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A catalog of my Tuesday (“Museday”) posts that are about whatever’s on my mind that week.

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 7): Gig/Band Stories

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 7): Gig/Band Stories

Since playing shows really isn’t a thing right now, for a variety of reasons all tied to the current Coronavirus pandemic, I figured I’d tell a few stories I could remember from my life as a gigging musician. Times when I learned something.

First one, early 1993. The band: Magic Garden. My first band playing bass. At the time, I was 100% focused on guitar. My brother Rob had bought a bass a little over a year earlier, and that was now “his” instrument. In fact, just to play the shows and not have Rob throw a fit, I paid him half of what I made at the gigs to use his bass and amp for the shows. It was a white Arbor P-Bass, and all we had in the family at the time to amplify it was a tiny Crate practice amp. I cringe thinking about walking into a show with that shitty-ass rig expecting to be heard. Anyway, first gig was at a bar that would later become like a second home in my more depressed, alcoholic days my last year in college. Maxie’s.

I barely knew the music, which was a mix of originals and covers. The leader of that band was this guy who was my first solid example of the Dunning-Kruger effect in music. This guy thought he was an AMAZING musician. He was mediocre at best. Even then, while I was still in heavy Dunning-Kruger mode myself, I could tell he was a big pile of “meh”. Anyway, we get in there and set up, and play some, and the owner of the bar brings us beers. Mind you, this is February of 1993. I’m 19 years old. Even though I was gawky and looked about 17, tops, he brought me beers, too. He asked if we were all of age, and I didn’t say anything but everyone else said yes. I didn’t expect to be served, but that Yuengling Lager was delicious. The gig went terrible – no one could hear me – which was good because I couldn’t hear myself, so I’m sure I was playing like shit. I wasn’t a bassist, really, at that point. Just a kid who WANTED to play bass. I think I played with a pick all night because I hadn’t developed my calluses yet. But I was so excited to have my first bar gig under my belt. Even if it was “just as a bassist”. I played a few more shows with the band and then quit (with plenty of notice) because they basically seemed more concerned with smoking weed than getting any better. I remember Mr. Dunning-Kruger was super pissed and then super weird to me after that, always throwing their new bassist’s talent in my face whenever he had a chance. What a prick. Shawn Gray – if you read this…fuck you, dude. You were an asshole to me for no good reason. (He’s never going to read this – there’s no chance he even remembers who I am…) But moving on. GIG NUMBER TWO…

Open mic night. Holly Springs, PA. 1994ish. Got up and did a couple of songs with my friend Mike (aka “Pizza Man”). I even did a solo rendition of Anthrax’s Dallabnikufesin (their goof on the hair metal power ballad). People really liked it and laughed really hard at the end of the song because it has a punchline ending. A few minutes later, Mike came up to me and told me his musician friend, who he had a ton of respect for, said, “Where’d you find this kid?” about me. Which was the first big vote of confidence I ever got for my singing. Prior to that, it had always been my friends kind of shitting on me for it when I tried to sing. Mind you, I’m sure it was terrible. I just really wanted to be able to do it. This was the first time someone seemed impressed. And it really gave me a boost. I still think about it now.

Neon Logic Band, 1998. Bass Guitar. Played a wedding that the band booked without talking to me, that I couldn’t get to until about 40 minutes after we were supposed to start because I had to work. Came in late. Sound was shit. Guys were sort of mad at me, but they knew it was going to happen. Wedding people were happy. First time I realized you could suck ass and still make people enjoy themselves.

Slaphappy, 1999. Bass Guitar and Vocals. Played a seafood restaurant called “Calico Jack’s” for Halloween. Got to sing lead on TWO songs (Surrender, I Alone) and harmonies on tons of others. It was EXCITING. People really loved the band. First show truly killing it in a cover band. Still makes me smile thinking about it. I think the lead singer dressed as a cow. Cut to about two months later (in early 2000), after playing a regular Thursday gig at this same venue, with varying levels of success, because it was a THURSDAY, the manager chose to fire us BEFORE we started our set. Up to that point, it was the most phoned-in show a band I was in I ever played. We just basically fucked around and played whatever we wanted. It was not good. But it taught me a lesson about professionalism.

Slaphappy, August 2001. Bass Guitar and Vocals. We’d been playing with a fill-in singer since April, and then had a run of about 15 weeks in a row of gigs, and we were all tired of everything. We were playing at the Jacksonville Landing, one of our biggest venues by size, and it was DEAD. What? A gig OUTSIDE in Florida in August doesn’t draw a huge crowd? Anyway…nothing was going right, and the lead guitarist lost his shit. Threw his guitar on the ground and walked off stage. We had a show the following evening that was very tense. We talked it out and set some good boundaries, and “found the fun” again. But it was really hard to get there being so burnt out. He still has that guitar, and though the body got a crack in it, it never split, and still sounds awesome. Any time I wanted a reminder of keeping my cool on stage, I’d pick up his guitar and look at the crack, and it helped immensely.

Jumping back, Slaphappy, May 2001. Hurricane Hattie’s. This was at the beginning of the run. Our fill-in (now one of my best friends) was messing things up left and right, and who could blame him? That was a lot of material to learn as a lead singer with very little time to prep. I kept making mad faces all gig, scowling and basically being an asshole every time he messed up even a little. I can’t remember who pointed how terrible it looked out to me, but damn, I felt like a complete asshole. I apologized to him, and plotted a new strategy for myself for dealing with on-stage mess-ups. I’d smile, and if I could, laugh at them. IT WORKED! To this day, if you see me smiling on stage, it’s possible either I fucked up, or one of my bandmates did. And I guess sometimes I’m truly enjoying myself. Okay, most of the time. Now I embrace the chaos, when in the past, it would drive me to the brink of fury. That was a good lesson to learn. And it took basically one person pointing out how much of a prick I was. This seems to be a trend.

Forward in time…band named after the method you use to dial out of a hotel, 2005-2006. Guitar and co-Lead Vocals. I joined this band after they didn’t pick me to replace an important member earlier that year (in January 2005). The previous version of the band was kind of its “classic” lineup – with the most talented players they’d ever have all together. I really wished I would have gotten picked for that opening, but at the time Slaphappy was still a thing, and that paired with the fact that the other guy seemed more appealing to women (he was single and had more of a rock image), and already kind of had a solo fanbase sealed my fate, even though it was clear to everyone in the band I had powerful musical chemistry with the other guitarist/singer and the bassist. They went with the image rather than the talent in a 2-1 vote. It would bite them later. By May, the two super-talented guys would quit the band for family and motivation reasons. They weren’t having fun anymore. They might have stuck around had I been there, but we’ll never know…

Slaphappy had died in February, and I was looking for something new, so I joined. Now, new guy from January (who had an earlier stint in the band but was fired for a variety of reasons) had it in his head that he was the lead singer now. I guess because of his five months of seniority? Of course, that wasn’t the deal with me joining – I joined on the condition that we were going to share lead vocals equally, and each sing the songs we sounded better singing. It was discussed clearly, and he agreed. Cut to September and October, and he keeps making suggestions that he sing something and I play lead on it, edging me out so he was singing more of the songs. And worse, trying to take songs that were more suited to my voice. By the time we got to November, I was pretty livid, but not only because of the not-singing-lead thing. When I’m playing, I only care about making whatever ensemble I’m in sound its best. And me singing on the songs I was singing was us at our best. Honestly, me singing even more might have been even better. We’ll get to that in a second.

So, I’m still angry about being pushed down, but I couldn’t find a way to confront him directly about it because I didn’t have the communication skills, so I was going through the drummer/bandleader to express my frustration. Apparently he was getting it from the other guy as well, and he finally basically told me to shut the fuck up and talk to the other guy because he was tired of it. We finally figured it out, but it was still kind of tense, because he wasn’t really doing a great job singing the stuff that was his. Unfortunately for the band, he was really sounding like shit at the shows, to the point that one of the managers at our “home” venue came up to the bandleader and said, “What the hell is wrong with that guy? He’s terrible.” Referring to the other singer. “You should have THAT guy sing.” Pointing to me. This confirmed my sense that we were headed in the wrong direction. We sputtered along through the new year into 2006, and then a few months in, the other guy quit rather abruptly. We tried one guy and had a promising rehearsal, but then we had a horrible show – he did a terrible job and didn’t know the material and sang very poorly. So we moved on. We decided to go with me as sole lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist and got a great lead guitarist who wasn’t really a singer, and we played a couple of good shows with that group, which would prove to be the last shows I played with them. I moved to Austin in May that year. I still kind of give the bandleader shit for not picking me instead of the drama queen when they had a chance. That would have been an amazing band.

Around the time all this drama was happening, I was starting a new band (Schizophonic) with the genius drummer from Slaphappy, the brilliant bassist that just quit the band I joined, and an awesome-but-green keyboardist. Things were going great until we started to pick songs, and it became very apparent to the bassist that we weren’t headed in a direction he wanted to head in. Add that to the lack of gigs booked for this band, because we were trying to truly be something different and pick songs we hadn’t heard other bands play, and he decided it just wasn’t worth it anymore. He felt marginalized. And I felt terrible, because he was right. I mean, I truly still don’t believe the songs he was picking were all that marketable, but giving him at least an equal share of the repertoire might have made us sound really unique and awesome and not really hurt us in the long run. We ended up finding another player who was only okay, and we sputtered through a gig or two and died in the rehearsal space at the keyboardist’s house months later, after the brilliant bassist had joined another band and then taken the drummer for that band. I ended up filling in with them a couple of times later, so it wasn’t any big drama, but it still hurts, especially knowing it was largely because I lacked empathy for what my friend wanted to do and how not picking his songs made him feel.

There are so many more stories to tell, but I think I’ll stop here.

Learning self-confidence, professionalism, patience, equanimity, balance, and empathy through these situations has helped me make my band experiences truly the best they can be, and me a much better bandmate.

Hopefully reading these might serve as cautionary tales for your experiences in bands or as a musician in general.

Have a wonderful week, and I apologize for this being published a day late. Life is weird. We were working on the final mix of Chandler and The Bings’ new single. It’s pretty awesome.

Black Lives Matter. Keep your respiratory droplets to yourself. Wear your mask. Wash your hands. Keep your distance.

And peace be the journey.

TMS

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 6): Luke and The Dude

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 6): Luke and The Dude

I have just finished reading “The Gospel According to Luke”, Steve Lukather’s autobiography. I won’t be disappointed if you don’t know who Steve Lukather is, but I will tell you that you’ve listened to pop music made between 1975 and 1995, you’ve heard him play.

Lukather’s been a bit of a hero of mine for a long time. I deeply admire the fact that he’s a true virtuoso – blessed with that immediate “music just makes sense to me” instinct, but with the drive to always seek and learn. I like to think that if I was blessed with the same drive and ambition I might have ascended to greater heights as a musician, because for me it was just kind of easy from the start, things just sort of made sense. Sadly I’ve never worked as hard as I should have. Now I steal time to try and improve my playing, but life with my wife and kids is honestly more interesting to me than perfecting my hand synchronization or memorizing/internalizing the fretboard or learning to sight-read music.

But back to Luke (that’s what people call him, generally). His notable works as one of the most prolific session guitarists in the history of recorded music swing from movie soundtracks to Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” to Michael McDonald’s “I Keep Forgettin'” to Spinal Tap’s “Break Like The Wind”. He was one of THE GUYS of the Yacht Rock era and had his fingers on every bit of pop music in the 80s, from hard rock to R&B. He was one of Quincy Jones’ go-to guys, appearing on most of what Q produced through the 80s and early 90s. His ability to come up with exactly the right part for something is virtually unparallelled. His improvisations on solos, a weird-but-always-melodic mix of his biggest influences from the Beatles to British Blues to Funk to Bebop, still “raise the fur” for me to this day. He just kills it. All the time. And he’s a goddamn character, too.

His book is so specifically written in his voice, if you’ve ever heard him talk you will hear him narrate the stories to you in your head. With his “Valley dude meets jazz cat” speech mannerisms and liberal use of profanity, it honestly feels like you’re hanging out with him while he’s telling you stories.

So why did I title this Luke and The Dude? Well, Lukather tells some stories about his interactions with various people in the music industry, and particularly about how his “friend” David Foster (look him up – you’ve heard his stuff, too) responded to Luke and his gang in their band Toto cleaned up at the Grammys in 1983 behind their legendary album Toto IV – they won album and record of the year (for the song Rosanna – my son’s favorite tune and one I’ve yet to tire of after almost 40 years), but the one that really pissed off Foster was Producer of The Year, because he was up for Chicago 16, and Toto beat him. He reacted by kind of shutting Luke out. They were friends, they’d do sessions, hang out, eat meals, everything, and one little award that Luke won that Foster wanted tanked it all. Because David Foster’s a little bitch. I find that true from other stories I’ve read, because he’s one of those producers who makes everything sound the way he wants, not the way the artist necessarily wants it. That is not a philosophy or method of production that I particularly appreciate, even if sometimes it’s amazing (I’m looking at you, Jeff Lynne and Mutt Lange).

Now, on the flip side, another nominee for that Producer of The Year award was the legend Quincy Jones, who was up for tons of awards for his album “The Dude”. When the Toto boys won Producer of The Year, he wasn’t crappy to them at all. He was excited for them and congratulated them.

Heading into reading this book I was pretty sure I was going to enjoy myself. After the last two music books I’d read (“Ted Templeman: A Platinum Producer’s Life In Music” and “Van Halen Rising”), I was kind of starved to read something with the artist’s voice. Those other two books were great, but to be honest, since they were very facts-oriented and they were biographies written by someone else (Greg Renoff – who did a great job telling the stories but has a specific, very facts-oriented documentary/historian-style voice as a writer), they were a little less personal than I’d hoped. Luke’s book was the opposite. It was as I remember Nile Rodgers wonderful book or John Taylor’s. Or even Butch Walker’s book – the writing truly sounded like them. You can’t not read those books and come away from them knowing those guys as people a little more.

So I’m thankful that Luke decided to put it out there, because I’ve connected with him even more deeply than I did just as a fan of his playing.

I sincerely hope I get to meet him someday so we can swap stories about our boys on the spectrum. Maybe I can get him to show me that crazy descending bop-inspired run he does at the end of Rosanna.

If you dig Toto at all, or are interested in some good stories and a fun hang with a goddamn legend, check out The Gospel According To Luke. It’s fun.

Speaking of fun hangs, I had one last night via Google with Patrick from Chandler and The Bings. We talked about all sorts of stuff, and we talked about how thankful we were that the four of us have each other. It’s such a healthy dynamic. It is such a bummer that we aren’t playing shows, but – luxury problem – we REALLY shouldn’t play shows because our shows are usually fairly packed. We’re not putting anyone we love that comes to see us in that position, masks or not.

Instead, we’ve cooked up an excellent take on a Boy Band classic, and we should be releasing it very soon. We’re almost done with the mix, and then once it’s mastered and we clear the rights to release it (which shouldn’t be that bad – shout out to DistroKid for making that part super easy for artists), it will be available for purchase on iTunes and Amazon and stuff like that, and it will be available to stream on Spotify, iHeartRadio, etc. It’s heavy but still has the sassiness of the original, and features tight rhythm section work and some pretty cool parts. Pat and I share lead vocals and we all sing harmonies. It’s gonna be great.

Wear a mask. Physically distance. Black Lives Matter.

And peace be the journey.

TMS

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 5): Equanimity in the face of Idiocy

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 5): Equanimity in the face of Idiocy

I said last week that I’d probably be back on track with music stuff this week, and yes, sorta. You see, I have an unfortunate divide in my life. I love music. I love making music. I love artists. I love artistic people. I love people who have free and interesting minds. I love making music with artistic people with free and interesting minds. I DON’T love the belief system that seems to have a solid grip on many of the musicians I know.

There’s a generation of people from about my age (46) through 60ish that grew up on arena rock and came of age in the Reagan era. The youngest boomers and oldest Gen-Xers. Most of the people that populate the jam sessions I like to attend up north fit this category. And sadly most of them are mindlessly conservative and reactionary in their beliefs. These are the “all lives matter” crowd. These are the idiots that shared “Plandemic” as though it had a shred of credibility (and still insist it makes good points when it’s been thoroughly debunked). These are the people posting “blue lives matter” all over the place as police escalate situations and beat, tear gas, pepper spray, and shoot peaceful protesters in the streets for merely being present. These are the brainless fucks that think people should be shot for looting. Like theft deserves a death sentence. Many are still saying COVID-19 is all a hoax Democrats created to hurt Trump. They buy all the bullshit conspiracies and lies from Trump’s GOP and their enablers at OAN and Fox. They sincerely believe “Black Lives Matter” meant “ONLY Black Lives Matter”, and refuse to accept that it actually meant “Black Lives Matter, too!” They’re probably not wearing a mask out in public.

I bring up all their moronic beliefs because I’m in a tough spot. I sincerely LIKE the majority of these people who hold these idiotic beliefs. I am a person who sees people for their goodness, I traffic in love and empathy. I do my best to look past their blindness to their white privilege, their ignorant hatred and fear-based reactions to everything.

But that’s getting really hard.

It’s a very good thing that we’re all physically distancing and not going to bars and clubs right now. Because I’d probably be in their face ripping them new ones for their thoughtless comments on Facebook. I can’t let it go anymore. I’ve unfollowed pretty much all of them, and that is actually quite nice. But it’s just a band-aid. I’m so disappointed in them as people, because their core isn’t necessarily rotten. Many of them are kind, at least in “real life”. But too many of them are too stupid and proud to be educated at this point. I think it’s time to let it go. To take my time and figure out ways to be strong in my belief, shit on them hard if they’re being stupid or racist, but love them anyway. Like I do with my relatives. Good people, believe in reactionary conservative bullshit and can’t see past their privilege and lack the empathy to consider how it might be for someone lacking their skin tone or upbringing.

So we’ll see how things go. I don’t generally go after people or post politically on social media anymore, because it’s just exhausting. No one wants to hear it. No one wants to be corrected. No one is really like me. I don’t mind having my ideas ripped to shreds if it means I’m learning something. People of the “Boomer/X” group (the conservative ones, anyway), lack the intellectual curiosity to actually challenge their beliefs when new ideas render them questionable. They just believe what they believe, and expect people to honor that, which is utter madness. And everything is taken so personally when they’re IDEAS not PERSONALITY TRAITS. Except when they are, I guess.

Living in this stupid society founded on greed and aspirational greed has taught me a few things: 1. Greedy people will continue to amass everything. 2. They will do anything in their power to tweak the rules to ensure they can keep amassing things. 3. They don’t care what that means for anyone but themselves.

So being calm and composed and maintaining my kindness in the face of all this idiocy is my goal. Equanimity.

On the music front – Chandler and The Bings’ new single is VERY CLOSE to being complete – one last mix tweak and then sent off to mastering. Its release will be accompanied with a performance video from our respective studio spaces.

I may be posting the audio from our 5/29 livestream concert here soon. I like my mix of it…and the band is kicking, even with no audience!

Last thing: NEW FRIDAY FLUSH WAS POSTED FRIDAY (finally). Okay it’s not new, it’s from March of 2011, but it is still pretty cool, in my opinion:

And that’s all for today. That should be my last word on anything political for a while. Black Lives Matter. Oh, and HUMAN LIFE IS MORE IMPORTANT AND VALUABLE THAN PROPERTY OR A BUSINESS.

Stay safe, stay strong, stay curious, and peace be the journey!

TMS

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 4): Black Lives Matter

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 4): Black Lives Matter

Words are hard right now. My heart is broken, not that it hasn’t been for a long time on this topic. But the way police agencies are responding to peaceful protests, with military action and violence, is disgusting and makes me ashamed.

I realize this blog is about music, but I haven’t been able to really think of music with the shit state of the world right now. Police need to weed out the “bad apples” IMMEDIATELY and start implementing the changes in training, de-escalation, and disciplinary actions that they so desperately need. Communities need to take social aspects of policing off their plate and let them focus on real crimes.

Black Lives Matter. And fuck you if you’re still saying all lives matter in response. You’ve been told what it means, and if you still don’t accept it, you are a garbage person.

I hope every violent cop who started these police riots (that’s what the majority of them are – police departments’ overzealous use of force is what made them happen) gets prosecuted for their crimes and loses their job.

No more bullies as cops. No more dumb people as cops. It’s time to take the power away from them, because they’ve shown they’re not worthy of it anymore.

Black Lives Matter. Acknowledge your white privilege. Stand for change. Vote our piece of shit President and all his lackeys out of office in November.

Next Tuesday will be back to normal musical programming, probably. I do have a lot to talk about on that front. Just not now. Not this week. My heart can’t keep my feelings on this topic to myself anymore.

BLACK LIVES MATTER.

Peace to all.
TMS

P.S. STAY THE FUCK HOME. This COVID-19 shit isn’t over. If you must go out for a good reason, like a peaceful protest, follow the guidelines for being out in the world. Wear a mask. Social distance. Wash your goddamn hands. Thank you. I don’t want you to die or to kill anyone because you were careless (or selfish).

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 3): Setting Appointments, Working Out Logistics…

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 3): Setting Appointments, Working Out Logistics…

I’ve heard people say you can’t schedule creativity. And they are correct, I think, but I do think if you set aside time to be creative on a regular basis, it definitely helps create things. I didn’t have time this week to really get any of my creative things done the way I wanted (hence the Museday Mumbling coming out basically at midnight on Wednesday night). And there are other issues, of course.

I still have to figure out the logistics of how to make the Friday Flush happen, because the only suitable bathroom in my current house gets crazy bright in the afternoon BEHIND where I’d be sitting and singing, so the lighting is terrible. I can’t record once the baby is in bed, because it’s too noisy. That leaves mornings (when I’m almost 100% trying to work and take care of baby at the same time), and then baby’s nap, when I can’t be noisy either. So you can see it’s a challenge. I’m going to have to carve out time on weekends to get it done. It will happen. For now I have one other singing video from a while back (might be 10 years ago, actually) that was banked and never released. I’m not sure why I decided not to release it, but I really like it now, so it’ll be Friday Flush Episode 2, likely released this coming Friday, as a sort of “holder” for when I figure out the Friday Flush logistics. I might end up turning it into something different, where I’m not recording in a bathroom. We’ll have to see.

Anyway, the point is, the road to regular creation is so far sort of a rocky one, but I’m doing my best. I have some neat ideas and I should be executing at least a few of them this week while I’m off work. Please bear with me, and head over to my YouTube and subscribe and ring the bell so you get notified when I do release the videos.

Thanks for your time, and keep an eye out here. I think there’s some good stuff on the way, and on a more regular basis! 🙂

TMS

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 2): Updates and Rocketmen

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 2): Updates and Rocketmen

A lot of big thoughts and emotions this week in the world of music-related things for me. First, I decided to start being a regular creator. Judging by the arrival of this blog post a day late (two if it takes me more than 6 minutes to post it), you can see that life has been a little more important than meeting my arbitrary internet obligations on a blog basically no one reads. That aside, I had some very nice experiences and I’m going to talk about them

First, I had a great social-distancing practice with my Chandler and The Bings homies. We’re playing a livestream concert this Friday night from The Venue ATX, and it should be weird and fun.

I also saw the Elton John biopic “Rocketman”. It was truly enjoyable. Taron Egerton and Jamie Bell dazzled. Just perfect performances. Reminded me that no matter what shit you put in the way, you should always strive to keep working and creating and never forget to keep yourself grounded. And remember that you’re loved…

Three minutes left until it’s Thursday. Okay. Shit! Two minutes. Well, the other cool thing is that I finished an electronics project to add some footswitches to my gear to give me a little more flexibility on stage.

Okay. One minute left. I’m going to just keep it simple. I love music. I love the guitar. I love the bass. I love playing with my friends. And that’s all for now. I’m going to keep plugging away, and next week, I’m going to be lazy AF because I’m off work. Hopefully lots of guitaring.

Peace be the journey!

TMS

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 1): New Feature

Museday Mumblings (Vol. 1): New Feature

I’ve decided that I’m going to start being more active on this site. So welcome to what I am now calling “Museday” I will release a new blog post every single Tuesday going forward. Sometimes it will be me blathering on about some musical topic that tickles my fancy that week, sometimes it will be to release new songs, sometimes it will be just life stuff, but it will happen every Tuesday, or “Museday”. I hope you enjoy it!

Now, on to today’s thoughts. I’m in a band with a guy who’s 11 years younger than me. In our teens, we were both very fond of the punk rock of our day. But the 11-year gap between what we love makes things kind of amusing sometimes when we talk about it. Now, he’s always had way more punk rock cred than me, in terms of his dedication to creating original music in the genre, and his look and stuff like that. I’ve never been into the fashion of punk rock. I think it’s kind of silly, actually, but I think that about most fashion, so it’s not really relevant. The music has always been the only thing I cared about.

When I started liking punk rock, it was the beginnings of what people would call “punk-pop” or “pop punk”. It was the Lookout! Records bands – Green Day, Operation Ivy, The Mr. T Experience, The Queers. And it was Rancid, The Descendents, All, NOFX, Offspring. It was all very California-style, steeped in the Bay Area/Gilman Street scene and the Southern California surf-punk thing. I loved when people mixed genres in to punk, like ska, especially, and I especially loved the bands with exceptional melodic sense, like Green Day. My punk rock was the softer, more pop version.

In discussing the genre with my bandmate and buddy, I found out something interesting. “Pop-punk” means something COMPLETELY different to his generation. It’s the bands that followed the Blink-182 model – the first generation AFTER all the bands that I loved. The production was slicker, the guitars were thicker, the drum sounds big. By the time all that stuff was getting popular, I had grown tired of the genre. I mean, I liked Blink-182 a little – definitely a fan of their more pop material (their “heavier” stuff sounded super derivative to me), but I was snobby about it. So I never got into the bands that he loved all that much. We do have some overlap, in that he was younger when the genre grabbed him, so we both dig the skate punk stuff and stuff like NOFX, because they kind of just kept making records, but I find it kind of amusing that we’re so far apart on some stuff. I think he sees a lot of the stuff I was into as almost unlistenable because he really digs that Pop Punk production quality that became very specific and a genre unto itself in the early 2000s.

By then, I had shifted my focus to more purely classic alternative/indie pop and power pop stuff like Fountains of Wayne, Jellyfish, Superdrag, Sloan, Marvelous 3, The Grays, Jason Falkner, and other super-melodic, dense music that had a melodic and harmonic sense derived heavily from the best rock and pop music of the 60s and 70s (and sometimes 80s). Often these artists added a lot of punk rock attitude and energy to what they did, and I think that gave me the “edge” I needed to keep devouring it. It’s probably still my biggest go-to when I want to listen to music. But I also was way into the “alterna-pop” stuff of the day, so I was into Barenaked Ladies, Fastball, Semisonic, and bands like that – they also derived their melodic and harmonic sense from classic rock and pop, but were less punky and more mainstream.

All the while I never stopped listening to the metal bands I loved (Anthrax, Pantera, Metallica), the hard rock bands I loved (King’s X, Extreme, Living Colour, Van Halen), the funk bands I loved (The Meters), and the progressive rock bands I loved (Rush, Queen, Yes, Zappa, Primus, Dream Theater). All of this plus a steady diet of the classics (Beatles, Beach Boys, Motown, Atlantic Soul, Zombies, Grand Funk, Led Zeppelin, 70s Chicago), 80s pop stuff, Next School hip hop (De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, etc.), a few classic hip hop acts (Run-DMC, Beastie Boys, LL Cool J) and a smattering of jazz and classical and soundtrack music.

So, circling back to the topic, I was never a punk rocker, even if there was punk rock that I liked. And sometimes I find it hard to talk to my buddy about the music partially because what he seems to really love is something very specific that I don’t understand – the Pop Punk, Hardcore, and Emo stuff of the early 2000s. I wasn’t the right age to “get it” and by that point I’d already had a kid (and then another in 2003) so it just wasn’t for me. In fact, at the time, I HATED it. Not because of the music, necessarily, but because of the culture surrounding it. I didn’t get it. I thought it was whiny, crappy, overproduced, edgeless music. Punk Rock Air Supply. I still find it hard to keep a straight face when someone says anything positive about any band of that time except perhaps Jimmy Eat World, because I really liked them (and still do). I also liked New Found Glory even though the singer’s super whiny. So I’ve been a kind of a dick about it forever for no good reason. And to get along, I definitely don’t talk shit about it to my friend who I love and don’t want to hurt by being an asshole.

But I have a confession to make (and not a Dashboard one…yay dad joke):

I REALLY DON’T KNOW SHIT ABOUT THAT GENRE.

My attitude about it is one based on ignorance and merely being annoyed by the people clad in what appeared to be Hot Topic uniforms who liked it back in 2002. How crappy and small is that? How “dickhead older brother” is that?

Now, I will say that I’m trying to turn over a new leaf here, and just say what I always say about music, “If it’s good to you, it’s good. To you.” Music is personal, it’s subjective, and anyone can pick apart absolutely anything for whatever reason they choose. So my hatred of the genre, however silly, considering how much of that type of music I enjoy that doesn’t really carry the label (I’m looking at you, Weezer), is actually just as valid as hating the stuff I love that most people agree is great (like The Beatles).

I want to have passionate opinions about new music again, but so much I hear that’s new just falls flat for me. Some people love the exploration – the next new creative thing from someone – but I’ve never been one of those people. New is just more recent. It doesn’t mean anything else to me. I find something special I like, devour pretty much everything they’ve ever done, and then listen to it over and over again ad nauseum until I go back to listening to something I loved 30 years ago.

A perfect sort of recent example of this is the English band Muse. They are a perfect combination of so many of my favorite bands all at once, so once I got hooked on them (their 2006 record “Black Holes and Revelations”), I bought EVERYTHING and listened to it constantly.

An even more recent example, which might be surprising to some people, is Billie Eilish. I heard The Interrupters’ cover of “Bad Guy” (I LOVE THAT BAND…) and then circled back to Billie’s original version, which I actually didn’t like at first. But it grew on me fast, and I had to consume as much of her stuff as I could find. When I found out her brother Finneas was heavily involved in all her music and produced it, I made sure I consumed whatever I could find from him (his EP is fantastic – go listen to it now).

But back to the point. I’m kind of a hard “get” at this point as a fan. I’ve blogged before about hating music, and honestly, that was probably never really true, even though it felt true at the time. I just find it hard to be inspired by new music. I pick it apart and ruin it for myself before it even has a chance to move me. It has to be something that surprises me or feels fresh. There’s very little of that in the mainstream. There’s very little of that in hip hop for me anymore. I’m such a fuddy-duddy when it comes to the style of flow I like in hip hop (basically, pre-1995) – and I just don’t like the over-processed vocals on most of those tracks, and trap beats are the high-waisted jeans of music – they work about 5% of the time. Even when I hear about a promising new hard rock band, I almost always end up going “meh” after a while. Not much feels fresh anymore, and very little surprises me.

But I admire my friend. I love that he can get joy from the stuff that I find endlessly boring. I love that he gets excited about the new stuff. I don’t know that I have the bandwidth to give a shit, to be honest. Sometimes I wish my ears were more open and I was less of a party pooper about music, but being true to me means I’d almost always rather listen to Toto’s “Rosanna” another thirty times to get the nuance of David Hungate’s bass phrasing or to nail that Luke guitar solo than listen to some mumble rapper, some wank-vocal-with-small-minded-lyrics pop chick or a guy with face tattoos who seems to sorta like rock music but is famous as a rapper.

(Although I did like that guy’s Nirvana tribute a few weeks back.)

I doubt I’ll ever be able to just listen to whatever’s current and enjoy it again unless the way they make music these days changes, but “new” is whatever you really haven’t experienced, so since my buddy’s favorite music is that Emo stuff I never bothered to really explore, maybe I should check out Saves The Day, The Used, Taking Back Sunday, Bright Eyes, Alkaline Trio, Simple Plan, AFI, Boys Like Girls, and Relient K. And maybe some more*. Maybe I’ll get into screamier bands like Thursday, Silverstein, Underoath, Senses Fail, Hawthorne Heights, or Story Of The Year? Maybe one of them will hook me and I’ll be sucked in. Maybe not. Who knows? It’s probably worth giving it a shot. And if nothing works, at least my negative opinion of the genre will have a more solid, empirical base.

(* – But not Dashboard Confessional. I’ve heard enough of that already to know that the only Carrabba I’ll ever like serves me delicious fettuccine alfredo.)

Peace be the journey, and C U Next Museday!

(wait, that kind of ruins it the joke…crap)

TMS