December 30, 2009

           That’s the hand that rocked the hammer. I am replacing part of the sole of some expensive Italian shoes. The threading has to be pounded flat for comfort, that’s the white stitching you see around the perimeter here. The hammer is a specialized tool and I use it for hobnails as well. Don’t try that unless you like sore thumbs. Everybody knows the back of the hammer is called a peen, but what do you call the sides? They are called “cheeks”.
           It was a draggy day at the office (shoe place) as days of custom work can be. See, I can’t do custom work, although today I stitched up a faux fur coat that should have been ash-canned twenty years back. Do you remember the cartoon “Betty Boop”? I don’t. But I’ve seen posters of it, and sometimes she wears that mink stole. That’s what today’s coat looked like, although the customer looked like Boop’s great-aunt, father’s side.
           Taking inventory, I see that 2010 has to be a year of changes. Music, or in particular, the performance of music, will continue to dominate my income. However, that is only insofar as I don’t get a job in a town where other musicians don’t seem to be an educated lot. That’s irony, for where local musicians seem to have had their academic careers stunted by music, I am opposite by always having such high-paying jobs that I did not focus on musicianship. Now, later in the game, I’m glad it turned out that way, because unlike a job, music can be forever. Plus, I am keen on competitive innovation.
           Looking at statistics, I extrapolate that if I continue calling bingo, I’ll do twice as well as taking gigs with other musicians. Plus, bingo occupies an otherwise tempting Saturday night, which are a waste of resources in this town. I have not met a “single” woman here, ever, not in ten full years in Florida. I make a third as much at bingo as I do in regular tips, so it is here to stay unless something else comes along. In another statistic, my worst music month of ’09 was June, the month after I suspended my weekly gig at Jimbos. I made $20 that month.
           So that everyone understands my reasoning, here are some details. When I played Jimbos regularly, I was a single act, making it time-consuming to keep my presentation a little different each week. One must not bore the staff. Some musicians don’t care about that, explaining why their average house tenure is a month, not the full two years I was a Friday regular. My equipment was wearing and tearing and I was not able to alter the fundamentals of the show. Nor can I change over a little at a time. You can’t cross that canyon in two jumps.
           But re-emerge I will, and with a stage show that will trounce much of the competition, be it Karaoke or singles. There will always be room for talent, but in all seriousness, I’m referring to local club (excluding Boston Johnny’s and Jake’s, who have sporadic acts of overkill Blues). I’m targeting those acts which play where I would like to play and could care less about anything else even if it is just up the street. I view my most serious competitor as Johnny D, whose song list has been on this computer for two years, and whom I have not seen in half that time.
           My new show will be highly interactive, and it is already the most interactive in town (by far). Where other performers hope the audience might clap, I distribute live microphones into the crowd, and soon will have lyrics on screen for them. No, not a lame Karaoke version, or a rigid midi-sequence, but the full-blown original tune which I can extend or clip on the fly. My show is very “live”, proven by how people don’t sing along to the juke box or an uninviting act. I may not be original, but if there are other shows like this nearby, they are very well-hidden.
           Some may object to me tagging other musicians as competition. Let me say this about that – I didn’t view them that way until I got to Florida. Also, I am not out to conquer, just to get myself into a few good regular positions.
           And the final stat for today is that I have doubled my music income every year since 2006 (but that year was a musical disaster being the last time I relied on others to find good work). Of course, there is a limit to my musical Ponzi income but I think I can keep reporting good increases during 2010 and 2011. Anyway by 2012, the world will end.
U           m, trivia is different from statistics, right? Here is an oddball comparison. There are 800 million undernourished people on the planet. That’s a lot. But did you know they are outnumbered by overweight people? That’s correct. There are one billion fatties. Still, we’d best not let either group get too hungry . . . .