Portrait of the Artist as a young rock star. Or not.

In my last blog, I talked about being a musician when I was younger. I think once I met Sarah, I became more interested in our relationship than being in a band. I was in a few bands, but towards the end of my “career,” we didn’t play out often, or at all. To me, that was the whole point. I would much rather be nervous and play in front of a roomful of strangers than in a rehearsal space in front of a few friends. Since I stopped being in bands, I stopped playing as well. I can still play, but not with the skill I had then.

I took up the drums when I was in elementary school. My dad played drums when he was a kid, and I was big into the Beatles by that time, and they figured into everything I did musically. My parents bought me a snare drum and I took lessons with Mr. Nagle at school. There’s only so much you can do with a snare drum, though. I had been really getting into Paul McCartney’s bass lines (see?) when I was in middle school, which made me decide that I wanted to try the bass guitar. I was afraid to ask my parents, because they spent so much on that snare drum. I mustered up the courage, and my dad was very supportive. But since I was working, he said that he would pay for half if I saved the other half. This tactic worked in his favor when I wanted a motorcycle, but not this time! I save the 65 dollars and brought home a genuine Fender bass copy. I bought a book and taught myself how to play, rudimentary at first. I managed to be able to play some tunes in a short while. I think I surprised my parents with my dedication to my new instrument, and they bought me an amp for 8th grade graduation. It turned out to be a guitar amp instead of a bass amp, but never mind.

My best friend Mark played guitar, and we put a band together. We got to be pretty decent, and we got paid to play a few times, which to us was beyond fabulous. We got a new drummer in our junior year and we became even better. We played at Beatlefest! Also in my junior year, Mark bought me a cheap acoustic guitar for my birthday or some such. I could not play the guitar at all, but I did the same thing that I did with the bass: I bought a book and taught myself, and I was able to play some easy chords, but I never learned how to play leads (bending strings is alien to me). I got pretty good at playing arpeggios after I got into R.E.M., but besides strumming, that was it. I would have called myself an adequate rhythm guitarist.

The band ended with high school, and I joined a band that I played with when their bass player went on vacation for the entire summer. True Detectives were an all-original band, and they played rap, punk, funk, and reggae, among other styles. Their music was way out of my comfort zone at the time, but I loved it. It was with them that I had my musical plateau, which was playing a short set at CBGB’s, and I played very well that night. It was totally worth the harrowing drive into New York. It was not to be with the TDs though, I was younger than they were and I didn’t feel that I fit in, so I left.

I played with Mark again in a few bands, and also with our high school drummer Greg in a different band, but the writing was on the wall for me. I was dating Sarah by this time, and I just didn’t have the drive to play anymore. I was also having a lot of trouble writing songs, but I always did. I started writing songs after I got the guitar from Mark and learned enough chords to be able to do so. I wrote maybe 7 or 8 complete songs, and many, many fragments of songs that I couldn’t finish or lost interest in. These are the lyrics of the very first song that I wrote, called “Portrait”:

I loved you for the longest time, you were always on my mind.
You picked me up when I was down, changed my life just by being around.

But then you went away, and I haven’t felt the same.
I feel so broke up inside.
I wish I could see you one last time.

I think of all the joy we had, always happy, never sad.
But now I can’t accept the fact, you’re gone for good, never coming back.

My tears begin to fall, at night your name I call.
I just want to run and hide.
My love for you, it cannot die.

When I see a picture of you, my tears they show my pain.
Won’t you please come back to me, I want to see you again.

You know I miss you so. Why’d you have to go?
My memory will keep you alive,
But I guess that I have to say goodbye.

I had no idea what to call the song, so I settled on Portrait, I guess because it sort of is a portrait. The lyrics are pretty bad in hindsight (I’ve never experienced sad joy myself), but at the time, I was bursting with pride that I had written a song! I was especially proud that I had written an actual bridge, and also of the C maj 7 chord that I threw in there. The rest of the chords were pretty ordinary, the C maj 7 was actually a mistake (I didn’t get my finger onto the high C in time), but it fit perfectly. This was also before Pink Floyd became ubiquitous in my life (later Pink Floyd songs are lousy with C maj 7 chords).

So by the subject matter, you would think that some freshman girl hurt me, and I poured my broken heart out into this song. This is not the case, as I had yet to kiss a girl (unchastely) at the time I wrote this. It is actually written for my grandmother, who passed away a few years previous, when I was 12. My grandmom (she was my dad’s mother) was very special to me, and she was the first person that I was really close to who passed away. I took it very hard. Back then, funeral homes normally had 2 days of viewings before the funeral was held, and I cried the entire time we were there. During those few days at school, I tried to stave off the hurt by acting out and getting lots of detention. But the hurt stayed with me until I wrote this song for her. I only wish that I had the courage to play it for my grandfather or the rest of my family. I don’t think anyone outside of my 4 other band members ever heard this song, but it’s been in my head ever since. Perhaps that’s why.