Jason Landry's Blog

The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin

Released in 2023, The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin is a bible of highly quotable material that all artists should read. Rubin, a music producer of such acts including The Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and even Jay-Z, is like a zen master. His expertise lies in what he hears and how he is able to suggest and or push an artist to dig deeper or go father, or think differently than they currently do—just think of him as an oracle.

The creative act, as the title states, can refer to whatever type of “art” you are studying or producing. Whether you are a musician, photographer, painter, or designer, it doesn’t matter. Every single thing he discusses within this book applies. I found it to be one of the best books that I have ever read on the subject of creativity. It should be a required reading book for anyone in art school or trying to master a given craft.

Each chapter is short and covers a variety of topics including: Creativity, Awareness, Self-Doubt, Experimentation, Momentum, and Success, just to name a few. Here are a few of my favorite quotes from the book:

“If inspiration does not come to lead the way, we show up anyway.”

“The objective is not to learn to mimic greatness, but to calibrate our internal meter for greatness. So we can better make the thousands of choices that might ultimately lead to our own great work.”

“We're all different, and we are all imperfect, and the imperfections are what makes each of us and our work interesting.”

“Distraction is not procrastination. Procrastination consistently undermines our ability to make things. Distraction is a strategy and service of the work.”

“You are never alone when you're making art. You are in a constant dialogue with what is an what was.”

“If we are aiming to create works that are exceptional, most rules don't apply. Average is nothing to aspire to.”

When Art + Album Covers Collide

Back in grad school, I use to sit with a few of my classmates and we’d create ‘exquisite corpses’ during lectures (don’t worry, we all paid attention and all went on to do great things in the arts). If you aren’t familiar with what an exquisite corpse is, it’s when one person folds up a piece of paper, the first person creates the start of a person, place, or thing, then folds the piece again and hands it to someone else to create the next part of the image without seeing what was originally drawn. In the end you end up with a Frankenstein of an image.

Contemporary artist Christian Marclay, b. 1955 has done a number of projects with records over the years and decided to do what you could only call an exquisite corpse on a more interesting scale. In his project titled the Body Mix Series, Marclay created fun, tongue in cheek collages with album covers and thread and when placed together, create an entirely new and entertaining image.

Marclay earned his BFA from my alma mater the Massachusetts College of Art + Design and has had a tremendous career in the arts and has exhibited and sold his works world wide. Check out a few of the collages from this series below.

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Cheap Trick Guitar Picks

One of the greatest rock bands for me has to be Cheap Trick. Their album Live at Budokan is undoubtedly one of the best live concert albums ever produced. I attended my first Cheap Trick concert 35 years ago and I got hit in the face by a guitar pick by their guitarist Rick Nielsen. I still have that pick. I met him seven years ago at their concert in Boston and told him this story. He then asked me, only one pick? And I said, yeah, just one.

That night at their concert it was extremely hot. I was lucky enough to have a front row seat right in front of Rick. At the end of the show, he walked to the front of the stage, pointed at me, and then pelted me with a fist full of guitar picks. Since I was sweating, they stuck to me like glue.

After the show I went backstage and he asked me, so, how many picks do you have now? I’ll never forget it.

I'm Too Old To Collect Vinyl Records

As I flipped through stacks of vinyl records in a shop in Montreal a few weeks ago, my friend said to me, you should get a turntable. I told my buddy that I was too old to start collecting vinyl and that my days of collecting things had passed and I was trying to downsize my lifestyle. I had sold off my collection of rare fine art photography books when I moved out of Boston, and more recently sold half of my fine art collection. On my 50th birthday this friend decided to disregard everything I said and presented me with a new turntable.

The fact is, I had thought about buying one on numerous occasions but always talked myself out of it. I spend a lot of money on digital music (my primary way of listening to music here in 2022) and to me it didn’t make sense.

It’s been two weeks since receiving this gift and I gotta say, it’s a change of pace. Usually I tend to just buy songs. I listen to what appeals to me and then create a playlist to listen to on repeat for a bit. Listening to an album in its entirety gives you the opportunity to listen to music the way the artist intended you to hear it, as well as sometimes, you’ll find that hidden gem tucked in toward the end of side one or two, or in some cases, sides three or four.

I promised my wife that it wouldn’t get out of hand and I would just buy albums that I would listen to on repeat that were full of great songs. So far I have kept that promise…..kinda.

p.s…..Don’t promise your wife anything. It’s only gonna get you in trouble later.

What Type Of Music Defines You?

1986.
Somewhere in Nova Scotia, Canada.
14 year old me rockin’ a DIO shirt.
It was the beginning of the metal years.

Although my musical taste has grown over the past 50 years from listening to the oldies channel with my folks in the car, to classic rock, to hard rock, heavy metal, alternative & grunge, blues, jazz, electronic, new wave, and even country for a short spell, I feel that music as a whole helps to define who I am as a person. If a song has a great groove, or thumpin’ drum beat, wicked guitar lick, or clever lyrics, there is a purpose for it in my mind palace.

What types of music have inspired you in your lifetime? Does it define who you are, or say something about your character?

Electronic 22

Creativity is the spice of life, and it can be defined and appreciated in various ways depending on where in the world you live. So in celebration of my 50th birthday, I collaborated with artists from all around the world on this BRAND NEW album of electronic music instrumentals called Electronic 22.

From LoFi to EDM, to Ambient and Dark Synth that is harder to describe, what connects all of this music is a creative drive and the beat. The artists on this album are from the United States and South Africa, Norway, Italy, Germany and the Ukraine. Stream it now on Spotify or wherever you get your music.

The Beastie Boys - After the Party.

Do you remember back in the 80’s when The Beastie Boys hit the scene. Their hit Fight For Your Right (To Party) was on constant rotation on MTV. It featured the three New York rappers throwing a crazy party in their parent’s apartment.

Today I stumbled upon this great long form video written and directed by Beastie Adam Yauch. If you ever wondered what happened to the boys after they left the party…..well…..here it is. It’s full of so many cameos that I lost count. Enjoy!

Noga Erez - Montreal Jazz Fest 2022

Noga Erez performing at the 2022 Montreal Jazz Fest. Photo courtesy Marie Demeire/Canadian Beats Media.

So……..you go to a jazz fest to see jazz acts, right? Well, that was end goal as I drove from New Hampshire up to Canada for a weekend in Montreal in July. It was awesome, as I expected it to be, but I also stumbled upon a new artist (at least for me) by the name of Noga Erez. This singer who hails from Israel studied jazz piano and also wanted to sing jazz but as she explained on stage that night, and I paraphrase, there were so many other artists better than she was that she decided to change course—one that brought her more towards electronic music with a hip-hop twist.

She told the crowd that she always dreamed of playing the Montreal Jazz Fest and here she was. Dressed in a matching red tartan pant suit, she grooved to the electronic drum beat across the stage reminiscent of a young Gwen Stefani back when she fronted No Doubt.

A few of her key tracks include the songs End of the Road, Industry Baby, You So Done, Views, Off The Radar, Bark Loud, and her 2022 single Nails. For further listening, check her out on Spotify.

Quote of the Week ~ Bjork

“It’s so amazing when people tell me that electronic music has not got soul. And they blame the computers. If there’s not soul in the music, it’s because nobody put it there.” ~ Bjork

Herbie Hancock Comes To Town

Herbie Hancock and his band at Jimmy’s Jazz & Blues Club in Portsmouth, NH. Photo courtesy Jason Boucher.

It’s not every day one of the greatest musicians and performers in the history of modern jazz plays a club date in your city. But on this rare occasion, one certainly did. Jimmy’s Jazz & Blues Club on Congress Street in Portsmouth, New Hampshire welcomed Herbie Hancock and his quartet to its stage this week. This massive event had been in the making since the Labrie brothers started building the club. In fact, Herbie was scheduled to be one of the very first performers at the venue before the pandemic put the brakes on their plans.

Nevertheless, as they closed down Congress Street for a short time to hoist Herbie’s oversized piano in through one of the large windows of the beautiful club, we knew we were all in for a real treat.

Herbie Hancock and his band brought electricity to the stage. They kicked off the show with an overture–a medley of music that, as Herbie put it, starts… in the future. They moved into Wayne Shorter’s Footprints, the track Actual Proof from his 1974 album Thrust, and then Herbie kicked it up a notch when he brought out his signature white Keytar. His band, consisting of Lionel Loueke on guitar, Terrence Blanchard on trumpet, James Genus on bass, and Justin Tyson on drums were energetic and each showed off their unique talent in various ways.

Herbie ended the show with one of his most popular tracks, Cantaloupe Island, and then brought out the Keytar one more time to rip through Watermelon Man.