…2..3..4 – An Xperience Column – by Chris Busone.
I wasn’t much of a talker in my early youth. I am the youngest of six, and with my brothers and sisters and parents in the house, I was more of a happy observer. And I loved it. There was always lots of action and talking, and sometimes loud talking, and even louder sometimes, and it was all great fun and entertainment.
But my silence made some people uncomfortable because apparently, we are meant to be babbling nonstop as a species, even if we have absolutely nothing of consequence to say. So inevitably, someone would ask, “Are you ok? You haven’t said anything in a while.” And while I was touched by their concern, I really disliked that question. Still do. A lot.
When I was very young and silent, while other children were perpetrating merriment around me, the occasional crude adult would ask one of my parents, “Is he ok?” Or worse. “Is he backward?” That’s the word they used back then. Can you imagine grown adults saying that about a child? And to their parent?
“He’s fine,” my father would say emphatically, while fixing a steely gaze on this dolt. “He’ll talk when he has something to say. You should try it.” Then he’d put his arm around my shoulder and call them a curse word under his breath, but just loud enough for them to hear. (Thanks for that, by the way, Dad.)
The simple fact was that I was excruciatingly shy and had trouble talking to anyone I didn’t really know. And being a kid, outside of my immediate family, I didn’t know a whole hell of a lot of people. I mean, at four years old, the nightlife is pretty much nonexistent, so I wasn’t out clubbing and working the room, gladhanding. But as I grew a little older, even I recognized it was starting to be a problem. So, I began to develop this idea that I needed a conduit. Something that could help me convey the thoughts I had swirling around inside of me that I just couldn’t seem to express in a conventional manner. Then, as luck usually has it, I found it.
The guitar.
The guitar was perfect. It could stand in front of me. And I could stand behind it, while it helped me get on top of my thoughts. It could speak when I couldn’t. And it could accompany me when I could. It was the perfect conversational partner, and it never asked me if I was ok. It just played along. It’s always given me pleasure, passion, and strangely, a sense of worth. It’s just always … been.
Plus, it looks really cool.
I hear from time to time musicians being asked why they initially picked up an instrument or joined a band in the first place, and the answer is always the same old tired dribble … “To get girls!” they proudly proclaim.
Let me be clear; I do not believe that horsesh!t for one second. You don’t devote your time, effort, sweat, heart, your very being to something just so your 12-year-old crush will notice you. You do that sh!t because you are compelled to do it. It’s not a choice, at least not in my case. I couldn’t have stopped if I wanted to.
People have asked me what it is about guitar that I love so much. It’s hard to quantify, but I can say this: when I first looked at a guitar neck, age nine, it just made sense to me. And as a kid, not many things make sense … e.g., “Why do I have to be in the house by the time the streetlights are on? Why is ‘Because I said so,’ an acceptable answer to every inquiry? And what in the actual f*** is up with brussels sprouts?!” But the guitar always gave me a logical answer whenever I strummed it, never sent me to bed when Mannix was coming on the TV, and never, ever, made me eat my goddamn vegetables. (Seriously, you want me to eat these little green balls, but I get yelled at for putting marbles in my mouth??)
But as I was teaching my fingers to teach my guitar to make the sounds my ear was after, my guitar was teaching me things I desperately needed outside the musical realm. It was teaching me self-confidence and that, ultimately, I didn’t need it. In an incredible act of selflessness, my guitar was showing me that I didn’t need it to speak for me. I only needed it for what it was originally intended. Music. To make the music that, at first, I thought made me worthwhile. But my worth, it turns out, was not dependent on the guitar or the music. The guitar was showing me that I’m worth something with and without it. That I could have it in front of me, but I didn’t have to hide behind it. That I could come out from behind my guitar and be the person I knew I was inside, but could never find the words to express. That I didn’t need to play second fiddle to my guitar. (Cheesy, I know, but once you write that line, it stays in.)
Yes, my guitar is responsible for introducing me to almost everyone in my life who is most dear to me, including the most important person, my amazing wife. Were it not for my guitar, I would have never been in a band, and simply never have met the people who are my closest friends today, and never have met the love of my life. I can trace back, person by person, when I was first in close proximity to each of them simply because I was in the band, with my guitar. It put me in the places I needed to be, to meet the people I needed to know, who made my life what it came to be.
So, I never regret the days of my youth when my friends would call to me from outside to shoot hoop or whatever, but I instead remained in my room studiously fingering the pentatonic scale until it became second nature.
And again, there’s that thing where it looks really cool. So that’s nice.
But lest we make this too touching and Dickensian a tale (I mean, I wasn’t playing my guitar on street corners, mute and malnourished, begging for another helping of porridge), playing guitar has been one of the most enjoyable aspects of my life, and it has taken me places I never would have had access to without it.
I was, in fact, just recently talking to my good friend and former bandmate Jim Lazzaro about the places we went and the people we met when we were traveling in the band together. How we would have never seen those sites or met those folks were we not musicians. It’s truly been the Best of Times. And this time, now, is the best yet.
And still, today, people who knew me in my early silent years – childhood friends, cousins – when they see me on stage, say to me, “It’s crazy that that’s you up there. You were always so quiet.” Yea, I guess I was, and sort of still am.
Because every once in a quiet while I’ll lapse into a silent, stoic, solace in a club or at a show, prompting someone to interrupt my repose by uttering my favorite quizzical phrase, “Are you ok?” But thanks to my extensive work with 6-string therapy, I can truthfully answer, “Yea, I’m great.” And as a result of years of immense growth, I can also add, in an exaggerated, overly concerned tone, “Are you???” After which, I revel in the look of confusion on their face.
But by spinning this yarn of woe, I am not in any way proposing that I have the answer for every kid who feels emotionally disconnected from their surroundings. I don’t have any of the answers, and I’m absolutely certain I am no one’s role model. I can, however, say that when I found myself in that place, there was a lifeline that I reached for that gave me hope and got me through. And maybe they’re out there for everyone if you look for them.
But I can’t stress this enough: what the hell do I know? I’m just a guitar player.
So, in summation, this, for lack of a better term (because I can’t come up with one), is my love letter to the guitar. I’ve had and have many, and they all make me happy. I never leave home without one because you never know when things might turn musical, or the opportunity may arise when I can jump up on a stage, with a guitar strapped to my back, securely hanging in front of me, but not fronting for me, and count it off…2…3…4.
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