The main thing I like about gigging is it keeps me busy. It gives me a reason to leave the house and do something vaguely constructive because like a lot of musicians, I don't like my own company. It's no secret that some muso's tend to be quite sad people. It goes with the territory. You come off stage to a standing ovation, pack up, go home and sit on your own. It's not a great feeling.
My own brand of sadness is a horrid thing that grabs me when I'm left to my own devices. If I have a few days off, I can always feel it coming. A horrible, self perpetuating feeling of dread. You know it's coming and because of that, it arrives even quicker.
When I was in my younger days, I fought a running battle with it. My first attempt at living on my own was a disaster. I quickly realised that I'm not good at it. I always felt that the devil makes work for a lonely brain. Give my mind some time on it's own and it will eventually try and cripple itself. So I moved in with a friend and it helped for a while but I still found myself alone a lot. I soon realised that I was doing this on purpose. My mind was trying to be sneaky. I think it got a kick out of being the centre of attention. I would find excuses not to do things. Not to go out. To stay inside and feel crap.
How stupid is that?!?!?
Anyway, I eventually moved back from London to the coast and my family. Over the next couple of years, things got slowly better. I would have the odd dip but nothing like as bad as before. The real change happened when I began to gig again. I had played in bands all through my teenage years and stopped dead when I moved to London. Now I was back playing again and without me even noticing, my mood improved.
Unfortunately, nothing lasts for ever and over the last year or so, feelings have started to creep back. Insidiously changing moods and outlooks. Subtly undermining confidence and drive. Removing light and encouraging doubt. All these things will be familiar to many and I know that I'm no different. I'm just angry.
Why does the mind want to self destruct? It's a stupid thing to do. Bloody ridiculous, if you ask me.
No one likes to feel sad. No one wants to feel sad. People just get that way sometimes.
The way I deal with it is by keeping busy and pretending it's not there. Rather that than go back on those bloody drugs. Gigs are a great way of doing this because they are a commitment involving others. You can't be selfish and decide not to go. You'd be letting the rest of the band down, not to mention the audience and venue etc. I'm sure someone with letters after their name would call it a coping mechanism but that sounds weird. It's just life. Same as everyone else's.
In order to stop this post being a massive downer, I'll finish on a lovely Woody Allen quote. No one made the neurotic human condition as funny as he did.
"I was in analysis. I was suicidal. As a matter of fact, I would have killed myself, but I was in analysis with a strict Freudian and if you kill yourself they make you pay for the sessions you miss."
Pub, anyone? ;)
