Thursday, July 26, 2007

An Abecedary about Music

I...

A. am waiting here at the coffee shop for a
B. bearded funk musician who looks shockingly like me +75 pounds so he can bring me his
C. CD. I met him out last night because I was assigned to do a story about him, his bass player and their
D. dads, who are also musicians and also play together. It will be a nice story but nothing too heavy or taxing. But like
E. everything that ever deals with dads, it made me think about my own
F. father and that is a sticky situation at best. Fathers. Not to say that ones relation with one’s mother is a walk in the psychic park, I'm saying the father-child thing is so heavy. See, its such a psychological broken record, such a stop
G. gap that I thought I would never get to “G.” Plus, it’s a subject that, if one carelessly gets on, like the wrong bus, it generally takes you to places you won’t go
H. happily, so
I. I will switch gears. I’ve been in a refactoring of my listening habits, trying to let
J. Jazz and classical and experimental music back into my life, and
K. kick the indie rock habit. That stuff eats itself and its not the snarling dog I want to hitch my wagon to. For so many years, I only
L. listened to difficult, complex
M. music,
N. needing its
O. overwhelming sense of
P. purpose, its
Q. quaking gravity of all that history and learning and expense and culture that goes into its production. But what really got me was the
R. rigor of listening to it. The things I was attracted to were not ones that you passively took in, you had to
S. stand fast against the roaring gale.
T. This, I now see, is an angry young man’s folly. I
U. used it as a blind, a hiding spot,
V. viewing it as a place
W. where no one else, none of those
X. xenophobic idiots surrounding me would dare tread. But I am not an angry
Y. young man any more, and am finding that my thoughts no longer have to guard me from the world but are instead a way to bring the world in and my
Z. zeal serves a greater purpose (even if only to myself)

1 comment:

  1. Dangitall, I am going to have to try this out on my own blog. Very nicely done!

    ReplyDelete