I’ve been struggling with my rejections lately, but for some perspective, I’ve been stumbling upon some of my favorite underground artists and lost songs lately too. It’s like the universe did it on purpose. I recently used a song by Liggy Wog on my podcast of “The Godchild”, and I still have and listen to two of their cassettes. I’m pretty sure me and my ex wife were two of maybe fifteen fans they had, if that, and 25 years later it’s safe to bet I’m the only person who still has their music, similar to how I’m the owner of the only copy of a video cassette of an early 90’s feminist sketch comedy show that was on PBS at 2am every other Sunday for awhile. Lea Delaria who played Boo on OITNB, stand up comedian Kate Clinton, and Dr. Bertice Berry, plus several other well known feminists were the stars of the show. It was brilliant and ahead of its time and I’m the only one who has it. PBS literally sent me their only copy. A couple years ago, my friend Anthony searched high and wide to find me a copy of the song Electric Storms by The Devlins which was a B side to a song that flopped by a band that flopped in the early 90’s and I was the first and only person to upload it to Youtube. I still have The Organic Icecubes album from Mark Erelli’s high school band on my computer. I have a copy of “The Cadelli Stink Tape” on my Spotify (currently private)… which was a home town comedy gem of some kids I went to school with when they were like, nine and thought they were The Beastie Boys or something. I’m probably the only person who cares about the song Skies Turn Black by Bronze Buddha and Bobericc, and it’s one of my all time favorites. Lil Wayne’s most hated album is one of my all time favorites as well, and I have many super talented friends whose music still soothes me on a rough day that never went anywhere… so on and so on. All the artists who made those brilliant songs and albums that are hugely important to me probably considered those works failures. They weren’t a big success. They didn’t get those artists to the places they probably hoped it would get them, but they left their gifts to the world, if only at the very least, through me. I already know that my book impacted a lot of people who read it, as has the audio-book version. It has made a difference and my new books will be read too, whether they’re published by a publisher or not because there are several people looking forward to more, and that is something I can be proud of. Most people don’t get published, and if they do, it’s most often because they went with a glam agency, which was the kind of agency that did accept my book right away, and they called me on the phone after having read it and sent me a summary of how they would market it and it sounded a bit too good to be true, and while they are an actual publishing company, in the end, most people who sign with them sell about as many as I did self publishing, and are charged thousands of dollars for thousands of books they have to buy and this and that through the agency as well. I got out of it immediately thankfully, because self publishing hasn’t really cost anything other than some extra stuff I chose to put money down on like a week of promotional advertising and press kits, but it’s completely free to self publish through Amazon like I did, so I made the right choice on that, and the publishers I’m querying would be free as well. They’d be agreeing to do a lot of work for me on the faith that they thought my book would make them money. That’s not easy to get someone to do, especially for a nobody like me, so it is what it is. It helps to remember how much I love some really obscure sit though. Some of it is stuff I wouldn’t be me without. Other artists might consider that perspective as well, that even just a few fans can keep your art alive.
*BURP*
Here is some of the art I’ve been up to. I keep bustin’ my ass at it, hoping I’ll get noticed, and actually, today Parama Chattopadhyay who runs the art gallery posted a big thing on me with a bunch of my art, saying I was one of the artists at the gallery.
I made a drawing of cacti for my niece, because she asked…
And I did a few more pages in my children’s book. Actually, I finished it tonight!
I got away for a couple days to see my parents for their birthday. Their birthday last year was the last time I went out to dinner or anywhere pretty much, for that matter. This was the sunset when I got there…
I stopped at the graffiti spot on the way home to take some photos and get a walk with some air…
My cat Moo was glad to have me back home…
My friend Mel sent me this fifteen pound grey weighted blanket as a gift to help with my stress and it’s friggin’ awesome!
And to leave you with some music, here are a few songs that may have been considered flops by the artists, but they mean the world to me…
And that is all I got for you today!
