Waiting for Miracles

"We are musicians. Recognise our genius!"

I've always felt quite uncomfortable about referring to myself as a 'musician' in the context of what I actually do, and for others to use the word to describe me can be worse; that engulfs me in waves of imposter syndrome.

As far as musicianship goes, my skills are basic. Like most primary school aged kids of the 60s and 70s, I was taught how to play the recorder. There's very little outlay in that the instrument is affordable, and that it is also so portable is a plus. It was merely a vehicle to get those crotchets, quavers and demisemiquavers into hungry young skulls.

Next for me, was the violin. Coming from a family of fiddle players - on my Dad's side - this seemed like a natural progression. If you’d like to know more about that, you might enjoy watching this interview with my Aunt Sheila, wherein she speaks with such fondness of her upbringing, and of the musicians that surrounded her.

Aunt Sheila, fiddle player and whistle player.

Unlike Aunt Sheila, in my hands the violin was more Les Dawson (yes, I know he spoofed on piano not violin) than Paganini. They say God loves a trier, well he must’ve adored the 8-year-old me as I diligently rosined my bow and screeched through dull tunes such as Little Brown Jug and The Hart He Loves the High Wood, frustrated that I wasn't able to whirl through reels and jigs like my Aunt could, and indeed my cousin Seamie would come to be able to. I was an impatient pupil not that willing to put in the hours.

My cousin Seamie O’Dowd

My teacher was quite an elderly man who died before he could cure me of my inadequacies. There then didn't seem much will from either my parents or myself, to find a replacement for him, and so that was the end of my violin days.

Thanks to maybe six months' worth of weekly piano lessons at the late age of 13 or 14 - and a lot of self-tuition - I can find my way around a piano without much of a problem, but only really for writing purposes. I can play well enough to be able to record myself and then fix the errors, but were you to visit my parlour expecting me to entertain you with Moonlight Sonata or Für Elise, you'd be sorely disappointed. At a push, you might get the intro to ‘Feel Alright’ by Supergrass, I suppose.

The only instrument I’d say I could properly play would be the bass. I can get lucky on an electric guitar sometimes, but that’s about it. I suppose my voice is my instrument, but that just comes out of me. I didn’t ever learn to sing, I just sang.

I know plenty of real musicians, people more patient than I, who have spent years honing their skills. Most of them are self-taught, but I'm not one for inverted snobbery, so those who got their Grade 8 clarinet thanks to Saturday afternoon lessons, I respect them just as much.

Another word I have a problem with - possibly unreasonably - is 'songwriter', and I think this comes from having known 'songwriters' who seem intent on duping people into believing that to be able to write a song is a little like being a member of The Magic Circle. They'd have you believe that there are so many mysterious secrets, that there are certain clandestine rites of passage, and that you have to worship some kind of hallowed premier league involving the likes of Neil Young, Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan. Of course, they're all great writers, whether you like them or not - and in my case I do like one out of the three - but to study them does not guarantee the placing of some Holy Grail of songwriting in your hands.

Delusions of grandeur.

Through a mutual contact, I once asked Andy Partridge of XTC if he'd come in to the University at which I taught, to do some kind of masterclass, or at least to impart some wise words to my students. He came back with a polite refusal, adding that really, all the students needed to do was to listen to the songs they loved, look at them deeply, then let that inform what they did themselves. That is exactly how I learned to write songs; by listening to music I loved, letting it become part of me, and creating on that basis.

Andy Partridge, whose motto may well be ‘Just Do It’.

I personally don’t believe you can teach songwriting - which is ironic coming from someone who was employed to do just that for eight years - but you can certainly mentor, encourage and advise. However, there are many, many books that do purport to teach you how to write songs - in fact I have a pile of them from when I taught at the uni -  but in reality, what a lot of them do is provide you with exercises. Some are interesting reads, for sure, something stimulating for the grey matter to chew on, but will any of these books make a songwriter of you? On their own, absolutely not.

Tsundoku* (積ん読) So many books, so few actually read.

What if I took a fancy to climbing Everest? As much as I might learn about crampons, belay devices and harnesses, it could never happen. Pack me in as much goose fat* as you like, but I'm never going to swim the Channel. You see, the tools can be provided but you have to have… Now how can I say this? It’s not the ‘x’ factor, but I suppose you have to have something, and along with many thousands and thousands of others, it seems I’m fortunate enough to have that something.

What I do might be special in some way, but it doesn’t make me special. Of course, there is an elusive psychological, perhaps even spiritual place or space you can visit when you’re in the midst of creating a piece of music or a song, or indeed anything, but that’s a whole other post. If you’re intrigued, explore psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s concept of flow. There is a sweet spot, and if there is any magic happening, well that’s where it happens.

I’m aware that this is a particular bugbear of mine, in that many musicians seem to think that their ‘specialness’ is such that the world owes them a living, with some becoming a little bitter about not being recognised for their apparent genius. It brings to mind a song from the first album I ever bought. The album was Sheet Music by 10CC and the (quite gorgeous) song was Old Wild Men.

“Old men of rock and roll came bearing music. Where are they now? They are over the hill and far away, but they're still gonna play guitars on dead strings, and old drums. They'll play and play to pass the time, the old wild men, waiting for miracles.” - Lol Creme & Kevin Godley.

Which miracles are they (we) waiting for? Here are four, off the top of my head.

• Miracle 1 - For streaming to go away? Streaming is here to stay, but it’s clear that what needs to happen is that the owners of the ‘content’ - terrible word but useful shorthand - be fairly reimbursed. The current system verges on theft.

• Miracle 2 - For stadia to crumble and grass roots venues to once more thrive? Stadia will remain, but for grass roots venues to survive, with newer ones also springing up, well wouldn’t that be marvellous? Thankfully, the Music Venues Alliance is working on it, with recently announced support from bands such as Coldplay.

• Miracle 3 - For people to recognise their/our skills and prowess? In many cases they are recognised, it’s just that people now have more options and so that recognition doesn’t always translate into gig tickets or record sales. In my youth there seemed to be around three options that might consume a person, namely politics, sport or music. Today, there are numerous ways to spend time that compete with music. PlayStation, XBox, VR Headsets, Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV etc. etc. Music is just one of a suite of distractions and soul sustenance.

• Miracle 4 - For the clocks to stop? If you’re ageing, then so is your audience. Where they once revelled in the moshpit and put up with sleeping in railway stations, they’ll have discovered that there is much joy to be had in hiking, dog walking, gardening, beachcombing, genealogy, and a million other things that may have seemed oh-so-boring to me when we were in our 20s, 30s and even 40s. Music is now just part of a portfolio of pleasures, when it used to be absolutely everything. Yet to find enjoyment elsewhere doesn’t detract from any creative skills I might have, or from my love of other people’s music; if anything, it enhances it all.

The old, wild men - and women (and non -binary etc.) - rail against technology when in fact technology enables them (us!) to keep recording music and put it out there. It even enables us to do our own artwork and make our own videos. With technology - and some skills - you can make an album without spending hundreds of pounds a day in a commercial studio, as you watch the clock, anxiously. There’s no record company execs gatekeeping, for example, popping along to the studio to tell you that the chorus needs a bit more ‘pizzazz’ - which has happened to me. Home-made videos don’t involve being part of an entourage of perhaps 20 people that are flown out to the south of France, with £80,000 being spent in the process of the video’s creation.

Acoustic ballad? Hell, yeah! Let’s get a speedboat in the video! Let’s spend money!

To get a paragraph or two written about you in the press - which Prog Magazine, Louder Than War, Louder etc., alongside some great blogs - have been kind enough to do for myself and Tim Bricheno recently - is gratefully received, but thanks to technology, you can also inform people of your latest release via social media and/or your website.

There can be a balance. It doesn’t have to be either/or. You don’t have to use plug-ins for guitars. You can still rig them up to an amp and process the signal through a line of pedals. The plug-in police will not arrest you. Nobody is compelling you to use loops or drum software. Go into a studio if you want to and can afford to, or get yourself a cajon.

Technology isn’t cheating and it’s not out to destroy musicianship, so why rage against those lovely machines? Rather, technology can play a significant role in the creation and releasing of music, making the process far more affordable than it was in the 1980s and 1990s. They were the decades in which I, and many of my fellow creators, got into unimaginable debt with record companies. We were then seen to be no longer commercially viable, and so were dropped, or rather, ‘released from our contracts’.

Brian Eno, who has referred to himself as a ‘non-musician’. He sees the studio as a compositional tool.

“If you had a sign above every studio door saying 'This Studio is a Musical Instrument' it would make such a different approach to recording.” - Brian Eno.

I believe that we should be celebrating the freedom that is afforded us by technology and by social media, with Bandcamp as a particular godsend. As for Logic Pro (other music software is available), without it I wouldn’t be able to write and record music, because I’m not really a musician. Technology allows me to create, and for that reason, I embrace and love it.

To be clear, I’m not mocking the old wild men (women, non-binaries) for their waiting on miracles. I keenly understand how it feels to see your value somehow lessen. Miners don’t mine anymore, milkmen don’t deliver milk anymore, nor do lamplighters light lamps. Incidentally, knocker-uppers no longer do any knocking-up, but we could give up our mobile phones and alarm clocks in order to create a need for them. No? I thought not.

We are the working class. We adapt and find other ways to keep body and soul together, and, if we’re very fortunate, we can repurpose ourselves while still making music, albeit in our spare time.

Knocker-up. Lancashire. c. 1900 from ‘Rare Historical Photos’

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Notes:

• The Japanese word tsundoku (積ん読) refers to buying books and then leaving them, unread, in a pile in your home.

• It's a myth that modern-day swimmers use goose fat. These days, it's all about Vaseline.