Back to work

It has been some time since I posted anything here.  Lots of other stuff going on, much of it music-related, hence fair game for “Diary of a Music Man.”

For the last half a year or so, I have been a member of songwriter’s group.  It is not the usual writer’s group (songwriter or otherwise) in that there is no teacher and no lessons.

The premise of the group is “We are the writers at a music publishing company and we are all writing on assignment.”  So, every time we meet, there is a new assignment and it’s usually something along the lines that an artist or his/her manager would be seeking.  Then the group members do the assignment with the goal of creating something of good and marketable quality.

I would like to give special thanks to my friend Jane Bolduc for suggesting me to the group (you can only join by group consent and pretty much everyone in the group was brought in by by someone they knew who was already in the group).

This group (and the two others like them in Southern California) was established by songwriter Marty Martin, a longtime fixture on the L.A. songwriting scene, who passed away prior to my appearance in the group.  I am grateful to him for starting these groups as I see myself and the other writers improving and writing more commercially competitive (and just better) songs in this environment.

At the start of each 14-or-so-week session, each member puts in a check for $100 (made out to no one).  Then we write a song every two weeks, according to a new assignment.  So, at the end we will have five or six new songs.  One of the meetings is set aside to present a rewrite of any of the previous assignments.  At the last meeting of the session, we have a “Song Off,” in which each of the 10 members plays two of the five or six songs they wrote and the top three are chosen.  Sometimes the choosing is done by the group members (you can’t vote for yourself) and sometimes by outside people from various areas of the music industry. Then the checks are divided up into a first, second and third prize (the first being the most money and so on).

This last session, our “judges” were songwriters Kevin Fisher and Warren Sellers, each of whom possesses some pretty admirable songwriting credits.

I am proud to say that I took first prize with my song, “Rails.”

Here's the money shot.

It’s a soothing sort of thrill to be crowned by your peers or even those who are at a higher position but winning at songwriting (or any art) is a subjective exercise–not anything near as objective as having, for instance, the shortest time in the 50-yard dash.

I appreciate Warren’s and Kevin’s talents.  They are without a doubt uber-qualified to select a good song but had someone else been in their place, we’d certainly have had a different set of winners.

Winning is great but in the ever-truthful words of Bachman-Turner Overdrive: “You’re only as good as your last record.”*

Yeah, winning is great.  Recognition is nice.  Money is always good.  But none of that is IT.  IT is continuing to work, to write better, more meaningful and more accessible songs–giving people what they want to hear and/or need to hear.

I’ve got lots of new stuff you ain’t heard yet (yeah, that’s right: ain’t).  Stay tuned.

Thanks for reading,

Steve

*Lyric from the “Rock is My Life and This is My Song,” written by Randy Bachman, from the album Not Fragile, released in 1974.

L.A., L.A.

I live and work in Los Angeles and have for about ten years.  Prior to that, I lived in various locations in the San Fernando Valley which is a sprawling part of L.A. County but it is not what I think of when I think “Los Angeles.”   Los Angeles, as I perceive it, is the 323 and 213 area codes, the urban, as oppose the suburban Valley.  Certainly there are locations in Los Angeles which are more urban than where I live, in Hollywood-Silverlake.

On the topic of urban life, how many cops does it take to arrest one man?

I came out of work one night a few months back, onto Sunset Blvd., on foot.  As I headed east toward Cahuenga Blvd., I noticed one or two police cars down the street and what looked like an arrest.  There were three cops wrestling with what looked like someone who did not want to be arrested.  In a matter of about twenty seconds, a dozen more cop cruisers screamed to the scene from every possible direction, cops a-popping out and toward the scuffle.  The man would not give in.  People filmed it with their phones from across the street at the club, which I heard someone say he’d been ejected from.

I had to roll my eyes at the ridiculous display of police “force”—like using a tank to kill a snail.  I don’t care who the perp was: if three or even four officers couldn’t bring him under control, then it seems they should have to forfeit the right to arrest him.

I know my blog is usually about more cheerful things but this has been on my mind.  This and the days when it seems the sirens come one after the next, minute to minute, like a terrible Top 40 countdown where all the song really do sound the same.

I am relieved and pleased to say that today I don’t recall hearing any.

And then you walk out the door and see something like this:

Virgil Ave. south of Santa Monica Blvd., January 29, 2011

And you (I) think to yourself (myself), “L.A.’s not so bad.”

When the sky in a L.A. is beautiful, it’s “Oscar class” beautiful, as my friend Richard would say.

Well, I haven’t written a song about it though I have been writing (and recording) quite a bit here is Los Angeles.

Here’s something new called “I Will Miss You, ” which I trust you will enjoy.

Thanks for reading,

Steve

www.stevennealwagner.com

Push pins

At about 11 am last Halloween morning, a nice old lady in a big, maroon Lincoln Continental helped me out by wrecking my little speck of a car while I was in line at a red light. I really liked my car. It was small, great on gas, easy to park—in short, the perfect city commuter car. I was pissed at having my space invaded, my hatchback perforated and my hood corrugated (against the tow bar of the big American SUV in front of me) but, curiously, I did not feel so great a loss for the car as I would have expected. I was just pissed off at having my day forced into a pattern other than the one I’d intended.

Otherwise I was pretty calm about it all.

Perhaps you will see it this way, if you subscribe to such ideas: I’d had this side job I’d been doing for several years. It would take me almost eight hours every Sunday, with travel time. For more than a year, I’d wanted to quit doing it, as I wanted the time for my growing music production…but needed the money (welcome to planet Earth). I’d worked out my finances so that I could live without the income and, on top of that, the company was leaving L.A., so I’d lose the job anyway. But that decision was still hanging there in space: “I don’t want to do this work anymore.” Add to that, the realization that I’d wanted to get some regular exercise for quite some time. I am not the kind of person who will make time to go to the gym. If I can’t get my exercise in some way that’s practical, I am not likely to make extra time for it.

That's my (former) car's front end and some lady's rear end.

So, here’s these two decisions I’d made. Those things (decisions, conclusions) don’t just evaporate. They’re like push-pins in a map. You can go back and see where you pushed the pin in. And I think they have the power to change the directions of the roads on the map–the roads being the directions one life goes in.  (So like I said…if you subscribe to such ideas. )

The lady in the Lincoln just happened to come along and help me make good on my conclusions so perhaps I should have been nicer to her.

Annoyed with the situation, I was exchanging insurance information and talking to her insurance company on the phone, when she casually asked me (about my car), “What kind of car is this?” I hesitated…looked at her as if she just asked me if I’d ever heard of Amway and slowly replied, “It’s…a…wrecked car.”

I am okay. There’s a certain satisfaction in just knowing that such wreckage is not your fault. I had some minor whiplash, got physical therapy, etc.

But all of a sudden, I am without a car and, despite being able to buy another, I curiously did not want to re-enter the world of the commuter. I entered instead the world of the mass-transit customer, the pedestrian.

This has been going on for more than four months and…I like it.

More to come.

Mind your dreams

It’s 2 am January 2^nd and I am wide awake but not for lack of trying to sleep. I turned the lights out at a little after midnight, after a long and productive day recording a new song but I guess, in my musicmaking enthusiasm, I drank too much coffee. It was good French roast but I probably could have done without it, since I usually don’t lack enthusiasm or concentration when it comes to recording and arranging.

This was my New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day: Friday afternoon, 5 pm, I fired up the Mac and added drums to a recording I did earlier this year which suffered for lack of real drums. It’s a Beatlesque number called “We Won” and I’d originally recorded it mostly at my desk at home (I did the vocals in my car). I supplied the rhythm with my foot, tapping on the floor (for the bass drum) and smacking a phone book with a real drum stick (for the snare drum). Through the miracle of Apple’s Garageband program, I was able to make a very convincing drum performance for it, also while sitting at my desk, pecking at my computer keyboard. Time spent: three hours. You can hear the new and improved “We Won” here.

Then I launched into creating the sections for a new song called “Eye on the Mountain,” and worked on the guitars, bass guitar and drum parts for that until about 1:30 am New Year’s Day.

I spent a total of nine hours at the computer. When I finally stood up to stretch, my back and shoulders crackled like brown leaves underfoot.

I called my mother just before midnight to wish her a happy new year and I called my brother about a quarter after to do the same. (I talked to my dad earlier in the day.)

On Saturday morning I awoke an hour before the generous 10:30 alarm I’d set and got right to work, but not before taking a shave and trimming the sideburns (it’s New Year’s Day, afterall). I got the entire track done, except for vocals, by 9 pm. So, I spent almost another nine hours or so.

Despite being a musicmaking maniac, I knew I had to get out of the house and look at something other than the screen (the oh, so lovely screen) of an i-Mac. It was not a moment too soon. Had I left much later, I’d have missed one of the most beautiful, spectacular skies I have seen in years: a tender blue ceiling with windblow clouds in pleasing, random patterns stretching across the horizon. I found myself smiling and wishing I’d had a camera (not for me—I still recall the moment—I wanted to show it to you.) It was a sky tailor made for a new year’s day.

Sure, it’s a bit of a lonesome way to spend this time of year but it’ll be worth it when I have a beautiful finished product to share with you (it’s gonna pin yer ears back, lemme tell ya…).

I had my wacky social times on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, going with a friend to see a movie (the Coen Brothers’ True Grit—excellent) on the former and then doing a guitar-vocal solo gig performing Christmas carols, oldies and classic rock at a large church Christmas dinner on the latter. During the dinner, I got a request for the Eagles’ “Peaceful Easy Feeling,” (a song I don’t think I’d actually ever performed before) and pretty much nailed it from memory.

Oh, and don’t let’s forget that rain we had…

I hope your Christmas and New Year’s brought you much pleasure and good memories and even a big fat Christmas bonus.

Mind your dreams and make ‘em come true in the new year.

Sincerely,

Steve

http://www.stevennealwagner.com/

Something new (old?) for you.

When I write, it is in silence.

Except for the sounds of the environment, I work with no added sound/noise.

Not tonight.

At the moment, I am listening to “He Could Be the One” by Josie Cotton–remember?  It was in the final scene of the movie Valley Girl. It is a chugging bit of new wave pop with a sort of Phil Spector girl-group feel. A pretty tight little hip-shaker is “He Could Be the One” (why hasn’t some enterprising he-rocker done a “She Could Be the One” version?).

I don’t regularly drink either (so tonight must be irregular).  And never do I write when I have been drinking.   However, I sometimes drink when I listen to music and vice-versa.  You could probably conclude that I don’t drink and write with music on.  There are exceptions to every rule and this isn’t even a rule with me.

But enough about me.  Do you drink?  Listen to music?  Listen to music while drinking?  Write while music is playing?  (Perhaps while listening to songs about drinking?)

(Now I am listening to “Everywhere You’re Not” by Translator, a San Francisco guitar band from the ’80s with an interesting, jangly sound.  Their lead singer was/is a poet.  His name is Steven too, so keep that in mind.)

So, what is all this about?

It was just two beers...don't get all Carrie Nation on me.

I am merely leading you into the room to listen to a new song/recording.  Some months ago, I started asking my friends via Facebook to give me a title and style of music and I would write a song, record it and post it in a week.  I did one, “Up, Down and All Around” (the person, my friend Lorita, did not suggest a style of music) and then another, “We Won” (a title which came from Leigh Ann, who suggested the style of the early Beatles).  This title-into-song game served to kickstart my stalled songwriting (which is now tooling along nicely, thank you).

But enough about me.  Do you drink?  Listen to music?  Listen to music while drinking?  Write while music is playing?  (Perhaps while listening to songs about drinking?)

(Now I am listening to “Bye, Bye Love” by the Cars, which is such driving power-pop I can’t even tell ya [no pun intended either--I surprised myself with that one].  The Everly Brothers had a song called Bye-Bye Love” in the late ’50s, which just goes to show you that it all comes around.)

Anyhow, I started writing “Holiday Weekend” on the heels of “We Won,” being as I was on a the galaxy-sized inspiration (for me anyway) of the clean rockin’ sounds of the late ’50s and early ’60s.

(Now I am listening to Television’s “See No Evil.”  Television were a mid-’70s New York punk-era guitar band that I can’t otherwise describe for you.  If you’ve heard them, you either love ‘em or hate ‘em.   If you haven’t heard ‘em, well…at least you don’t hate ‘em.)

“Holiday Weekend” is in the vein of early Beach Boys or Dave Clark 5, if you remember them.  I hope you like it. You can listen to it here.  I recommend you turn it up LOUD.  Your neighbors will think you are having a party and will come over with snacks.

Love,

Steve

http://www.stevennealwagner.com/

(P.S.: Now I am listening to The Record’s “Starry Eyes,” which is such a joyous four minutes and 24 seconds of ’79 UK power pop that I swear it goes by in two minutes 30 seconds.)

Power poppin’

If you know me well, you know that I never go out.  I have driven my friends into apathy about ever getting me to do anything on my time off ever again.  It has brought about some bad blood.  Recriminations.  Threats of violence, of being officially excluded from the club.  “Here’s your f***ing marbles! Now go—no…stay home!”

So, of course, I “played against type” and went out two Friday nights in a row, rocked out, drank beer and stayed out late.

No, really.  I did.  Keep reading.

I suppose, upon “growing up,” I have allowed my social life to sort of shrink and shrivel up, not unlike a dish of chocolate pudding left too long in the fridge.  As gruesome as it sounds, my thinking on the matter has  been, “What’s to be gained?  Shouldn’t I be attending to something practical?  Producing something?  Getting ahead somehow?”

When I actually got into the spirit of getting out there, breaking with routine, it all came back to me:  The intangible benefits of having a good time (good title for a book, eh?).  Intangible perhaps; beneficial definitely.

By now, you might be wondering what “power popping” is.  (It has nothing to do with popcorn makers.)  Power poppin’ is the activity of enjoying power pop.  Power pop is a genre (or subgenre) of rock music.

Peter Townsend of The Who coined the term “power pop” in a 1967 interview in which he used the term to describe the sound of his group.  The term didn’t really stick for The Who but later came to describe a kind of pop-rock music influenced by The Beatles and other English groups of the sixties, as well as Americans like The Byrds:  crisp vocal harmonies, crunchy guitars and/or chiming, jangly 12-string guitars, a heavy beat, sometimes with wild drumming and song subject matter centering on girls (new ones, strange ones, treasonous ones, unreachable ones) and love (new, old, lost, desired) but could also include school, the daily grind, the joy of rock and roll, etc.

The Golden Age of Power Pop was, in my estimation, from about 1971 to 1979 (just my opinion—there was certainly some great stuff before and after).

“…on stage, he was all business too: rock and roll business.  With as good a band as any power-popper-rock ‘n roller could ask for, Collins gave us the classics (“Rock and Roll Girl,” “I Don’t Fit In,” “Look But Don’t Touch”) and other songs from lesser-known albums which…kicked ass!  The man just has a way with a musical hook.   And he sings like a man on fire—a man on fire who has gargled a handful of nails.

Paul Collins’ Beat released their first album in 1979.  I have heard it sold 50,000 copies.  Thought he toured and released subsequent albums, commercially speaking, things seemed to level off.  I noted he was still at it in ’90s and then I (and others) lost track of him.  But that first album stuck with people.  Enter the MySpace-Facebook era and Collins, who’d persisted in the face of seemingly overwhelming odds, discovers he’s got pockets of fans all over the world.  He’s back in action and is soon all over YouTube, playing the famed South By Southwest and, in short order, is universally acknowledged to be The King of Power Pop (which, unironically, is the title of his new CD).  Through my good friend (and rabid Paul Collins fan) Bill Berry, I find out he’s going to be playing in L.A., probably for the first time in 30 years.

Me and Bill plan to go and then the day came and…we went!  It was at a dive-y sort of bar in downtown LA and the place was crammed with all the Power Pop People.  The DJ was spinning old vinyl 45s of stuff I’d not heard in years (well, not on vinyl, anyway).  It was sorta now and sorta then but not really nostalgic at all.  Mr. Collins himself was manning the merchandise table and was, understandably, all business.

Paul Collins

And on stage, he was all business too: rock and roll business, thank you very much.  With as good a band as any power-popper rock ‘n roller could ask for, Collins gave us the classics (“Rock and Roll Girl,” “I Don’t Fit In,” “Look But Don’t Touch” and bunch of other stuff you’ve probably never heard) and also other songs from some of his lesser-known albums which…kicked ass, my friend!  The man has a way with a musical hook.   And he sings like a man on fire—a man on fire who has gargled a handful of nails.

If you are scratching your head, I understand.  Collins as a name is obscure for sure to the average man on the street but his music is rooted in things you know so well (Buddy Holly, Beatles, Beach Boys, etc.) that it would probably be very welcome in your CD or mp3 player.   I stood on a chair in the bar all night boppin’ and boppin’ and not stoppin’ the power poppin’.  Heck, it’s really, as Collins himself says, just “good solid rock ‘n roll.”   My neck hurt for a couple days afterward and I DID NOT CARE.  Me and Bill and the other 156 people in that bar had waited about 30 years for this and Collins did not disappoint.

Paul, if you are reading this:  Thanks for still having the power pop-rock ‘n roll spirit and doing what you do so well.

The following Friday night, good friend Bill Berry and I made our way to the world-famous Troubadour club in West Hollywood, where so many major acts have played, I am not even going to bore you with a partial list of them.  It is, hands down, my favorite place to see a concert: small but not too small and just about the best and most balanced sound I’ve heard anywhere.  And the concert for which I had purchased tickets months in advance and for which I stood in line with good friend Bill?  Well, that group would be Fountains of Wayne (FOW, named after a now-defunct New Jersey establishment which sold fountains, like, for your front yard…for the birds to bathe in or whatever).

I bought the first FOW CD in ’98 and enjoyed it but at the time, I felt that while they were tuneful, they just were not sincere.   I was never sure if they were laughing with their songs’ characters or at them.  I ended up not following them, didn’t buy any of their subsequent releases…until 2010, when good friend Bill sent me an mp3 of the FOW’s “Girl I Can’t Forget.”

If you want to quit drinking coffee, get this song and play it first thing in the morning.  It contains some of the wildest and imaginative rhyming I’d ever heard in a power pop (or any) song, brassy horns in just the right spot and a crazy story line that they wrap up with a master’s finesse.  It just floored me and rehabilitated my interest in the group.   I poked around on YouTube and listened to some more of their later stuff and it just…changed my effin’ life!  I went out the next day and bought everything of theirs in one purchase and I listened to nothing but FOW for months.

Fountains of Wayne

It made me see that one needn’t be “sincere” to create emotional impact.  Man does not live by James Taylor alone.  (Warning: Tangent Ahead.)  As a songwriter, I think I can safely speak for many that we go through (and sometimes get stuck in) the phase of being “deep,” confessional, first-person, etc. because we think that’s what songwriting should be.  FOW don’t often hoe that row but they are first-class song craftsmen.

Anyway, they hit the stage at the Troubadour a couple Friday nights ago and my foot was stomping so hard, I thought the balcony where I was sitting was going to crack off and fall to the floor.  FOW were not perfect.  They were not even particularly personable.  They were dry.  Deadpan.  And rocked like crazy.  They had fun amongst themselves, invited some kids from the audience to come up and play percussion with them on the Simon & Garfunkle-y “Hey Julie” and did I mention that they rocked like crazy?  Their lead guitar player gave the audience some of the best lead guitarist moves since Jimi Hendrix or Jimmy Page.  A real showman in an age of pop musicians who by and large seem afraid to stop looking at their feet.

Good friend Bill observed that the entire club was “full of people just like us.”  People who knew.  I declared that I hoped FOW go on making records forever.

And if you’re my friend and you know of some cool power pop or Paul Collins/FOW-like rock ‘n roll, you too can get me out of the house.

Thanks for reading,

Steve

http://www.stevennealwagner.com/

Thanks Ma.

I think I may be guilty sometimes of not acknowledging my mother as much as she ought to be acknowledged.  I can only speak for myself about this area but I wonder if other men and boys have also made it a point of trying not to be identified with their mothers–trying not to agree with them too much on things, trying not to be like them in certain ways.  (Then again, didn’t I go through this with regard to my father at an earlier time in my life?  Yep.  Sure did.)

“What the ****,” I can hear you saying now.  “I thought this was ‘Diary of Music Man,’ not ‘Diary of a Mama’s Boy.’”

Gimme a second.  I’m getting there.

I was unloading my equipment from my car this morning (I had a gig last night at a tavern in Hermosa Beach, California).  The last item I unloaded was a travel bag containing a little battery-powered amplifier I use when I busk.  Last night I was using it as a vocal monitor (a speaker in front of a performer which allows him/her to hear approximately what the audience is hearing through the main speakers), plugged into the main PA system, down on the floor pointing at me (this is a very loud gig with insufficient monitors, so this is what I did in order to be able to make sure I was singing the right notes).  The bag is an overnight bag that came with a rollaway suitcase my mother gave me a few years ago.  They are both made out of  heavy black material.  The bag is damn-near tailored for the amp, all my cords and musical doo0dads that I take on this particular gig.  I had needed something at the last moment and tried this out and it was perfect.  I was suddenly really grateful for the bag–a bag my mother gave me.

The rollaway has also been used mostly for musical purposes.  When I busk, I fit the amp, cords, a music stand, tip jar, microphones, boxes of CDs and all manner of musician stuff in there and roll it to my destination.  It has spared me much time, effort and expense.  I once had one fellow busker look at this “rig” and pronounce it “tight.”

I suspect that my mother (who lives in Vegas) gave me the rollaway as a little hint and while I may not have rolled away to Vegas as often as she would like, I have put her gift to continuous and grateful use.

Thanks Ma.

“Wow.  Your mom gave you a suitcase.  That’s…cool,”  you’re probably thinking (while rolling your eyes).  “Surely there must be more to the story.”

Isn’t there always?

While artistically inclined from the time I could hold a pencil, I was never particularly interested in playing music.  Oh, I loved to listen to it and considered the radio my very best friend and confidante.  There were times in my life when the songs that came out of the radio understood who I was better than anyone I knew.  And there again Mom comes in the picture.  When I was young and my folks had separated, it was a bit destabilizing.  Of course, I didn’t rationalize it like that at the time but I found in the radio, a stabilizing presence.  I would later appropriate my mother’s kitchen AM-FM and take it into my room for lengths of time, where I could listen to it at night or after school in my young teenage isolation.  But even earlier on, I appropriated my mother’s Panasonic cassette recorder, which was the most fun toy–a total fascination for me.  I would record my voice and hours and hours of AM radio hits, right off the radio.  (This certainly fueled my later interest in recording.)

Again: Thanks Ma.

But about playing music.  One day in the sixth grade, I just decided I wanted to learn to play guitar.  My mother had had a guitar in the house ever since I could remember (though I don’t recall ever hearing her play it).  Had she been a flautist, perhaps I’d have gone that route, but no– there was a guitar in the house and so I knew I could probably use it.  My mother was totally fine with that.

Thanks again Ma.

I did not have many luxuries growing up but I was free to play my guitar for hours after school.  Later, I was free to plug in and play electric.  At home.  For hours.  Even later on, I was free to play the drums in my bedroom (and we lived in an apartment, mind you).  In eleven years, only one person ever complained and it wasn’t anyone in my family.  I was free as well to drop out of community college to play in a garage band.

I could have had a less obliging mother who insisted I stay in college and “make something of myself” or “have something to fall back on.”  Perhaps I would have been wealthier today but I know I’d have been no happier.

She may be reading this now and thinking that none of this is really anything to make a big deal of.  So, I won’t make a big deal about it but certainly I will accord it the appreciation and dignification it deserves.

Thanks Ma.  You could have been a completely different person and I could have had a completely different experience:  one without radios, cassette recorders, guitars, art, plenty of latitude and the experiences that shaped and contributed to who I am.  Compared to the 14-year-old me, who only wanted to be like everybody else and for whom nothing was ever good enough, the today me would not want to be anyone else and I find I am relatively easily satisfied. I appreciate what I have and I appreciate the things you’ve done for me.

Love,

Steve

Experience is the only honest critic

Longtime “Diary of Music Man” readers will know that I have spent most of the last year or so “busking” (playing in public places for tips) and that it had its minor adventures and major insights. When I play alone, I can be fairly comfortable. The passersby don’t pay microscopic attention to what I do (and are as forgiving as saints if they do) so my goofs, missed lyrics, blown chords, etc., don’t really affect anyone else. I have good rhythm and I don’t miss a beat. It flows along.

When you play with others however, that goof factor takes on an entirely new context. It has the power to bring a song to a ragged, shuddering landing on only one engine or to a thud-crush nosedive ball of flames where even the black box can’t be recovered (as if anyone would want to listen to what’s on it).  Oh, perhaps it’s not all that dramatic.

However, when you play with others, you really have to have your act together. You need to know the words, the chord changes, signature melodic licks and rhythms, etc. You need to have equipment of a certain quality, that stays in tune and sounds good and isn’t going to break into pieces during the climactic solo section of “Ramblin’ Man.”

I have recently grown tired of busking. I don’t like not knowing if I will have a place to play (all of a sudden, the last couple of times I went to my usual place, other people were also showing up, plugging in and blaring away—and this spot isn’t anything like the Third Street Promenade: the comparatively tiny space will not comfortably allow for four singer-guitarists all playing away [different songs] at the same time).  So, I started seeking gigs in places with doors and roofs, with other people.

And then the adventure began.

I got an e-mail one recent Saturday morning from a fella seeking a “sub” (that’s “substitute”) for a paying gig for one of his bandmembers who has another gig. We spoke on the phone, found he was more concerned with a confident harmony singer (yeah, that’s me) than a wanna-be Eddie Van Flailin’ and I agreed to take the gig.

The fella turned out to be a very cool dude with years of touring experience under his belt backing a famous (though recently deceased) Cajun blues great. He’s a great singer and guitar player with hundreds of songs sequenced in MIDI, which we played and sang along with. A different approach than I am use to, but alright.

I  made my share of misses and goofs. But I held my own and actually nailed it most of the time. Most of the people I spoke to in the bar would not believe that me and this dude had never played together before. He was happy with the musical help and I was happy with the opportunity and income.

Had the guy been a perfectionist jerk, I would not be writing this entry, but he was cool, his philosophy being that no one of us is perfect. We all have our strengths and weakness and don’t bullshit anyone about what you are capable of (as some people seem to do until you ask them to show up at the gig and play for money).

And my philosophy? It’s that experience is the best teacher and only honest critic (if you’re honest with yourself, that is). Stepping up and doing the gig will tell you where you are strong and where you need improvement.

I am available for session and live work in L.A. and surrounding areas; Classic rock, oldies or original material; Lead and harmony vocals, acoustic and electric lead and rhythm guitar. I will listen to you and to the music, and do my best to give you what you want.  E-mail me at snw (at) stevennealwagner (dot) com.

Square? I’m there.

I am going to knock this out—from first word to “send” in a half-hour.  It’s 1:35 am.  Here I go.

What the hell is so good about “bad”?

Don’t get me wrong.  I love my black leather jacket and you can catch me cleaning house to AC/DC sometimes.  “Bad” is okay but I just think it went too far.

Now, that whole pasty white Pat Boone thing of the mid-fifties? Yeah, perhaps that was swinging too far in the other direction (because it wasn’t really “swinging” much at all).

But if you roll back the history, you’ll find that while there were some bawdy r&b numbers in the early rock and roll days (“Roll With Me Henry” and others), it was in the minority.  It was not mainstream.  Not that I don’t think it should have been.  It was a song about sex (the term “rock and roll” itself is a reference to the sex act) and we’ve heard plenty of those in the mainstream, particularly in the last 20 years (Madonna, etc.) but once upon a time, sex was something that happened in a bedroom, not on a radio.  I think I could be happy with it still in the bedroom (or backseat of daddy’s car even).

Anyway, the youth culture exploded in the generation following the end of World War Two and it brought on the Golden Age of Rock and Roll from about 1958 to 1966.

While marijuana and heroin had been around for decades or more and had been abused, it was the appearance of LSD and amphetamines in society and into the arts in the mid-sixties that coincided with the music becoming darker, louder, distorted, introverted, overtly sexual and even Satanic.  I don’t think it was a good thing over all.  Certainly not as a steady diet.  I doubt that pop music would have taken such a turn without the influence of drugs.  It would have “grown up” at some point and every generation has its innocence and its bubblegum I suppose, but the darkness has never entirely left and in some cases, it’s just gotten darker.

I was driving through Hollywood and saw a billboard advertising a new album by one of today’s dark, heavy bands, with song titles including “Cryin’ Like a Bitch!!” and “Love-Hate-Sex-Pain.”  Heck, that about covers all the bases doesn’t it?  And don’t those titles just make you feel…

I wonder why we can’t have it a little more like it was from 1958 to 1966.  Would that be so bad?

I know: Maybe I will get slammed as being a critic or a square, a goody-two shoes, a dickless girly-man, a member of “the Moral Majority,” a young old fart or a Republican for having such an opinion.  I will always uphold an artist’s right to communicate their reality, be it one of love and light or one of pain and darkness.  I just wonder sometimes why we can’t have it a little more like it was from 1958 to 1966.  Would that be so bad?

Two days ago, I was feeling particularly apathetic and hopeless and despite having some uptempo music in the car (which I could just not relate to at that moment), I put in Love’s Forever Changes–one of he eeriest and more disturbing psychedelic rock records ever: “Sitting on a hillside, watching all the people die, I’ll feel much better on the other side.”  It reflected my mood, to a degree.

But, in the main, I find I’d rather hear about life than death, rather hear about love than sex, rather be raised up than dragged down.  The Beatles hit this for me in 95% of what they do.  I listen to the Stones and their bluesy, boozey, earthy, lusty songs.  I rock and roll a bit but it doesn’t have the same effect for me.  It’s darker in most cases.  I love the Kinks but if you really follow the words in a lot of their songs (especially the stuff from their fertile mid- to late-sixties period), you may find they can be very sarcastic, even mean.  Great melodies for sure but the attitude sometimes leaves me feeling bothered.  It’s a sort of flow, a wavelenth even.  Even my beloved Fountains of Wayne (I listened to nothing but FOW for about three months solid) despite their musicality, indelible melodies and remarkable lyric craft, can be sarcastic, sardonic…you’re never sure if they’re rooting for the protagonist in their songs or ridiculing him/her.

Check out how you start to feel the next time you are exposed to sarcasm or someone being ridiculed.  Doesn’t make you feel good.  The Fab Four were always about love and it came through in their music I always feel better for having listened to them.  I get the same lift from Buddy Holly, much of the Beach Boys, the Dave Clark Five and others.

I’m kinda “square” but I just don’t care.

I recently posted the full versions of the songs from my CD here.  They are not particularly happy but they are sober and not fixed on sex or pain.  Some happy ones are here.

Thanks for read and keep on rock ‘n rolling.

Steven

Inside the Beatles

When writing a blog entry (or a song) I usually start from a title and that is what sparks my imagination and orients my idea so that the subsequent ideas have a place from which to follow.  But I ain’t got that tonight.  I am tired.  I had sugar (always good for wrecking my energy).   But I want to write something to you, so…we must overcome “tired” and sugar.

My latest song is something new and quite different than what I would expect of myself.  It’s probably also a lot different that what most people who know my music would expect.  But I guess the definition of “my music” is beginning to expand.  A very sharp and quite prolific writer once said (and I paraphrase) that a professional writer is someone who could write professionally in any style (or at least many).  Well, I don’t know if I am up to that task and there are some styles I have no affinity for anyway, but being able to knock out an authentic blues number (though it’s not something I would usually do) is something I’d like to be able to do.

I do this thing on Facebook every now and then: I will post a message like “Give me a title and a style and will write and record a song and post it here in a week.”  The last one I did elicited only a few responses and only one of them was useful.  The title suggestion was “We Won” and the style suggestion was “early Beatles.”

Sure, I am as big or bigger a Beatles fan as anyone but I’d never done a close analysis of their song structures.  So, after settling on a concept of the song (finding true love) I knocked out a passable “We Won” lyric only to discover it was not really a structure much like the typical early Beatles song.  Check it out:  “Love Me Do,” “She Loves You” and others are not the typical verse-chorus songs we mostly hear nowadays.  Even the verse-chorus early Beatle tunes have, for instance, really short verses—like two lines.  Not the same structure as the longer, more linear, confessional stuff I’d studied so hard to learn and emulate.  So, I started listening closer.  (Frankly, I don’t think a songwriter or musician can ever listen closely enough to the Beatles.  There’s always something there to hear, enjoy and learn from.)

(Look out! Hairpin turn ahead!) There’s a somewhat gross omission I have noticed in music instruction in general.  It seems to concentrate a lot on your hands or your memorization of things or technique.  I have found that for me,  learning musical things requires as much that you “get inside” them.  It is as if your mind permeates whatever it is you are studying and, rather than learning it or memorizing it, you become it and you “have” it in a way that I don’t think can be expressed in words.  It is an understanding of the unseen but but mentally or spiritually perceptible contours, shapes, sizes and relationships between parts.  It is not “book learning.”  It’s  “feel learning.”

So, in some satisfactory degree, I did this with the Beatles.  With their song stuctures, chord progressions, etc.  My final product did not come out like a carbon-copy Beatle sound-alike but I feel it definitely captures the feeling of the era and the kinds of songs they did back then.  Might even sound like some other groups from that period.  You let me know: http://www.stevennealwagner.com/newsongs.html

Thanks for reading,

Steve