music industry

The music industry has perverted the relationship between musicians and people with ears. Either the musician is a star and you must approach them as a grovelling fan or they are an ‘aspiring’ musician to whom you should drop a few coins as an act of charity. Both scenarios are false and repulsive.

I’ve known tragic cases where musicians died of loneliness despite having plenty of ‘fans’ because all these fans assumed the musician must be swimming in a sea of adulation & wouldn’t want to be bothered by them. Meanwhile the musician was actually living in isolation and abject poverty until they went insane and offed themselves. Unless a musician is super famous, odds are you have more money and friends than they do. So why be a fan when you could be a friend instead?

I know some people don’t want to know the people behind the songs because they feel it would ruin the songs for them. And yeah it probably would but isn’t that what life is about? Popping fantasy bubbles and replacing them with realities which you eventually decide are even tastier?

There are probably many men who would enjoy sex more if it could just be about the hole and they never had to meet the person behind the hole. But we train them to meet the person anyway because otherwise the thrill of the hole fades and they end up empty and bitter. In some cases they are even shot to death then hung upside down in the town square to be jeered at by their neighbors.* So just because it is simpler to see songs as divorced from their creators does not ultimately make it the way to go. If music is bread, musicians are the bread’s crust. Learning to eat your crust is a big part of life.

In fact I think the ultimate model for funding music would be an informal patronage system where music is free but those who like it fund the artist in some way big or small. But this can’t happen until musicians and listeners first become friends because I doubt many humans want to patronize a stranger or a star who is hovering above them.

It repulses me when artists are raising funds and say things like “If you donate 50 dollars you get to have lunch with me.” That is like paying for sex. Most humans aren’t into it. We don’t want to lunch with someone who considers it an honor for us to lunch with them. Once we reach maturity we don’t want to be no one’s fan no more.

So the first step in considering how musicians can earn a living is really to take money off the table altogether & heal the corrupted relationship between artist & listener. Place them on the same level and connect them.

And drop the “Support Local Artists” nonsense as well. Barf. It makes musicians sound like pathetic beggars with no inherent value who must be kept on life support out of the goodness of our hearts. If you don’t like a musician, please don’t support them. Would you take someone on a date because you felt sorry for them? It is cruel because it bonds them to someone who secretly finds them worthless. Set these losers free to find people who actually love them or else to find a new profession altogether. But prolong not their suffering through false friendom.

ON THE OTHER HAND…. if you believe the musicians you know suck, consider if this is really true or if you have actually become a brain dead zombie through watching too much American Idol. Did you know that if you use a vibrator on a regular basis you stop being able to enjoy sex? The same principle applies to music, food and everything really. When we become used to unnaturally stimulating products free of roughage that provide quick dopamine fixes we lose our taste for things which are more complex, fibrous & wholesome. Perhaps when you hear a local musician they miss chords, sing off key or use clunky lyrics. THE HORROR!!! But really, why does it matter?

Music is not a talent show. It’s about what touches the heart and something rough and awkward is as likely to do so as an overblown symphonic barf bag. Forget taste & critics & Shakespeare. It is just humans expressing feeling. Put yourself on the same level as the music and try to open up to it. Don’t hover above it like a disembodied brain trying to decide if it is worthy of you. Humble yourself and see if you get something from it. If you do, hit on the musician afterwards. Or at least say hi.

Cause one cool thing about being friends with a musician is that your spirit will certainly work its way into their music. Every song I’ve written was inspired by at least one person I know, although in some songs multiple souls overlap. I never tell the people cause this would seem super fucking creepy. Sometimes I don’t even realize who the song is for until later. It isn’t an intentional process, just an unavoidable organic reality. Pieces of other people enter your heart and come out as sounds.

So please. A Christmas Plea. Consider that music could be something other than an impersonal commodity to be purchased from our overlords. It is a living spirit and by befriending the musicians you become a part of it.

And in this way you shall enter the realm of the Immortals and through Paradise forever and ever shall your soul fly free.

The End.

* This is a reference to famous man ho Mussolini, not the figment of a sick imagination.

I feel like people are trying to fix the masculine side of society- the economy, the government etc, when that isn’t what is broken. On a material level, we do pretty well in America with most people able to achieve a reasonable degree of prosperity through hard work. Even the poor can get fat.

It is the feminine side of life where the problems lie. People don’t feel good about life. They have low self esteem. They feel like something is missing. I believe the solution is to stop the degradation of women since they hold the key to our emotional and spiritual well being.

Right now, there is lots of talk about the need to have more female leaders, ceos, scientists etc. But herding more women into dull masculine professions will not bring about the desired changes. It may make life feel even more hollow than before. What women need is that we push back against the forces that erode their sense self-worth,* such as Hollywood, the music and fashion industries, etc. It is the subjective side of life- art, design, fashion, psychology- which needs to be freed from the forces of capitalism and masculinity.** Rather than pushing women INTO masculine domains, why not push men OUT of the feminine realms?***

The problem with men controlling the subjective realms of life (which for the sake of brevity I will refer to as “culture”) is that their masculine, egoic nature will naturally seek a way to harness these energies for personal power, glory, and control- all positive aims when they are operating in masculine realms. The true purpose of culture, though, is to release us from the emotional cage of civilization and reconnect us to a source of magic and healing- the Other World- from which we emerged. To free us from the oppression of social judgments and reconnect us with our source.

This is why the objectification of women is so dangerous. On the surface it may seem like a superficial issue- less important than war and the economy- but in reality when we make females doubt their beauty and their value- or when we give them the message that these things decrease rather than grow with time- we dishearten them to the extent that they are no longer able to fulfill their natural role in society- which is to connect us to nature. Both our inner nature and the true nature of life. It is only this connection to nature which can bring peace and true fulfillment.

Women bring beauty and depth to life in a way men can’t because their egos are weaker and their connection to the inner worlds is stronger (hence why they have holes rather than poles.) To objectify them is to hypnotize them into a state of narcissistic self-consciousness which runs counter to their true power. In this state, they struggle to be free and creative in the way that is natural to them. Fixated on themselves, they lack the energy to bring to life those things which bring joy and meaning. Forced into an unnatural state of competition they are no longer able to heal others. Without the unique contributions of females, life becomes dry and even men can no longer achieve satisfaction from their masculine achievements.

When men control the arts, for example, art becomes a competitive sport. People struggle to outdo each other in skill, artistry and innovation. The struggle for competence and domination is male nature. Or things may go one step further- as they have in Hollywood and the fashion industry- with men using their creations as Trojan horses bearing toxic messages designed to disempower the population as a whole. In many cases, these poison arrows are aimed right at women. Maybe because they are extra-susceptible due to their softer nature. Or maybe because the culture lords know that women must be displaced so that they can dicktate values and control the subjective realm in women’s place.

But true art is not about self-serving messages hidden within an artistic facade. True art carries messages from the heart or from realms which bring healing or a greater connection to life. Art is meant to FREE us from the judgments and spiritual toxins of society- not reinforce them. Whereas a masculine art tends to reinforce these judgments as the artists struggle to outdo one another in their ability to embody group values.

Currently, our culture lords present women with two main avenues for achieving value. 1. Achieve a sexy appearance by conforming to their artificially constructed ideals. 2. Prove ourselves in the masculine realms by having a successful career and making lots of money. Or even better, do both!

But neither of these are feminine aims.**** Females like to connect, heal, deepen, and beautify. And beauty- from a female perspective- is very different from the ideas promoted by the phallocratic culture gods. To them, beauty is superficial and hierarchical, based on how perfectly you approach an ideal of their determination. It is basically a competitive sport.

In a feminine sense, beauty is that which brings an inner sense of harmony, peace and healing, regardless of how rough or primitive the container may be. Interior design by males for example, tends to be ridiculously impressive to the eye and mind. Interior design by females (if they aren’t trying to compete within a male industry) would probably not impress and yet somehow create a feeling of comfort and home. Males use “beauty” to impress and intimidate. But I don’t believe that is true beauty. True beauty is what makes us whole on the inside.

So, basically, I don’t believe anyone will be healed by socialism. It will only undermine the masculine side of life while doing nothing to uplift the feminine. But we could create change by pushing back against messages which degrade and objectify women. Women should not feel their beauty and value is something to be proven. We are the EMBODIMENT of value and beauty. Whatever we are is what beauty is.

It is the nature of beauty to carry us some place new and this can only happen when you open your mind to see the perfection of what is, rather than trying to find something which adheres to your own suffocating judgments. When you seek that which reflects your own opinions and judgments beauty will always elude you. That which is perfect by your own standards is merely a reflection of your own limitations and has nothing to offer you.
This same principle applies in art. When we look for art which is good, skillful and impressive, we are only looking for that which holds us in place. The only way to travel someplace new is to appreciate that which does NOT appear to live up to your wonderful notions.

This is why art, as well as women, must be freed from masculine judgments. We need things in life which are wild, which can be appreciated but not judged, and therefore allow us to travel beyond ourselves.

THE END

*I realize I am writing as though women are helpless victims but that isn’t how I see things. I believe women have the power to wake ourselves from our own hypnotic slumber. But I also believe any male who helps women to value rather than degrade themselves will be rewarded. Because the essence of femaleness is to reward back manifold any good thing that is put into them.

**I am very much in favor of capitalism, but do feel it has spiritual dangers. For example, humans can come to believe that value itself can be determined by the market, which in essence makes popular opinion the benchmark of value, something we all know is disastrous..

** I’m not literally suggesting we push males out of the arts because then we would miss the raw, pulsing expression of red dick energy and the golden intricacy of masculine skill. .

**** I realize aims vary according the individual. But qualifying every statement is tedious.