My Poor Brain

“Attitude is everything”

That is a phrase we might hear in gym class at school, or from ANY older person giving us advice. We hear it so much it becomes a cliche phrase and it tends to lose any meaning.

I discovered that this phrase, and many others like it that we always are told, are cliche and overused for a reason. That reason is because they are dead-on accurate phrases. I put this one to the test. I wanted to practice some songs that I had written but hadn’t actually every played. I know from too much past experience that having a shitty attitude and feeling churns out shitty sounding songs. I took a drive and blasted some feel good music. The plan was to over do it, WAY over do it, and I blasted the most over the top ridiculous energetic songs I could think of: Angels & Airwaves.

Songs like “Secret Crowds” talking about creating your own world for all the people with no place in this one:

If I had my own world
I’d build you an empire
From here to the far lands
To spread love like violence

Calling on all the crowds hiding in secret places to come out:

Let me feel you, carry you higher
Watch our words spread hope like fire
Secret crowds rise up and gather
Hear your voices sing back louder

It’s a strangely simple song yet so full of power that the hopeless and hopeful can’t help but believe in it:

Let’s make this a new world
I swear you can go if you want to
I know that you have it within you
Inventing the first clean and usable,
God’s greatest miracle

All coming from the mind of former Blink-182 singer/guitarist Tom DeLonge responsible for lyrics such as:

She smokes a dozen and he doesn’t seem to notice the smell
He took the seat off his own bike, because the way that it felt
He wants to bone this, I know she is ready to blow
They go out every night, his pants are super tight, oh yeah
They don’t even care at all

But is it really so hard to believe he would become such an inspirational lyricist, when even in Blink he wrote things like:

Everything has fallen to pieces
Earth is dying help me Jesus
We need guidance, we’ve been misled
Young and hostile, but not stupid

It’s been in him all along, but pressures of remaining the bad ass, punk rocker, dirty mouth kept it inside for the most part. I think anybody can relate to that. I see people saying things like “why did he change and stop telling jokes”. He didn’t change and neither did we. He brought out the other side thats in most of us Blink-182 fans and beyond people who listen to Blink.

Tom DeLonge had a bigger impact on me than I initially thought. I never thought about anything important about the future or my future ever. But in the past 6 months or so I’ve been doing intense thinking and evaluation of the world around me and what I am going to do in it. I’ve actually got plans. I have things either written in my head or in my computer. I’ve got ideas. I’ve got dreams. I fully intend to act on them.

I am not saying that everyone needs to go out and listen to Tom DeLonge and Angels & Airwaves (however if it interests you i recommend you go to their website and check out the music video for Secret Crowds on the front page). I think everyone can find someone in their own interest that can bring out the same feelings and ideas that DeLonge has brought out of me. Whether it be a famous person or your mother or your neighbor. There’s someone who can do it.

Or maybe it’s an event that will get you thinking. Some big event. For a lot of people it was 9/11. For others it could be something on a smaller scale such as a death of a friend or family member under bad circumstances.

The Future is ours, don’t let anyone take it from us.