A Map of the Psyche

Personal Journal entry: November 27th, 1997

My original meeting with Moby wasn't what I expected. I admit, I was really excited about seeing Juno Reactor play live that evening, and although I admired his work, I hadn't really come to Phoenix for the purpose of seeing him perform.

I had first attended an event to see him perform live called Plantasia for New Years several years ago. It was in Los Angeles, and was a significant event for me, because this was an event I was determined to actually watch the artist perform live, that artist being Moby.

Through every rave or event I had attended in the past I had always missed the live performances, I was too tired, or I had arrived too late, and then there was the time Mark fell through the stage at "All Boxed In"... but that's another story for another time!

This evening, at Plantasia, I went to see Moby. We arrived early and I told Alicia I couldn't wait to see him. We counted down the New Year, and around 2am I was a bit concerned. I didn't even see anyone setting up for his performance.

"When he is going to play?!" I asked her.

"Are you talking about Moby?"
I heard a voice say,
and turned around to see a drunk man
smiling at us both.

"Uh yeah, why?"
He laughed

"DUDETTE!
MOBY'S BEEN PLAYING
FOR OVER AN HOUR! "

He pointed to a building I hadn't even seen over to the far right end of the fairgrounds we were at. I heard his voice trail off as he said

"Over in that building there..."

I was already grabbing Alicia's arm and dragging her over to the other building.

"Another building, GEEZ!!" I said....
" I won't miss it this time, no way!"
We walked into the building and saw him onstage.

Moby looked out at the audience
as they were shouting and applauding.
He smiled and
raised his arms over his head
as he shouted out

"Thank you! Thank you very much!"
and immediately left the room.

I don't think Alicia stopped laughing
until we returned to Tucson.

Several years later I found myself at Plastik Records with Heather Markus and Moby, where he was signing autographs. He drew a cartoon on his newest CD, and smiled as we conspired together to stuff the 100 dollar bill into Sarah's copy.

He signed it, and gave it to Ryan, while both were unknowingly taking a part in what would eventually become our last passing of a tradition.

Later that evening I joined Markus, Heather and Mark and sat down to dinner with Moby... (well *we* ate dinner, and he watched, but we still had a great time talking about irony and our vices in life!) I found myself looking forward to seeing him perform that night as well. And with everyone else there to point me in the right direction, I thought I stood a much better chance of finding the correct building this time!

Mark and I went to the concert after dinner, and watched Juno Reactor, Markus and Moby play consecutively. I was surprised at how much I was enthralled through it all. He had unrelenting energy, and despite the thousands of times he has inevitably played the same material over and over again, it felt new and exciting. I don't view than as an easy feat.

" As a human being and a musician, I'm comfortable enough with ambiguity, that I don't feel a need to constrain myself and say, "Okay, this is what I am." I don't see any problem with loving classical music and also loving punk rock and speed metal. "

" There are different facets to different people's personalities, and it works through an artistic level as well. If you know someone for ten years, you realize that sometimes they're quiet, sometimes they're loud, sometimes they're funny, sometimes they're jerks. It all combines into a cohesive whole, and I would hope that my creative output reflects that.

-Moby

October, 1997

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