I always wondered how Michael Jackson was going to live with all he had done. Now I know.

I never wanted to be like Michael Jackson, even before he was accused of child molestation. I loved his music. Billie Jean, Bad, Smooth Criminal, Black or White, Jam, these and many others are some of the best pop songs that will ever be written. But there was always something off and very sad about Michael Jackson. His Neverland Ranch was not a home. His lack of a band or even constant real companions seemed evoked a deep loneliness. And where were the babes? I mean that with utter seriousness. Where were the stunning blonds and brunettes? Michael Jackson was a young, rich, successful pop star and he didn't have a girlfriend? Or a boyfriend? He was ALONE?

He was.

And then he started in on the plastic surgery in earnest and something became painfully clear: I wasn't the only one who didn't want to be like Michael Jackson. And as he continued to transform himself into, well, I'm not sure what and I don't think he was either, I wondered how on earth he would be able to live with what he was doing to himself. How could he wake up in the morning after another round of plastic surgery and be glad for it? More important, how was he going to grow old? What would happen to the implants, reshaped bones, and stretched, bleached skin? (Speaking of the skin, I once met a person who had actually spent a day with Michael Jackson and he said MJ's skin looked like suede.) And then came the rumours of child molestation, which I, sadly, believed and still believe. How could he carry on amidst all this?

Now I have my answer. In my opinion, Michael Jackson wanted to die. Whether he commited suicide or not, I will never know for sure, but I am positive he wished to be dead -- and remembered.

Michael Jackson, I will remember you, the good and the bad, but I am glad you are dead. Watching you live was a horror show, and I would only wish your life on my absolute worst enemies. It pains me to say that, it does, but I think you would agree. For yours was a life no one could live with.

RIP, Michael Jackson.

Diary of a mad[ison] man, part II of III.

Last Tuesday, I finally returned home after a week in Madison, punctuated by a brief trip up to Minnesota, thoughts on which will become part three of my Madison Trilogy.

On Monday, June 8, I woke up in a hopeful mood, doused my brain in a bit of Doubletree coffee (stuff’s not bad), and headed out the door to make the 20 minute trek to see Yuri Danilov, Ph.D., the neurology expert I first met in 2007 who, along with his colleague, Mitch Tyler, has been helping me recover from my brain injury every since.

Yuri’s building is not a very uplifting place to look at (see photo). But inside, magic happens. Yuri is at the cutting edge of brain research and is developing revolutionary approaches to help people like me, who have suffered a TBI, as well as people with other types of problems, including MS, vestibular deficiencies, and mood disorders. You can read more about Yuri’s research in an earlier post of mine, plus you can visit his University of Madison, Wisconsin, web site.

As I entered Yuri’s offices, I figured he would greet me with a big hello and smile. Mitch did, but, well, Yuri’s a former Russian military commander and small talk isn’t his thing. He shook my hand, said hello, and immediately set to observing me. He did not like what he saw. A talk ensued, and I discovered that I had been, in essence, doing it all wrong. Story of my life. Sigh.

Briefly, the therapy Yuri -- along with Mitch -- has provided for me is based on brain stimulation via an electrode placed on the tongue (read more here). But a key component of Yuri’s approach is meditation, and I had not been meditating in the right way for my condition. Also, there are a series of physical exercises I needed to be doing, but had not been, quite simply because I didn't realize how important they were.

Why was my meditative technique wrong? Lots of reasons. Argh. Mainly, though, I was meditating outside of myself (I visualized myself playing guitar) instead of inside of myself. Sounds hippie/new age/crystal power/Berkeley I know, but the rationale for me to be inside of myself as I meditate is solid. One of the main symptoms of my accident remains a constant feeling of light-headedness, like I have stood up too fast. And to combat this feeling, I need to do everything I can to fill myself with feelings of stability, which, yes, means imagining myself to be a tree or something equally well rooted. My constant light-headedness has also caused a lot tension in my muscles (what remains of them), as I am always a little worried about falling. This too is a reason to meditate inside myself and concentrate on feelings that create relaxation and a sense of stability. Sure wish I could just take some drugs…

As for the exercises, they have to do with loosening the joints from head to toe to restore movement and, VERY IMPORTANT, they wake up the brain and make it receptive to the stimulation from my BrainPort device.
If I change the way I meditate and do the daily exercises (sadly, called Ageless Mobility, which makes me feel old and decrepit) – yes, I’m doing these things! – I should see gradual improvement in how I feel. Sure hope so.

Last but not least, there is no end to this road. I will have to do these exercises and meditation for the rest of my life, or risk slipping back into the dizzier, more depressed, far stiffer person I was a week and half ago. And how the hell am I going to be a world famous rock sensation in such a condition?

Diary of a mad[ison] man. My week of brain therapy in Wisconsin, part one of, well, I'm not sure how many parts.

All week I've been in the able hands of some heavy-hitter brain scientists at the University of Madison, Wisconsin. This is the third time in three years I've visited Madison to get my noggin nurtured and just like the other times, I feel the effects of the treatment, all of which are positive. I'll post more about the specifics of my treatment next week, but briefly, this trip has focused more on meditation and relaxation, since stress really does a number on me and causes my symptoms to flare up like Ahmadinejad does at the mere mention of the word Israel. (Quick aside: that guy is an ASSHOLE.)

Anyhoo...

As for Madison, what a town. My wife, Catherine, accompanied me for the first five days of my visit, and we had a grand time exploring restaurants, bars and other establishments, not to mention the shores of lake Mendota, which is graced with some fine old houses, albeit frat/sorority houses.

The best restaurant we found? The Tornado Steak House, hands down. Which is surprising, because from the outside the Tornado looks like a club that if you are unfortunate enough to enter will accost your senses with the smells of stale beer, stale cigarette smoke and stale people. It does not, mostly. Granted, you do indeed enter through a proper bar, where people are drinking and the lights are low, but then you pass through a tight, little maze and, voila, you are in the dining room, which, um, doesn't look much different from the bar. No, your first hint that you are about to have the meal of a lifetime is not given away by the place whatsoever. Only when the menu and wine list arrive do you start to get your hopes up. For on the menu is a bone-in tenderloin, a most-hard-to-find cut that combines the stuff-your-face eatability of a tenderloin with the flavor only a properly scorched, marrow filled animal bone can supply. Once you've recovered your senses after imagining your first bit of beef, you can look at the wine list, which presents you with fine Bordeaux, some of California's best, and a neat selection from some pretty decent also-ran regions (Oregon, Australia, South America). I ordered the bone-in tenderloin, while Catherine didn't and, well, therefore I only remember my meal. Oh, and the salads we started with were the best iceberg lettuce salads I'e ever had. The oysters were good, too. In Wisconsin, no less! For drink, I opted for a glass or two of pinot, while Catherine had cocktails, over which she raved.

And to think, we almost didn't go to the Tornado. Nope, that night Catherine was supposed to be winging her way back to SF, but United, perhaps the most reliable group of screw-ups on the planet, was delayed to the point where she would miss her connection in Denver, so she headed back to the hotel. Credit to Yelp for giving us the confidence to enter the Tornado! Okay, I know I've hardly written about my therapy at all -- the REAL purpose of my visit -- but I think it deserves a post all on its own, which I will do next week.

Stay tuned.

Noticing something new on an old path.

This week, as a go through another round of brain therapy at the University of Madison, I've been thinking about pathways. Specifically, brain pathways. How many brain paths are now closed forever inside my head? What new ones have opened? Could an old pathway be reopened? The answers to these questions will forever remain a mystery to me.

But what of the pathways outside of my head? What of the roads I walk down to get to therapy? The new roads I try when I'm not late and have time to explore? The other paths I take in my life, to run, to commute, to make music? These pathways will probably never be closed off forever to me. More important, they all have one thing in common: if I pay attention, they will reveal something new every time I venture down them.

Take yesterday, for example. I have walked the path from my hotel to where I receive therapy at least 20 times. There are maybe three routes max to choose from, and yet, yesterday, while walking along the route I have walked along more often than the others, I noticed something I had never really noticed before: a large bed of purple flowers. Then I noticed the bees. I got out my cameral and did my best to snap a close-up of a bee as it burrowed into a purple portal and dug out some life.

Earlier today, these thoughts of seeing something new on old paths were very much with me. And I asked myself, what path best exemplifies this idea of seeing something new where you have been before?

For me, it has to be the neck of a guitar.

I have been up and down guitar necks thousands and thousands of times, and yet, I still find stuff that's new. What I find these days is never fundamentally new, but rather, a slight twist on something I have played before. I think this is where the best songs come from. They are slight variations on something we all know well. Consider Bad Moon Rising by Creedence. I mean, it's a straight-up I V IV change, it's played on cowboy chords (D, A, G), and it's in 4/4 time, nothing new whatsoever, right? Even the sound is just drums, bass, guitars and voice. And yet, if you are like me, the first time you heard Bad Moon Rising it grabbed you and never let you go. 

My most sincere hope is that every song on my album is like Bad Moon Rising, both familiar and new, a path I've been down before but never quite like this. A tall order, to be sure, but as someone I once worked for used to say, "Go big or go home." Truer words have rarely been spoken.

Sometimes I wish I could simply hope my way to being better.

All week, I'm blogging from Madison, Wisconsin, where I am getting some much needed therapy from a team of neurology experts, to all of whom I owe eternal gratitude.

As I was walking back from my second brain therapy session, I passed by a church (in photo), and thought to myself how I wished I believed in God. 

I've been in a lot of churches, primarily in Europe, and I like the feeling you get on entering. A hushed calm held in cool air washes over you, every step you take, every move, is amplified by the stone walls and arched ceiling. Oh, to be someone who could kneel in the pews, pray and believe.

But that's not me.

Instead, I will work my way back to better, by rededicating myself to the brain therapy techniques I've learned -- and am still learning -- here in Wisconsin. Like a wayward soul, I have not been practicing my therapy with enough fervor. I go through the motions, but mainly I seek ways to measure the passage of time, so I can know how much longer I have before I can stop. I also seek to entertain myself, by listening to music or playing an imaginary guitar. Not helpful. I need to focus within myself, be aware of my sense of balance, and stay in that moment. I also need to get back to doing some of the physical exercises I used to do as prep for my BrainPort sessions.

Prayer would be nice, it really would, but heaven can wait (ba dump bump).

What if General Motors were a band? Would the government's actions make sense?

This is not a political blog, and I promise that today's post is not a harbinger of what's to come, at least not on this blog! Also, I'm in Madison, Wisconsin, this week, where I am getting some cool brain therapy and I should be blogging about that not GM.

Cars and songs go together. And with the government taking over GM, I’ve been thinking, what if you had a rock musical act that grew to the size of GM, screwed everything up through gross incompetence, and the government stepped in to save it? What would happen to the songs, especially if the government were to dictate the kinds of songs the band should write in order to rebuild its popularity?

I fear the songs would be highly functional – they’d have tempos and topics that appeal to the times, they wouldn’t cost too much to record, they’d be easy to sing along with – and they would only become “popular” by force, incentive or some other form of artificial means. In other words, they’d be a Trabant (see photo). Remember the Trabi? It was the VW of East Germany, and it was only truly cool when U2 spray painted one, put it on the cover of Achtung Baby and toted it around Europe as the Soviet Union crumbled into Russia and the European Union solidified. It was never a good car.

What needs to happen to GM is the exact same thing that needs to happen to a band that has come to a dead-end: either breakup and move on or call in an outside expert (think Rick Rubin) who has the track record to prove that he knows the music business, knows good songs, knows how to match songs to a band and knows how to work with, guide and motivate a band. For Barack Obama to think that he not only knows how to turn around GM but also knows how to manage the process shows that he is both naive and arrogant, qualities you want in a dictator setting out to build a Trabant but not the CEO of a U.S. corporation.

Under Obama, GM will stop building cars to satisfy a market and start building cars to satisfy an elected official. And you, me and the rest of us Americans are the crash test dummies.

Let’s just hope there’s not an encore.

Recording with Toppe Secret and discovering the deeper meaning of "Happiness".

Yesterday, I spent about 5 hours at Hyde Street doing the way-too-easy job of "working" with Toppe Secret. The song was Happiness.

I would warble, she would sing, and so it went throughout the afternoon, as engineer Jaime Durr twisted knobs and captured, as only he can, Toppe's luminous lead vocal and harmony tracks.

As you can see from the photo, Toppe is sporting a baby bump. She's due in just a few months, a fact that inspired me to babble on about how her baby-to-be was the perfect thing to think about as she sang the lyric. For this was the central idea of the song, which I wrote right after getting married. It's about a person who who opens the door one day to find that happiness has come by — and not wanting happiness to ever leave again. Toppe and Jaime patiently listened to me philosophize and then Jaime added how we were each experiencing the song's subject matter in our own way: he and his wife just had a baby, Toppe was pregnant and I was still in my first year of marriage!

I can't wait to finally mix and share this song with my fans (you know, all ten of them!).

HAPPINESS

Happiness
Won't you come on in?
It's been awhile and you're looking kind of thin

Happiness
Can I get you anything?
Just tell me what you want because in my house you are king

And I have no pride
I will beg, I will borrow, I will cheat, steal and lie
I will not be denied
So happiness, won't you please come inside?

Happiness
I remember you so well
Why were you gone so long, what stories can you tell?

Happiness
I know you're staying for awhile
But where are your things? You've come so many miles

And I have no pride
I will beg, I will borrow, I will cheat, steal and lie
I will not be denied
So happiness, there's nothing to decide,
No excuses to try
So won't you please come inside?

And don't make me guess
Don't make me pass some kind of test
You know just what I want
All you need to say is, "Yes."

Happiness
Don't break my heart
We belong right here
Can't you see
Can't you see
Can't you see we should never be apart?

Blog's okay, but where is the music?

I confess, I have not posted much in the way of music for eons, possibly longer. But the dearth of musical musings does mean I haven't been busy with music. Consider this the calm before the storm!

Soon, possibly even as soon as July, I will be posting my album to the Web. Mostly, I will pursue a digital strategy, but I have plans for physical CDs, as well.

In the meantime, here's a picture of singer Dave Brogan warming up at Hyde Street.

Walks with my Dad.

Ever since I can remember, my folks have been walkers, especially my Dad. And over the years, we've gone on countless walks together, my Dad and I, along the streets and horse trails of Portola Valley, among the estates of Woodside, up and over the hills of San Francisco.

Recently, the walks have somehow taken on more significance. In the past, our walks were almost always tied to some sort of event, usually a visit to my folks' house, but for the past year or so, the walk itself has been the event. Who knows why. But if had to guess, I would say that my fall brought into crystal clarity the fragility of life, and the need to live it as fully as possible every single day, motivating my Dad and me to carve out a bit more time for each other. (I confess, too, it helps that neither of us has a full time job at the moment!)

Right after my accident, the walks took place mainly in San Francisco. They were short, enjoyable, yes, but also work, as I struggled to stay upright, get used to a cane, not look up/down/left/right too rapidly and worse. But as my condition improved so did the walks. And while I still have "issues", at least now I can walk and talk without too much trouble.

Yesterday was a particularly fine walk. We met at The Grove on Chestnut street around 9:30, where we doused ourselves in coffee and munched some breakfast items. Then we drove to the water's edge, parked, faced the ever present wind off the ocean to the west, and headed into the fog toward the Golden Gate Bridge.

Topics solved: banking, the future of the US economy, health care and possibly a few others. Sometimes our conversations turn to specific things we're doing -- music or advertising for me, consulting and computing for my dad -- but mostly we go for the big stuff, and that suits me fine, because I love to talk about the big stuff and so does my Dad.

What does all this have to do with songwriting and my upcoming (fingers/toes/eyes crossed) album? Nothing really. Except for this: The walks make me feel good: lucky to be alive, lucky to have the level of health I do, given the accident, lucky to have the parents I have, lucky to have met someone, Catherine, with whom I hope to start my own family someday, lucky to live where I live, lucky to be so lucky. And this good feeling stays with me, and keeps me from slipping too low to be creative, a constant risk for me.

So, thank you, Dad, for a fine walk yesterday and many other days. Can't wait for the next one.

(Please visit Serve The Song to read my first guest post!)

My first guest post!

Just a quick note to let my vast legions of readers all over the globe and moon and possibly Mars know that I wrote a guest post — my first — for a site called Served The Song. It's a cool site maintained by a cool dude, and even if you're not a songwriter/rock star/living legend, please give it a visit! To do so, click here.

Grabbing life by the horns. And getting gored. Then stomped on. Then pooped on.

Over the past few weeks, I decided to push my activity level up a notch or two, and see how I would hold up. There was a stint at an ad agency (yes, I still venture back into adland occasionally), some freelance writing for an I.T. consultancy, more contract work for a computer company and even a recording session or two.

As Lost in Space's Dr. Smith used to say, "Oh the pain."

I've gotten twitcher, dizzier, more nauseated, more fatigued, more depressed... hey, I'm beginning to sound like a proper rock star! Except, my "condition" is not the result of pills and booze. No, it's the result of my damn brain injury, my recovery from which seems to have reached a plateau.

But what is my choice, really? Stop doing the things I enjoy (writing about computers, writing songs, recording, going on little vacations with Catherine, visiting friends) because each and every one of these things seems to exact its pound of flesh.

No, I just need to press on and deal with the consequences. As miserable as heightened activity makes me, doing nothing is nearly as bad. Everything in moderation I guess.

Besides, was last week's migraine headache worth it, even though it cost me seeing my Dad for breakfast, forced me to stay in bed until one, then left me feeling hungover for what was left of the day because, well, that's what migraines do to me? The answer is yes, I think.

Because the cause of my cranial crapout was most likely the four hours I spent in the recording studio the day before. Mind you, I wasn't DOING anything, just listening and commenting from the comfort of a chair while Dave Brogan put his smooth, weathered voice onto two songs and Jaime Durr "played" The Pro Tools". Still, going over vocal parts, talking about phrasing, tapping rhythms, it's enough to do me in, especially after so living. Sigh.

Hope is not a plan. So?

Somewhere, sometime I heard that one of Anderson Cooper's favorite sayings is that hope is not a plan.

He's right, of course, but what's a plan without hope? Further, what good is a plan period? In this world, where the only thing you can know for sure is that something will happen to you that you didn't expect, I submit that plans are, at best, overrated.

You need hope. You need to believe you can do something despite good, solid evidence to the contrary.

Throughout my album project, I have gradually gotten better at planning less and hoping more, no easy task for an atheist, such as me. But as progress on my album has continued, despite the constant presence of dive bombing Black Swans, how can I NOT have hope? I've been too lucky.

Where to start? First, there was my call to Jaime Durr at Hyde Street, who led me to drummer Andy Korn, who brought The Mighty Sam Bevan aboard for bass duties, who, lo and behold, turned out also to be an incredible keyboard player, arranger and composer, all of which resulted in my first successful (by my measure) co-write (Here Comes The Weather), which made other music types, such as Tim and Eryn Young, take me seriously and agree to work with me and...

No mere plan could have led to all that. Nope, I needed hope, hope that I would find the players, singers and engineer to enable me to make my songs to, for lack of a better phrase, be all that they can be.

And right now I'm hoping to have my album done by the end of June. Stay tuned.

A rock and roll Mother's Day.

Yesterday, I finally returned to Hyde Street after a long absence to... RAWK.

Sort of.

Actually, Andy "The Drummer" Korn grooved and pounded his way through three tunes, while I sat on the couch. Thanks to Jaime "The Engineer" Durr, the sounds coming though the control monitors had a level warmth, clarity, energy and punch that only Jaime can beckon. Seriously, his ability to place mics so that they capture the drums, the room and the human playing is unrivaled in my experience.

Everything was going along nicely, when I glanced at my watch and realized I had to GO. My parents were coming over for a Mother's Day dinner, and I had promised Catherine I would be home by 5:15.

I scooted, and made it home by roughly 5:12. That's EARLY in my book.

Naturally, Catherine had everything set up, so there was very little for me to do (she'd even prepared a martini mixing kit for my Dad).

The night was grand, with good food, some wine, lots of conversation. And this morning, when I woke up, I asked myself something I had never asked myself before: who's more responsible for my noise making, my Mom or my Dad? Hmmm...

Both of my parents have always been very supportive of my musical ambitions, but if I had to guess who I inherited a few musical genes from, I'd have to go with my Mom. Not that my Dad isn't musical -- he played drums and piano in his younger days and, along with my mom, has been a lifelong devotee of classical music -- I just think my Dad's art form has been business, while my Mom's choices are closer to my own.

She's a quilter, and over the years she's also pursued knitting, sewing, macramé and even pottery. More important, at least given the question at hand, is that her approach to art is a lot like mine. We both go for the structured stuff. For my Mom, that means quilts based on repeating geometric patterns and highly intentional uses of color (see pic!). For me, structured means songs not jams. Nope, no hippie-psychedelic wanderings into innerspace, where all is one and one is all and you just have to go with it, man. Nah, give me two to four minutes of structured, focused music.

My Mom worries that her structured approach to art makes her less creative than quilters who have a free way with the cloth. Well, art is a subjective thing and no opinion works for everyone, but for me, I don't think a free form approach to art is more creative. I think it's less. I always think about Robert Frost's line about free verse poetry being like tennis without a net, and I agree with him. Anyway, this is a debate raging far beyond the confines of my little blog, so I'll just close with saying Thank You, Mom, for giving me some very much appreciated musical DNA. Happy Mother's Day!

Life or consequences? More like "life and consequences".

I'm not going to sugar coat it: brain injuries suck. In the case of my TBI, I've written about the many ways my life has changed since the back of my head was introduced to a tile wall mano-a-mano, but instead of continuing with more of how the "little things" add up (in a subtractive way), I'm just going to step back and take in the big picture: which is, that life itself has fundamentally different for me.

Before I fell, I was certainly aware that my actions had consequences. I mean, if I drank too much, I'd be hungover, if I stayed up too late, I'd be tired, if I didn't exercise, I'd feel lethargic. All very straightforward stuff. And so I went through life aware that everything had a price (or a reward), and I could more or less make things better or worse for myself with a decent modicum of control.

But now, EVERY GODDAMN THING I DO EXACTS A TOLL.

If I work a little too much, more than three days straight, I feel like hell; if I get on a plane, I might get a migraine; if I look up, I get dizzy; if I look down, I get dizzy; if i go to the gym, I'll probably end up in bed (gotta test this one again). Shoot someone, I go to jail. (Just kidding). Anyway, you get the idea: I'm on constant pins and needles about plain old living, never mind the Vegas kind.

Yet, as Dorothy Parker says in her poem Resume:

Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.

And so, I'm headed to Hyde Street today to record some songs.

As Kathy Griffin would say, "My TBI can suck it."

About to take flight. And I wish Apprehension would put a cork in it.

If all goes according to plan, I will be releasing my very first album in late June, possibly August.

I'm excited, but...

As anyone who has embarked on a long journey with an uncertain end knows, Excitement's favorite traveling companion in Apprehension.

And every time I glance in my rearview mirror, there sits Apprehension saying all the stuff you would expect him to say, wondering aloud if my songs are any good, if my lyrics are really they best they can be, if my tempos feel right and on and on.

Apprehension is a real bastard, and in addition to all of his out-loud musings about my "talent", he also loves to needle my entire musical purpose. His point of view can best be summed up by "Why Bother". Here are are some of his most beloved mutterings:

"What the hell are you doing this for, do you really think anyone is going to buy your music or even listen to it?"

And, "Dude, you're 45, you missed it, man, time to get real."

Another favorite, "You realize, of course, that in today's music world, touring has never been more important and since your health issues prevent you from touring, I have to ask again, What the hell are you doing this for?"

And the most devastating thing Apprehension says, "Yo, your blog has, what, ten readers, and on a really, really good day it maybe gets up to 50. What's 50 times $.99? Wow, you're gonna be rich."

All good points, to be sure, and trust me, I wish I could push a button and eject the prick, but no such button exists, so on we travel.

And my best defense against all of Apprehension's Whys?

Why Not.

Yeah, that's right, you a--hole, "Why not?"

Seriously, what's the worst that could happen? I don't sell a single MP3? Alright, that would suck, but I could still go to my final resting place saying, "I put out an album."

And that's why Excitement rides shotgun.

The afterlife.

Just in case the title of this post got you thinking about religion, let me set the record straight. I am not religious, and I do not believe in life after death.

Life after life, though? Now that’s possible.

Here’s what I mean: before my brain injury, I lived a very different life from the one I live today. I had a genuine career, I was single (albeit in a committed relationship), I had certain political views, certain perceptions, I went fishing every now and then.

Today, I have no career to speak of, I’m married, my political views are much changed, I see life through a different lens and I can’t go fishing (I’d fall in the river and be eaten by trout).

It’s a whole new life.

And in my continuing struggle to figure out why I’m now suddenly writing songs again — after years of never doing more than noodling on the guitar — I think this life-after-life idea is playing a role.

To want to do art -- any kind of art -- you need to relate to the world in a certain way, and my former life did not let me do this, or at least I could not figure out how to ever find time for anything but work, work and, um, oh, right… work.

Now, some might say that my work WAS my art, but I don’t think so. True, I was an advertising writer, and I spent a lot of time thinking about words and images, but advertising is not art to me. Wait, I take that back. Advertising is art, it’s just done with a far tighter focus than most other forms of art, and it’s not meant to last. The first aspect, focus, doesn’t bother me. I like focused art. But the second aspect, the fact that advertising is meant to be here then gone, well, that grew to really eat at me. I mean, if you’ve ever worked in an agency and seen the amount of blood, sweat and tears that goes into every single ad, you would not believe it. People KILL themselves to be great; they sacrifice relationships, sleep… living, all in an effort to create something that will be short-lived. Ads go into the world to die, that’s just the cold, hard truth.

Songs, on the other hand, and novels and poems and paintings, go out into the world to live, to be a part of peoples’ lives, to enrich existence. But when I was in the badlands of adland, I spent every waking and dreaming moment thinking about how to create something that did the opposite. Sure, people like Superbowl commercials and they might even appreciate the occasional print ad that informs them or expresses a thought in a witty way, but let’s face it: people try to avoid ads. They flip past them as fast as they can, or change the channel, or turn the radio dial. But a good song? People stop, they listen, they play it again, in time they associate it with memories. Songs are woven into our lives.

I knew all of this in my past life, but somehow I could not act on it. I was scared to leave my job, scared to leave my career, scared to leave all that was familiar, and so I stayed, frozen in a life I knew was wrong. Then that life ended. Cause of death? A tiny bone fragment that punctured my cerebellum.

Now, hokey as it might sound, I feel like I’m living in the after-life. No, it’s not heaven, but it’s a second chance, a new life and story, and I’m writing the soundtrack.

Writing a cheeseburger.

Over the weekend, Catherine and I drove up to Napa for a few days of rest and relaxation. And amidst the splendor of vineyards, the opulence of world class eateries and wineries, and under a blue sky and sun that would have felt right at home on the Cote de Azure, when lunchtime first rolled around on Saturday, we stood in line and waited 45 minutes for...

a cheeseburger at Taylor's Automatic Refresher.

And this got me to thinking. If I could write the musical equivalent of a cheeseburger, I would be happy. In fact, this humble goal might just prove to be my Holy Grail. For a song that does what a cheeseburger can do is a rare thing. Every time you listen to it, you are brought home, you are served memories, you are at once familiar and surprised as the experience is both one you know so well, yet still find indescribably satisfying.

What's a cheeseburger song in my book? There are many, but these spring to mind: Lodi, by Creedence (hell, ALL Creedence classics are cheeseburger songs); Brown Sugar, by the Rolling Stones; The Night Before, by the Beatles; One, by U2; Lady, by Trio.

There are many, many more, some newer, most older, simply by virtue of time, since classics are not instant. They require memory and experience, they require good times and bad. And I want to write one.

Someday.

To a Mother Concerned About File-Sharing.

This post is in response to a post on musicianwages.com asking bloggers to comment on a note from a mom, who is concerned about her kid's attitude that piracy is okay.

I'm not a parent, but if I were and my teenager were downloading pirated music off the Internet, here's what I would say (I think!).

First off, just because something is easy to grab doesn't mean you're not stealing it. In most cases with music, those free files are just like newspapers outside the magazine shop, or candy bars out of view of the clerk. Yup, you can grab 'em no sweat, but you're still stealing them, and stealing is not cool. Nevermind the law, although it certainly matters, but to take something from someone else is just cruel, selfish and hardly "no big deal".

Second, SOME music is available for free download under a new type of copyright called Creative Commons. Artists who choose certain types of CC licenses are saying their music is free to those who promise not to try to profit from it. Look for the CC license and grab all you want. No harm done.

Third, if you think stealing music is okay because music has essentially become an advertisement for the artist's live act -- where the real money is made on tickets and merch -- you're wrong. Stealing is stealing.

Fourth and last (and by now, let's face it, I've lost my teen's interest), think about the artists you like as people, not "artists". Now imagine just taking something from them, something they've created, poured possibly years of their lives into, something they are filled with pride and love for. Would you do it? 

Seems that writing about feelings has proven to help chronically screwed up people — like me — so here I go again.

A recent article in the New York Times caught my eye and re-motivated me to write even more about my brain injury and how I feel as a result. Call me a crystal-powered-new-age-commie hippie, but, as I have said in previous posts, I am willing to try pretty much anything at this point.

So what feelings shall I write about today? Given the crappiness of last night, I'll go with the feelings I have about of sleep.

Think about your bed for a moment. Think about how when you first crawl in between the sheets they go from cool to warm, as they absorb your body heat. Think about the soft pillows and how you position them to get everything just right for your night of slumber. Think about the feeling of release you get, the sense of finally just letting the day go, being able to truly escape for awhile (they say sleeping is no different from dying, except, of course, that you wake up, pretty big difference, but you get the idea). Now think about the person you share the bed with, if you are lucky enough to have someone who does this with you. Go ahead, get a little lewd in your thoughts if you want to, it's a bed for god's sake.

Now scratch all that and think about not being able to get comfortable, no position quite does it and sleep comes as a manifestation of defeat not renewal. And when you wake up? Nothing has changed. The first thing you feel is not grogginess, recharged, whatever, no, you feel just like you did when you went to bed, probably worse, because your sleep has been disrupted by your discomforts.

Sadly, the second description pretty fits me to a T1. No position really works for me anymore. On my back, dizzy. On my front, dizzy. Side, dizzy. Pillow against the front of my head, hurts, the side, hurts, the back of my head, hurts. Legs are cold and wet feeling, neck is stiff (had a bit of a whiplash during my fall).

This is a tough situation to be in, as you can imagine, but not solely for the reason you might expect, which is that sleep should feel good. No, another reason — a deeper reason, really — is that sleep and rest are things you should look forward to. They should be experienced as a welcome and well earned break from a relentless world. When you crawl into bed, it should not be with reluctance or resignation. Even when you simply sink into an easy chair, it should feel like a reward.

These days I dread rest and sleep. When I sink into the couch or crawl into bed, I think to myself, "Well, here I am again, another afternoon shot, another evening gone, more of life's precious moments wasted." This happened to me this morning. I woke up and I felt awful. Hard to explain exactly what was wrong — sort of a headache, touch of nausea, dizzier than usual — but something was very wrong, so I cancelled the breakfast I'd planned with my dad and went back to sleep. Several hours later, I finally got up, ratted around a bit, felt better, but not great, and now here I am again in bed. Oh joy.

This post is getting kind of long, so I'll stop. But, having written down all these feelings, I have to ask myself, "Do you feel better, punk? Well, do ya?" And you know what? I do, kind of.

In fact, I think writing out these feelings might have given me an idea for a song: "I wish my bed would die in its sleep."

1) What the hell does fit to a T even mean? Where did this expression come from? The answer is here.

Living with Black Swans.

I'm reading a book right now called The Black Swan, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. It's several hundred pages, but John Lennon was able to make the same point in one line:

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."

And some people only need two words:

"S--t happens." (A phrase, I hate, by the way, not for its meaning, just for its utterly uncreative, crass, ugly choice of words.)

The point? Our lives are determined by what we don't expect, i.e., Black Swans.

To be clear, Black Swans are neither good nor bad, they are simply unexpected. You will also most likely see more than one in your lifetime, as they are NOT unlikely, just, again, unexpected.

And so, as we plan, hope and pray, we will, at some point, be hit by something we do not see coming. For me, it was a tile wall (a pink tile, sadly, as a black tile would have been much cooler, considering the whole Black Swan theme).

What to do about Black Swans? Nothing. I'm still going to plan, to hope, to do my best to change what I can in my life for the better, even though, a Black Swan might fly by and poop on me at its whim. I'm also going to continue working very hard to live in the moment, which, I admit sets up another odd animal, the pushmi-pullyu.

How can one both plan for the future and live in the moment? Not sure, really. You just do it. Besides, as a pushmi-pullyu, you can see Black Swans coming at you — and chasing you down.