Darn That Dream

Last night after rehearsal, Ant had a band meeting and asked me to stay. He asked me what I wanted to do with the band. The band members were impressed with how honest I was about some things such as my fears. I told them that was all out in the open because of this crazy blog, so there was no point in holding back now.

Ant wanted to know how I felt about playing with them after this gig. This is something I thought a bit about on the way home. In essence, if I had to spend this much time on the material throughout the year and I had no time for my own things such as Blue Funk, my songs, and the general piano-playing technique that I want to build, then I would say no way. But for a few gigs here and there, I should be able to manage. Also, I think and hope this will get easier as I do it more. I hope next time I'll at least know a few of the songs!

The funny thing is, the band is talking about their plans for the future, and they are big. In theory, it would be great to do it with them. But I know that in my heart, this band is not the only thing I want to do musically. As I said before, it's a great band and great music and I'm finally starting to enjoy playing the material. But in order for me to be fully happy, I have to do my own thing. I think even if I wrote songs for CH and they liked them and did them, that probably would not be all I wanted to do (though this could change, like anything).

Personally, I would not be offended if Ant found a keyboard player that loved this music and fit them personally, and made me the backup. I think if he found a player like this, he should grab him or her with both arms. There's little better than having a musician in your band that just loves the music you're doing and it suits them perfectly.

Thinking about all this led me to a confusing thought. What do I want? Would I be happy writing just songs for other people, even if they were some of the greats? Would that be enough for me, even if I got to play on their albums, produce, whatever? Or do I need my own band in the end to be truly happy? I don't know the answer to this. I've gotten so used to thinking of Blue Funk as a hobby thing because the rest of them have (or are at least supposed to have) day jobs, that I have trouble seeing them as anything near a full time band at this point. I guess one fantasy scenario would be for me to get famous (enough) as a songwriter/musician, and then being able to come back to Blue Funk and get them playing much more based on that, where they could actually justify the time playing due to the money they'd be making. That would be cool. More realistically, we'd probably just play around when we could fit in gigs around everyone's schedules, including mine.

Posted 2008 12 09 at 6:00 AM

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