Music

Contacts dry. Dehydrated. No dinner. Drank a skunked Sam Adams that’s been in the fridge for months. Listening to REM’s “Sweetness Follows” (“It’s these little things that pull you under / Live your life filled with joy and thunder”). Fresh from rehearsal… I foisted all kinds of new wrenches on the band. Todd’s never played…

I should be in the studio, but after this morning’s triathlon, I called Kevin and begged off. It goes like this… I woke up at 4:55, showered, and walked to the 79th Street Boat Basin transition area, dropped my gear (helmet, gloves, shoes, backpack, PowerGels, Vaseline) at my bike. Then I followed the line of…

Tonight I’m doubly nervous. I carbo-loaded, hydrated, and filled to the gills with soy protein shake. In 12 hours, I’ll be in the middle of a one mile swim in the Hudson River, staring down the barrel at a 25 mile ride followed by a 10k run. Per usual, I feel unprepared. I notice every…

Sigh… At home, Friday night, resting up for Sunday’s tri, listening to the Innocence Mission, kinda’ melancholy (pretty rocknroll, huh?). I miss my guitar. I need it. Crave it. It’s like I’ve lost my voice, my ability to dream, or my ability to understand dreams. That’s what songs are, after all: lucid dreams. When the…

I’m watching “Vanilla Sky,” another piece of Cameron Crowe brilliance. Tom Cruise is about to get in his big car crash. Life’s so great right now, so full, so busy, so complete — the work, the record, the travel, the tour, the relationships — I hope I’m not headed for my own big crash. Last…

After the world’s longest and busiest day (I’m planning and prepping for MTV News’ Video Music Awards coverage and 9/11 Remembrance concurrently), I met my buddy Jon Rosenblatt for a bike ride. The sun had fallen into New Jersey by the time we hit the path along the river. The George Washington Bridge was glistening…