DO NOT LOOK DIRECTLY AT THE SUN!

We capped off the weekend with a drive home from the Panhandle with this sunset…yes!

This is from Dion’s Pizza in Lubbock, which is an Albuquerque pizza chain. They have branched out to Lubbock and my friends are nice enough to eat there with me when we pass through sometimes. Green chile is good on anything, but on pizza it is transcendent.

Katie Lessley: Website!

Emily Shirley: Website!

My first and only true love, however, is guitar. And I have a great one…I bought a Martin OM-15 when I graduated from high school and it has been my brilliant-sounding steadfast companion ever since. I had a Taylor for a while but sold it last year and bought an Art and Lutherie parlor guitar, which I keep out by my desk and use as a writing guitar.

I don’t usually need much of a reason to blow some cash on an instrument, though no acoustics have called me name lately because my Martin is, as I said, THE BEST GUITAR EVER FOR ME. However, traveling is hard on instruments and I do a lot of it.

I’ve had it for 12 hours now…I was staring out the window for the FedEx truck to come all morning. So far so good. I even folded it up and popped it back open and it was pretty much still in tune. Very cool.

It gets road-tested on May 30th when I fly to Seattle. Watch out, TSA! I’ve got music and it’s coming with me.

Time management as an artist. Making time to write, etc. – Jackie
When you find out, let me know. Just kidding. No magic answer except diligence and devotion to a schedule and a routine. Every time I read an interview with a successful author they say they treat writing like a job and do it every day at the same time…it’s their job so they attend to it as such. I’m not as disciplined though I want to be. The Daily Practice that I blogged about below is actually helping me out with this…I get to check things off and feel accomplished. Same applies for voice exercises and guitar and whatever you want to do…do it every day and you’ll get better. It’s a simple answer but it’s probably correct!

Who are some musicians who you can barely stand to listen to, but whose work was a major influence on you or your influences? – Richard
Great question. I will step right out into the folk singer fire and say I don’t listen to a ton of Bob Dylan or Joni Mitchell but I know I am majorly influenced by them and who they influenced. I don’t even really dislike their stuff, I just tend to gravitate toward stuff that is a bit more contemporary. Also, multiple people have told me I sound like Edie Brickell and I have never listened to her except that one song that gets stuck in your hear when it’s on the radio. Gah!

Do your artists have ‘menu restrictions’ on the road? – Denisa
The folks I work with are pretty easy-going, although when there is a chance to request things I think they’d all ask for at least something a bit healthy because road life can get to be…well, fattening.

Why is it so hard to find a way to do things the easy way? – Sherry
A cruel fact, although I think the harder you work at it, it gets easier to determine the easy way on most things. A culmination of experience and training your brain. This is what all the self-help blogs I read tell me, anyway.

How many FB friends do you have purely because of a shared love of one certain singer? – Kris
Kris is referring to Mary Chapin Carpenter because I have been a member of various online MCC fan communities since the dawn of the internet. Well, the dawn of the internet for me, which was Prodigy and then AOL message boards and then an email list. Pre-social media, y’all! Anyway…I’ve collected quite a few awesome friends based solely on our taste in music from around the globe (Kris included), and over the years I have been able to take advantage of them in several ways like getting great seats at MCC concerts and staying at their homes when traveling. A few have even put Susan and myself up on tour. This is a great and friendly bunch, for sure. So there you have it, being a Mary Chapin fan has saved me several hotel bills. Perks, y’all.

If you could only listen to one album/CD for the rest of your life, what would it be? – Angela
If I couldn’t make a 10 CD box set mix tape, then I guess I’d go with Stones In the Road by the aforementioned Ms. Carpenter. It holds up.

Sunday was a lovely day. I drove back from Houston with Elizabeth Wills, who had played a house concert there the night before. I took a nap and hopped in the car to go down to Gruene Hall, one of my most favorite venues on the planet for The Susan Gibson Band Extravaganza. It was rockin’. Michael O’Connor, David Carroll, and Ron Erwin gave the groove and the funk, and SusanG brang it as usual.

On the way home I made my roommate divert to the brand new Buc-ee’s in New Braunfels. I am a big Buc-ee’s fan – we stop there whenever we can on the road. They are like a convenience store on steroids. They are not a truck stop because they don’t allow semis. It’s a weird conglomeration of gas station, souvenir stop, and snack food heaven. There are several out near Houston, but this new one was supposed to be even bigger.

Oh my land it was. A beacon in the night, larger than my neighborhood Target and Walmart stores. I walked in and was confronted with rows of snack items and…more snack items.

A testament to obscene consumerism or an oasis for a weary traveler? Probably both. I got yogurt pretzels and an iced tea, being the obscene, weary traveler I am.

I’m quiet here right now because I’m juggling a lot of things…booking, studio management, a little publicity, trying to play guitar more in my extra hours. It’s all good stuff, although I have just begun implementing The Daily Practice (thought up by one of my favorite bloggers, James Altucher) so that I have scheduled writing time and music time and work time. I also have drink water and eradicate crappy people from my life on the list (I don’t have a lot of crappy people in my life now but the point is to keep watch!).

I’m on day 2 of The Daily Practice. This is replacing my wayward goal of that “Experiment a Month” thing because that lasted a whole two months and then I started traveling a bunch and the only experiment there is to just keep going until you stop and sleep. I’ll report back on TDP in a week or so…pretty excited!

In the meantime, this weekend in Corpus Christi I ate some limes off a real live lime tree. Check something else off the list of “Things I Hadn’t Done And Didn’t Know I Wanted To Until I Did Them.”

I have had a favorite comedian forever and her name is Maria Bamford. I have never seen a live comedy show (certainly not a professional one, anyway) before…and when I saw Maria Bamford was coming to Austin and I was going to be in town I jumped on it.

She is right up my alley because she does an enormous range of voices and characters…some impersonations but mostly she has an incredible way of embodying 3 – 4 people at a time, so that she can tell a full on story with everyone’s voice involved. She can relate to us a 4-way conversation between herself, her father, mother, and sister…and you never get lost and you always know who is talking. This is hard.

I stole this photo from someone’s blog because I was too chicken to take photos. Now I can’t remember who I stole it from. Shhhh.

She’s also great with accents, another thing I am very fond of in a comedian. (I think I am supposed to say comedienne but it makes me twitch a little for some reason).

The show was at Cap City Comedy Club and Katie went with me. Perhaps we peaked with seeing someone as cool as Maria, but I think live comedy might just be the cure for what ails all of us. I had a smile on my face for 2 hours straight and was full on crying/laughing for a big chunk of that time as well.  It was a great endorphin rush and my face hurt all night.

Here is Maria in action…go see her live!

What’s it like to be The Jpo? – K.C.
K.C., it’s flattering you ask because I get up in the morning and put on my Lady Gaga 2011 Concert T-shirt just like everyone else. Actually, I believe from reading several female singer-songwriter biographies that as a 29-year old, it is completely ok for me to admit that being The Jpo is pretty fun although somewhat riddled with a constant and nagging anxiety about “doing it right” (“it” meaning: life, music, credit card payment, oil change schedule, writing, and coffee brewing). I have been told by many folks that the next decade and beyond does get easier, so being The Jpo right now means cruising along doing well at what I can while keeping in mind…it will all chill out in the future. In a good way. For now I will continue to consume mass quantities of caffeine, read one (and exactly and only ONE) celebrity gossip blog a day, work with people I love, and post pithy one-liners on Facebook.  Amen.

When did you know you’d make a profession out of music? – Heidi
When did you decide that music was the career for you and what influenced that decision? – Krista
Heidi and Krista’s questions had the same vibe so I stuck them together. Heidi, meet Krista.
Well…I will say that I had the druthers to be a rock star (or in those days, a country star…gack) as early on as 11 when I started playing guitar. Perhaps even earlier if you go back to the days of my intricately but tastefully choreographed lip sync productions of “The Little Mermaid” in my room. I will tell you in the seventh grade we had a class discussion about “What do you want to be when you grow up?” and I said, “A musician!” and my teacher said, “…But they don’t make any money.” Ouch. Way to kill a dream and start a cycle of anti-abundance thinking all at once, Mr. 7th Grade. But I ramble.

I did move to Austin because of the music scene here and so that clearly means I had decided to give music a whirl by the age of 23. What I did not know is that the oddity and the beauty of the music business is that these days, you must be a jack of a lot of trades. This turned out to be a blessing, because I do like writing and playing songs, but I also like working/traveling with artists that I believe in like Susan, working at Rubicon with Dan because his business is so unique and useful, and booking artists like Elizabeth and Michael and Charlie because they are great artists and great people.

The truth is that most people you see who are making a living in independent music these days have multiple streams of income.  This is not a secret so much as an overlooked fact.  Stumbling on some awesome people who allow me to utilize my interests and skills in what is (I hope) a mutually beneficial business arrangement has been the thing that has made this music profession happen at all, and for them I am grateful!  It takes a village, but it does not take The Village People.

Why didn’t you get the pie out of the vending machine? – Norma
Norma is referring to these videos where Elizabeth Wills and I stop at a place outside of Austin we refer to as “Pecania.” This tourist trap has a 24-hour pecan vending machine that actually sells a whole pie. Norma…to be honest, I’m not sure. Sometimes I wake up from a dead sleep thinking, “I should have tried that pie.” Sometimes I imagine what a pecan pie might taste like after sitting in a glass case for 24 hours in the Texas sun. It boils down to the fact that for $20, I am just not going to find out. Unless it’s someone else’s $20. I’ll try any pie on someone else’s tab.

How has music and culture in the past inspired you to bring you to the style you play now and where do you see yourself going musically in the future (1-2 yrs, 2-10 yrs, 10+ yrs) due to those and other current influences? – Mike
I wanted to print this because it’s such a good question but I am going to let the answer slow burn for a bit and address it in the next round. Also it gave me flashbacks to college paper writing prompts.

Favorite Austin restaurants and why? – Kathy
My Austin-based food criteria are usually comprised of a) is it wrapped in a tortilla, b) can I afford it and c) is it made of organic and free range and all that goodness. I don’t always find the trifecta, but I do love me some Torchy’s Tacos and some P. Terry’s. Taco Deli was also just introduced to me and I loved it. The tofu crack at Bouldin Coffee is greatness, too. Once I ate at Uchi and it was amazing, and Dan was buying so that was doubly amazing.

Name your Top Five Favorite Books / Albums / Movies – Jon
If you don’t know Jon, you know he has great (and sometimes pretty obscure) taste. I do not. I’m also not gonna front an answer to make me look cool or literary-snobby or super musical-hispter-educated.

Albums
1. Stones In the Road – Mary Chapin Carpenter. Always and forevs.
2. Buy 1 Get 11 Free – The Groobees. The first recording with Susan Gibson on it that I ever owned.
3. Rose Cousins – If You Were For Me. Gorgeous.
4. Lady Gaga – The Fame Monster. How I embraced pop music.
5. A Few Small Repairs – Shawn Colvin. Epic.

Books
1. Bird by Bird – Anne Lamott
2. Portrait of an Artist: Georgia O’Keeffe – Laurie Lisle
3. The War of Art – Stephen Pressfield
4. Bossypants – Tina Fey
5. Mere Christianity – C.S Lewis

Movies
A note here is that I can never remember movies after I have seen them and I really only have a direct interest in Christopher Guest, Alfred Hitchcock, and laughing at Kristen Wiig and Maya Rudolph. Pedestrian? Maybe. Awesome? Yes.
1. A Mighty Wind
2. Best in Show
3. North by Northwest
4. Bridesmaids
5. I can never think of a 5th.

Do you ever hit a creative block and if so, how do you get past it? – Natalie
YES. I have arrived at the idea lately that people may get creatively blocked in one area, like…”I can’t possibly match words to any chords right now and may never again,” but that usually means I’m still cool with some other form of creativity like…making a ridiculous video or writing a blog post. So I go do that.

The other thing I have learned to tell myself is that the blocks always pass and there will be another song/video/blog/Facebook post. Panicking does no one any good, and probably prolongs the block. When blocked, sit back, relax, and doodle in a sketchbook or watch something funny. Blocks hate it when they are met with chillaxment. (Yes, I just made up the word “chillaxment.” You’re welcome).

Top 10 artist/band for a road-trip playlist? – Kelly
My favorites! Road trips and playlists! People I work with are exempt because I’d include them all anyway.
The Dixie Chicks, Terri Hendrix, Garrison Starr, Ryan Adams, Gregory Alan Isakov, Kathleen Edwards, Jason Isbell, Abra Moore, Florence + The Machine, and Imogen Heap.

Off we go…

Why were mosquitoes created? Really what was the need? – Tammy
The good Lord knew that once Bill Gates had amassed a billion dollars with Microsoft, he’d need to turn his attention elsewhere…so God created the mosquito so Bill Gates could exercise his humanitarian side. Nets for all!

What was the first Mary Chapin Carpenter song you learned on guitar? – Lisa
He Thinks He’ll Keep Her. Which is weird for an 11 year old to be jamming to a popular country song about divorce, but it was by far the most interesting thing on the radio at the time and we HAD NO (USEFUL) INTERNET…so radio was it. Also the music video was awesome. I learned it in A on a nylon string guitar.

Why doesn’t Reese’s sell the peanut butter eggs year round? They have the perfect ratio of chocolate to peanut butter… – Erin
You are right, Erin. Once you go egg, you can’t go back to cup. I also recoil at those creme eggs…I just can’t do it because they’re too close in texture to real eggs. Anyway…I don’t know. I think the solution is to create more holidays throughout the year where an egg is the centerpiece symbol. National Egg Day. National Poultry Reproduction Day. National Spherical Plastic Container Day. In the meantime…start stockpiling.

What is your favorite stretch of road? – Ryan
Awesome question. I love the trip from the Texas Panhandle into New Mexico. We often drive from Amarillo to Taos, so you’re looking at plains and plains and plains (pretty in their own right)…and then you cross the state line into New Mexico and I SWEAR the sky gets bluer and the clouds get prettier. It’s flat and dry until you go through the mountain pass after Cimarron and suddenly you find a river alongside the road and even snow at the right time of year. It’s windy roads and green mountains all the way into Taos, and it is then that I start craving red and green chile and having the string urge to buy an adobe casita.

jet lag – Havilah
Havilah is my talented songwriter roommate who has spent so much time traveling these past few months that she can only type in short thought bursts. I have been there. I get jet lag when we have gig weekends that keep us awake until 3 or 4 in the morning (and I don’t even do the driving so I get off easy – yay Suz!) and then I try to get back into the “wake up early and do things” schedule. On the first day my re-acclimating trick is to sleep until noon at the extreme but NO LONGER! Drag that butt out of bed. 10 or 11 is better. Do not nap. Be lazy, but be awake. Go to a bookstore or Target and window shop or something…mental stimulation and walking outside. Then try to be in bed by midnight that evening…and boom. Usually I’m back on a schedule I can deal with because I can get 6 – 8 hours of sleep that night. Don’t stare at screens (this is the hardest for me)…read a real book before you try to sleep. Keep the temperature in your bedroom cool. This is more like a “sleep better” answer than a jet lag question, but the two are intertwined in my head.

I have so many questions that this post will continue tomorrow!  Now go eat a Reese’s egg, sleep well at night, and learn a Mary Chapin Carpenter song.