DRUMMER CAFE

My sister suffers from depression. She's what you call uni-polar. She dips way down into depression and never quit makes it back up to "normal". Its taken years but she finally has her meds dialed in just right and is probably the most productive she's ever been. She's also a very talented singer/songwriter/gutarist. For a while we were involved in a project together. It was sort of just a Friday night get together with the two of us and 2 other former bandmates from years ago. She constantly called and cancelled coming to practice, at the time we were frustrated but understood. I don't think it was a priority for any of us to really turn this into a band, but its frustrating to make plans and have someone blow it off. Jokingly, we wrote a song about the disfunctions of our project. I tracked down the lyrics and here is the section about her:

Last Friday night we meant to play
But the singer felt too ill
She had to go to therapy
And she may be there still

She's a good sport about all of it

I honestly believe that our society has put labels on any quirk in ones personality.  It is so easy to take a pill. 100 years ago we had the same type of humanoids on this earth. They didn't have access to all these drugs. Some how they survived and the crime rate was nothing like it is now. As musicians, we tend to use more of one side of the brain than most.  Any creative personality is not really wire the same as everyone else.  This is what makes us so unique. Not necessarily Squirrely. Do we need a pill or is this all just part of our personalities? What is normal anyway ?
Not me, I like being a bit different and not exactly like the perfect mold that society says we have to be.  It is OK to be a little Nutz !!! To the original poster, did you ever think that maybe the stuff that is pissing you off is not the real problem.  Maybe the problem is that you let everything piss you off??  Think about it!!
                                        Nutty
                       

I'm not a moderator here, but this thread seems to have gone from a discussion of squirrley musicians to a discussion of medical issues - some very personal (and I'm sure I helped with that - my apologies). 

Can we get back to the squirrley musician posts?

Sorry if I got under your skin but there is always two sides. It is hard for me not to look at things medically when my father was a doctor. My point is this, some of the things that bother you about people bothers most of us.  As musicians, we have all delt with people being late, drunk, stoned, unable to show up, don't call you to let you know what is going on. This stuff is pretty normal and most don't put up with it forever. Just remember that people do what they want to do and we have no control over that.
                                 Nutty

I think I was pretty much on topic here. By the way, I like your Web site. Your guitar player is a big old fellow. Wouldn't want to piss him off.  Good luck with your project.
                                Nutty

In fact, music is what is sometimes called a "global activity". That is, it calls on the functions of a great number of the brain's centres on both sides of the brain. Musicians will often score right down the middle on so-called "hemispheric specialisation" tests. Not to mention that the rigid Right Brain = Creative/Left Brain = Logical dichotomy has been broken down somewhat since it was first proposed...

This is a little bit of a hobby horse of mine...

Am I the only person that feels a bit left out by being one of the few musicians that seems pretty much completely normal and relatively emotionally sound? Haha, maybe not left out, but something along those lines...

It's like, maybe this is why there's a lack of emotional intensity in my performance (musically not visually) etc.

Ehh...

Ive met squirrely people from all walks of life but with musicians it just seems to come with the territory. At my age, 41, its something that I have less willingness to deal with. When I was 23 I called them eccentric, now I call them immature, irresponsible, self centered, GUITAR! players .

I consider prog metal snobs squirrely