The Long Plastic Hallway (A Major Label Story) Part 3

Below is a blog I started a couple months back. Now that I'm back in the States, and have a little distance from my European adventures, I feel a lot safer putting this out there. It's hard to talk about the almost and what could have been with maturity and eloquence. Here's my best crack at it:

I've been back in NYC for three months now, through the summer and into fall and, the occasional overseas jaunt aside, I may be here for a while longer. It's a funny concept to wrap my head around, makes my time in London seem like a music filled dream of pubs and clubs, fried brekky and Wellingtons. These days I wake and find myself right back in my Red Hook stomping grounds, renting a dusty, floor-boarded apartment just a half a room bigger than the one I left two years ago. What happened? How did I get here? I never thought I'd find the answer in a Turner Classic Movies Murder Mystery DVD 4-pack at Barnes and Noble.
Lately I've developed a serious appetite for Bogart. His dry, pragmatic, pessimistic brand of optimism has pulled me in like magnet. The past few weeks I've scoured iTunes, renting any and all Bogart titles: The Big Sleep, The Treasure of Sierra Madre, Key Largo. There's something so singular about his self-control; he never loses his cool, even when he's losing his cool (McQueen definitely took a page out of his book). And what a strange looking man for a movie star: a long, giant, stone faced mug planted a top a thin, wiry, body which at first looks awkward, but then moves with complete grace, taking guns from his enemies like a trained ballet dancer. And in no movie is the power of Bogart more on display then John Huston's masterpiece, The Maltese Falcon.
The story is typical noir: Bogart plays Dashell Hammet's finest creation, Private Investigator Sam Spade, who, in the pursuit of his partner's killer, is led down a continually twisting path, meeting all sorts of n'er do well miscreants along the way ala Peter Lorre and Sidney Greensteet. The cause of the commotion is The Maltese Falcon, a jewel encrusted bird lost since the 15th century and worth untold fortunes. All parties involved are after the bird, including Mary Astor, who is Bogart's love interest, and incidentally, (SPOLIER ALERT) the killer of his partner. What I found especially intriguing about the film, is how it's a direct parallel for the music business.

***
Standing at a fork in the road of my blog, I feel like Robert Frost, trying to muster the courage and take the road not taken, sidestep a bitter rant on the cruelty and injustice of the music business. We've all heard countless stories about major labels breaking the hearts of artists, shelving records for months, years, maybe even for good They lift musicians to the pinnacle of their profession, only to drop them out in the cold to fend for themselves. Sad to say I am another casualty, but rather than dwell in the darkness, I'm trying to see light at the end of the tunnel. And for me the light always comes in the darkness of a movie theater. Stay with me here, I'm going somewhere:

***

I remember peeing in KensalTown studios a couple years ago (Jason Mraz penned and recorded the international smash "I'm Yours" there, perhaps simultaneously while I was urinating). I had signed to EMI 4 months prior and was riding a high of accomplishment. It was in that toilet I first read Hunter S. Thompson's genius quote about the industry, scrawled on the wall by some musician who'd come before:

The Music Business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side.

Those words cut right to my core then, and still hit me hard now. If I think back to when I started writing songs in my high school bedroom, more than 12 years ago, I never saw it as a path to fame or a career choice. I wasn't trying to be the guy in Billy Joel's The Entertainer, didn’t want to play all kinds of palaces and lay all kinds of girls. I was writing songs because it was the only way I knew how to make sense of the world, to ease the weight in my chest. And somewhere along the way, despite my best efforts, I ended up like all the other singing, songwriting hooligans, chasing desperately after the Maltese Falcon.
For the bulk of my twenties, I recorded album after album, went from manager to manager, signed one bad contract after the next, all in the pursuit of doing what I love. I thought that if I made uncompromisingly great music and performed it with all my heart, that everything would work out in the end. Plow straight through life in the carefree pursuit of your passion and at some point end up with a permanent smile over the rainbow. I wish that cherubic 18-year old had seen The Maltese Falcon. Maybe Bogart could have knocked some sense into that baby Rock Star with the handle of his revolver.
There is no Maltese Falcon. At the end of the movie, the bird turns out to be a fake, and everyone who pursues it becomes obsessed. The only character who lives by any moral code is Spade. In the final minutes he not only hands over the Falcon to the cops and gives back $1000 of bribe money, he also turns in the girl he loves (remember she’s the killer of his partner, and is trying to get Sam's to, in his words, "play the sap"). Spade refuses love, the realization of his dreams. As an explanation, he gives one hell of a monologue:

You'll never understand me, but I'll try once and then give it up. When a man's partner is killed, he's supposed to do something. It makes no difference what you thought of him. He was your partner, and you're supposed to do something about it... and it happens we're in the detective business. Well, when one of your organization gets killed, it's... it's bad business to let the killer get away with it... bad all around, bad for every detective everywhere. I've no earthly reason to think I can trust you. If I do this and get away with it, you'll have something on me that you can use whenever you want to. Since I've got something on you, I couldn't be sure that you wouldn't put a hole in me someday. All those are on one side. Maybe some of them are unimportant. I won't argue about that. But look at the number of them. What have we got on the other side? All we've got is that maybe you love me and maybe I love you. You know whether you love me or not. Maybe I do. I'll have some rotten nights after I've sent you over, but that'll pass. If all I've said doesn't mean anything to you, then forget it and we'll make it just this: I won't, because all of me wants to regardless of consequences and because you've counted on it, the same as you counted on it with all the others.

Let me make my metaphor as plain as possible:

The girl is the music business. Your partner is your art. The Maltese Falcon is the dream of success, and the detective/dreamer/singer songwriter is Spade. Every day I wake and hope for the strength to be like him. As I beat the streets of NYC once again, my mind lives in another city in the past; it's 1941 in San Francisco, it’s always raining and I'm wearing a trench coat with a .45 tucked in my pants. I've had to learn lessons I never wanted to learn first hand. The only advice I give to any aspiring acolyte is keep a good look out for villains, don't play the sap for anyone, especially yourself, and stay alive long enough to close the case and move on to the next one.

And write some good tunes while you’re at it. I mean, that's the whole point, isn't it?

The Zen of Aaron Boone (A Major Label Story Part 2)

It's 20 past midnight and up and down the long, narrow island of Manhattan, there are countless people celebrating the victory of their pinstriped warriors, The New York Yankees. Right now I present a stark contrast to the bustling, crowded sports bars of the Upper West Side, sitting in my sister's old bedroom, covered in stuffed animals and flowered blankets, falling in and out of sleep while watching hour upon hour of streaming online movies courtesy of Netflix. I promised myself not to let this blog's fate match my last. But last time I sat down to write one of these things, the words came gushing out like a rusty faucet, dirty brown water not meant for drinking (I'm doing my best to clean it up for consumption like an artistic Brita filter). It's a tough pill to swallow, going from living the life of a UK chart-raiding acolyte to crashing back at your parents for the first time since college. But hey, those the brakes. What would the up be without the down, the left without the right? Just as in January 2007 I was spending 5 nights a week boozing and accumulating credit card debt in downtown NYC, I had no idea that in January 2008 I would be living in England signed to a major record label, or that in January 2009 I would still be living in England signed to another subsidiary of said major record label. Right now it's looking like January 2010 will provide yet another stark contrast. But you know what - I'm actually happy. And being happy is a weird thing for me.

I've been suffering from a strained voice these past few months, a blister developed on my chords back in July as a result of stress and poor health. It's the kind of weakness that cuts right to the core of my identity. But do not fear loyal concert goers, I'm well on the mend and will be in fighting shape for my December tour, thanks to various "New Age" practices I've adopted. I went to my first acupuncture session this week, and I've developed a serious Yoga habit over past months, guided in my stretching by some guy named Rodney Yee who wears too-short shorts and sits on a platform on a cliff overlooking a beach in some perfect place that cannot exist. In addition, I've completely cut all alcohol, coffee, carbonation, dairy, citrus, spicy and fried food from my diet (In case your wondering, yes I'm very boring to hang out with now. I take all my friends to drink tea in Starbucks). But it's the combination of these things, along with an hour's worth of vocal exercises a day (which sound unbelievably terrible), that's making me healthier, building my sound back up so it's richer and fuller, and I suspect better than ever before. My day is taken up by simple tasks - writing new music, rehearsing my new band, responding to emails from fans, figuring out my new very nerdy keyboard rig. And for the first time since I left New York for London two winters ago, I don't feel the pressure of a giant looming in the woods. I don't feel like I'm speeding toward a terrible crash, some poor diner on the Titanic feeling the chill of the Iceberg. And this new found simplicity is bringing a bounce back to my step, ink to my quill, happiness to my warm gun...

There's an easier way to say what I'm trying to say:

Everyone wants to be Derek Jeter. But there's only one Derek Jeter, and I'm not him. And if you asked me to choose between being A-Rod and Scott Brosuis, I'd pick Scott the man with the ugliest face every time. And every now and then, if you bide your time, tuck your head down, and get a bit of luck, you get to have a moment like Aaron Boone in the 2003 ALCS, where the world stops and watches in wonder.

The irony is I don't even like the Yankees. 1986 Mets still play the field in the dreams of my life.

The Maltese Falcon (A Major Label Story)

Coming as soon as I wake up and finish writing it. I am a skilled woodworker with my thoughts. Stay tuned...

Hungover

Sometimes coming home ain't all it's cracked up to be. While in London, I had visions of returning to graffiti filled subway cars, three-card monte hustlers set up on sidewalks, and spending late summer nights in checkered cabs racing through rain slicked streets. For some reason, the rest of the world views New York City as it was in the 1970's and 80's, home to the bohemian lifestyle that created Hip-Hop and Pop Art. Living in England the past 18 months, I started to romanticize my hometown as the rough and tumble metropolis that nurtured my artistic personality, a concrete womb as opposed to jungle. But being back here, I was greeted by a very different NYC, a place that felt more like Chicago, or Cincinnati, maybe even Indianapolis, some other American collection of highways and byways. Maybe it's a case of the recession blues, or just getting older, but my hometown has changed, and I'm not sure if it's for the better...

My realization started about a week after being back. While standing on the corner of Lafayette and Houston, some shirtless guy with nose paint and tightly wound abs gestured for me to follow him into a darkened room. This wasn't a homeless ne'er-do-well trying to include me on a score, but rather an over eager Hollister employee hoping I'd buy some redesign of Jams (I still have a pair from 1991 somewhere). I'd never heard of Hollister till that moment, but from the people streaming in and out of this black-lit cave, you'd think it was the latest nightlife hotspot, not a clothing store. What this Ambercrombie & Fitch spin-off was doing in the heart of downtown NYC was truly baffling. When I left America, The Gap was everywhere, but it certainly wasn't the place to be

The next shock to the system came when I went to see a movie called The Hangover. Zack Galifianakis, one of the stars of the film, has been a cult comic hero here for sometime. With this role he'd finally broken into the mainstream, a John Belushi for a new generation. I'd seen him on Conan O'Brian recently and he was hilarious. Conan threw out that The Hangover was the most successful R-rated comedy of all time, a factoid making me all the more excited. The next day I settled down in a midtown multiplex with a tub of Popcorn, ready to laugh my ass off. What commenced was one of the most dislikable 100 minutes of my movie watching career, a mindless rehashing of every Owen Wilson/Vince Vaughn/Ben Stiller vehicle without a charismatic lead to pull it off, not to mention a second grade plot revealed entirely in the trailer (why watch a movie when the whole thing is in the preview, right?) By far the most infuriating, soul-sapping part of this movie, was the Alpha male portrayed by Bradley Cooper.

Here we have, Phil Wenneck, your stereotypical party-hearty everyman (who looks surprisingly like the guy outside Hollister) getting trashed on roofies at a bachelor party the night before, stumbling round Vegas the day after, reacting completely unbelievably to the completely unbelievable situations he and his buddies have goten themselves into, flashing a too-white smile and perfect six pack at every possible moment. To quote Jonah Hill in Apatow's new flick, Funny People (good movie, little long though) - There's nothing funny about a guy who's in shape. All the while, Phil keeps his frat boy cool with all the "crazy" shit that's going on. He's the only character in the movie without any human flaws, and the only one who has nothing seriously bad happen to him (outside of a hospital visit we never find out the cause of). And we're supposed to believe this guy is married with two kids and a SCHOOLTEACHER! Worst of all, whenever he tries to convey anything humorous, he screams at the top of his lungs. For the record, yelling does not make something funny.

I'm sure those of you reading this are thinking: calm down JV, it's just a movie... but it's not just a movie. It's the MOST SUCCESSFUL R-RATED COMEDY OF ALL TIME. To give you an idea of how preposterous this is, here's a list of some of the other successful R-rated comedies of all time, all of which in my opinion, are in a different league of originality, and more importantly, funny:

Beverly Hills Cop
Borat
There's Something About Mary
Knocked Up
National Lampoon's Animal House
Wedding Crashers
Pretty Woman

My problem is this movie is a reflection of the values of the modern American male youth, hence it's overwhelming success. It's every American guy's fantasy - get wasted in vegas, win a lot of money, and marry a stripper who looks like Heather Graham. Phil Wenneck is every guy I ever hated growing up at school, at camp, even the playground. And today he's the guy every guy want to be. When I was a kid, the coolest guys were Michael Jackson and Pee-Wee Herman. They were cool because they were different. They were freaks! They didn't look like male models and they could do strange things like moonwalk and talk to animals. Even back in the day, teen idols possessed a rebellious streak (Marlon Brando, James Dean, Elvis, Steve McQueen, John Travolta, even the Dukes of Hazard were running from Boss Hog). There is nothing rebellious in the slightest about Phil Wenneck. He never goes against the grain. He behaves hedonistically without regard to his friends and is rewarded with the time of his life. He's the slapstick comedy version of John Mayer - a smirking, vanilla faced everyman who is famous and we're not quite sure why...

So in short, please don't go see The Hangover. Pixar's Up is a more rewarding alternative. The hero is a 70-year-old hopeless romantic who flies his house to South America with balloons, discovers an extinct bird and fights talking dogs that fly 1920's style fighter planes. In my opinion, that is so much cooler than stealing Mike Tyson's tiger and getting away with it.

8 Great English Things (There are only 8)

I am leaving London for the summer. The past 6 months have been my longest stint here yet, the longest amount of time I've been away from home my entire life. With my flight a mere 72 hours away, I feel a fear creeping up inside me that I have become too "English". My mind is cluttered with conversations where I refer to "Laundry" as "Washing", say "loads" in place of "tons", make dentist appointments for "half six a week Monday" instead of "next Monday at six thiry". As much as I dread the ridicule that will follow the abandonment of my native New Yorker tongue, I have come to the realization over the past half year, that England ain't half bad. Yes there is no sun here and it rains all the time and the people can be cold and closed off and hyper-stylized and they drink too much and then act inappropriate and at times have stereotypically poor hygiene and bad teeth, but there are a few things the UK has over the USA. I counted 8. Here they are:

P.S.: If you think I might have missed a great English thing, please email it to me at jvfanmail@gmail.com

Marmite -

I've already dedicated a entire blog to Marmite, the disturbingly thick yeast extract solvent I spread on my bagels each morn (have to get my NYC fix somehow). Back in September I saw it as a warning sign of my impending Englishness. Guess I was right. Read my Marmite blog at http://julianvelard.blogspot.com/2008/09/marmite.html

Withnail & I

Before I got to London I'd never heard of this 1987 cult classic, a perfect slice of dark comedy which has become mandatory University viewing here in the UK. Consider it a more literate, drug fueled counterpart to Animal House or Up In Smoke, one of those special kind of movies where every single line is instantly and eternally quotable. I remember watching the movie Warlock in 5th grade and being strangely drawn to Richard E. Grant's character, Giles Redferne. Withnail was Grant's first role and he is truly brilliant, spewing one memorable, hysterical line after another. And Richard Griffiths, Uncle Vernon of Harry Potter fame, plays a very different kind of uncle here, the terrifying Monty who nobly exclaims, "I mean to have you boy, even if it must be buglary!'

Pimm's & Lemonade

First produced in 1823 by James Pimm, a farmer's son from Kent, Pimm's is a gin-based drink containing quinine (tonic water) and a "secret" mixture of herbs. There were originally 5 different types of the drink (No.1-5), but after the brand fell on hard times in the 1970's, No.'s 2 & 5 were phased out. Pimm's mixed with lemonade is one of the traditional drinks at Wimbledon and during the Ashes. I tried this delicious, refreshing summer cocktail while playing my first and only game of Cricket. You can watch my experience at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTL477pVFmc


Marks & Spencer's at rest stops

Pulling off the M1 (The UK's version of I-95) while en route to Latitude Festival, I discovered what I still consider to be the best thing about England. I walked into a gas station and was able to purchase freshly squeezed orange juice, smoked salmon, and a tomato and mozzarella bruschetta. How is this possible? Mark's and Spencer (M&S for short) is one of the UK's major retailers of clothing and food. They are known for their superior quality and taste, servicing an upper end of clientele compared to Sainsbury's or Tesco's. They have food outlets in rest stops throughout the north of England. I can't tell you how many times I've been on tour in the States I've forced myself to eat hydrogenated, freeze-dried, fat boy foods like Beef Jerky, two-week old Donuts, and Sandwiches made from God knows what. Never again.

Nando's

This one may seem ridiculous to English people, but I think Nando's is amazing! We don't have high-quality fast food in America. It's all crap (with the exception of In-and-Out Burger in L.A. which is clearly what they eat atop Mount Olympus, the food of Gods). Nando's is a Portuguese Chicken joint which is fast, nutritious, and delicious. And the price is right! And you can get membership rewards cards! Buy 9 Chickens and the 10th is free. Amazing!

Fancy Cars parked on the street

People park really dope, mint condition vintage cars on the street in England. I dunno why, maybe it's safer here, but somehow I doubt it. Walking around London, I see incredible MGs, Triumphs, Austin Martins, Porsches, even Lamborghinis almost every day. Here's a look at the ones I snapped, pretending they were mine of course:

Film4

Film4 is the UK version of HBO but better in my opinion. We all know HBO's original programming is second to none (Sopranos, The Wire, Curb, Entourage, etc.). But in my mind, HBO stands for Home Box Office, just like MTV stands for Music Television. When I was a kid MTV played music videos, and HBO played movies, and that's all Film4 does. Their programming is impeccable, mixing long lasting classics with the latest releases, curating their schedule with themes like "Great Indie Directors' Week" or "The Films of Ben Stiller". Plus it beats HBO in the cost department: it comes as a part of Freeview which is, you guessed it, free.

BBC iPlayer

We've all heard about the BBC in America courtesy first of Jimi Hendrix's Radio 1 sessions, then Austin Powers' amazing BBC song, and now through BBC America which plays UK comedy staples like Little Britain and The Office. The BBC website has an amazing feature called iPlayer which lets you watch any of their programming on demand without commercials, whether it's coverage of Glastonbury Festival, The Olympics, documentaries on Jazz legends like Jelly Roll Morton, or the latest original Guy Ritchie rip-off, East London gangster mini-series. This is the gold standard of television programming. BBC 1, 2, 3 and 4 is all they need to get the job done. My Pops has over 700 channels at home and there's never anything on.

JV does Street Pianos in London!

It's 9 O'Clock On a Saturday...

There comes a time in a man's life when he has to stop blogging and start living, you know!!!.... I'd like to say my lack of communication stemmed from a deep need for self-reflection, that I had to take some time away from my online audience to ponder and process the past 2 years of ups and downs and in-betweens. But truth is, I've just been really, really busy.

This Spring I've become quite the scribe, occupied not with gigging, but exclusively writing songs for myself and others. The last twelve weeks has seen me produce an obscene amount of material, collaborating on music for the first time in my life. I've had the pleasure of working some great, established talents like Greg Kurstin, Gary Clark, Martin Brammer, Steve Robson, Lol Creme, Grant Black, and Jerry Abbott, as well as exciting new artists Rachel Furner, Ayah Marrar, and Ed Drewitt (all three of them are in my Top friends on Myspace, check em out, they're great!). As for the fruits of my labor, they will be on display during my shows this summer in the UK and US, as well as future recordings... more on my recording career in a few paragraphs... right now I feel a thought brewing (uh oh)....

So how does it happen that a self-made, suffering artiste like myself becomes, dare I say, a hack, in the truest sense of the word, i.e. Alexandre Dumas, Victor Hugo? While living in New York, making music was my private obsession, dirty auto-erotica done in the confines of my Brooklyn apartment and the occasional recording studio. Playing shows provided me with a much needed release, an exhibitionist kind of thrill. I considered myself a streaker of the highest order.

But when I got to London, something changed. For about a year I sat down on my lonesome to write and I was out of things to say. It was the first time in my life I was sapped of melodies, a rusty, dusty muso pick up truck on the side of the road. I mean let's face it, after 7 or 8 dedicated years of singer/songwriter-ness, how many times can a guy hit a chord on a Piano and feel inspired to pour out the contents of his soul? As I write this, Nicole Scherzinger of the Pussycat Dolls is on MTV pouring out the contents of her soul on a Piano in the middle of the desert, belting a dance remix of "The Hardest Part". If that's not confirmed proof that the singer/songwriter mold has been completely co-opted, I dunno what is. Somewhere between John Mayer, Jason Mraz, Jack Johnson, Gavin Degraw, James Blunt, Paolo Nutini, Howie Day, Joshua Radin, Brett Dennen, and Mat Kearney, I stopped buying into the notion of the earnest guy with his guitar tugging on my heart strings. Ok, maybe these all-american, cheeky chaps are legitimately suffering and there is something strangely beautiful about it but honestly, who cares? Not me.

So where does that leave this nearly 30-year confirmed Piano singer/songwriter, now that he's slagged all the acts he could potentially open for? ;) After awaiting the release of my major label debut, a Pop inflected, singer/songwriter album called The Planeteer for nearly a year, I find myself making a different kind of music. Music that's F-U-N. With the current shit economic situation, multiple international conflicts, global warming and whatnot, I don't wanna hear some guy who's never struggled with anything but a line at Starbucks whine about bourgeois malaise that he mistakes for heartbreak. I want Michael in 1982, I want Prince 1984. I want to party with Zombies and Were-wolfs like it's 1999, or 2009 for that matter. I want a self-aware, self-made, world weary version of Robbie Williams who's able to sing about life and love and sadness with a raised eyebrow. To put it plain and simply, where's my generation's Billy Joel?

Now before I propose a full on, feel good revolution, I owe you guys an explanation. To answer the emails I've received as of late: The Planeteer has not been released. The sad truth is its fate is up in the air, like a piece of my heart lying around outside my chest, without a home in your stereos, ipods and file-sharing sites. The reasons why, while painfully clear to me, would be painfully boring to you. Just know that with each passing week, my album is getting closer to your ears. In the meantime, I've put some new music on Myspace. More than ever, I feel I'm writing the best music of my life, working toward a new album of truly inspired songs that not only make me happy when I listen to them, but make me wanna dance. Don't worry, it's not a disco record (though that would be cool - I would make a great Tony Manero). Just think about that part in Uptown Girl, when Billy blasts into the bridge (Middle 8 for you English people) and goes "woah-oh-oh-oh-oh, oh-oh oh-oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh". Now imagine 45 minutes of that feeling. I've finally acquiesced to all the after-work businessmen at the hotel bar. I will sing you a song. I am the Piano man.