I do see where he's coming from, however. I'm in the military as well as playing music, and when September 11th happened, I felt like for the first time in my entire life I was doing something worthwhile. I'm in a couple of bands, and although I'm only staying in the AF until I can be where I want to be and get out, when those jets crashed into the buildings, my whole outlook changed. I didn't think about music, I didn't think about anything else but doing my duty, and I knew it would come. My life revolves around music; everything I do in the military is just gearing me up for what I really want to do, and that's play music. However, it IS just an illusion. Unless you've been a part of something that has had an impact on something globally...I mean A MAJOR IMPACT...you will never understand and fathom the seriousness and magnitude of it. All you know is what you see on television. I was in the AF before 9/11, and even then I began to get complacent, it was just a job.
The AF is just like a civilian job, as I'm sure icedsymphony will tell you, being a former marine. We are nothing like the other services, and there is some bitterness towards us because of that. We get paid more, live easier lives, get better benefits, don't have to put up with the bullshit...before 9/11 it almost seemed like a regular job. You went to work in the morning...no PT or any of that shit...checked your email, did your job for a bit, went to lunch, went back to work, then went home at 1630. Granted, my job is a little more operational than most, as I control jets through ground radar, but even then it's nothing compared to what the Army and Marines are going through. Anyway, what my point was before I got sidetracked was that all of that complacency stopped on 9/11, and you realized exactly why you were here on this earth right now, why you did the job you did, and what was expected of you. I've never felt that way before in my life...such clarity. Nothing else mattered...the only thing that mattered was that our country had just gotten attacked, and that we had to gear up for a counter-attack.
On the flip-side of all this is a very good point as well. This doesn't happen every single day. It's good for a while, but like everything else, it fades. You find yourself not in the GO! GO! GO! mindset, and when the dust settles, it kinda sinks in that although you've done your duty, it's back to square one. Back to doing the things you disliked, back to your old habits, back to complacency. So while I agree and support Matt's decision, he needs to listen to people who are on both sides of the river. Although I love my job and have done things that no one will ever get the chance to do, my real passion is my music. My military career is just a vessel to get me there. Keep paying me all that money here in Italy, while I have a blast with my Italian friends, play with my band, go to shows, buy a new guitar every month, and work up my chops so I can be in a position to get out and just play. I'll put money away to help me out, but I don't plan on doing this for the rest of my life. When you aren't that big of a music fan, it's ok to have a 9 to 5 job. It's ok to have that white picket fence with a wife and two kids. Not me. I don't want that. I don't want to work when I'm 30. I want to prepare myself NOW, while I'm still very young, invest in all I can, monetarily as well as musically, and follow my heart to where it belongs...music.
Matt will be back. He'll see that although the music industry is an illusion, he's grown accustomed to that way of life. In the real world, no one gives a fuck who you are or what you do, that's the bottom line. That's why it's a free country...it's ok for them to dislike you for what you do. People who live lives of dreams and excess don't adjust very well to the lives of the rest of us.
instead of the band?
