Words

"Throw down your truth and check your weapons.
Don't look to see if you're alone,
Just stand your ground,
And don't turn around -- whatever happens.
Don't ask directions;
The next voice you hear will be your own.
- Jackson Browne, "The Next Voice You Hear" from the album of the same name.

When I first started writing songs, the idea of actually doing something with them was still years away. I had little confidence in my ability to write, and was feeling somewhat trapped in a persona that I had created for myself. During the period of time that I lived in Carson City, Nevada, I had pretty much carved out a persona for myself as a do-anything-for-a-laugh clown, shamelessly engaging in the type of outrageous, frequently politically incorrect, and hopefully funny behavior that most people would be too inhibited (or perhaps too mature) to attempt.

And for the most part, I was having having a blast. I still can't beleive the stuff that I got away with - or that I attempted some of the stuff that I didn't get away with. Aside from occasional, thoughtless moments where I may have gone too far and sought humor at someone else's expense, as an adult I have few regrets.

I began to become concerned, however, that my persona had painted me into a corner. I had created a personality that was so strong that I suspected that it prevented people from considering that I might be capable of having a moment of thoughtful reflection. Yet behind the carefree existentialism that I exhibited was a kid who was as deeply concerned about his existence and as deeply effected by the world around him as anybody else. But in a way, I had cut myself off from others by presenting myself as considerably more happy-go-lucky than I actually was. Nobody, I felt, would take me seriously if I really opened up to them. In retrospect, I wasn't giving people enough credit, but I suppose that like many high school kids I was susceptible to my share of self-created melodrama. I often felt like a big phony who couldn't stop putting on a show that I wasn't really committed to for an audience that I feared would not accept me any other way. And I was deeply bothered by the fact that I couldn't stop. I was addicted to performing an artificial personality that, I suppose was some sort of defense mechanism intended to to keep people at arms length. Any vulnerabilities I might have had were, for the most part, skillfully camoflaged.

And the songs that I was writing during this time maintained the happy-go-lucky persona by avoiding being about, well, anything at all, really. They were light and poppy, and bore the influence of much of the popular music that I was listening to at the time.

When it came time to go to college, I went to a school that offered me a fresh start. Nobody from Carson City was going there, which I saw as an opportunity to find out what type of person I might be when nobody had any expectations of how I might behave. And while I discovered that I wasn't some deadly serious and somewhat pretentious poet/philosopher, I also discovered that I wasn't just some idiotic clown willing to do anything for a laugh. I was somewhere in between, and managed to strike a comfortable balance somewhere in the middle of those two extremes. I wasn't interested in being the clown anymore, but I didn't want to adapt a mindset that might have prevented me from having any fun. And I ran into enough pretentious poet/philosophers at college to render that particular option woefully unappealing, but I didn't want to deny myself the freedom to express the occasional reflective thought or opinion and have it be taken seriously. It is fair to say that my freshman year at college was an interesting and valuable experience that helped me to, for the first time, find comfort in my own skin.

One of the real turning points of that particular year came about as a result of my friendship with a fellow student named Richard Moore. He carried (and continues to carry) an interesting sort of wisdom about him and seemed to have a finely-tuned bullshit detector. Before I had found a way to reconcile the two embattled aspects of my personality, he observed that I was essentially living two parallel lives: I had two distinct circles of friends - one who knew the serious side of me and one who knew the clownish side of me and never the twain did meet! It would have been interesting to hear a conversation between members of the two camps. It is likely that they would have wondered of it could have been possible for there to be two individuals on the same campus with such a unique name.

One night Richard and I were having the first of many sprawling conversations that would continue into the wee small hours of the morning. Both of us were passionate about music, and we discussed it extensively. I revealed to him that I had written a few songs, and he was interested in seeing them. Mind you, this was a big step for me - it was the first time that I admitted to anybody that I wrote songs. For some reason, this was something that I had felt overly cautious and even somewhat embarassed about. I suppose that, over time, I had developed a fear that my desire to create music would be exposed to people who would do their best to make me feel ridiculous for having such a desire (a fear that, in time, would be legitimated when it turned out to be exactly the case).

I brought out my secret folder of songs and handed them to Richard. He read through them silently. When he finished, I asked him his opinion. His response was candid. "To tell you the truth, Karis, I'm sort of disappointed." He pointed out that, after our in-depth discussion, surprisingly very little of what I was about had found its way onto the page. My songs weren't really about anything. They were fluff. They were insincere. They were inconsequential. There wasn't really any reason for them to exist.

His words were, without question, the most accurate and most valuable criticism that, perhaps, I have ever heard. I wanted to write songs, but I was pacifying that desire by knocking out pages of thoughtless fluff in mere minutes and priding myself, albeit privately, for having written them. Yet, as Richard pointed out, I was not communicating a single genuine idea about how I felt about anything. My songwriting persona was yet another false face that failed to represent anything about me. I've written about the "legitimacy" and "illegitimacy" of certain types of criticism before. Make no mistake, the right criticism at the right time can be extremely valuable if you approach it with the right attitude. Constructive criticism doesn't attempt to shame, embarass, or ridicule you. It has a higher objective in mind.

Perhaps one of the greatest things that a good friend can offer is insight about blind spots that you might have developed. A true friend can let you know when you aren't meeting your potential without shaming you in the process. A true friend is there to tell you when you're capable of being better than you've been. And their words are encouraging instead of punitive. It has been said that the most cruel people in the world pride themselves in their honesty. A true friend knows how to be honest without being hurtful. I consider myself lucky to have found a true friend in Richard Moore. He never made me feel ashamed for wanting to write songs, but instead encouraged me to try to write better ones. That's a friend.

There was, however, one unfortunate by-product. I found myself marginalizing much of the music that I had previously enjoyed (and which had helped to fuel the desire to create music in the first place) in favor of songs that were "about something." And I came to a point in the early years of building my CD collection where I realized that I had a lot of albums that were critically acclaimed and "meaningful," but not much that was, you know... fun. It took me a long time to come to terms with the idea that for music to be fun might just be equally important as music having meaning. And in the same way that not every song should be required to be fun, not every song should be required to have deep meaning, either. And while I just wrapped up that idea in a fairly concise paragraph, I can assure you that this conclusion represents decades of reflection upon my motives and objectives where music is concerned. I had to come full circle before I could give myself permission to write something frivolous and fun with a clean conscience. I am seriously considering recording one of those original songs from the "secret folder" and putting it on my album. The lyrics don't hold up on their own as poetry, but maybe lyrics aren't really supposed to do that anyway. Lyrics are merely a component of a song, and good songs are greater than the sum of their parts. All of the most critically acclaimed and respected songwriters have written their fair share of fun songs. Many, like Dylan and Lennon, have even indulged in lyrics of joyful nonsense. It is easy to point out great songs that have nonsense lyrics. They're still great songs!

I am thankful to have had a true friend who put me on the path of trying to become a better songwriter. I believe that I have benefitted greatly from the journey. And I am glad that I eventually reached a point where I can feel comfortable being fun and frivolous. In a strange way, I feel that I have earned it. And I should point out that it was never Richard's intention to encourage me to marginalize anything that wasn't oh-so-deep-and-meaningful. I like a lot of different types of music. It is likely that everybody I know could go through my collection and come up with a CD that they feel I should be ashamed to own. And everybody would pick a different CD. And maybe they'd all be correct! But you know what? Nobody actually rifles through my CD collection, so I have no need of declaring anything I own a "guilty pleasure."

Music is simply a pleasure.

It is far too easy to develop an elitist attitude about music. It is easy to form the opinion that the music that you like is somehow objectively superior to the music that somebody else likes. We each have our personal tastes, and we hold our own opinions, but in the end it is impossible to justify the alleged superiority of one opinion over another. A cellist who has studied music theory under the most famous conductors for dozens of years may have an educated and informed perspective from which they form their opinion, but that fails to invalidate the personal taste of the five-year-old who likes a particular song because it makes them wiggle their butt. The challenge to an artist is not to attempt to patronize his/her audience by attempting to guess what is most easily liked. Any attempt to do so reveals an attitude of condescenscion toward the audience as well as cynical insincerity on the part of the artist. The artist must simply create, and then release their work into the world to be accepted or rejected by individuals at will. But ultimately the artist needs to find solace in the knowledge that they created exactly what they intended to create, that they fulfilled their vision, and that they were true to their own voice. Perhaps their voice felt fun and frivolous that day. Perhaps it attempted something deeper. Either objective holds the potential to be either a blessing or a curse. And while I've never been one to preach the questionable values of style over substance, ultimately, perhaps the content of a work matters less than the intention, the execution, and the degree to which the work fulfills the artist's vision. I don't know. Something to think about.

"Be of good heart," cry the dead artists out of the living past. "Our songs will all be silenced, but what of it? Go on singing. (Orson Welles, "F for Fake")"

(Editor's Note: Sadly, shortly after this item was posted, Richard Moore apparently ended his 24-year friendship with Karis Rowley.)