Smarter in Sixty Seconds: The Beggar At The Side Of The Road

Every now and again you read something that speaks so profoundly to you that it stops you in your tracks.

Mark Hermann sez…this guy Tolle is on to something.

It grabs hold of your soul and whispers in your ear, “I am the truth. Ignore me at your peril.”

I just finished re-reading such a book.

It’s called The Power Of Now by Eckhart Tolle.

Maybe you’ve heard of it.

In a nutshell, it explains how we waste our entire lives dwelling mostly on the past, which is gone forever or worrying about a future that hasn’t happened yet and miss out on the only reality that ever actually exists in this life, Now.

How enlightenment is not something you can go off in search of, buried like a secret treasure in some distant Tibetan mountain cave. It can only be accessed by focusing on this moment.

I know what you’re probably thinking right about now:

What is this guy going on about and why on Earth are you reading a book review about some personal growth BS when you came here to SonicScoop to read about all the cool new developments in the New York music scene, right?

Yeah, I hear you brothers and sisters. But there is some madness to my method so hang in there for just a second.

So I’m reading the first chapter of this book again, which begins with this parable:

“A beggar had been sitting by the side of the road for thirty years. One day a stranger walked by.

“Spare some change?” mumbled the beggar.

“I have nothing to give you,” said the stranger. Then he asked: “What’s that you’re sitting on?”

“Nothing,” replied the beggar. “Just an old box. I’ve been sitting on it for as long as I can remember.”

“Ever look inside?,” asked the stranger.

“No,” said the beggar. “What’s the point, there’s nothing in there.”

“Have a look inside,” insisted the stranger. The beggar, reluctantly, managed to pry open the lid. With astonishment, disbelief, and elation, he saw that the box was filled with gold.”

Then the author goes on to say,

“I am that stranger who has nothing to give you and who is telling you to look inside. Not inside any box, as in the parable, but somewhere even closer: inside yourself.”

Likewise, I’m going to do the same thing here at Sonic Scoop and ask you to look inside your own box if you have anything to do with making music.

Here’s why.

The first thing that popped into my mind, after reading that story again, was a flashback to my life in music and all the pauper stories I’ve heard over the years from musicians who were convinced they got a bum rap.

It never ceased to amaze me how many of these often amazing players saw a glass that was always half empty. They couldn’t figure out where the gold was hidden.

I include myself here. So guilty, as charged.

The Legend Of The Almost Famous

It all began when I first started playing guitar in my teens and would have to endure what became known in my neighborhood as the infamous kitchen rap by Harry Mass, my best friend’s father, a jazz player who taught me how to play.

This was the era when WASPy names were en vogue and ethnic cleansing had more to do with scrubbing your name of any vowels or impossibly spelled syllables at the end that might implicate you as to your immigrant status and threaten your position on the social totem pole.

Think Joe Pass. Tony Bennett. Bob Dylan. You get the idea.

While you’re thinking of Joe Pass, give him a listen! You’ll be glad ya did.

It was always the same story. A tape loop stuck on infinite repeat. How Harry was playing a gig up in Bridgeport, CT at the Weeburn Country Club or something like that. Les Paul and his orchestra were in town playing in the next room.

On a break, Les pokes his head into the other room to see who the guy was playing this amazing solo on “Satin Doll.” Harry almost gets the gig with Les. At least that’s his recollection. Then he would play me that legendary solo (the same one I had heard now at least a couple hundred times).

And every gig thereafter always had something to do with those bastards who stiffed him on the bread. The guy could play like Tal Farlow. But he always got the shaft in the end. At least that’s how he saw it.

Self Deprecation: The Ultimate Vibe Killer

Then I was in a band in high school. It was kind of a rock fusion funk jazz thing. We had this sax player who was burning. Except he didn’t think so. So at the end of a great set we’d say, “Hey, Johnny, you were really burning tonight!”

“No, I sucked, man,” he would reply. “I was flat.”

You would try to counter his vibe every time and remind him of how great he was. But he just wouldn’t have it. Well, if you hear the same reply enough times, eventually you just have to accept his position.

OK, I guess you do suck.

East Coast West Coast Blues

When I moved to the West coast in my mid-twenties, my best friend (Harry’s Son) moved to the city. He was a bass player, doing a bunch of different gigs but his bread and butter was the Long Island wedding circuit.

Sure enough, most every gig had some story that digressed into something like pissing in the fountain at the catering hall or a rant about those bastards who stiffed him on the bread. And it was either the band leader or the client who never saw his genius.

I would remind him how he sounded an awful lot like his old man. He would get really pissed off at me, vehemently denying any connection. (No Freud going on there)

But this phenomenon wasn’t unique to local musicians. Famous ones too, who did actually make a lot of bread also caught this disease.

The Benjamins Are Always Greener On The Other Side

When I was out in L.A. I got a gig as an engineer at Ray Parker Junior’s Ameraycan Studios. One day, Ray asked me to give him a ride to pick up his car that he had left over at a friend’s house somewhere in the Hollywood hills.

Here’s hoping Ray eventually got it right.

We arrived at a long, winding stone paved driveway that led to this palatial estate. There sat Ray’s lowly black Porsche 911 Turbo, parked next to a shiny new Bentley coupe. I asked what this guy did for a living and Ray said he owned a chain of car dealerships. Said he was worth like $60 Million.

“Do you know what I could do with $60 million?” he told me. “Now we’re talking serious cash.”

Poor guy. He had only made something like $10 million from the theme to Ghostbusters and everything else he recorded in his career. He only owned one airplane and it was a single prop at that. Not even a Gulfstream. Life’s a bitch sometimes.

For The Love Of Money

Everyone wants to be a rock star.

Or at least they did once upon a time when being a rock star conjured images of feather boas and dark shades. Trashed hotel rooms, limousines and hot chicks.

Or musicians had dreams of being a top studio cat or touring as a sideman with big time acts and making good money was a real possibility.

Yeah, those were the days.

Today you have to develop the hot new video game or you’re a star DJ if you want to roll like that.

But when exactly did playing music become synonymous with making money? Let alone serious cash?

Seriously, who in their right mind ever got into playing music for the bread?

I’ll Gladly Pay You In The Next Life For A Session Today

A few years back, I caught a live interview with producer, Steve Lillywhite, hosted by the RIAA. He was waxing poetic about some of the amazing albums he had produced over the course of his illustrious career.

But one of the more interesting stories he told was about the history of music and making money.

He reminded the audience that in the entire timeline of music history, of which recorded music was but a small fraction, there was this tiny little window of time, during the heyday of the record business, where musicians ever made a dime playing music.

And how this emphasis on music and making money was totally skewed.

You Can’t Touch This

Throughout history, kings and queens, heads of state, social luminaries and titans of industry have always featured the finest musicians and composers at their special events.

Buying the dream?

Did you ever wonder why the super rich buy priceless artwork?

Why that hedge fund manager who always dreamed of playing music keeps that broken Jimi Hendrix guitar and other memorabilia in a sealed glass case?

It’s not the investment.

Oh sure, their net worth will increase. But the truth is that what they really want is to get a little closer to the dream they could never achieve. To touch the hand of the creator themselves.

Because the real power lies with the artist.

It’s just that most musicians forgot.

Of Hedge Funds And Rockstar Dreams

It all hit home for me when I was attending a trade show last year at the Javits Center. I ran into a client rep friend I had worked with on a project. We hadn’t seen each other in quite a while.

His last memory was that I was about to play the Izod Arena with my band, after just winning a battle of the bands contest. And how cool that must have been. How he had just seen a Foreigner concert and remembered how I used to tour with them. He asked me how the music was going.

I could have gone on and on about what did happen for me and what didn’t. I could have seen that glass half empty. But I just told him I was still rocking. He smiled and said he had to run.

When I turned around, a well dressed man was standing alone, drinking a glass of wine and struck up a conversation with me. He excused himself for eavesdropping on our conversation but started asking me all about my musical experiences.

He gushed how he loved Foreigner and how exciting a life I must lead. I just smiled and laughed to myself.

I was getting ready to leave and he said he was doing the same so we continued to talk on the way out.

Out in the street, I asked him what he did but he just sluffed it off. He said he had something to do with finance. That he just pushed numbers around all day on spread sheets and how painfully boring it all was, just dealing with people’s money.

He went on to tell me how his daughter didn’t really talk to him anymore and his wife was always pissed off because he worked so late. Basically, his life was a total drag but for his love of music and did I maybe want to go to a show sometime?

I said sure as he gave me his card and said goodbye, crossing the street.

When I got home I looked at his card. He was president of some huge hedge fund. Out of curiosity, I Googled him and found out that his hedge fund had won all these awards and he was managing billions of dollars of his clients’ money. The guy was filthy rich. Yet, he was totally miserable.

I remember picking up a guitar and just playing that night. It was hard to take in what had just transpired. This guy saw me as the rich man with this exciting life in music while he slogged through the hell of making boatloads of cash and hating life every step of the way.

Ready to peak within?

Now About That Box You’re Sitting On

So if you’re sitting alone in a studio right now or in a garage somewhere and you’re feeling sorry for yourself because no one’s got any change for you, take a minute and just stop what you’re doing.

Go ahead and take a look inside that box and see what you find. It might surprise you.

Making music is a gift you can’t put a price on.

There are people who would give anything to feel that power. But like anything that really matters in this life, there are some things that money can’t buy.

And don’t bite down too hard on the coins either if you happen to find your box filled with them. You might break a tooth and then you’ll complain how you don’t have dental coverage.

Peace,

Mark Hermann

NYC-based producer/artist/engineer/more Mark Hermann spends his life in the professional service of music. He has toured the world with rock legends, produced hit artists, and licensed music for numerous TV/film placements. Hermann also owns a recording studio in a 100-year old Harlem Brownstone. Keep up with him at Rock & Roll Zen.

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