Interviewing bassist stories

[Arthritic_Tom]

Originally Posted by TinIndian

Way to go Tom! I am thrilled for you. You have so much to offer and a talent for story telling. Keep us all posted on the progress and ultimately, the release date!

Will do.

We've barely touched the tip of the iceberg here, by the way. Everything I wrote here was bass related. In the memoir, I get to write about the non-bass aspects of life in the L.A. entertainment industry.

Like sitting in a kitchen watching a sweet-faced young actress you all know dropping the N-word like a Grand Imperial Wizard.

[Downlowd]

Originally Posted by Arthritic_Tom

You think I'm afraid of flame wars? I've published three books on them!

Originally Posted by NWB

Oh man, I really busted up laughing on this one!

Me too. That's hilarious.

[turbo chicken]

Thanks Tom and everyone that contributed to this thread.

I literally spent the day reading this. With the exception of dinner and having "family time" this evening.

This is an excellent read. This coming from a guy who has only read one book cover to cover as an adult. I read to my kids but I don't count those as it's not for me. There hasn't bee many things that have captivated me like this thread has.

Some of the messages/lessons posted here about being happy and what actually is important spoke to me. I have ... well... you got me doing some inward thinking. As I type this I look over and sitting on my night stand is a coin I got a couple years ago. Im sure it's been there for some time as my side of the bed isn't tidy. But it's funny how it decided to peek out at this moment. One side of it has a message I've forgotten about in the past few months.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can,
And wisdom to know the difference.

good night fellas ... time to go chill with the misses.

[Arthritic_Tom]

Originally Posted by turbo chicken

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can,
And wisdom to know the difference.

Yup. Great advice.

This poem, too, is great advice. From Stephen Crane's The Black Riders and Other Lines:

XXIV

I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed by this;
I accosted the man.
"It is futile," I said,
"You can never--"

"You lie," he cried,
And ran on.

I pursued the horizon for ages. No more.

[SoVeryTired]

Tom, this is great reading and great prospects for you. I hope that in the same way that you feel your past state of mind wrecked your body, you see a recovery in your health to match that of your emotions.

[rosanne]

Thank you Tom.

I'm enjoying this immensely. Have been reading this thread for three days now and am only on page 29 (I'm old with bad eyes). Sure hope you don't stop writing in it before I catch up.

[Stumbo]

Good luck Tom.

Glad we made the light at the end of the tunnel shine a bit brighter for you. You did the same for us!

Keep on keepin' on, brother.

There are still a LOT of things to do before we get to the endless sleep. Still a lot of memories to create. Still a lot of love to get and give.

Book deal or not, we're right there with you!

[dhsierra1]

Originally Posted by Arthritic_Tom

You did tell me. I'm glad I listened.

There were quite a few, actually

Ultimately, doesn't matter if you do land a book deal w/this, at least not as far as I'm (and no doubt everyone else here) is concerned (though obviously it's looking really good ).

You got a bunch of great Parables written and memorialized here, enlightened and entertained many people, but most importantly, you got your "groove" back on life. And we all got to share in it. Thanks so much, you've helped more than you may ever know, that's being a Mensch

[Arthritic_Tom]

Originally Posted by SoVeryTired

Tom, this is great reading and great prospects for you. I hope that in the same way that you feel your past state of mind wrecked your body, you see a recovery in your health to match that of your emotions.

Thanks very much. Meniere's disease almost always goes into spontaneous remission, and the good thing about it is now I can't do readings or book signings. No more weirdos and creeps insulting me, ignoring me, or raving away about minibars. Yay!

[bass12]

Still reading and still loving it!

[Arthritic_Tom]

Originally Posted by dhsierra1

There were quite a few, actually

Ultimately, doesn't matter if you do land a book deal w/this, at least not as far as I'm (and no doubt everyone else here) is concerned (though obviously it's looking really good ).

You got a bunch of great Parables written and memorialized here, enlightened and entertained many people, but most importantly, you got your "groove" back on life. And we all got to share in it. Thanks so much, you've helped more than you may ever know, that's being a Mensch

Thanks. You're right; no matter what happens, this was one heck of an episode, wasn't it?

(But I'm pretty confident about my prospects. The person who sent me the e-mail asking for a formal proposal happens to be a gigantic Zappa fan, which I knew beforehand. He also bought my interview book years ago. I pitched my memoirs to him rather than go through an agent because I knew his tastes in music and he knew my work.)

The goal of the memoir will be to entertain but also to help as many people as I can avoid making the same mistakes I made. Before I pitched it, I asked for and received permission from various involved parties to use our correspondence, since I didn't want to blindside anyone. They were very gracious.

I hope to receive permission from one of my musical idols to use her lyrics, and then I'll have all of my material except for updates from a certain sulking bassist who will serve as a kind of Greek chorus in the book.

If I do say so myself, the outline I pitched is quite original. I've never read a memoir quite like it.

Wait'll you hear the title.

[Downunderwonder]

Waiting.....

Good job Tom. I sure hope it comes off. I can see Quentin Tarintino making it into a film.

[Arthritic_Tom]

My favorite part of the interview I did with Chi Cheng of the Deftones:

CC: We did this interview with BAM-- I never do interviews myself, so they're pretty much all quotes from the other guys.

TW: You don't like giving interviews?

CC: I'd prefer to do zero interviews, because I don't think the questions people ask ever really get towards the intrinsic nature of most people. They're kind of superficial and they don't really try to get to know you as a musician. I prefer things to be a conversation as opposed to like a... I prefer two people to just have a conversation. I think that a lot of interviewers have preconceived notions of what artists are or what they should be, as opposed to just looking at the personality of the musician.

That's why I don't even trust the Bible. See, it could be the word of God, but it went through a man. It went through his hand, it filtered through his system, and he put in his own learned behaviors and his preconceived notions, so even if it was the word of God, it kind of got flipped around. I do the same thing with my writing. I've been writing for twelve years, and when I write, you'd better believe that it's everything I've gone through and everything that I'm doing. It gets focused into my writing.

TW: What kind of writing?

CC: Poetry.

TW: Does any of it ever end up as a song?

CC: Nah. Too strange. Yeah, it's really crazy. I write a really weird style. It's cool. Yeah. I used to go... I had the lucky experience of one of my old professors in college liking my writing so much that she had me come in and tutor one of her advanced poetry classes. It was really cool. I don't fool with iambic pentameters, meters, none of that stuff. I did learn a little bit of it, but it's just another constraint, you know? I mean, if you write honestly, if you write passionately, then everything you write is all right. And I don't write for anybody else.

TW: That seems to be pretty important to you, the idea that what you're presenting has to be passionate and honest and very emotional.

CC: It is. That's how my belief on life systems is. If you're going to do something, jump in feet first and have passion and honesty and love when you do it, or don't do it at all.

TW: So what happens if you put something out there and people don't get it or it bombs?

CC: Oh, I couldn't give a sh*t. I know I put everything that I had into it, and it was honest and came from the source, and everything I had went into it, so I could really care less. It'd be great if I could be financially secure. You know, I have a baby coming. It would be great if I was able to not worry about bills. But you know what? It doesn't really matter. You know what I mean? As long as I know I'm putting everything I have into it, that's what matters. I used to build houses as a carpenter. You know, frames or whatever. I would put everything I had into it, do the best I can, and not have any regrets in life. It's not really about the end product. It's more about the love and the passion and the honesty that you put into the work. That is actually the achievement, not really the end product.

TW: There would be a lot of people in this industry who would say that approach is just opening you up to being smashed on the head, because this is a really cold-blooded business.

CC: Yeah. But I would rather be smashed on the head than change the way I am. You know what I mean?

[Arthritic_Tom]

Originally Posted by Downunderwonder

Waiting.....

Good job Tom. I sure hope it comes off. I can see Quentin Tarintino making it into a film.

Thanks very much.

The best "inside Hollywood" film ever made is called Ellie Parker, starring Naomi Watts.

Ellie Parker (2005) - IMDb

Nobody's ever heard of it, because it sank without a trace. Why? Because it strikes too close to home. It's merciless in its portrayal of the sort of people I knew for ten years, and those people HATE to have themselves exposed this way. So this brilliant film--which must've been made on a budget of about $8 because it couldn't get any financing--disappeared.

The really funny thing is, four years earlier the entire cast of Ellie Parker was in this misbegotten pile of garbage called Mulholland Drive, by David Lynch. It was an incomprehensible, pretentious, dumb, boring, humorless, self-indulgent atrocity that didn't work on any level--except for the lesbian scenes between Naomi Watts and Laura Harring. Even those give you twinges because they were clearly put in the movie simply as an aging man's fantasy. And I can say that, because I'm an aging man. But I wouldn't have done that to Naomi Watts. She's much more than a piece of meat to be crudely exploited.

Mulholland Drive was critically acclaimed, even though it isn't even a tenth of the movie Ellie Parker is. One great movie with a particular cast is ignored; another horrible move with the same cast is raved about. All because of the subject matter.

"How dare you tell on us! We'll fix you!"

My memoirs won't be made into a movie. Not unless I do what Sam Raimi did with Evil Dead and get business owners from my little city to pony up the bucks. Even then, nobody would distribute it.

But that's okay. I don't need to earn tons of bucks. The only thing I spend on is World War I postcards. You ought to see my collection!

[Downunderwonder]

Yeah, go on then...

[SoVeryTired]

Tom, as a First World War enthusiast and a real searcher for historical truth and evidence, I thought you'd appreciate the priceless treasure my family has. My great-great uncle Ralph was a man I remember from my early childhood holidays at my Gran's house. He was a doddering 90-something year old man with wisps of white hair and a tendency to pick scraps of food off the floor and eat them unless he was stopped. It was only after he'd died that I learned this gentle, frail man had been a sniper in World War One. Whilst I never had the chance to talk to him about his experiences, and I'm not sure his recall would have been great, he left behind three full diaries from his time in France and Belgium. As a primary source of information they're amazing, particularly as I was told that keeping a diary was a court martial offence in case they fell into enemy hands. My dad keeps them safe but I occasionally have a look when I visit.

Three entries stand out in my memory. The first is from New Year's Day 1917 when he was on sentry duty. Nothing particularly happened but the matter-of-fact description of the cold and the quietness are quite affecting given that this would normally be a time for family and looking forward, and this young man was in the mud of Northern Europe looking forward for enemy soldiers. The second is one that's changed in my mind as I've got older. To me as a child, it was the story of how, in 1918, he got a bullet through the foot and was carried to safety in a wheelbarrow by a couple of soldiers from another regiment. As I grew up and came across the expression "shooting yourself in the foot" I began to question the account or, more accurately, to wonder what remained unwritten about the incident. Whatever the reality, that was the end of his front-line war.

The third diary entry is one I can quote, and it's one that could count as an explanation for self-inflicted wounds. It comes in 1917, just after his arrival at the front during the 3rd Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele). This was a man not given to hyperbole or poetic depictions. He didn't write about emotions and tended to stick to facts and figures - very English - which is why this one-word diary entry stands out so much and haunts me:

"Hell."

[Gazman]

Originally Posted by Arthritic_Tom

"Love this!!! I'm half-way through and want to do the book! Pull a proposal together at your leisure. Fantastic read!"

Best news I've heard all day, I involuntarily gave a little fist-pump and a let out a "yeah" reading this.

I hope it goes well for you, I believe you've earned it.

[Roadkill]

Originally Posted by Arthritic_Tom

The best "inside Hollywood" film ever made is called Ellie Parker, starring Naomi Watts.
Ellie Parker (2005) - IMDb
Nobody's ever heard of it, because it sank without a trace.

Actually it's available to watch for free online on Hulu. There's even a link to that from the page you linked - FTW !

[Roadkill]

Originally Posted by Arthritic_Tom

A surprisingly good movie about it is Rock Star, with Mark Wahlberg.

As my main project at the moment is a Journey Tribute and that band's present lead singer came right out of that movie's premise I'm not sure re-watching that movie at the moment would be good idea for me (LOL), but in the spirit of "Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it" that movie is a must for anyone in this biz even if it is fiction. Hilariously funny at times and darkly disturbing at others .

Oh, and lest all that drives all you all into despair check out "The School of Rock" with Jack Black .

[fraublugher]

Originally Posted by Arthritic_Tom

Yup. Great advice.

This poem, too, is great advice. From Stephen Crane's The Black Riders and Other Lines:

XXIV

I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed by this;
I accosted the man.
"It is futile," I said,
"You can never--"

"You lie," he cried,
And ran on.

I pursued the horizon for ages. No more.

and Ivor Cutler's version there-abouts:

" The earth meets the sky at the horizon, i was told , by a sparrow with a lump on its head."