Interviewing Bassists Stories part 2

[Buzzramjet]

While I don't post here maybe more than once a decade, I have to say this has been the most fascinating two threads I have read in music journalism in my 61 years of life. Parts 1 and 2.

I used to read BP but as stated in became a commercial. And pretty useless. I remember reading better articles years before and then nothing but fluff and very obviously more interested in promoting the band,tour, record whatever.

In depth articles about bass players have been for all intents and purposes relegated to the dustbins of history which is a crying freaking shame.

I was brought up on bass players like Jack Cassidy-Jefferson Airplane/Hot Tuna, Berry Oakley-Allman Brothers Band, John Entwistle, and from there all the great bass players that came afterwards.

As a bass player, I was more interested in who they were as much as rigs or musical background and there just was practically nothing back then.

THEN writers like Tom and damned few others, then nothing.

So this thread has been more than just enlightening it's been a ginormous, huge shot of fresh air. And fun.

I do hope you produce a book, even if it's self produced and/or limited edition.

It's as much fun trying to figure out who the bassists are (and I figured out a few) and as such maybe few names would be necessary.

OR at the end of the book, just a list of bass players interviewed over the life of your career as a music journalist and we can then play connect the dots on our own.

Nonetheless I would hope you rethink that you are a failed music journalist. Rather the complete opposite.

Most enjoyable thread I've read in years and years.

Bravo and MORE!

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

I do hope you produce a book, even if it's self produced and/or limited edition.

Bravo and MORE!

Thank you very much. I'm very grateful.

The book is going to be published by one of the largest publishing houses in the nation, and I'm going to hire a publicist to help me promote it. I can't do book tours or signings, because I can't travel, but I can do radio and print, and I'm going to have a Web site and social-media presence.

I'm confident that this will reach a wide audience. The book is currently in the hands one of the best editors in the country.

The book will be widely available. It'll be up the the book-buying public to make it a success or not.

 

[GrooveChef]

Finally after couple of weeks I finished the whole threads. Congratz to Mr. Wictor for your book. I enjoy the anecdotes and interviews. What caught me the most is Mr. Wictor's and Mr. Thunes's honesty. Honesty that create many bridges which connected all of us as a human being. Thank you! Wish both of you all the best thing in life!

Keep on Groovin' with Life!

Dre

 

[Stumbo]

In the strict sense of the phrases, I am indeed a failed music journalist and a failed military historian, because I didn't succeed in these fields.

In 1921 General Billy Mitchell proved that aircraft armed with bombs made battleships obsolete, and as a result he was court-martialed for insubordination and had to resign from the service. All the world's navies kept building battleships.

During World War II, the British lost the Prince of Wales and the Repulse to Japanese bombers; the Germans lost the Bismarck to British torpedo bombers; and the Japanese lost the Yamato to American dive and torpedo bombers.

Mitchell was right, but he was still a failed general.

I think you're a bit hard on yourself and Billy Mitchell. He was ahead of his time. The people who failed are the people who were above him. IMO, same as you.

An artist creates. Whether people like it or not is not under one's control. If you define an artist's success by how much money is made, then by definition, 99.99999% of artist's fail. Did their creativity fail? Even a painter like Van Gogh's gained notice after he died.

Best wishes on your project.

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

I think you're a bit hard on yourself and Billy Mitchell. He was ahead of his time. The people who failed are the people who were above him. IMO, same as you.

An artist creates. Whether people like it or not is not under one's control. If you define an artist's success by how much money is made, then by definition, 99.99999% of artist's fail. Did their creativity fail? Even a painter like Van Gogh's gained notice after he died.

Best wishes on your project.

I mean "failed" in the sense of flunked out, which I most certainly did. I flunked out of music journalism.

This book, though, is the best thing I've ever done, and it wouldn't have happened unless I failed at music journalism and a while lot of other stuff.

So it's a tradeoff. I think my failures were unavoidable, so I don't feel bad about them anymore. Except for one failure, but since that was unavoidable, too, I don't feel as bad about it as I did before.

You're going to love the photos in the book.

 

[WokenDeer]

Apologize if it's already been said and I just forgot but do you have a time frame in which it will be available? Or is it still a little early

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

Apologize if it's already been said and I just forgot but do you have a time frame in which it will be available? Or is it still a little early

The deadline for turning in the manuscript is August 31, which I'll easily make. They tell me it'll be in the fall catalog, so presumably it'll be available before the end of the year.

Right now I'm waiting for the edited manuscript, and then I'll take an author photo and turn in the whole schmageggie.

To prepare for my author photo, I shaved off my hermit beard. I'm now ready to face the world! Woo-hoo!

 

[EvilTwin126]

To prepare for my author photo, I shaved off my hermit beard. I'm now ready to face the world! Woo-hoo!

Looking good Mr. Wictor!!! I don't usually wish my summer away but I can't WAIT until fall to get my hands on this book!!!

 

[TinIndian]

Yeah, who knew he'd clean up that well?

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

Yeah, who knew he'd clean up that well?

You sound like my dad.

 

[JimmyM]

Wow, and I thought I had a network of friends to tip me off when awesome stuff like this is going down! I missed the whole thing and just caught up today. I feel a little drained reading the whole thing in one day, but I couldn't stop. At times it was a trainwreck, and there were times I wondered how you couldn't know what a ****hole the music business is, or what depths people with tremendous insecurity will sink to keep their tenuous but awesome jobs, but it was entirely compelling and quite the fun read. At some point, you just have to laugh.

Tremendous Devo-tee here too, BTW. Almost 40 years after Devo's first gig, it's pretty impossible to laugh at their de-evolution theories like people did in the 70's and 80's because they were so right on. De-evolution is real and your war stories serve as evidence.

I only wish you'd name the folks in your stories. Wouldn't that fall under fair use to name them since these are your stories and not theirs? Or do you just not want to deal with the hassles in case someone tries to sue?

At any rate, looking forward to your book, and I'll definitely be snagging it when it comes out. Thanks for deciding to unload here, and I'm glad you got something out of it.

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

I only wish you'd name the folks in your stories. Wouldn't that fall under fair use to name them since these are your stories and not theirs? Or do you just not want to deal with the hassles in case someone tries to sue?

Thanks very much for your nice words. I appreciate them.

One of my favorite painters is Francis Bacon, who said, "The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery."

This book is a very conscious art project. When you read it, you'll have tons of questions, such as, "How the hell did he get those photos? What do they mean?"

There are other, far more disturbing questions you'll ask, and I won't answer any of them, ever. By withholding the names of the artists, I deepen the mystery. By withholding information about myself and my ghosts, I deepen the mystery further.

I used to love the comedians Richard Lewis and Margaret Cho. Both of them wrote memoirs that revealed everything you could possibly know about them. It not only made me lose interest in them, I didn't finish either book.

Richard Lewis had an eating disorder. In his memoir he describes how he used to make big bowls of ice cream, sliced bananas, and granola. It was a whole ritual. He'd eat spoonfuls of the stuff but suck the ice cream off the granola chunks, spit the granola back into the bowl, and then remix it and do it all over again, until each chunk of granola had been in his mouth fifty times. When all he had left was a soggy mess, he'd swallow it down. Did you really need to know that about him?

Margaret Cho described in detail her own eating disorder and the horrific damage it did to her kidneys. She also used her memoir to settle scores, naming names and spilling beans about everyone.

Although both books were written by comedians, there isn't a shred of humor in them.

I've had a hard life in lots of ways, but I've chosen to keep the details concealed. This will not only deepen the mystery, but it'll allow you to use your imagination, and it'll prolong my writing career.

Have you noticed that whenever someone writes a tell-all book full of sordid, shocking details and confessions, it gets a lot of buzz for a few months, and then the person's career crashes and burns? The most famous tell all is You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again, the memoir of film producer Julia Phillips. Although a smash bestseller, it really makes you dislike her, and you have no urge to read the book again. You don't even want it in your house when you're done. It's all one note, and her two follow-up books--Driving Under the Affluence and Drudge Manifesto, coauthored with Matt Drudge--had nowhere near the impact of her first book. Also, she was only 57 when she died.

I'm already 50; I have the chapter outlines of ten novels I'm going to try and publish. If I wear out my welcome early by puking out every possible detail about my life and the people with whom I interacted, nobody will care enough to buy my novels.

The three books I mentioned above fail in the long run because the authors told us too much. The authors were self-indulgent, and they imposed on us. Yes, we read their books, but we don't want to re-read them, and after reading the books we lose interest in the person.

I'm not going to let that happen to me. One way to preserve the interest of you--the book-buying public--is to keep the names of my interviewees concealed. You can imagine whatever you want about the stories, the way we imagine what Francis Bacon's paintings mean. If he explained them, it wouldn't be as entertaining.

If I dissect my life for you, it'll be as attractive as a gutted frog laid out on one of those pans in biology class.

Basically, I respect you too much to reveal everything; I want to publish many more books; and I want my books to be read years and years from now.

 

[TinIndian]

You sound like my dad.

Ouch!

 

[JimmyM]

You know, Tom, I never thought of it like that. We get our fill and you get nothing else beyond it...makes sense. Alright, I can appreciate that. Good answer

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

You know, Tom, I never thought of it like that. We get our fill and you get nothing else beyond it...makes sense. Alright, I can appreciate that. Good answer

It's a balancing act. Although one reason I wrote this memoir is to maybe help people avoid making the same mistakes I did, I also don't want to preach or come off like someone who's got all the answers.

The best way to do this was to present my disasters with a minimum of explanation for why I've had my problems.

The second-to-last-chapter is titled Lessons Learned, but I make clear that these are my lessons. We all live our lives differently, because we're all individuals.

I wrote the book mostly to banish my demons, but the second reason I wrote it was to honor the two main ghosts in my life, and the third reason was to entertain you, not lecture you, depress you, or make you feel sorry for me. I've tried to make the book as funny as possible, even when describing the lowest points in my life.

To keep a certain tone, I decided to conceal quite a bit about myself and my two ghosts. The arrangement I made with them was that I would not write or speak about their lives before or after I was involved with them, other than to use what's already public knowledge (in the case of Thunes) or to use their own words, which I ran by them for their approval.

All three of us--my two main ghosts and I--have concealed far more than we've revealed, but this decision was made not because we're ashamed or embarrassed. Rather, we did it for the sake of the art we wanted to create. Both Thunes and "Carmen" are great artists.

Concealing the names of the musicians I interviewed fit in better with the overall themes and tone of the book. Revealing all their names would've distracted from the art I wanted to create, and it would've ended up disappointing you in the long run.

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

If there's anyone reading this who can alert the forum owners that I need permission to reprint excerpts from this thread, I'd appreciate it.

Moderators? Someone who knows someone? Bueller? I sent in a request but got no response.

Here's what I plan on writing:

"Interviewing Bassist Stories" on Talkbass.com, copyright ©2012. Talk Music Group Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

If I can't get written permission in the form of a PM, I can't use the Thunes excerpt from this thread, which will gut the next-to-last chapter of my book.

So, if anyone can help alert the owners, I'll send you a copy of the book when it comes out.

Thanks.

 

[RoadRanger]

Interesting, getting Thunes' permission isn't enough? Would any of us have to get similar permission to reprint our own posts here?

 

[Arthritic_Tom]

Interesting, getting Thunes' permission isn't enough? Would any of us have to get similar permission to reprint our own posts here?

Believe it or not, yes. I just found this out a couple days ago.

Invalid Link Removed

Notice what's written at the bottom of each page here:

"Copyright 2011 Talk Music Group Inc. All rights reserved."

People have been successfully sued over this, so that's why I need written permission from Talk Music Group Inc. It's ominous that I haven't received a response yet.

 

[Betrayer_Bass]

In case anyone missed it, there's a FaceBook group ready and waiting https://www.facebook.com/GhostsAndBallyhoo there.

Tom, when it's time to use FB for the book you can, of course, take this over

 

[dbd1963]

I just got caught up at around 4am this morning and I want to say, this thread is full of epic goodness of a kind that surpasses easy description.

In a way, I feel I cheapen it by thinking in terms of entertainment because this was something that happened in real time, while real people were affected. But the value of it as a participatory experience is very high precisely because of that. It's much more than entertainment, because you come away affected by it. And the lessons that Tom is trying to teach are among the most valuable we are "sent" here to this school called life to learn.

I'm struck by how much Tom and I have in common -- I've got Meneire's disease, have had an NDE-like experience, have mild arthritis (I even have asthma like his friend Stiev did). I have been a blogger for years so I know a little about the writing business, and I have issues with unresolved anger that I'm trying to solve before I get any older. This thread pretty much hit me square in the solar plexus.

Speaking of Meniere's, which runs in my family too, if our experience is normal at all, you won't go deaf but you will lose hearing in the affected ear. In my case, it takes away the mids, where speech recognition happens, so that I can't understand what people are saying on the affected side. Too, since that was my "reference" ear, I can't mix tracks anymore. My other ear hasn't got the dexterity (though I keep trying to work at it). It's even the case that certain frequencies can be out of tune with each other, and I won't notice it until they are shifted to another frequency I can hear with my bad ear, like through tiny, crappy speakers. It has caused me embarrassment more than once! But it's not getting any worse, and I've been able to go back to a regular diet without issue.

I know everyone is different and you don't know where you are headed, but I tell you this to ease your mind that it's not necessarily going to be the worst case for you. My vertigo issues cleared up in about six months and dramamine helped to control them, so mine may not have been as severe as yours.

I do have a WONDERFULLY terrifying story to relate that I know you will understand. I was student teaching, working toward getting my teaching license, and in school when the meniere's hit. I had no idea what was going on, just that the room suddenly started spinning madly beneath me and oh lord, the nausea.. The spinning was like a centrifuge working the contents of my stomach up against my throat. Somehow, through sheer willpower, I did not throw up. Standing became almost impossible as the room wouldn't hold still.

Trouble was, a nice blizzard-like flurry of fluffy snow had just started. I had to drive home in those conditions, not knowing what the hell was wrong with me, unable to see more than ten yards ahead, the road whirling. Just thinking about it sends my head spinning right now!

The worst of it, though, is that it seemed nobody believed there was anything wrong with me that day because they couldn't see it. I think they thought I was a slacker who wanted to go home and play in the snow.

Well, I survived all that, and in surviving it found out something about how strong I can be when the chips are down. Tom, I think this thread shows you much the same thing. You didn't believe in the power of your own story, but the members here helped you to see that, and more, that you are very strong. All of those temptations to give in and be like the people you describe -- those would have ruined many another, but not you. You proved your strength, and by showing it to us, you let us experience it and maybe find its likeness in ourselves, when otherwise how would we know it was there without going through what you did?

So you might add that to the lessons you are teaching (and maybe learned for yourself).

There's a value to a thread like this one that is rare and hard to communicate completely.. Thanks for sharing your stories and experiences with us. I can't wait to get the book!