Of Songwriting

Oscar Hammerstein not so famously quipped that there is no such thing as inspiration. Only hard work.

He was kind of an ass.

I prefer Leonard Cohen's answer when asked if he sweated over the good lines.

"Only before and after. The good ones just appear." he said

Then there's my dad's quip: "I hate writing, but I love having written."

I'm not sure if he stole that one, but if he did, I'm better off not knowing.

There's the classic story of Archimedes being forced to find a method of distinguishing real gold from the fake stuff. He went mad trying to come up with something, until his wife told him to go take a bath.

As legend has it, he noticed that his body displaced a certain amount of water in the warm tub. Then the idea hit him!

There is a mathematical ratio between weight and volume.

Only materials made up of the same stuff will have the same ratio.

Therefore anything that doesn't have the same ratio as real gold must be the fake stuff.

(Warning: This next sentence may contain Adult Nudity.)

"Eureka" he screamed. And then ran naked through the streets.

That's right . . . naked.

Now Aronofsky fans will remember this little allegory, because when the story was told, the main character says "Yeah, Yeah, I got it. Taking a break from a problem will lead to the answer"

Which is followed by his mentor who says "NO! The story tells you that you need a woman to give you perspective."

Wierd movie, great scene.

So I told you these two stories in order to tell you this one.

Since I've been puttering about the house, I've been having Calvin play the piano. He will sit next to me and ask me to play numbers.

1-2-3-4-5-6-7-1

or as you might now it,

Do-Re-Me-Fa-So-La-Ti-Do

As you can imagine, this got real irritating, real quick.

Then I started mixing it up.

1-2-3-2-1

and then

1-3-5

and then

1-3-4-5 (Oh, when the saints)

and then just for giggles,

1-1-5-5-6-6-5--4-4-3-3-2-2-1--

Or Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are

or A-B-C-D-E-F-G-H-I-J-K-Lmno-P

Again, this got really irritatinger, really quicker.

But he can play it. And loves to play it. Over, and Over.

And over. I was almost to the point where I kind of wanted him to knock it off. To let me pace about the house with some semblance of silence. Or at least without twinkle haunting me.

Then one day, as I was laying on the bed, half heartedly moping. My wife came in from the bathroom.

"How does my hair look?" She asked.

As she said this I could hear Calvin at the piano playing two notes together. First 1 & 3. Then 1&5. Then variations where he kept the beat going on 1 and would play other notes on alternate beats. 1&3&1&4&1&5.

"Honey, listen, he's experimenting with basic harmony!"

"Uh-huh, how does my hair look?"

I barked at my wife. "Did you hear what I said? I didn't teach him how to do that! He's three an a half! That's when most kids are still banging on the keys like it was an ivory "whack a mole" toy and he's trying to work out which notes sound best together."

My overzealous imagination, clearly without moment's notice, shot me down the vicarious path of baby genius. I might fail to write another note, but this is a momentous occasion. All my puttering, all my depressed pacing, all my tossing and turning hasn't resulted in a damn thing but this! My son, oh yes, MY SON is going to have the skill of Mozart, with the temperance of Bach, the rock star prowess of Metalica with the down home earthiness of John Denver.

He could never get in an airplane.

But just as Icarus needed the sun to burn him out of the heavens, sometimes husbands need their wives to get them back to work.

"Did you hear me?" I asked

"I heard you" She said. And then she spoke slower and more deliberate.

"How . . . does . . . my . . . hair . . . look?"

We Can Be Invincible

In the car I have the radio cranked.

So what if its NPR?

But the news started to get a little redundant, even for NPR, so I turned the radio over to a music station.

I do this rarely because A) If I listen to music too much during the writing process, I tend to extract melody lines that aren't really mine, B) I hate commercials and C) Talk radio is slowly giving the sixteen year old an ulcer.

That just makes me laugh.

But low and behold the moment I switch to my favorite rock station, there she is.

Pat Benatar.

I'm sorry . . .

THE Pat Benatar.

That's right.

And she's runnin with the shadow of the night.

Oh, yeah.

My volume knob goes up to 36 before the speakers begin to bleed.

Take that! Nigel Tufnel.

However, the chorus begins to repeat itself over and over.

Not in the usual pop song way, we're talking 8 or nine times. And then, instead of the Fender Strat power chord and Fatty compressed drums kicking in, there's this Casio style beat box followed by sample bars from other songs.

A remix?

Who the hell remixes Pat Benatar?

Doesn't this person understand that there's no conceivable way to improve upon the pop rock goddess perfection that is Pat Benatar?

Now my wife would argue that I'm a total ass and that clearly Joan Jett deserves the rock goddess mantel.

But Joan Jett doesn't have the boobs to shimmy in a pink prom dress.

My best friend Jeremy would vote for Jane Weidlin. Cute, but unfortunately lost in Belinda's ever growing shadow.

Dad might argue for Janis. (he's old, p.s. Happy birthday Dad)

Calvin would say Cat Stevens. (still having trouble with his pronouns.)

The sixteen year old would most audaciously vote for Rhianna. But he prefers his singers to be off key. However, my sixteen year old self would have probably put in a good word for Tiffany.

I take no responsibility for anything I did before I was thirty.

So anyway, I was so muddled by this bad remix of Pat that I told a co-worker I was going to have to dig through my old CD's so I could hear the right version and get this awful remix out of my head.

Then I told the truth and said I was going to have to find it on my ipod.

He told me it was probably going to be in the "Most Played" file.

yes I said, it probably will be.

So I'm driving home.

"Shadow of the Night" cranked to 35. And when it stopped, I put it on again.

And then I let the rest of Pat's greatest hits continue on.

And then I came to a red light.

Windows rolled down.

"We Belong" cranked to 35.

I made the mistake of looking to my left.

A grizzled former contractor in a beat up old truck staring at me like I was one of those hippies.

Then he nodded his head to the beat and turned back to look at the light.

Because really . . .

If you haven't rock out to Pat Benatar, with the windows rolled down,

You're either a communist,

or my mother.

the Momentum Method

So it's no use denying it now.

I'm in a total slump.

this "impinged" nerve in my back has totally proved that Newtonian physics are fully applicable in the magical world of creative endeavors. Inspiration in motion will stay in motion until acted upon by a greater or equal force.

I was on a six month high. Gettin it done, as it were. But when I came to an abrupt physical halt, everything, including my desire to break every songwriting law I know, shut done like the landing lights when Johnny pulled the plug.

The tower? The tower? Rapunzel, Rapunzel.

But, as I stated much earlier on in this narrative, this ain't about writer's block. It's about method.

So yeah, I haven't been writing. I haven't been performing. I haven't been out partying or curling up in a ball and crying myself to sleep.

I have been banging away at every little idea that cropped into my head. For better or worse, I've been working without producing anything.

So yeah, I'm in a slump.

But there's a little secret I know.

Passed down from oral histories, Rolling Stone interviews, and parental guidance.

First, clean your room. Eat some fruit. Go for a run. Pick up another instrument. Pick up another art form. Be nice to your wife. Cook an amazing meal. Let it go. Feel human again.

I think what I'm doing is a good idea. I think it will produce some of my best work yet and here's how I know.

Years ago, I was in a little musical.

It was my first lead role.

I thought my excrement existed without odor.

During a matinee, one of my new acting coaches was in the audience. I wanted to impress the hell out of him. Make him think I was the coolest kid in school. He wore jeans and cowboy boots to class, smoked in the theatre, and was the kind of professional actor I knew I would be some day.

But I had a horrible show. I didn't forget my lines, or miss any entrances, I just didn't feel like I was at the peak of performance.

After the show, he came up and we began talking. He asked me how the show went and I stupidly told him that I felt lousy about it.

Then he asked me how I dealt with it.

I, of course thinking how volcanic my excrement was, when into a long diatribe highlighting my professional ability to pull it all together in the end.

He shrugged and went away, fully aware that my monologue was pucky at best . . .

. . . miserably whiny self conscience twaddle at worst.

Hindsight really sucks sometimes.

He couldn't have cared less about the show, or me for that matter.

What he wanted, as any good teacher might, is to have the opportunity to instill a little bit of wisdom, and he knew I was way too full of myself to listen.

Had I not been such a schmuck, I might have learned in just a few conversations what it took me another decade to learn.

So yeah, I've once again found myself without a magical key to creation. But there is a secret of gaining momentum. Of pushing Newton's body at rest into motion.

Give yourself the peace of mind that comes from organizing your physical space. Fuel your body with good stuff. Get your body strong. Show a little fragility. And listen.

Of Pasta Salad and Prop 8

Tonight we dined.

Barbecued chicken breasts and day old pasta salad.

Day old pasta salad doesn't sound like a culinary delight, but oh how wrong you are.

Give the pasta salad a day to absorb all the flavors from the dressing. The fresh garlic, the extra virgin olive oil, the balsamic vinegar, and the fresh thyme. A day to soak up all the fantastic tastes (including the bacon slices) and the day old pasta far exceeds it's day-of younger brother. A glass of wine and a little cracked pepper, and you, my friend . . . are in heaven.

It would be nice to say that its an age old recipe, brought to the new world from my scottish-italian forefathers.

(Note: there's really no italian in my ancestry, but my son is half italian and that makes me sorta honorary)

But this pasta salad is really a concoction of ingredients invented by my father and I.

To start . . . we were kind of poor.

Not "mismatched shoes from the goodwill" kind of poor, but we did have a van that used a coffee can as an oil filter.

Pasta salad was a dish that my dad and I could make on a friday morning and still be nibbling on by sunday afternoon. We used to eat barrels of the stuff and the recipe always changed depending upon what we had in the fridge. Sometimes it had broccoli, sometimes chunks of cheese (Monterrey jack was my favorite, but extra sharp cheddar was my dad's). Sometimes celery, but always carrots.

Most of the time there were bacon bits, and Dad always splurged on the marinated artichoke hearts and Bernstein's dressings.

Gotta love him.

(Thirteen year old debutantes riding on their new ponies couldn't have been more spoiled)

Pasta salad was my first introduction to cooking. How to boil pasta and check for doneness. How to wield a chef's knife and not cut my fingers off. How to make bad puns by confusing colander with calender.

Good times.

It also taught me, that sometimes, day two is the best. You gotta let things stew awhile before they reach perfection.

Proposition 8, the amendment to ban same sex marriage in the Californian constitution, was upheld this week.

I'm angry. and frustrated. and disappointed in my fellow human beings.

I needed comfort food and day old pasta salad fit the bill.

Now, I'm no activist.

I don't even like ordering specially prepared burgers in the drive-thru.

"Just pick the pickles off!" I say to the sixteen year old.

But a blog is a soapbox, even when the town square is empty. And I have personal vendetta against homophobia. A fire which unfortunately will never be extinguished.

When I was eighteen I worked in a bookstore. One day, a well dressed man in his late forties berated me for ten minutes about the homosexual content that was available in our human sexuality section. He didn't use foul language or raise his voice, he just spent ten minutes of my life to display his disgust with me and my bookstore, regardless of the fact that I had no control whatsoever of the titles we sold, and how ashamed of myself I should be.

Now, I've dealt with really god awful people in the retail world and I am fully aware that weak people seek out confrontations with sales people because they know that there are no repercussions from offending a bookstore clerk, but what really upset me isn't that I was powerless to argue with him, or even that I lacked the courage of such confrontation.

It was that fact that he had no way of knowing that I wasn't gay.

The miserable, stupid, condescending ass might not only been offending my pride but my whole existence. He could've incited violence. His monologue could have been the catalyst for an unfortunate confused teenager to commit suicide. His tirade had no purpose other than to hurt and to emasculate me as I stood there too unsure of myself to speak up.

So I've been thinking about this immensely since "Yes on 8" posters were littered across half the lawns in my neighborhood.

Why? Really . . . why?

In fact, what kind of society am I raising my son in where this kind of inane mental retardation is considered the norm?

And it occurs to me that the weak minded, the uneducated, the brainwashed by propaganda insufferable bigots of this world need a rallying point for their fear. It's a final stab at relevancy. It's Laertes' final thrust of the poisoned sword before they become marginalized by a progressive society that doesn't require their ilk any longer.

You have the activists (again, not me) to thank for the turning of the tide. It's their continued fight that will keep that poisoned sword from slicing into the delicate skin of our children.

As for me, I get to teach my son how to check for doneness, how to wield a chef's knife without cutting off his fingers, how to love, how to be far more sure of himself at three than I was at eighteen, and, hopefully . . .

that day two will be even better.

Duets and B-flats

"Why are you Broken?" is a duet.

It just is.

I can't tell you why or how I know it. I haven't got much beyond the first few lines, which I won't bother to share yet because they are bound to change.

I don't have a true melody line, a bridge, or a chorus.

Just a title and an idea.

The title came from Calvin. The idea came from a friend.

A good friend. A loving friend. A lifelong companion who called me up way too late at night.

She asked me what I thought of starting a band.

Remember now, it was late . . .

I told her that it was a terrible idea.

She plead her case anyway.

Knowing that it was too late for me to even think about thinking about it. I told her to call me back the next afternoon and pitch me her idea.

Then I went back to sleep.

Sure, it was only 10:20pm, but I'm freaking old.

The next day I mulled the late night idea around in my head and decided that I was still right.

It was a terrible idea.

See "This is Spinal Tap" for a full disertation.

But I loved the idea. I miss playing with other musicians. I dream about the production possibilities that could come from not filling in all the space myself. I even kind of miss yelling at the drummer to stop playing for jut a moment.

But the real reason I loved the idea is because I want to hear my wife sing again.

It pains me to think of how much of her life has been sucked out of her because she has no place to sing.

In fact, if I were to point to any tension in our relationship, the root cause would be that she has no opportunity to express herself beyond work and motherhood.

So that's it.

"Why are you broken?" isn't just a line fed to me by the three year old. It's not just about the phisical pain I'm am feeling, but the emotional pain between two people who are both broken.

It's a duet.

and I'm gonna make my wife sing the girl part.

also, its a piano duet.

This has a much less esoteric reason.

I pulled my guitar out today for the first time since the show. Calvin saw the case a ran into his room to get his guitar.

On his tippy toes none the less.

"Play with a pick daddy, play 'booty fool girl' daddy."

I began playing "Beautiful Girl"

A little uncomfortable at first.

A little achy,

oh yes

even a little breaky.

Until I hit the b-flat.

(Its a bar chord, nothing as tricky to learn as F-major, but you need a little stretch)

and then something popped.

Like "Holy Sh*t, don't let the boy see me cry" kind of pop.

"It's break time sweety" I said.

"Can I play Mario Kart now?" he asked.

"Do you mind if I play the piano?" I asked

"No, just don't be too loud."

Sorry . . . no death for you

Well, I don't have gout. I don't have tendonitis nor the aforementioned tendinitus (again a fine distinction) I don't have cardivascular disease. My blood pressure was 144 over 75. High, but normal. I'm not suffering froms SARS or swine flu.

No, unfortunately, I have a perfectly normal impinged nerve.

Impinged?

That's not even a word.

I checked.

And the treatment is perfectly normal as well.

Rest.

Do you want muscle relaxers?

Yes Doc, yes I do.

I found it funny how tired and unresponsive to humor my general practitioner would be at 2:30 in the afternoon.

She asked me what kind of job I did.

I told her that I worked in a coffee shop.

She didn't seem all that impressed. Then she asked if it required a lot of repetitive motion. I told her yes. She nodded her head in a very knowing way.

She asked me if I wanted to take a stretching class.

"Like naked yoga?" I asked.

she didn't respond for a moment and then said she might be wrong about her diagnosis and asked me to go get x-rayed. Then she prescribed muscle relaxers and gave me some very half hearted directions to radiology.

I thanked her for her time.

Indifferent medicine is embarrasing.

Turn to your right. Breathe in. Take off your shirt.

These are the directions given by doctors and aged prostitutes.

I just hoped to feel better.

but I ponied up my co-pay and went home.

And then took my muscle relaxers.

My dad asked me the next day if they worked at all.

I said no.

He said "take two"

can't. . . not . . . do stuff (part deaux)

Ow.

No really.

Ow.

Calvin gave me the perfect line for the next song.

"Why are you broken?"

It'll be like the anti-power ballad. I envision incredibly peppy satirical lyrics wrapped around minor key melodies.

It takes the perfect song cliche "I'm broken, you're broken, we're all broken" and kind of tosses it in the air to watch it splatter to the ground.

I live for turning phrases.

Live for for it.

So what to I do now?

ow . . . ow . . .

I might have tendonitis. or tendinitus (a fine distinction). I could have bursitis, or cardiovascular disease. (Just ask WebMD) I could have a dislocated shoulder, or gout.

That's right.

Gout.

The advice nurse at kaiser asked me if I had ever had gout.

Thank god it was over the phone so she couldn't see me finishing my sausage in abject horror.

Then she asked if I had diabetes.

Then she asked me if I was pretty healthy.

Then she asked me if I was pretty and if I liked naughty girls.

I made that last part up.

But I am. And I do.

But the moral of this story is that I can't play. if I can't play, I can't write.

this is because I discover melody by mistake. I play and I play until I reach a particular zen with the universe and then everything spills out of my head like half eaten lipstick from a bag lady's purse.

I even worked myself into a very cozy postion with my back on the floor, my feet on the couch and my ukelele resting on my chest. No luck.

Any pressure on the frets sent shocks down my arm.

Then Calvin jumped on my belly and told me he was hungry.

I tried the piano with just my right hand. I leaned my face down on the bass keys and let my bad arm dangle.

You wouldn't have guessed it, but even dangling hurts.

If I wrote hip-hop, a painful dangle would be the kind of stuff legends are made of.

So I'm frustrated.

Not by writer's block, but my own potential and looming death.

And if not death, then maybe just inactivity.

Which is like death.

But with an ending.