"Define 'friend'."
The best advice I ever gave myself and, sensing that I was talking down to myself, advice I've yet to take. What, in this life that I have, seems to be the defining thing that bonds me to anyone else? I mean REALLY....
Is it time? Have we simply spent enough time together? Do we look forward to the looks, the sighs, the turns of phrase - are we used to the smells?
Is it suffering? Is my suffering like someone else's so much that I feel a kinship?
Is it joy? Do we find the same things funny, does the same stuff charge the battery?
Is it ambition? Do we reach for the same things with an implicit agreement to allow each other some degree of bullshit because we sense what we're after?
Is it a fever? Are we crazed in ways that compliment each other?
Is it questioning? Do we worry about the same stuff, unsatisfied by the same answers?
Is it that we know each other, warts and all, and still choose to hang around? Do our weaknesses make the other feel better about themselves or is it a duality of pure strength?
Parasite to host? Chocolate to cream? Oxygen Oxygen Hydrogen? Sour mash? Reason to passion? Hug to fencepost?
Is it an idea or is it real? Tangible? Communicable?
Living new in New York City will elevate these questions from navel gazing to matters of supreme urgency as you adjust your mind and struggle to stay connected. There are plenty of people around who can act friend-like and, although not meaning to, will zap the soul of its juices. Maybe it's just that they spend most of their time around other friend-like people. Me and everyone else here wants to be known by another, to reveal. Who doesn't? But many already have their fill of friends and can't afford the time and space. Dreams are dashed quicker and with more regularity than the stops of the F Train, which threaten at every second to carry the familiar faces on to their greater destinies. It's terrifying to let yourself care, yet you want to recognize the people you see everyday, to let them know you see and appreciate. To offer them a sliver of what you would, if things were different, maybe give them in whole: this, I think, is being friend-like. It's a beautiful gesture for your fellow traveler, but that doesn't mean it is enough.
I spent my birthday with two friends. I know this about one of them for sure, the other I believe to be as we get to know each other. Across the Village, some new friends were tearing up some Karaoke with an extended group of their friends. On my cell phone I kept getting calls about "my birthday party" that was raging. "Where are you? Everybody's here!" "We rented a big room for your party, dude!" "We came to see you where are you?" Those that called had to shout over the voices of the rest of the group. I intitally had said I wanted to go, but something was stopping me.
I would have relished having those who called me hanging with my assembled threesome, but my friend Bob wasn't interested in Karaoke and more importantly, I knew that if I showed up I would have been treated excellently, but that the group was not really gathered in my honor. If we went we would have been exposed to a room of friend-like people along with the genuines, and thinking "a bird in the hand", I was not willing to take the risk. On this birthday, "one-year wiser" meant recognizing the difference and respecting it. In the presence of the real thing, I wasn't interested in having the sanctity of my B day co-oped by a single "friend-like" soul.
On "friendster" everyone fills in the blanks about themselves, asks for friends and in some cases are sought out to be someone's friend. It is as simple as asking permission and clicking a mouse. In seconds you have a virtual record of your "friendsters", complete with photos and endearing information. It is an experience that I enjoy (currently not registered) but it speaks nothing to the real responsibility of friendship. Are we in danger? Are we losing something?
Maybe only if we don't define our terms.
"Friendster" and "friend-like". I'm straight as long as I know the difference. I'll be your "friendster" for sure.
I might be friend-like. Maybe that's enough for you. Maybe not. We don't have to define the word the same way to enjoy a symbiotic bond. Again, the point is not to navel gaze here - it is to stay connected or reconnect. I don't really care to chase down a quintissestial definition of the word. Just to ask if I'm doing alright and to consider and celebrate the "elements of me and you" (Wood).
Ray
Sunday, February 20, 2005
Saturday, February 19, 2005
The song threads. Criteria #3.
For Chris Hall's article "The Top 5 Rock 'n' Roll Songs Of All Time" (Courier-Journal, Feb.12) I wrote the following:
The word "song" made me think of a composition that would be great regardless of a particularly fantastic recording, which eliminated possibilities like Miles Davis' "Flamenco Sketches" and "Everybody's Got Something To Hide "Except for Me and my Monkey)" by The Beatles. So:
1. The Needle And The Damage Done - Neil Young
2. Shoot To Thrill - AC/DC
3. Hallelujah - Leonard Cohen
4. Stella By Starlight - Ned Washington and Victor Young
5. Workin' in a Coal Mine - Allen Toussaint
I felt good about my list because I didn't pine over it. It was done in 20 minutes. So far, the only song I've thought of that should have been on the list is Gram Parson's "$1000 Wedding" which would enter at #1, except that my criteria sort of disqualifies it because Evan Dando did a shitty version of it a few years ago.
Anyhoo, my friend Bill Born sent me an e-mail for his top five which he based on a different criteria:
1) can't be more than 2 1/2 minutes
2) It's gotta rock
3) You hafta remember where you were when you first heard it
Bill's criteria was inspiring - especially the last point.
Years ago when my Mom was sick she and I drove West. She had never been and I only knew what I'd seen while on a King Kong tour in a van, which was very little. On our way north from Seattle to Vancouver, we stopped at a mall and picked up some tapes to listen to. She found an Eddie Fischer (sp?) tape that excited her. We had been listening to Sinatra for hours (Sinatra would die later that night). Anyway, when Mom put the tape in the player it was immediately apparent to me that Eddie was, um, I guess he was clearly a star, but especially after listening to Sinatra, it was also clear that he had nothing unique or interesting going on.
I started closing down my ears and enjoying the drive when my Mom said, "You know, this music isn't that good, but I like it becauae it reminds me of where I was when I heard it."
In remembering this it hurts me because I didn't ask the obvious question: So Mom, where were you when you heard Eddie Fischer? I was too consumed. Consumed with the ride, with our life, and with ideas of my personal relationship to music which is confused at best. Still, I did manage to gain some powerful insight: different people identify with music for different reasons, and (for those fooled into thinking they can create music) the power of music goes far far beyond one's ability or intention tot create.
This is an insight that turns in my brain as of late, still deepeing my relationship to what I experience with music.
So here's the immediate list that I made before my heard and mind were flooded, based on Bill's Criteria #3:
50 Ways To Leave Your Lover and Southern Nights, both were deep tranmissions from 70's a.m. radio, when I started coming alive and talking to myself, sensing a world beyond my family.
Peg by Steely Dan which - oh, man. This is hard to talk about - it was playing late on WLRS one night when my high school girlfriend stayed over and we.....she....uh.....That SONG!..... it is sooooooooooooo........ Wow wow wow wow.
Then there was Sara by Starship - even harder song to talk about, but unfortuantely one I have words for: My parents were seperated and I was staying over with my Dad. We slept in the same bed in his barely furnished apartment and I was up all night smelling the perfume on the pillow next to his. Sara played over and over on another Louisville station. ALL NIGHT LONG. My only consolation is that "Sara" was a shitty song before it racked up such a bad memory.
Alex Chilton by the Replacements - the first time I heard the band was on Louisville's WFPL on a saturday night. What a powerfuck for the spirit! That was back when Louisville's public radio station wasn't a soon-to-be clear channel station masquerading as a non-profit good agent of music. I know I shouldn't nip at the hand that feeds, but they have to admit that compared to when rock and roll was first played on that station, something has changed and it is dangerously familiar to the early years of commercial station programming. My prayers are with them.
The word "song" made me think of a composition that would be great regardless of a particularly fantastic recording, which eliminated possibilities like Miles Davis' "Flamenco Sketches" and "Everybody's Got Something To Hide "Except for Me and my Monkey)" by The Beatles. So:
1. The Needle And The Damage Done - Neil Young
2. Shoot To Thrill - AC/DC
3. Hallelujah - Leonard Cohen
4. Stella By Starlight - Ned Washington and Victor Young
5. Workin' in a Coal Mine - Allen Toussaint
I felt good about my list because I didn't pine over it. It was done in 20 minutes. So far, the only song I've thought of that should have been on the list is Gram Parson's "$1000 Wedding" which would enter at #1, except that my criteria sort of disqualifies it because Evan Dando did a shitty version of it a few years ago.
Anyhoo, my friend Bill Born sent me an e-mail for his top five which he based on a different criteria:
1) can't be more than 2 1/2 minutes
2) It's gotta rock
3) You hafta remember where you were when you first heard it
Bill's criteria was inspiring - especially the last point.
Years ago when my Mom was sick she and I drove West. She had never been and I only knew what I'd seen while on a King Kong tour in a van, which was very little. On our way north from Seattle to Vancouver, we stopped at a mall and picked up some tapes to listen to. She found an Eddie Fischer (sp?) tape that excited her. We had been listening to Sinatra for hours (Sinatra would die later that night). Anyway, when Mom put the tape in the player it was immediately apparent to me that Eddie was, um, I guess he was clearly a star, but especially after listening to Sinatra, it was also clear that he had nothing unique or interesting going on.
I started closing down my ears and enjoying the drive when my Mom said, "You know, this music isn't that good, but I like it becauae it reminds me of where I was when I heard it."
In remembering this it hurts me because I didn't ask the obvious question: So Mom, where were you when you heard Eddie Fischer? I was too consumed. Consumed with the ride, with our life, and with ideas of my personal relationship to music which is confused at best. Still, I did manage to gain some powerful insight: different people identify with music for different reasons, and (for those fooled into thinking they can create music) the power of music goes far far beyond one's ability or intention tot create.
This is an insight that turns in my brain as of late, still deepeing my relationship to what I experience with music.
So here's the immediate list that I made before my heard and mind were flooded, based on Bill's Criteria #3:
50 Ways To Leave Your Lover and Southern Nights, both were deep tranmissions from 70's a.m. radio, when I started coming alive and talking to myself, sensing a world beyond my family.
Peg by Steely Dan which - oh, man. This is hard to talk about - it was playing late on WLRS one night when my high school girlfriend stayed over and we.....she....uh.....That SONG!..... it is sooooooooooooo........ Wow wow wow wow.
Then there was Sara by Starship - even harder song to talk about, but unfortuantely one I have words for: My parents were seperated and I was staying over with my Dad. We slept in the same bed in his barely furnished apartment and I was up all night smelling the perfume on the pillow next to his. Sara played over and over on another Louisville station. ALL NIGHT LONG. My only consolation is that "Sara" was a shitty song before it racked up such a bad memory.
Alex Chilton by the Replacements - the first time I heard the band was on Louisville's WFPL on a saturday night. What a powerfuck for the spirit! That was back when Louisville's public radio station wasn't a soon-to-be clear channel station masquerading as a non-profit good agent of music. I know I shouldn't nip at the hand that feeds, but they have to admit that compared to when rock and roll was first played on that station, something has changed and it is dangerously familiar to the early years of commercial station programming. My prayers are with them.
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
The Reverend Vince Sings all your favorites
Sunday night at a bar on East 4th Street the Reverend Vince Anderson brought it in full force. I drank a German pilsner beer and watched Torbet hit his drums wearing a shirt that said " The Crack Don't Smoke Itself". At one point Vince rose to the pulpit (!) and expalined that it made sense that Valentines Day was in lent. For you Catholics, this should say it all. For the uninitiated, lent is a time of sacrafice and atonement. His message, accented by the "fuck yeahhhs!" of those in attendence, was that love is not a holiday destination (lent ends with Easter). It ain't Christmas. It is a passage experience that consists of giving up, waiting, and being quiet. It's silent. It's thinking. Good shit.
Afterwards, Suki, Wilder, Paula and I went to East Village Karaoke where I had my first private room Karaoke. I was a little awkward at first because the set up reminded me of booths at the porn shop, the difference being that everything was clean and for the most part the machinery in the rooms worked. Paula's rendition of "Golden" by Jill Scott was a mantra. Wilder rarely finished a song without making sweet love to himself, and Suki singing "Xanadu" helped the universe make some sense. I sang every chance I got and felt good about my read of "everyday I write the book" (how can you not with two women singing the backup parts?) Suki knew at the end of our stay that my cut of the Karaoke cost was more money than I was really prepared to spend, but I assured her that it was worth it. I remembered this tonight when I concocted my second and final meal of the day from tuna and old pasta, and believe me - I am not complaining - the memory made my meal even better.
Over the weekend I had many conversations around the idea of "favorite songs". Having submitted a list to a friend in Louisville that was based on my sense of songs that are great regardless of who does them, I was inspired by my friend Bill to use a different criteria that defined a "best" song as one that you remember where you were when you heard it (this was also a big part of my Mom's enjoyment of music). For an afternoon, I blew my mind apart with memories, enjoying the thought of songs that keep within them some powerful times in my life. Part of me is still the age I was when I first heard them. I discovered some amazing shared connections: everyone around me that day had had a Zen experience with a song that Michael McDonald sang on. Roomie/bandmate Adam and I both share a deep experience with Robbie Dupree's "Steal Away", (a song that if Michael McDonald didn't sing on, he should have.) And roomie/bandmate Paul and I both were forced to like a song that Peter Cetera sang JUST because our girlfriends at the time said it was "our song". His : "You're The Inspiration". Mine: "Glory Of Love".
On a walk to more Karaoke, Suki reminded her friend Jaleel of a time in Louisville when he interupted his pizza delivery to knock on her door just to come in and dance to "Kung Fu Fighting" as it played on the radio. Jaleel bravely confessed to not remembering the occasion and, speaking as all of us at one time or another, said, "I wish I was that person you remember in the story. I'd like to be him." Ah...growing up. We forget! Another case for the greatness of song and the greater-ness of friends.
Tonight I saw a second play about cloning since I arrived here. I've been noticing quite a search for meaning and purpose in creative works as of late. I will wait for a good buzz before I share my take on it all (its really a big part of why I blogged in the first place). But right now I am, like many currently living in this world, far too sober.
Afterwards, Suki, Wilder, Paula and I went to East Village Karaoke where I had my first private room Karaoke. I was a little awkward at first because the set up reminded me of booths at the porn shop, the difference being that everything was clean and for the most part the machinery in the rooms worked. Paula's rendition of "Golden" by Jill Scott was a mantra. Wilder rarely finished a song without making sweet love to himself, and Suki singing "Xanadu" helped the universe make some sense. I sang every chance I got and felt good about my read of "everyday I write the book" (how can you not with two women singing the backup parts?) Suki knew at the end of our stay that my cut of the Karaoke cost was more money than I was really prepared to spend, but I assured her that it was worth it. I remembered this tonight when I concocted my second and final meal of the day from tuna and old pasta, and believe me - I am not complaining - the memory made my meal even better.
Over the weekend I had many conversations around the idea of "favorite songs". Having submitted a list to a friend in Louisville that was based on my sense of songs that are great regardless of who does them, I was inspired by my friend Bill to use a different criteria that defined a "best" song as one that you remember where you were when you heard it (this was also a big part of my Mom's enjoyment of music). For an afternoon, I blew my mind apart with memories, enjoying the thought of songs that keep within them some powerful times in my life. Part of me is still the age I was when I first heard them. I discovered some amazing shared connections: everyone around me that day had had a Zen experience with a song that Michael McDonald sang on. Roomie/bandmate Adam and I both share a deep experience with Robbie Dupree's "Steal Away", (a song that if Michael McDonald didn't sing on, he should have.) And roomie/bandmate Paul and I both were forced to like a song that Peter Cetera sang JUST because our girlfriends at the time said it was "our song". His : "You're The Inspiration". Mine: "Glory Of Love".
On a walk to more Karaoke, Suki reminded her friend Jaleel of a time in Louisville when he interupted his pizza delivery to knock on her door just to come in and dance to "Kung Fu Fighting" as it played on the radio. Jaleel bravely confessed to not remembering the occasion and, speaking as all of us at one time or another, said, "I wish I was that person you remember in the story. I'd like to be him." Ah...growing up. We forget! Another case for the greatness of song and the greater-ness of friends.
Tonight I saw a second play about cloning since I arrived here. I've been noticing quite a search for meaning and purpose in creative works as of late. I will wait for a good buzz before I share my take on it all (its really a big part of why I blogged in the first place). But right now I am, like many currently living in this world, far too sober.
Sunday, February 13, 2005
Listen.
In the midst of my personal transformation, I'm trying to recognize and act through the wisdom of my senses met with reflection. In the rush towards a new era that is oversaturated with unfulfilling data and stimuli, I think we share more in regards to our misreads than our understanding. At every turn in my life of late I am charting missed opportunities for connection with a greater fabric that bring us echos of home or, for some of us, home itself. I want to make a list of the obstacles, identify them completely, and then burn them down with word, sound and gesture. With the means laid out before me I'll create return transmissions to blast back across the canyon. Because while the arts continue to be reduced to commodities in the constructs of the 20th century, the artist is more vital than ever.
Right now I am focused upon listening, in part, I'm sure, because I am a musician and a lover of sound, but also, I suspect, because I am aware that I am losing my hearing quicker than most. For me, listening to music and sound transmitted from any place, in any medium, gives me great psychic and mystic vibrations that I believe are available to every soul, regardless of where they come from in their expereince of music/sound.
For any skeptics, pick a song - one you know or one you don't - and sit with it for 15 minutes. (For passionate music lovers with opinions that can be defined by genres and radio stations, I challenge you to pick a song by a band/artist you don't have a taste for.) Listen to it once. Respond to how you feel, what it makes you think of. Then listen again. See what changes in you, what changes with the song. Did you close off to it already and "pass judgement" or are you still listening? If not, at what point did you stop listening? Why? What thoughts are floating around the way you feel about the music? Are you aware of the the heart(s) and mind(s) from which the music comes from? Can you get a sense of who they might be? etc. etc.
I'd like to believe that anyone open to the idea of this process will have a deep dialogue with themself, which In my opinion, is the greatest wish of any artist with something to share. (Notice I didn't write "with something to say" - I think the backlash of 20th Century experiences like Bob Dylan inadvertently shut people down in regards to how music - perhaps especially recorded music - can affect their other senses.)
Anyhoo, the end result, I hope, is joyful or at the very least, life-affirming communion.
Off the top of my head, recommended mind-blowing listening: Kind Of Blue by Miles Davis and Has Been by William Shatner. Don't indulge your thoughts about what these recordings are until you've heard them. And if you've heard them, listen again!
Anyone with a passion hit me back with song or thought. I'm listening.
Right now I am focused upon listening, in part, I'm sure, because I am a musician and a lover of sound, but also, I suspect, because I am aware that I am losing my hearing quicker than most. For me, listening to music and sound transmitted from any place, in any medium, gives me great psychic and mystic vibrations that I believe are available to every soul, regardless of where they come from in their expereince of music/sound.
For any skeptics, pick a song - one you know or one you don't - and sit with it for 15 minutes. (For passionate music lovers with opinions that can be defined by genres and radio stations, I challenge you to pick a song by a band/artist you don't have a taste for.) Listen to it once. Respond to how you feel, what it makes you think of. Then listen again. See what changes in you, what changes with the song. Did you close off to it already and "pass judgement" or are you still listening? If not, at what point did you stop listening? Why? What thoughts are floating around the way you feel about the music? Are you aware of the the heart(s) and mind(s) from which the music comes from? Can you get a sense of who they might be? etc. etc.
I'd like to believe that anyone open to the idea of this process will have a deep dialogue with themself, which In my opinion, is the greatest wish of any artist with something to share. (Notice I didn't write "with something to say" - I think the backlash of 20th Century experiences like Bob Dylan inadvertently shut people down in regards to how music - perhaps especially recorded music - can affect their other senses.)
Anyhoo, the end result, I hope, is joyful or at the very least, life-affirming communion.
Off the top of my head, recommended mind-blowing listening: Kind Of Blue by Miles Davis and Has Been by William Shatner. Don't indulge your thoughts about what these recordings are until you've heard them. And if you've heard them, listen again!
Anyone with a passion hit me back with song or thought. I'm listening.
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