It’s time to get Confusing!

I am absolutely flummoxed by the ways of non-rockers. What do they mean when they say of themselves ‘I rock’ when they can neither play an instrument nor hum to a single song that isn’t lady Gaga’s poker face? And when they say rock is evil, do they mean it’s inspired by the devil? Or does it inspire evil doing? This got me thinking, what can I do to make people understand that it isn’t music that’s evil; rather, people are?

Without thinking too hard, I feel that many musicians sing about my life as it was, and as it will be. Their lyrics give me delusions of grandeur. “I just found out there’s no such thing as real world,” he sings to me, convincing me that someday, I’ll fly, someday I’ll soar, because I’m bigger than my body gives me credit for.

John Mayer sang these words and about vultures hiding right outside his door while simultaneously, playing completely discordant chords on his fender. Before he knew it, he was free falling because gravity was working against him. He was talking about paparazzi going to whatever lengths to get his pictures, the more compromising the better. He sang about his half smile and zero shame; a reflection with a different name. Now if that’s a bad thing then I guess we all belong in a schizo-clinic; and he’d be all our boss because his eye-hand-mouth co-ordination is unparalleled.

Macy Gray tried to say goodbye and choked, tried to walk away and stumbled, when she tried to hide it, it was clear that there was nothing evil in her words.

In 1997, Pink was Steve Tyler’s new obsession because back then it was the color of passion and just went with the fashion. Now while his words might have raised questions about his sexual orientation, the song was and still is a hit because of his use of wordplay.

Incidentally, at around the same time, a young Jason Mraz was composing Remedy and You and I both in which he heard two men talking on the radio in a crossfire kind of new reality show, the bright lights turned to night and after being all around the world mixing and mingling found another way to live a life of leisure; he wrote, recorded and performed his hit single Wordplay. Over ten years later, before the cool ran out, he gave it his ‘bestest’ and urged people to see that it was their God intended right to be loved, loved, loved. I listened to these songs and decided that I too was a curbside prophet, waiting for my rocket to come.

Even in 1975, when rock n’ roll was at its peak, Freddie Mercury, who would later die of AIDS cried to his mother, in Bohemian Rhapsody.  “Life had just begun,” he says, “and now I’ve gone and thrown it all away.”He not only shows remorse for whatever wrong he’s supposed to have done but also urges us to carry on, carry on as if nothing really matters if he has not returned this time tomorrow.

Now, If you’re still wondering what ‘who did you think I was’ is about and if you have no idea what I’ve been saying, and if you still think rock n’ roll is evil, and if you’re sitting there with a confused look on your face thinking, ‘this girl is insane’ then, you most definitely DO NOT ‘rock’.

I know, it’s only rock n’ roll but I like it – yes I do.

So this is what it feels like to be homicidal...and broke.

What a life I lead!


If all I did was music, I’d probably have starved to death already because guess what? My show got cancelled!


Yup! After weeks of rehearsal, nerves, finger and nail damage, some event manager decided my band wasn’t well known enough to cut it. Hell! If all event managers thought like this, Hendrix, Kansas and every other great musician who started just like me would never have made it. Not to say that I’m as good as any of them but when starting out, it’s good to have yardsticks that are better than you might ever be.


So here I am pretending to the black version of Courtney Love playing for Kurt Cobaine during the dress rehearsal and before I know it, midnight comes a’ knocking. Everyone but the singer is present but we’ve been so engrossed in perfecting our parts that we didn’t notice she hadn’t arrived. Front-men and women are generally dramatic, moody and ‘fashionably’ late so we let it slide this time. It was now two days before Sunday’s scheduled show and we get the rude realization we’ve been snubbed.


True to character, our front person, Kelly, dramatically depressed, explains everything and the fact that the employer – those guys they like to call corporate – had decided to go with a better known artist. This had us all crying on account of the oestrogen saturation that characterizes an all female band.


Not to sound new-agey and stuff but hasn’t it ever occurred to lady I-don’t-know-who- Sandpaper-are, that maybe even they need a new sound injected into their monotonous track lists. You can’t possibly have the same listeners forever. There is such a thing as a new generation. But that show was not to be, for Sunday came and went and all I did was stage an imaginary kung-fu duel where I beat the crap out of the event manager with my guitar.


Boy, was I miffed! I’d spent nearly all my money knowing that Sunday would be payday, my outfit was all ready and sparkling, I had a manicure – Jeri the all round tom boy had a manicure and it cost me five hundred; five hundred that I would have spent on two copies of last year’s Q magazine.


Diary, it’s not so much that I spent a lot of dough preparing for this, it’s that people, supposedly of influence can write you off just because they’ve never heard of you. As if people start out by being as famous as say, B.B. King. He was a nobody at some point too. No one is paying attention to new comers; exactly the reason why the people dominating award shows now have been doing so for fifteen, twenty years.


No. The world, no matter how unreceptive, will not push us down for we are the sun. We’re never really gone; we’re just on the other side.


It’s just like Kansas said: Carry on my wayward son, there’ll be peace when you are done.

Nine

Any hint of self esteem I might have had went out the window this past Saturday.

I had the honor and pleasure of watching the performance of one very talented singer at an amphitheatre somewhere in Lavington, Nairobi and decided that perhaps it was time I gave up music all together because if that’s what I have to compete with, I might as well try competing financially with Oprah Winfrey. But there was a way out of this sudden feeling of talentlessness.

I made it a hobby to try and sing like all my favorite singers, men and women alike. And since the way to learn is by emulation, I decided to hang around this wonderfully gifted singer, Esmeralda. It was not long before she had me under her wing, if only for that day, teaching me how to breathe, the facial expressions to make; it was a struggle and different from my default rock n’ roll sneer.

And so with my newly acquired skills – of controlling the crowd with my mind – I went back out into the world to put them to practice. Well, the world consisted of five of my neighbours, the watchman, the house help and the building caretaker, but it is a wise performer that tests their strengths on a dummy audience. I thought of calling my best friends but they would just smile and congratulate me even if I did a horrible job, because according to them, that’s what friends do – let you make a fool of yourself and then convince you that you were ‘the bomb’.

After what I thought was a breathtaking performance, I stood in front of my audience waiting for feedback. Now, judging from their lack of expression, I had had absolutely no impact whatsoever, or these guys were really good actors. But as it turned out, looking at someone with a blank face after they’ve shocked you is an Indian thing, according to Anmol. She lives in the flat above mine.

“Jeri that was amazing!” her daughter Indu said to me with that same non-expression. Where I come from, an extraordinary performance is met with more song and dance. The caretaker was indifferent, the watchman just wanted to know If he could play my guitar when I was done. It was Hakim though that gave me the honest feedback.

“Okay, one, your voice is almost perfect, you need to make your strumming cleaner and more distinct, right now, you’re just banging away,” he took a breath, “aside from that I really hope you’re planning to vamp up your outfit.”

Okay.

As soon as that was done, I went back into my flat, locked myself in my room and pulled a Prince: recorded myself playing every instrument I had, drums, rhythm, bass, keyboard, and then I played the lead over it with a metronome on. This, according to Hakim would help me keep time with other instruments and perfect my solo. The tricky part was playing lead and singing at the same time. I’ve found that it’s much easier singing what you play, literally.

I have until tomorrow night to practice, then Sunday all heavy metals will be sipping out of my fingers. Wish me luck, for it’s been hard work.