so…..timmy (monsieur kee-bored) were talking/jamming today like we usually do ‘round three o’clock or so and we hit upon something that’s been confusing for us as a group…..which is the notion of musical creativity/current culture trends/image/marketability/genre and how all of the collide to influence a band’s approach in their craft.  it’s something i’m definitely thinking a lot about.  you could even say i’m struggling with it.  i’m sure most artists do in some way, whether they admit it or not.  but it’s something that, recently, has been reverberating heavily in my world.

you’ll get where i’m coming from as i continue…and i’ll try not to go off too much…though i most likely will…consider this thinking-out-loud…..so…as i see myself…i’m a creator.  one who toys, always playing around, deconstructing, daydreaming, looking through the mirror, analyzing what appears to be magic, hanging out in the moment with discovery-desire for a rod and reel and a song for a fish to catch.  this is what i like doing.  why?  shit, i don’t know.  i don’t know!  my only answer is:  it feels right and i love it and am committed to it…“it” being the act of engaging that hard-to-pin-down process.

i’ve been “doing” for almost ten years, officially.  playing guitar/piano/drums/singing/writing/recording/mixing/listening.  living in rehearsal spaces.  convincing my parents i’m sane.  chain-smoking moonlight.  walking and talking in circles.  loading out gear at three in the morning for 50 bucks.  only until recently did the prospect arise that i could make a living creating and performing music.  it’s something i’ve always dreamed of but i’ve never, as most musicians would agree, sought to make money.  that is, you’d never find my ass at a Barnes & Noble reading “Music Business For Morons” or “How To Write Hit Songs”.  to me, that’s ridiculous.  i’m over in the section reading J. Krishnamurti. browsing Billy Collins poems, staring at Rauschenberg, etc.  i’m studying the footprints left by my fellow creators. 

but one day it hits you.  and, most likely, it hits you when someone comes along and wants to turn what you do into something that can be objectified/quantified/justified/criticized—chewed up and spit out.  like a sandwich in a plastic wrapper.  the album.  the single.  the EP.  the genre.  the “artist you sound like”.  the album artwork.  the inside scoop.  the one-sheet brochure.  the elevator pitch.  something-something-something.COM.  somebody’s gonna inhabit your world and ask you to start drawing borders around your open world.  they’re gonna tell you that this works and this doesn’t.  they’re gonna tell you to start here and stop there.  they’re gonna snuff the burning flame of freedom.  deadlines.  headlines.  graveyards.

and for the artist/musician….if they don’t understand the rules of the game…..there’s mainly confusion and bewilderment.  where do i belong in the search for representing my feelings of true/false/mystery in the fast world of….stuff?  which way do i go?  how should i dress?  how do you package the muse when it feels like the muse is something beyond you?

my first taste of this struggle was when we were getting together this last record (the record i’m supposed to be still supporting and re-couping).  everyone wanted me to describe it and name it and play certain things.  “don’t do this!”  “don’t do that”  “MORE of this!”  “less of THAT”.  and on and on.  SLOW songs are not good in sets.  EVERYONE wants to dance so do dance stuff.  we REALLY love your voice when you do COUNTRY songs but the COUNTRY songs don’t match the others.  Make people MOVE.  it’s gotta be EDGIER.

i try to listen to all the stuff coming out to stay in tune with what’s happening.  i check out the music blogs, watch videos, go digging for treasures.  i can say that my last record didn’t have the world at large in mind.  it was one person just picking some songs that they thought were pretty good and felt honest.  that person didn’t care about genre, styles, trends, nuthin’.  i mean, i worked hard on that record.  i really did.  but i don’t know if i had commisioned myself to make something with vision that was unified and fell along all the alleged necessary components that makes a product in this day and age “successful”....that is, displaying a sense of cohesion and identify that allows a marketer to “move units.”  at that time, i thought success itself was just doing it.

but now i’m in the market.  i’m for sale.  i want people to buy/see/download the musical me so i can keep doing it and traveling and rocking out and seeing the world and living the idea of a dream.  so i’ve been thinking.  how do i be totally ME without any concessions and fit into this blurred cluster-fuck of a musical marketplace built on image, speed, loudness and at times, a lack of story.  like Bad Blake sang in Crazy Heart, “this ain’t no place for the weary kind….”  it almost feels like thinking this way regresses me back to middle school where everyone is trying to fit in and be cool.  am i back there?  dios mio…...

so here’s how this figures into my process…...one man would say, “ahh, he’s losing his cool.  he’s letting the world get under his skin…..”  the other man would say, “ahhh, he’s growing….he’s paying attention.  he’s stretching…...”  really, i don’t know which man i am right now.  i’m cool with that, though.  my deeper worth is in something other than the bi-product of a process.  BUT…i wanna work and connect, so i feel the urgent need to be relevant and listenable.  if you’re an artist and wanna be able to pay bills and you’re serious about your own output, you’ve thought about this….even if it’s worded differently.  don’t lie.  you have. 

i’m thinking and feeling:  i don’t wanna be some f—-ing blues guitar player guy that rips solos and does guitar magazine interviews about my rig.  i don’t wanna be some indie rocker all the blogs write about who says absolutely nothing of any relevance but somehow has managed to push his/her/their way into market visibility because they have a cool haircut or good art director or PR person.  i don’t wanna be a singer/songwriter that has to strum an acoustic guitar and is called “folky” or “rootsy”.  i don’t want everything to be pretty.  i don’t wanna have the same voice all the time.  i don’t wanna always make sense but i don’t wanna not make sense for the sake of….  i don’t wanna repeat things. i don’t wanna be sexy so you like me.  i don’t wanna try to fit into some mold of cool.  i don’t wanna be in a genre.  i don’t wanna do that shit.  i just wanna play and rock and have fun.

trust me, if you lived in minneapolis and were hip to the music scene, it is dominated and controlled by a certain aesthetic.  how this is determined is beyond me.  it has been in my favor and not in my favor.  it doesn’t really matter but it exemplifies the idea that taste-makers for the marketplace create niches for people to fit into…. and if one doesn’t fit the particular mold required to be relevant, then it increases the chances of narrowing the lifeline that connects the artist to the listener.  this is not anything new, by any means.  but i’ve felt it.  i know other serious creative beings have felt it.  and all i can say is…..if you feel that, i feel you.  even if you’re not a musician, but you see a parallel in what i’m saying…..i feel you.

my dad would say, “hang in there, son.”  i think that’s what i’ll do.  it makes sense.  i’ve been hanging in there this far and i’m not unhappy doing it.  might as well keep going now.  but i’m paying attention.  i’m stretching the vessel.  turning it upside down. cross-eyed.  sober.  honest.  digging deeper. 

either way, i’m playing.  we’ve got this whole summer booked!  may through september.  oh hell yes. 

stay tuned for some website re-construction.  and some new photos of the complete lineup of the Jason Shannon Band.

hang in there, wherever you are,
jason

p.s. go see Crazy Heart