Epitaph

To me, it’s much easier to make a noise than it is to make a sentence. I believe that the wordsmiths among us have a stronger tether to something cerebral than the noise makers among us. While I am almost definitely smarter than Nathan, he (and Jake) (and Whistler) can write circles around me. Some ability to push from one word to the next, not by starting with the end in mind, but instead, by moving laterally through his mind, one doorway to the next. The implicit meaning found by putting two seemingly errant words next to each other. As a back-seat observer to the majority of the lyric writing of this band… I have often felt beguiled by this writing style. How can you sing what you barely understand? Can music truly be good if you didn’t intend every meaning that someone might take from a song?

But these are questions asked by someone plagued with worry about what is right. If you have the superpower of not concerning yourself with what is right, but rather what feels right, then you can see what I cannot. And perhaps you can answer my questions for me. Where do you find the words in your body, rather than in your head? How do you intuit meaning from a feeling? That’s what so impresses me. Getting someone to emotionally understand your words before they mentally understand them.

Epitaph encapsulates this for me. A demonstration of conjuring a feeling through words, more than an image. And sure, I’m biased. Blowing smoke where it needn’t be blown. But a feeling of awe is proportional to how close you can be to something, and still be mystified by it. How long and dearly you can know something and still be in wonder of it. So perhaps I am the authority on marveling at your friends, and championing their tricks to any open ear.

This song, written in the basement like all the others, was recorded at Sonic Ranch. Then finished at Flowers Studios in Minneapolis, like most of the others. BJ, in his typical fashion, had brashly worded thoughts on arrangement and instrumentation. A dark cloud of musical wizardry and big-brother-bullying. His strengths lie somewhere in the auteur category. A vision and a skillset to match. An uncompromising dedication to the music, or at least his version of the music.

Where trouble begins is when that dogmatic vision is used as license to stop listening. When choices are made to be right in accordance with that vision, instead of right with the music. Trouble begins when you are sure you are right. And maybe that’s where BJ and I find similarity (and turbulence). I function on trying to do things right, trying to have an answer for most of the choices I make. I feel guilty when I don’t. But my saving grace is sharing creative control. Yielding to each other in moments of uncertainty and being challenged to grow in the process. Being taught that getting it right is less important than feeling it right.

A quote that has been kicked around for years comes to mind when I talk of my creative compatriots. Maybe you feel similarly.