Hello people. Crespo here. My first blog is this. What to say, what to say? Do I ruminate on the state of the world? Our nation? Seems like a tall order since I live in one just part of it, taking up only enough space for me. I really don't have my finger on the pulse of the nation or have ready answers for the problems of the day. I don't have a set of beliefs or a brand of politics or a religion that I think will save the day. Sorry.

What I do have is my music and my stories and the good fortune to have the ability to think for myself. My music is very American music, a little of this, some of that and a dash of some other thing. Mix 'em all together and see what you've got. Which is pretty much what America is, a spicy gumbo of every nation on earth. No one can claim to be the definitive American. Outside of Native Americans, there's not a soul under this big umbrella who didn't have a bunch of ancestors from some other country.

And the beauty of it is that anybody can join this club. I see it here in New York all the time. People come here from other countries all the time and before you know it or sometimes before even they know it they're Americans and could never imagine living anywhere else again. I also see Americans from other parts of the country go through the same process in becoming New Yorkers. They know they're New Yorkers when they visit family or friends in the place where they came from and couldn't wait to get "home." I guess you are what you think you are.

And that's why Rock & Roll is the ultimate American art form. It's all over the place and as big an umbrella as New York and America itself. Could Jimi Hendrix be any more different from The Beach Boys? Franky Valli from Kurt Cobain? The Temptations from Jay and the Americans? Chuck Berry from the Red Hot Chili Peppers? Or solo Neil Young from Neil Young and Crazy Horse? Different animal altogether. What other umbrella could shelter Janis Joplin, Sly and the Family Stone, Marylin Manson, Johnny Cash, The Partridge Family, James Brown. Elvis Presley, Blondie, Jerry Lee Lewis, Devo, Little Richard, Patty Smith, Canned Heat, Roy Orbison, Fifty Cent, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Dusty Springfield, Otis Redding, Pearl Jam, The Monkees, Bob Marley, Jefferson Airplane, Green Day, Keane, Earth Wind and Fire, Santana, Blood Sweat and Tears, Jay Z, Los Lobos, Gomez, Wilco,The Young Rascals, The Go-Gos, Talking Heads, Gene Pitney and Frank Zappa? Rockers all.

Sure some are metal, some R&B, some New Wave, so-called Alternative (to what?), country rock, bubblegum, soul, reggae, rap, what-have-you. That's just labels, half of them dreamt up by music executives anyway. I'll bet that exactly no one who loves Rock & Roll likes only one category of it. That'd be a tough thing to do since so many artists explore a lot of different styles. You'd have to both love and hate Neil Young for one, to say nothing of Bob Dylan, who actually did have people hating him when he stopped being a "folkie" and went electric. Judging from his astounding creative output since "Blonde on Blonde" I'd say old Bob had the last laugh, if he even thinks about crap like that.

Another very American thing about Rock & Roll is the great many foreigners who excel in the field and are made right at home here in the USA.. The Beatles come to mind, as do The Stones, The Who, Van Morrison, Queen, Elton John, Zeppelin, Clapton, The Animals, Bunny Wailer, Ozzie Osbourne, Elvis Costello, The Clash, AC/DC, Men At Work, Gordon Lightfoot, Rick James (a Canadian who played in early bands with fellow Canadian Neil Young. How's that for a combo?). And where did Lennon settle down? New York. And what happened to him? Murdered by a deranged nobody. How American is that? That still pisses me off no end.

I listened to all of these artists, loved what I heard, then learned and absorbed and spit it all out my way. I can't tell you how to write a song, only how I write songs. I start with a line usually, a bit of melody with some words. Sometimes I just have a little bit of music. If it seems promising I work on it. The song always tells me just what it needs. Just because I can do something clever or convoluted that doesn't mean the song wants that. That stuff might be for another song, and that song will tell you when the time comes just what it needs. A song has to speak to me, tell me it's worth listening to.

Of course it doesn't always work out. I've thrown out a lot more than I've kept. Sometimes I've only kept a single line from a song, letting it roll around in my head until the right song for that lonely line came along. Sometines a song is finished in ten minutes, like you're taking dictation from thin air and just trapping the song as it floats by, but those are rare. Other times you work for months at your craft to get a song just right. Working your craft means matching the syllables in complementing lines, getting the melody soaring, looking for hooks and generally getting out of your own way and let the piece go in unexpected directions if that what it wants. The song also tells you when it's done.

Finishing a piece of music is like a person getting dressed; it wants to wear what it wants to wear and nothing more. Some like shorts and t-shirts, others like tuxedos and jewelry and overcoats and top hats. The trick is to know which ones like to get dressed up and which like to keep it simple. That's especially true when recording a song. Having all the bells and whistles on hand is a gas, but using them all the time is a drag. Think of the masters. Everyone knows the Beatles could dress a song up like nobody's business but when it came to recording "Yesterday" they went with one voice and a guitar. When they recorded "Don't Let Me Down" they sent the orchestra out to lunch and played guitar band rock & roll. "A Day In The Life" got the full treatment but on the same album " A Little Help From My Friends" was scaled down to the basic quartet. All those songs worked pretty well, no? I'm guessing that like any musician, they listened to what the material told them.

So listen to my material and see what it tells you. Read my stories and enjoy yourself. So far as we know we only get this one measly life so let's live it up. Later. -Bob