TomFlannery.com

Taking a break in the action….sitting here listening to an old Mike Scott solo record called “Still Burning” and contemplating what comes next. Scott’s music is a good soundtrack for this sort of rumination, because the man staggers to and fro like a drunken man on a sidewalk. You never know if you’re gonna get something genius like “Fisherman’s Blues” or some bloated overproduced pile of gargantuan 80-ish shite with overbearing and even cultish religious overtones. But you’re always gonna get something different, and that’s more than you can say for most. So I’ve always been in Scott’s corner, even though it can get kinda snug there.

Besides, what’s the use of pondering your future in silence? That’s the height of boredom. And it can get scary too. Nothing like the sound of your own breathing to make you feel insignificant in the overall scheme of things. You can tell that Scott ain’t the kind to spend his time kicking his own ass, and that’s the type of guy I want to hang with, if only because opposites attract. That plus anybody who can write songs as good as “Fisherman’s Blues” and “This is the Sea” may still be scrounging for the rent (such is the lunacy of the music “business”), but ain’t ever gonna be insignificant again. Music lives longer than landlords. Thank your deity of choice for that.

So, there it is. Whatever any of this means. I’ve got good intentions nearly every time, but I do tend to allow myself to be battered…..like a Kansas weather vane. What I need to do is hunker down in the barn until the wind passes, then emerge and work like hell before a new storm starts forming on the horizon.

Easier said than done. Especially with the Waterboys bouncing around in my head…..a head that’s full of half-formed ideas and fully-formed air pockets.

In a bit…

–tf