Artifice vs Substance vs Me

Well, I guess that's kind of a heady title for my first blog of 2013, but what the heck.  I'm a heady sorta guy!  Except not really!  Mostly I'm a middlebrow guy (at best) who just happens to like what he happens to like.

But what I've noticed in the last few months, as I've been going to a lot more live theater than I ever have before in my life, is how much I actually *like* artifice,  when done right, when done in a way that feels like it actually elevates the content,  or comments on the content in a cool way. That is, I think I'm okay with artists who kinda like to show the strings and ropes, who signal their intentions, who are consciously aware, and make us consciously aware that we are watching/listening to "art" as opposed to "real life." 

I just started reading David Byrne's new book How Music Works, and he talks about this a lot. About how, as he grew confident as a performer with Talking Heads, he started incorporating elements of Kabuki theater, etc, into his staging of the Talking Heads live shows, having the lighting and staging actually contribute to the mood and feel of each individual song, rather than just being a "live rock and roll show."  He mentions that not everyone, even amongst the performers, felt equally at home with the idea, that others felt he was sacrificing the spontaneity of rock for a more formal artifice. Byrne, while acknowledging the artifice, does assert, though, that the structure does not have to be mutually exclusive with spirit and emotion, and on this I totally agree.

In fact, the Stop Making Sense tour, around which this discussion takes place, remains to this day my favorite concert experience of all time, in part because the "show" that he presented so elevated the music to me, giving the songs even more weight to them than I'd previously felt. In addition, the entire cadence of the show,  from Byrne walking out on an empty stage, with an acoustic guitar and a boombox, to play "Psycho Killer" solo, to the end, when the entire extended band is joyfully grooving to the afro-funk rhythms of their later stuff, tells a story - the story of this band - in a way I'd never experienced before or since.

 I remember when I saw the show, even at the time, that I was aware how cool it was that Byrne had figured out a way to expand their sound and vision to encompass their ever-expanding audience. When I first saw them, in 1979 at Zellerbach Hall for the "Fear of Music" tour, it was just these four geeky, awkward musicians, playing absolutely intense (and great) music, but with zero flash whatsoever.  Anti-flash was really their thing, as it was for many (most) in the early days of punk/new wave. No rock star poses. No machismo bullshit. No elevating themselves above their audience.  And it was awesome.  Especially for uncool nerds like me, who finally had someone to identify with on stage. But as Talking Heads became surprisingly popular (or maybe not so surprising - given their immense talent, brains, and embracing of catchy pop melody), it was clear - even to a mere fan like me - that their original stage presence/persona was not going to translate to a bigger space too well. I actually worried about it.  "Are their new fans going to think they're boring live?"   And what I discovered at the Stop Making Sense shows (I went two nights in a row) was that Byrne, of course, had figured this out way ahead of me. He thought about the larger spaces the band was going to have to fill, and how, to reach those back rows, he was going to have to think differently, not just sonically but visually as well.  When you're in a small club or hall, the individual intensity of the performers is enough. But in a large space, especially from a distance both the band members themselves and the sound can become lost.  Byrne figured this out and took it as a creative challenge and embraced it wholeheartedly, and said, in the end, it filled him with immense satisfaction.

Reading about this stuff, just in the last couple days, was kind of a weird coincidence, since this topic had already been at the top of my mind after my last two experiences at the Berkeley Rep,  seeing "An Iliad" and "The White Snake."  In structure and format, these two plays couldn't be more dissimilar.  One is a one-man show, on a completely bare stage, in which the actor acts/recites/performs The Iliad -  a monstrously brilliant performance that only seems implausible until you remember that that's how The Iliad was presented/performed in the first place, back in Homer's day.  It was oral storytelling, and yet--it was also completely modern, in the way the actor shifted back-and-forth from "classic" text to modern vernacular -- but in a seamless way that didn't feel forced or gimmicky, even as it drew attention to its own artifice. The actor himself was playing a character.  He was a storyteller, THE storyteller, who'd been telling this same story for god knows how long, weary of doing it,  horrified by some of the stories themselves he'd have to tell, tired of praising some of the "heroes",  rebelling against his own job of having to do this.  In doing this, he made the audience - us- characters, too. That is, the performance specifically drew attention to the fact that we were sitting there, that the only reason he was there was because we were there.  We were the ones who were demanding that he do this, one more time. We were the witnesses to his own breakdown.  As with Byrne's songs, all of this artifice only served to make the stories that much richer -darker and more "real."  It was an emotionally overwhelming experience.

"The White Snake,"  on the other hand, was a gloriously rich and vibrant spectacle, full of wondrous staging, color, and light. It reveled in its own staginess.  And, in fact, the staginess, in this case, did kind of overwhelm the story,  for much of the time anyway....except that it was so brilliant that it was hard to just not sit back and marvel at it all.  Drawing from ancient Chinese folktales,  the play told not JUST the story of the white snake (who assumes the persona of a woman, joins the human realm, and wreaks havoc everywhere), but ALL the stories of the white snake, in all its permutations, as it morphed over the past few centuries.  That is, at times the narrative would almost literally stop dead,  as a character (a "narrator") would come on stage to inform us that "at this point the story  goes in many different directions - we'll go this way" - though in a few places they ALSO give us glimpses of those other paths the story might have taken.  In other points of the production, the actors freeze in place, as the narrator returns to brief us, before the actor unfreezes, on how the scene to come is representative of certain Chinese theatrical stereotypes.  It may seem a bit precious and clever for its own good - except for the fact that in so doing, it acknowledges us as a modern audience,  as people who might otherwise be skeptical or impatient, to tell us WHY we're seeing what we're seeing, as we see it.  Again, the artifice comments on the content.  And, for me, at least, adds a depth to it I might have otherwise not felt.  When, in the play's epilogue, the artifice is dropped almost entirely and the characters are allowed to shine simply as themselves,  it's a moment of near transcendence - the veil lifted to expose the humanity behind the spectacle.

As I think about my own writing - as well as the writers I love - I know that I too enjoy artifice over "realism." In my case, as someone who's still, in the end,  a total amateur and wannabee,  I worry at times that the artifice is a crutch, rather than a tool to get to the truth.  It's being clever for the sake of being clever.  Which, ya know, can be okay, in small doses. But may not be where I'm trying to get to. My first NaNoWriMo book, "The Cudgel of Xanthor," which I honestly hope you can read someday,  was all artifice: It was a dual story.  The story of an incompetent team making a videogame,  along with the story within the videogame itself, in which the reality of the game's main character, Xanthor, kept changing as the game's development kept spiraling further into chaos.  Basically, it was a mildly clever one-joke conceit masquerading as a story.   My second NaNoWriMo attempt, from this past November, I did not finish, but again it was all structure and not much else:  I was trying to write a book in 30 days about a guy trying to write a book in 30 days.  Parts of it were funny, but I ultimately gave up because I realized that all I was really doing was trying to be clever, rather than, ya know, having anything to say.  As it turns out, another story kept beating its way into this one,  which was about my experiences growing up as a teen in LA in the 1970s. It had nothing whatsoever to do with what I was writing, and yet I found myself drifting to it as I was trying to write my clever sentences.  So, at some point, I gave up THAT book entirely, bored with myself, and started jotting down my memories instead - first in the third person, then in the second (!), and then finally, when I felt ready to drop all pretense, in the first.

 I don't know really where I'm going with it, if anywhere, but I think I realized something in the process of doing this:  I've been using artifice to avoid being honest, to avoid exposing emotion. In the works I praised above, the opposite was true.  The artifice exposed and informed and ultimately deepened the artistic achievement.  That's what I'd like to do.  I have no clue whether I have either the talent, ambition, or drive to do any of this. Maybe I'll just keep wiling away the years playing videogames, listening to music, seeing movies etc--- enjoying OTHER people's artistic achievements.  Hey, it makes me happy.  But something tells me I'm not done yet.  I've got something in there to get out.  The key now, at age 51, is for me to let go. To stop messing around with "clever" and  go for something much more humble, yet something far, far harder:  Truth.

GFW Radio Rap - The Lost Verses (2008)

It may not be widely known, and has certainly not been reported on noted websites such as Wikipedia, that the original "CGW Rap" that I "banged out" on our final podcast in 2008 was really only the first verse of a larger composition I had been writing for weeks, in preparation for the full-length rap album I had planned on recording if Dr. Dre would ever return my calls like even once.

Lost and forgotten for generations, these just discovered verses, which I found when sorting through some Word files on a pile of 3.5-inch floppy "disquettes," represent the complete song as originally composed.

A true find for any completist.

"GFW Radio Rap"

GFW Radio
Listen to our podcast
Yo yo

We play PC games
Because we like 'em
If we have a good guest
We fuckin' mic him

GFW Radio
Listen to our podcast
Or go blow

We do five-page interviews
With Sid Meiers
If our intern is a dick
We fuckin' fire him

GFW Radio
Listen to our podcast
YOLO

If it's turn-based gaming
You know we like it
If it's just a console port
Go take a hike, yeah?

GFW Radio
Listen to our podcast
Yo Yo
GFW Radio
Listen to our podcast
Ok we out yo



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

The Kid Who Doesn't Give A Shit

Here's a short story.

The Kid Who Doesn't Give A Shit
By Jeff Green

Johnny Johnson just doesn't give a shit. He so doesn't give a shit, that he doesn't even give a shit that he doesn't give a shit. That's how badass he is. And he is fucking 5 years old. Does that bother you? Guess what? Johnny Johnson doesn't give a shit. See?

That's why all the adults in town love Johnny Johnson. Even the parents of the kids who Johnny Johnson beats up. They are glad, if you want to be completely honest about it. That's right, they say. Kick my kid's ass, Johnny Johnson. We trust you. He must deserve it, if you're doing it.

And Johnny Johnson just glares at the parents. For like a whole minute. Man, he finally says. You think I give a shit? And he shakes his head and walks right out of the goddamn room without saying another thing or looking back or anything. Like a goddamn glorious gladiator.

Man. That kid sure is cool one dad says.

He sure goddamn is says another.

Fist bump.

Totally.

Boom.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

A Dream from 2005

I have tried, at various attempts in my life, to keep a journal. It never works out. Mostly I just don't have the kind of discipline to keep it up. I have started and stopped numerous times, and usually I start with a great amount of diligence and enthusiasm, but, eventually, it just peters out. 


In any case, I found an old notebook this morning while looking for my keys (which I have still not found), and came across an entry from 2005.  I had just woken up and written down the dream I had just had. I am going to transcribe that journal entry in its entirety her, with no edits or changes whatsover.  I have no recollection of ever having written this. It's like a found a stranger's journal.

Dec 30, 2005
Okay, so how's this for a dream? I am supposed to go to the Neil Young concert with Annie. We are walking there. Along the way of whatever crowded urban street we are on, I fall way behind. I am too tired. I stop to sleep. So there I am sleeping right on the sidewalk, with some kind of a musty old blanket - and then all of a sudden I resemble and am mistaken by some as a street person. Various people look at me as they walk by and I am approached by a few questionable-looking guys as a kindred spirit, or maybe somebody they can easily rob.

But I somehow rally myself back up, get a couple anxious text messages from Annie letting me know that Bob Dylan has already finished playing, that Neil Young has begun, and where am I?

I am on my way. Somehow I end up in a long line with Dave Salvator [Ed note: a fellow former editor at CGW magazine], and he and I shuffle into the stadium.  Our seats are a mile away. One of us says, "Well these sure are nosebleed seats." I sit down next to Dave and someone else says the seats aren't so bad. I look again and somehow Neil Young and the two female singers look very close indeed.

They are playing a little bit when all of a sudden Sammy Davis Jr. walks out onto the field and we all laugh at the absurdity of it until he starts singing and his deep baritone sounds great as he belts out some kind of Americana song of Neil's.

Then we are all on a train and the train begins to roll forward, looping around the coliseum as if it were suddenly part of a Disneyland ride and this was a scheduled part of the show. We are all happy and excited. Sammy is still singing to us as the train makes its slow loop.

Then, in the train car from the rear, Tom Waits suddenly appears, scruffy, in a flannel shirt, singing to us as he makes his way down the aisles, looking at each of us like the conductor asking us for our tickets. He stops at each person and says something nice or witty, giving them a moment of his attention, this famous star.

And when he gets to Dave and I, he looks for a second, giving me somewhat of a blank look, like, what could I do for this guy? And he reaches into a bag and hands each of us a box of Jujubees, and it seems like the most perfect, generous gift. But I am still desperate to make an impression with him, so in response to some question of his, I respond with an unexpectedly witty answer that genuinely makes him laugh, that I am proud of, and that he is going to remember and share with others and possibly means we may even be friends now. And that's when I woke up.

Tom Waits gave me a box of Jujubees. I don't even like Jujubees. What does your brain go through to come up with stuff like this?

That's the end of my dream.  I think I need to start keeping a journal again.
--Jeff

The Depression Post.

I've been taking medication to battle clinical depression for 25 years now.  I've written that sentence first mostly to get it out of the way, but also because it's taken me 25 years to write it. Talk about procrastination.  The problem with suffering from depression (well, one of them anyway) is that it's often the condition itself that prevents one from talking about the condition. (The first rule of Depression Club is: Don't talk about depression.) It is, at times, like walking around with a giant anvil over your head, ready to pound you into submission at any random moment, ready to take you down 20 pegs until you're just a sniveling puddle of goo utterly convinced of your own inherent worthlessness. It is, in short, a handicap. A debilitating one, and a real one.

The other, maybe bigger problem is that depression is still, if no longer a taboo subject, one that is largely misunderstood,  and still somewhat embarrassing to admit.  And it's why there are so many cases in which you don't find out that someone "suffers from depression" sometimes ever, or sometimes not until after they're gone.  But I'm kind of tired, at age 50, of not talking about it, not even once, so I figure there's no better time than now, on the 4th of July, to talk about it. Consider it my Independence Day from my own shame around it.

So here's the main thing to know: I am not sad. Really.  I don't need anyone to send me teddy bears or hugs, though of course both would be awesome and I wouldn't return them. Cash, too, would be great, preferably in small, unmarked bills.  I have a great life: A great family, a great job, great friends.  If this isn't entirely the life I envisioned for myself as a boy (I'd always wanted to be an English gravedigger), it is one that I feel pretty good about and won't complain about.  Suffering from depression doesn't translate to the more casual use of "I'm depressed!" in the way you might say after, say, you've just eaten two Snicker bars in a row, or after discovering that Bristol Palin has her own reality TV show.  It's not like that.  Most of the time, most days, I'm just like everyone else: Plugging along,  trying to avoid thoughts of my own mortality, and trying to squeeze the maximum amount out of fun and pleasure into days annoyingly riddled with real-world responsibility.

What it does do, though, especially on days when, for whatever reason, the meds aren't working well, or (worse) I either forget to take them or (way worse) convince myself I "don't need them anymore," is remove the floor from underneath my feet.  Not literally, of course, because that would be rather disturbing and surreal and make me a walking public health hazard.  But figuratively, it puts me off balance, quite often in a way I don't fully feel or see or understand until it's already kicked in in a bad way.  Those few who are close to me who have known about my depression usually see it before I do. "You haven't taken your meds, have you?"  they'll say--because the things I'm saying and my worldview and my energy level become different, different in ways I have no control over or no awareness around in the early stages.

The biggest bummer around it all, for me, is that even when I am being good, the pills don't eliminate it entirely. It's not an on/off switch.  Shit seeps through.  And the toll of this has affected every aspect of my life for decades.  I have days where I can't write anything, decide anything,  or really be much of an effective human being at all because of it.  It's screwed up my ability to be a good friend, to focus, to be productive. It's kept me, at times, in a fog of self-doubt and self-hate, of low energy, of recrimination and regret over things not accomplished or things never even attempted.  It's kept me in a perpetual state of wishing I could do things over again, of feeling like "I've failed" no matter what I accomplish or how many total strangers come up to me and say they like what I've done.  I register it, I appreciate it (more than I can express), but it never fully overcomes my own internal dialog, so much of which is just a loud, mean, clattering cloud of noise that a few little pills do their best to dispel day after day. (And not just pills, either, I should say. They're not magic. They are supplemented by a steady, weekly decades-long stream of therapy, to talk the stuff out and get it out of my head.)

I should be clear about one thing. None of this is being written today to either elicit pity or to excuse myself from any choices or actions I've made in life.  It's all on me. Always.  It's like when people try to excuse their behavior because "they were drunk"--when of course part of them is always conscious.  Any stupid or irresponsible thing I'm doing, or avoiding, is done with at least a chunk of awareness that I am doing (or not doing) that thing. The problem is that, even while seeing it, I can't grasp it by the horns and cut it out.  This is the key issue.  I see it, I'm aware of it, and yet I can't do anything about it.  What the medication does,  when it's really working,  is just eliminate that aspect of it. It puts the floor back under my feet.  It makes me have what I imagine to be the strength and resolve of "normal" people.  I can act and respond and simply tell myself to keep going. To just write that email or call that person or finish that article rather than just sit in the chair for an hour and tell myself what a shitty, worthless person I am.

It's exhausting.  I get tired of being me. It's so much noise all the time. I think about what I might have accomplished, or what my life might have been, if I didn't have to deal with this.  But one thing I'm trying to come to grips with at age 50 - because if not now, when, dude? - is that fighting it is just a fool's game, and maybe a little bit of a cruel thing to do to myself.  I mean, I'm never going to stop being hard on myself, ever, and I think a lot of that - depression aside - is good for a person. I want to constantly challenge myself and be better. So I'm not asking for a free ride for myself.  What I think I am asking for is the ability to forgive myself for "only" being the person I am today, for "only" having the level of success (whatever that is) that I have - rather than some mythical, theoretical success I imagine some Alternative Jeff from Earth 2 to have.  I guess, in a way, I'm asking myself not to "be depressed" over having depression.  I'm stuck with it, and so my decision now is to accept and acknowledge it, rather than fight it and hide it and beat myself up about it, which is a guaranteed loser of a strategy.

Anyway, I hope I didn't depress you with this blog post. Though if I did, I might have a couple pills to recommend. Just kidding.  It doesn't work that way.  What I think I mainly want to say, and my bigger reason for writing this, is that if you are younger than me, or, heck, even older than me (if that's possible), and any of this sounds familiar or resonates,  know that you are not alone, that it is probably more common than you think, and that there are solutions. There are ways to regulate it and control it.  You too can go on to have a family, a home and a degree of success you might not think possible within the turmoil of your own noisy brain, as long as you're not afraid to acknowledge the problem and do something about it. I encourage you, strongly, to not give up, and not be afraid to seek help if you think you need it. Odds are you do, and odds are there are people, both personal and professional, ready right there to help you, if only you'll reach out.  That itself is probably the hardest step you'll ever take.  But it will be the most important one, too.

Okay. That's enough New Agey self-revelation and self-help for one 4th of July, don't you think? I have a couple teeny little pills to swallow, and then after that I'm going to go out and have a kickass holiday with my friends and family.   Here's hoping you have a great day - and life - too.

Remember that you deserve it.

--Jeff

Mortal thoughts

This past 6 months marked two significant milestones in my life: I turned 50, and my daughter turned 18. Even typing these sentences now results in a certain cognitive dissonance, or, to speak more plainly--a quiet little freakout.

I've mentioned this before, but I always remember reading an interview with Bruce Willis, as he became an "aging" action star, and he made a comment something along the lines of "In our minds, no matter how old we get, we always think of ourselves as 27." It's such a great quote. If you're younger than that, you can't possibly understand now. But when you get to be a half-century like me, you will. Though our bodies and metabolisms change - inevitably and unfortunately for the worse - our minds really never do. I'm just the same Jeff Green I was when I was in my 20s, in my own head. I still love music, games, books, movies with an insatiable passion. I'm still easily distracted, absent-minded, and lazy. I still love dogs more than people. I still love pizza and Snicker bars and nacho cheese Doritos. I still distrust all authority, and bristle with a natural instinct to rebel whenever it rears its head.

So this is how I feel, inside myself. I feel like that same guy. (Not emotionally, though--thank god. But that is a post for another day.) The problem is that on the outside, to other people, I'm a 50-year-old man. I don't mean this is a problem for all those other people, because, um, yeah, that's what I am. They are right. I am a 50-year-old man. The problem is that my own perception of what a 50-year-old man is supposed to be does not jibe with my own self-image. Call it reality distortion. Call it self-delusion. Call it - as many people have said of me - a refusal to grow up. Not gonna deny it. Because I honestly don't even know what that means. If there was supposed to be a switch that flipped, in which I suddenly feel like attending cocktail parties, discussing my stocks, listening to adult contemporary radio, and harrumphing about how much better things were when I was a boy, well, then I short-circuited somehow. All that stuff feels like it's still 30 years away for me. At least.

I'm giving superficial examples, I know. And in terms of basic responsibility of adulthood, I do like to think of myself as at least somewhat of a grownup. I've held a full-time job steadily, and with increasing responsibility, ever since graduating college. I'm a husband and father. I try to do my best at all three of those things every day. The mistakes and failure on all those fronts are constant, as they are with anyone who isn't kidding themselves, but I do like to think of myself as hanging in there and trying and learning, as best as I can.

What I really mean, I guess, is the weird dissonance I feel when I sense the way people - especially people I'm just meeting, strangers, random encounters - are looking at me or treating me. When, for instance, did I become "sir?" When did I become "the old man of gaming?" When - and boy, this is a tough one - did I switch from being someone that at least the occasional woman - if they were desperate and perhaps a bit nearsighted - might have found somewhat marginally appealing to, instead, someone who reminds them of their father? I know I look like a middle-aged man. I know I am a middle-aged man. I just don't feel like a middle-aged man. And I guess part of me doesn't want to be one, wants to rewind the clock, wants to have a second-chance to do it all over again, but better and smarter and more successfully. I'm simply unable to parse or accept that so much time has slipped away, that over half my life is over, and that what I am in now is an undeniable, unpreventable period of decline. (And, boy, that sure makes me unique, huh!)

Of course, one doesn't simply give up. One doesn't just say "it's over" and go sit on the rocking chair until death. I have so much I want to do and accomplish and see and experience that I'd need multiple lifetimes to get through it all. (At the very least, I really need to catch up on Dr. Who.) And I think that's the hardest part of all of this, the crux of the matter of these milestones in my life. For the first time, I've been seriously confronted, in a real and palpable way, with my own mortality, with the harsh reality that I am just not going to get to it all, and that if I really want to actually reach some of these goals, well, I better hurry the hell up.

So I'm going to get right to it. Right after this nap.

A Fan's Notes

I am not a musician. I am not a musician now, nor have I ever been one, despite having played the trumpet for 10 years and the bass for about 5 years. It's one of the great frustrations/regrets of my entire existence. Because if I could be anything in life, that's what I'd be. Honestly. I'd give up any relative "success" I've achieved in life if I could master an instrument and be part of a band (or orchestra) and contribute in a meaningful way to the creation of music. Instead, I must be content (and I am, happily!) with watching and listening from the sidelines--a perpetual fan. An obsessive listener and collector. An outsider.

My love of music has always been with me. At least partial credit goes to my dad, who instilled a love of early jazz (starting with Fats Waller) in me early on. But, like any teen, I gravitated towards rock on my own, falling in deep starting at around age 14 and never emerging, only expanding. I don't think a month has gone by in over 35 years when I have not bought new music. Probably not even two weeks. The advent of the Internet of course has made it that much worse (or better), and more dangerous (and easier). My interests are all over the map. For the past few months I've been heavily obsessed with New Orleans R&B and jazz. I started with current stuff--Trombone Shorty and Galactic--and have been working my way back in time and falling even more in love. My most recent purchases were a Fats Domino collection, and this glorious box set. Allen Touissant is playing on my laptop right now as I type this.

When I was a miserable, unhappy teen in the San Fernando Valley, and then a miserable, unhappy college kid at Berkeley, music was my refuge and my salvation. That'll be corny to some, but that's okay. Because I know it's true. Music is what got me through. I clung onto the inspirational music of guys like Bruce Springsteen, as well as the nerdy empowerment of Elvis Costello and other "punks" at the time. These days, at age 50, I don't need to self-identify through a musician or anyone else, which I guess we can call progress. But I do still get ALL my inspiration to create, through words or otherwise, from the music I love. Many of my old Greenspeak columns for Computer Gaming World magazine back in the day were written either to the accompaniment of the Beastie Boys, or were at least preceded by a listen to them---because their snarky, immature intelligence was exactly the tone I was going for. When I couldn't handle actually listening to lyrics while writing those columns, I'd switch to Thelonious Monk--another musician who so brilliantly infused his work with humor.

In ten years of playing the trumpet -- from age 7 to 17 -- the best I ever got was that I had a decent, steady tone and could read music well. I could execute. That was good enough to place high in the chair seatings in the school orchestra, and to serve as lead trumpet in the jazz band--but it wasn't the same as being a musician. In the jazz band, it was the second trumpet who did all the solos. I might have carried the melody, but I couldn't improvise for shit. I had no vision or point-of-view, nor the technical skills or knowledge or understanding of music theory to even take a stab at "academic" improvisation. I could play what was in front of me, and play it well, but that's it. And I was jealous as heck (and still am) at anyone who could.

Years later, around age 25, when my friends were forming a punk band, they asked if I'd like to play bass. I had never previously touched a bass. In true punk rock spirit, I of course said yes. It didn't hurt that, growing up, I'd always gravitated to the bass anyway. I was one of those guys who would forget to listen to (or even realize that there was) a guitar solo, because I was grooving on the bass line. I still do that. And because I was already aware of my lack of inspiration and imagination, the bass, as rhythm keeper, appealed to me. I could play away, keeping the beat, letting others do their thing, while still feel like I was contributing. So I did that. I did it for years, as the bass player for "The Uncalled Four." We played a lot of gigs in the Bay Area. The two songwriters were actually damn good. I liked the songs they wrote, a lot, and loved playing their songs. We made one record (a vinyl EP), called "Oakland's Newest Hitmakers," in which we paid homage to the first Who record on the back cover and a Gang of Four record on the front cover. I listened to it again recently, after not hearing it for well over a decade, and it sounded pretty good. Their songwriting holds up.

I had moments as The Uncalled Four bass player that I was proud of. Never on stage though, where I was all frozen nerves, just repeating the same bass line over and over until the song ended. I never found my comfort up there, mostly because I always felt like a poser. A fake bass player who didn't know what he was doing. But there *were* times, when we were practicing and learning new songs, when I would try to go deep within the song, and myself, and find a creative bass line, beyond the rudimentary obvious ones. I didn't usually succeed, but at least a couple times I did. I found a line that came straight from my own head and heart that made the song better. But it was work, and didn't come naturally to me at all. And then once I'd come up with the line, all I could ever do was repeat it, note for note. I had no ability to deviate, to experiment, to play. Whatever that is, I don't have it.

And hey, I'm okay with it. The truth is, I get so much pleasure out of listening to music, that it's enough for me. It's more than enough. It's one of my life's great passions. The best live concerts I've ever been to (Van Morrison in 1987, Talking Heads in 1980, Nusrat Fateh Ali Kahn in the 90s, Springsteen numerous times--just to name a few) have been transcendent, near-religious experiences for me, making me love and appreciate the simple act of being alive.

But I never stop having this kind of dream, in the middle of the night, deep in slumber: I'm on stage with a band (usually jazz). We're all jamming on a song. It's my turn to step up. I adjust the mouthpiece, settle my hands and fingers on the horn, and then let loose with heart, humor, and skill. flowing in and out of the song's melody and the band's backup, telling a story, or a joke, or a tale of heartbreak or redemption, through pure sound. I'm feeling it, the band is feeling it, the audience is feeling it. I'm part of a moment beyond words.

Is that the dream of every writer?