Said it before, say it again, I never really liked the guitar. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great when it’s played well. There is no instrument quite as compelling in so many genres. But you gotta have a certain agreement with it in order to really make it sing. And above all, you simply cannot fight it.

And by the way, I will immediately stipulate that some of the absolute best guitar music ever made has been made by people who do not have this agreement, who do fight like Ahab for every note. I’m one of them. But that’s different. There will always be something missing for those who don’t really surrender to the instrument. As with ‘The Great Whale Dick’ it may be a hell of a fight, but you will never win.

The big issue for me, aside from having elfin-sized hands (and I don’t mean Tolkien-elves, I mean the ones that make the cookies and live in small trees) is that the guitar doesn’t really sound ‘good’ in […]

There’s a whole philosophy about ‘the pointlessness of…’ life/love/complaining…whatever.

http://nymag.com/arts/popmusic/features/grizzly-bear-2012-10/

The history of art has progressed along with the history of commerce. Successful artists have always struggled to find ways to make a living with their art. From Beethoven to the Beatles, you see the same story over and over: the artist works like a dog performing; all the while plotting on how to stop performing and concentrate on creation. At some point, every artist needs to stop being a trained monkey and start getting paid for the tune.

I’ve railed here a bunch of times on the huge shift brought about by the internet. The main thing, in my view, has been the radical shift in how musicians are viewed. We’ve spent the last 500 years trying to free ourselves from patronage and performance and actually get paid for the music. And in the past ten years it’s all gone down the pan.

This is not sour grapes. When an artist can only make a living doing shows or selling t-shirts, it turns […]

I Need A New Drum Kit—In Praise Of Ringo & Art

My drum kit she is a gone. And she’s a no coming back. My loverly Ludwig Silver Sparkle set (aka ‘Old Ringo’ appears to have been ‘liberated’ from the storage space I had kept it at during my recent studio renovation. I am told that it is not insured for the current market value of $1,500 smackers.

So it’s time to mourn. Not just for the dough-re-mi. And not just because it was my pal for several decades. But rather because it was a critical part of my education as a musician. Drums are a big deal. Even if you’re playing bass or guitar, the more you know about ‘the set’, the better you do your job. So I shall grieve.

And then? I gotsta get me a new one. And, since every loss is also a chance to ‘learn something’ (grumble, grouse, grumble), I think I ought to use this tragedy to re-think my drumming.

From Pee Wee To Ring-o

My whole concept […]