My name is Andy, and I'm a recovering musician.

What does that mean, exactly? Well, it's kind of a meandering tale that's low in drama, but ultimately lets me make peace with something that was a big part of my life for many years.

I wasn't born into a musical family. When my Mom was growing up, she took piano lessons and sang a lot with her sisters. And I don't think my Dad ever picked up an instrument.

But there was always music in my house growing up. Some of my earliest memories revolved around hearing Elton John and Willie Nelson, or Linda Ronstadt and Queen. And at one of the houses we lived in, we had an upright piano. Other than the few times my Mom would play Für Elise, we didn't really use it.

One Christmas in the mid-80s, my parents got me and my siblings a Casio SK-1 Sampling Keyboard, a 32 key synthesizer that had a button that allowed you to sample 5 second snippets of whatever you wanted to record. You could then turn that sample into a song, or back with a samba beat, or do a bunch of other things. We had so much fun making up songs or tormenting each other with it.

Around the same time, I was finally able to pick an instrument to play at school. But when it came time to do so, all of the "cool" instruments were taken, and I got stuck with a French Horn. But, it being a public school, they maybe had one or two functioning horns at any given time. So most of my band time was just me tooting along with my mouthpiece.

It didn't take long for me to be unimpressed with the French Horn, so I gave up on musicianship until Middle School, where it was required. This time I took up the trumpet, which was more portable and less nerdy. (early teen minds, man...) My band teacher, Mr. Sandeen, was a character. He chewed tobacco and dressed so bad we were convinced he was colorblind. I could taste the Beech Nut or whatever he was chewing on my mouthpiece after he used it to show me something or another.

I was good at the trumpet. And I liked it. Mr. Sandeen offered me a seat in the more advanced band if I would practice over the summer between 7th and 8th grade. I declined because I probably wanted to work or play baseball. But after 8th grade started, I was quickly promoted anyway. We'd travel around the metro, playing competitions and food courts.

I took freshman year off from the trumpet so I could focus on not getting beat up in high school and other stuff. But when I was a sophomore, I got right back into it was the school jazz band. Now mind you: we didn't actually play jazz. We played a weird hodgepodge of songs like the themes to The Simpsons and Late Night with David Letterman. Or Norwegian Wood and Oye Como Va.

But it was also around that time that I discovered punk rock. And so all sanctioned extra-curricular activities were kicked to the curb. I needed to make my voice heard the only way an angsty 16 year old could: I joined a band.

Sure, I was punk. But I was also goth. And noise. And industrial. I was also a shoegazer, so two friends and I started The Art Deco Theatres. (the spelling was purposely pretentious) I had never played a stringed instrument before, but I was able to teach myself a couple of Cure songs on bass relatively quickly. Our debut was at an open stage night that the school would occasionally put on. We did a cover of '10.15 Saturday Night', which I don't recall being very good. But there were people watching us, and we were having a blast.

The band stuck around for a few years. We were all too busy to pour much into it, but it was fun. My band mate taught me some basic chords on guitar, so I started writing songs. I shared a guitar with my brother and taught myself some more stuff.

The band petered to an end when we graduated from high school. Our guitarist was moving away for college. Me and the drummer stayed in town, but wanted to get going on our own post-secondary careers. That's when our friend Hideo asked us to start a band with him.

We were called Real Estate Fraud. A friend of ours came up with the name, always saying it in a W.C. Fields-type drawl. I always thought it was kind of a dumb name, but I digress. We didn't really know what kind of band we were. Hideo had recorded all of these songs on a 4-track, some slow and poppy, others 90 second thrashers.

I was of the opinion that we should stick to the punk stuff. It would be easier to find places to play - especially since we were all still under 21 and many bars frowned upon that. Plus, this was the part of the 90s when everyone had a band. I wanted us to stand out a bit. (I worked at a Best Buy store in Uptown at the time, and there were members of at least 6 bands that worked there, including 12 Rods and Rhymesayers)

We played a few new band nights, some coffeehouses, a couple of anarchist resource centers, and a bunch of other all age venues. We started touring the area, traveling to such exotic locales as St. Cloud and Menomonie.Then the touring increased, putting a cramp in my ability to earn a living. I started to resent it.

After a few years of this, I sort of fell out of love with playing live music. I had also started to develop an intimate relationship with alcohol, so that was really the only impetus to get me to play somewhere. One night, however, we were playing a show at the late, lamented Foxfire Lounge - which didn't have alcohol. I smuggled in my own, got completely blotto, and preceded to make a complete ass of myself onstage. I was relieved of my duties as bass player a few hours later.

Who needed them, anyway? I bought an acoustic guitar and branded myself an earnest folk and country musician. I wrote songs, filling multiple composition notebooks with lyrics and other ideas. I hit the open mic and coffee shop circuit, playing where I could. I enjoyed it because this was me - being all creative, and stuff. I felt real. Authentic.

I was also able to tie it into my labor activism at the time. I learned as many union songs as I could. And even rewrote some to reflect current events.

Eventually, performing live seemed less and less appealing. So I stopped. I always had a guitar nearby; and I'd still play when something moved me to. I wasn't comfortable about performing in front of people unless I was sufficiently buzzed, which made me play terribly. But even playing became a hassle at some point.

And now I've just stopped.

My fingers are arthritic. They've lost a lot of dexterity and aren't strong enough to hold down the strings for very long. And thanks to GERD messing with my esophagus, I can barely hold a note now. I mumble and slur through lyrics I've sang a million times before because I've forgotten words.

And thanks to sensory overload, today I can barely even listen to music because it's just too grating. Aside from the ringing of tinnitus in my ears, I hear silence a majority of my day, blocking out most interference from the world with my noise-cancelling headphones.

But I'm still going to buy records. And I'm still going to attend shows. And I'm still going to sing along to songs in the car, however sloppy.

I love music. I love everything about it. And I love that I was able to help create it while I could. But it stopped loving me back at some point, and I can't do much about it. Music is all the adjectives, the feelings, the messaging. There is nothing close to its power. And when it shuns you, it's a hurt you'll never quite recover from.

But there's also a certain kind of peace in knowing your limitations. What I'm currently dealing with does not negate anything I've felt up to this point. Nothing will. And for that, I'm profoundly grateful.

m u s i c b r e a k

Phil Ochs - That's What I Want To Hear (1965)

Phil was my idol when I was playing on my own. I love his rhythm and cadence. His lyrics were stunning. And his sense of humor was acid. He should've been considered one of the greatest American folk musicians to ever lived. But his struggles were real, and his life cut tragically short. He'd piss you off in all the right ways, and then he'd win you back with a tender verse of love. There's never been a musician that has spoke to me more clearly.

Take care,

-AG