Beasts of Bourbon

After ten or so days and six or so songs in California, I have returned to New York. The weather was disappointingly cold, but seeing friends and family was saucesome, and I'm pretty excited about a couple of the new songs that I have. Traveling out west gave me a sort of Manifest Destiny, Woody Guthrie sensation -- if that makes any sense -- and sparked some tunes in that style. We'll see what comes of them.

My first night back was weird...I think my head is still in California, eating sunbeams or something. I tried out two new songs, one of which is still going to take a lot of practice. I think people can sense when I'm playing a song that I feel isn't quite ready yet. I thought busking would be a good toolshed for shaping up new material, but sometimes I feel too awkward to try out the fresh ones. I dunno. Anyway, two guys were complimentary of my song "Emmylou" tonight, which dispelled some of my insecurities in performing that one. They wished me good night and good luck, like the great Edward R. Murrow.

I'm a big fan of kids asking their parents if they can have money to put in my guitar case...it's wonderful to see children enjoying music at an early age, as well as acknowledging the music maker!

Boston may be housing me once more, this time just for the weekend (my first time back since living in NYC...which hasn't really been that long), and I may test out the T for buskability (they require permits in Boston, but I've never had problems).

Indonesian Junk

Oasis song + group of teenage British girls = big moolah.

This I have learned. It would seem that I also learned that my horrible new haircut (it's so freaking short that I look as though I just tumbled out of a naked mole-rat's womb) and grotesque shave (the first barber shave I've ever had, and let's just say I'm not going to let it mate with any other painful shaves out there to make shave-babies) have brought on a deluge of donations because people probably think I'm a fifteen year-old kid. I'm cool with it. What I'm not cool with is how I forgot to bring my website sign today. Pretty unfortunate, since so many passersby were flocking to see the lumpy-faced, pre-adolescent busker.

I've had difficulty thinking lately because the Cheap Trick song "Surrender" has been lodged quite firmly in the intersection of my crucial neural pathways. I decided the best solution to this dilemma was to learn how to play the song in about a day and spout it off to the great underground ear of New York. I certainly had fun, but I'm not sure if people recognized the song. Am I crazy, or is that like the best freaking power-pop song ever? Sure, Badfinger's got some pretty sweet tunes. But "Surrender" is truly epic. I was just surprised that I didn't see more looks of acknowledgement tonight. Talk about "losers of the year"....

Still, I made record cash tonight. I was close to losing record cash, too. A huge bunch of black kids were eyeing my case full of money and pointing and laughing at me. Heh, real cool. I'm not trying to be racist...they just happened to be black, and they really seemed to be planning some kinda heist...or maybe I just got keyed up and my imagination filled in the rest. Regardless, I got pretty evil-eye on them, and started playing a little snarly; my appearance probably negated this, though. I swear that barber's gonna get a piece of my mind! And many pieces of my hair....

I've been having some problems with one song, "Where Marlborough Street Ends." Could be because when I wrote it, I quickly recorded it with a drum loop and now I can't play it exactly right since I can't hear the drum rhythms. I also wrote it when my ex-girlfriend and I were still dating, so maybe it's hard to play for that reason. At any rate, I think I'm going to give it a rest for a bit. I'm still polishing up my newest song, "Cold, Cold Columbia."

I'm actually heading to sunny California in a few short hours! It's high tme I see my grandparents and extended family out there, plus my bottles of sunshine are almost out here. Every time I go out to CA I have an amazing time and get pretty into my writing, so hopefully I'll have some swell stuff to update on when I return on the 23rd.

Until then, godspeed and gehsundheit.

Bond. Vagabond.

After creatively exhausting myself to the point of actually going to sleep before midnight last night (I think the last time that happened was 5th grade...must have been the one Friday night that TGIF was temporarily replaced by the news, sports, or "Beaches"), I think I've decided to not worry so much about this song I've been working on. I'm really happy with the lyrics, so who cares if the melody sounds like a Neil Young song? A tweak here, a tweak there...unrecognizable. I hope.

I got a guitar pick (canary yellow) from a guy at 59th Street yesterday. Musicians are definitely -- and logically -- the most generous, at least thus far. I got a five dollar bill from a guy who said he needed to help out his fellow guitarist, but he'd only been in the station about thirty seconds before hopping on the train! I was floored. I also met a very complimentary lady who really liked "The Fly," a song I wrote based on the William Blake poem of the same name. I usually don't play it because the finger-picking pattern is too soft amidst the torrents of underground New York, but I'm glad I did on this occasion. She wrote down my website address, and told me she's a performer, too: an aerial performer! Cirque du Soleil type of stuff, she told me. Wow. I can't even ride an escalator without tumbling into oblivion...doing anything more complicated is simply incomprehensible to me.

It's weird...everytime I start feeling groggy while busking, I'm able to convince myself "Just one more song," and I always end up getting a sizable amount of donations from that last song, or meet someone who has valuable insights into music, busking, performance, etc (or mybe part of my brain just searches for something meaningful to justify my procrastination). Last night I ran into my friend Caroline (the one who didn't really ditch me a few posts earlier)! She and I went to high school together back in NC, and haven't seen each other since. I wonder what would have happened if I continued on this "one more song" mentality...maybe met some Mole People?

Samhain's Revolver

The main highlight of today's busking expedition was my friend Christian trying to take some pictures of me at 50th St -- most of them didn't really come out so hot. Turns out that the visual flurry and musical splendor of a real, live Rob Morrison performance simply can't be captured on film. Ha, if only that were true. Oh well, back to the drawing board. Literally, since the photos are a no-go.

I only stayed out for about an hour and a half today...I was supposed to meet up with a friend from high school for coffee (she totally ditched on me...or maybe I was supposed to call her...), so I kept things short. I did see the same guy today who observed me quietly yesterday. I think that's probably the first time I've ever seen a passerby more than once.

Things were low-key at the office today, so I was able to spontaneously write some song lyrics. The trouble is that when I write lyrics first, they often take on someone else's melodies. Today I ganked a Neil Young tune from his new album, Prairie Wind. Whoops. I've also been noticing that I write way too many ballads and generally downtempo stuff, and since part of my goal in busking is to entertain the folks around me enough to get them to actually listen to what I'm playing, perhaps super-depressing tunes aren't my best bet, at least not a full brigade of them.

Milk and Honey

Life is all about calluses. If you're not willing to build them up either literally or figuratively when it comes to what you wanna get better at, chances are you'll stay pretty bad. Not 24-karat wisdom, to be sure. But true, I think.

I'm having an awkward time spinning the acting and songsmith plates simultaneously. Well, in truth, I haven't done much for my acting career since arriving in town. There are tons of excuses to be had, and none of them deceptively winning enough to show up here. Suffice it to say that way too much of my life has lately been sapped by unimportant projects (my job). Nevertheless, I came out of last week one song lighter (I guess I should say heavier...but when I write something new, I feel a lot more buoyant and a lot less cumbersome), and the show I was helping out with is -- thank the merciful heavens and even-more-merciful jars of tupelo honey that have imbued me with sufficient sugar rushes to charge, broken-axle and off-kilter, through this week --is done! Now I gotta get back to earnin' me some songwritin' and buskin' calluses.

Had one listener tonight who never said a word to me but made a nice donation and gave me multiple -- if somewhat grave -- thumbs-up. I wouldn't think to do that in a solemn way, but then again I didn't think to pay off my monthly college loan payment on time this month.

The new song (I even need a working title!) was a scrap of something I started writing two years ago, if I'm not mistaken. I hadn't forgotten about it, but I had forgotten a chunk of it after I came up with it, and in a sacred effort to summon the ghost of the missing chorus back to the realm of living music, I nobly left it my its lonesome for way too long. Now, sidestep for a second: I've been really into this artist Laura Veirs (I mentioned her a few posts back). I haven't really fallen headlong for an artist's stuff in a while, so being won over by her performance and music brought a much-needed sense of refreshment. More on her stuff another time. At any rate, I read an interview of hers regarding songwriting...she was never super into music in high school (can't say I shared that trait), but music of all manifestations -- including songwriting -- hit her towards the end of college. She's since become a champion of songwriting, insisting that "anyone can do it", and going so far as to teach private songwriting lessons in her hometown of Seattle. One of her pupils was an elderly German guy (if I recall correctly) who adamantly resisted the notion that he could write until Laura sat down with him and helped him string some chords and phrases together. Once he saw how easy it could be if he just allowed himself to toss the fear of failure (or success, as it may be) aside, he was overjoyed. But he soon descended into huddling over his lyric scraps, protecting his ideas...basically becoming one of those "classic cases" as Laura says.

I'm totally one of those guys, and I hate it. Songs don't need to be these malnourished tubors that I labor over for ages, providing just enough water to keep them alive but preventing them from growing. That's like fucking veal. And I hate veal. I'm not going to write veal!!!

Anyway, I finally finished that song. It's far from perfect (I fudged some lyrics today at 50th St), but until I really really really get in the habit of working on songs (I'm only up to one and half reallys), I shouldn't be expecting a smooth, polished shoe of a song. I'm fine with Chuck Taylors for now.

Brother, can you spare some time?

Yeesh. Just one busking outing this week. I thought I was getting quite an audience at one point because the trains stopped running for about forty minutes....and then my string broke. I thought I had a replacement, so I started fitting a new one in before realizing that I'd picked the wrong string. The proper G string (that just doesn't good) was waiting at home for me, so I packed up and called it a night. Not too eventful. I was kinda grumping around all day, and because office work's getting crazy and longer (I hate having to use that as an excuse), I didn't find a pitch until 8:00 or so. This weekend's not looking so good either...it's amazing how quickly I can get rusty.