Lightning is Not Impressive Because it Holds Back

The 666th post is ambiguous at best, particularly when you have some unpublished posts counting, youtube posts not counting and whatnot. But this post is close enough to the unholy number and what a perfect place to put down my personal philosophy of music.

Which doesn't deserve to be immortalised. My tastes and preferences change over time so by no means is this gospel. But there is only one commandment in my philosophy of music right now, and as we all know commandments are made to be broken. Hence here it is entombed in my 666th post.

"Though shall not make vag-moistening music"

So of course, the little businessman inside me says that if there's a market for "vag-moistening" music then by all means make it. Pursue the mighty dollar. But that's business not music, not my music, not MY philosophy.

You see, as an infant of music and truly being blessed to reach my sentient phase in the midst of the mighty early 90's I believed the rule to be 'though shall not sell out' but as Tool point out in one of my favorite works of their's "Hooker with a Penis"

He told me that
He thought
We were sellin out,
Layin down,
Suckin up
To the man.

Well now Ive got some
A-dvice for you, little buddy.
Before you point the finger
You should know that
Im the man,

And if Im the man,
Then youre the man, and
Hes the man as well so you can
Point that fuckin finger up your ass.

All you know about me is what Ive sold you,
Dumb fuck.
I sold out long before you ever heard my name.

I sold my soul to make a record,
Dip shit,
And you bought one.

So yeah, chances are if you hear a band's music and it isn't live in the corner of your dingy local pub chances are they have already 'sold out'. They have signed on the dotted line with the devil, the man, interscope records, whatever you know him as.

All bands have to jump through hoops to get studio time, airtime and all importantly record presales. I hear if you want to get on triple J richard kingsmill just mails his paste too you to suck straight out of...well not an envelope, not since he cancelled the music meetings, now you really have to suck to get by Dick Kingsmill, maybe one of those poster post tubes that architects use.

Anyway, there's good selling out and bad selling out. Good selling out is like Tool, making money by filling stadiums with a fanbase based on quality products. Same same for many a touring group.

Furthermore, I can also admire bands that keep producing material but are not beholden to their fanbase. At one extreme you have Primus who's fans would only be dissapointed if they realeased a track that sounded like any of their old tracks, or Wes Borland's sideproject Big Dumb Face a band designed to test the very limits of how loyal his fans would be. Then down the other end you might have Metellica that went all suited up and cut their hair for Reload upsetting many of their most 'loyal' fans.

Then disastrously Metallica decided to bow down and lick the collective nutsack of their fanbase and try and recapture that 'raw' sound that produced Saint Anger, one of the worst metal albums of all time.

So fans are 50/50 love, hate em they don't matter much. Selling out I don't oppose I can see how bands could be pissed off at people stealing their music through file sharing just as I can see how Jamie Oliver could be pissed off when his new recipe book gets circulated around the world as a pdf.

But there is one thing I abhore, and was reminded by Incubus which is the only band I have in my ipohd that starts with 'I' so I can see how I missed it for so long. It's been seriously like 3 years since I listened to one of their tracks. But I noticed it the other day while flicking over to Guns N' Roses for some hair metal action.

Suddenly I had a craving to hear 'Redefine' again. I was surprised to see I actually had a few of their albums on my playlist instead of just a few token tracks. So I ended up listening to all of their 'S.C.I.E.N.C.E' album and was surprised to find that it kicks arse. Sure it's not the greatest album of all time, but mayhaps back then Incubus came as close as anyone did to having the 3 x soloist formula going since Cream. Busy, busy bass lines, thrashing guitar and kicking/jazzy drum solos all laid one over the other in the artful way that preserves form over noise.

Nothing like true masterpieces like Cream's take on 'Crossroads' the best example of the 3 x solo on vinyl or Primus' thunderous heart thumping 'Frizzle Fry' of which I still wish to make an animated short one day. But nevertheless pretty awesomeness.

But in their follow up Album - 'Make Yourself' the transition took place. The title track 'Priveledge' is arguably as awesome as anything on S.C.I.E.N.C.E. but that sadly is a farewell to awesomeness. Because furtherdown the playlist we come across 'Drive' now 'Drive' is an Incubus track people probably do remember.

It is the very definition of vag-moistening music. When adolescents turn to boyz-to-men. Except Boyz-to-men where ironically funny in their own way. When a Primus wannabe band turns into a vag-moistening band it moistens my eyes.

I remember talking about bands I liked to Barry the Bass Guitar teacher and he talked about the natural progression of bands from focusing on experimenting with instruments/virtuoso stage to knuckling down into song writing.

Now Incubus is a great band because you can pick up their early work in one hand and then take the album at which I lost all pretense of interest in them called 'Morning View' or something which was basically twelve tracks of 'Drive' which had suddenly more than doubled their following with teeny boppers eager to get their vag-moistened.

A simpler more recognisable band to point to, perhaps the epitome of vag-moistening music is Powderfinger. Powderfinger, Jeff Buckley and post Californication RHCP are the soundtracks to every girl my age's adolescence. But Powderfinger too used to be more Hardcore-Alternate rock in the Double Allergic and earlier pieces.

And that is the only selling out, fan upheaving shift in musical tone I'm opposed too.

And it's just personal preference, a personal philosophy. But here's my rational as to why this of all the transgressions that make up that 'to err is human, to forgive divine' sentiment in the music world.

It can be summed up with this revelation I had yesterday as direct rebuttal to Barry my Bass instructor, and if I'm honest somewhat inspired by Mark Twain's saying "Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work."

It is the very title of this post "Lightening is not impressive because it holds back"

It can be expanded though -

Weather is not impressive because it holds back. A drought is not impressive, a calm day is not impressive, flags drooping is not impressive. They can be terrifying if your calmed at see or stranded in the desert, but they are not impressive.

Lightning, Hurricanes, Cyclones, Blizzards, Thunder Storms these are all impressive. Terryfying, sometimes unwelcome, sometimes dangerous but never unimpressive.

Just so, while it is easy to make an adolescent boy excited with music composition wise, its just as easy to get adolescent girls 'dripping' as a friend of mine used to say.

What's actually hard to do is play the music that is easy to write for an adolescent boy like I was (and still am deep inside). It takes years of practice and some huge degree of talent to play drums like Puff of Faith No More, Tim Alexander from Primus or Danny Carey from Tool, it takes fucking prodigal ability and insight to play bass like Les Claypool of Primus or Flea from RHCP, it takes dedication and a fine ear to play bass with a plectrum like Justin of Tool, it takes reflexes verging on precognition to play the guitar like Ler, Frusciante, Navarro, Morello, Borland, Adam Jones etc.

The moral of the story is, not many people can do it. It's fucking hard. It takes real skill, real talent, real creativity.

Incubus could do it all. And they chose to hold back and write music that anybody can write. Because sadly vag-moistening music is largely mathematical in execution (all music to a degree is) but I mean there is a clear cut difference between:



"Man everyone can enjoy that girls."



Not everyone's Cake in a tin. But it does kick.

Anyway, as a footnote anecdote, I can proudly say that when I was 18 running against the grain of my group of friends I proclaimed that the new Incubus album 'sucked' and that remains true to this day. I stuck by my philosophy even before I knew what it was. My friends were all like 'No, I like it, it's really good.' which I now know was there way of saying 'shut up tohm, we're out for some moist vag action and you're spoiling it with your adolescent male-ness'. Well jokes on them I just found a cool heavy metal chick.

Be true to yourself kids.