You have to be tall to be in the NBA Unless you’re fast
You have to be fast to be running back in the NFL Unless you have powerful legs
You have to be a great hitter in the MLB Unless you’re a pitcher in the AL
This works in music too
You have to be a great singer Unless you’re a great leader
You have to have a major label Unless you have a great plan
You need a big break Unless you can goals and reach them daily/monthly/yearly
You need a great drummer Yep, that one is true
In this day and age you have to figure out which rules to break, which to bend, and which to play by. It’s worth taking time to re-examine what rules you believe in, and asking yourself if you need to update you’re perspective.
Stretch. Push. Invent.
I’m always interested in your perspective, whether affirming or dissenting. Continue the conversation anytime: gabethebassplayer@gmail.com
If you’re not creating on your own, you’re not creating your best work.
It’s even known (years after the fact) that most of the Lennon/McCartney songs came from one of them bringing the other one an idea 70 or 80 percent of the way there.
You have to be willing to walk into the wilderness alone.
There you can wander, chase melodies, chase words, stumble, keep going, find chords, see a million mirages before finally arriving at the waterfall.
In a co-write starting from scratch it’s a victory to come away with a song that’s mediocre. A victory for the writers, not the listeners. (You chose to do this for a living, so you’re going to need some listeners.)
When you go it along, you don’t celebrate mediocrity as much. There’s no one to impress, so when you arrive at mediocre you either push through or change direction…you don’t spend the afternoon gloating in it.
Write with other people, create with other people, bring unfinished ideas to people, be willing to accept help and creative direction. But don’t forget the difficult, thankless, un-sexy, scary, time suck, amazingly life-giving and fulfilling part of mapping new territory on your own.
Tell everyone when you find something good.
I’m always interested in your perspective, whether affirming or dissenting. Continue the conversation anytime: gabethebassplayer@gmail.com
I watched the latest season of House Of Cards in an embarrassingly short amount of time. Something like 13 episodes, roughly 50 mins each. Do the math….no I’ll do it for you, that’s almost 11 hours dedicated to a single entity.
I was captivated. Obviously it did a great job of keeping my attention.
But the reason I was able to blow through all 13 episodes, without blinking, didn’t have to do with my attention span…it had everything to do with the fact that I didn’t believe I was missing out on something else better.
People have long attention spans. Really long. Regardless of what you read telling you the opposite.
Attention spans become irrelevant as long as you can make me feel like I’m not missing out on something else.
The goal is to make people forget that there even is something else.
The shift in focus is a shift toward what’s really happening. Doesn’t mean it’s any easier, but at least you’ll be battling the right dragon. So whey you slay it, there’s actually a prize.
If you can make people forget about missing out, you win.
p.s. I’ve also watched a good bit of Scandal. Definitely keeps my attention. Definitely feel like I’m absolutely for sure missing out on something better. So I stopped.
I’m always interested in your perspective, whether affirming or dissenting. Continue the conversation anytime: gabethebassplayer@gmail.com
There’s a really well written, funny, satirical article going around about a band at SXSW having a miserable time. It’s a worthwhile article. Hilarious and sad at the same time.
Lot’s of people are using this article to boo-hoo being an artist at SXSW, to point the finger at everyone else…avoiding responsibility.
But SXSW last week was a place where the yakkers and talkers won. So in this case, some people were natural winners, but everyone had the potential to be winner.
If you showed up to SXSW after a year of being a hermit, writing, tweeting, dreaming from your living room, certainly you didn’t expect to excel in a social environment.
You’re like Pee Wee showing up and expecting to do well at a cross fit competition.
You need to get out of the house.
You’re surprised you couldn’t and can’t get along and connect with people, but you haven’t initiated conversation in ages, and thats what SXSW is, and also what life is made of. Connection.
If you’re willing to connect, to put yourself out there and talk to people, you can always avoid taking ten steps backward at an event. And I might even go so far as to say you can turn anything into at least a baby step forward.
So congrats to the winners, you deserve it. Losers, start practicing for next year.
I’m always interested in your perspective, whether affirming or dissenting. Continue the conversation anytime: gabethebassplayer@gmail.com
When you were a little kid taking piano lessons or violin lessons, if you made 5 mistakes per 100 notes, you were an exceptional player, maybe even top of the class. Your parents would weep at the end of your performance.
You keep practicing and practicing year after year and in high school you’ve been able to whittle it down to 1 mistake every 1000.
That’s really good. Not perfect, but really good. You practiced years, took private lessons, played everyday in school.
Now, if you want play for the New York Philharmonic, the difference between 999 correct notes and 1000 correct notes is the size of the grand canyon. And you will have to practice multiple hours per day for years in order to close that gap.
People don’t come from all over the world to hear an orchestra that is mostly right…they come to hear sophisticated perfection. That’s the orchestra gig. Perfection.
But your act isn’t like that. People don’t come for perfection. That’s not your reputation (unless you tell people that’s your reputation).
Bands and artists should be great, and focus on being great at their instruments. The music deserves that.
But the time it would take for you and your band to become absolutely 100% flawless, is not time well spent. You’re not the New York Philharmonic.
People don’t come to you to be moved by perfection, they come to be moved. Totally different gig.
So keep practicing, keep getting better, but remember that just because you don’t make mistakes doesn’t make it important.
If you got perfect at moving people and were imperfect in your playing or singing….sounds like every big act I can think of.
I’m always interested in your perspective, whether affirming or dissenting. Continue the conversation anytime: gabethebassplayer@gmail.com
