Why Am I Here, Really?

It's been a couple months now since I lost Finesse. Seven months since Style. I find myself just going through the motions. I work, get home, dawdle, sleep, wake, dawdle, sleep, repeat. Even though I have what many would presume to be a happy life, as well as a nice home and a lovely wife, I find that I am stagnating. I have given up on music. I no longer play any musical instrument. It doesn't being my joy anymore. I have a closet full of guitars that I am preparing to sell off. I just don't have the time or motivation anymore to do a band thing. I've turned down a few gigs so far this year and do not anticipate ever returning to any level of competence on any instrument I have ever previously mastered. It's not something I even want to do.

When Style and Finesse were here I had so much to look forward to. They were the very solidifying markers of my existence and also represented a very happy point in my life. Now that they are gone, I feel empty and worthless. Even more worthless than I have felt at any time in the past. I exist to work like a dog to earn money to pay bills which never end. A vicious cycle of life but not life. Is there anything that brings me happiness anymore? Some of the people in my life, close family, my wife, I guess.

What do intend to do? I intend to keep going until I can't. I have had plenty of instances where I've made a split-second life or death decision, always choosing life. Instinct over intent? Or instinct as unconscious intent? I'm still here. But why am I here, Really?

Committing Suicide

I will most likely be dead before the end of 2121. I have a tentative plan in place already. I have a few loose ends to tie up on the Homefront. I need to make an ironclad will so that the government gets nothing, and my family gets all. I need to be sure that my pets live out their full lives in comfort. Once I have those assurances, then I am free to kill myself.
I am not on any kind of psychoactive meds. I am not nutso. I am not acting on an impulse. This is something that I have thought through and through, down to the exact method of my own suicide; that, too, is foolproof, and does not involve blood, severe injury or paralysis, loud noises, or alligators. In this life, I have done most everything that I have ever wanted, and achieved most everything I have set myself to.
But there comes a time when there is really nothing more, and life has become a boring drek. Even the sunrises and sunsets all seem to blend together into a meaningless haze. I would like to have full control over how I end it. And I shall.
This isn't so much a fuck everyone else kind of thing anymore. It's more of a fulfillment of going out on top, with all my faculties intact, at a time of my own choosing. The fuck everybody else part has more to do with people's knee-jerk reactions to this kind of talk. Most always its along the lines of someone needing mental health realignment. Trust me, I have no need for that. I can think quite clearly from day to day. And this is the right path for me to take.

Losing It

I find I lose my patience a lot more easily than I used to. Which is not saying too much because I have always been impatient. I have a low tolerance for stupidity and ignorance. I have zero tolerance for stubbornness. And I have difficulty dealing with people and friends who are ignorant to the truth. A recent incident involved a missed band rehearsal by the lead singer, who made up a dumb excuse and projected his own arrogance on the rest of the band. At the last minute, while he was lounging poolside, he decided to change up the rehearsal location to one that was more convenient to him, mainly his house. His argument was simple: come rehearse at my house today or I'm not rehearsing today. So he instigated a shitstorm of text messages and ultimately totally blew us off.

It is fortunate that this rehearsal is for what will be our final gig, one which I never wanted to participate in, but am stuck because, like a fool, I committed to it.

I should mention that this band member was also the best man at my wedding. We've come a long way in just a few years from being close friends to being casual associates who no longer speak to each other. I said some rather nasty things to him in textmessage-land. Some of which were merely pointing out reality, others which were downright mean. I really need to stop that. But all the same, this is a person who more often these days refuses to acquiesce to reason. People like this no longer have a place in my life. I have decided to move on.

It is true that our kids take after us. Kids pick up on pretty much everything we do, even if we think we're keeping it secret from them. They take promises seriously and however we handle ourselves when we keep or break our promises has a tremendous lasting effect on their psyches. For example, smoking. When you promise your kid that you're going to quit smoking, you'd better keep the promise. When you want your kid to grow up drug-free, then you'd better not be sneaking around behind your kid's back smoking pot, or worse. These are classical betrayals of the parent-child bond, the parent-child trust. And when someone points out to you that you have done just that, and that your kid is now a reflection of yourself, you should say, "Thank you."

This is just my side of the story, which is the only side that matters in this blog. I am losing it when it comes to dealing with people who claim to be my friends. I am moving exponentially towards an asocial existence. I abhor people anymore. I have my wife, whom I love, and who supports me 100%. She agrees that the kid is a reflection of his father's failures and is the only one who has expressed gratitude at my stating that fact directly to the father in this story. I have reduced my "friend baggage" by three in the process. And after next weekend, it will be reduced by two more. The only band member that I care to associate with anymore is the bass player who resigned 8 years ago to start a family. He's the only one I can see myself working on music with. To the other guys I offer a closing salutation and best wishes in the future.

Sleep Deprivation

It's a kind of magical, between universe kind of feeling, when I go without the necessary sleep. It feels like a rock is hitting me in the side of the head, but in slow motion. I put myself through a couple double-shifts, on consecutive days. I really shouldn't because I am so fucking tired right now. But I need to keep working in order to stay in this nice house with the beautiful wife and wonderful garden, etc. But there is a part of me that would be relieved if it all ended in a fiery head-on collision as I drive home this morning. No big loss, of course. No one gives a shit anyway.

The End Of Music

It's been nearly five months since I picked up a guitar. I played one song back in December for my family. Beyond that, nothing. I'm pretty much done. There is one show left this July for which I don't really care. I wish I had been smart and not agreed to do it. I dread it horribly. I was bamboozled into doing it by Andy, the rhythm guitar player for the now extinct Yesterday's Child. That will never happen again. Any music I do will be strictly to please myself, as it should be.

Jimi Hendrix "New Album" Releases

     I have been an eager listener, follower, and collector of the music of Jimi Hendrix for nearly 40 years. My collection of the recorded sounds of Jimi Hendrix spans his entire career, and then some; hundreds of recordings including all official studio and live releases, outtakes, alternate takes, live concerts, and separated basic tracks from which I can gain insight into his guitar playing. Jimi has been a tremendous inspiration on my own guitar playing. I learned to play many songs from watching films of Jimi. I have adapted his singing style to my own with enough effect that people tell me I sound just like him. I formed a Jimi Hendrix tribute called, Foxy Lady: A Tribute to Jimi Hendrix. I have the credentials, the history, the archive; I am an expert on Jimi Hendrix. I am close friends with only one other person whom I would call an expert on Jimi. We have traded tapes back and forth through the years. And we have eagerly awaited, consumed, and dissected each release that has hit the marketplace. We can discuss fluently the many phases/faces of Jimi. I'll focus this blog entry on the more recent Jimi Hendrix releases and how we should move away from any further bottom-of-the-barrel offerings..
     Over the last 15 years there have been many Jimi Hendrix albums released through official channels. Even though he passed in September, 1970, his music is still very much in demand. The "keepers of the vault" are his half-sister, Janie Hendrix, whom he barely knew, and archivist/historian, John McDermott, who has published several informative books about Jimi. At first, the albums that they released were right on the money. They followed the course that had been pretty much set by Jimi. They also released several live albums through the side label, Dagger Records. Then, gradually, as the studio remains became less and less refined, they began to pad releases with sightly alternate versions of tunes they had previously released. An upcoming release this March threatens to do more of the same.
     When Janie and John took control of the Jimi Hendrix legacy, "First Rays Of The New Rising Sun," was the obvious starting point since it was the album Jimi had been working at the time of his death. The album sequence had been set by Jimi, and many of the songs had been mixed. A few of those songs had final mixes and were complete. When Jimi died, these tracks appeared on the posthumous releases, "The Cry Of Love," "War Heroes," "Rainbow Bridge," and "Loose Ends." The newly charged Experience Hendrix group did an excellent job with "First Rays..." and with the follow-up, "South Saturn Delta."
     Dagger Records was the side label which allowed them to offer recordings that were essential but may have suffered from inferior sound quality. This collection on Dagger Records stands out as some of the best Jimi stuff released since he died; LIVE recordings from Clark University and Paris; Embryonic studio rehearsals from late in Jimi's career; The jam sessions that happened right before the infamous Band Of Gypsys two-night stand at the Fillmore. The Dagger releases are treasures.
     My favorite official collections are "West Coast Seattle Boy," and the "Jimi Hendrix Experience Box Set" (Purple Box.) "West Coast Seattle Boy" is a fine collection which delves deep into Jimi's catalog. It includes several tracks that Jimi recorded before he hit the big time, such as the previously hard-to-find, "My Diary," which he recorded with his friend, Arthur Lee, later of Love. The Purple Box is an evenly paced collection of studio and live tracks from throughout Jimi's career. The standout track (among many) is, "Somewhere." This song first appeared on the posthumous "Crash Landing" album; a collection of tracks put together by Alan Douglas, a producer reviled for wiping the backing musicians off of Jimi's recordings. Alan's claim to fame was to replace Jimi's backing musicians with his own eclectic group of people. The goal was to create the tracks the way "Jimi would have wanted." The end result is questionable at best. The best of intentions, eh? Even worse was the "Midnight Lightning" album which dredged the bottom of the barrel, wiped the backing musicians, and supplanted them with the same cast of unknowns on "Crash Landing."
      My favorite unofficial collections are Box Of Gypsys and 3 Nights At Winterland. Box Of Gypsys is the most complete collection of Jimi's two-night stint at the Fillmore; four complete concerts plus the aborted show at Madison Square Garden they did nearly a month later when Jimi walked off the stage after just two songs. 3 Nights At Winterland includes the 6 concerts Jimi did at Winterland in 1968. Both collections are mostly in excellent sound quality, which means they were professionally recorded. Yet, sadly, they have still not seen a proper release.
     The Experience Hendrix group continued to release decent Jimi Hendrix studio fare until around 2010, when the availability of unheard "new" Jimi Hendrix material started to wane. They released "Valleys Of Neptune," which featured the title track; a song that had been circulating for years as one of the most complete and best representations of the direction Jimi was taking his music. The album also featured other recordings which were in varying degrees of completeness. They followed this up with "People, Hell, and Angels," in 2013. This album featured a slightly different version of, "Somewhere," from the Purple Box. It also included, "Bleeding Heart," and "Hear My Train A-Comin'," versions of which were also on the Valleys Of Neptune album. A new album is slated to be released in 2018, "Both Sides Of The Sky." But this album already looks to be yet another disappointing rehashing of songs that have already been released; nearly half the tunes are reworkings of songs from the previous two albums. It is clear that the bottom of the barrel has been scraped bare and should probably be left alone. There are other areas of Jimi's canon yet to be explored.
     A real puzzler was the 2015 release of a Curtis Knight album, "You Can't Use My Name." I suppose this was necessary to shine a light on the work Jimi was doing in the year before his rise to stardom. But at the time, Jimi was a sideman to Curtis Knight, whose only claim to fame is that Jimi briefly played in his band. The fidelity of these recordings could not be improved upon; not even with the studio wizardry of the incredibly talented Eddie Kramer, who produced pretty much all of Jimi's finest work. And the quality of the material is way below what we think of when Jimi's name comes up.
     The Experience Hendrix handling of Jimi's concert recordings has a few blemishes, but is much more relevant and satisfying. For example. the 2016 release, "Machine Gun: The Fillmore East First Show," is an excellent recording of the first of four concerts that Band Of Gypsys played over new year's 69/70. So what about the other three complete shows? It's clear that all four shows were professionally recorded because multiple songs have been released from each show. Another example is "Winterland." This 4CD official release highlights the six shows Jimi did at Winterland. But the tracks are out of order and it does not present a complete concert. Why not present the concerts in their entirety with the songs in the correct order? Because of this, 3 Nights At Winterland, while only a bootleg, is a much better choice for any serious Jimi Hendrix collection.
     To be fair, Experience Hendrix did do a fine job with the 2013 release of Jimi's appearance at Miami Pop in 1968. The associated DVD, "Hear My Train A-Comin'," showcases not just the available Miami Pop footage, but also several other films of Jimi performing live including footage of Jimi's last concert on the Isle Of Fehmarn in 1970. They also did a good job in 2015 of finally releasing the 1970 Atlanta Pop Festival DVD/CD. This had originally been released on laserdisc in Japan over 20 years earlier. So it was nice to see it's domestic release.
     It is clear that the likelihood of finding and presenting new Jimi Hendrix songs is bleak. Experience Hendrix should do better than to continuously recycle material we've already heard many times over. While the recent Jimi Hendrix studio releases increasingly lack substance and flair, there are still areas to explore. There are many high-quality studio recordings which follow the making and development of various Jimi Hendrix tunes such as, "Fire," "Red House," and "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)." There are still several well-known concert recordings yet to be released in either video or audio formats. The 1969 Royal Albert Hall performance still ranks as one of the most requested unreleased concerts. It is unfortunate that there are still unresolved issues pertaining to the ownership and copyright of the actual recorded material from that show. There still circulate excellent complete audio recordings of this show, but the existing circulating video is grainy from many generations of copies. It would be nice for this historic concert to finally see a proper release. Also in the vaults: Jimi's Maui concert in July, 1970, the New York Pop performance also from 1970, various appearances on British and German TV.
     The Jimi Hendrix legacy has been kept alive and vibrant thanks to Janie Hendrix, John McDermott, Eddie Kramer, and their team at Experience Hendrix. While it seems that the wealth of new studio recordings has been exhausted, there is still much to explore within the Jimi Hendrix vaults. Hopefully, in the near future, we will be able to enjoy more of Jimi's music as it becomes available.

The Gift Of Music (Part 1)

     I have been playing music for nigh on 47 years now. My family has always had some music playing, whether it be classical, flamenco, show tunes, movie soundtracks, pop, jazz, I was exposed to all kinds of music from birth. And we always had an upright piano in the house which was played often. My musical activity, actually playing something, all started with my sitting next to the piano and listening, gradually being shown a few notes here and there. It was around Christmastime in 1969. Our first Christmas in our new house in Larchmont, New York. The song was Winter Wonderland. For real, I remember this. I remember who was playing and who had me on their lap  to try to show me the basic melody. Every so often I would try to bang something out. But it was just banging.

     When I was in the first grade at Murray Avenue School in Larchmont, New York, my class was introduced to the recorder (a flutelike instrument.) We were all given basic lessons over a few weeks and learned a few songs.  We gave a performance as part of the school's Christmas programme.

     Off and on, I would sit at the piano and try to read the strange black dots on the page. I even tried to teach myself to read music. But I had it all wrong. I knew the little black dots represented notes, but I interpreted them wrong. My parents saw my frustration and gave me some guidance. They tried to show me where on the piano those notes actually were. I remember them showing me where "middle C" was. Periodically I would come back to the piano, bang away, try to remember what the little black dots meant, and skulk away in frustration.

     I was eight years old when I first picked up the guitar in July of 1973. I remember because my family was making the big move from New York to California. While they were loading all our stuff into the family Volvo, I sat with my younger brother upstairs and tried to play the guitar. I had seen a picture in the Guinness Book Of World Records, which I enjoyed looking through. It was a picture of The Beatles on stage. It really stuck in my head. They were playing guitars on a huge stage in England. As for me,  I knew next to nothing about how to hold a guitar, where to put my fingers, what a chord was; I just happily strummed the open strings and sang whatever I wanted. I could be like the Beatles in that picture. I think I was singing songs from The Wizard Of Oz. Of course all it sounded like was some 8 year old kid banging on the guitar.

     We had hired a moving company to carry the larger furniture and stuff, but my parents had miscalculated on the rest of the stuff. The car was overloaded; the body was grinding against the wheels and would hardly move. So we needed to rent a U-Haul trailer to ease the weight from the car. It was already late at night. That meant staying at least one more night in New York at a friend's house, the Ripley's, before starting the long trek to California. We had two guitars in New York. But by the time we got to California, there was only one. ...to be continued

Facebook Deactivated

As of today, January 1, 2018, I have deactivated my FB account. I've had enough. I've wasted too much time on this whole social media thing. So much that I believe social media is more like anti-social media. Many is the time that I have put things off so that I can respond to or create some inane FB post. I'm not sure how long I can hold out. But the first step towards breaking the cycle is to deactivate the account.

The Foxy Lady page is still up. However, if I want to do anything on that page, I'll need to reactivate my own FB account. Since Foxy Lady is dormant, this shouldn't be a issue.

In my own life, I am in a state of happiness with my wife, Premmanee. The exact circumstances of our marriage are complex, and I had to make a really harsh and tough decision with regards to who could attend the ceremony. I am thankful that my father and brother have been supportive and have welcomed Premmanee into their lives. Whatever reservations they may have, they put their love for me first; they accept us as a couple. Same goes for my first cousin, David, my only maternal family member who has accepted Premmanee.

The house in Woodland Hills which Premmanee and I bought has become a dream home to us. It is just a short distance from the house I grew up in. I can see retiring here and my body eventually being found somewhere in the house many years from now when I stop breathing.