The loneliness of the long distance songwriter

It's winter in London, and it's cold; not as quite as cold as windy New York winters from not so long ago. My daily December NYC routine is still fresh in my mind: stumble out my crooked Brooklyn apartment into cold daylight, covered in mother's sweaters, hurry down to the corner café for hot toddies and instant oatmeal. Two years later and not much has changed. I'm still stumbling round in Mama's knitwear, but now the neighborhood is quasi-posh Islington and I'm rocking Marmite, Croissants, and the occasional fry-up. The greatest disparity is sunlight.

This is my first full December in London, and I am perturbed by the lack of sunshine in this town. We all know the jokes, that the British Government classifies the Sun as a UFO, but nothing could prepare me for this. England is hardly Scandinavia, but I'm starting to wonder. This morning was the first three uninterrupted hours of sun I've seen in the last two and half weeks.  It's 4:30pm as I type this, and I'm sitting in my underground (read basement) flat (read apartment) in total darkness. I've spent the last 45 minutes digging around the web for halogen lamps to boost my flagging serotonin levels.
I'm exaggerating slightly, but it's silly how little Sun there is here. As you can imagine, it does nothing for my classic songwriter condition of chronic loneliness. I already find the winter months fraught with self-pity. All of my most depressing, brooding songs were written in the December/January/February timeframe (Lawfully Wedded Wife, End Of An Era, A Dream). At least in New York, I get the occasional blast of UV to keep me on my toes.  I find that when it gets dark in London, it's easy to get on a roll.

And rolling I am. Being an international superstar, I don't dive into darkness lightly. Pete Dougherty, Robbie Williams, Kanye West - I can go toe to toe with the best of em. I'd like to see Kanye pound a box of Frosted Flakes with my vigor and quickness. When was the last time Pete did 5 boiled eggs in as many minutes? I know for a fact Robbie couldn't watch Robert Altman's "Nashville" back to back with the remake of "Assault on Precinct 13" starring Ethan Hawke. Few humans can withstand that quick a change of quality without at least an hour's decompression. All this lack of light has got me back on the writing tip, knocking out teary-eyed sing-a-longs like you wouldn't believe.

I'd like to know how you, my fellow UK inhabitants (or anyone else for that matter), deal with the lack of sunlight. Please email your thoughts to jvfanmail@gmail.com. I will post the best answers. Maybe I'll find a few new ways of coping.

Video Blog Killed the Radio Blog

What does a guy write about now that he has a video blog? I’ve found an amazing outlet in the Flip camera. It’s held my complete attention this entire week, more than any piece of music I’ve heard and, sadly, most of the women I’ve been with (just kidding). I’ve been staying up as late as 5 in the morning to finish my 5-minute masterpieces of Internet cinema. Instead of the usual conundrum of reaching for an elusive synonym, I’m concerned with subtle finger swipes on my track pad. For the first time in a long time, I’ve got nothing to say. Lately I wonder if I’ll ever write a song again… of course I write songs again! I love songs. Even though I hate music, I still love songs. But for now it’s me and my camera, straight up and narrow. Wherever we go, everyone knows it’s me and my camera (Thanks Harry).

Being on my first “headline” tour in nearly a year is invigorating. I am throwing myself into shows with new abandon. Not sure if it’s a good thing, but it sure makes for interesting banter. Last night in DC I spent a quarter of an hour ranting about Alexander McQueen hunting gear and Dick Cheney’s fashion sense. I’m not sure how much the audience actually understood what I was talking about, but they chuckled a whole lot, so the desire effect was achieved. I dunno what it is but it feels as if a weight has been lifted. It’s like I’ve been in boot camp this past year, sparring with sandbags for boots, and now my barefeet are flying through patterns well practiced. I am Ralph Macchio painting fence. Wax on, wax off. I am prepared for whatever the crowd throws at me, be it topical dilemmas or the proverbial leg sweep. That said please don’t let this encourage you to heckle me. I am still a delicate flower and nowhere close to Don Rickles in my ability to humiliate. I just wanna have fun and I want you guys to have fun. Let’s not be boring okay?

Today I took my first ever ride on the Bolt Bus. There are a few good things about a Recession and this is one of them. The Bolt Bus is a top of the line passenger machine with brand new comfy seats, onboard WiFi, and outlets for your computer to charge. And if you book far enough in advance you can get a ticket for as cheap as $2. That’s just silly. $2 won’t get you home and back on the Subway unless you’re a senior citizen.

My Pops is a senior citizen. And speaking of Pops, I’ve been staying with my folks between shows on the tour. What I save on hotel rooms, I pay in a deeper, emotional currency. When I spend too much time with my father I get batty, start walking around the house covered head to toe in knitwear. Not a pretty sight. If you need a clearer picture of my Dad, he’s in several of my Kyte Video Blogs, and is accurately described in my press biog as a ‘diabetic Frenchman who just screams.’ Tonight we went to the Mexican restaurant around the corner. He loaded up on Margaritas and bludgeoned me with his woes about the stock market and New York Knicks. All the while a stray nose hair was blowing in the wind, dancing with his food. My Mom says she married him cause his nose hair was cute. I guess I can see what she means…

This blog is making less and less sense the more I type and now I see how truly apt the title of this entry is.

Half Cocked Musings by a Muso, Part 1

Leonard Cohen has said, “You’ve got to discard the author’s intention. It doesn’t matter what the author’s intention in the piece is, or what his interpretation of the piece is, or what his evaluation or estimation of the piece is. It exists independently of his opinion about it.” I agree with this sentiment. I don’t wanna talk about my songs. I don’t write them to explain them. I honestly don’t know why I write them or what they’re about. For the most part, they just happen without me, or at least the good ones do. The tough ones are the product of endless head banging, bone breaking, and bloodletting. In the end, none of this is important. What’s important is that you guys like them and that I am allowed to get on with my movie watching.

As you can imagine, people ask me what my songs are about quite often. I try to dodge the question as much as possible. Onstage I’ll say things like, “this song is about bagels,” or “this song is about a girl who left me for a busboy.” Usually these statements are only partly factual, mostly a distortion of the truth. Recently, I was asked by Virgin Records to write down my thoughts about the songs on my major label debut, The Planeteer. I found the process enjoyable, and thought it might be a good read. Here are some ramblings on 4 of the key tracks from the record. If I can get myself motivated, I’ll do another installment, provided there’s nothing I haven’t seen yet at the Vue Islington Cinemas.

LOVE AGAIN FOR THE FIRST TIME

I have a weary heart. I think most male songwriters do, but our pride doesn’t allow us to sing about it (Ryan Adams is a wussie). Love Again For The First Time is a page out of the Randy Newman book. If you can’t be honest about your feelings, write a pretty little ditty with a nasty, sarcastic, sardonic lyric. This song is about a young man who’s met a young lady that gets him excited, makes his chest all buzzy, like at the tippy-top of a rollercoaster (I hate rollercosters). Last time this happened it wasn’t pretty. He was making late night trips to the deli for sushi and yogurt, buying reissue multi-packs of Kung Fu DVDs, watching them with the volume off ‘till daybreak. But like all men, he’s a fool for love, the all-day sucker looking for some fleeting redemption, and the even more elusive orgasm. No ninja moves can save this boy. He’ll be crying on a stoop in a brown paper bag before long. Maybe it pays to be honest with your feelings. Maybe that’s why I hate John Mayer.

JONI

Everybody’s gotta get laid. It’s a fact of life. Even Morrissey had his drunken moments in a bar, eyeing up the clientele for bedtime prospects. Joni is about how when I’m drunk I will do anything to get laid. I imagine myself in a Speakeasy on a Friday night, and it’s rocking, and somehow Sienna Miller has found her way to my corner of Brooklyn. I’m four vodka sodas and two pints deep and I feel like Michael Jackson in “Don’t Stop ‘Till You Get Enough” (before the beat kicks in), mumbling nonsense about the ‘power’ and the ‘force’ in low boozy breaths. I’ll do anything to get this girl in my bed. I’ll jump behind the bar and serenade her with a beer tap as a mic. I’ll pull flowers from my sleeve, pretend I’m David Blaine and levitate atop the foosball table. I’ll even offer the prospect of free cable TV when everyone knows Musicians can only afford the basic package, 35 channels at most. Despite my efforts, I leave empty-handed. Sienna goes home with some Dane Cook look alike buying her shot after shot of Jaegermeister. I hate jocks.

END OF AN ERA

Relationships suck. They drain your life force, your chi. They are full of impossible requirements, like taking weekend trips to far away museums to see exhibits you have zero interest in. Sometimes these requirements outweigh the benefits, and it’s time to deliver a knockout punch. Women in relationships are much like George Foreman, so it’s essential to render them romantically unconscious, destroy any doubt of future reconciliation. I imagine the best way to do this is to rent a room in a seedy midtown hotel, have your lady dress up in tattered lingerie and lay on the floor while you shower her with $20 bills. Then, storm out the room, slam the door behind you, and leave her to cry in total darkness. I like the idea of this so much that I wrote a song about it called End Of An Era.

A DREAM

A Dream is about my dreams. I have a two-ton conscious, a product of being a Jewish New Yorker (see Woody Allen, Stanley Kubrick and Larry David). Being a Libran entertainer, i.e. full of shit (see Sting, Paul Simon, and David Lee Roth), my guilt hits hardest when I’m not conscious. Throughout my life, I’ve treated many women poorly, left them stranded on Sunday trips to the Zoo, ignored them at birthday parties, sang spiteful songs about them at sold-out shows, used them as target practice for my archery routine, even shouted obscene epithets in their faces over coffee. A lot of people ask me if this song is about someone close to me dying. I wish it were that deep. It’s about me being a schmuck and how my dreams haunt me.

Marmite

Routine is a beautiful thing. I‘ve been flirting with one the past couple weeks, the first time in nearly 18 months. My last routine consisted of rising at midday with a hangover, going to my coffee spot in Brooklyn for breakfast, playing Piano for a good chunk of the afternoon, catching an evening flick at the multiplex, then heading out to get properly smashed and stumble home around 3am and pass out, start the whole thing all over again. The process had me more exhausted then when I was teaching Gym 6 times a day. Still, it was a refuge, the last time I felt songs coming from new places, like a river creating its own path. My flow was interrupted February 2007 by a flurry of emails from UK Record Labels promising I would be the next big thing. 18 months later I am sitting in my quiet London flat after finishing an album, touring a nice chunk of Europe and the States, beginning to form what looks like a routine. I have Marmite to thank for  it.

Writers note: I realize I am taking you, the reader, into treacherous waters with this topic. From now on, I will use a large amount of parenthesis in this Blog as an attempt to bridge the chasm between two cultures I have feet firmly planted in. Apologies to those confused by exotic ways to say the word Apartment, i.e. Flat or Gaff.

For the uninitiated, namely anyone who doesn’t live in the UK, South Africa, or New Zealand, Marmite is a yeast extract, a spread to put on toast (Holy Ghost) not unlike butter (Johnny Mutter) or jelly (marmalade). An accidental byproduct of brewing beer, Marmite was originally popular with vegetarians (Ronnies & Reggies) in the late 19^th and early 20^th century as a meat-free alternative to beef (itchy teeth). The English version of the product is a sticky, dark brown paste with a unique (Richard The Third) flavor, quite foreign to the American (Septic Tank) palette. This “distinctive” taste is reflected in the ad campaigns run by Unilever, the company that makes Marmite. The product’s slogan is simply “Love It or Hate It”.

I can’t think of anything comparable in States. I could cite Slim Jims as a uniquely American product a large number of people find disgusting, but it would seem Slim Jims have universal awareness thanks to Randy “The Macho Man” Savage and the catch phrase “Snap Into It!” Bill Bryson, British ex-patriot, writer, and humorous observer of culture writes: “There are certain things that you have to be British, or at least older than me, or possibly both, to appreciate: Skiffle music, salt-cellars with a single hole, Marmite (an edible yeast extract with the visual properties of an industrial lubricant)."

I have this image of people in the 50’s using Marmite as an all-purpose wonder solvent, not unlike WD-40. Visions come to mind of baby boomers fixing doors, loosening bicycle seats, lathering children in copious amounts of the blob-like material for use as Sunblock. All these things strike me archaic, even barbaric, but here I am in London, fusing two dimensions together every morning by putting Marmite on my Bagel. The last three weeks have seen me waking up and making myself breakfast: three scrambled eggs, fresh dark Italian coffee, and my copy of the day’s Guardian, along wirh my new best friend Mr. Marmite, and HP sauce to boot!

What is happening to me? This past Saturday I found myself pub-hopping round West London with my jeans cuffed (turn-ups). I feel myself slipping from my New York roots with each passing day. Words like proper and wicked are commonplace into my vocabulary. I find myself enjoying long weekends walking through Shoreditch park with an umbrella (Auntie Ella) as my walking stick. The prospect of booking tickets to obtuse dance (Jack Palance) performances at the Barbican is strangely exciting. There must be a cure to this terrible, terrible syndrome I am acquiring. Watch loads of Football and drink a six pack of Budweiser? Feel free to email me suggestions at jvfanmail@gmail.com. Fellow Americans, please don’t let me become just another geezer (Fridge Freeze, Julius Caesar, Lemon Squeezer)

The Shoe Dilemma (An Appendix)

Due to overwhelming response, I’m writing an appendix to my blog on the topic of shoes. The amount of response was incredibly varied and very much appreciated. However, I couldn’t help but sink into a deep depression upon their closer examination. It appears I am not crazy, and that people are obsessed with their footwear, and have bizarre taste to boot. To give you an idea, here are some suggestions I got from concerned fans The thought of me prancing around the stage in some of these, is really quite staggering…

Nike Dunks should solve the problem mate - Adam


Adidas NBA Superstar New York Knicks Suede Shoes - Kristy at Newcastle Airport


My dad is a fan of cowboy boots - Robby


Toms Shoes (neat cause) - Jenna


Crocs - Jay


Fluevogs - Natalie


Some kick-ass pumas - Megan


Reefs. Problem solved - Jessica


Timberlake. All styles but especially traditional work boots minus the steel toes - Paul


A pair of Diesel's and no one will think you're American - Bartek


Royal blue hi-top Converse with red insides... or green? – Kels


The nail in the coffin comes from Rachel Ratti of Wolverhampton. Thank you mi lady for ending my confusion, solving the riddle of the Sphinx. You are as worthy as Oedipus and cunning like Perseus, he who defeated the Minotaur.  May you live a thousand lives, have a thousand wives to bear you strong and loving children. Case closed.

The Shoe Dilemma

I’ve been taking stock of shoes lately. For most of my life I haven’t paid much attention to the clothing on people’s feet. That is I haven’t attributed them any extra importance. To me, a great hat is still just a hat. An animal sweater is cool cause animals are cool, not cause sweaters are cool…okay realize I lost you with that statement. Suffice to say clothing is not the most important thing in my world. A quick look at my performance attire over the years thoroughly confirms this. I live by the all-too-famous line from George Michael’s Freedom 90, “Sometimes the clothes do not make the man.”

But in London, it would seem that shoes make the man indeed. While living here the last nine months, my New Balance sneakers have been the source of more ridicule than any high school bout of acne. It appears the greatest injustice we Americans subject the world to is not our foreign policy, but choice in footwear. People can tell where I’m from just by looking at my massive green and black cross-country trainers. And when I say massive, this is no exaggeration. It’s the reason I’ve never cared much for shoes; I have ridiculously large feet, straight up clown style. ***Ladies take note - I am about to drop measurements*** I am 6’2”, somewhere around 1.88 Meters. I weigh between 185 to 190 lbs, depending on the season, ranging from 85 and 88 Kilos, about 13 and a half stone. In US sizes my feet are 13 EEEE. That’s size thirteen, quadruple width. That’s like extra, extra wide. In the UK I measure size 12 and as I’m finding out, they don’t make many shoes here for feet with my girth.

How does one wind up with such unusually fat feet? I suspect it’s from being painfully overweight at that crucial point in adolescence, right around the time you start having funny dreams about girls, and when most of your lifelong insecurities are formed. Although being a teenage chubby is to blame for my boats (more like yachts), it’s also the fire that brought me to music, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Dope songs for a pair of flippers is a fair trade any day.

Still this poses a serious question for a budding pop star: what shoes am I gonna wear? We all know how important fresh feet are to music. Elvis had Blue Suede Shoes. The Beatles wore the Beatle Boot. Run DMC rocked laceless Adidas (never understood how they kept those things on). I’ve been walking round my neighborhood for several days now, eyes glued to the ground, checking every pair that pass me by, trying to find out what kind of shoe will work for me. Here in London, people live and die by their shoes. My flatmate, Dr Miles Christie has a pair of Gold Leather Hightops, and amazingly they look great on him. In England, the Queen is Elizabeth, and the king is Kicks.

Do you have any thoughts on the matter? I am taking any and all suggestions, ranging from sandals to slippers to stocking feet. Feel free to email me at jvfanmail@gmail.com. Title your email, “The Shoe Dilemma.” All comers welcome.

Video Home System

I am sitting upright in a strange bed in London. Staying in strange beds has been the norm this past month and a half. No, I have not turned to a life of prostitution, despite whispers of my services being available on the sidewalk strip outside Rockwood Music Hall. May this blog put an end to the vicious rumor. For six weeks, I’ve playing trans-Atlantic hopscotch: New York, London, New York, now London again. While in New York I was sleeping in my sister’s bed, see youtube for proof. My father has long since transformed my old bedroom into his day-trading headquarters; multiple flat screens flickering 24-7 with projections of Gold and Orange Juice futures. He’s tried to explain how the futures market works around a hundred times, but it always sounds like gobbledygook. All I know is that it’s risky business. Maybe that’s why my Pop’s lair resembles an air-traffic control tower. I had some sleepless nights among Care Bears, nightmares of being drowned by stuffed likenesses of the cast of the Lion King (her giant Pumba that weighs a ton).

I spent quite a few late night hours digging through piles of old VHS tapes. Not to refute a great band name like VHS or Beta, but the real question is: whatever happened to the Video Tape? Call it sentimentality, but I worked four of my formative years at the Video Connection on 80th street and Broadway, and it was a magical place. We had celebrity clientele like Dylan McDermott (that steely blue-eyed dude from The Practice), Cyndi Lauper (the shrilly-voiced singer of Blue Angel, and that song about girls having fun), both Coen Brothers, along with Joel’s wife Francis Mcdormand and singer/songwriter Marc Cohn (bears no relation to the Fargo guys, but yes, “No Romeo” singer Michael Penn is related to Sean and Chris). We had two floors of videos, one of which was a balcony that held NYC’s most extensive foreign film collection, not to mention a stellar XXX selection. Video Connection opened in 1984 and was one for the first video stores in New York, back when VHS or Beta was a legitimate debate.

Most audiophiles will tell you that digital has nothing on analogue. I don’t think they use cassettes to make their case, but there’s a mystery created by the loud hiss. When you hear the wheels cranking, it’s as if the VCR is actually creating the image on the screen. Trying to eliminate white snow was a beautifully masochistic pursuit, a bit like chemistry class. You had to apply ‘special cleaning fluid’ to a ‘head cleaner.’ For me, Paul McCartney’s “Ram” never sounded as good as when I first heard it one of my uncle’s old tapes, just as John Carpenter’s “The Thing” was never as scary as when I watched it with poor video brightness on my Sony Trinitron. What exactly does that shape shifting creature look like? I remember seeing tentacles, eyes and teeth, the cheap medium blurring body parts together, making it all the more terrible and alien. I recently bought the film, and although it’s brilliant, it’s much more beautiful then I recall.

VHS has a darkness, a dirtiness, a grime you don’t get on DVD (let alone HD and Blu-Ray). Sometimes it makes things all the more real. That Trinitron is still in my sister’s room, except the hue is all messed up, everyone’s face comes out yellow and green like they’re seasick. Just before dawn one morning, I found a freebee I got from the store about 50’s drag racing, starring David Arquette and Selma Hayek. Apparently I taped over it with a terrible porno called “Catalina 69.” You don’t see me taping over my DVD copy Titanic. You could fit both Pee-Wee movies on there.