too_little_too_late continuous ache i've been so long in waiting putting my life on hold for this chance to live out my dreams you think you know what i should do with the choices i now have make them benefit you what if i don't want to hear the things you say? where were you when i was needy yesterday? you want in with me now that it's good but it's too little too late time and again i've asked you just for some light to show the way i was in total darkness you act like i owe you something but i don't owe anything to anyone but me have you no dignity? what if i don't want to hear the things you say? where were you when i was needy yesterday? you want in with me now that it's good but it's too little too late i know exactly what i'll do with the advice you gave watch me throw it all away -hoobastank 020329 ... yummyC I love that song... I saw that series of blathes and knew it was hoobastank :) 020329 ... continuous ache you rock, yummy. :) 020330 ... Casey I remember sitting in Jeff's house the first time I saw them on MTV-X it was great. We just sat and listened to the rocking music and the infinity symbol in the back ground. 020331 ... dafremen I'm not sure where the disconnect came from. I mean, it's pretty obvious to most of us who pick up an instrument (or even sing in the shower) that music is there for us when we need it. And somewhere, over on the other side where unwritten songs await their authors and lovers, there is music that needs us to be there for it; to bring it over to this side and give it life. It absolutely boggles the mind how we can claim such great loyalty, then cling to our old rock victories and forget the new music that needs to be found, fed and nurtured. There comes a day when many musicians turn their backs on music to play it safe. To get that career, make that decent money, have that family, wife, kids. And good for you. You did it. You have them and they have you. That was the choice you made. But now you're coming back to Lady Rock like she's some slut who waited for you all of those years. No. She wanted you THEN. She wanted you brave, bold and courageous by her side. She wanted you to take those gifts you'd been introduced to and worked so hard to be worthy of and devote them to her and trust her to keep you well. And you said no. So now the kids have gotten older and you're coming back and fucking her flippantly again with no thought to her future. You're like, "Hey remember the good old days, baby?" As though she died back when you did. But she didn't. Rock is in a constant state of evolution wherever its changes are embraced and allowed to thrive. And you'd have her die in a corner somewhere with you; stuck in your memories of whatever years you actually gave a shit about her (if ever.) You don't give a fuck about her reputation. Especially not here in the D. For you, it's enough that she comes off like some old has-been bar fly whore..as long as you look like a rock star now that you've spent a lifetime of domestic servitude proving that you aren't. Rock? She probably knows you as you most likely are: beaten in spirit beyond repair. She gave you Seeger, Springsteen and Alice in Chains to soothe your soul, because she knows you did what you thought was right. And even though you turned away from her needs, she never stopped having YOUR back. But she DID get over you, so please stop calling yourself a rocker. It's an insult to those of us who struggle for her daily as a way of being, instead of selling out for a nice comfy situation. You're slurping the last noisy gulps of your life from the bottom of the cup and trying to call it rock. Too little too late. Long live music. Long live Rock. 160907 ... in a silent way i just read this on craigslist. imagine my surprise to find it here too. let me get this straight. you position yourself as some arbiter of what constitutes real, worthwhile rock music, while taking a giant crap on the people who've decided to work for a living in some non-musical capacity, as if they don't have the right to enjoy playing music just because they realized they weren't going to become superstars and they decided they didn't want to starve? so, if you can't make a decent living playing music, and you decide to do something else so you can afford food and shelter and all the basic necessities none of us should ever be without, and you work on music when and how you can, you're a sell-out, you have no right to play music at all, and you don't deserve anyone's attention or respect. that's what you're saying here, more or less. that anyone who doesn't devote every waking moment of their life to music and doesn't do things the way you think they should is a hobbyist at best, and a whore at worst. i hate to break it to you, but a lot of bruce's music is about (and for) the very working people you denigrate. bob seger turned his back on rock for a decade to enjoy life with his family. according to your logic, that makes him a hypocrite unfit to call himself a rocker. he also sold his songs to car commercials. he's released only one album of new material in the last ten years. otherwise it's been one greatest hits collection after another, and live shows loaded with the same old tunes everyone already knows in their bones. and is layne staley worth more to you because the drugs killed him and he suffered for his art the way a true artist should? something tells me his family would trade every song he ever wrote for one more day with him. there's nothing noble about dying alone, incontinent, with most of your teeth missing, an ancient, heroin-addled husk in your mid-thirties. there's nothing cool or sexy about addiction. layne himself tried to explain that to a star-struck writer who got him on the phone not long before he passed. rock music at its best is great music. but rock isn't the only music that matters. and there isn't some one-size-fits-all cosmic cloak that determines who's entitled to play or create music, whatever genre it inhabits. you start off by saying music is always there for us when we need it. then you decide only certain people are deserving of that need. i'm not sure what you think entitles you to make that determination. as far as i can tell, you didn't pick up an instrument or start writing songs until well into your adult life. your rant reads like sour grapes from someone who's angry about not getting the recognition they think they're due, and bitter about anyone else's success, no matter how marginal it is. who are you to judge what anyone else does, or how they do it, or why it's done? and who cares if cover bands get gigs and make money? some people like that sort of thing. good for them, and good for the bands who are musically adept enough to tap into that. just because you and i aren't into it doesn't mean it's garbage by default. some of the songs you probably hold up as high watermarks in the pantheon of rock are covers. jimi hendrix didn't write "all along the watchtower" or "hey joe". manfred mann didn't write "blinded by the light". janis joplin didn't write "me and bobby mcgee". half of the great early led zeppelin songs aren't far removed from being straight plagiarisms of old blues songs. joan jett didn't write "i love rock and roll". elvis presley never wrote a song in his life. that doesn't make the music any less meaningful. some of the greatest jazz recordings of all time are technically cover songs. the same goes for folk music. some of us are born living and and breathing this stuff. i've been making music since before i knew what a fucking boner was. i've put an ungodly amount of time, money, and work into it over the years. i've been shoving my heart and my brain and my guts into this from day one, and have never compromised my art to please anyone else. i give the music i make away for free to whoever wants it, losing money every time i do that (i stick with making physical albums, because i don't like the whole digital thing). i share it with a handful of friends and people i know care about it. otherwise i keep it to myself. i play live about once every five years. i don't make the music for other people. i don't do it to make a living or to generate attention or to be able to talk about doing it. i make it for me, because it's a part of who i am, because i need to make it to feel human. that's it. if i can keep doing that until i'm dead, whatever i have to do to facilitate it, as far as i'm concerned i've succeeded beyond my wildest dreams and it doesn't matter one lick what anyone else thinks. none of that makes me or my music more hardcore or real or worthwhile than anyone else's. i don't go around telling anyone else what i think they should be doing with their music. i'm grateful every day to be lucky enough to have music inside of me, to be able to write and play and sing, and to be in a position where i can express something and make it real without having to rely on anyone else for anything, without anyone else having the power to alter or bury or cheapen it. i do what i can to help other people, whether they write their own stuff or they can't write their way out of a chocolate bar wrapper. i've recorded albums for others and played almost every instrument when they didn't have a band and been paid nothing and felt good about it. i've made some incredible friends through music, and a few enemies too, and all without ever playing by the accepted "rules". but that's me. i do what works for me. you do what works for you. maybe, for once, you should try accepting that other people do what works for them, and there's no joy to be quarried from pissing on whatever reward anyone else gets out of banging on a guitar and singing some shit that rhymes, whether they wrote the shit or someone else did. be happy you get to make the music you want to make on your own terms. that's a rare gift. be grateful for whatever audience you have. everything else is gravy. besides, this "holier than thou" stuff was old fifteen years ago, dude. it's not getting any younger. 160908 ... dafremen For the record, I said I was happy for your life choices somewhere in the middle of the piece. You're a church goer not a priest. It's ok. Priests have a bad reputation anyway. (Some are even considered Judases.) Once you accept that as/if a musician, your life is worth less than the music you bring into being we have a basis for communicating. Until then, we simply don't speak the same language. You see music as a hobby/choice, I've learned late in life that it's in me and I couldn't imagine turning my back on that if I'd run into it earlier in my life. I've raised kids, done the whole family/career thing and knowing how strongly responsibility pulled at me in those days I still would never have turned my back on it. EVER. Maybe that's why the kids came before the discovery. I'd miss 'em all if I'd never had them. Still, I would've chosen music in a heartbeat. She needs me much more than a world overpopulated with children does. It's quite clear when someone is using something for their own gratification when it's convenient. I've been in this scene long enough to watch it, fucking wade through it for months at a time. I wasn't fortunate enough to be a young rocker. I'm blessed as fuck to be one now and I'll be one poor, broke, broken, doesn't matter..I'll never turn my back on this responsibility to bring the music through. So far music's blessed me mightily for my efforts and I'm grateful. You deserve a fat hug from yourself. You did good. Have a great life. 161203 ... dafremen To qualify what might not have been clear: " i make it for me, because it's a part of who i am, because i need to make it to feel human." I do it because there are these songs on the other side that have zero life if no one brings them across and fights for them. I do it because bringing them to life means more than my own. Maybe it's the same for you. It sounds like maybe it is, but I would just then wonder why you'd have a problem with someone shouting to the internet ethers about the deplorable scene we all work in that is inundated with hobbyist "rockers" bearing "show me your tits" stickers on their guitars? 161203 what's it to you? who go blather from