We'll Make The Money Later

Finding someone as passionate about your music as you are-and then finding you make a good fit together. With LC Varella in Greenpoint.

My Rider

1. If you’re a friend, I’ll give you the art. It’s a postcard. It’s an extension of us and our friendship that has enriched the work. 

2. If I like your stuff, i'll buy it. It’s a way of showing that something has resonated. Something has taught me about the world or myself. It'll actually be a pleasure handing you the money. It's money I would have wasted on a bad meal or another guitar. I probably won't be able to afford anything much more expensive than that, though.

3. If you’re a band, I’ll pay up to $10 on a weekend to see you. Some of you are professionals and have families; I respect that. $20 for a national. $25 for an international; I can’t afford more. The live experience has as much to do with non-music factors as the music. 

4. If I'm hiring you for one of my little projects, I don’t expect you to charge me your corporate rate. I assume you’re working with me because you like my work. I recognize that you have bills to pay, too, but I’m not a corporation and most of the work you do for corporate profits frankly sucks. 

5. If you’re in your twenties and have a $20,000 kickstarter project, I’ll give you $20 once.  I too was once in my there and thought there was a direct line between my family home life, university, and an artistic career. You have technical ability at this age and probably not much else. I'm sure we’ll have great conversations in about 10 years' time :).

5.5. Alternately, you should be able to create something interesting that won’t make you broke.

6. If you come to one of our spoken word events as a comedian and leave right after your set, I will mock you when I’m on stage. This event is not a stepping stone to fame and fortune. I don’t have any friends that talk about their “dicks”, how “white people” and “black people” act, or make observations about things on TV. If you haven’t had a significant human interaction this month, you should try to have one at the event itself, or at least try to meet people before you run out the door.

Thanks,
Bob

In The Vault

I still buy a fair amount of new music every month. Technology has allowed us the ability to swap whole music collections with friends- this is amazing. I believe that critical listening to the other artists is completely essential to developing as a songwriter. It sounds obvious, but what is also apparent to me is how many of my peers fall back on familiar sounds and motifs essentially derived from their earliest listening experiences.
Books like This Is Your Brain On Music have documented how the music of our adolescence is deeply imprinted on our consciousness.

We'll always have the sounds we love the most, but there is a process of stretching yourself as a listener that is crucial. Helping you along the way is connecting with other music fans, reading up on writers, and being engaged in trying to get behind the illusive answer to the question, "Why something works and why it doesn't."
Before I ever wrote a song, I spoke to friends endlessly about favorite tunes and what was it exactly that made them so great. Creating mixtapes can be seen in this way as a form of proto-composing.
Singer, writer, and musician are often three different careers that each take a lifetime to perfect. It's rare to find greatness in all three areas in one person. It makes collaboration, practice, experimentation, and further study all the more important. Your music collection is your textbook.

Finishing What I Started

Sometimes it's better to wait. Let those babies gestate, grow into teenagers that cause problems.

Wait for the people that get you, that are on your wavelength. The non-careerists. Then let those teenagers out into the world.

Indian Poetry in English

is the best. There are many great authors. Check out Modern Indian Poetry in English by Bruce King (2001 Oxford India) for hints.

Here is something by Vinda Karandikar (from The Sacred Heresy):

The Ganges of Sweat

The Ganges of Sweat knows no pause.
She flows on gaspingly
from infinity to infinity,
pounding rocks with the thrust of her head,
breaking all the cliff and crags,
skimming over hill and dale.

The Ganges of Sweat knows no pause.
She breaks all bounds and barriers
of country, religion and blood.
She waters soils, both black and white.
Look, how she flows over the entire world,
how the boat of life canes on her stream!

The Ganges of Sweat knows no pause.
She flowed in the past, flows in the present;
flows day and night morning and evening;
as much in summer as in winter.
A fuming cobra as it were,
She bites the one who stamps on her.

The Ganges of Sweat knows no pause.
She flows onward in sheer abandon.
She flows behind those ploughs in the fields;
she flows beside the machines in the mills,
flows through the mines, and behind the swords,
effacing stamps and effacing titles.

The Ganges of Sweat knows no pause.
She levels the hills; fills up the pits;
makes even all that lies around.
she changes her course from age to age
and thus fulfills the Universal will:
brings down to dust the tyrant's throne.

The Ganges of Sweat knows no pause.
Her mud is red; her water is black.
Singing the songs of revolution,
she explores the ultimate ocean
of unity, of freedom, of a new millennium,
with multiple mouths in multiple ways.

Brazilians

I have made friends with Brazilians. They have happiness technology. This is important for songwriting as there are many reasons to be depressed and they make for crappy songs. Brazilian artists for the most part have respected the division between the poet, musician, and singer, which has led to a very rich tradition. I first started listening to Brazilian music when I was in my early 30's. I had tinnitus so perhaps I was subconsciously attracted to softer sounds. I don't make Brazilian music. I'm not a wannabe, but I am constantly amazed by the culture's rich output.

I befriended a circle of people through Suely Mesquita, an interesting writer with whom I've worked with in several roles. Now, I'm the Brazilian Songwriter Embassy in the Bronx.

Bethi Albano visited me last week. It felt like a 4-day conversation that never flagged. She's a great composer and will finally be releasing an album of her own next year.

"Collaboration lies at the heart of creativity," says Milton Nascimento. Yup.