Take 2

There’s a lot of good stuff in the first take. So why do a second?

There’s three reasons for another take…

- you know what you want and you want to see if you can do it better

- you’re experimenting, trying new things, creative brainstorming

- there’s no clear understanding of what you want but it just doesn’t sound right so lets just keep doing takes

The first two are a great reason for another take. 

‘Let’s do another take and then another and then eight more just so we have them for when we actually figure out what we’re doing’ gets long, boring and is rarely the attitude of a professional.

»» The first time I was in attendance at a professional A-list session was at Blackbird here in Nashville. It was all the usual suspects (in a good way) with Dann Huff producing. They’d never played the song before so there was a brief listening of the demo and handing out of charts.

All the players filed into the live room. Take 1. It was certainly the best first take I’d ever heard but there were some flubs. The guitar and piano didn’t dip in and out quite at the right times and not everyone pushed the ending together.

Take 2. All the notes were there and the groove was there. At the end of the take there was chatter back and forth of how some of the lead licks could be tweaked.

Take 3. Absolutely stunning. Everything. I could hardly believe what had happened over the course of this twenty five minutes.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Not Waiting For The Road

We let people into our lives quicker than ever. 

We also switch the people in our lives quicker than ever.

We’re slow to stop letting someone in completely.

And also slow to get to know people better.

Life on the road isn’t perfect but one of the beauties is it provides the limited options, limited personnel, spontaneous excitement and necessary boredom to actually get to know someone a bit better.

Let’s not wait for life on the road.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Luck and Diligence

If the good thing happens completely out of the blue, it’s monumentally exciting. Like winning the lottery. So random, so incredibly lucky. Zero to a hundred in an instant. Pure exhilaration.

If the good thing happens as the result of diligently executing a three year plan, it’s far less of an emotional pop…but it’s way more likely to happen.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Card Games

Play the hand you want as opposed to the hand you’re dealt.

But long before that, know what game you’re playing. What the rules are, what winning looks like, which parts are luck and which parts can you get better at.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Prepared For vs. Prepared With

It’s hard to know what to be prepared for because it’s hard to tell the future.

But we can keep building on what we’re prepared with.

The skills, attitudes, connections and habits we are building now will be the tools we’re prepared with when the next unknown rolls around.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Pretty Good At The Beginning

I had just bought my first bass guitar and quickly invited my guitar playing friend over. After arguing about which notes to tune the guitars to and a subsequent phone call to the local music store to clear the air…we mapped out our first four chords.

We did it. Four chords. The same chords. Playing together, in rhythm. Pure bliss. We were pretty good.

Thinking you’re pretty good at the beginning gives you the patience and time and curiosity to actually get pretty good. And once you’re actually pretty good, that’s when things really get good.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple