I know I’m not the problem. But neither can I be the solution. So I have to just sit here and wait and hope and hope and wait.
Fucking shit, what’s the point? Jack, I just want to get into your house and play music, even if it’s only for a few hours. I’m not asking much, I’m really not. I just want to DO THE THINGS THAT BANDS DO WITH MY BAND. Why is that so fucking hard to arrange?
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Bro, I know that there’s some drama going on, and I know that ranting is your method of feeling better, but nobody is REALLY listening. The entire party is silent, Khaliid is agreeing with you out of courtesy, and my eardrums are ringing because you’re, while you’re not really screaming, your voice IS very loud. >.>
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You check somebody’s Facebook profile out of curiosity, and then realize that they don’t have a single picture of themselves on the entirety of their profile, opting instead to post a fucking ridiculous number of anime characters and little chibi drawings in all of the areas where pictures would normally go. Whenever I see this happen, I am forced to assume that the person doing that is the most vile, disgusting hambeast in the history of mankind’s existence. And I’m usually right.
Shit, guys…. I’m crossing my fingers as hard as they’ve ever been crossed that we can figure out a way to keep going, I don’t want to have to fucking FIND a whole new band for the fourth time. I’m seriously having a panic attack, but that’s beside the point. Just know this. If we can make this work… if we can take whatever external sources are trying to sabotage us and make them bend to our will, if we’re able to rise past all this shit, there’s no way why can NOT make it. I’m trying to think of it this way between my bouts of paranoia and rabid, soul crushing depression. If we manage to keep playing together after all the piles of steaming FUCK that we’ve been trudging through lately, we’re basically destined for some sort of greatness. That’s gotta be it. Our music is preordained to be TOO fucking good, and some malicious outside source has seen this written in the stars and is trying to fuck with us. Seems legit, right? I dunno. I really don’t.
I want this band. Specifically, I want THESE members of this band. Because this band is the only fucking PURPOSE that I have in my entire life right now. I’ve got no job, my classes are over until September, I don’t have the financial means to move away from home, I’ve got nothing to strive for right now. And out of all of the things in my life, this is the thing that I want to fight for the most.
My friends are amazing, but they can’t be with me all the time. I’ve got an awesome girlfriend, but I only see her once or twice a week. The only two members of my family I can stand to be around are my mom and my brother, but my mom works nights when I’m awake, so I can’t really talk to her too often, and my brother prefers MMO’s and League of Legends to actual physical companionship, getting him to do something with me is fucking difficult as shit. This band, though… this band…
Even when I’m not with you guys, I still have this band. Not in the physical sense, but I can still be doing something to further our efforts. I can write songs, I can practice with my voice, I can DO SHIT. Even if we’re not in the same room playing together, I can still take action toward this band. It’s the only real concrete thing that I’ve got that I can literally turn to ANY time and take some small comfort in.
Maybe I’m fucked in the head, but to ME, and I know I don’t speak for all of us, or at least, I’m 85-90% sure I don’t, this band is the most important thing in my life. Music is the most important thing in my life. Performing, even if we haven’t been able to DO that yet due to unfortunate circumstances, is the most important thing in my life. If I were given a choice to be given an acting career or a music career, I’d be stepping into a tour bus RIGHT NOW. I would give up almost anything to make this happen if I had to, you guys don’t seem to get just how much I’m willing to let go of.
I just want to let go of everything, sometimes… to drop all of my connections, all of my obligations, all of my past, to just leave this place forever with you three and never turn back. I want to cut the strings that are dangling me here in the air, swinging me around the fucking ghetto-ass town and just fucking jump into the unknown, and maybe that’s wrong, but I don’t care, that’s what I want. I won’t know it’s wrong unless I make that jump. And maybe I’ll regret it one day if I ever do that, maybe I’ll feel some remorse. Maybe it’ll hurt. Maybe it would give me something real to write about…
Please don’t leave me, guys…. I have a hard enough time living in my head when things are going WELL…
I’m having a panic attack. A band related goddamn motherfucking panic attack. Greg can’t come to practice until summer, don’t even know if he’ll be able to come then, don’t even know if we’re keeping him in the band. Jack is…. I don’t know what the fuck is happening with Jack. We need Jack, he’s the drummer, the practice space AND the ride, we kind of need Jack to be in the band with us. I don’t know why the fuck somebody’s parents won’t just let them do what the HELL they want to do. What the fuck kind of person restricts somebody’s freedom like that. If Jack wants to be in the band, let Jack be in the fucking band. Don’t be a psycho bitch and force him to leave. We haven’t even finished a goddamn set. We haven’t played a fucking show. WE HAVEN’T EVEN PLAYED A SINGLE FUCKING SHOW! All this time we’ve been working, and we haven’t been able to play a single fucking show! I don’t know why you’re trying to fucking sabotage us like this before we’re even out of the fucking gates, but I know I don’t like it. I don’t like you. You seem nice, sure, but the second we look away from you, BAM, PSYCHO BITCH MODE! JACK CAN’T HAVE FRIENDS ANYMORE, AND YOU GUYS CAN’T BE FRIENDS WITH JACK! HAHAHAHAHA, YOU SUCK! I just want to have a fighting chance. SHIT’S ALL READY HARD ENOUGH WHEN YOU WON’T LET US KEEP A CONSISTENT GODDAMN PRACTICE SCHEDULE, YOU DON’T NEED TO TAKE AWAY OUR DRUMMER TOO!
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And to think I was so fucking excited about today, too. I thought things were finally starting to look up, maybe. That we’d actually be able to gather together and get something done. Nothing is ever going to get fucking finished at this rate. There’s got to be a fucking way around this, but I’ll be fucked if I know what that way is.
I’d be able to excuse this if it only happened occasionally, but every time? EVERY FUCKING TIME? If it were any other reason at all, fine. Shit happens. But, “Sorry guys, my mommy said I can’t go”? FUCKING REALLY? If Jack broke a drumhead practicing, I could see postponing practice until he replaced it. If Graham crashed his moped into a tree in a low speed collision and twisted his ankle, I can see postponing practice. If I strained my voice at a concert or something and lost my voice, I can see postponing practice. But not showing up because your mum won’t let you show up even ONE TIME IN THREE GODDAMN MONTHS? If he’d been able to make it more than ONE TIME EVER to practice, I wouldn’t even be as pissed, but I’ve practiced with this kid ONCE, and now we’re expected to just do without him. I honestly don’t even want to have practice today anymore. If we can’t have the entire fucking band, if all of the members don’t care enough to show the fuck up, I don’t want to do it. Music is supposed to be something to be passionate about. We’re supposed to gather together and create something that we couldn’t make by ourselves and then share it with the world. We’re supposed to make the world a brighter place through noise. WE CAN’T FUCKING DO THAT IF YOU DON’T FUCKING SHOW UP FROM TIME TO FUCKING TIME! I CAN’T EVEN FUCKING THINK STRAIGHT RIGHT NOW! I just want to go outside and murder a half-dozen small children out of spite.
Why did we bring on a bassist that can’t ever make it to practice? At what point did we collectively think, “Yeah, this is totally a good idea.”? I’m getting fucking sick of this shit. Yeah, it’s his mom being a bitch that’s keeping him from practice, I get it, but of your mother is seriously so controlling that she won’t let you go hang out with your friends once a fucking week, if you KNOW THAT FACT ABOUT HER, don’t agree to do something that requires your consistent fucking attendance. If you know you will barely ever be able to show up, don’t offer to fucking do it in the first place. God dammit.
Ever had an epiphany? It’s a difficult feeling to describe, really. It’s like one moment, you know exactly what you want out of your life. Everything is right in the world, and you know exactly how your life is going to turn out. Then suddenly, you just realize that all of the things you wanted, all of your aspirations, all of your hopes and dreams, everything that you’d been using for years as the basis of your very identity, you suddenly know that you never really wanted any of that. Not a damn thing of it.
I’ve had two epiphanies in my life. Two times when my very being was changed to the very core because I realized that my life was going a way I had never wanted it to, despite my best efforts to convince myself that I had really wanted it.
When I was little, I played video games every single day. I still do. The whole experience is a big part of my life. I’m not amazing at shooters, I’m not ridiculously skilled at platformers, I’m not the god of action-adventure games, I’m just a guy who loves to play video games. I loved it do much that I wanted to make video games. The same thing that a lot of kids want when they’re young and searching for a purpose. I wanted to be a video game designer, and the world be damned if it was going to try and stop me. Problem was, I suck at anything artistic. My hands fail me at even the most basic tasks when it comes to art. Give me a Guitar Hero controller, I can destroy anybody in a casual game (not that tournament level shit, though. Those people’s fingers scare me). Give me a pencil, I can barely draw a straight line, which sucks, because I’ve got a great imagination and of I could draw the ideas that I have in my head, I think I’d be a pretty popular artist, but when the ideas try to go from brain to hand, the thought seems to get lost in translation. So, I thought, video game programmer will do. Except I don’t know the first thing about programming. I thought maybe I’d be able to just pick it up at some point.
Before this point in my life ever came, though, my first epiphany hit. I enrolled in my first high school theater class. It was amazing. The first time I performed a piece for the class and they clapped for me, nobody had anything really bad to say. Maybe it’s because I was one of the new theater kids and nobody wanted to hurt my feelings, but it still felt pretty great, regardless. Being able to perform in front of an audience, even one as small as 20-30 people was the biggest thrill ever to me. It opened my eyes. I kept taking the theater classes until one day, I decided to try out for an actual play. I auditioned for Romeo & Juliet. I had wanted with all my heart to be Mercutio, my favorite character in the play, but unfortunately, I never even got to read the lines for him. I ended up reading for Benvolio instead, because rather than audition for the part I wanted, I opted to help a friend of mine try to get the role instead and read a different set of lines than I had intended. I still got into the play, though, landing a role as Lord Capulet.
Rehearsals were some of the most fun times I had ever had, despite the fact that the year I was in this play was also pretty much the worst year of my life that I’ve had thus far, full of dying family members and encounters with the opposite sex that, frankly, make me surprised as hell that I still have any sort of sex drive at all. Every day, I was around great people having a great time.
Then the first show came. I was nervous, to say the least, but I forced myself onstage and delivered the lines. I’m sure I messed up a few times, but it felt like everything was going perfectly. I delivered every line with all the emotion I could muster, and eventually, the final act ended. The lights went out. A thunderous noise rose from the depths of the crowd. They loved us.
I went up to take my bow, and the cheers intensified when I stepped up. They loved ME! I felt like the king of the world. At least, until the lead actors stepped up. My appearance always drew a fantastic amount of applause, but never anything compared to those two. People may have loved me, but I was nothing compared to Romeo and Juliet. But that made sense, I thought. They were the lead roles, after all. I kept at it all throughout high school after that.
I was in acting classes whenever I could get away with it, even if I couldn’t get into the plays (though, to be fair to myself, I’ve been in every play I’ve ever auditioned for except for one, and I didn’t make it into it because the director felt like my physical appearance wasn’t close enough to that of the actual characters themselves.) At the end of senior year, one of my theater teachers even went so far as to call me his favorite actor. That was an extremely proud moment for me.
I’ve had a second epiphany as well, though. This one didn’t bring as drastic a change, but it was still significant. It didn’t even really kill my dreams of being an actor, honestly. I just realize now that if I were to be given a choice between being an actor or following this new path, I’d never act again, if that’s what it took.
I started a band with some friends one day. We met at my friend Khaliid’s house and practiced once a week. I wrote songs and sang them as best I could when I was with them, but when I was with the band, Zealot, it always struck me as more of a hobby than something I would be doing forever. I loved it, but it seemed to me the way that video games seem now. It was a distraction. We wrote a few original songs, got some cover songs practiced and finalized, and we were able to get a slot to play a free show at Planet Rock. Not that it was hard, anybody could play of they wanted to, but it felt like a big deal to me. We got up onstage to open, since we were the newest. And there. We played our set.
The feeling of being onstage with the lights on my face, singing to a crowd of people, even making them sing along with me during the song Welcome Home, was seriously the very very best thing I have ever felt. This wasn’t an audience clapping for me then forgetting that I exist as soon as I leave center stage. The praise wasn’t watered down the way that it was during a play.These people loved the five of us. That was it, nobody else. They were cheering for me and my friends.
Unfortunately, a series of events led to my being removed from that band. They’re still around, but only two people from their original lineup are still members. That’s not to say they aren’t good, because they still write some good stuff when they do write music.
Now, I’ve got a different band. A great group of guys, the four of us all get along really well. We’ve been having problems actually getting together and practicing, since our drummer and bassist are still in high school and are having a lot of unfortunate scheduling issues that I’d give anything in the world to get rid of, but when we do get stuff done, I think it sounds really good. I honestly think that if we kept working at it, we could put records out. We could seriously be a touring band if we could just meet more consistently and get work done. And I realized, after that first show, that’s all I really want. To be in a band. To tour across the country and see amazing things. To play music for throngs of screaming fans every day. I want to live my laugh standing in a spotlight with a microphone in my hands and good friends by my side. I want to load all of my earthly possessions into a van and drive away to places I’ve never been. I want to experience this sort of life forever. I don’t think that’s too much to wish for, you know?
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