Wednesday, December 31, 2008

my morning breakfast...with jakob



good morning.
do you eat standing up?
i've found it's a nice alternative to the usual sit-down meal. it allows you to multi-task: scrambled eggs, cinnamon-raisin toast with a smattering of peanut butter and mashed banana, and vietnamese coffee with a dollop of soy; the morning fashion news; aaaand let the day begin.

breakfast sing-along: 'one headlight', as per the wallflowers (oooh jakob dylan)...despite the catchy tune and sultry raspy voice of his, that song is kind of depressing. as per wikipedia:

the lead singer and songwriter of The Wallflowers, has said that the song is about "the death of ideas"[1] and that the many metaphors and images in the lyrics were not meant to be taken literally. Dylan explains that he and the band had very little support when they were putting together the record, hence the shout-out «c'mon try a little». The last two lines of the chorus «we can drive it home / with one headlight» are a reference to how the band were able to get through with their ideas despite being hindered (i.e. with one headlight) by the lack of support.


"lack of support..." sounds familiar....i know resistance to reaching our passions will only make us stronger. and persisting to the end, despite it, makes you realize how badly you want something. hopefully we can all get what we want, in some shape or form. or color. as monica poignantly has pointed out, "we can have it all, but not all at once." c'est la vie.

after reading just one of jakob's interviews, i have a deep respect for him, not just for his....um...hotness...*blush* ...but because he made music for music's sake and none of the glory. in fact, he resisted any association or accessibility to his father's legendary name to promote his work. he didn't rest on any laurels and pursued to make his own.

on the music side, he struggled just as all artists do, having been dropped by record companies, facing bleak shows and band member fallouts. he continued to write what was true to him, lyrically and musically, and he kept doing it his way no matter what the music landscape was at the time. he was resolute on maintaining a personal connection with the music, rather than giving into his record company's desire to sell records by using his 'dylan' name. all the while he went thru a self discovery joyride, as we all do, to find what we love doing and to live it out (luxury permitting). he actually at one point thought painting might be another outlet, but dropped out of parsons after realizing he didn't NEED painting day and nite, as other students did. wise move there, jake-o.

gimme more, jakob, gimme gimme more (all quotes as per interview) :
When you're in the middle of writing a song, you can come up with this whole web of stuff only you know how to get through," he said. "That's very entertaining for me to do that. But two years later I have to sing the song, and I've forgotten how to get through the web, and it becomes frustrating. Like, how come I didn't know that the last verse is really the same as the second verse? If I have a point, maybe it should be simpler. Because if I no longer really understand what I'm talking about, I don't know how anybody else could." (NYTimes)

Entitled "I've Been Delivered" it was a song of rebirth. "I just wrote that song about not knowing what the hell I wanted to do," he says. "That's kind of what the song is about: a journey of trying to figure out what your point is and why you started doing this to begin with. Getting through the song somehow made things more clear." (Wall of Sound).

Q. Well, your songs do have a haunting quality.
A. I'm trying to scare people out of rock 'n' roll so we'll be the last ones standing. I see some pretty terrified people at our shows. I guess the record is a little more dark than me. When you write music you write with a certain personality each time. It's up to everybody how honest and clear they want to be. And as far as the material being somber and dark, I don't think "Wooly Bully" is going to work for me. (Chicago Sun Times 11.10.96)

"It's a ridiculous job. It's 99.999 per cent fruitless and ineffective. It's ruthless. It's emotionally damaging to a lot of people; they invest their whole lives in it and that becomes what the measure of their self-worth is, and they never realize there's other parts of life. And even if you are successful, how long does that last? People write nasty things about you. It's nothing you'd want your kids to get into. But the act of being interested in the arts was certainly never discouraged in my family." (Telegraph)

the things we go thru to get what we want....the pursuit of passions...hmmm...

i need more coffee.

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