Throw it all away

One thing I hope to develop while writing for this site is the ability to produce good writing consistently. I need to develop the habit of production. Creating a system for making things is a really effective way to ensure that you don’t fall victim to any of the excuses that so often seem to plague creative people. I have confidence in my ability to write. I have less confidence in my ability to consistently generate good ideas and work them through to completion. It’s an interesting distinction.

It’s possible that because I haven’t had effective systems in place in many of my creative pursuits, I tend to hang on to ideas and pieces of work when I shouldn’t. It might explain the existential fear about letting go of any idea that I have. I’ve often acted like everything I come up with needs to be turned into something substantial because it might be the last idea I ever have. I’ve never been particularly prolific in any area either, so maybe it’s only sort of crazy. The next idea might be a while away so best to cling on to anything I have, or something like that.

A couple of days ago I finished a piece, and upon reviewing and editing it, realised that I shouldn’t publish it. I felt some unease with it while I was writing it but I figured that might fade once I finished it off and reviewed it. Instead it made it more obvious. It did not articulate my ideas effectively. It was not disciplined enough. Most crucially, it did not get to the core of the issue that I was addressing. So I’ve abandoned it. It’s still sitting in a folder somewhere in the cloud, but unless I find a new angle, that’s where it will stay.

I’d like to think it’s a sign of creative maturity that I am starting to separate myself from the things I produce. It still sucks when I have a song idea that falls flat in the band room, but not everything you come up with is going to be a winner. I bet even Jimmy Page wrote some dud riffs. Looking at your own work objectively can be difficult, but it is important. One advantage of collaboration is that someone can quickly tell you that your idea sucks, which only hurts up until you come up with something good. Editing yourself requires more discipline and focus, and the ability to listen to what your gut is telling you. My gut told me Friday’s piece was off, so I killed it. It’s hardly been the waste of time I might have feared: I learned something important and it inspired this piece.

I hope that any time you take the time out to take a look at my work that you are only seeing my strongest ideas executed as well as I can. Throwing things away means that people only have to focus their attention on the best I have to offer. I know my time is precious, and I certainly don’t want to waste a second of anyone else’s. If that means getting rid of the stuff that isn’t as good as it needs to be, so be it.

Lip service

For too long there has been a part of me that has been more concerned about being perceived as something rather than actually being that thing. I don’t want to be too hard on myself, nor do I want this to turn into some sort of confession, but I think it’s true. In the past I’ve wanted to play every instrument and be involved in every aspect of the creative process. But while I was busy trying to do everything, I didn’t grasp the idea that to do but one of these could be a life’s work in it’s own right. In so many areas, I was happy to be seen to be capable of doing many things rather than being excellent at a couple of things.

There was a time not so long ago where I thought just being a guitarist was primitive, not enough. I hate to write these words, but I might have felt it was beneath me as an artist. I wanted to ‘move up the stack’, you see, and that meant producing, mixing, more instruments, more genres, anything I could get my hands on. I became OK at some of those things, and I’m probably better and broader for those experiences, but it seems like arrogance now. Talking to other people about production or playing drums sounded impressive at the time, but it was dishonest. They were things I could do but they were not what I was.

In preparation for recording guitar parts for a new project I’m working on, I did something I don’t think I’ve ever done before. I recorded myself playing through a guitar amp, you know, with a actual microphone. I’ve been playing since I was maybe eleven years old and I’ve only ever really used modeling pedals and software. Sad. Throwing down some parts as a sound test, I went to do some double tracks and found myself struggling to get it to sound as tight as I wanted. My playing wasn’t accurate enough! I needed to be more disciplined, to put in the effort and time to get it sounding better. It was humbling. I made significant improvements in the half an hour I was mucking around, but the whole thing has been rattling around in my head for a couple of days now.

It seems strange to talk this way about something inanimate like an instrument, but the guitar owes me nothing. To it, I am utterly insignificant; it is me who is indebted to it. It has been a platform for my creativity and an emotional outlet for the majority of my life. If I was never to touch a guitar again, I would be less than I am today.

I still have a lot to learn. There are many ways I can improve. In the process of doing this recording, I will learn a lot about where I’m really at. One thing I know: I’m not going to take any of this for granted any more.