makes us put pen to paper when we feel like we have nothing left to say and
there is no ink in our proverbial pen. Faith pushes on when hope is gone.
Doubt is hope's other face and who knows what face will show up because hope and
doubt are flip sides of an emotion. Faith is knowledge and action and faith
remembers that we've seen hard times before and that in those hard times our
needs were met and the water flowed and we had what we needed when we needed it.
Faith knows what hope forgets. Faith is what enables us to become more than we
are by helping us do that which we do not feel like doing, because at it's core,
faith believes that our efforts will be rewarded in the end, even if they do not
seem rewarded now. Faith and courage are the true sisters. While we may doubt
that we can cross the desert, faith knows that we can take the step we need to
take today and that with enough steps, eventually we will walk into the
light.
create and live in faith.
create and live in faith.
Posted at 01:50 AM
Mon - July 9, 2007
Talent doesn't grow on trees... or does it?
Some pics from my sister.
My sister finished her doctorate in clinical psych and she's an adventurer like me, having done everything from teaching english in China to counseling sex offenders in a state mandated program. Right now she's between adventures so I drafted her to be my live-in dog sitter. She's been here for a couple months and since I kept my old camera as a spare, I gave her a basic tutorial on how my 7 year old fujiS1 works and then she took it away to experiment with in private, like a dog with a treat. A couple times a week she'd disappear into the field behind our house.
Last week I noticed that she's developing a nice eye for macro photography. She's got a ways to go yet, she still gets lucky as much as she doesn't, but nonetheless a personal vision is starting to peek out...which is totally different than mine I might add.
She always says that she didn't get the creative gene, but despite that, she's been willing to pick up the camera and see what happens. She didn't try to do what I do or worry about doing it badly. She just took it away and did it quietly herself. She didn't spend 12 hours a day working on it, she just got interested and started teaching herself and with a small investment of time, she's really starting to turn out good work. She might never do more than shoot for her own happiness, but it does make her happy. And I think she's really developing a talent for it. These are all her shots.
At the heart of my beliefs, is that everyone has latent talents that are untapped. They often don't seem like talents at first, they start out as interests. Those interests keep us moving forward and become itches and one day gradually morph into talents. It's not always an easy or quick ride, but it's always worthwhile. I've personally never sat down to try something and been brilliant at it. In fact, I've quite often been horrible, it took me 3 days to learn to snowboard where most people take one. I still play guitar badly. Nonetheless, I've always believed that I would get it eventually and if you believe it, most of the time it turns out to be true as long as you keep at it.
Photography has never been easier to get into, if you have a computer, you have a dark room. Digital Rebels are going on ebay and Craigslist for $250-300 if you pay attention. It's not a great camera, but it can be had for very little money and you'd be shooting at least. If $300 is a lot of money, then find 2 friends who want to learn as well and split it 3 ways. There's a ton of instructional stuff on the internet for free. If $300 seems like a lot, consider this story about Lee Bridges.
Lee decided he wanted a honda motorcycle. Lee's dad told him he would split the cost of the $2200 bike with him. Lee rose to the challenge and saved $1100 in a year. Lee got his motorcycle. Lee was 11 at the time. Now you don't want to say you got pwned by an 11 year old do you? The only time that's acceptable is if you're playing Halo.
So what are your interests? Maybe you could water them a bit and see what grows?
Posted at 02:11 AM
Sat - March 31, 2007
The greatest in the world.
In a text message Matt wrote to
me:
"Remember, you are the greatest songwriter of all time".
Well, of course, I don't believe that. I tend to believe that everyone's stuff is better than mine. Matt doesn't believe that either, but he's an encourager so he says stuff like that. He's good to have around when you're writing because his enthusiasm keeps you moving forward past the moments of self doubt which paralyze and prevent originality. He has saved me from throwing away a #1 single. Everyone should have a Matt in their creative circle.
Or you could just have syphilis.
One of the symptoms of late stage syphilis is delusions of grandeur. Deborah Hayden asserts that it's quite possible that many of our great works of art were created by people with syphilis, including Beethoven. Some of the greatest art in the world was created by people who believed they were qualified to do so. Would my art be so timid and tepid if I truly believed that I was the greatest songwriter in the world? How much am I being held back by my beliefs that I am the least deserving songwriter on the planet? How much more creative would we be?
Today's exercise: Pretend you have syphillis. How would you create if you knew you were the greatest artist in the world?
"Remember, you are the greatest songwriter of all time".
Well, of course, I don't believe that. I tend to believe that everyone's stuff is better than mine. Matt doesn't believe that either, but he's an encourager so he says stuff like that. He's good to have around when you're writing because his enthusiasm keeps you moving forward past the moments of self doubt which paralyze and prevent originality. He has saved me from throwing away a #1 single. Everyone should have a Matt in their creative circle.
Or you could just have syphilis.
One of the symptoms of late stage syphilis is delusions of grandeur. Deborah Hayden asserts that it's quite possible that many of our great works of art were created by people with syphilis, including Beethoven. Some of the greatest art in the world was created by people who believed they were qualified to do so. Would my art be so timid and tepid if I truly believed that I was the greatest songwriter in the world? How much am I being held back by my beliefs that I am the least deserving songwriter on the planet? How much more creative would we be?
Today's exercise: Pretend you have syphillis. How would you create if you knew you were the greatest artist in the world?
Posted at 01:22 PM
Mon - March 5, 2007
Putting in your year
I like crab, but after having watched the
documentary series: Deadliest Catch, I'm not sure if the crab on my plate is
worth dying for. Seriously, people die so we can eat crab legs. The next time
you eat crab, enjoy the sweet taste of crab caught by a man who cheated death.
When a show came on about lobster fishing I left it on to see if catching
lobsters was as TV worthy as crab fishing. In comparison it looks like a walk
in the park, but like crab fishing, you put your traps in the water and drag
them up later to see what you caught. One boat captain summed up his
philosophy: (I'll try to paraphrase from
memory)
"well you put your traps in and sometimes you get something and sometimes you don't, but you gotta put them in the water. You miss a day cause you think maybe you won't get something, you stay at home cause you don't feel like going out in the cold and pretty soon, you don't have your year. You don't put your year in, you don't come home with your year's catch."
That statement smacked me in the head - It's the essence of creativity, you don't always get something, but you gotta put your year in.
"well you put your traps in and sometimes you get something and sometimes you don't, but you gotta put them in the water. You miss a day cause you think maybe you won't get something, you stay at home cause you don't feel like going out in the cold and pretty soon, you don't have your year. You don't put your year in, you don't come home with your year's catch."
That statement smacked me in the head - It's the essence of creativity, you don't always get something, but you gotta put your year in.
Posted at 01:36 AM
Fri - November 3, 2006
Good is the enemy of great. Planning is the enemy of doing. Palpatine is the enemy of Yoda.
As you well know if you're a regular here, I'm a
big fan of people chasing their dreams. Here's the max formula yet
again:
1. dream,
2. research/plan,
3. try,
4. fail,
5. repeat.
after lunch today with a friend who's road managing a backstreet boy, I have come to this conclusion:
Sometimes people get stuck in the planning stage. I believe in planning. I love research. I think before you embark on any endeavor you should ask someone who's done it to tell you all about it. If you don't know any astronauts/ballerinas/pro bass fishermen you should read a book about it. But here's where it goes wrong. If after 60 days you're spending more time planning than doing, you're probably letting fear keep you in the planning stage. If you've pretty much only done planning then you're most likely stuck. Planning feels like progress. But it can actually impede progress if you never get past the planning stage.
So quit waiting for the weekend to work on your book. Quit building the perfect creative space. Quit reading books about creativity. Quit reading this blog. Hold your nose and jump in. Get your feet wet. Make beginner art. Be bad at something. Get your bum in the chair and create/practice/snowboard or whatever it is you wanted to do.
nuff said. I'm off to work on a song.
Sold my 30D and 10-22 to said road manager who should be writing his book on touring. New shiny shiny 5D and 16-35 in the mail. woo hoo. (well that's woo hoo combined with "owie" when I realize how much more money I'm spending)
1. dream,
2. research/plan,
3. try,
4. fail,
5. repeat.
after lunch today with a friend who's road managing a backstreet boy, I have come to this conclusion:
Sometimes people get stuck in the planning stage. I believe in planning. I love research. I think before you embark on any endeavor you should ask someone who's done it to tell you all about it. If you don't know any astronauts/ballerinas/pro bass fishermen you should read a book about it. But here's where it goes wrong. If after 60 days you're spending more time planning than doing, you're probably letting fear keep you in the planning stage. If you've pretty much only done planning then you're most likely stuck. Planning feels like progress. But it can actually impede progress if you never get past the planning stage.
So quit waiting for the weekend to work on your book. Quit building the perfect creative space. Quit reading books about creativity. Quit reading this blog. Hold your nose and jump in. Get your feet wet. Make beginner art. Be bad at something. Get your bum in the chair and create/practice/snowboard or whatever it is you wanted to do.
nuff said. I'm off to work on a song.
Sold my 30D and 10-22 to said road manager who should be writing his book on touring. New shiny shiny 5D and 16-35 in the mail. woo hoo. (well that's woo hoo combined with "owie" when I realize how much more money I'm spending)
Posted at 04:25 PM
Wed - November 9, 2005
I've written my 1st book. Now what?
I got an inspiring email from someone who had
finished their 1st book and felt prompted to offer this unsolicited
advice:
Kent
Let me be the first to congratulate you on your endeavours. You mentioned you haven't met your goals, yet, but you have taken your first steps. Showing up and doing the work is the toughest part. Trying your hand at art and actually pushing something through to completion, (whether song or book or painting) is in and of itself a serious mountain climb. Completed art is a rare summit few attain, so congratulations! Enjoy the view. Celebrate your courage and your success. You belong to the rare and elite club of practicing artists. Usually though in our minds though, we expect there to be a trophy when we get up here and perhaps a welcoming committee in the form of a bestseller or grammy. Well, even though you haven't got that yet, I'm here to welcome you to the league of extraordinary gentlemen. Success is hard to quantify, I know I personally felt like I had to make money at what I was doing to prove to my folks that I wasn't headed for life as a hobo. But having walked the road you've walked I can tell you that just to complete art, is and of itself; success.
After that you may have one of two problems.
Sometimes, you can't find an agent or manager right away. Sometimes it doesn't resonate with an audience. Many artists are not appreciated in their lifetimes. Some diligence and faith is required at this stage. There is a great blues guitarist named Ken Tucker who persistently calls me once a week to see if I can help him with his career. After calling me for a year, during most of which I ignored him (thank you caller I.D.) I finally picked up the phone after my annoyance turned to amusement. Ken launched right in with "you're harder to get ahold of than a fart in a torndao". Because of Ken's persistence I passed his demo on to my manager and I'm talking about him here. Anyone need a great blues guitarist? Homeboy can play for sure.
So don't be discouraged if you're not successful right away. Keep plugging away and as you already figured out, don't be afraid to revise the work. Part of what made the Karaoke Superstars record interesting is that we fiddled with it for 3 years while we were trying to get the band up and running. You'll miss that endless time to revise when success catches you like a tidal wave. We put the Last One Picked record together in less than a year and it shows.
The second problem you might encounter in the early stages is that you're probably not as good as you'd like to be. If your first work doesn't sell right away, by all means keep trying to find an audience for it. Shoot, post it on your website and give it away for a couple weeks just to see what people think. If you're a musican, play coffee houses, open mics, whatever. However, don't spend the majority of your time doing that. As you've already figured out, get started on book number two. (which you're already doing, so as the ozzies say; 'goodonya!') There's nothing that improves art like doing it, so just keep doing it. The majority of your time and effort should be spent improving your craft. If your craft is writing then write. If it's performing, then perform. I was given a record deal, looong before I should have been. I still shudder when someone digs up my old records. I'm sure I will shudder at most of what I've done as I improve, but nonetheless, now that you're done with your first book, take that momentum and keep going forward. Don't be afraid to revisit themes or ideas you've done before. There's a long tradition of film makers making similarly themed movies till finally one of them just stuck with the public. You know you're repeating yourself, but outside of your core audience, no one else does. And maybe you'll find an expanded audience for your original idea by improving the craft. An obvious example would be Robert Rodriguez's film El Mariachi, which he later reshot with a much higher budget as Desperado.
Once again, it always fills me with excitement to see someone take up pen or pick or paintbrush and ask themselves; what do I have to say? The hardest part is always getting started. Once you're started, just keep going. That's all there is to it. :)
There are always more talented people out there, but only one person who has your viewpoint: You.
Thanks for the inspiring letter.
peace and brotherlove
max
Kent
Let me be the first to congratulate you on your endeavours. You mentioned you haven't met your goals, yet, but you have taken your first steps. Showing up and doing the work is the toughest part. Trying your hand at art and actually pushing something through to completion, (whether song or book or painting) is in and of itself a serious mountain climb. Completed art is a rare summit few attain, so congratulations! Enjoy the view. Celebrate your courage and your success. You belong to the rare and elite club of practicing artists. Usually though in our minds though, we expect there to be a trophy when we get up here and perhaps a welcoming committee in the form of a bestseller or grammy. Well, even though you haven't got that yet, I'm here to welcome you to the league of extraordinary gentlemen. Success is hard to quantify, I know I personally felt like I had to make money at what I was doing to prove to my folks that I wasn't headed for life as a hobo. But having walked the road you've walked I can tell you that just to complete art, is and of itself; success.
After that you may have one of two problems.
Sometimes, you can't find an agent or manager right away. Sometimes it doesn't resonate with an audience. Many artists are not appreciated in their lifetimes. Some diligence and faith is required at this stage. There is a great blues guitarist named Ken Tucker who persistently calls me once a week to see if I can help him with his career. After calling me for a year, during most of which I ignored him (thank you caller I.D.) I finally picked up the phone after my annoyance turned to amusement. Ken launched right in with "you're harder to get ahold of than a fart in a torndao". Because of Ken's persistence I passed his demo on to my manager and I'm talking about him here. Anyone need a great blues guitarist? Homeboy can play for sure.
So don't be discouraged if you're not successful right away. Keep plugging away and as you already figured out, don't be afraid to revise the work. Part of what made the Karaoke Superstars record interesting is that we fiddled with it for 3 years while we were trying to get the band up and running. You'll miss that endless time to revise when success catches you like a tidal wave. We put the Last One Picked record together in less than a year and it shows.
The second problem you might encounter in the early stages is that you're probably not as good as you'd like to be. If your first work doesn't sell right away, by all means keep trying to find an audience for it. Shoot, post it on your website and give it away for a couple weeks just to see what people think. If you're a musican, play coffee houses, open mics, whatever. However, don't spend the majority of your time doing that. As you've already figured out, get started on book number two. (which you're already doing, so as the ozzies say; 'goodonya!') There's nothing that improves art like doing it, so just keep doing it. The majority of your time and effort should be spent improving your craft. If your craft is writing then write. If it's performing, then perform. I was given a record deal, looong before I should have been. I still shudder when someone digs up my old records. I'm sure I will shudder at most of what I've done as I improve, but nonetheless, now that you're done with your first book, take that momentum and keep going forward. Don't be afraid to revisit themes or ideas you've done before. There's a long tradition of film makers making similarly themed movies till finally one of them just stuck with the public. You know you're repeating yourself, but outside of your core audience, no one else does. And maybe you'll find an expanded audience for your original idea by improving the craft. An obvious example would be Robert Rodriguez's film El Mariachi, which he later reshot with a much higher budget as Desperado.
Once again, it always fills me with excitement to see someone take up pen or pick or paintbrush and ask themselves; what do I have to say? The hardest part is always getting started. Once you're started, just keep going. That's all there is to it. :)
There are always more talented people out there, but only one person who has your viewpoint: You.
Thanks for the inspiring letter.
peace and brotherlove
max
Posted at 11:15 AM
Tue - October 11, 2005
Letters to a young artist
Excerpts from a dialog about art.
I got a letter from a young friend of mine who is
struggling with her early songwriting, showed it to her boyfriend and was hurt
by his dismissive response. (he's also a
songwriter)
Here's my reply.
Hey sis
First off, let me say that I'm so proud of you for songwriting. Creating, art, any art at all is an act of courage.
I'm sorry your boyfriend doesn't understand your songs. I'm glad you can see already that he's just into a different kind of song. I have the same problem with one particular magazine reviewer who only likes "real" music and dislikes what we do. I really want to strangle the guy and it's so hurtful when he crtiques something he just actually doesn't like or understand. I wish that I was all poetic and artsy and I have my moments, but really, it's not who I am, and the most important thing about being any any any kind of artist is to be who you are.
But also understand that there are people that you should show your work in progress to and people you shouldn't. If he makes you feel dumb about your songwriting, he's not a good person to show stuff too early on. As artists, we're insecure and it's easy to lose perspective about our work. Feedback becomes very important, but it has to be the RIGHT feedback. I remember when I wrote the chorus to Bowling Ball and I thought it wasn't even worth showing to anyone. The only reason it's on the album at all is because Melissa came down and was frustrated with Tricia and I sang her the chorus. Both Matt and Melissa immediately jumped on it and now it's on the album. Sometimes, even more than feedback, you need support. Permission to keep going with your art. Most of us go through a phase where we doubt what we're doing. (sometimes once a night) it's important to have someone in your life to help you through that. So try to find someone who thinks you're amazing to play stuff for. That person will help you get the art to the point where you like it, which is when it's time to show it to other people. Be very wary of critical people who only like a small handful of bands that no one else has heard of. They are good people and they serve an important function in society but they are the natural enemy of the starting artist. Frequently, they are repressed artists themselves.
In the end, just keep in mind, that not everyone will like your music. Not everyone agrees with what you have to say. That's why it's so important for you to raise your voice anyways. If you don't agree with what you hear in other people's art, don't get down on theirs, make your own. There will always be more talented and better people out there, but only you can say what you have to say the way you say it. So get out there and do it. Keep writing bad songs, eventually, they will become good songs and if you're honest, people will always respond to that honesty.
One college newspaper review of Beauty from Pain started with "the only reason I can think of that Inpop sent me this record is that they must have had an excess of blank CDs" and went downhill from there. You can't win em all, but as of 5 minutes ago, the lead track on that same record: Anthem was selected by MTV to be the theme song for the MTV Road Rules/Real World challenge, the Gauntlet.
you lose some, you win some.
that's art.
peace and brotherlove
max
Here's my reply.
Hey sis
First off, let me say that I'm so proud of you for songwriting. Creating, art, any art at all is an act of courage.
I'm sorry your boyfriend doesn't understand your songs. I'm glad you can see already that he's just into a different kind of song. I have the same problem with one particular magazine reviewer who only likes "real" music and dislikes what we do. I really want to strangle the guy and it's so hurtful when he crtiques something he just actually doesn't like or understand. I wish that I was all poetic and artsy and I have my moments, but really, it's not who I am, and the most important thing about being any any any kind of artist is to be who you are.
But also understand that there are people that you should show your work in progress to and people you shouldn't. If he makes you feel dumb about your songwriting, he's not a good person to show stuff too early on. As artists, we're insecure and it's easy to lose perspective about our work. Feedback becomes very important, but it has to be the RIGHT feedback. I remember when I wrote the chorus to Bowling Ball and I thought it wasn't even worth showing to anyone. The only reason it's on the album at all is because Melissa came down and was frustrated with Tricia and I sang her the chorus. Both Matt and Melissa immediately jumped on it and now it's on the album. Sometimes, even more than feedback, you need support. Permission to keep going with your art. Most of us go through a phase where we doubt what we're doing. (sometimes once a night) it's important to have someone in your life to help you through that. So try to find someone who thinks you're amazing to play stuff for. That person will help you get the art to the point where you like it, which is when it's time to show it to other people. Be very wary of critical people who only like a small handful of bands that no one else has heard of. They are good people and they serve an important function in society but they are the natural enemy of the starting artist. Frequently, they are repressed artists themselves.
In the end, just keep in mind, that not everyone will like your music. Not everyone agrees with what you have to say. That's why it's so important for you to raise your voice anyways. If you don't agree with what you hear in other people's art, don't get down on theirs, make your own. There will always be more talented and better people out there, but only you can say what you have to say the way you say it. So get out there and do it. Keep writing bad songs, eventually, they will become good songs and if you're honest, people will always respond to that honesty.
One college newspaper review of Beauty from Pain started with "the only reason I can think of that Inpop sent me this record is that they must have had an excess of blank CDs" and went downhill from there. You can't win em all, but as of 5 minutes ago, the lead track on that same record: Anthem was selected by MTV to be the theme song for the MTV Road Rules/Real World challenge, the Gauntlet.
you lose some, you win some.
that's art.
peace and brotherlove
max
Posted at 02:39 PM
Thu - September 1, 2005
Creative tip of the day.
When you're stuck on an idea, like say a lyric or have writer's block and can't make progress, call someone and explain to them what you're trying to do. Explain in great depth. Explain the problem and why you're frustrated, oftentimes talking it out will help you crystalize or focus the idea. If you can't find someone or aren't comfortable with that, write it out like you were talking to someone who cared. If that doesn't work, consider making a sock monkey and then explaining what you're trying to say to that. If none of these things work, take a break and come back to it later.
If it's a problem solving idea, ask yourself if you had unlimited resources how you would solve it. If you can solve it with unlimited resources, then the problem can be solved and then you just have to work out the logistics. If it can't be solved with unlimited resources, then you know it probably can't be solved.
ok that was 2 tips. I had to stop myself. Feels like all I do all day is solve problems. I kind of like it though. The picture above, while not of a sock monkey, is from Ireland, where Benji, Zito and I met a girl traveling by herself who was inserting this monkey into her shots, amelie style. We adopted both the girl and monkey and when I finally get around to posting the travel shots from England/Ireland you'll see more monkey business.
Posted at 05:03 PM
Wed - September 15, 2004
Chipmunks
We have a chipmunk living under our front step, much
to the annoyance of Bruce who fears that enough excavation will cause our front
step to fall in. The chipmunk has been making appearances around Tricia who
sits out there whenever she can to be in the sun. Tricia tried to feed it
chicken, which it didn't want and as far as I know, chipmunks don't eat meat..
that would be somewhat terrifying to watch a group of chipmunks bring down a
chicken like a tiny version of cheetahs bringing down a water buffalo. Anyways,
I sat out there and left him a grape and eventually, his little head poked out
and after a lot of waiting he sniffed it and took it inside his hole. Ha! It
took a fair bit of patience and I was reminded of an old indian story about a
boy who wanted to feed the birds and how he put seed in his hands and lay in the
grass at 4 in the morning totally still till the birds came and ate out of his
hands. I'm also reminded of something we used to say in AXIS creative team
meetings. If we had a particularly weird idea we would put our hands over our
heads in the shape of a house roof and say that we had a "weasel moment". What
that meant was that you were going to suggest an idea that you were unsure of
and that you didn't want critiqued, thus making it safe to share the weird idea.
It comes from the saying: "if you want to catch a weasel, you don't stand by the
hole." Sometimes weasel moments were weird, but sometimes they were our best
ideas and we tried to create a culture that allowed people to say potentially
stupid things, cause sometimes, they're potentially brilliant. Here's a little
shot I grabbed of our
chipmunk
Posted at 01:32 PM
Thu - July 29, 2004
People get ready.
There are more opportunities than there are people
to fill them. I know more bands seeking people than I know people who are
really talented and doing nothing. I'm personally looking for an assistant,
someone fluent with engineering and pro-tools transfers, someone who can tune
and comp vocals. I'm also looking for someone who can program really hot hip
hop beats. The thing is, maybe you're not ready now, but you have to practice,
so that when the time comes, you will be ready. You can not wait to start
practicing till you're asked. It's like waiting to get accepted to the olympics
before you start training. Anyways. just a thought. Get your stuff rolling
people, cause opportunity is all around you. Incidentally, Jenny wins the what
movie is that from contest, the movie of course is Joe versus the volcano. One
of my favorite movies about life. if you're super super observant you'll be
able to tell me which superchick lines comes directly from that movie. My
ankles are sore from yesterday's long motorcycle ride with Tony and my wrists
are sore from playing guitar all day, it's good to be back. Let's vote, should
I stay home and write or go to soulfest and kingdom bound
festivals?
Posted at 07:26 PM
Breaking it down
I've been reading some great writing books lately
and it's been very stimulating to be crossing disciplines. I'd recommend Write
Away by Elizabeth George and Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott if you feel like
joining my current headspace or want to create or if your name is Abby and you
happen to be working on a fantastic idea for a murder mystery in the record
business... heh heh.. Anyways.. even though I'm not a "writer" or screenwriter,
I think the ideas apply.. in fact I continue to wonder if everyone is creative
somewhere.. there's a book about a barrio writer called Every Child is a Poet
and I think it's true.. inside all of us, there is a desire to tell the truth,
to share our stories, to make sense out of the world. If you're sitting on the
fence, maybe you should try it... start with just journaling or freewriting a
page or 2 a day. As Elizabeth George says, get some high quality "bum glue" and
get your bum in the chair and write. Writing a novel has always seemed like a
gargantuan unmanageable task to me, approachable only by the mysterious hooded
"writers", but the books I've been reading are showing me how to break it down
into small approachable tasks, just like I understand that an album is a song by
song process and each song is broken down into sections and each section divided
into words, melody and music. I know I can write albums because I know how to
break it down into little jobs I can do. Almost anything scary can be broken
down into little approachable bits. The process is only
this:
1. Have the desire
2. Research (ie read books on how to do it)
3. Break it down into little achievable goals
4. Do a little bit each day
5. Try not to judge it yet.
6. Continue until finished.
You really only need to have the desire and the tenacity. You're going to hit obstacles and thus learn to go around, over, under or through them. When I wanted to learn drums, I didn't have the money for a drumkit, so I asked everyone I know for any spare drum parts they had and bit by bit, I built myself a frankenstein kit out of pieces. It wasn't pretty and didn't sound good, but it was enough for me to put in some practice time. My first guitar was a used $75 pink ibanez that after some new paint I played onstage for years. You might not have the tools you need right away, but by asking around for stuff you can borrow and lessons, you might be suprised at what you can dig up. I think a great product of my missionary upbringing is I'm comfortable asking around for help.
1. Have the desire
2. Research (ie read books on how to do it)
3. Break it down into little achievable goals
4. Do a little bit each day
5. Try not to judge it yet.
6. Continue until finished.
You really only need to have the desire and the tenacity. You're going to hit obstacles and thus learn to go around, over, under or through them. When I wanted to learn drums, I didn't have the money for a drumkit, so I asked everyone I know for any spare drum parts they had and bit by bit, I built myself a frankenstein kit out of pieces. It wasn't pretty and didn't sound good, but it was enough for me to put in some practice time. My first guitar was a used $75 pink ibanez that after some new paint I played onstage for years. You might not have the tools you need right away, but by asking around for stuff you can borrow and lessons, you might be suprised at what you can dig up. I think a great product of my missionary upbringing is I'm comfortable asking around for help.
Posted at 02:54 PM
Thu - June 3, 2004
Just showing up
thoughts on the war of art
I read that 90% of being successful is just showing
up... sounds easy doesn't it? I actually think the statement is true.. but what
it doesn't tell you is how hard showing up actually is. If you haven't read the
Stephen Pressfield book "The War of Art" I'd recommend it. Borders carrys it
usually. It's short and accurate in it's depiction of the struggle we go
through when we try to create.
Pressfield explores the concept of resistance.. for every positive thing we want to do, there is a part of us that doesn't want to. Some people I know don't struggle with this, so if you're one of those people, than just be grateful art is not a labored thing for you and keep making it. However, if you're like the rest of us.. read on.
Even though I really really want to make art (and have to, now as a job, which takes some of the fun out of it.) Part of me really doesn't want to... right now. Tomorrow, I will work on it.. or when I get the next big block of free time, or when everyone else gets here, or whatever the excuse happens to be. In my mind I really want to work on it, but I have little internal fights with myself everytime I go down to the basement. Sometimes they are bigger fights and I lose out to washing the dishes or some such thing. We all have our timewasters and I'm quite capable of losing an hour to surfing the web while I'm researching a gadget.
So if I had a choice between washing the dishes and writing music, why would I wash dishes? I think there are in each of us 2 opposing desires. One part of us dreams. The other part is trying to protect us from the unknown. It's easy to be afraid of change. When we start taking tiny steps towards claiming who we are, part of us is afraid... we're afraid that we might be bad artists.. afraid we might be wasting our time... afraid maybe that the changes we wanted might happen and than what happens? It's always safer to stay behind the curtain and play the "I could have done that" game. Almost every time you hear someone say that, it's because they themselves are frustrated artists.
Sounds kind of weird I know..
But you don't know how many times, I've seen someone take a step towards a dream.. they bought a guitar or camera or weight bench and they spent lots of hard earned money on it. They saved for 6 months or a year or blew out their credit cards on it. And than, the shiny new toy, that represents hope and a different life and a step towards a dream ends up collecting dust. It just doesn't get used. And there's always a very reasonable explanation.. "I just haven't had the time", "I need someone to show me how to work it", "I can't cut my nails for work right now, so when I quit this job, I can start practicing." They always always mean to get started on it tomorrow or "as soon as I have more time" or something like that. And they really mean it. They do.
Even weirder than that, when we were starting superchick, I asked everybody I knew if they had heard of anyone suitable for our project. Sure enough, names started coming in. So I'd call someone and sure enough the person on the other end would get really excited about what I was saying and they'd tell me something like: "that's amazing what you're talking about cause I've always wanted to do something like that and I feel like God has put that dream on my heart." and we'd set up a time for them to come by and hang out so we could figure out if we all were trying to go to the same place. Usually a couple days later.
But than invariably... the night before we were supposed to hang, I'd get a call, sometimes a message and it would go like this: "well, I really want to do this but I just talked to my parents/boyfriend/friend/postman and maybe this isn't a good time for me to do this, I have to go to college/camp/siberian labor camp this summer, sorry." Now remember we're not talking about a 5 year commitment, we're talking about coming to meet the crew and see what it's about. Just to see what it's about.. We're talking about people who had been so excited 2 days before suddenly were so afraid that they wouldn't even come and talk about it. weird huh? People ask us why we chose Melissa and Tricia.. but really, they chose us.. they were the only 2 brave enough to do it. Melissa didn't even really play anything when we met her, I taught her to play guitar. Tricia even quit after a disastrous show opening for Audio A. But than came back....
So what are we afraid of? Afraid we might suck maybe.. afraid we might not. I think it was Nelson Mandela who said:
"it is not that we are afraid that might be judged and found wanting, but rather that we would be judged and found to be powerful beyond measure."
Which leads us back to this icky feeling that perhaps our own fear keeps us grounded here.. safe, yet yearning to fly. I remember Seal's song crazy had this lyric: "in a world full of people, only some want to fly, isn't that crazy?" Now I'm not sure what he meant, but to me, it captures how many of us don't chase our dreams. But the thing is, everyone wants to fly. Just few actually find the courage to do it.
So we're afraid we might succeed and all these changes we can't control will happen.. we're also afraid of sucking. It's always safer to be a genius in your own mind rather than a mediocre artist in reality. Our culture places a huge premium on success and mocks the failures. We demand instant success. We write a little song and than instantly the critic on our shoulder starts comparing it to other stuff that we love and our little creation wilts under the comparison... I think the critic on my shoulder works for Rolling Stone.. he's pretty harsh. When people start writing, I always encourage them to write 10 bad songs to get them out of the way. Very few people start writing good material. We compare our beginning work to people who are at the top of their game, working with teams of people who are all the best at what they do. No one who wants to play tennis steps into the ring with the williams sisters and expects to beat them the first time they pick up a racket. Why do I expect myself to be better than Trevor Horn than?
And than there's the time issue. Who's got time for anything these days? The only people with time are 8 year olds and prisoners. How can anyone be expected to pursue a dream working 2 jobs or whatever your situation happens to be? But the truth is, we've all got 15 minutes a day we can carve out for a dream or a change we want to make. I always tell guitar students, that 15 minutes a day every day is better than 16 hours of practice on the weekends. Cause somehow, that 16 hours never happens, but 15 minutes a day is achievable. If we get in the habit of giving just 15 minutes a day, you'd be surprised at what happens. It's just a matter of showing up for those 15 minutes. People always say: "do you know how old I'll be before I learn to play guitar at that rate?" To which I say "as old as you're gonna be if you don't learn." which comes from the book "you're only too old if you don't start right now." Sounds easy doesn't it. Than do it....
And here's where the hard part comes. We don't really want to. That's just how it is. Whether it's working out or practicing or writing or whatever, we just don't want to. (if you do, than stop reading this and go do it and count your blessings that you're not working uphill.) It's never easy to make a positive change. Stephen Pressfield refers to it as "resistance". I think it's even a little more than that. Let's say it's an internal war between creativity and entropy, between light and dark, between bad for us and good for us. In the end, I think Satan likes to see us living lives of quiet desperation, to see us half fulfilled and partying our dreams away... wondering if this is all there is. And he's quite good at it. So the thing to take away from all this is; if you're trying to make a positive change in your life, expect it to be uphill.. expect to have to fight for it. Plan on it being a long haul marathon where every day, you're going to have to fight for your 15 minutes.
So why do we fight for it? Is it worth it?
The funny thing is, when we actually get started on it, we quit worrying about it and as Stephen Pressfield says, the muse shows up.. he calls it a muse, I'd say that God is the God of creativity, the original artist when he created the earth in all of it's glory. Every glorious sunset I see, I think that he's really the original artist.. but the point is, when I sit down to create art, if I stay at it, pretty soon, I get something I like. I haven't made a song that I'm really really happy with yet, but I think some of them are interesting.. and I enjoy the process... and the amazing thing, is that other people seem to like them to. But we don't do it for other people or for success, we have to do it for ourselves in the end. Because we're not promised success, only the success of learning to live in courage. Of learning what it is to stretch and grow ourselves.. to be a different person at the end of the year than we were in the beginning. To quote a bridge from "Rock Star" off the Last one Picked album:
it's not about success
life is not a test
you just do your best
to see the view from wings of courage
to push on through when we're discouraged
failures are flyers who touch down
only they know what it's like to leave the ground.
So we do it, because in the end it's so satisfying, because it's what we're supposed to be doing, investing our God given talents. We do it because it's so fulfilling, more so than trying to fill our lives with noise and videogames and partying or whatever your dreamkiller is. So I challenge you, all my faithful and lovely readers, to dig in today.. to show up.. to claim whatever lost dream you've had.. whether that's working out, writing, shooting or something, your art, your future your new self awaits you.
And in the spirit of that, I'm gonna go write some music.
Peace out y'all,
max
Extra credit:
Stephen Pressfield, The War of Art
Julia Camerin: The Artist's way
Pressfield explores the concept of resistance.. for every positive thing we want to do, there is a part of us that doesn't want to. Some people I know don't struggle with this, so if you're one of those people, than just be grateful art is not a labored thing for you and keep making it. However, if you're like the rest of us.. read on.
Even though I really really want to make art (and have to, now as a job, which takes some of the fun out of it.) Part of me really doesn't want to... right now. Tomorrow, I will work on it.. or when I get the next big block of free time, or when everyone else gets here, or whatever the excuse happens to be. In my mind I really want to work on it, but I have little internal fights with myself everytime I go down to the basement. Sometimes they are bigger fights and I lose out to washing the dishes or some such thing. We all have our timewasters and I'm quite capable of losing an hour to surfing the web while I'm researching a gadget.
So if I had a choice between washing the dishes and writing music, why would I wash dishes? I think there are in each of us 2 opposing desires. One part of us dreams. The other part is trying to protect us from the unknown. It's easy to be afraid of change. When we start taking tiny steps towards claiming who we are, part of us is afraid... we're afraid that we might be bad artists.. afraid we might be wasting our time... afraid maybe that the changes we wanted might happen and than what happens? It's always safer to stay behind the curtain and play the "I could have done that" game. Almost every time you hear someone say that, it's because they themselves are frustrated artists.
Sounds kind of weird I know..
But you don't know how many times, I've seen someone take a step towards a dream.. they bought a guitar or camera or weight bench and they spent lots of hard earned money on it. They saved for 6 months or a year or blew out their credit cards on it. And than, the shiny new toy, that represents hope and a different life and a step towards a dream ends up collecting dust. It just doesn't get used. And there's always a very reasonable explanation.. "I just haven't had the time", "I need someone to show me how to work it", "I can't cut my nails for work right now, so when I quit this job, I can start practicing." They always always mean to get started on it tomorrow or "as soon as I have more time" or something like that. And they really mean it. They do.
Even weirder than that, when we were starting superchick, I asked everybody I knew if they had heard of anyone suitable for our project. Sure enough, names started coming in. So I'd call someone and sure enough the person on the other end would get really excited about what I was saying and they'd tell me something like: "that's amazing what you're talking about cause I've always wanted to do something like that and I feel like God has put that dream on my heart." and we'd set up a time for them to come by and hang out so we could figure out if we all were trying to go to the same place. Usually a couple days later.
But than invariably... the night before we were supposed to hang, I'd get a call, sometimes a message and it would go like this: "well, I really want to do this but I just talked to my parents/boyfriend/friend/postman and maybe this isn't a good time for me to do this, I have to go to college/camp/siberian labor camp this summer, sorry." Now remember we're not talking about a 5 year commitment, we're talking about coming to meet the crew and see what it's about. Just to see what it's about.. We're talking about people who had been so excited 2 days before suddenly were so afraid that they wouldn't even come and talk about it. weird huh? People ask us why we chose Melissa and Tricia.. but really, they chose us.. they were the only 2 brave enough to do it. Melissa didn't even really play anything when we met her, I taught her to play guitar. Tricia even quit after a disastrous show opening for Audio A. But than came back....
So what are we afraid of? Afraid we might suck maybe.. afraid we might not. I think it was Nelson Mandela who said:
"it is not that we are afraid that might be judged and found wanting, but rather that we would be judged and found to be powerful beyond measure."
Which leads us back to this icky feeling that perhaps our own fear keeps us grounded here.. safe, yet yearning to fly. I remember Seal's song crazy had this lyric: "in a world full of people, only some want to fly, isn't that crazy?" Now I'm not sure what he meant, but to me, it captures how many of us don't chase our dreams. But the thing is, everyone wants to fly. Just few actually find the courage to do it.
So we're afraid we might succeed and all these changes we can't control will happen.. we're also afraid of sucking. It's always safer to be a genius in your own mind rather than a mediocre artist in reality. Our culture places a huge premium on success and mocks the failures. We demand instant success. We write a little song and than instantly the critic on our shoulder starts comparing it to other stuff that we love and our little creation wilts under the comparison... I think the critic on my shoulder works for Rolling Stone.. he's pretty harsh. When people start writing, I always encourage them to write 10 bad songs to get them out of the way. Very few people start writing good material. We compare our beginning work to people who are at the top of their game, working with teams of people who are all the best at what they do. No one who wants to play tennis steps into the ring with the williams sisters and expects to beat them the first time they pick up a racket. Why do I expect myself to be better than Trevor Horn than?
And than there's the time issue. Who's got time for anything these days? The only people with time are 8 year olds and prisoners. How can anyone be expected to pursue a dream working 2 jobs or whatever your situation happens to be? But the truth is, we've all got 15 minutes a day we can carve out for a dream or a change we want to make. I always tell guitar students, that 15 minutes a day every day is better than 16 hours of practice on the weekends. Cause somehow, that 16 hours never happens, but 15 minutes a day is achievable. If we get in the habit of giving just 15 minutes a day, you'd be surprised at what happens. It's just a matter of showing up for those 15 minutes. People always say: "do you know how old I'll be before I learn to play guitar at that rate?" To which I say "as old as you're gonna be if you don't learn." which comes from the book "you're only too old if you don't start right now." Sounds easy doesn't it. Than do it....
And here's where the hard part comes. We don't really want to. That's just how it is. Whether it's working out or practicing or writing or whatever, we just don't want to. (if you do, than stop reading this and go do it and count your blessings that you're not working uphill.) It's never easy to make a positive change. Stephen Pressfield refers to it as "resistance". I think it's even a little more than that. Let's say it's an internal war between creativity and entropy, between light and dark, between bad for us and good for us. In the end, I think Satan likes to see us living lives of quiet desperation, to see us half fulfilled and partying our dreams away... wondering if this is all there is. And he's quite good at it. So the thing to take away from all this is; if you're trying to make a positive change in your life, expect it to be uphill.. expect to have to fight for it. Plan on it being a long haul marathon where every day, you're going to have to fight for your 15 minutes.
So why do we fight for it? Is it worth it?
The funny thing is, when we actually get started on it, we quit worrying about it and as Stephen Pressfield says, the muse shows up.. he calls it a muse, I'd say that God is the God of creativity, the original artist when he created the earth in all of it's glory. Every glorious sunset I see, I think that he's really the original artist.. but the point is, when I sit down to create art, if I stay at it, pretty soon, I get something I like. I haven't made a song that I'm really really happy with yet, but I think some of them are interesting.. and I enjoy the process... and the amazing thing, is that other people seem to like them to. But we don't do it for other people or for success, we have to do it for ourselves in the end. Because we're not promised success, only the success of learning to live in courage. Of learning what it is to stretch and grow ourselves.. to be a different person at the end of the year than we were in the beginning. To quote a bridge from "Rock Star" off the Last one Picked album:
it's not about success
life is not a test
you just do your best
to see the view from wings of courage
to push on through when we're discouraged
failures are flyers who touch down
only they know what it's like to leave the ground.
So we do it, because in the end it's so satisfying, because it's what we're supposed to be doing, investing our God given talents. We do it because it's so fulfilling, more so than trying to fill our lives with noise and videogames and partying or whatever your dreamkiller is. So I challenge you, all my faithful and lovely readers, to dig in today.. to show up.. to claim whatever lost dream you've had.. whether that's working out, writing, shooting or something, your art, your future your new self awaits you.
And in the spirit of that, I'm gonna go write some music.
Peace out y'all,
max
Extra credit:
Stephen Pressfield, The War of Art
Julia Camerin: The Artist's way
Posted at 11:50 AM
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Published On: Oct 03, 2009 06:37 PM
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Published On: Oct 03, 2009 06:37 PM