Look at my hands. They’re

August 18, 2002

Look at my hands. They’re typing in such an ungainly fashion. My typing resembles my guitar playing. I’ve chosen these vehicles for the majority of my creating and they still seem so foreign to me. I certainly am no “one take wonder” on the guitar and its amazing if I can get one word right without a typo. One very close friend of mine, if present at a show, always tells me not to look at my hands when I’m playing. He usually adds, “you look like you’re the type of guy who’s going to fuck up tonight”. I know he’s a zen master but without an element of truth these statements can’t do the trick. If someone was watching me type they’d say, “don’t look at your hands”. I try to look up at the screen sometimes and not at my hands and I’m always surprised what happens. I’ll give you an example:

This is me when I type with eyes flitting up ans down from the screen.

You’ll notice the typo on “and”. The “s” is close to the “d” so this is understandable. Its still pathetic since I was looking at the time.

Thiw ia me when O don’r look ar my finhrts.

What I meant to type was, “This is me when I don’t look at my fingers”

I’m actually amazed I got that close. This is how I play guitar. I jam all the feeling in and pray that my mistakes will somehow help me find new ground. I’ve had a lot of luck in the lazy man’s learning. Its stunning to shoot the arrow in the dark and hit a bulls eye but its even more amazing to get seven out of ten on the damn target. Now I can play fine without looking at my hands. We used to practice in the pitch black with the Odds sometimes. It really does change what you hear. Its more about the moments when I let the music take me away and I realize I’m lost in some strange cul de sac and all the other players are nowhere in sight. Its like driving full speed off that new off ramp they haven’t finished building. You “used” to know that stretch of road pretty well and now the map has changed. You should have been paying attention to the big orange signs. Now you are in “Jazzworld”. In Jazzworld everyone knows what they are doing and everyone has memorized the map. The beauty in their playing is how they can do a bit of offroading to try and throw or impress their passengers and co-pilots and then quickly swerve back on course. Everyone who has memorized the map knows when you’re holding a phony passport in Jazzworld. There are plenty of fabulous “in jokes” in Jazzworld. If you’ve learned your instrument by ear and understand the basics of theory you can sometimes get back on the on-ramp ( to the places you know) by pure instinct and animal cunning. Sometimes it just feels like one way has to be the right way to go and it ends up working. Sometimes you are looking at your hands to avoid looking at anyone else.