So Long, White Shadow or Going Carless: A Social Experiment

In the words of our esteemed governor, "Adios, mofo."

Tony shook his head and made a cringing face as he stared under the hood of my white 1999 Honda Civic, or as I like to call it, The White Shadow. Actually, I've never called it that. Not once. That, just then, was the first time. I tend to come up with great ideas too late.

"It doesn't look good," he said. Tony, a short, peppy hispanic guy, has been my mechanic for years. Everytime I bring my car in he points to it's many dents, scrapes and ghetto paint touch-ups and makes fun of the terrible shape it's in. This time, there were no jokes.

"Your head gasket's blown," he said. "Ooooh," I gravely replied, pretending I knew what he was saying. "What does that mean, exactly?" He went on to tell me that, in summary, the cost of the repair is greater than the value of car.

"Ooooh," I said, this time with a bit more gravity. On the drive home (the car is still drivable for a short time until it inevitably will explode, Macgyver style), I started thinking of options. There weren't many. After all, besides my moped, it was my family's only source of transportation. When I got home, Julie and I talked.

She asked me a simple question: "Why do we need a car?" It was so outside-the-box that it took me a few minutes to actually consider leaving behind the convenience of owning a car. Considering my moped and the DART Rail station literally across the street, I couldn't really come up with a good answer to her question. We don't need a car. At least not for now. We certainly don't need the debt that comes with a new car.

So, our plan is this: For the next four or five months, we will live on a tight budget and put away enough money to pay cash for a reliable car.

In the meantime, we will ride the DART Rail, which Nigel will love. I'm excited about looking at our city's public transportation (the largest light rail in the nation) as a necessity rather than a luxury.

What I'm most excited about, though, is looking at this as a way to simplify our lives.

drums for sale

hey guys, got a few drum items for sale. check em out.

set of 14" new beat hi hats. these are excellent hi hats for rock. very crisp and dark. no keyholing. good condition. I'm asking $75 for the pair.








22" ride. i love this ride, i'm just ready to move to a darker sound. very crisp and heavy. i really hate to part with it. 1 year old. no keyholing. just a little wear.
asking $150





snare. this is a 1966 ludwig supra-phonic 5"x14"(date stamped on inside). rough shape. lots of pitting as you can see, and a little rust. matches my 1966 kit, but no match for my black beauty! still sturdy and sounds great!
asking $100


1970's ludwig 6.5"x14" vistalite (smoke) supersensitive snare drum. super rare. there is a small bb-sized chip on the resonant side bearing edge. other than that, great condition and beautiful drum.
asking $400









don't like the prices? make me an offer
d.s.hopkins@gmail.com

Adventures in Radiant

My favorite Radiant adventure (to date) happened during New York's CMJ festival in October, 2006. We drove down from Boston, parked our van at The Hero Factor's hotel in New Jersey and, through a series of events involving a busload of Haitians and a man urinating on the subway, we found our way to Greenwich Village at about 10pm.

We met our friends in a bar smaller than your average elevator, and crammed the entire band, The Bear (road manager) and Lance (good times coordinator), in the door. Lance did his job well as the good times rolled until about 4am.

The next day, seeing as it was our first time in NYC, we helped ourselves to a tour of Manhattan. At 10pm, we took the subway back to New Jersey, and got back in the bus full of Haitians. Only this was the wrong Haitian bus. We appealed to the driver to turn around, but instead he kicked us out.

So there we were, stranded in New Jersey in the middle of the night. Thanks to The Bear's inner GPS, we could at least walk in the right direction. After a few miles, we realized we had entered a freeway's on-ramp. We then realized that the freeway had a large wall in place of a shoulder. The night had reached rock bottom. At least that's what we thought until we stared into the flashing lights of the police car that was pulling us over.

After a brief explanation, the officer ruled out what I thought were the obvious solutions: offer better directions or offer a ride. In a stroke of genius he shouted "I'm gonna turn on my lights and you guys walk in front of my car!"

The six of us walked single file in the slow lane of a 6-lane Freeway for about a mile, until we reached the safety of our beloved van. That was one of the craziest adventures we ever had.

NEXT TIME ON ADVENTURES IN RADIANT: how the Chicago police thought we were attempting to blow up the Sears Tower.

Running on empty

Sitting here watching an old Jools Holland rerun that I tivo'd and one of the guests is Jackson Browne. It's been a while since I've seen a performance so inspiring as when he just played "These Days." It was sobering, really. To hear him sing "These days I seem to think a lot about the things that I forgot to do," and "Don't confront me with my failures, I have not forgotten them," makes me look back over the last decade with a little regret. I think, "did I work hard enough?"

It can be so confusing when you realize the thing you thought you were meant to do, might be holding you back from the rest of your life. How in the world can you cut ties with what you love? I don't think I'm supposed to, but it is sad to see Jackson Browne celebrating a beautiful song that he wrote years ago, and for the first time think, "i might not ever get where I want to go."

I've always had high hopes for me and music. I always thought the the best was still to come. Maybe it is, but this is the first time in my life that I doubt it.

Maybe I should take a lesson from Mr. Browne, "Gotta do what you can to keep your love alive."

more on drums...

I guess it should come as no surprise after writing a blog about musical skill, that I sit here humbled in Blackwatch Studios in Norman, OK. Levi and I made a weekend trip to start work on his new solo record.

For the few of you who have never recorded drums in a studio, the process is simple. Levi records a "scratch track" as a metronome keeps him in time. After that, I sit down and play along to Levi's track and the metronome. Then the engineer, Chad, performs a sort of audio surgery, in which he zeros in on and corrects each beat that is out of time. It turns out that my performance was stuffed with those things.

Chad's extended time fixing my out-of-pocket rhythms certainly put me in my place...which is a good thing. I'd like to work on that area of my drumming, but in the meantime I will console myself by taking a lesson from my last entry.

Art vs Ability

I'm a professional drummer... well, semi-professional. It sounds braggy until my part-time job at Starbucks enters the equation. When I'm not slinging lattes, I can usually be found behind the trap-set in several capacities. I play at churches. I play in bars. I play in studios. I play for punk bands. I play for pop bands. There is nothing I'd rather do than play the drums.

I cross paths with a lot of musicians with different ideas on what makes music "good." Many of them can be found on the wrong side of the battle between Art and Ability. 

People devote their lives learning how to shred like Steve Vai. The drummer for Dave Matthews Band spends most of the song letting you know that he is better than you at the drums.... and for some reason people love it. Unfortunately for these misguided souls, somewhere along the way they forgot that music is not a sport. 

But, those of us who are not so great at our instruments (true story) can breathe a sigh of relief, because music is art. That means Flea can slap his bass guitar until his fingers bleed and the Red Hot Chili Peppers are still bad.

I'm not saying that skill is a bad thing. I'm saying that it's not the most important thing. Ever since the Velvet Underground's debut, musicians have been shaking off the idea that you need skill to make great music. 

From the mom that hums as she sweeps the floor, to the little girl who sits in the back seat of the car and sings a weird, out of tune song, great music is all around us. It's usually not coming from the people we call Virtuosos. Heck, the Beatles were not great players, but they are the fundamental artists of pop music. 

If I want to watch someone with great skill, I will watch Tony Romo throw a football... er, nevermind.

Until then, tune in next time for my take on Art vs Commerce!!!

My ghetto history with technology

When I was a kid, all of my friends had compact disc players, nintendo, cable television, and cordless phones years before I did. I remember the embarrassment when over at a friend's house one day I was asked to put a CD in the player and I put it in upside down.

It's no wonder that I'm just now getting an iphone, but there's a catch: it's not activated, nor will it be. My brother gave me his original iphone when he received his iphone 3GS in the mail the other day. 

I'm not sure how long my pockets will tolerate so much technology with my ipod, normal phone, and now the iphone, be we're going to try to make it work.

I'll keep you updated.... riveting stuff I know.

daniel