From The Land Of Celebrity #6

"Off the plane, on a train, on our way to see the FIFA World Cup..." It's this really annoying ad for Rogers Mobile that I really won't miss. Rogers is one of the larger mobile networks (and cable/wireless internet/magazine media conglomerates) in Canada, and they obviously paid mega-bucks to get their ad in EVERY commercial break during the World Cup. I have the dialogue etched into my brain, as well as the contorted faces of the three ultra-trendy 20-something gimboids as they rock around Germany pretending to be best friends. It's one of those ads that is monumentally irksome, but just gets under your skin.

With the completion of the World Cup, that particularly irritating commercial is no longer on. But now it's been replaced by a sequel. Wherein four friends go on a roadtrip across North America, whilst listening to their mp3 phones and simulating bliss during coming-of-age moments. I'd hack on it a lot more if I wasn't in it. (wha!?) Yeah. See... on the days that I haven't been playing or in the studio, I've been doing some SOC (silent on camera) work for feature films - you know, just mime talking in the background behind Christopher Walken in a cafe or something. It's just something that I've been doing for some extra cash.

But it's kinda snowballed, and in addition to my bg agent, I now have a principal agent. Who occasionally sends me to auditions. I've probably been to about 10 auditions now... and have been cast in a few things. This Rogers commercial is the big one - it's high rotation so the residuals are helping my bank account out to no end. Apart from that, I've been a 'fashion expert' in a life network program called 'Style By Jury', a cinema usher in a show called 'Instant Star' and a surfer-type dude in 'Degrassi'. Yes, that Degrassi. But what aboot the baby Spike I hear you ask.

Funny. I have absolutely no interest in being on television or in films, but these things just seem to be landing in my lap. Meanwhile all these acting types that I meet are furious with me because I've got so much work already, when they're busting their ass for these parts, and I'm only in it for the money and the catering.

Oh, did I mention that in that Rogers commercial, I was a pirate? No? Good.

Now for the real news.

Things have really been picking up for me! I've made some close friends and fallen in with the musical community that comprises Toronto's most talented and in-demand musicians. These are serious players. They do a lot of the session work for the soul/rnb that comes out of NY/LA/TO. Tuesday nights I play in a band with a Keyboardist who tours with Parliament Funkadelic, a bassist who plays on joints by ?uestlove, Mos Def and Keisha Chante, and the Drummer for Rufus. Just to name a few. So it's amazing they're humouring me and letting me play with them... and I'm just blissed out every time we play. Which is about 3 or 4 times a week in various combinations with other players from the same pool.

Oh, I've got a story you might like. I recently got back from a tour of Northern Ontario that I was doing with this band called The Payback. I guess you could best describe our repertoire as sophisticated funk. Anyway, the tour sounded like it would be a really fun time. Which it was. Apart from the gigs themselves. See, the problem was the crowd. We were playing very rural areas (read: backwoods-of-nowhere-inbred-hick-towns), and most of these people aren't really used to seeing live music, let alone anything without a banjo. They were confounded and confronted by the fact that we weren't playing Sweet Home Alabama over and over again. So on one of the last dates of the tour, we had a crowd that was quite hard to win over. And in one brief moment of frustration, I plucked the opening bars of Sweet Home Alabama. 'Durt durt diggurr, ba-durt durt diggurr.' It was incendiary to say the least.

All at once, the band looked at me, horrified, whilst the entire congregation of toothless hicks stood up and promptly ejaculated on the walls in a moment of sheer elation. At which point I stopped. Which was an even worse decision than it was to start. I really overestimated their sense of humour about the whole thing. Hahah... There were these massive denim-clad cowboys standing erect by the pool table in the corner, holding their pool cues in one hand. I was waiting for them to smash them on the edge of the table and rush the stage. It was a Hollywood moment, honestly. So the lead singer immediately apologises on my behalf... "Look guys, I'm really sorry about that. We don't really know the song, and we shouldn't have teased you like that when we can't follow through and play the rest. We don't know it."

Amidst the booing and howling for blood, I heard this weathered and crackly voice from an old toothless guy at the bar, as he muttered forlornly into his beer, "Just play it close." It was a solitary and desperate plea, that really allowed me to realise what a mistake I'd made.

At this point, in my defence, I might just mention that the night prior, our trumpet player had been arrested by local police who were on a power trip. He spent the night in jail and we had to bail him out, and attend the court hearing 2 hours before we went on stage. These weren't the 'good' kinda yokels, OK??

Anyway, we didn't finish the set.

So I've been so busy with all this live playing at night, and stupid film work during the day... I've all but forgone the production side of things. I say "all but" because it's a phrase that sounds kinda cool, but also because I'm still doing some co-writing and production for a couple amazing local artists.

I also say "all but" because last week I slammed my hand in a door. This big metal sonofabitch at one of the clubs I was playing. On the way out to load gear into the car, I gave the door a bit of a tug, and the spring mechanism released suddenly and it flung itself into the perpendicular brick wall, sandwiching my hand in the process. Apparently the door is "just like that" and it "happens all the time." So for the last week my hand has been kinda purple and swollen, which has prevented me from playing (the purple just really clashes with my pink jumpsuit). Which kinda hurts financially, but it's given me cause to focus back on the production - what I came here to do anyway!

So I'm diving back into the sonic arena, tweaking attack times, compression ratios, adjusting noise gates thresholds, brickwall limiting, smoothing frequency curves and whatnot. I'm totally in love with music. Love dynamics. Love the frequency spectrum. Love Hertz. I think that'd be a good name for an electronica band. Whaddya reckon?

Aiight, think I've crapped on for long enough. Sorry it's been a bit duller than usual. Too busy with serious stuff to get into mischief. But whatcha gonna do.

I miss you all, and am thrilled by everyone's various ongoing successes.

Lots of love,

Jesse

PS Please find attached a couple photos of me with Mike Patton. Apologies for the quality - camera phone. For those who are interested, we talked primarily about over-zealous Mr Bungle fans with body-fluid fixations, and the ceasefire in Lebanon.







Slang update v1.3 - The Verb Special
'reach' = to attend an event... eg "yo yo, are you gonna reach tonight?"
'walk with' = to bring... eg "i didn't walk with my phone"
'watch' = to be troubled by something... eg "i don't watch that" = it doesn't bother me at all.
'jook' = to poke, also to 'cork' as in when you hit someone between the muscles such that it hurts disproportionately with the force of the impact.