It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You just gotta fight your way through.
Ten things I'm reading this weekend.
Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, and I wish someone had told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap.
For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you.
A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this.
And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know it’s normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions.
And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.
— Ira Glass
2. Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking
The ceramics teacher announced on opening day that he was dividing the class into two groups. All those on the left side of the studio, he said, would be graded solely on the quantity of work they produced, all those on the right solely on its quality.
His procedure was simple: on the final day of class he would bring in his bathroom scales and weigh the work of the “quantity” group: fifty pound of pots rated an “A”, forty pounds a “B”, and so on. Those being graded on “quality”, however, needed to produce only one pot – albeit a perfect one – to get an “A”.
Well, came grading time and a curious fact emerged: the works of highest quality were all produced by the group being graded for quantity. It seems that while the “quantity” group was busily churning out piles of work – and learning from their mistakes – the “quality” group had sat theorizing about perfection, and in the end had little more to show for their efforts than grandiose theories and a pile of dead clay.
3. Watch Picasso make a masterpiece.
4. Jean-Michel Basquiat Oil Stick Drawing, ca. 1979.
5. How Ella Fitzgerald turned forgotten lyrics into one of her best performances.
6. Dua Lipa Craved a Fun ’80s Dance Song. See How She Made ‘Physical.’ This whole series is incredible.
7. Madonna - Hung Up… I’d forgotten what a perfect pop song this is. It’s produced by Stuart Price, who I think is my favourite remixer (he’s the man behind the Les Rythmes Digitales, Jacques Lu Cont, and Thin White Duke monikers). Pushed for my favourite three 3 remixes by him, I’d give you:
Royksopp - What Else Is There (Thin White Duke Mix)
Coldplay - Talk - Thin White Duke Mix
The Killers - Mr Brightside Jacques Lu Cont’s Thin White Duke Mix
8. BONOBO @ Mixmag Live 2017 (DJ set). I just can’t get enough of Bonobo’s DJ sets.
9. I don’t know why the brain works this way sometimes, but on Monday, I suddenly remembered reading a Rolling Stone interview in high school where Powderfinger’s front-man Bernard Fanning talked about his love for Masters At Work’s 1997 album Nuyorican Soul. It’s been maybe… 10? 15? years since I last listened to it, but wow… what a treat to rediscover.
10. Life’s Work: An Interview with Jerry Seinfeld
You and Larry David wrote Seinfeld together, without a traditional writers’ room, and burnout was one reason you stopped. Was there a more sustainable way to do it? Could McKinsey or someone have helped you find a better model?
- Who’s McKinsey?
It’s a consulting firm.
- Are they funny?
No.
- Then I don’t need them.
Most read link last week: 68 Bits of Unsolicited Advice - Kevin Kelly, the founding Editor of Wired Magazine turns 68, and takes a moment to share 68 pieces of his pithy wisdom: If you are not falling down occasionally, you are just coasting.
Real Quick:
- nuraloops are finally out this week, and the sound experience they deliver is just amazing. Related: Stevie Wonder went on American Idol this week, wearing his beloved nuraphones.
- Thanks so much for all the emails last week. I’ve fixed the formatting this week (thanks Dre), and I’ve loved digesting the mostly music links people shared. Please keep the gold coming!
- This is a delicious, easy vegetable curry recipe for you to cook this weekend.
- Blackbird’s podcast - Wild Hearts - is launching on Monday. The first episode with Tim Doyle is really good. He’s the best thinker we know on the future of direct-to-consumer businesses. You can read more about why we’re launching the podcast here.
- Finally, I found myself in a YouTube rabbit hole last night that led me to this (literal) teardown of the quality of the $425 Common Projects sneakers you see everywhere right now. RM Williams boots on the other hand, still made here in Australia, turn out to be as high quality as you’d hope, and the comments (for once) are fascinating to read… a nice reminder of the power of durable businesses, making wonderful products.