One of the most challenging tasks I have ever faced is the task of coming up with a name for a band. It doesn't seem like it should be that hard, until you actually try it, then you realize that it is an exercise requiring a certain amount of creativity, some marketing savvy, a fair amount of diplomacy, well-honed negotiating skills and abundant tolerance for foolishness.
When I started out playing music with my buddy Jimmy, it was pretty much his gig. We played his songs and he got the bookings and so we went by Jimmy's professional sobriquet "j rulon" or "the j rulon band." Now, nobody knows what the hell "j rulon" means and sometimes people got a little confused when we introduced ourselves. Plus no one could figure out how to pronounce it. But it's Jimmy's name and we stuck with it.
Things began to change when Will Ray came into the picture. Will has already carved himself out a decent little niche in the music business and has no interest in going around playing second fiddle (or guitar) to some guy with a weird name. Nor should he. He suggested that we come up with a new identity to distinguish this current project form the previous one. A very reasonable idea. Except that Will decided that he wanted to call this new band "The Cooties." At first I thought he was just kidding around. He does a lot of kidding around and it took me several months before I learned not to trust him. Like the time I showed up at a gig and set down my guitar case in the back room where Will was tuning up so I could make a quick pit stop before we went on. When I came back, Will was standing over my empty guitar case shaking his head. "Rich, you brought your case alright but you forgot to put your guitar in it." Already nervous about the gig, I completely freaked out. How could I have been so stupid? What the hell am I going to do? There's no time to go home and get my guitar! Then I noticed the evil grin on Will's face. "You son of a bitch!" He laughed wickedly and reached behind the door to retrieve my guitar. Now I never turn my back on him.
We started to realize that Will was indeed serious when he gave us each a rehearsal CD with "The Cooties" written across it in indelible ink. Nobody liked that. Cooties? What kind of stupid name is that? Big thumbs down all around.
Meanwhile Jim was still lobbying for "j rulon" and nobody much liked that either. The moment of decision was approaching as we had a gig coming up and needed to tell the booker who the hell we are. That's when the email wars began. Will sent out an email formally proposing The Cooties, but if no one liked it, we should suggest a better name. Jimmy offered j rulon and the Cooties but that was shot down by everyone. This is a band, not a group of sidemen and a star.
I finally persuaded Jimmy to give up on the j rulon idea by telling him he could use it on his first solo album. Then I sent out my list of really great band names for consideration by the group. It included such gems as, "Southland," "Last Fair Deal," "The Rounders," "The Sidemen," "The Vagrants," "The Fugitives," and several others. No one liked any of those, and besides they have all been taken already by other bands. The bass player, Clay, suggested a couple of interesting names like "The Wagoneers" (after his car), and "Trailer Park Rodeo." A little too corny. Tom the drummer chimed in with an inspired suggestion: "Squawk Mulligan", which is the name of the guy who plays the bartender in all of the old W.C. Fields movies.
Still, none of these names were really doing the trick. It was at this point that I started to actually consider "The Cooties." My argument was this: It doesn't really matter what we call ourselves as long as we go out there and kick ass. There are plenty of lousy bands with really cool names and plenty of great bands with really dumb names. It's the band that makes the difference, not the name. Think of the dumbest band name ever -- The Beatles -- if they weren't the coolest band in history do you think anyone would have remembered that stinker of a name? So why not go with Cooties? We will make The Cooties the coolest name ever! What do you say fellows?
They said no.
Clay hadn't given up yet and sent out another email with a few new suggestions, including The Pistol Buzzards. Will and I were talking on the phone one day and he said that the name Buzzards appealed to him. Kind of in the tradition of the Byrds and the Eagles. We even came up with a catch phrase: Meaner than the Byrds, Uglier than the Eagles. I decided to put my full support behind it. Will chimed in with his vote. Jimmy said he thought it was OK, but wanted to think about it. Tom said he would go with the majority. Clay had to call the booker at the club that night and tell him our name so we are now officially called The Buzzards. Please hold your applause.
The other night at rehearsal I was eating one of my special sandwiches and Tom asked me what was in it. "Free range turkey." Tom laughed, "Hey how about the Free Range Buzzards!" Jimmy thought it was great. Will just groaned when he heard the idea. Clay showed up with a bunch of flyers with the name The Buzzards on them and made no comment.
So who knows what our name will be at the next gig. But for now, let history record that The Buzzards are making their first flight on Thursday the 23rd of October at the ungodly hour of 11 p.m. in a French restaurant in Echo Park. And when they do the "Behind the Music" special on us, they'll say this is where it all began.
Cheers.
I've always said that I don't believe in writer's block. You just need to sit your ass down and start putting one word after another. It's just like laying bricks. One by one -- you've got a sentence, a paragraph, a page. And before you know it, you've written the Great American Novel. Simple. No magic. No heavenly inspiration. No angst. No excuses.
So why haven't I written anything for the past six months? I had an idea for a screenplay that really had me going. I wrote an outline and even the first few scenes. Then I kind of got distracted. A little while later, I had another idea for a short movie. Figured out the basic premise and the overall theme of the piece. Knew where the jokes would go. Never quite got around to writing it. A few weeks ago, I heard about a contest for a one-hour television pilot. Came up with some characters, basic plot, cool title and the opening scene... Nothing.
So what's the deal, has the well run dry? Have I lost the spark? Is the honeymoon over? Do I rely too heavily on cliches? Or could it be the dreaded Writer's Block?
Writer's Block. The very words invoke a tomblike sense of finality. They conjure up images of a vast murky abyss that echoes with the stillness of eternity and reeks of the foul funk of two day old Chinese food. Even to acknowledge its existence brings you another treacherous step closer the brink. And once you fall into that abyss, you may never claw your way out. It feeds on your fear, expanding with each excuse, widening with every self-pitying whine. Its walls become sheer cliffs of ice where neither hand nor foot can find purchase. The very sky is made dim by the smoky shadow that looms like a shroud over its vast expanse. It envelopes and overwhelms, suffocates and consumes, leaving you numb and hollow, gasping for inspiration and praying for redemption.
But it never comes. You've given in. Now your at its mercy. And it wants your soul.
You struggle. You think you still have a chance. Flailing about wildly you reach out for anything that might serve to empower you. Blackness overtakes you and the roar of oblivion thunders in your ears. You scratch at the last tatters of vanishing reason...
And then, you feel something. Something solid. Something real. A book.
Your trembling fingers fumble with the cover. Blurry shapes slowly take form. A word. A sentence. A paragraph. A page. You read on. Half-formed thoughts wink like fireflies in the gloom. A light appears in the distance. An idea. Magic. Inspiration.
A world is created from nothing. People are born, live and die in a universe cradled in your hands. A lifetime's experience is captured in walls of imagination. A story becomes real.
So, I have a new project to work on. I'm not sure if I'll finish it. Right now it's just an idea. But as long as the ideas keep coming, that's enough for me.
Thanks for helping me through my writer's block.
Rich
There's such a thing as being too clever sometimes. Like the other night when I came home from the movies and parked my prized Honda CRV across from the parking lot of the local bar. Knowing that they were having a big beer bash that night, I thought "no way am I going to leave my car here, directly in the path of dozens of half-blind, judgement-impaired drunk drivers!" No sir, I decided to play it safe. I moved my car way down the block to a protected location, congratulating myself on my foresight and prudence. As I walked back to my apartment, I noticed a big black Cadillac Escalade wedging itself into the space I had just vacated. I couldn't help but think what a great target that Escalade would make for some inebriated slob, careening out of the parking lot a few minutes after closing time. Oh well, we can't all be geniuses. I slept soundly that night, secure in the wisdom of my precautions.
The next morning as I walked down the sidewalk towards my car, I could have sworn that I had parked it in a different spot than the one it now occupied. In addition, it seemed to be sitting at a slightly cockeyed angle to the curb. I was sure I had done a better job of parking than that. I walked out into the street to get a better look. Sure enough, my car was crooked as hell. I immediately flashed on the time my old Toyota had been banged so hard that it was shoved up against the curb. Damn these drunks!
When I got closer I realized that it was worse than I thought. My front left wheel was jammed up against the inside of the fender. I felt the bottom of my stomach drop out and a wave of rage flood my brain. I got in and tried to move the car, thinking I could take it to the repair shop down the street, but it was undriveable. What the hell happened? There was hardly any damage to the body, but the wheel was completely cocked and the car looked like it had been bounced several feet. I looked around and noticed another car parked on the other side of the street that had its whole left side crushed in. I figured some idiot had bounced off that car and sideswiped mine. I was completely freaked. Here I've only had the car about ten days and it's already wrecked! It seemed like every time I try to do something for myself it ends up in disaster. Oh, and did I mention that I hadn't changed my insurance policy over to include collision coverage? I still had the minimum coverage that I had on my Toyota and was planning to update the policy after I sold it. But at least I still had my Toyota, and despite it's squealing brakes, smoking engine and dangling bumper, it got me to work.
That evening I was out looking at the damage when a guy called out from an upstairs window, "Is that your car?" I nodded. "I'll be right down," he said. He comes out of his house and introduces himself (his name is Marvin) and asks, "Do you have any idea what happened here last night?" I said, "I guess someone hit my car." He laughed and then told me the whole story:
Apparently this guy, we'll call him the Asshole, pulled away from the curb at the end of the block and proceeded up the street towards my car. Marvin happened to be returning home at the time and noticed that the Asshole's vehicle was swerving over into the wrong lane. As Marvin watched, Asshole clipped the front of my car, driving it backwards a full ten feet until it jammed up against the curb. At that point, Asshole's 1999 Malibu flipped completely over and landed on an Acura Integra parked across the street. Moments later Asshole emerged from the car, looking none too sober.
Soon thereafter, several police cars appeared on the scene, along with a fire truck, EMT's and a tow truck. Dozens of onlookers gathered around to watch. The street was blocked for hours. The tow truck had to drag my car out of the way in order to get Asshole's Malibu off of the Integra. The police arrested the Asshole and charged him with DUI. Marvin gave a clear, credible and comprehensive statement and the guy who owned the Integra took digital pictures of the whole thing. His name is Ralph, and as it happens, he was out walking his dog and heard Marvin was telling me about the wreck. Neither one of them could believe that I had missed the whole thing, considering the tremendous noise of the crash, followed by the sirens, bright lights and general commotion that followed. I was kind of surprised myself. But, I am a pretty sound sleeper. Besides, I lived in Brooklyn for nine years, so things like gunshots, police sirens, car wrecks and loud screams are as soothing to me as the sound of a babbling brook or the gentle ocean surf.
Anyway, I spent the next few weeks dealing with the Asshole's insurance company, who turned out to be quite cooperative and have agreed to pay for all repairs. Those repairs ended up being pretty extensive, as there was a lot of damage to the front axle. On an interesting side note, however, the one item that needed attention on the car when I bought it just happened to be a loose axle boot on the front left side. Since I'm now getting an entirely new axle, I won't have to worry about replacing that anymore.
The car is still at the shop where it was towed by a Russian guy named Shawn who kept saying, "don't vorry, is collusion center, is fix everything, no problem." For a while I wasn't sure exactly what a "collusion" center did, but now I realize that they try to find as many things wrong with your car as possible without going over the amount that the insurance company will pay for repairs. Fortunately, in my situation they seemed to have reached just the right balance, so that the bill for all the repairs will be very nearly equal to what I paid for the car in the first place, but still a couple thousand less than its market value.
It seems that I lucked out after all. I outsmarted myself by moving my car to what I thought was a safer parking space, but was in fact directly in the path of a drunken driver. And that damn Escalade got through the night without a scratch. Have I learned my lesson? I don't know. No matter what you try to do to prepare yourself, something always happens that you never saw coming. I'm sure I'll be a little nervous the first few times I park my car out on the street again. And I'll probably go ahead and get the collision coverage on my insurance. And next time there's a beer bash, I'm parking behind that goddamn Escalade!
Good Luck to you all,
Hollywood Dick
