I Was Born a Ramblin' Man
On this week’s podcast I take only 20 minutes to introduce my newest track and offer up some back story. With this much talking, I realize that Elliott’s Podcast might in fact be the perfect tool for helping people to go to sleep, and I don’t really have any problem with that.
After I recorded the episode I had to do a bit of reflection about why I am ok with talking so much. Because our society typically wants us to shut up, watch Netflix, take in advertising and then go buy things at the mall.
On one level, all this chatter is the opposite of a zen-like existence. I could exist like some sort of apparition or ghost, and just drop little nuggets of soundscapes and music online. However, instead, I chose a different path, one of connection. The path where I am ok to be present and I am willing to talk through everything.
Not everyone is reading or listening every week and that’s fine. I am more like the radio, always broadcasting and if you’re open to receiving the message this week then fine. If not, no harm done.
I guess what I’d like to take the opportunity to say is that the world is in its perfect form at this moment and forever. I know you might have some objection to this idea, because for starters there is still all sorts of war and injustice in the world to say nothing about the gap between rich and poor, genders and race.
So the word, “perfect” is a bit of a trick. I don’t use that word in the context of the office admin who has a perfect desk, or the person who has the perfect education and then the perfect career and finally perfect family. You can start to see that this concept never existed in the first place.
What I do mean when I say that this world is in its perfect form is that everything has happened and is happening for a reason. The hardships that we go through are taking us to the place we need to be. On the flipside of hardships, when we find ‘success’ or when we buy the product we were lusting after, we realize that all it did was generate a short burst of happiness and then we’re back to wanting things again.
Therefore I feel like there is a time and place for writing and talking as long as I happen to do. Because the people who want to come on this journey with me, now have a chance to come along. If I was just silent I couldn’t open any new windows for us to look at the world together through.
Sure, there might be a time and place for pretending like I’m a serious person which is how “popular” artists market themselves, but I’m not a popular artist 😂 !
That’s the role of devoting energy to making music and talking about it. It creates space to re-arrange my life in accordance with this hunch or idea that this is one of my life purposes, an idea that’s been in the works since I was a teenager. You also have the same hunches that were probably developed in that time too and I want you to keep exploring them even as you get older and have to do boring adult things.
So back to this podcast episode, I talk a bit about how I ended up working on ambient music, and how I rediscovered it in an unlikely way which is starting a funk band (UPS) a few years ago. I also share my goal of winning a Grammy award one day and what category I think I can position myself in. That should be worth the listen in itself!
And don’t forget you can just skip the podcast and listen to the new track itself.
Read a short post, three things that helped me focus this week on Twitter.
Ok I’m off now. Here’s a melancholy bagel for your rainy Sunday if you live in Toronto.
Elliott “Talkbox” Fienberg