30 Days of Music: Day 26
Feb. 9th, 2011 08:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
janradderA Song I Can Play On An Instrument
Back when I was sixteen and first started playing in a band, my friend and I made it pact that we'd never play cover songs. Covers were all that the other bands at our high school played -- Steve Miller, Chicago, Traffic, Yes. Back then the idea was that if you wanted to play rock and roll you had to play note-perfect versions of someone else's songs. Like if you were learning to play guitar, you had to play "Stairway to Heaven" or the intro to "Roundabout, " and you had to play them exactly like they sounded on the records. If you couldn't, you shouldn't even bother to let anyone know you played because you were just pathetic. It's why for a long time I thought I'd never be able to play in a band. But that changed when I heard punk. WIth punk you didn't have to have the best chops, or know your scales, or even know what the fuck note you were playing or sometimes even if you were in tune. You just played. And you put everything you had into whatever song you were playing as if it were the last thing you were ever going to do in your life. And when you did, you played your own damn songs, which was why we never learned anyone else's. We felt pride in that fact, because we weren't following what someone else had done, and we weren't being like everyone else at our school. We were just being ourselves.
The thing is though, it's kind of fun to play other people's songs. In a way, when you do, you kind of make it your own. Quite a few years ago, long after I was in a band, I switched from bass to playing mostly guitar because, honestly, it gets kind of boring after a while to play bass by yourself. And when I did, I started learning covers for fun. I got a book of Beatles songs, and then I found a site that had tabs for every Hüsker Dü song ever recorded, and then a little later I found another site that had tabs for tons more songs, some punk and some most definitely not. One of my favorite covers that I learned from that site is the Who's "I'm One." To me, it's perhaps the best thing that Townshend ever wrote, though I'm more than willing to listen to any arguments for others. The way it moves from that quiet plaintive beginning to that explosive chorus and verse and then back again -- it's what Nirvana's Kurt Cobain only wished he could have done just half as well. And the alienation and that feeling of low self esteem that Townshend sings about is as honest and soul-baring as he's ever gotten. I love playing that song. I'm nowhere as good a guitarist as Townshend is, and I can't play it nearly as well -- my fingers really are too clumsy -- but my voice . . . man, I can sing the fuck out of that thing when I want. And I love how I feel when I am.
Back when I was sixteen and first started playing in a band, my friend and I made it pact that we'd never play cover songs. Covers were all that the other bands at our high school played -- Steve Miller, Chicago, Traffic, Yes. Back then the idea was that if you wanted to play rock and roll you had to play note-perfect versions of someone else's songs. Like if you were learning to play guitar, you had to play "Stairway to Heaven" or the intro to "Roundabout, " and you had to play them exactly like they sounded on the records. If you couldn't, you shouldn't even bother to let anyone know you played because you were just pathetic. It's why for a long time I thought I'd never be able to play in a band. But that changed when I heard punk. WIth punk you didn't have to have the best chops, or know your scales, or even know what the fuck note you were playing or sometimes even if you were in tune. You just played. And you put everything you had into whatever song you were playing as if it were the last thing you were ever going to do in your life. And when you did, you played your own damn songs, which was why we never learned anyone else's. We felt pride in that fact, because we weren't following what someone else had done, and we weren't being like everyone else at our school. We were just being ourselves.
The thing is though, it's kind of fun to play other people's songs. In a way, when you do, you kind of make it your own. Quite a few years ago, long after I was in a band, I switched from bass to playing mostly guitar because, honestly, it gets kind of boring after a while to play bass by yourself. And when I did, I started learning covers for fun. I got a book of Beatles songs, and then I found a site that had tabs for every Hüsker Dü song ever recorded, and then a little later I found another site that had tabs for tons more songs, some punk and some most definitely not. One of my favorite covers that I learned from that site is the Who's "I'm One." To me, it's perhaps the best thing that Townshend ever wrote, though I'm more than willing to listen to any arguments for others. The way it moves from that quiet plaintive beginning to that explosive chorus and verse and then back again -- it's what Nirvana's Kurt Cobain only wished he could have done just half as well. And the alienation and that feeling of low self esteem that Townshend sings about is as honest and soul-baring as he's ever gotten. I love playing that song. I'm nowhere as good a guitarist as Townshend is, and I can't play it nearly as well -- my fingers really are too clumsy -- but my voice . . . man, I can sing the fuck out of that thing when I want. And I love how I feel when I am.
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no subject
Date: 2011-02-10 02:31 am (UTC)I remember when I was taking guitar lessons, the intro to 'Roundabout' was my bête-fucking-noire. I didn't dislike the song, but I hated playing it - and the instructor was deadset on me learning it.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-10 02:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 05:06 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 03:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 04:00 pm (UTC)Also, your boyfriend wrote it.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 04:04 pm (UTC)