Marc Spitz

i guess i always knew this song was about Performance. the first BAD album pretty much never left my turntable when i was 16. i’ve heard the song probably 1,500 times. i even interviewed Don Letts once for Spin. but now that i’ve written about the film for this Jagger book, it’s oddly brand new. “E = MC 2″! it’s possible to hear an oldie in a new way, which is a happy thought. am all about happy thoughts today. last night the power went out. fuses blown from the extreme heat. a sense of dread crept in and a few of us tenants were standing around like passengers on a plane just as the engines crap out and before the big drop. we all knew how hot it was. but in the end, it wasn’t so bad. it was actually oddly good therapy, esp. given the everything/allt he time shit i’m dealing with trying to finish this book. i opened the windows and laid there in the pitch black and the heat imagining i was dead. or unborn, maybe. either way, at total peace. and i tried to just – think. which is not the easiest thing for me. i usually like the tv on, a magazine or book in my hand and sometimes the radio on too. i read somewhere that randy newman worked the same way: just bombarded with stimulus to the point that it makes some kind of dream machine white noise in his head and he can think. it’s good to go the other way every once in a while. make the best of a bad situation and remind yourself that you are basically one blown old wire away from total darkness. the thoughts came eventually and they were good ones, calming thoughts and fresh ideas on the hustled to the page stuff i’d written that day. “i like a bit of a cavort,” but as we know it’s possible to overdo it and lose your “demon.”
memo from spitz