08.15
DGM HQ.
Awake around five & rising at 05.30. Dribble. Jet lag continues.
Offline for over a week, the
catch-up is beginning.
The future is closer.
Reflecting on recent arisings in the domain of Crim & corresponding responses on the Guestbook; and what passes for acceptable behaviour / treatment in public / professional life. I note: my public / professional life is not exceptional; and while I cannot comment authoritatively on the lives of others, within own sphere of activity a representative sample of recent (and un-recent) commentary, online & hard copy, would in most other contexts be considered exceptionally rude & unacceptably bad manners. Yet, in public life, in many fan encounters & much online posting, the tone & behaviour is appalling.
Speaking in front of my Sister’s speaking community in Phoenix was so exceptional as to be remarkable, in my professional life; as remarkable & exceptional as five Churchscape performances in Estonia, where the audiences listened. What does this say for much of the remainder of my professional playing life, that events which might be counted on 2 hands over 39 years, stand out as examples where goodwill, openness, acceptance, support & encouragement are the norm, rather than exceptional & unlikely? Can it be that the professional lives of everyone that take place within the public sphere are similarly characterised by resentment, criticism, nastiness, hostility & simple rudeness?
Playing music is always a privilege. Playing music professionally is the price we pay for this privilege, for those who feel the need to take that calling further. The music industry & its notable yet unexceptional absence of honesty, responsibility, equity & goodwill (exemplified in various forms of underpayment & non-payment); the presence of exploitation & theft as default procedures; fans & their presumed consumer rights, volubly & forcefully expressed in person & media; musicians of varying degrees of reliability, some of whom harbour ongoing resentment & bitterness over a period of years; lavish, exaggerated & misplaced praise for supposed achievements, nastiness & anger for supposed failings; these are all ongoing & commonplace characteristics that exemplify & demonstrate the norm/s of my own professional world over four decades.
In summary, experientially & subjectively, my trajectory has been against gravity.
(En passant, in respect of the professional aspect of musicianship, I have been told that, overall, the industry has regarded me as a safe pair of hands. That is, a player who is reliable in terms of delivering what is promised <and in the creative world, no guarantees are possible>; in contrast with some fellow players, regarded by the industry as flaky & not to be counted upon).
Some recent Guestbook postings have moved towards the same tenor of discussion & commentary made widely available since the cyberworld enabled a greater diffusion of opinionation. Taken together, pro & anti, this discussion almost completely cancels itself out. Similarly, over the decades of KC/RF activities, press reviews when added up come to little more than a waste of energy & a soiling of the public mindsphere.
I have not quite accepted that the activity of this planet, to the extent that I have known it, is as utterly unreal as it appears to be - surely not! Yet, I must now accept, as regards my specifically professional life, that 99.99% has been unnecessary; this to the degree that, as an older & much bruised man, I understand necessity; although the life has been a liberal education, in the unreality of things.
When music comes to life, the 0.01 per cent of reality follows the first two principles of quality:
a quality is ungovernable by number;
a quality spreads.
The small opening through which music emerges from the creative world, and enters our own, is as if through the eye of a needle. Fortunately, the eye of a needle is large enough for what is Real & Good & True to enter our sorry & ungrateful world.
Scorecard of My Life In The Music Industry…
Unreality: 9,999;
Reality: 1.
In Guitar Craft, the quantitative measure of reality available is greater than in the world of the professional player. This is partly because the conditions available within Guitar Craft allow & present greater opportunities for us to see & recognise what is unreal & imaginary within ourselves; and to see & recognise what is Real. A false comment falls flat, sounds out of tune & out of tone. In daily life within the music industry, the continual clamour of bad notes support & encourage what is lesser in us.
So, in summation on this reflective morning: my life as a professional musician pretty much sucks, as it always has. Greater success has brought greater problems, dishonesty, resentment & jealousy, irrational & unreasonable demands of many kinds. Repercussions generated over many years continue to make demands & have to be addressed. DGM is an exceptional business construct which is not, properly, seated within the world of business: it merely pretends to be. DGM’s raison d’etre is not economic, and is seated outside the value system of the industry. This carries its own price tab.
My personal life: is happier than it has ever been.
Guitar Craft is a blessing, a joy, a gift, validation that Benevolence is as constantly available to us as we can bear.
Music is no less generous than it has ever been, although in popular culture I sense it is mostly hiding from music consumers; and my own listening is wider than ever.
Q: Touring: why?
A: The reason must be: the touring is necessary.
Q: Where lies the necessity?
A: For me, that the music must be heard.
Q: And if this music has already been heard, where the necessity?
A: Perhaps, a celebration? Celebrating music is surely sufficient in itself.
Q: But if planning the party is an ordeal, the partygoers not quite committed to being there & the partying unnecessary beyond its own perimeter, where is the celebrating?
A: Good question/s.
Qs: Is touring the only way of embracing music? Is embracing music only possible in public?
A: So much is available, just outside & just inside the witterings of conventional commentary.
I hope Guestbook commentators will allow me the space to attend to what is valuable in my life, rather than proffer advice & opinion on how best to be who &
what I am; and perhaps to undertake, once more, what has already done: unless there is a necessity that moves beyond my own, and this necessity speaks its name loudly & clearly.
09.50 Kitchen discussions.
David arrives & presents his view of the morning: the need for greater reality in his life. So, we are both on the same page this beginning-day. David feels that the future is presenting itself, but its appearance is not inevitable.
And then dear old Mr. Stormy appears I…
II…
III…
… an appearance that is not inevitable either. Mr. Stormy’s work for today is to prepare Collectors’ Club CD releases for downloading.
11.35 Crimson Tours Inc. has now been formally closed. David & I tried for some years to close the US company, but the accountant in charge seemed unable or unwilling to do so. Perhaps this is another example of conflict of interest: the accountant’s interest in keeping the company running, and the Directors of the company seeking to close it?
Q: What made this termination possible, after repeatedly failing to do so?
A: An American attorney, Artist Advocate Andy Leff.
I have noticed, over 39 years of hands-on experience, the near-impossibility of an American branch of a UK operation accepting direction from the UK: the US operation follows is own agenda. I can give several examples, but on this day offer only one: Crimson Tours Inc. Now closed by our American representative, Crimson Tours Inc. has been replaced with another vehicle, one administered in the band’s interest & accepting direction from the UK.
14.10 Bad news. Tino Licinio died on Tuesday following a short illness. Tino, Gordon Haskell & myself were in our first two beat groups together, The Ravens & The League of Gentlemen. I called Tino’s wife Barbara to learn details of how to visit Tino in hospital, but I was behind the news by two days. Yowch.
15.10 On the desktop I…
II…
III…
IV…
V…
VI…
15.45 Major progress in the DGM Art Department: technology is the multiplier.
A request has come in for aid in translating several GG&F lyrics into a foreign language. I have declined the request. Firstly, I see no benefit in translating lyrics from GG&F into any language, including English. Secondly, the person requesting the translation-assistance also asked for an autograph. Immediately the situation changed, and not for the better. I wonder how many Guestbook / ET posters have any sense of the damage this does, regardless of my own personal difficulties autography. For some, it doesn’t matter anyway. To me, it matters, regardless of protests to the contrary from those on the other side of the fetishisation pen / camera that it matters not a jot.
Creative insight trumps experience. Experience can be bought, but the currency is not easily available; and I have been getting in the back of vans & setting off to gigs for 47 years. Insight & experience: I’ll accept the views of those who have more of both. Otherwise, dear Guestbook posters & fans who write to me with helpful advice on how to modify my understanding in accordance with your own, I’ll give priority to my own insights & experience; and continue to follow my own trajectory.
16.54 Part of today’s portion of opaque music industry dealings: we have declined Atlantic’s repeated request to grant a license for 21st. Century Schizoid Man to be included on their Atlantic glory-years compilation: we don’t trust Atlantic to honour the license terms. IMO & IOO, once the licence was granted, Schizoid would be digitised & made available for download, even though downloading would be excluded from the terms of agreement (as with EMI & Sanctuary which didn’t prevent them doing the same); and our concern & experience suggests that Atlantic’s legal deptartment wouldn’t give a hoot. We would then invest time & energy chasing the violations, as with EMI & Sanctuary, without much support from Atlantic themselves. One example of our concern: Atlantic has a “strategic interest” in a file-sharing site that has KC material illegally available on it.
So, no. Not. No way. This is what happens when less-than-best-practice practices inherit the remorseless & inevitable consequences & repercussions: a loss of credibility, goodwill & trust. King Crimson were part of Atlantic’s glory years; we will not be part of its gory years.
Other arising news: in from Panegyric - Travis & Fripp has recouped. Well. Hooray!
17.07 An e-mail from a fellow musician re: the KC shows in Chicago. Interaction with players, regarding the experiencing of musical events, is of an entirely different quality & kind to commentaries & interactions from fans. The exception: discussion with a connoisseur. Three connoisseaurs, of my personal acquaintance, spring to mind. I have learnt from each.
18.33 More developments in the Art Department have David in good form. In the Chamber of Venality, there is dribbling.
19.10 David has left, satisfied with today’s developments.
19.47 A day of fighting jet-lag, e-frenzying & stuff.
20.23 It waits…
Dribble dribble.
"Listening is a craft.
Hearing is an art."
