When I first released "Rhythms Of The Gods", in 2003... it immediately became a hit in the early days of internet music downloads. I was very surprised because of instead of recording it with one of my thirty some odd high end guitars, I was just fooling around with a guitar that was a beat up piece of junk purchased for $2.00 at a Flea Market. When the recording was finished I was still not convinced I should even present it to my people at Rhythms Of Life Records, but I did.  Within only days after it was out there for sale it was a success.
Ridiculous... I thought, with no planning or sketch of what I was even going to play, and with nothing but a few simple chords and a rhythm enhanced by a drum loop... it was really almost disgusting.  To think that I would ordinarily spend perhaps days composing a piece, and then carefully select just the right guitar to pull it off... and to discover that all that planning/decision making was perhaps unnecessary. And; additionally that instrument... a reject in the world of guitars, sounding as it did... bringing to life perhaps the real Rhythms Of The Gods, what would be next.

This made me take a second look at my previous methods and choices in my work, and doing a 180 degree turnabout as I proceeded into the future.  Since then I have been infused with a new sense of what creativity in music is all about. Music is a Landscape in sound that is ever in motion, and playing music must contain that spontaneity and freedom it was born with, you cannot solidify it because the form contains the life energy of the person playing it.  Creating and performing music is like life, ever flexible and changing... that we the artists are a part of and need to experience fresh each time, rather than copy or just regurgitate the musical performance of someone else. Music is, as painters once said of visual images after the invention of the camera... "if you want the exact picture, take a photograph".  The same is with music, if you want the sound of someone's performance download a copy, or buy a CD; otherwise become yourself... as once that player did before he or she became popular. 

Istanbul by Craig Smith

 


The Natural Heritage Of Music... The Family Of Your Culture...

We all enter this world complete, with a brain... The Processor and Operating System, and also with a Natural Heritage of Our Culture of Origin... The Programming for that system. From the beginning everything is in place all ready to be used. All we have do is unpack the box and start using the equipment inside, that is... inside us. With this, let it be said... as with any equipment, we have to not be in the box itself, but just like using a new computer... outside looking in. Letting any piece of equipment to remain in the box makes it unusable... and nothing changes... things do not grow... and we access nothing from the wealth of information and applications that we have available. Things remain at status quo... still, un-moving, in a state close to that of death itself, No Movement, the basic indicator of the non-existence of life, as that of a piece of stone.

We were not born to be a solidified mass of nothingness, with no objectives or purpose in this thing we call life. We were all put on this planet to be part of the planet's own life energy field; and interact with all things around us in creative ways which allow for survival. We are to be using Our Natural Bio-Computer, The Brain, to help the world and all that is a part of who we are keep moving forward in the endless Procession Of Creativity Unfolding for the betterment of the whole including all mankind.

This is our reason for "being"... that's why we are Human "Beings". As I have previously said "We Are The Creators... We Are Man". However, are we really alive... acting in the responsible way that we were put here for, or are we just standing there "still"... not much different than that image of death itself... caught in the Death Trap of non-purpose without any direction. Trapped in the conformity of those who are our jail keepers, our slave masters?

The answer is NO. We ascribe to and follow these almost dead "call them zombies... perhaps" beings that make us believe this is the way it is to be. But, we are not actually enslaved or trapped, we hold the keys to our imprisonment... all we must do is unlock the cell of illusion that others have made us believe that this is all there is. Once again, "We Are The Creators... We Are Man": And we have all the equipment and natural resources within us to free ourselves from the "Daymare" of waking life and move into the World Of Our Own Reality... and Live Our Dreams. Life is not that, that we are being told it is... Life Is Freedom and Continuous Movement. We must create the world we want to live in and the life we want to be ours.

Life is like a river, or a natural spring... it is meant to be flowing... not dammed up, or diverted in it's course. And, as we so often seen... water so diverted or blocked frequently causes devastating changes to an environment, turning what was once a green pasture into a desert... making life no longer the same, or maybe even totally non-existent... or... Dead.

Craig Smith