radical druid Posts

Yeah sure it may be just a trope
or just talking to yourself out loud
but if you’re going to say something

(if ya gonna SAY sumthin’)

why not say Something. Isn’t that it?

Yeah maybe it’s the rhythm and the warp and the woof and the tangible and the legible
the horizontal and vertical
but so are you
already.

You say Something
and it don’t even have to be out loud
and then maybe

you’ll HEAR Something.

And that would be something, wouldn’t it?

Of course you already know that.
You just forgot.

22 SEP 2026

© 2026, John Litzenberg. All rights reserved.

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Another singing bassist friend (Keido Toby Rider) posted something about singing and playing bass simultaneously recently, and as it’s a subject dear to my heart, I’ve been thinking it over. My first “real” musical inspiration was Paul McCartney, so I’ve pretty much been a “singing bassist” my whole life. Outside of jazz, my non-singing bass influences are few. Geezer Butler. Steve Harris. John Paul Jones. Most of the rest sing a lot.

So here’s my take on it. For ME, singing and playing bass is the ultimate meditative activity. It is absolutely and completely about being mindful. Of the lyrics and your parts, certainly. But more than that, mindful of the MUSIC. Particularly the beat. Voice and bass from ME require a solid pocket of the right depth for the cargo at hand. Right?

At its trickiest, the singing is more serpentine than anything else. It weaves and winds around the groove you’re creating [and don’t get confused here. The BEAT is created by the drummer, who is the master of time. The GROOVE is created by the bass player, who is the master of space. Thus endeth the lesson.]. That CAN make things hard, unless you’re the kind of bass player who doesn’t need to look at their hands. Work on that. Definitely. It’s essential. You CAN look but watch out, because you REALLY need to be watching a whole lot of other things. Like the lyrics to a crazy ass request that you’re reading from your iPhone cause it came in written on a twenty. In other words, you really HAVE to be comfortable playing the bass for this to work.

Of course, sometimes it’s easier, if the bass line is easier. But you have to be careful that “easy’ doesn’t mean ‘mediocre”. You know where that line is. And you know what happens when you cross it. Word to the wise, etc.

Bottom line for the bottom line: lock with the damned drums. And don’t ever let go. Even in your mind. LOL.

But that of course just one end of the stick, the fingers end. Now to the torch end: the voice.

Of course, it helps to actually BE a singer. There are a lot of folks out there who really ought to know better than to approach a microphone without thinking about it. Seriously. NOT to be discouraging. Of course, everybody CAN sing. That’s what they say. But like Mick Jagger once quipped (and I’m certainly if not paraphrasing then interpretive dancing), if there was a school for rock and roll singers, nobody would be themselves. Or any good. LOL. Not sure whether the sarcasm there was from me or Mick. I’ll take the blame and let Mick have the merit.

So. If you’re a singer or not, this will probably work. YMMV. I ain’t evaluating your bass playing OR your singing. That’s not my circus. You ain’t my monkey, Mickey.

Of course it helps to know the song. The words. To have a reasonably good relationship with the melody. And you will need to practice the singing separately, just like you practice the playing. Until you get them BOTH right. You know, left hand right hand both together. Olde schule music lessons.

Practice without holding a microphone. Without having the microphone right against your lips. Because as a singing bass player that’s NOT going to happen. You’re going to have to be expressive without your hands. Some folks just can’t do that, can they?

Not gonna teach you how to sing. There’s lots of other places for that.

Next time, we’ll start THINKING about putting one and one together and getting three.

19 SEP 2026

© 2026, John Litzenberg. All rights reserved.

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Forget all that nostalgia and mumbo-jumbo;
clinging to the past never made a single step forward
(as if that’s where we’re sure we want to be)
and anyways the kids won’t listen to it
unless it’s got a good beat
and you can forget about all this bullshit
for a while.

There’s no method, no teacher, no way, no journey.
Because there’s nowhere to go.
It’s all in your mind.

And that’s OK.
But it doesn’t just belong to you.
You’re just borrowing it
unless you’ve already lost or broken it
in which case it’s yours by default.

Forget what you think you think you know;
there really is so much unknown.
It’s almost overwhelming, isn’t it?
the amount of crap we just can’t won’t don’t imagine.

I forget why I’m even writing this;
how could it possibly ever matter
when it’s not a makeover or a lifestyle change
but an actual revolution:
you have to start over.
Every time.

They say that knowledge is cumulative, that it builds
on everything you’ve ever experienced
and cataloged
and organized
and canonized
and codified

in a never ending, never high enough mountain
on which you stand
desperately trying
to touch the light.

Maybe that’s why you never see it shining.
That light comes from you.

It can’t be that simple.

Forget what you know about complexity. You’ve obviously constructed that in your mind.
Nice feat of engineering.

Too bad it won’t fly.

But if you have your mind right, you won’t have to.

15 SEP 2026

© 2026, John Litzenberg. All rights reserved.

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From the liner notes for this record which changed how I think and feel about music forever. Hearing and absorbing everything about this was magical.

“This album is the music of four musical men and their musical friends (close friends) some of whom do not use musical instruments to make their song. Men who love one another, men who are always in love with lovely ladies, children, dogs, cats; with Old Ma Nature at her best and at her worst; men who can laugh and cry, men who have paid their dues to the unknown cashier, menu who can accept their own mistakes and the mistakes of others. It’s all living, you know. Be well.”

#MusicSky #TajMahal #TheNatchlBlues

© 2026, John Litzenberg. All rights reserved.

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Just in case you didn’t know, most of my content at John Litzenberg IRL (@radicaldruid.com) — Bluesky comes from here (my perpetually collected works). But for those who just know this site (radicaldruid.com) I do post little, fun pebbles of thought into the pond at #BlueSky to see what waves come up. Some of these are NOT found here (at least not YET LOL).

When people say “as always” which snapshot are they referencing 🙂

© 2026, John Litzenberg. All rights reserved.

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There’s no proof in it.

In fact, there’s actually no “proof” for anything. Of anything.

Because demonstrable evidence or whatever you want to use as a yardstick for factualizing something is never an objective sampling.

We find what we look for. Because we really don’t know what else there is. And if it ain’t on our maps, it’s beyond our comprehension. Beyond here, there be monsters. There may be something, or there may be nothing. But it’s definitely not monsters. Because those all come from places we already know and have defined.

So, no proof. No way to prove.

But still we gotta have “something” to prove. Right?

Because how else are we going to measure ourselves and judge our “progress”, our “success”, our “achievement”? You can’t compare yourself to the infinite, right, because our math doesn’t work that way. Maybe dolphin math does, but we aren’t really smart enough to ask them. Or maybe we just don’t listen.

In any case, whatever axe you’ve got to grind, stone to turn, chaff to burn, skip to my lou or the ritualized dance of your choosing, you could just USE the axe instead of grinding it down.

What are you waiting looking dreaming hoping wishing for?

Deep down, why do you think you don’t already have it?

Have you actually looked?

09 SEP 2026

© 2026, John Litzenberg. All rights reserved.

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How like a mirror is what we see as “us”, how we define and describe the “I” we see reflected there, either watching vigilantly to ensure no dust obscures the surface, or letting the patina of time slowly blur the image at its own natural pace. It is us, certainly. And like that magic Mirror of Erised of Dumbledore’s, what you see is what you want to see. How you think the world sees you. Everyone, everything, every minute of your life is reflected there.

Well, not exactly. It is reflected there, but it also happens there. In fact, that’s the only place it does happen.

Because it’s a reflection, it’s not the object being reflected. The You you’re looking at is NOT YOU.

You’re actually keeping the mirror clean, aren’t you? So that in the mirror life, love, job, nationality, gender, language, ethnicity, sexual preference, education, knowledge, culture, religion, all of it, isn’t you either.

That’s what emptiness means: there’s nothing there in the mirror.

That’s the first step.

The next one is getting rid of the mirror altogether. Physically, maybe. Donate it to a politician.

But that’s not a real solution. And obviously if you’ve been following along, it’s not the answer either. There isn’t an answer, because we don’t have a question. Or maybe there isn’t an answer so there is no question. But you have to know that answer before you stop asking. Human nature is just LIKE that, isn’t it?

So on with the pointless searching. It’s all in the mirror.

Everything you actually need you already have. What’s actually essential to you is not reflected.

Starting to get the point?

Well, that’s ok too.

Consider that a good time to start over at the beginning.

Sit on that a while. What ever that means to you, whatever partial filter you put over your whole life that happens to fit at the moment.

Don’t worry. That won’t last very long either, at the beginning. But the time you’re there, and the time it takes to get there, get proportionally longer and shorter respectively.

That’s what they ALL say, innit?

You’re NOT the screen either. Nor the theater. Nor the neighborhood. And so on. Another point scored there for everyone. For those keeping, worried about, driven by, remotely interested in, the score. Because the “game” metaphor is the same game. Rinse and repeat.

So what’s the “way”?

Why the fuck do you need one?

Exactly who do you think you are? Really? As a naked motherfucker dropped on the face of the earth. One of billions daily. Who is THAT?

That’s just step two.

LOL.

01 SEP 26

© 2026, John Litzenberg. All rights reserved.

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