These Trying Times.

Taking a break

I used to steal music all the time. I’m sure I still owe a few bands another purchase or two to make up for my pirating. The question used to be, “Why not?” Followed by some justification along the lines of, “well the artists dont get that much of the money anyway,” and “they make more money doing shows and selling merch.” Both those arguments make about as much sense as Kirk Cameron in an evolution debate. To address the first one: so, what, it’s better to pay them no money at all? And the second: records aren’t merch?
The whole entitlement attitude my generation has towards music is pretty insulting in comparison to all other art forms (movies get to join in on this, too… For the most part). Its as if taking the time to craft a genuinely engaging heart plucking song is of no economical worth… But McDoubles and Workaholics are.

We used to give our music away. We spent thousands on the production, album art and packaging for Loud Ass, and once we made back a portion of that, we gave the rest away. Why? Because we wanted people to hear us. It makes sense for a young unknown band to spread the word. But what I came to realize is that our EPs are as cheap as a Gold Room special, and you get to keep them and enjoy them for as long as you want. They aren’t half bad either. (www.anchoreightyfour.com)

A great album is the finest, cheapest form of art you can own and enjoy. Even a reprint poster of starry night will cost you 40 bucks. If it’s painted and painted skillfully… thousands. An album may be a replica, but it’s an exact replica. Its the culmination of visions from singers guitarists drummers pianists cellists clarinetists flautists MCs producers mixers masterers engineers etc… It’s a presentation, and it’s presented to you exactly as it was to the band when it was first finished. And you get nifty art. And lyrics. For about ten bucks. And unlike going to the movies, you get as many listens as you can handle.
Keep in mind months and years go into creating an album. Darlings get killed, hooks get replaced, entire songs are trashed. When its all over, as long as you take your fans and yourself seriously, you release something worthy of ten bucks, or at least a subscription to spotify.

This year alone I’ve listened to some of the finest music I’ve heard in my life, all of it available in physical, download, stream, or pirated. I only pay ten bucks a month so I can gorge my ears like a glutton on everything and anything I could ever want and guess what, artists get compensated, too. Some people honestly tell me I’m stupid for doing this. Why? Because I have respect for the works these artists create? You should too. Its a hard life we live through. Music makes it better. We should encourage the beauty and talent growing and blooming around us, not take it for granted.

This could be the longest lap of depression yet. 26 years old. Full time work. Completely unfulfilled in any sort of passion whatsoever, be it love, music or writing. I wish I could stay awake forever. I would have more time to play guitar and read and write and work and make money and even relax. How did I get here. How did I find myself waist deep in the American dream so soon? It’s congealing around me. It feels like I need a crane to get out. At least a tree branch and rope.
I’m mad at my friends. I’m mad at them for things that are only my fault. For not seeing that I’m crumbling while I glue the pieces back with drinks. For not stopping in their pursuit of happiness to help me find mine. For finding meaning in a life that only reveals chaos. Who are you people? What wash has been rinsed through your brains? Why do you still find those things you find funny, funny? What is wrong with me?

I want to be left alone as often as I feel lonely. Everything is a hypocrisy. I look down on myself for not excelling and bringing focus and productivity to a store that I care nothing about. I have been socialized, too, friends.
I’m trapped. I thought I wanted to die, I really did, until I rode in the car with someone who was going to kill me and himself with his driving. Thats when I realized I want to go on. I want to see whats next. I don’t want to leave yet. But what I am in feels so ridiculously miserable. My heart, my soul, my consciousness, it works against me…. And all I see is everyone pulling themselves up by their boot straps, as it were. Well congratulations. Some of us weren’t programmed to easily ignore the reality in front of us. some of us acknowledge it everyday. And it makes it hard to watch mac and cheese commercials without choking up.
I want to meet someone who has truly given up. Who has released all pretensions of adulthood and the american dream and found peace with their existence. Where are you? Please don’t be a bum. Bums are manipulative and depressing and annoying. You have to be something else… You have to be important. And when I find you, I will consider it the equivalent to finding God… maybe even happiness

Imaginarykidd you and your discerning ear win a shirt! ( I should have edited out the chorus, huh)

Being in a band is not an easy career/hobby/passion. It takes time and money and dedication to keep a band running and it infuriates me to see people put in a serious amount of promotion and then sit on their creative asses and write uninteresting crap. It’s hard getting people to even listen to your band, let alone buy a record or come to a show. Part of that reason is most people are going to assume your band blows because most of the time it does. I am probably not the first to admit this, and I know I am not the only one who feels this way, but when I go see a local show, I automatically assume the bands aren’t going to be very exciting or good. This is an acquired attitude. As a kid I was just happy to be in the pit, getting shoved against the bass drum, hearing the crash cymbal so loudly that the sound was more crackling ear drum than wash. Running in circles, drinking 40s and swinging my arms wildly were more important than the content of what I was hearing. It just needed to be loud, fast and angry. I wasn’t naive. I just hadn’t been bit by the desire to create new fascinating sounds and hooks. I hadn’t come to expect other people to want to do the same thing.

Art is a copy cat game. Even true geniuses are inspired by something. Call it mimesis. Call it lifting. We do it. I think one of the problems in music is that people lift their influences from drying wells. Drainage, Eli.

Rock music should not be easy to make. Playing power chords doesn’t make you Green Day or Nirvana. Playing noodle-tech-butterfly-metal riffs does not make you Metallica. So here are some haphazard rules I made up. Follow or disavow them at your own risk.

If you are able to write an entire song in one day and be fully satisfied with it, you are not pushing yourself hard enough to be considered an artist. Just because you managed to string it together doesn’t mean it matters. The name of the game is being profound. Getting on that stage means you think you are doing something that is worthy of my attention, so make what you are doing matter.

Our job when writing music is to create gravity. The center of that gravity is the tonic. If you aren’t always secretly pulling the listener toward the eventual tonic, you are failing ass. But more importantly consider the idea of sucking a listener toward something. One chord should suck you into next and then the next. A chorus should be an inevitability, not the part of the song you repeat just because that’s where you are in the song. From the first sound of a song, the last note has to be inevitable. Your song is a finely tuned Rube Goldberg, not a set of dominos.

Adding more notes to your boring riff doesn’t make it less boring, just more complicated. You are making beige more beige. Approach riff writing like the Gordon Lish school of writing. Say in five notes what you would say in fifteen. Move through the chords of a scale, not the scale itself. This is also the most bullshit of the rules as there is great rock music that use more notes than a Mozart opera. Basically what I’m saying is make sure EVERY SOUND MATTERS. Waste ye not the attention of your listener.

If you still don’t get it and want to see what I’m talking about, check out Weatherbox.

-Jon