hello. 

it’s 8 am, monday morning, in minneapolis.  i couldn’t sleep in.  woke up at 5:47 only to lay in bed, work out emerging songs/drive-by memories, change blankets and body positions, and wonder when i should actually get up.  6:30.  using my cell phone as a flashlight, i stumble over to my dresser, throw on my jeans, grab my hat, put on my last pair of clean socks (yes, they have holes in them), gargle purple, put on sunglasses.  step outside to meet the morning.  it’s dark out.  i haven’t been up and about this early.  birds sing.  i wish i was one of them.  i’ll keep my sunglasses on.

the band practiced most of the day yesterday.  we do that occasionally….devote a sunday to working out arrangements and nailing down parts and listening to sections over and over again while i tinker with the registers so no one’s crossing each other’s frequency path.  i got my kick drum radar on, my bass playing radar.  i want everything to groove hard.  no front heaviness.  laid back head bop.  the kind where you don’t know you’re moving.  meanwhile, i deliver the words.  it’s reverse bank robbery.  we show up.  create a diversion.  give the teller a tiny note.  and then send in the men in clown masks to put money in the bank (or reveal the riches inherently there).  i guess you could call it a deposit.  but the spot i’m aiming with this group isn’t so easily accessible.  maybe for children.  but not for you (unless you’re lucky).  not even for me.  but it’s there.  it’s heart.  not the one that beats.  it’s the one that beats the one that beats.  the invisible energy.  the kind you can volley to and fro in the course of a performance.  black snake oil.  that’s what i’m after.  the same thing that rears its head as a song.  the naked moment. 

anyway, practice was good.  it’s nice the band gets along.  i enjoy their company.  when they come over, it’s like friends hanging out.  and we’re all different.  everyone’s got their little spot on the shelf and take on the land.  no one’s taking up too much space.  sure, there are things we’d change if we could, but some things aren’t worth gettin’ freaked out about.  i remind everyone on occasion that we’re there to make these songs speak clearly.  that’s it.  i suppose when you keep this in mind, it detaches the aim and centralizes focus.  and my band, thus far, is getting better and better at it.  and for this, i’m grateful.  if you’ve been in a situation where you can’t get a point across because somebody’s got some unspoken issue with god-knows-what, then you’re cognizant of an environment where everyone is working towards the same shining goal.  i’m not saying it’s perfect.  but it’s the mix is good:  the right amount of respect.  the right amount of tension.

i guess i’ve been thinking a lot about this kinda thing because of the impending tour/lifestyle change i’m about to encounter.  i was laying in my bed the other night and it dawned on me that soon enough, my quiet nights will be over.  No more countless hours in whispered space, working out my thoughts into words or imagining the world away.  it’ll be a new kind of night.  and i hope the chemical equation that is this group can endure a prolonged period huddled together in the test tube van while time and the road (bunsen) burns its way through to our humanness.  basically, i like quiet.  i like to be by myself.  and i hope i don’t freak out on anyone!  i guess that’s what diaries and blogs are for….

in the meantime, i’ll be kind.  it pays to be kind in the meantime.

—jason
03.23.09