Your sound, made up of your musicianship, tone, feel, and passion, needs to be re-inspired every once in a while. That’s what’s so amazing about music. You can play or sing the same ‘E’ note in identical ways…but the one you believe in while you do it, will sound better. Music isn’t great unless it’s saying something. Sometimes it’s something deep; sometimes not. Sometimes it just needs to say ‘Beautiful’ or ‘Feel this’. But there’s gotta be passion behind it.
So every once in a while, I try to find ways to re-inspire my tone. And for me, it’s Hollywood. I don’t know why. Hollywood sings to me. I guess maybe I think that I’ll be at one of the amazing guitar shops on Sunset, and I’ll grab a 1967 ES-335 and a Carr and start playing those three notes I know, and then Brian Eno will come out from behind the vintage Roland Juno 60 that I’ve been unconsciously harmonizing my three notes to and he’ll say, ‘I’ve never heard such feel and tone behind three notes before! Would you please sign this contract.’ And, of course I’m joking, but there’s this little piece of me that always honestly hopes for that. I mean, Eno’s gotta be somewhere, right? Why not at the LA gear shops? Or, what’s worse, maybe I have run into him, and he heard my 3 notes and left? This seems more likely.
But whatever the reason, I just feel alive in Hollywood. And it makes me want to write music, and get better tone, and play more passionately, and keep trying to make people cry with one note. And keep looking for Mr. Eno (and actually, any famous musician or record exec will do…just for the record…I’m not picky). And my amazing wife, actually gets this. See, I would think that she would go hide behind my ‘Crash’ poster every time I even start to mention Hollywood, because, inevitably, I will always end up saying something embarrassing. (See the post on one of my previous trips to Hollywood: The Journey to My Amp Tech .) But instead, she like, totally gets me, and loves going up there with me. So (getting a little personal and soft here), we do some kind of ‘love celebration’ (sounds like a hippie Led Zeppelin thing) every month, where one of us takes the other one someplace cool. And she just decided to take me to Hollywood to hang out. She’s quite cool. Here is a picture of her:
She was judo-kicking the cars that got better parking spaces than we did. Which was many. See, my parking philosophy is usually something to the effect of ‘I see one. We’re parking there.’ Which unfortunately makes for some long walks. And yes, this is at Disneyland, but it was all part of the trip…and I love this picture of her. But, she would probably rather that I show this one:
This one was taken at City Walk in Hollywood. Which, of course is completely inspirational to tone because it has this:
Fantastic. That’s on a giant guitar outside a Hard Rock.
And then this happened:
I’ve always wanted to do this, because they look so surprisingly plausible! Except for the fact that if you look at Arnold’s hand, it could definitely fit my whole face inside it. (Ugh…I don’t want to think about that.) And ya, it’s a picture of the picture…because I don’t have a scanner, and they of course can’t give it to you on a digital medium. And yes, that is Larry Mullen Jr.’s face on the book the picture frame is on. Mmm…U2.
Oh, and here’s the thing that probably inspires me, too. Almost every time we go up to Hollywood, or Malibu, or that general area, we see someone famous. And they’re usually just complete losers. Which, of course, inspires me more. Like, ‘Well if that guy can get famous…’ Seriously. Seeing a celebrity without makeup, scripts, or stages, is an inspiration to us all. When I asked my wife to marry me, this guy started clapping:
Yep. Mr. Daniel Stern. City Slickers, Bushwhacked, Tourist Trap, and of course, Home Alone…featuring my favorite line, said to an 8-year-old: ‘Santy don’t visit the funeral home, little buddy.’ He was actually very nice and polite and congratulated us; and I probably made his day by actually recognizing him, saying his full name (seriously, there has to be something wrong with you if you know this guy by ‘Daniel Stern’ and not ‘that guy from Home Alone’), and saying that I enjoyed his work. But he applauded us, and then continued walking down the beach. Very kind. But extremely normal. Inspirationally normal. And unfortunately, we didn’t have a camera.
Then, the next year, when we went back to Malibu to celebrate our engagement, we ate lunch next to this guy:
Seann William Scott. Better known as Stifler from American Pie, or, the possum from Ice Age 2, or, the guy from Dude, Where’s My Car that’s not on That ’70’s Show. (He was actually very funny in Role Models.) Now he was an absolute jerk. We’re eating lunch there, and in walks him with this girl. And he literally talks…about himself…for 20 minutes. We never hear her say a word. And his best quote was, ‘I’m doing this new movie right now. It’s like a dramedy. It’s like…did you see Little Miss Sunshine? Okay, it’s like that, only better.’ And this time, we did have a camera; but didn’t care. But, to be fair, girls can make you look jerky. ‘Fools aren’t born; pretty girls make them in their spare time.’ And he does dress very well, which is always a plus for me. (Because clothes are cool, not because I like the way he looks in them. Come on, people. That did sound pretty bad, though.)
So this time, we’re walking down City Walk, and there’s this high, private catwalk, and Jamianne says, ‘Oh, how do you get up there?’ And I look up to see a group of about 5 guys surrounding this one guy, and laughing at everything he says. And I go, ‘Babe, that’s Jon Lovitz!’ Now, that’s not an incredible feat, I guess, to see Jon Lovitz. He’s at the Laugh Factory, like, 3 times a week. But I was still pretty stoked. And if you’re going, ‘Who?’, you’re not alone. He was in such classics as High School High, Trapped in Paradise, and Benchwarmers. But I’ve always thought he was hilarious. So I used my insane photo-taking skills to snap this shot:
No, seriously, that’s really him! The guy who half his face is hidden by the railing. I’m such a good photographer.
And of course, Hollywood wouldn’t be complete without some sort of sweet, sweet Heat reference. This is where Pacino and DeNiro (Al and Bobby) had coffee in like, the best written dialogue scene ever:
But in all seriousness, you have to find the places that for whatever reason or another, fill you with some sort of ache or longing or passion. Then you have to make sure you channel that into every note you play. Tonally and musically. And most importantly, in your feel. Every note you play or sing needs to say something; some piece of passion or feel or art has to come out of you and be communicated to your audience. And to be able to do that, you’ve gotta find what fills you up. Hopefully, for those of you that are worship musicians, a good portion of that is Christ’s love. But you’ll find that a change of scenery can reveal all kinds of new feelings for you, even about God Himself.
So find your place, or whatever it is, that inspires you to make passionate music. Whenever I go to the guitar shops (which, by the way, my wife actually goes into with me and enjoys…oh ya…way cool) down in Hollywood, or walk the scenes in Heat or Crash, I always have this soundtrack playing in my head. And these are two of the songs that evoke the feelings in me that I try to get across in some way with every note.
Moby’s ‘Porcelain’:
And Terje Rypdal’s ‘Mystery Man’ (the improvy part from 3:00-5:00 is a little weird, but the rest is wonderful):
Passion just makes such a difference in your playing. Find that passion, that song, that feeling, that lyric, that view of God, and make your instrument say it.
And yes, in case you were wondering, this whole post did start as just an excuse for me to show my terrible picture of Jon Lovitz. ;)
Splendid.
Karl.
Guitar for Worship 