Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Getting Comfy

As the winter is wearing on, everything is all about comfort these days. People are putting on their comfortable winter coats and scarves (yes, even in San Francisco. I am aware that we are all wimps), they are eating comfort food, and doing "comfort things" I suppose. What those are, I can only guess. I just picture sitting by a fire, maybe cuddling, maybe drinking hot toddies.

Ladies, I would just like to say that at this moment, my schedule is almost entirely clear and open if any of you wish to pursue any of these activities with a certain charming and verbally awkward blogger. But my chimney is broken, so you have to supply the fireplace.

I find that throughout the year, I have a whole different comfort tradition: I am a comfort reader. It sounds silly perhaps, but from time to time I just feel the need to go back and read books that I know and love. Sometimes it's because I want to re-capture a feeling that a book stirs up in me, sometimes it's because I want to re-immerse myself in a world that the book creates, and sometimes it's just that I love the story so much that I want to take it all in again. I don't know if this is a unique feature to myself or not. As far as I know, a number of people are not re-readers. I'm not always, but there are a number of books that I can pick up and read pretty much any time and I know I'll be happy about it.

This came up in conversation the other day: I was discussing holiday traditions with some friends, and I mentioned that for probably about six years straight from the time I was a young teenager, I used to read Stephen King's The Shining every Christmas break. It started because it was the first chance I had to do pleasure reading after my Fall semester had ended, really. I had purchased a copy at a garage sale, and found myself so taken with it that I couldn't put the book down. It's the 100% honest truth that reading that book is when I realized I needed glasses: I'd find that reading for more than 2-3 hours at a time would give me one hell of a headache, so I'd have to stop reading, little did I know it was due to eye strain from my farsightedness. But I digress. I read that book in a few days, and decided then and there to make it an annual tradition, and I think that, especially given my recent lack of employment, this is the perfect chance to re-kindle that tradition.

There are other titles of course, the Scott Pilgrim series being a prime example, where I just feel like it is totally worth my time to go back and read it all again. Specifically in that case, they are quick reads, so I can usually knock it all out in a day or two. On the Road is obviously an "A-number-one" example (between pleasure reading and thesis prep, I have got to be nearing my twentieth read of that one).

But I'm not here to catalog books I read all the time, (you can check out my GoodReads account for that). Rather, I am curious about why certain books are so re-readable, and if I'm a freak for having reading habits like this. Is it a book nerd thing? (I hesitate to say "scholar" because if you know me, you know that's not a term I'd usually apply to myself) Is it something else? Is it something that authors actually strive for? I know this seems disjointed, but I guess I just have to keep hearkening back to the base question: am I alone in my comfort reading repetition? I know a lot of people who re-read books, but are there people like me out there who re-re-re-re-read stuff? If any of you out there have an opinion, please chime in, I'd love to hear what you have to say.

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Dream Big

I had a dream the other night. It was about a girl. A real girl. A girl I "kind of have a thing for" I suppose you could say. We don't have a relationship or anything like that - we know each other by name, we interact from time to time, and we are friends on Facebook, but that's the extent of it. She has a boyfriend, and myself being an upstanding young man, I would never stand in the way of that. Honestly, I don't believe, even in my most delusional mind, that she thinks of me the way I think of her. Yet still, she popped up in a dream I had the other day. I never tend to remember a whole lot of my dreams, so the details are hazy, but I remember the gist of it, and that is what this whole blog is about today.

See, usually when someone talks about a dream involving the opposite sex, especially a member of the opposite sex that they are attracted to, it is some kind of sexy dream, or a dream where that person is just so overwhelmingly in to you that you wake up feeling like a million bucks. It's something that bolsters your confidence and creates a reality in your dream world that you can never accomplish in waking life. But here's the thing about my dream from the other day: it was wildly awkward, probably just as awkward as I would be in real life. Instead of dreaming of fun sexytimes and what I could do with this girl given the lack of restrictions, relationships, and hangups, what did I do? I awkwardly talked with her for like half and hour, at the end of which I was just as oblivious about her feelings towards me as I am in real life.

So what the hell is wrong with me? Has my subconscious become just as awkward and stammery around women in my dreams as I am in real life? For all my ways with words in written English, for my master's degree in literature, I am absolutely fucking terrible at talking to women. But why should this carry over into my dreams? Shouldn't I be the great Lothario that I always wanted to be in real life? Shouldn't I be witty and charming and suave? Apparently not. Apparently my dreams are pretty much useless in fulfilling any of those desires, even in a dream world of my own creation. Apparently my dreams are trying to tell me that no matter how I try or how far I may go, I will never be that charmer that I would like to be.

Maybe it's for the best. Maybe I'm not meant to be the silver-tongued ladies man. Maybe I will in fact find a girl who doesn't mind the fact that i trip over my words like a verbal Inspector Clouseau. Hopefully, some day my long, mildly awkward pauses wil come into vogue and I'll be every girl's dream come true. But until that day comes, I will continue to be kind of quiet, always short on things to talk about, and a huge fan of telling women I'm interested in that "yeah... you know... I think you're, well.... pretty awesome. And maybe.... some time that works for both of us maybe.... we could, ah, you know, like, get coffee? Or a drink? Or dinner? My treat? I think? Because, yeah, your'e pretty awesome and you're pretty much... you're... definitely almost exactly the kind of person that I want to get a drink or some food with. But if not that's cool." and then quietly slurk away while they are trying to suss out exactly what I'm yammering about.

Friday, December 9, 2011

Revival?

I'm not going to go making a bunch of crazy promises or anything, but seeing as how I will now have free time again, and feel like I need to make a more concentrated effort to write regularly regardless of my employment status, I hope to bring this blog, like a phoenix, back from the ashes.

But seeing as how I'm at work at the moment, all I'm going to do is insert this video, because it is just everything that is right with the world right now for me.



But check back soon, I will be writing here again. At least for a little bit, ya know?

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Rockstar

A friend recently posed an interesting question to me: as a musician, would I prefer to have a handful of okay hit songs, or to have one major super-hit.

I answered as truthfully as possible, that I'd totally take any string of mid-quality songs, so long as I could keep on playing music as long as possible. While I earnestly believe that this answer is as true as possible, there are some interesting considerations to make.

First off, the case for being a one-hit wonder:
  • Superstardom - This is hard to overlook; I believe that most everyone who plays music somewhere deep in their consciousness dreams of the spotlight, of being on the cover of magazines, and of hearing your songs played everywhere you go

  • Royalties - let's face it, when you have a mega-hit, people want to use it for everything. It will probably be in some movies or at least used on a TV show. Radio stations will play it day and night. Soon you'll be hearing your smash hit being used to sell everything from cars to candy to hair restoration treatments. And each time those few notes hit the airwaves, you'll be making a few cents. And that's just sweet.

  • Giant Shows & Diva Perks - When you have that one song that everyone wants to hear, your label/manager/promoters/etc. are going to make sure that as many people as possible can hear it. This means opening for acts who are way bigger and playing venues that most bands can only dream of. When this happens, you don't have to lift a finger. There is simply no chance in hell if you're playing something like the Oakland Coliseum or Bill Graham Civic Auditorium that you're going to have set up your own drum kit or really even tune your own guitar. You just have to show up, not be strung out, and play that one song that everyone wants to hear.
Now, the downside of mega-hits
  • Burnout - Think about this logistically for a moment or two. You know how you get all tired and bored with songs when they get played out? You know how quickly you reach for the mute button when you hear that song in that commercial? You know how much you gripe when that super hit keeps showing up on your Genius playlist? Now imagine having that happen PLUS having to go out and perform that song three to four times a day for shows, radio live performances, mall openings, or whatever. Do you think you'd EVER want to hear that song again? Yeah, me neither.

  • Pressure for a follow-up - There is an almost mind-boggling misnomer about the idea of a "sophomore slump". Bands that blow up on an initial release are really cursed. From the time that big hit or super debut album drops, the pressure is on to be equally impressive on the second record. But you're mired in a huge catch-22: if your follow up sounds too much like your original release, then you're considered uncreative or stale. If you stray too far from your original sound, you're persecuted for changing too much. It's a total no-win situation.

  • The Brightest Star Burns Fastest - Yes, this is also connected to the "burnout" factor, but this has to do much more with public perception. The term one-hit wonder exists for a reason. Do you think the Toadies wish they could write another "Possum Kingdom"? So do I. But let's be honest; writing a really great popular song is a very difficult art, and doing it consistently is an incredibly rare feat. Unfortunately, the much more common occurrence is that you write one great song (or group of songs) and that helps you crack the big time, and you spend most of your career trying to live up to that.
Now, a couple of considerations on the benefit of being a band that just consistently puts out quality music, but no super hits:
  • Sustainability - The gold standard that most all musicians I know hold is: can you pay your bills by doing nothing beyond being a musician? If so, you have officially made it. I just spoke to a friend of a friend last night who makes his living as a musician, and despite being successful enough to warrant his own wikipedia article as a musician, he said that he spent his first two years touring in bands being essentially homeless, because he couldn't afford to be on the road and still pay for rent for an apartment back home. Still, he can do it now and he doesn't exist solely on ramen and canned soup. But still, for any serious musician, the ability to do nothing else but write, play, and record music is an absolute dream.

  • Experiences - I believe that you haven't really experienced places until you've played there in a touring band. By doing so you not only get to see what the night life is like, you have some free time in the day to wander around and experience a place, and if you're touring on the cheap, you usually meet fantastic people and have some of the greatest stories you're ever going to be able to tell as a result. You have some nights where you're totally blown away or caught off guard by some smaller towns or venues, and you have some nights where you can only take comfort in the fact that it's finally over. Still, it's what every musician I know wants to do for as long as humanly possible.

  • Artistic fulfillment - This is what we also call the "cover band conundrum" - if you make a living as a musician playing original material, you get to enjoy having your music heard night in and night out by groups of people who, for the most part, just want to go out, enjoy themselves, and hear some music. They won't be calling to hear your hit single, but they are also more likely to pay attention to your whole set, rather than waiting for that one song. Plus, you get to play your songs to your heart's content, moving new and old songs in and out at your discretion only.
But, there is always a down side...
  • Money - yes, you're making a living doing what you love, but the vast majority of musicians who play and tour for a living don't really put a whole hell of a lot of money in the bank for a rainy day. You don't have a 401k, you don't have benefits, you just have whatever is in your bank or in your pocket. What you're really working towards is being able to have enough money to make it to the next tour, next album, or anything like that. Hopefully you can stockpile a little cash here and there, but it's not an easy route.

  • Wear and tear of the road - If you're just a working musician, the only way to really make money is to play shows and hit the road. Yes, you make some money selling merch and music online, but it's probably not enough to sustain much of anything. So you hit the road for months at a time. One story I hear in common from almost all the bands I've heard interviewed that gain enough success to be interviewed is that in the early years they always played shows. I believe it was Motion City Soundtrack who said that their first year after being signed to Epitaph, they played something like 325 shows. On a smaller scale, Crown Point, who are friends of mine, estimated themselves as playing 285 shows or something like that in the past calendar year. I don't care who you are, but that schedule takes the piss out of you at some point. There comes a point when all you want is a home-cooked meal and to sleep in your own bed.

  • Motivation - Let's face it, there is going to come a point where you're going to look up and say "what am I doing all this for?" There are sort of built in "levels" that musicians hold themselves to; whether it's the ability to book a certain size venue, to tour, to make a living playing music, to get signed - it all depends on what the person's aim is. Still, I honestly believe that there comes a point where you realize you've plateaued, and the trick is recognizing that point when you get there. Not every band is destined to have a chart-topping hit, hell not every band is going to be able to play some of the biggest venues in your city. You just have to be happy with what you can do at a given point, or do your best to improve that situation. Do I want to be playing local clubs and venues when I'm in my late 40s? Probably not. But I can tell you right now, all I want to do is play as many shows as humanly possible and tour as much as I can afford to.
That's a somewhat more in-depth look at what into my decision. Again, it's a matter of time frame and motivation, and I feel that has to change with your age and personality as much as anything.

So.... anyone want to sign my band so I can live the dream?

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Transience

Jeez, I tell you what - you start working a contract job that takes the usual 9-5 timetable, and suddenly all my late-night blogging goes straight out the window. Fortunately for you and I (but definitely not my wallet), I am back to my standard unemployed self. And as I wrap up another contract, I can't help but think about how much of my life has been marked by a certain degree of employment transience. It's interesting, for someone who clings to such deep roots, that much of what I do for a living is connected to the "here today, gone tomorrow" idea of impermanence.

First, the roots: I have lived in San Francisco for what most would argue has been my entire life. Yes, there was a short-lived freshman year of college where I lived in the East Bay, but not only was that maybe a 45 minute drive from home, I spent on average four nights in the city regardless, so I was really just sleeping in the East Bay for the vast majority of that time. I still remain close with friends from as far back as pre-school, and I take a great deal of joy in going to any establishment where I am a long-time regular. I mean, come on, don't you like it when then owner of your favorite restaurant comes up to you and greets you by your first name? I know I sure as hell do.

So, taking all this into consideration, I find it peculiar that I have spent so much of my working life not connected to much of anything. Yes, there was my time as a Community Manager, and there was the year I spent teaching full-time, but by and large, I have spent the majority of time since graduating college as a worker who has no official long-term connection to a business. In the nearly five years I spent teaching, as I said, one year of that was full time (a stat that implies impermanence in itself), but the rest of a time, I was a substitute. This means that every day I worked, I was generally greeted by an entire classroom full of strangers in a room I'd never been in. People didn't know my name or anything about me beyond what was written on the white board at the front of the classroom. Still, in that time I feel like I made a number of significant connections with students, teachers, and office staff. I don't know if it's the nature of the job to breeze in and do that, or if I simply have that tendency as an individual, but I feel like it was almost a coping mechanism in dealing with the stresses of the job: if you could walk out of the school at the end of the day and feel like you almost belong, or that you learned something about somebody in those few short hours, it put a whole new spin on the rest of the day.

Freelance work, at least in my experience with it, has been rather different. While I occasionally had moments in my recent job where I felt like I was really part of the team, on the whole, I had a much greater "outsider looking in" perspective on the whole process. I think it's mostly due to the fact that I am only brought in house when it's really crunch time, so everything that is happening around me is a bit of a whirlwind, and I can simply put my head down, turn up the music in my headphones, and tune it all out while I do my drone work for the day. Naturally, there were exceptions to that scenario on a semi-regular basis, but still, on the whole, when I left the office for the day, it wasn't very often that I would find myself thinking about my officemates the way I did kids.

But all that aside, I find the nature of this work rather singular: why is it that I am drawn to jobs that I can take and leave at the drop of a hat? Do I really value freedom that much? Do I just like being able to work around my own schedule and whims that much? I wonder how much of it is that I do indeed have such a wide social base around me that I don't feel like I need the camaraderie of co-workers. Think about it: I have two awesome roommates, great bandmates, a bunch of Rumdums, high school friends, a cop, and a wonderful monkey who are all people that I look forward to spending time with pretty much on a weekly basis, so I don't really need to add to that, so maybe that's why I can come home from work, no matter how isolated, and still have all the social interaction I may have missed out on during working hours.

Who knows. It's just something that's been kicking around in the ol' brain for a little bit, especially as I once again start staring down the rabbit hole of full-time employment again...

(sorry there's no image with this blog post, but searching "transience" on google proved a hell of a lot of really ugly art, and for some strange reason, a lot of pictures of urinals. Check it out for yourself if you're interested)

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Transformative

Tonight I'm tackling a subject I don't usually breach on this blog: love. I suppose it's only fitting that I should be so moved to finally tackle the L word (no, Scott Pilgrim nerds, not "lesbians") because of something that I witnessed, not something that happened to me. It helps me keep my gruff and curmudgeonly exterior.

This particular tale is about a friend of ours that my roommate works with, who for the sake of this blog and his anonymity we'll call Bento. He's a good guy, but for the few years that I've known him, he's always been kind of a lovable drunk. Granted, the times I'd usually run into him was after he was leaving the bars and coming to hang out with our crew, but without fail, he was more or less stumbling drunk. That didn't make him any less a fun person, or a nice guy, quite to the contrary; he was always fun to hang out with and nothing but friendly -- the type of guy anyone would say has a heart of gold.

Another mutual friend noticed, as I did one of the last times I hung out with him: for as fun and lighthearted he is when he's at the bottom of the bottle, he's actually a really fascinating and charismatic guy when he's sober. We'd just never known because we'd never really seen him dry until recent times that we hung out.

Now that I've got that background out of the way, let me jump to last night. My roommate had told me over the weekend that Bento's woman of his dreams was in town for a few days, and that his current girlfriend of the last year or so was none too pleased about it. When I was invited to go out with my roommate, Bento, the girl of his dreams, and the girl's sister, I just couldn't pass it up. My roommate had gone on and on about how much different Bento was around her; he hardly drank, he had nothing but her best interest in mind in everything he did, and he just comported himself much differently, so I had to see it for myself.

We met up at the local bar, where Bento was nursing a beer, which I discovered later was the only one he had all night. We decided that rather than going to another bar, we'd grab some beers and go hang out on the roof deck of the hotel where the sisters were staying. It ended up being a fantastic night; we sat out on the deck, watched the stars, listened to music, and had great conversation until sometime after two in the morning. Bento indeed seemed like a changed man - he was practically beaming from ear to ear, re-living old times with a woman with whom he once shared an intimate bond. My roommate and I gave them their privacy as goodbyes were said, but after that, I drove the three of us back to our house, and that's when I got the full story: he had met this girl years ago, fell for her immediately, they dated until she had to move to Chicago for business. He followed her there, only to be absolutely miserable (with the city, not her -- he just couldn't hang with the winters), so he ended up coming back to San Francisco, and they kept up a long-distance relationship for some time, until finally resigning themselves to just be friends.

Up until a few days ago, it had been almost two years since they'd been in touch, but as he described it, when she sidled up next to him at work on Friday, it was if she'd just gone down to the store and come back - every bit of the intimacy, affection, and love was still there. The problem with this, of course, is that Bento has had a girlfriend for nearly one of those years. Much to his credit, he did hands-down the most respectable thing he could have: he came completely clean with his current girlfriend, saying it would be cheating them both if he kept going out with her, knowing full and well that he was in love with another woman, even if she does currently live on the East Coast.

But what struck me most about this whole story, now that I've gotten through it all, was the cliche idea of the "transformative power of love". I've heard a lot of people give it lip service, but to see it in a situation like that, I was almost at a loss. It was incredible; here was this guy I have known for years, but he was like a completely different person, and it didn't have to do with the alcohol in his system, it had entirely to do with the love in his life. I could say he was literally glowing, which is overstepping and misusing literally, I realize, but it isn't far off. I've never seen anything like it, at least not in a long time. Bento kept saying, and I noticed, that when he's around her, he feels like he's about ten feet tall. It was like seeing someone finally realize and live up to their potential. I know it sounds like I'm gushing or being flowery with my language, but that's how intense the response was.

Granted, waking up at our house today, he was kind of in the opposite shape, knowing that as we sat there on the couch, the woman of his dreams was on a plane back to the East Coast, only to hope that it wouldn't be another two years before he saw her again, but I guess that's the necessary evil you have to experience with affairs of the heart. Either way, it was an absolutely fascinating and heartwarming experience to witness from a third-person point of view, and I only hope that I and everyone who reads this will experience love like that at least once in their lives, and kudos to those of you who already have.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Distracton

No, I'm not talking about the distractions in my life that have kept me from updating this blog on anything more than a sporadic basis. I am just kind of lame, and my moderately quiet blog life is more a byproduct of the occasionally hectic, occasionally banal lifestyle I'm currently living. Sadly for this blog, much of my creative energy is being funneled into Hello Monster world (there will be a new CD sometime before the summer is out) and into the fits and spurts of fiction writing I've been trying to pull together.

But yeah, distractions. See, weekend I spent a lot of time hanging out with a lot of people. Under this blanket term, "hanging out" generally encompasses sitting in places with other people, from two up to probably about 25 at various points, in people's back yards, houses, at BBQs, at bars, you get the idea. In each instance, save for one which I'll address later, there was a widely common theme: distraction. There was always something else going on somewhere which caused people to split their attention from the conversation at hand. I know that it's wildly indicative of our fast-paced modern culture, but it is also a somewhat disturbing trend. Why do we always have to multi-task? Still, there is always a TV on somewhere, or there is someone doing something internetty, or even something as small as everyone constantly checking their phones for missed calls, texts, emails, and all that business. I am a firm believer that if you're going to hang out with someone or spend time with them, that you really owe it to them, if not yourself, to really be there. It's sad that we've lost this ability, but it was really a common theme of much of my weekend: being surrounded by people who were by and large focused on something other than interacting with the people around them. It wasn't constant, but there were so many "oh, hang on, I've got to take this" or "have you seen this internet thing? I'll pull it up on my phone for you" that there was no real reason for people to actually be in the same space.

Now, before I move on, I'll make myself perfectly clear when I say that people will break conversation for phone and internet reference stuff, I am absolutely as guilty as the next person. I do my best to give mostly undivided attention if I'm spending time with someone, but there's a natural tendency in our generation to take any lull in attention or conversation to sneak a peak at your phone. I do it, you probably do too. It's okay, I'm not saying we're bad or insensitive people for doing it, but it does make me a little sad that it's so widely accepted.

But moving on to the exception: today was an absolutely beautiful day in San Francisco. The sun was out, there was a light breeze, and I'd had a wildly productive band practice. I left the studio to see a message from a friend wanting to see if I wanted to hang out, maybe have a few beers, and just enjoy the day. So he came over, and initially I figured we'd watch some TV or maybe play video games or something, but instead we did a fantastic alternative: we sat and talked. Yeah, I was playing music in the background, but other than that, we spent pretty much the whole afternoon sitting in my living room, talking about life, discussing job hunting stories, and just catching up on what has been going on with each other in the past week or two. To make matters even better, a few hours later, more folks came by, and the four of us just sat around talking for another hour, before we went in separate directions for dinner. Even as I was sitting there, I was realizing: this is much more what people used to do. People would visit, friends would go to people's houses to socialize, and you all got a better sense of people as individuals. It sounds cheesy, but I really feel like I know these friends a lot better after spending a few hours just talking about nothing in particular with them. Yes, I have known all of them for years, but there was just a great connection made all the way around that I don't feel as often as I used to when hanging out with people, and I think most of that can be chalked up to just spending a little time doing nothing but talking.

After all, as Anne Morrow Lindbergh said: "Good communication is just as stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after."

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Sounds for Our Fathers

As most of you know, I am a musician, and music is pretty much my lifeblood. It's cliche, I know, but it's true - the moments are few and far between that I'm not either listening to music or humming or whistling something. I have songs that remind me of some of the best times in my life, as well as songs that hearken back to some of the worst times in my life. It's just part and parcel of my life, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

So I was at the cafe tonight, they were playing a bunch of oldies - or what I was raised to refer to as oldies; songs mostly from the sixties, lots of doo-wop and stuff like that, and I had a comfortable warm feeling creep over me. I realized without a lot of thought that the reason was not that I was drinking (I wasn't - just coffee) or that I was feeling the effects of the thermostat being turned up. Rather, I realized these songs were comforting to me because they were the songs that my dad would always listen to. I never gave it much thought before, but my huge love for doo-wop probably comes directly from the fact that those were the albums (yes albums on vinyl) I heard pumping out of the big pioneer speakers in my parents' house whenever my mom was out of the house for any length of time.

It's funny, with myself being a musician, and my sister once being a very talented pianist, neither of my parents really had a musical bone in their body. My favorite story to tell about my father when asked about my parents' influence on my sister's and my musical educations is this: as a child, my dad was a tinkerer, which led directly to him pursuing a career as an engineer. However, he did take clarinet in middle school. That ended one day when, being the engineer he was, he noticed that all the screws on his clarinet were loose, at least to his perception. So to rectify this, he got out his small-sized screwdriver and went through, one by one, tightening the screws on the clarinet. However, when he tried to play it a few minutes after "fixing" it, he discovered that every single key on the instrument was stuck -- he didn't realize that the give in the screws is what allowed the keys to move, and he'd inadvertently rendered his clarinet completely unplayable. At that point, according to his account, he knew his music career was as good as over.

But getting back on topic - I was enjoying the songs selected at the cafe, thinking of how they reminded me of those cold afternoons at home where my dad would sit at his desk, balancing a checkbook or paying bills, listening to these classics of the fifties and sixties. Then that got me thinking: if I have kids, will they have similar affections to my music? It could be due to my odd tastes, or the fact that most of the bands that I listen to and enjoy the most are all currently active and putting out music, but I don't see my hypothetical kids, when they are thirty, gleefully whistling or humming along to We Are Scientists songs, tapping their toes to Motion City Soundtrack, or reveling in the epic sounds of Explosions in the Sky. Maybe they'll latch onto their grandparents' music, and love the fifties sound too, or maybe they'll like none of it.

It's even a discussion I've had with older generations from time to time: fifty years ago, there wasn't the broad range of music that there is today. For the most part, there was just "popular" music. With the exceptions of specific stations who would play classical or jazz, most mainstream radio stations played a whole range of the music that was popular at the time. There was not the division of stations that there is today. Just imagine if you turned on the radio and it played like your iTunes library on random - oldies, metal, hip hop, punk, indie, whatever. You'd probably complain that the station had no focus, or that it was inconsistent. The best way to contextualize it is to use the retirement home analogy that my mother uses: for her parents generation home, if you were in the common room at the retirement community, if you put on Big Band music, they'll all love it due to the memories and emotional connections to the songs. For her generation, it's early rock and roll and all the other music rolled up into the "oldies" label. So what will happen with my generation? Will we all be excited to hear Nirvana when we're 80? Will Snoop still be a go-to when I'm in a wheelchair? There has become such a divide, with the opposing sides entrenched against each other, over music nowadays that there isn't much of a common ground for my generation.

Am I crazy? Do you think that there is a universal music that captures our generation? Am I overly romanticizing the music of yesteryear? Or am I just a big sappy pile of musical mush because I heard some old Commodores and Four Tops while drinking coffee a few hours ago?

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Trapped

I've said the joke time and time before, but I find as time goes on, I honestly kind of believe that I am a man trapped in a lesbian's body. Yeah yeah, it's a funny joke because straight men and lesbians both like attractive women, but I seriously find that on a semi-regular basis, I find myself most attracted to females who turn out to be lesbians. I don't know how it happens, or what it is about them, but I'll be at a bar or out somewhere or something like that, and check out a girl; I'll think she's cute, I'll keep an eye on her from afar, and sadly more often than not, I continue to do so until I see her pair off with her girlfriend. So no, the attraction is not based on that "woah, those two chicks will totally make out" philosophy that makes a number of guys attracted to lesbians on the surface. Nope, I just find girls I think are cute, and then they just so happen to prefer the company of women.

A perfect example the other day, which is kind of what prompted this blog being written in the first place, is I was driving around town, going down a long stretch of road with timed lights, which means you pretty much have the same cars around you for a few miles. I happened a glance to my left, and saw a girl driving next to me who was about my age. Keeping pace with her, I said to myself "ooh, she's kind of cute." I do this to myself all the time - there's little more joy I find in my day-to-day existence than the fun and excitement of finding that you're driving alongside a cute girl. It's dumb, but it brings me joy. So anyhow, I am driving, and the cute girl is driving alongside me, and after a few glances I notice a few things: I notice she has a cool and what most would call "alternative" haircut. In short, her hair kinda almost looks like an anime character, which for some reason appeals to me. She has bumper stickers of good bands on her car, I don't remember which, but I remember being impressed with her musical taste. However, most importantly, she has an air freshener hanging off her rearview mirror. It took a second or two to finally get it to swing in a direction where I could read it, but once I did, it was clear as day: "I (Heart) Lesbians." All I could do as I drove along was laugh, shake my head, and say "Apparently, so do I."
These are not theoretical isolated incidents either. There is, of course, the ill-fated tale of MUNI girl. For those of you who don't know this story, it may be better served to hear the full version from me in person, but I'll give the cliff notes for those of you who don't have that luxury. Basically, there was a girl I'd see all the time on the bus in to work, it just so happened that our schedules lined up like that. I saw her once in a local bar, and we talked briefly because I didn't know if she was in the extended group of people we were with or not. So months progressed after that where I would see her and wave or exchange pleasantries in the mornings. I finally caved and put up a missed connections ad on Craigslist, figuring I'd cast my fates to the internet. She saw the ad, replied, and we went to lunch one day. That night I received an email from her telling how she usually dated women, but had gone out with men in the past and hoped that telling me that didn't freak me out, which it didn't. Remember, I am a San Francisco native, it takes a LOT to freak me out when it comes to personal preferences. I tried and tried to get her to commit to another date, and after a short while, realized I was making no traction, only to find out via Facebook that she had a new girlfriend some weeks after I stopped calling.

So yeah, lesbians. I tend to dig 'em, much to my chagrin. Even when I don't know it, the world keeps on reminding me of this fact.

Saturday, March 5, 2011

Dirty

That's right, kids. I'm now officially old. This makes me feel slightly better in that now I can feel a tad more justified in being a crotchety old man. Other than that, things don't feel much different otherwise.

So I'll warn you advance, this is going to be one of those sappy "glass half full" kind of blogs where I remind myself that turning thirty is no big deal, and it's just another day in my life, and all that business.

"So what has been going on in the land of Bill?" you ask.

I suppose the main thing is getting settled in the new house, which is always an adventure, but based on the fact that there haven't been bile-filled blogs about how horrible my roommates are, you could say things are going well. Granted, having people around to interact with after midnight has a rather direct relation to the downturn in blog productivity.

One of the pleasant upsides to the current setup is the fantastic quality of coffee in my cup each day. We're blessed to have two fantastic coffee shops a stone's throw from our front door, and they're always a short walk away. Better still, I have two wonderful french presses in my cabinet, and top-notch beans in my cabinet. I get to remain wonderfully caffeinated all day and night, which makes the days skate by easily. Unfortunately, I haven't spent a whole hell of a lot of time in the cafe, but that's due in part to the fact that I have an incredibly comfortable couch that sits in front of an almost stupidly big TV screen and my entire collection of books. I can crank my music as loud as I want (well, while keeping the neighbors in mind, at least) and can do so in the comfort of my underpants if I so choose, so the lure of the cafe isn't quite what it once was, despite it's ridiculously close proximity.

Coffee and my mailing address aside, life just kind of keeps plodding along. Hello Monster is busy kicking ass, taking names, and trying to figure out the most efficient means of fundraising while we start pushing towards recording a full-length disc. I will say that that, even at 30, playing in a band is one hell of a wonderful way to retain grasp of your youth. I tell ya, I feel like a high school kid when I'm onstage. Albeit an out of shape and sometimes tipsy high school kid, but a kid nonetheless.

So as I look forward to this coming year and my new decade, I am excited with everything around me - a new home, great friends (many of whom are expecting offspring soon), great music, and even fantastic coffee. Hopefully a job will finally be something I can add to my glass-half-full list, but other than that, I wouldn't really change much.

Saturday, February 5, 2011

The Big Day.

First off, I am writing this from my phone since all my computers are packed away, so if there are a lot of typos, don't be shocked.

I am lying here in my bed, in the comfort of my hovel for what may very well be the last night. Tomorrow is the big move, and by the evening, I don't expect much of anything of mine to be left here in the hovel. I don't want to get all sappy, but I really feel like I'm approaching a turning point: I am entering a new house with new roommates (old friends, just new as roommates), I am inching dangerously closer to the big three-oh, and, for the first time in recent memory, my car is actually working absolutely like it should. Yes, to be able to make that last statement, I had to shell out almost $750 to my friendly and talented mehanic, but for the way I feel today, it was definitely money well-spent.

I was honestly caught off guard by how happy a properly functioning car made me. I think it's twofold: first, I have been car-less since early Wednesday morning, so I was just plain itching to get back in my driver's seat, better yet without the worries of overheating. Secondly, I think that being in a car that's struggling and not performing correctly, I am immediately transported back to the last year or two that I drove my old hooptie, the '78 Cadillac. I re-live the stress of trying to understand why your car just won't do what you ask, the feeling of helplessness when it starts to break down or idle roughy or sputter when you accelerate. It is a broad, broad comparison, I know, but it's kind of like being alongside a friend or relative in declining health. That car was my first car, I understood it and it understood me, it really felt like a family member at times. And for me to see it slowly slipping, and eventually sitting idly in front of my house when I got my current car was a hard thing for me to do. Harder still was watching someone drive off with it.

But alas, I digress. Today I feel like a kid in a candy store: I have a new home to get all set up, and I honestly feel like someone has handed me the keys to a brand new car. It's rare that I can sit back and enjoy these rare moments of undiluted joy. At this very moment I am not worrying about my finances (something that is short lived - the worrying not the finances themselves I hope), I'm not wondering about a job (again, just a momentary reprieve), and everything else is coming up Bill. I'd say I should play the lottery, but I'm not that dumb.

So here's hoping for a good move, good times, and a great weekend to all of you. I might be sans Internet at the house for the next couple days, but I'll try to update as best I can via either my phone again or by free cafe Internet.

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Pages of the Past.

Yes, this is another "packing everything I own into boxes post", but luckily for you it isn't a bitter or cynical one. Rather, it's a nostalgic one.

This afternoon I tackled one of the final boondoggles in my packing: the top drawer of my dresser. Save for getting out the occasional pair of sunglasses, I don't ever even look into this drawer. I open it once every two to three months, and it served as a refuge in my youth for many random whatnots that didn't have a place elsewhere in my bedroom. I found a very stylish beret (yes I am saying that completely without sarcasm, I promise), old cub scout projects, science fair ribbons, and a giant bag full of old letters.

I did what any good person would do, I went to the couch, put a recycling bag at my feet, and spent almost an hour walking down memory lane. It was one of the more enjoyable and heartwarming experiences I've had in quite some time. I saw letters from friends back in grade school and high school, kids from confirmation camp, a pen pal I'd forgotten we'd set up in the third grade, and, naturally, lost of old schmooze letters from former girlfriends. It was so fun, I damn near want to find addresses for old friends just to send them an honest-to-goodness letter.

Naturally, this made me think about what happens these days. Do kids still write letters to each other? The girl I dated when I was a freshman in high school and I used to write letters all week long to each other, and give each other overstuffed letters with everything in there - pictures, guest notes from our friends, all that cute high school stuff. What do kids do now? Is it all reduced to cell phone conversations at lunch, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and constant text messages? Is there no permanence to their communication? It makes me a little sad to think that freshmen in high school these days will not be able to look back seventeen years from now and see what kind of inane stuff you used to write about that special someone you were completely convinced was going to be the love of your life forever and ever. I got to today, and it was amazing.

The other thing about this reminiscence is that, probably for the best, that era has passed. Imagine if now, at almost 30, I sat in the office all day writing about how much I missed my hypothetical girlfriend. I could talk about how the boss busted my balls, and how if she had been there to give me a hug, it would all be okay again. I could go into the lunchroom and have my friends that I sit with write little notes to them, and say how much they can tell that I miss her. I could even doodle a little picture of me, bored in my cubicle, with a thought bubble of the two of us just cuddling. But do you know what would happen? Either the girl would run screaming because that's kind of insane, or everyone around would refer to me as "that guy". Then again, if I found a girl who thought 14 year old Bill affection was just the bee's knees, I might be a little worried too. But I suppose the opposite would be true - if I found a girl when I was 14 who was content with a meal and some drinks every now and then, I probably would have convinced myself that she didn't give a damn about me.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

It's Been Done.

In the madness of my moving and packing, I have officially packed away my DVD player, PS2, and Xbox 360. This means that I have to watch regular television. Yes, there are far worse fates than watching television, but it also means that I am once again exposed to commercials, which is a little foreign to me.

I saw one commercial, today, that was truly jarring. Apparently, as of today (or yesterday, or some time recently) you can purchase the DVD or Blu-Ray of Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2.

Yes. Let that sink in. Smell it. Taste it. Root around in its hideous mess.

Now, let's think logically about this. This is a sequel to a movie that starred primarily latino actors doing voice work for a bunch of CGI dogs who make bad puns and discuss how hard it is to be a lapdog for a spoiled princess. I am sure it's chock full of fart and poop jokes, which, don't get me wrong, are great, but it's not enough to carry a whole movie. Which leads me to my inevitable follow up question: why in the hell do we need two of these movies? Hell, why did we need the first one? Why do we need a third "Fockers" movie? How many more Scream movies are they going to make? I thought the whole idea was that was a trilogy. Why the hell are they doing a fourth?

So just for funzies, let's take a quick peek at what's out there right now:

- True Grit, a re-make of the John Wayne classic. Yes, it was fantastic, and if anyone can pull of a remake, it is the Cohen brothers.

- The Green Hornet - This one double dips: it was both a television show and a comic book.

- Little Fockers - I don't even have to go there. The first movie was great, but yeah, that's all I want to say.

- Tron: Legacy - I have to admit, I really want to see this one. It may be derived from a movie made nearly thirty years back, but I feel like they're at least going about it the right way. Plus Daft Punk does the soundtrack, so it can't be that bad.

- Yogi Bear 3D - Of course, used to be a pretty legit cartoon, but I heard the movie is so bad even the kids don't give a damn. Might be the very worst movie made all year. Might well be the worst idea for a movie I've ever heard, and it makes me shed a little tear when I think that Tom Cavanaugh agreed to do it.

This is just of movies that you could go out and see tomorrow. I won't try to catalog the number of re-makes, re-workings, adaptations, or needless sequels are out there from the past few years, or are in development. Naturally, this makes me think: has the state of entertainment gotten so dire at this point that we can't come up with decent original movies, and if we do make decent ones, can't we leave it at just one? I know, I know, everyone makes their money opening weekend, and the current economic system of movies is to churn out as much drek as humanly possible. I just wish it were a little more sustainable.

However, there is another way of thinking about this that I don't know if many people consider, and that is that the amount of borrowing ideas is not entirely unique to movies. I would never think to re-write something like Hamlet, nor would I try to change punctuation of an e.e. cummings poem and try to re-sell it as another poem. I suppose the closest comparison on the literary front would be adaptations like "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" and "Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters" but having read both the originals and the re-imaginings of both those titles, I can tell you that a NUMBER of liberties were taken with the originals. Still, aside from parody, you don't see a lot of replication of work in the literary community. Yes, I realize in music it is much more prevalent; a point that was driven home with a vengeance when I saw a couple of cover bands last Thursday. So I suppose in that respect, re-making a movie is pretty comparable to covering a song. Despite that similarity, cover bands make money and get people to come out at shows, but the primary difference is they're not re-recording albums from the bands they cover and selling those.

So what are your thoughts? Is this whole movie-remake gripe limited to me? Should I look at it like theater arts, where people re-imagine and re-invent plays all the time? Or am I just a crotchety old coot who should just be happy they still make movies and that I can then get them months later on Netflix and gripe about how much I didn't like them to the internet?

Monday, January 31, 2011

Here's to the Experts.

As my Facebook pals have seen, I have been having some car issues. Now, there was once a time in my youth, where I could be considered a "car guy". It's still true to a greater degree: I love cars, I love classic cars, and hot rods and all those wonderful things. I have a great appreciation for classic Detroit steel, yet at the tender age of about 23 I abandoned my good ol' 1978 hooptie Cadillac in favor of an Isuzu Rodeo. Though I will say, it has served me admirably as long as I've had it.

That is, until about two weeks ago. It started overheating, acting all weird, and leaking coolant like hell. But therein lies the problem: I am generally handy with a lot of things, but there's no fix-all like "unplug it and plug it back in again" with a car. I did what I could: I re-filled the coolant reservoir, checked the oil, topped it off, and walked around the car while scratching my chin. Then I gazed deeply into the depths of my engine, much like the gentleman to the right. Then I wiped my hands and got back in the car and kept on driving.

So what did I do when the problems persisted? What any reasonable guy my age would do: I asked my dad to look at it.

See, unlike me, my dad is from that generation. You know, the generation of guys who change their own oil, who know how to snake a drain (and own a snake to do it with), the guys who know metric-to-standard conversions off the top of their head. The generation of guys who build, measure, draft, re-wire, and repair, all without the aid of our good pal, the google machine. It's not necessarily a knock on our generation; we just have different skill sets, and I guess that's indicative of the change in times. Yeah, we know html, we can work in Photoshop, and we can even assemble Ikea furniture when necessity dictates, many of us just have no idea how to gap spark plugs.

It is an interesting generational chat I had with my folks just today that brought this all together. We were discussing cooking, and my pops made the offhand remark that more males in my generation, and his to an extent, cook for themselves. My grandfather, who was a true man's man of the previous generation (he was a logger, a longshoreman, and for a time a demolitions worker) would never set foot in the kitchen unless it was to eat or to get a fresh beer. Anything else was women's work. But I think it really speaks volumes to the differences in generations, with different skill sets, different knowledge, and really different talents. And while I may not have been able to discern that one of my spark plugs in my poor car had gone kaputski, and that my radiator was leaking, I was able to go on Facebook, ask everyone if they knew a good mechanic, and find a friend who I went to high school with who was an amazing help, and saved me a trip to the auto shop. So sometimes my skills can pay off too. Yes, it was pops who replaced the radiator and the plugs, but it was a high school pal two years younger than myself who identified the issue in the first place.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

If You Didn't Blog It...

Hey all, I'm back yet again. It's been too long yet again. Let's move forward from there. Recently I read a rather fascinating blog written by Anil Dash, who is kind of famous to a lot of us interwebby folks. In it he claims "If You Didn't Blog It, It Didn't Happen", and that title alone really got me thinking; I have been so lax in my blogging in the past year or so. I often attribute it to being busy or just plain not having much in life to blog about. Plus, I figure a lot of the folks who read this probably either check my Twitter or Facebook or Foursquare or something to that effect, or else you just see me in real life. But that's not blogging. That's "having a blog that stagnates while you don't write on it." Still, I have to constantly remind myself that pithy quips or check-ins at local drinking establishments does not online content make. (well, it kind of does, but it ain't great reading) I have prized myself for quite some time now on my ability as a wordsmith; I like to think that I have a certain pizzaz when it comes to writing interesting stuff that most of the general public, or more importantly you folks who read this blog, find both readable and enjoyable. Yes, I get a bit verbose at times, and I also have a rather undesirable habit of dropping a few f-bombs here and there when I get worked up, but all in all, I like to think I spin a good yarn about whatever it is I happen to be writing about.

So, let's get this train back on the tracks and steaming towards something fun and interesting for both myself and for you. The biggest news that has transpired since I last sat in front of this composition window is that I will soon be re-locating from my beloved basement hovel to a posh (posh for yours truly at least) and swanky new bachelor pad by the beach. I am finally laying down stakes (rented stakes at that) in the Outer Sunset. The good news is that I will be a mere five or six blocks from my beloved coffee shop, rather than like two miles, so I should be back on my home turf for classic blogging. The down side, if any, is that I will be sharing this swank bachelor pad with two of my good friends. That will be an ongoing adventure which shall unfold and I'm sure much of it will end up on this fine blog.

On a somewhat more philosophical note, I had a fascinating discussion with a friend tonight about happiness, and more importantly, my own personal happiness. Those of you who know me or have met me all would consider me a fairly happy-go-lucky guy, and you would be absolutely right. By and large I am a very upbeat and cheery gent. Still, overall, I tend to find myself being dissatisfied with various aspects of my life, whether it be the basement hovel, the lack of a sweet young thing to call my own, or the current lack of gainful employ. None of them completely set the ship off course, but overall, and when added together, they can cause for the occasional rough patch in what is usually a pretty smooth sail. I had to admit that the last time I felt completely satisfied with my life, and felt like everything was really coming up Bill was back at the tender age of seventeen or thereabouts. I was finishing up high school, doing well in classes, enjoying playing music as well as playing sports, and I had a fantastic group of friends as well as the general good wishes of most all of my classmates. In other words, I had the world by the balls and the future looked bright and sunny for me. Since then, I can't say that anything major has changed. I am blessed to be healthy still, I still pride myself on the wonderful friends I am surrounded with day in and day out, I still get to play music that makes me feel invincible. None of these things have gone unrealized or unnoticed. Still, there are a lot of nagging thoughts about potential realized and all that jazz. Maybe I was just brought up in a nature of a lot of positive support or something, but I felt (and still feel) that there's something great that I'm meant to do, and I feel like I've spent a number of years searching to find that thing. I have to remain optimistic that it is still possible, but in the meantime I need to also think about paying bills and all that fun stuff.

Plus, the more I thought about this question, I began to realize the other, perhaps more positive, interpretation of why I am seldom completely happy and content: I love challenging myself to live up to my expectations. Yeah, I beat myself up at times or get down on myself when things don't go my way, but by constantly challenging myself do to something bigger or better with my life, I can make sure that I don't get caught up in the day-to-day mundanity that people sometimes get stuck in. Clearly I'm not knocking a regular 9-5. If someone offered me something that would pay the bills that I found even moderately interesting, I'd swoop it up in a heartbeat. But I think a little dissatisfaction goes a long way in challenging yourself to be better at whatever it is you do, whether it's work or school or music or writing or anything else.

I don't really know where I was going with all this, and it's late, so I'm sure I'll re-read this when I wake up in the morning (afternoon) and scratch my head and wonder what in the hell got in to me, but it was somewhat cathartic to get all this out. Sorry if I've rambled a bit, but the mere act of sitting here and writing has been wonderful. Hopefully this is a harbinger of things to come, and I get back on the ol' blogging pony on the regular.

Monday, January 3, 2011

No Flow

A caveat before you read this: I'm kind of irrationally cranky these days. This may be tinting my perception of the world around me the last few days. I'm also listening to my playlist which I call "Old Sad Bastard Music" so that may also have a little bearing on my current mood. Having said that, I will do my best to put this in a comedic light...

Arright, so I was out buying bread tonight to bring to dinner at my friends' place, and (as those of you who follow my Twitter, Tumblr, or FB already know) Trader Joe's, the universe's standby for bread, was completely tapped out. I am not exaggerating or doing anything for effect. There wasn't a damn piece of bread to be had in the whole store. I'm talking like end of days Y2k stocking up kind of lack of bread. From the right side of the entire aisle of bread to the area where the muffins and cookies are sold, there was not a single item to be purchased.

So, I came up with the brilliant thought to try the Boudin bakery just down the way in the mall. If you are from SF, and have been to Stonestown Galleria, you probably know the geography of this story well, and if you don't, let it suffice to say that I had to trapse the entire distance of a moderately sized mall in order to get from point A to point B. As I made this journey, I decided to make the whole experience a little more interesting by seeing if I could walk the entire distance without breaking stride. It's these little challenges I do from time to time to attempt to restore my faith in the common sense of humanity, and oh what a mistake that was.

If there is one thing I came to realize from this trek through the mall was that the heads of my fellow man are so deeply embedded into their own rectums (recti?) that I might as well have been walking around a herd of misguided cattle. Sadly, I can't count on my fingers the number of people who were just wandering slack-jawed, completely content to meander their way through the evening. (see image at right) Yes, I know people window shop, and I know that not everyone places the value on ambulation that I do, but I can't help but get a little frustrated at families walking four abreast who have to stop to examine spots on the ground, what kind of mannequins are in the window, or how it is that the little garage door-style grates come down to close off stores at closing time. They might as well be like monkeys picking nits from each others' fur for an early evening snack. Even worse is the people who stop to answer their cell phones as if walking and talking were a herculean task that just shouldn't be attempted in public. I damn near ran over two separate people whom I happened to end up behind because they came to an immediate halt to stand stock still, check their phones to see who was calling, and then begin a conversation as if they were the only people within a hundred yards.

Yes, I'm an old coot. I think that there are conversations that can wait. I think that yelling into your phone in a public place to try to carry on a conversation over the general humdrum of the mall is dumb. Still, my bigger gripe is not having the slightest concern for those around you and the fact that they might actually want to walk at a normal pace or not have to constantly side step these odd techno-zombies. I can't help it; I'm a man of decorum - I still look behind me whenever walking through a door that might need to be held open for someone behind me. That happened too tonight - I was entering the mall maybe two strides behind this couple, and I almost caught a faceful of door because I mistakenly assumed that when the guy turned around and almost flicked his cigarette into my chest, he might have realized there was someone right behind them headed in the same direction.

Sorry, I digress. The world is not a sad and terrible place. There are still plenty of things that uphold my faith in humanity, like kitties that wear people clothes, free Tetris, good music, olympic weightlifters who look like they might explode at any moment, Star Wars rock and roll motivational posters, 90210 reruns, and finally, this video of a Corgi doing bellyflops.