It always amazes me when I meet people who seem to enjoy music, but don’t consider it to be part of their lives.  To me, music is just as much a part of survival as the air I breathe, the food I eat and the roof over my head.

Likewise, one of the things that seems to surprise people about me is how obsessive I am about music when they find out that I am a writer.  I guess people assume that I would eat, drink and dream the written word if I’m a writer.  And I do.  Voracious reading is not only for pleasure but study as well.  One of the best ways to become a better writer is to read, read, read.

Music, however, satisfies different needs.  I enjoy living vicariously through the bands that I know because of how different the satisfaction seems to be for them than it is for me with my writing.

Writing is very solitary.  If a musician is sitting around, strumming on his or her guitar and maybe working on a melody that later ends up becoming a song, others can sit there too and listen and appreciate that form of expression.  It might not be as polished as when they’re up on stage with the lights, amps and crowd, but it’s still performance.  It’s fun to watch and the gratification comes instantly to the musician.

As I sit at my computer writing poetry or working on the novel I’m writing or even right now writing these very words, no one wants to sit here and watch me.  The stimuli just isn’t as exciting as watching someone playing the guitar or piano.  Even my cats have forsaken me today for sitting in the windows watching the sun melt yesterday’s snow.  And when I do show something I’ve written to someone, then I’ll receive the gratification, but the level of excitement can’t even compare with watching a band perform on stage.

Being an audience member at a show is electrifying.  Music carries people higher than any of the other arts can, regardless of how much you love them.  I believe this is why music has so closely been linked with religious tradition of most every faith going back thousands of years.  I know that when I’m watching a band that I know perform and I have some interaction with the performers while they’re on stage, then I feel special, like I’m part of this magic that’s being created and pumped out at decibels that will have my ears ringing the following day.  No one’s going to leave my place fueled with adrenaline after I read a passage of my writing to them, but you better believe that if I go to a show and the singer sings directly to me or the drummer comes over to hand me one of his drum sticks after his solo, I’m going to be telling one of my girlfriends about it later with a certain level of glee.

The goal of the band is to get the recording contract.  The goal of the writer is to get that publishing deal.  Billboard’s top 100 albums, the New York best seller list…  These are the ways in which our forms of art are similar and share that camaraderie in the quest for the ‘American Dream.’  But the musicians have clubs to play in, t-shirts they can sell, groupies, etc.

The life of the writer is a lonely one.  But I do have the unique advantage of being able to slip on a CD while I’m writing.  You can’t play guitar on stage and read a book at the same time, so maybe that’s the only one-up I’ve got.

I write because I have always wanted to.  If I didn’t, I’d crave it like a junkie in withdrawal.  As for being the ever frustrated musician, I’ll keep taking my bass lessons.  If Henry Rollins can write poetry, then I can at least try to learn an instrument!

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