Old Musicians.

Tonight I get the pleasure of working the George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic show. Not that I'm upset, I like some of their stuff. You know, the stuff they put out 35 fucking years ago? Some of it is classic, timeless, and always fun to listen to. That's the beauty of music, once created, if done well enough, it can live on forever and inspire people for generations to come. Good music lives forever. Unfortunately, so does bad music, but I digress.

Artists do not live forever. No. They get old and then they die. It's the circle of life and shit. Sadly, many artists feel the need to continue to tour until the day they die. Not that they lose their talent, but they definitely lose the ability to do things like move around on stage or perform for more than 20 minutes without taking a break or control their bladder. For some reason, watching people who created music that has influenced and inspired and filled people's lives hobble and wheeze around the stage for a few minutes isn't that appealing to me. I worked George Thorogood recently, and while he was more mobile than David Allen Coe, it was still pretty sad to see someone trying so desperately to keep a grasp on the things that (somehow...I'll not get into my feelings about these artists here) made them famous 30-40 years ago. It's like watching that athlete who once was great flail around several different teams when they've lost 6 steps at the end of their career. Just hang it up.

I can imagine that if you build your life a certain way, giving it up would be hard. Many people have an impossible time accepting retirement after working their entire lives. Many people have a hard time accepting that they can't do at 65 what they did at 35. The human psyche is a bitch. But, it's a little different when some dude who pushed paper from a desk for 40 years has a hard time sitting on his couch watching daytime TV. That dude isn't standing up on stage in front of people who paid money to watch him fill out TPS reports, hoping he can get 6 done in a show when in reality, he can only do 2. Old musicians seem to be content to sacrifice their dignity and forfeit the chance to just let their music be their legacy for the sake of holding on to the good old days. Or to pay bills, because they've wasted their money on hookers and booze and blow.

While I can understand the difficulty in just letting it all go, I still think it's sad. People don't really want to watch old musicians spinning in circles in their Hoveround on stage. People want to listen to the beat of the drums, not the sound of a hemodialysis machine keeping kidneys alive on stage. No one wants to see their musical heroes taking shots of Metamucil in between songs. Or, no one should. But, the shows still sell, so apparently, some people do.

I'm not saying that the show tonight won't be enjoyable, hearing the music will be fun...but watching a bunch of old dudes hobble around the stage might not be. Unless one of them falls and breaks a hip, then I'll be laughing my ass off.

Shut up, people falling down is funny. You'd laugh too.