Merging music and the arts with local community networks of activists is both very attractive and not altogether free of risks. But signing with a label seems like one huge risk to me. Been there, this web done that and have seen enough scary contracts to run away pretty fast. Always shower afterwards too.
So at a initial organizational meeting of Transitions in my local, nurse Venice, FL (a suburb of Sarasota), I got to meet several community individuals who are like minded in that they all support greenness. Nobody raised any political affiliations. I think, however, you’d have to be pretty uninformed not to realize that the green movement is identified much more strongly with one side of the Congressional aisle than the other. But it’s my feeling that as soon as that other side realizes they can make just as much $Green off of the green than they’ve been making off of the dark brown crude, things will change. This article hints that this change may be coming. In the meantime, I try hard to avoid obvious political posturing in my music. I’m not after the fringe market.
I know there are plenty of big names in music who seem to have no fear of separating themselves from potential fans. And even turning some of their own off by making bold political statements in and out of their lyrics. Neil Young certainly hasn’t been hurt by it. But The Dixie Chicks are another story. Hank Williams Jr. comes to mind more recently in the “Did I Really Say That?†department. Just really risky and of questionable value, most of the time, in my view.
I don’t engage in political arguments. I’m not gonna change anybody’s mind and they’re not gonna change mine. So why waste the energy?  I have many good friends and acquaintances who walk a different road to “salvation†than I do. We stay friends by avoiding certain topics. Most of the time. A little good natured kidding is as far as it goes. None of us carry guns.
I have a few songs that might be considered political in some sense. One other that used blasphemous language, according to a church lady who got pretty vocal with me. And I don’t mean she was singing backup. That song, “Meltdown,†was co-written by my friend James Braha (Find it on the Tune Widget in the right column) . When I wrote “Underground,†(Find it on the Tune Widget in the right column) I didn’t want to record it but my producer, Helen Avakian insisted. I played it for a family member who is an Army officer and an instructor at West Point. He assured me it wasn’t at all offensive. So maybe I’m a little over sensitive. But that was in 2005. The country wasn’t as blatantly polarized as it is today when one side in particular just objects to whatever the other puts up. Even if they had previously put it up themselves.
Then there is “A Way†(Find it on the Tune Widget in the right column) which I wrote about environmental disaster and the error in ignoring it. I even wrote an additional unrecorded verse about the Gulf BP Oil Spill. It’s a favorite locally anyway. But I hesitate to get too militant in anything else I write since EVERYthing is so political these days. Who needs to piss off people who might otherwise buy your music? Yes, some of you out there actually buy music.
But I will be attempting to merge my music with topics I think deserve objective public consideration. And if my own point of view shows it’s head above the chorus, well I can duck pretty fast. But I won’t flip or flop.
Here in the middle of an insane Christmas gig season, viagra 100mg
I’m beginning to think past the holidays about the New Year 2012.  My predictions and projections are as follows:
An App for that: Every human function will have an app by the end of the year. I have one to show where the public rest rooms are and where to get Starbucks so how far can we be from an iBlood Test, an iMood Enhancer, an iAppetite Controller/Satisfier, iOrgasm anybody?
Occupy this: Tent cities will spring up anyplace there are unemployed. Invest in canvas.
Electronic LED green hair: Led lighting matched with solar power will give us such innovations as instant hair color changes projected from LED earrings, necklaces, headbands, powered by solar collectors imbedded in our clothing.
Bizarre oddities: New species will start appearing to replace those going extinct. Expect naked polar bears,
Reverse osmosis gills on fish, domed and gated communities for honey bees, Monsonto resistant wild corn and wheat, Oil eating algae that will defecate plastic,
Music cliches banned: In a move to help culture evolve, BMI, ASCAP, SESEC and the Library of Congress will refuse to register songs that use cliches. Several entire genres go silent.
Chocolate declared a vegetable: Chocolate will take it’s rightful place beside pizza as a vegetable in school cafeterias. It will melt all over the food pyramid making the whole thing more appetizing.
Oil wells declared as persons: If corporations are people, so are their offspring
Poor people declared as non-persons: Aren’t they already?
News networks suddenly realize how ridiculous they sound: At a conscious raising media convention, all the major TV News anchors and corespondents get a look at themselves after being secretly dosed with LSD/truth serum punch. They become embarrassed, point and laugh, vow to forever shut up and go away. They eventually go into recovery and everything gets back to normal.
Performers who’s demographic aims at sex appeal, will appear naked with no sound: Britney, and that entire ilk will realize that production costs can be cut to almost zero if they just do naked web cam with no sound. Their profits soar.
CD sales will boom at naked gigs. Performers still trying to sell CDs find that a naked merch table is the only way to go.
And who knows what else might happen? The Christmas song broadcast that my writing partner/drummer Jax Resto and I did along with bassist Bri Hays, was good fun despite some technical difficulties. I’ll perform those two songs again with Jax soon. In the meantime I fed her another one liner and she returned two lyrics to me overnight. The girl may be my best Christmas present yet. Has Santa sent me a human song writing machine? I still have the Christmas weekend to play at my regular gig at Back Eddy Bistro, a private Boxing Day Party and the New Year weekend. Then the really busy season is upon us here in southwest Florida. I still plan to get more done this year than last. I don’t do resolutions. I just stay busy on my goals. Adjusting them as time moves forward. I write, I perform, I make new alliances, my business grows, I stay healthy, I realize my happiness hourly. I make good Karma. Happy New Year!
