So, my husband and I didn’t Desert Trip last weekend.
That is, pay $1600/ticket – and then some – for good food, wine, and a place to rest concert-weary bones for Friday and Saturday nights. It was a pre-eminent experience for our friends who did – and brought me this teeshirt. Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!
Don’t alas-and-alack for my husband and me. We’d seen the line-up artists before: Dylan, the Stones, Neil Young, McCartney, Roger Waters (Pink Floyd) and the Who. When each artist/group was younger, more vibrant and finely-tuned. Big, bodacious, and LOUD! Like us, they are older, perhaps, better, but still here.
Making music alive, realtime, and relevant, despite Daltry’s famed proclamation, “I hope I die before I get old!” and Paul McCartney’s song title “Will You Still Love Me When I’m 64?”
Hope that they and their audience of 75,000+ had a laugh at the irony of the lines penned before any of the rock-n-rollers had aged. My friend reported lots of tokes all around, air thick enough to sustain irony, laughter, and mega munchies…
Instead, my husband and I saw the movie, “Eight Days a Week”, which showcased Beatlemania: the good, the bad, and the ugly results of their fame. The Beatles’ early camaraderie and joie de vie caved. They bought secluded homes and retreated to preserve self and sanity, raise families, and enjoy the fruit of their spoils.
The sound quality of the concert footage was grand, re-mastered skillfully to surpass the experience I barely recalled. The screaming was masked and their brilliant melodies and harmonies showcased. Yes, I am old enough to have attended a concert (note to those computing my age: I wasn’t able to drive for five more years from the year I attended)
Despite the decision to cease live concerts, the Beatles continued to go to the studio to create music in unity of spirit, talent, and drive. I learned that these four talented young men may not have truly become The Beatles without two gentlemen: Brian Epstein, who mannered and molded them, and George Martin, who contained and channeled their imaginations while urging imagination to thrive. He disciplined them to specific hours to show up at the studio, just like any regular job, a mandate to create, to do the work.
I learned that the Beatles made most of their money from touring and so they did as desired/demanded. Then they had three months off: to recoup and revive and replenish. To enjoy the trappings of their efforts. To re-ignite the muses and enjoy each other as brothers in a phenom like no other on Earth.
What about the last several paragraphs stands out for you, Constant Reader and Writer? Did your eyes light and your brain flash on spirit, talent, drive, contained, channeled, imagination, disciplined, regular job…
Followed by three months off to recoup, revive, replenish, enjoy, re-ignite the muse, and enjoy…
Did you catch the parallels to writing? Just sit your butt in the chair. Write more, suck less…
Add your own lesson and/or metaphor, but do it. Eight Days a Week, if necessary.
Recent Comments