Wednesday, June 28, 2006

How Much Time Does a Rock Star Take If A Rock Star takes up time

I played at Mo's again last night...This time it was for singer/songwriter night. The battery in my guitar: DEAD AGAIN. I had to stop the song so that my new found friend Trenton McIan (very talented SLC songwriter guy) could set me up on his very expensive guitar. BUT an amazing thing happened...I WAS not nervous even after a little debacle! I played decently, nobody booed and Terrence Hansen who hosts the singer/songwriter night invited me to come play as his "intermission" act during one of his regular Thursday night gigs. I was elated...and kind of perplexed.

It's taken me over 3 years to get out there and play and now that things seem to be picking up, I'm left wondering how much time I should really spend doing this. It's heady. And fun. And easy to get very sucked up. I want to be a rock star (or alt/country/folk star as the case may be...especially since someone said that I look like a Dixie Chick in my publicity photos! WAH WAH!) It has been my contention since day one of my "enlightened performer" days post mission, that I have to be careful about how much energy I put into being on stage. There is real work to do. I've got homeless people to feed, children to save and relief society visits every thursday night. Where exactly does self-gratification and crowd adulation fit into the plan of salvation for me?

Obviously, I'm taking this to an extreme. I'm a balanced person with a healthy sense of fun and wacky mayhem...but we've all seen fame rear its ugly head in the form of Paris Hilton and other B list celebrities who have no day job and just spend their time in pursuit of fame. I just wonder at what cost? And how easily could that become me? ok, minus the thousands of dollars of plastic surgery and multi-million dollar hotel empire, probably not that easily...but it's a thought.

2 comments:

Skye said...

HA! That IS the question, isn't it? How funny that I checked your blog today. :)

Well... after experimenting with that one for about 4 years I still haven't found a suitable answer for my life, but I've found out a lot about what works and what doesn't. I'll let you carve your own path though. Your answers might be different from mine, and I'm afraid I might sound cynical in your bright-eyed, bushy-tailed moment. I CAN tell you that it has be basically be your life, if you want to take it anywhere other than "around town." That's not news, it wouldn't seem. But somehow I still find myself wishing I could do it differently. I suspect my success will wither and die with my current part-time efforts, but that's what the rest of my life demands at the moment. And maybe "around town" will just have to be enough.

Do I sound washed up? Oh, heavens, I hope not. Maybe a little burned out, if I'm honest.

Anyway, sorry for going off. Good luck! You rule.

Marianne & Clayton said...

Well, I saw you play and I did not get embarrassed for you, or me.(Which always happens when I watch friends perform, regardless of how good or bad they are. We call this the donnyosmandchills.) So you obviously have the talent to make it big. And you are obviously too cool to let fame eat you alive and become a parisisawhore type of gal. How about we do a halfsies type thing. You be wonderful, achieving whatever fame you want. You could be like Ben Folds, complete with ex-pat status in Australia. He's not too famous right? And we can treat you like Paris by paying you to come to our clubs. And by clubs I mean our apartments. And by pay I mean free ice cream. Ok then.