Forever Unknown

Thursday, July 31st 2014

By the time you read this, I’ll be high-tailing it to California for the umpteenth time this month with my band, BoomrangKids. I should just buy a jet already. Do you think they come in the form of a 1969 AMC Rambler? If so, give me that debt and sign me up. I’m terrified of heights, but for some strange reason I love being on a plane. I don’t get it, and I don’t bother questioning it. I’d say I’m sick of the scenery of I-5, but there’s only a sliver of truth there. It’s better than sitting still, I suppose. Besides, the scenery really isn’t all that bad. At least up to Redding. And anything South of it. I believe I’ve expressed my love for that rough patch of molasses we were stuck in not once, but twice, just a few short weeks ago (but feels like a lifetime), in a previous blog. Feel free to look it up.

This is the last blog I’ll be writing for the weekly Chasing The Dream series in the month for 96.9TheRogue, and I almost forgot to write it. So, once again, I’m spending the night/morning at Shari’s with coffee and deep thought. I guess this is my new routine, and I really don’t feel like breaking it. My days are too filled up to sit down and rack my brain, and the most creativity (so I’ve heard) cruelly comes after midnight. I should just strap a Go-Pro to my head and give you my day-to-day routines for a blog. Sometimes I think a schizophrenic would be envious. Not that I live some crazy/wild & adventurous life. Just sporadic, at best.

So tonight, I reached out to my friends for a subject to write about. Asking for either: A) The deepest subject, or B) The simplest. Surprisingly, at 1:30AM, I got quite a number of varying responses (I’ve decided all will be a topic in future blogs). But there was one in particular that stuck out. It was on (you guessed it) music. I was hoping to stray from that and find something completely different, but what it consisted of, and the pure beauty of the descriptive words (props to my brother Josh, AKA – Acousta Noir), grabbed me and immediately opened the floodgates of my mind. To sum it up as best I can, he talked about the troubles of being an independent singer-songwriter these days, and the vicious cycle troubadours find themselves in. It was absolutely fascinating, and inspiring. I honestly could not even keep up with my mind to write everything I wanted to say, so I apologize for sounding crazy over the next few paragraphs. Bear with me.

Being familiar with that field myself, I can completely understand and sympathize with the fact that some of the greatest “songbirds” of our generation go completely unnoticed. It’s so sad to me that the harsh realities are the fact that most will not get the true recognition they deserve until after they leave this world. It’s romantic in a sense, but tragic, really. We see them in dive bars, independent festivals, house shows, and even the street corners. They live the life they sing about, and it not only shows in most, but you can feel it. It’s amazing, the power of a truly heartfelt written song, and being right there in front of it. I’m getting chills just thinking about it.

I guess another reason this is a good time to touch down on this subject is because one of the books I’m reading at the moment is called ‘Music & the Mind’. By “distinguished psychologist and author” – Anthony Storr. He reaches deep into the logistics of music, and digs down into different cultures, philosophers, eras and even animals. From Darwin, Stravinsky and Freud to Native Americans, infants & mothers, birdsong, basically anything living or breathing that has touched down on this earth. I haven’t finished reading it yet, but am excited to see what else he and his predecessors have to say on my favorite subject. If blogs were the size of books, I’d write an anthology on my opinions of music right here & now, and why I feel it is such a huge, huge part of our existence. Yet, so mysterious in it’s ways. It’s so embedded in us, that we don’t even give it proper recognition these days. We “use” it for everything. Civil War era used it to march into battle and intimidate, Native Americans and other indigenous tribes use it for Ceremony (all separate throughout the world, yet somehow it became a natural part of their respective cultures), we use it to praise god/s, make love, express ourselves, to get us through some of our greatest struggles in life. It’s everywhere. The wind, rivers, birds, our footsteps, machinery, our fucking heartbeat. It creates order out of chaos. What song is playing in your head right now? Think about it. You might not be acknowledging it, but I bet my AMC Rambler Jet that there’s one right there in your head at this precise moment. For me personally, it’s constant. Maybe I’m just crazy.

Flutes carved from bone have been found in caves dating back to Paleolithic times, but since there was no form of music notation, we’ll never know what music was to them. Imagine the possibilities, what they could have had equivalent to The Beatles. Fascinating. And yet, here we are. So spoiled with our riches and technologies, that we don’t acknowledge the true, simple beauties and necessities in life, and what can really bring us together as a human family. We’re over-run and force fed a bunch of bullshit to keep us on dividing lines. Then given an image of what we should be, who we should look like, what we should be doing with our lives and who we should praise. Rather than give our future generations a keen interest in art, music (creativity in general) or whatever it may be that comes natural to them, we reinforce whatever insecurities they may have by making them believe they were put here to compete. And we fund it all. I’m not going to dive down that rabbit hole of negativity, I choose to avoid it at all costs. But I’ll tell you this much: You show me two complete opposites on this earth, and I’ll show you their commonalities. And it most likely starts with music. Everybody has a favorite song, and a number of memories that tie to a number of songs. Ever wonder why it is you get the chills when you hear a song that really strikes a chord in you (so to speak)? Vibrations. When a song is crafted so naturally and beautifully, something inside of us recognizes that. And for that few minutes, that something is what connects our body and mind in a state of euphoric wonder. Cherish that moment as if it will last forever. Because it really can. As cliché as it sounds, I live for those moments. Psychologists try to analyze it and give it some sort of reason. Whether to stroke their own ego, or to ‘puff their chest’ at one another. (I don’t 100% believe in that last sentence, just giving an example. I am merely just an observer, so it’s all the same to me.) But there are some powers in this universe that are just that: too powerful for reason. In the immortal words of Paul McCartney: Let It Be.

Sure, you can shake your ass to a Nelly song (Is that reference outdated? Good. That’s the point I’m trying to make.), but can it bring you to tears? Can it raise the hairs on your arms and neck? Can it change your life? Can it bring a stadium of people together to sing ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’? Music is a movement, a tool in life that will always be used, and never used up. To wrap back to what I was originally saying, troubadours are heroes. Heroes that would rather be hated than ignored. I’m not conveying hate whatsoever. In fact, just the opposite. It’s just better to stir some sort of emotion out of people, than none at all. At least you know then you’ve made an impact. Through music we’re all connected, and where it comes from, we’ll most likely never know. But just the same, it’s one of the few things better left unknown. Rather felt, instead. That’s music. Below is the original excerpt of the post from my friend Josh. Thanks for keeping me up all night, amigo ;)

“I’m sitting here in the dark, picking on a 70 year old guitar, trying to find the right key to properly fit my voice to the melody of a song written by a good friend and one of the best songwriters I’ve heard. My life can be put on hold for a moment so that I may attempt to absorb just a small amount of the heart and depth that this particular songwriter manages to harness and convey. This man can bring musical greats to tears with his stories, and yet I’ve had conversations with him that revolved around his thoughts of giving up, as though he wasn’t good enough to continue. To think that what one man may feel is his failure could be the inspiration necessary for another man to uproot his life and forge a new path through this world is both humbling and terrifying. Why do we musicians and artists types so often find ourselves at the brutal mercy of self doubt? Is it in these most trying moments that we find the darkness necessary to rise above and help others along as we overcome? Or are these moments simply the price we pay for continually pouring our souls onto the sidewalks and bar room floors for nickels and beer? Perhaps we will never know, and this mystery is part of what draws others to our words and melodies. Perhaps all we can hope for is that some close and valuable few will understand and be there to reassure us and pull us up when we are low, and know that we will be there to do the same for them.”

***Thank you guys for reading and keeping up all month, next week I will be keeping this blog going and you can find it at – boomrangkids.tumblr.com***

-Kyle