Many times I find myself picking up an acoustic guitar with hopes of anything worthwhile just emitting from my fingers on the strings. Tentatively waiting for something original and thought provoking to pour out of my head in real-time. Sometimes this happens and I document the process with anything and everything at my disposal- sometimes being able to record and write an idea as I'm formulating a finished song. This happens often, but I feel that this particular talent doesn't occur with all musicians- especially those who view this practice secondary to other time sensitive material (IE life). Writing music, literature, or crafting artistic devices don't have a functionality to all people.

     I'll be truthful in stating the main reason I started playing the guitar was 1) My cousin played it 2) He was getting attention from girls with it 3) I wanted to be Billy Corgan. Number three on that list may be void at this point and the first two are connected in some way- but I started developing to play because I didn't have a main form of personal communication outside of the standard human daily rituals. Those first songs were horrible and completely unlistenable to anyone's ears- but I slowly began to understand the language that music offers ourselves and others to convey our feelings. I see creating music as a personal voice by mastering tools available.

     Let's look at the reasons why cover bands exist. People do enjoy familiarity often and being comfortable in knowing what they like. Repetitiveness soothes the brain in many ways- perhaps to make ourselves comfortably numb in our down time. Understanding why people have a set preference to musical tastes seems incredibly limiting and hard to understand. Listeners have a preference to a specific sound recording and enjoy the familiarity of a song. I would imagine that playing unfamiliar music to the general public would be a tough sell- as those people have deep preferences already. These things make it easier for cover band musicians to find work regionally. Playing in local areas will divulge an editable list of musical preferences to grab from and retain locations to play.

     Besides the cover band work, one that bothers me greatly though is the idea that some musicians prefer to only play their instrument rather than develop something FROM the instrument. The reasoning of playing out in a live cover band scenario works fine, but seemly limited due to a preexisting context in which you're mainly performing (in most cases). I enjoy the challenge of hearing and fine tuning a song to what I deem fit for a song- mine or not. It's hard enough to find like-minded musicians that are willing to play original material, have live-ready equipment, and devote time into developing the music. Hell, I learned 40 songs in two weeks once for a cock-rock cover band gig only to hate the music even more due to the constraint of preexisting musical conditions.