Big city, small world. March 26, 2008

Yesterday I received this e-mail from my friend Abby:

“I’m sitting at McNally-Robinson yesterday after work. It’s a beautiful bookstore in Soho, with a really stellar collection of all the books I’ve ever wanted to read (and let’s be honest, the sort of place I’d love to see one of my books on display one day). I’m sitting in the cafe section with one of my best friends, Kate, who is visiting from Montreal, and we are updating each other on all the happenings in our lives. I’m going on and on about this one particular man who has managed to insert himself back in my life. This man (who I told Michael the then-latest happenings on on Sunday) has been in my life for 8 years and still doesn’t know what he wants. Needless to say, it’s exhausting and depressing and I’m getting ridiculously close to my breaking point–which is the point at which he panics and shows up again.

Anyway, this is not the point of my story. The point of my story is that I am going on about this man, and Kate is doing a good job of calming me down and advising me. Then Kate’s phone rings and she starts to talk on it, and a woman sitting next to us says, “I’m so sorry, but I’ve been eavesdropping on your conversation, and I just want to say I just went through the same thing with someone, and it took 3 years for it all to end.” I do the polite thing of acknowledging her without getting involved, until she says, “I found this amazing song that’s really helped me through it.” I’m like, oh, God, this woman is crazy and is going to hand me some weird thing I would never listen to. She says, “It’s this song calmed ‘Take Your Time’ that I just discovered and it has really helped me and that I’ve really connected to.” So, not thinking anything, I say, “Oh really? By who?” She says, “Her name is Jamie Leonhart.”

I just start smiling, and tell her I know you, and I love that song, too, and ask how she knows of it–like, does she know you? And she says, no, that she gets Joe’s Pub’s emails and usually ignores them, but had, for some reason, listened to the one with your music on it and had really connected to it.”

Wow, huh?

Obsessive musing #2: Me and the cover of Psychology Today March 15, 2008

Full disclosure: Michael and I have a rule. We allow ourselves to buy “crappy” magazines (go ahead and judge) when we travel — train, airplane, bus, camel, etc. — we get an Us or Star magazine and ogle the disorders of the stars. Why? Maybe it’s a nice break from reality. Maybe it’s a “fashion dos and don’ts” fix. Maybe it’s just frivolous idiocy. Whatever.

So last Friday I was at Penn Station with 30 minutes to kill before boarding a train. I walked over to the Hudson News to get my “fix” when I espied the cover of Psychology Today. Three out of the four cover articles (not dentists surveyed) called out my name: A+ or Bust: How Perfectionism Undermines Success, The Obsessive’s Revenge: Making Quirks Work, Desperate Love: When Neediness Strikes (this one because I run for the hills at the scent of it…) I broke the cycle and bought this magazine and was not disappointed.

A few things I learned:

1. Dreams unfold at close to real-life speed. They seem so long, perhaps, because your brain constructs a fictional backstory to provide context – false memories, basically – and later you assume that this story, too, played out in the span of the dream. (Excerpted from the article “Time Flies” by Matthew Hutson)

2. Lexicographer Erin McKean, who is the chief consulting editor of American Dictionaries, hates the word “irregardless.”

3. According to Miriam Adderholdt, author of Perfectionism: What’s Bad About Being Too Good?, excellence involves enjoying what you’re doing, feeling good about what you’ve learned, and developing confidence. Perfection involves feeling bad about a 98 (remember those?) and always finding mistakes no matter how well you’re doing. The article goes on to state that “the truly subversive aspect of perfectionism is that it leads people to conceal their mistakes.”

Gee, I wish I read this article, oh, 20 years ago. That would have been helpful. However, the next article, about using OCPD to your advantage was heartening:

Check this out: “Obsessions and compulsions drove the English language’s three most famous lexicographers – Samuel Johnson, Noah Webster and Peter Roget. Roget, a British doctor who completed his legendary Thesaurus at the age of 73, began compiling copious word lists when he was just 8. Much later, he organized his whole life into a list, dubbing his autobiography List of Principal Events.“

Maybe that’s why I’m blogging…

xx

Obsessive musing #1 March 5, 2008

I’ve been having this ongoing conversation with my brother about “the reluctant artist” syndrome (I’ve named it that – he knows nothing of the title I’ve given it.) This discussion began many years ago when he had left his job as A&R for a major label (remember when there were more than you can count on one hand?) and had started his own Indie label, with the dream of working in partnership with the artists. Making decisions together, letting the artist have their own voice when it came to choosing outreach for advertising, placement, etc…everything that a Major machine was doing without the artist’s input or consent (necessarily.)

Much to his surprise and chagrin, some of the artists he had signed to his label didn’t want this, although they had cried war against the Majors who hadn’t given them any room for creative or business input or control.

I, as an independent artist, began with the argument you can imagine: do I even have to write it? The Reader’s Digest version…The artist’s first/main goal is to create the music/art/etc. — striving to be authentic and prolific and interesting and interested. Then booking shows and building a fanbase while playing (hopefully) good shows. While carefully cultivating an image (but not too polished, of course.) Not to mention the care for/of the rest of the band, whether they are your partners-in-crime or support machine. And then of course the cash that’s needed for some of the above. SO to add the responsibility of the business side of it is at a minimum daunting, at a maximum paralyzing and exhausting (without even doing any of it yet — just the thought is enough to set off an opossum-like reaction.)

After my ranting, cursing and general tantrum-ing, I came to the conclusion (you are with me, right?) that yes — although it is more work on top of the creative element, it is essential to be involved — if you’re working with a label or a team, or doing the work yourself if you’ve chosen to hit the (figurative) road alone — particularly today and moving forward in time. Yes, there is something seductive in someone else with the job to simply make these decisions for you, and VOILA, shit is done, but what if it wasn’t what you wanted? And are never asked? Your future (my future) hinging solely on someone else’s decisions? No thank you.

So, then. To take action is a good thing. Jesse, I’ve come to your side. See?

To be active is a good thing.

What isn’t good?

Today, I’ll write about one of my pet peeves (and I hate that phrase too.)

Misuse of language, four examples that have been on my mind:

• Most people’s use of the word “proverbial”
• “intensive purposes”
• “me, personally”
• I overheard this one in a store today, spoken by a woman who had located a pair of pants: “These ones?”

What are your favorites? There are many websites dedicated to this topic, but it’s fun to hear what makes YOU cringe.

Enough for today.