Garret Allen

January 2nd, 2011 (I was born today, a while ago)

Hey it’s my birthday! I realize this comes a few days late, as it’s the 8th, not the 2nd. . but I think we’ll be okay. I’m not one to make a big to do of the day I fought those nazi uteral walls to emerge victorious. There are plenty of people in the world turning their birthDAY into a birthMONTH in which to spend their own money having 982374928 parties celebrating themselves, and someone need offset that jive shit. Of course, thank you thank you thank you to every single person who took time from their day to make mine special. Your love is overwhelming, and I’m an absolute lucky guy! Since I am, one year wiser since last we convened in celebration of my emergence from what I can only imagine was a very relaxing place, I thought I’d share a bit of what I’ve learned about life during the course of the past year. . 

People love for the sake of loving another, not to be loved themselves.

Intellectual prowess need be used as tourniquet to another’s bleeding, as opposed to a weapon at one’s disposal.

Bettering yourself for anyone but yourself, or someone you love, will breed negativity.

When thinking scrupulously, compliments should be rest stops, all else, fuel. 

Traveling any road alone, yields the result of arriving alone.

Playing a game yields one of two results, you win, you lose. Not playing will always be a shortcut to one or the other.

With maturity comes an increased vulnerability and honesty within oneself, as well as a newfound respect for it in others.

No one that loves oneself more than is necessary, is prepared to love another as much as is necessary.

No person will ever give you all of the attention you crave, if at any point, you craved it.

What goes around comes around only comes around, because what went around started with you. No action goes unnoticed or without consequence.

 It is impossible to take even a step in anyone’s shoes but your own. No two people’s values are alike, and so it is unfair to measure by any standard you yourself posses. Don’t judge people. Fa’ real.

People who are too proud, are also too ignorant.

Everybody’s life is different, and everyone is the best at living their own.

..Of course, I learned much this past year, but not all is applicable outside of my own life. Hope what I’ve said here will encourage you all to delve a little deeper into your own behavior and that of the people around you! Knowledge is wisdom, wisdom is king. I hope this message finds you well.

..to keep up with the less intellectual, lighter side of my daily experience, twitter’s where it’s at @garretallen

// GJA

Man vs. Self

I often wonder if I’ll ever be completely satisfied with anything I do. As an artist, I’m not solving problems with a definitive answer. There’s never a right or a wrong. There’s no science, there’s no cure, no quotient, no sum. Everything just. . is. Such a tough concept for me, as everything can always be improved. Chasing an elusive state of perfection seems to be a never ending run. There’s a quote I always find myself falling back on, “Art is never finished, only abandoned.” I don’t remember who said it. But I remember the words. They’re important to me. They’re perhaps the most honest words ever spoken in regards to creation, and indirectly reflect an issue that plagues many artists both past and present. When is enough is enough? No matter when art is “abandoned” and released for the world to discuss, criticize, and maybe admire. . 1 month down the road, I’m going to hate it. I say 1 month, when in reality, I hate something the moment I internalize my declaration that it’s finished. Complete. That’s the word right there, “complete.” There is no complete. There is, move forward. Dismiss what it is you did before, and better yourself in the next. Take the next step in developing yourself, your art, your being. So who am I creating this art for if I’m never content in finishing it? I suppose you. The world. But in every step I take, my outlook changes, I adapt, I grow, and find myself embarrassed of my former self, even if my former self was only yesterday’s. My dad always told me “start as you mean to end.” My mom insisted I focus on quality, not quantity. And so I do, but halfway through the voyage, I learn that its “end” is no where near where I saw it from the “start”, and the quality of my work never seems to match the quantity of my work. My former acting coach, Lesly Kahn told me I am the epitome of “perfectionism”, and that I will one day come to terms with the fact that there is no 100 percent, and that my 80 percent is always going to exceed what “normal” people see as complete.

Man vs Self. It’s right there. Listed as one of the only three conflicts a person can ever face, and the only one that plagues me. I don’t know that it’s a battle I’m ever necessarily supposed to win. Maybe it rages until I die, at which point nature wins it for me. All I can do is be honest, in my work, and with myself. Everything I create can be a snapshot along my journey, whether I want to burn that moment or not. So when do I arrive?

Keep At It. .

// GJA

ANNOUNCEMENT : GARRET ALLEN YOUTUBE

Alright folks! After a year long absence, I have decided the time is right to take my antics back into the world of YOUTUBE. I’m OFFICIALLY ANNOUNCING that the reopening of my Youtube Channel found here. . will take place on August 24th, 2010! That’s next Tuesday. The first video goes live at 8:00am PST on that day; may or may not capture some of the excellence that was my previous channel, and may or may not hint as to my forthcoming EP in some way or another. . Ready your ghillie suits and ruck sacks, young travelers. We’re going on a journey reminiscent of many other long journeys that came before. .

In the event that you’re using a computer from 1994, and your Netscape/AOL browser was unable to follow the above link. . the ADDRESS is:

http://www.youtube.com/imGarretAllen

Please, don’t be afraid to post this unimaginably fantastical news, along with the url, to your twitter, facebook, match.com, and myspace pages. It would be an absolute travesty for your immediate circle to be neglected of the wondrous, unicorn-like beauty that is my incredible skill-set. 

Thank You for Reading.
Enjoy your Thursday. 

// GJA (Papa Bear)  

WELCOME

Firstly, welcome children, to my newest venture into the world of ‘blogging’. . or as I like to call it, ‘taking things no one really cares about but are important to oneself and voicing the way you feel about them on the ever so popular medium that is social-networking’. For the sake of time, we’ll just call it, ‘blogging’. This way, I don’t have to say, hey everyone check out the place I. . ‘take things no one really cares about but are important to me. . ’ you get the point.

Moving forward, you may have noticed I transferred entries from my previous blog. . into this one. However, assuming most of you haven’t taken the time to peruse them, as you’re likely to have already read them, you may NOT have noticed that they have been cut down, edited for length and content. Admittedly, my previous blogging endeavor was quite self serving. I was always out to prove my intellectual superiority in any way possible. . only to realize I had written paragraph upon paragraph of unrelatable, egotistical jargon filled with words no one could understand. One could say I’ve moved past that onto what is most important to me, affecting my audience in a way not usual of their every day routine, stimulating growth, and hopefully a hunger for knowledge in all of you.

This blog is mine, in that I’ll be writing about things I deem important, or interesting (obviously, if I wrote about things that didn’t intrigue me, it wouldn’t be my blog right?). . but I want it to be legible, easy to read, and most of all, relatable. I will not be taking the time to proof read, am terrible with sentence structure, and am not likely to write often. . but if you’ll give me your time, I promise not to waste it.

I encourage all of you to post comments, concerns, and ask questions. I will do my best to make adjustments as necessary in order to make this personal space of mine thought provoking and enjoyable to all who read! 

Follow me on Twitter @GarretAllen.

Visit www.GarretAllen.com.

Always Read more than you Write. . 

// GJA

KNOWLEDGE

Originally Posted on 07 / 12 / 2010 at 1:38 am PST

To quote my good friend Chloe Bridges, “…there is always more to learn, more to understand. Passion usually manifests itself in an insatiable desire to learn more…” . If time is of the essence today, I’ll ask that you please stop reading now, as the next paragraphs will only elaborate, and give some insight into what is one of the most brilliant combination of words I’ve ever personally read.

As an artist, I create. At the end of the day, all stripped of logistics and process, that’s what I do. . create. Art quite unlike many other methodical processes we engage in throughout life, is different in that there are many ways to arrive at a single destination. What might be the ‘right’ way to someone is quite likely the ‘wrong’ way to another.

The war has raged on for years up on years upon years between the classically trained musician, and the non classically trained. On one side, the theorist, and on the other, the organic. The person with no training will argue that the work created by a theorist wasn’t created organically.  While the argument from the theorist typically questions the legitimacy of the music made by he or she with no training, who plays only what they feel is right. Is either of them in a better position? Not necessarily. The theorist may be able to write a chord out on paper, while the organic musician may not, but the fact is, neither of them will succeed if they don’t know what it sounds like. A theorist might know why a dissonant chord is dissonant, and an organic musician might know only that a dissonant chord feels ‘funny’, but so long as they both know how to plug it into the creative process, they’re both in good shape! That being said, if neither can successfully implicate it into a song to achieve a desired result, well they’re both screwed. 

In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king. . but one with 2 eyes is better still; and it is impossible to talk apples, with someone who only knows oranges. By being the man with two eyes, or the person familiar with both apples and oranges, one can rightfully choose between them. It is not about black/white, right/wrong, day/night. . it is about acquiring all you can from the ever flowing wells of knowledge left to you by those who came before, and developing as most thorough an understanding as you possibly can. In familiarizing yourself with information open to you on all fronts, as opposed to one or the other, you become truly invincible. The possibilities are endless. Whether you use your new knowledge to follow a path created before you, or deviate from it. . you’ll do so knowingly, without asking why. You never know when a skill-set acquired at random may come to mind during some point in the creative process. In addition, by examining the numerous ways to arrive at a single destination, one opens one’s self up to many new ways of thinking, which expands your mind’s ability to hypothesize, analyze, process, multitask and problem solve in every aspect of life! Like calculus, which teaches you skills you’re never likely to use, but opens your mind to process, and diversifies the way you think, learning every possible way to arrive at a destination leaves you with endless possibilities. 

The best part about knowledge is, you can use it however you’d like. But first, one must acquire it. I leave you with words from some much smarter than I. .

“I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.”
-Abraham Lincoln

“Anyone who stops learning is old, whether twenty, or eighty.”
-Henry Ford

“To know that we know what we know, and to know that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.”
-Copernicus

“More important than the quest for certainty, is the quest for clarity.”
-Francois Gautier

“There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.”
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

Be the man with two eyes, he who knows both apples, and oranges, and NEVER STOP LEARNING.

It is only when the student is ready, that the master appears.

// GJA

THE PRESSURES OF BEING A TEEN, SOME ADVICE FOR THE LADIES

Originally posted on 05 / 18 / 2010 at 4:50 pm PST

Let me start by saying that this particular blog is long over-do. The topic is one that affects me constantly. I cannot tell you how often I feel a sense of sadness for girls who succumb to the pressures of being a teen. All too often I witness a pretty young lady with the world at her fingertips being taken advantage of as I rome from various local hang-outs here in Los Angeles. Taking into account the fact that humans are the only beings on earth to have sex because they enjoy it (aside from dolphins), I’d like to offer some words of encouragement to young women who, like many, are having trouble with the often awkward transition into adult-hood.

I can tell you as a 24 year old man, 90% of teenage boys really just want to have sex. That isn’t an exact figure, but I’d imagine it’s close. What do girls want? Attention. To be desired. To be loved. Of course, naturally, we all want to be considered attractive, and we all want attention. It is the reason I frequent the gym, and hair salons exist. But what this breeds, is competition. I can’t name one girl I knew when I was 17 who didn’t look at every other girl as a competitor for attention. Q: What gets a guy’s attention? A: Sex. Q: What does a girl who needs attention from guys lead to? A: Her succumbing to the pressure to “put out” for such attention. . Ladies, THIS IS THE WRONG IDEA.

The typical high school setting involves three things drunk dudes, and 2 girls; one girl with the reputation for being easy, and one girl with the reputation for being a prude. Q: Who gets the attention in this setting? A: Easy Girl Q: Why? A: Because drunk guys want sex even more than sober ones do! This leads to the classier of the two girls feeling dejected as a result of the lack of attention received. She might not want any of those silly boys, but she’ll still naturally want their attention. .

Everybody wants to be desired! Don’t feel bad for wanting attention! I want it, your parents want it, celebrities want it, we all want it! I can’t encourage you to avoid the above setting, because many things good come from socializing, and I understand how much you ladies love getting dressed up, having nights out with your friends, and all that lovely girl stuff ;). . So what I ask is that before you visit a setting where you may be vying for attention, you stop and ask yourself a few things. . 1) What kind of guys do you want to attract? 2) Will they be at this party? 3) What do you want from them? A Relationship? 4) How should you go about getting their attention? 5) What shouldn’t you do to get their attention?

In Hollywood people will tell you any attention is good attention, but in the real world, that is simply not true. If you show up time and time again looking your best, providing good conversation, being flirty, and doing all the things that you girls do. . and a boy never capitalizes on your flirting by taking you to the bedroom upstairs. . you become INCREDIBLY desirable. The result is not as immediate as the one our easy girl receives, but it’s GOOD attention. It’s ‘hey, you know what, that girl is a sweetheart, I’d like to take her to dinner,’ attention. In time, the prude girl becomes the untouchable girl. . and NOTHING is hotter than a girl labeled as ‘untouchable’. People naturally want what they cannot have, and if you can’t be had, you become incredibly desirable. That, girls. . is a win. On the other side, is a girl being called ‘slut’. . and I’ve seen many girls cry over the word. . not because it’s offensive, but because they know it’s true. It’s heart breaking. You don’t want it. You don’t want to be passed around the school. You don’t want to be untouchable because you have an STD, and nobody wants to touch you. You want to be untouchable because nobody can.

Eventually girls, you’re going to grow up, as are the stupid boys you’re forced to be around when you’re young. Boys want quick thrills. Men want longevity (except for George Clooney ;). The strength and security needed to make decisions that might label you ‘uncool’ will develop as you grow, as will people’s reaction to your choices. Nobody considers me a nerd because I don’t smoke weed and get fall down drunk. Nobody considers a 24 year old girl who doesn’t sleep around to be prude. She’s now labeled classy, elegant, a commodity here in Hollywood. Stay strong girls, and please take some time out to decide who you are, who you want to be, and what kind of guys you want to attract. Most of all, have respect for yourself, and don’t underestimate your worth!

Most any guy out of high school is rooting for you!

Respect for Each Other.

Respect for Yourself.

// GJA

For Further Reading I recommend “Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man” by Steve Harvey. . and those of you with Twitter should ALL be following Rev. Run if you aren’t already (@revrunwisdom)

MANIPULATING LIFE’S TRUTHS

Originally Posted on 01 / 13 / 2010 at 11:03 pm PST

It’s burned into our minds from a young age. It starts as early as our mother and father disciplining us when we misbehave. The differences between right and wrong, reactions we’re meant to have in certain situations, acceptable behavior, expectations about life, ideas about society.. these are things we must be taught. But why is proportion most desirable to look at, why are alarms.. alarming,  why does blue signify something is cold, and how does any of this relate in any way to what it is. . that an artist does?

Some behavior can be credited to our nature as human beings. There is no denying that we inherit certain traits from our parents. Such is the reason why twins who are separated at birth, come of age in completely different environments, and will meet 20 years down the road, only to find many distinct similarities in tastes, views, and behavior. Going even deeper, straight down to the most basic of human functions; all of us are born with the instinct to breast feed, cry when we hurt, etc. The most basic human functions are written. Even some behavioral characteristics are passed through conception and development in the womb. . though not all are.

Of course, I’m no scientist. I’ve opted to create with the life i’ve been given, rather than discover. I know not which behavioral characteristics are passed down from parent to child, or which we develop through exposure to sights, sounds, events, and so on. What I know, is we weren’t born with the knowledge that loud noises are startling, nighttime is when we sleep, and the smell of poop isn’t favorable. It is through repeat exposure to these things, that we develop a type of expectation as to what is associated with them. I don’t know why bright colors are associated with the summer, but I can assume it has something to do with flowers being in bloom, green grass, and blue skies. Such colors have clearly transcended across various ideals to give us our “summer clothes”, fruity colored drinks, and so on and so forth. Imagine you’re sitting in your house late at night, and you hear a loud booming thud. . it is likely to scare you, at which point you’re likely to jump up and turn your fear into an audible release similar to the sounds made famous by Chandler from Friends when he would yell out an abstract sound such as “blegahhhhh”. . But, if a loud sound occurred every 15 minutes, followed by a cute puppy coming to play with you, and 500 dollars falling from the ceiling, you’re not likely to have the same terrified reaction. . rather, one of joy! You see, we learn from our surroundings, and allow it to affect our reactions, expectations, and ideas. 

Believe it or not, every single experience you have, moment to moment, leaves some kind of imprint on your mind’s expectations of the world around you. I like to think of these expectations as what we know to be “true”. These experiences vary from time to time, and place to place. A clever artist understands this, and uses it to his or her advantage, manipulating what one knows to be “true”. As a musician, I understand certain things about what people know to be true of sound. Through life’s exposure, we’ve learned that fast, repetitive sound rising in pitch and volume signifies excitement, anxiety, etc (think car alarms). Noises that are low in volume, slow in tempo, and low in pitch create an essence of calm (think a clothes dryer, my apartment has a Maytag. It’s not bad. Seems to favor liquid detergents). How can I now use that knowledge to my advantage? Well that’s easy, if I want you, as the listener, to feel excitement, you can bet pitch is going up, perceived loudness is going up, and tempo will either be faster, or will be a simulated faster pace through fitting more notes into a fixed amount of time, while remaining in signature. Of course, much more goes into making music than that, but you get the idea. 

I’d like to say this blog had some kind of point.. though, frankly I just sat down and wrote thoughts as they crossed my mind. So now I’m going to try and write some kind of closing paragraph, as if to tie everything together, and say I had any kind of goal in all of this. Okay? Okay. Creating music is about manipulating what we as human beings know to be “true”. Manipulating the minds (and feelings) of your listener through creating expectations, and either meeting, or breaking such expectations, is a key element in the creation of music. Tastes in music vary based on a listener’s upbringing, the life they live, and what they’d like to get, emotionally, out of their time spent listening. As people evolve, so does music, in order to more accurately fulfill the wants of a day’s society. Changes in society = changes in truth = changes in music. The instruments used, the way they’re used, mixing techniques, lyrics; all of these things and more go into music’s evolution. Of course, no two societies are going ever going to feel the same about music, as no two society’s “truths” are the same. This explains the vast discrepancies between what we know as “western music” here in America, and the music created in say, Tanzania. Take some time, and listen to artists/songs of various genres. Try to pick up on the techniques used to manipulate what you know of the truth. Tempo, pitch, rhythm, how are you being affected? What do you think the composer’s goals were?

If you’re an artist, write the truth.

It’s real. It’s powerful.

// GJA

FOR CONTINUED READING I SUGGEST : 

“This is Your Brain on Music” by Daniel J. Levitin

This book opened my mind up to more ideas than I can count. .

NOTHING NEED BE CERTAIN, WITH THE EXCEPTION OF UNCERTAINTY

Originally Posted on 12 / 10 / 2009 at 12:39 am PST

As an artist, there are certain skills I’ve acquired through the years. The ability, for example, to ignore thoughts triggered by my left brain, so as to stay focused on the creation of art. As some of you know, the brain is separated into two hemispheres, the left, and the right. It is the right hemisphere that is responsible for the more “artistic things” [creativity, spatial awareness, the recognition of people, places, things]. The right brain is subjective; it examines wholes. Whereas, the left brain looks at parts, is objective, analytical, and analyzes speech, time, numbers, etc. .

Moreover, what I want to talk about is something I believe to be of great value to an artist. Firstly, one must examine why we create art. . Why does a dancer dance? How do writers write? What makes a singer sing? Of course the answer can become very complicated if we were to sit here dwelling on it for too long. . but I think it boils down to one thing. We create art so to convey emotion. We want others to feel, and we want to feel ourselves (don’t take this the wrong way, masturbation is not the topic of discussion). Whether it be the writing of Ernest Hemingway, who’s simplistic prose and vivid imagery had the uncanny ability to bring a reader from their surroundings into the very pages, the very life of the story he told, or a piece of music that inexplicably moves you to tears.. at the end of the day, art is about emotion. 

I’ll admit to you now, I’m not a very emotional person, which may have detrimental effects on my ability to create. I do not often become angry, I’m not easily excited, and while everyone was crying at the end of “The Notebook”, I spent those last few moments wondering why they didn’t cast actors that more closely resembled the young Allie and Noah, to portray them in their old age. 

As someone who is emotionally inept 99% of the year, I’ve learned to seize the moments I am, to some extent, ‘feeling’.. and turn it into inspiration, motivation, and inevitably. . art. So what is it that triggers an emotion, hm? Well, of course there are many scientific explanations, differences of opinion, and such. . but I think, well. . for me at least. . emotion seems to be about experiencing something you haven’t been, or are rarely, subjected to. Few things are more beautiful than a sunset in Arizona, but after living there for some 19 years, those sunsets were just another part of my everyday routine. They became associated with being stuck in what I thought was traffic (before moving to LA), and trying to fix my ‘side-armed’ baseball pitch. Now a permanent resident of Los Angeles for going on 3 Years, on the rare occasion that I do venture back to the 110+ degree some one shoot me in the face now heat that is Arizona, I have what is a new appreciation for the feeling of serenity brought upon by the sun’s fall into the horizon.

Whether it be a song, someone we find particularly attractive, a time, or a place. . whatever it is that struck us once so profound, will one day strike us no more. We become accustomed to things. Just as I grew accustomed to fantastical sunsets, just as your once favorite song suddenly gets stricken from your newest playlists. . we become. . bored. We’re certain of what will come next. We know the sun will set somewhere between the hours of 5:00 and 7:30 pm and it will turn the sky a whole bunch of colors, and we’ve seen it all before. We know there is a key change at the bridge of ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’. . we are certain of it. . because we have heard it. It is no longer of interest, it is no longer interesting, because the emotion once triggered inside of us, is triggered no more. 

As an artist, the best thing you can do is to live in a place of uncertainty. It is after all, surprises, new and exciting things, and living in a place of wonder, that keeps you reacting on an emotional level. The very second your life becomes mundane, your art reflects it. Any number of things can provoke feelings of newness, or an anxious uncertainty; new surroundings, new friends, falling in love, a new job, losing when you’re typically the winner, winning when you’re expecting to lose, the list of riveting experiences one can experience in a lifetime is endless. It is up to you, as the artist, to observe yourself, and to observe others during a change in process. Open your eyes. Watch. Listen. Observe your world in it’s ever evolving state. Stop trying to be complete. Stop being in control. Stop trying to force the comfort associated with routine. Experience the change, enjoy the new, and if you fall into routine..  break it. Nothing will destroy an artist, nothing will eat a person alive, like routine.

// GJA