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Some days you just don't have much time to put show notes together.
Today is one of those days.
I was going to call this episode Cereal Self-Doubter, but I thought people would just read the title and think I'm illiterate (yes, it's possible to overthink these things). If you don't have the art, you aren't hip to how clever I'm being, and your fragile solo podcaster needs everyone to be hip.
As outlined in the episode, I took another little self-confidence wobble last week, playing along to some old school Christian heavy metal that I used to play when I was a young drummer in the 80s. I didn't play it well (my focus is on much different music these days and I seem to have lost a bit of the muscle that metal can require). Self-doubt runs deep in your humble host, and it comes at me hard with respect to drumming.
Fortunately Olivia Newton John was there to remind me to believe in magic.
We've talked a lot on the pod about the music that formed me as a music fan and musician. Magic by Olivia Newton John - recorded for the 1980 movie Xanadu - is another of those songs. I hadn't really paid attention to the lyrics before, but they jumped out at me this week:
You have to believe we are magic
Nothin' can stand in our way
You have to believe we are magic
Don't let your aim ever stray
And if all your hopes survive
Destiny will arrive
I'll bring all your dreams alive
For you
I'll bring all your dreams alive
For you
There is such spirituality in those lines. The whole song is about surrendering to your higher self, believing in your dreams, chasing them. It was a timely reminder to me that things are possible with surrender. I forget that all the time and usually when I do I wind up locked in self-doubt and anxiety. So thanks Olivia.
This week we're spinning Perdida by Stone Temple Pilots - quite a leap for a fan of 80s metal who has housed a toxic resentment toward grunge music for thirty years. But I was reminded of something Tom Keifer of Cinderella once said to me about Kurt Cobain and Nirvana. You'll have to listen to find out what it was, but it gave me new perspective going into the STP album. And I think the album - which caught me very much by surprise - is pretty cool.
Right, that's all for now. Hear Olivia below, and be sure to check out the John Huff Podcast Referenced On The Pod playlist to hear the music I'm talking about on the show!
And don't forget you're magic:
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