I suffer from hubris and a bad case of contempt prior to investigation. When the new Keith Richards documentary, Under the Influence, appeared on Neflix I figured I’d see the standard charming drug-crazed rock ‘n’ roll hero gone geezer. I was wrong. What I saw and heard sunk in, took root and came out in my writing an editorial for the travel writing website, MatadorU. (I teach for them.) . My thanks to Keith Richards, Tom Waits and Buddy Guy for this Breakthrough:
We Begin and Begin and Begin: Keith Richards, Tom Waits and Buddy Guy on Creativity
…something that you thought you’d played wrong was the start of a whole different song… Keith Richards, in Netflix documentary, Under the Influence
You might think you know Keith Richards – guitarist and bad boy icon of the Rolling Stones. In Under the Influence, Keith is anything but a bad boy. He is seventy-two and old school hip enough not to refer to himself as a boy – and he doesn’t give a damn about being an icon. He is a devotee of the blues, reggae, country western music and real rock and roll. He is a man still faithfully in love with music. And, he is a mentor for any of us who create.
He talks about his love for playing the piano and that he often composes on it. He understands that the music comes through him. When I heard him say, …something that you thought you’d played wrong was the start of a whole different song…, I thought immediately of our students here at the U. I thought of you. Many of you may have learned that you need to have a polished “product” on your first try – that can be a trademark of the contemporary push to get it right and get ‘er done.
Deep creating takes time – not just the time to write and revise and write and revise, but the time to learn your craft, be it writing, photography or film. We are here to help you learn all of that, not just the technical skills, but the patience. And, maybe the deep humility that anyone with a gift would do well to cultivate. Musician Tom Waits – if you don’t know who he is you have a gift waiting for you to explore – says in the video, “If you want to start writing songs, you have to start thinking like one. You’re trying to break into the ritual of music. It’s kinda like Houdini in reverse, you know. It’s not you’re trying to escape. You’re trying to be let in.”
“If you want to start writing songs, you have to start thinking like one. You’re trying to break into the ritual of music. It’s kinda like Houdini in reverse, you know. It’s not you’re trying to escape. You’re trying to be let in.”
Note: Old-time Blues great, Buddy Guy, is in the film. The Blues were the first music to fire Keith Richards up. He and Mick Jagger started the Rolling Stones to turn the world onto the Black American Blues. Guy says, “If you haven’t had hard times yet, just keep on living.”
And, if you are a writer and haven’t had hard times yet, ask to be let in to your writing. Love to hear from you. If one of you has sent me some writing that hasn’t yet appeared in Breakthrough Writing, please remind me. I juggle plates a lot these days…and I’ve had to go off real high octane coffee…whimper.
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