Debbie and I walked into the Denman movie theatre, glad to be out of the Vancouver rain and looking forward to the treat we were about to watch. It was a quaint theatre. There was only one employee. He had to run from the ticket booth to the popcorn machine in order to serve the different customers. There was funny colourful carpet and cheap decorations in the stairwell and foyer, but the theatre itself was quite nice. It had comfortable seats with plenty of leg room. The screen and sound was sufficient. But what really stood out to me was the film itself.

A movie about guitars and guitar players is obviously something that would intrigue me since I am a guitar player myself, but “It Might Get Loud” far exceeded my expectations. It is a documentary about three guitar players: Jimmy Page, The Edge, and Jack White, who got together for a conversation and jam session. The film takes you through their own stories and interweaves the meeting of these three innovators in an inspiring narrative. There were too many good moments to describe, but one highlight was watching Jack White listen to his favourite song on vinyl: an old soulful singer belting out some blues, singing accapella accompanied only by his own clapping. I’m pretty confident I will buy this film when it comes out on DVD. If you have the chance to watch this, it is a must-see.

Because my music career is a self employed endeavor, it is up to me to make sure I spend my time wisely.  I could easily waste my whole day just watching TV… OR… I could make little developments with my music.  What I’ve realized is that I need to give myself some realistic tasks in order to make progress.  For example, I won’t sign a record deal tomorrow, but I could book a gig or contact a radio station.  A whole bunch of small steps will eventually equal a big step.  

Today I did two main tasks: (1) I got a busking permit, (2) I sent my CD to a lady who puts music on film and TV.  

It was a good day.  Both of these things could lead to some good development.  Busking is basically paid practicing and there ain’t nothin’ wrong with that!  And if I get my music on film or TV, that would be a dream come true.  It would also be some great exposure and potentially some supplementary income.  So this is a good example of how doing something small could lead to something bigger.

I wonder what sort of realistic tasks I might do tomorrow…

My friend, Adam Roper, came to visit for a few days and we wanted to experiment with making some videos similar to the blogotheque style. If you’ve never seen a blogotheque video, go to www.blogotheque.net right now and be inspired (you can also type “blogotheque” in the search on youtube). I can’t say that our day of filming was a major success, but we had a lot of fun and learned a fair bit about filming.

We just wandered around the city and spontaneously shot footage of me playing some songs.

We actually had a meeting with a former professor of ours, Nelson Boschman, and on our way to the coffee shop, I played “Shame on Me” in the back of the city bus. Then after hanging out with Nelson for a bit, we wandered down to the beach and I played “More of Myself Without You” on top of a boulder that sits under a city art piece. That one didn’t work very well, so we searched the area for a new location. I saw a cool mural on the wall of an alleyway and wanted to shoot there, but we almost got hit by a truck, so we decided against it and just started heading to my house. On the way, we stopped at a skytrain station and shot “Tired Eyes”. The train dominated the sound as it came it, but it looked pretty cool. The other downside was that some chauch dove in front of the camera as he got off the train. Somehow that didn’t get caught on tape though. As we continued heading toward my apartment, we saw a violinist busking at Waterfront station. He was really good, so I asked if he would jam with me for a few minutes. We played “Numbed” together. He was a nice guy. I think he said his name is David. He had a thick foreign accent that I couldn’t pinpoint. Finally after a short sea-bus ride to the north shore, we walked up to the look-out and filmed me playing “Won’t Wake Up”.

When we got to my place we uploaded the videos and watched them over a late lunch. The sound quality wasn’t great and there were some things to be learned about simplicity with videography, but we had so much fun and it was an adventure. Perhaps art is supposed to be adventurous – breaking forth into unmarked territory with creative attempts.