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Robert Temple | The Christian Reeve Podcast | #152 | · The Christian Reeve Podcast

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Hello and welcome to another episode of the Christian we
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podcast. Today's guest is an artist and
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musician hailing all the way from Oakland California.
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His name is Robert Temple. Welcome to the show.
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How you doing with it? I'm doing well.
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Thank you. Thank you for having me,
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pleasure to have you on the show.
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Let's just jump straight into your art.
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So where did you first sort of get into sculpting, and creating
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Arts that well, where does that artistic Journey begin?
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Well, Well begins probably as youth just playing with art but
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never very focused. You know, little bit of drawing
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and perspective drawing not so much free hand and just playing
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with things. I mean art is a combination of
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the Practical and the visual. So you know coming from a
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background of father was a plumber but also a handyman, you
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know. It's like I combined the Using
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the hands with artistic vision. And then about eight years ago,
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I took a class from a guy who was also a musician as I am and
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he just got a class on making a lamp from A Bottle, that's the
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real simple bottle lamp. And that resonated with me
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because I'd collected artistic items glass.
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Since cool sculpture items for years and always trying to
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figure out what can I do with these, you know, like because
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you can only have so many windows that you can stick
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stuff. And so, you know, the idea of
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combining light with glass and other items appeal to me and I
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started to make some lamps and that's how it got going.
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I didn't know what I was going to do in the beginning.
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I just made some some simpler lamps and then it started to
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develop. So I was The impression you've
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always been an artist like for work, so have you had like a
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different career sort of prior to this or well?
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Yeah, I mean, I've always I mean, I've done why didn't music
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from, and I still do music, but I did music for many years, but
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never made enough money. Make music to fully support
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myself, so I did various things. I worked in well as a whole
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history, but worked in. I work in construction.
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I worked in a steel mill but money basically I were I did
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window coverings which was a somewhat artistic because on a
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lot of color and light involved in putting the window covering
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in front of a window so that all kind of faded to the artistic
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thing and help me make a living. So that I could at that time I
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was mostly doing music. So we do music and then when I
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started, but I stopped doing window coverings and I started
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doing lamp stuff that became sort.
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Of my artistic Focus. So when it came to that moment,
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as you say, you took a sort of an art class and then you began
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sort of experimenting around that time about eight years ago,
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what was that transition period? Like for you to go kind of
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full-fledged full on this new new career path?
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Yeah. How did that feel?
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What was that? Like and ultimately how did you
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make it reality? You know, I just started to make
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I just started, you know, just followed my intuition and start
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to make some smaller lamps, didn't really have an idea, you
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know like the first lamps I made were for these blue bottles that
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were actually beer bottles but they were real blue.
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They weren't painted blue and I made it, you know, few smaller
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lamps with I was and at first, I wasn't really sure what I was
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doing. Am I going to make a lot of
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these blue lamps? Because I can repeat these glue
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bottles but all along part of the whole recycled thing was
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part of what I was doing buying and finding things that were one
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or two of a kind and pretty soon I developed understanding that I
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was making art. I was just my, the making
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commercial lamps and part of the art was the idea of being able
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to recycle items that were, you know, Expendable another level
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that I could use to make art. So you know, any anything that
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struck me artistically, whether it was you know, seemed like an
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art item or not might become part of my collection.
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And so, you know, I started to collect all time, it had some
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stuff, I started to collect a pretty large array of things
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items bottles pieces of granite. Metal piece.
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Lots of metal pieces from candle holders and stuff and I started
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to collect them and then I had to start organizing them.
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My garage started out as just, you know, a tall pile of stuff.
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I had to go through it, completely it was a big process
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going through it and, you know, cleaning it out and creating
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space to put these items and all during this eight or nine years,
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it's been taking over that hole. Whole lower garage and upper
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garage to organize and store stuff.
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So, you know, now I've got, you know, brass and nickel plated
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types over items and then glass of various colors.
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And I've got drawers that have that are somewhat color-coded
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for smaller pieces of colored glass, so that when I'm working
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on an item and I'm like, okay, I really need a cool little green
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glass. For this here, I can go into
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that Green Glass drawn, you have a selection of items and then
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I've got a whole Shelf with larger glass items which I can
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use either as they are. But I also now have the means to
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cut and sand those items. So sometimes I'll just, I'll
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just take a green bottle and just cut it.
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Use the parts. It's amazing to be the word
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organized with autistic. It's just Such a foreign concept
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to be like, no I think that's brilliant.
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I mean if anything is it speaks to the fact that you know that
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you're going to be able to use these and you know you kind of
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can predict almost like your demand or whatever.
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But I suppose, what I want to kind of focus on the moment is
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what she actually kind of your protest because obviously every
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artist has like a process. So do you just like randomly
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have ideas and go? Okay, today, I want to just make
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these types of So something or do you gain kind of inspiration
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from a particular place or an idea memories like where do you
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draw inspiration from? Well, you know, part of my
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process is to collect Pieces of glass metal, whatever that
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somehow, when I look at them, they strike me artistically.
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I'm like oh yeah that's going to be in a lamp and sometimes I'm
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like I've thought about it, I'm like, okay I want to make a lamp
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out of, you know, a certain kind of lamp at a certain pieces, but
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often it's just that I've got this really cool looking piece
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and sometimes, you know, it's very interesting, it might be
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just the most recent Thing I picked up that sitting on the
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the work table and I'm like, oh, I love that piece and and I'll
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just start messing with it and I've developed this whole
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process where I drill a lot of the glass pieces.
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So they're kind of ready to start working with and then I
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have a workbench has well, and the four different spots has
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holes in it. So I can take what we call light
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pipe, it's threaded pipe, that Lamps are made from and I can
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stick a piece of that threaded pipe in there and then I can
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start putting things on the pipe, be metal or glass.
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Drilled sometimes I'm, you know, just drooling on the spot
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because I say, oh, I really need this and it's over there, it's
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not drilled. So I go that I drill it and I
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started experimenting with putting different pieces
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together and seeing what I come up with.
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So, a lot of times, I think I'm just, I'm inspired by the pieces
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I've already picked up. Or I'll start looking around and
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seeing things. Sometimes I've made quite a few
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really nice lamps. Of pieces that were in the
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refuse from a previous project. So sometimes I'll go and colors
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for a while because I put a made a lamp with, you know, featuring
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kind of a teal glass color. And I've got I've tried out like
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30 different pieces of teal glass as part of the lamp and I
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made this lamb. I've been sitting over here in
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the workbench or all these other ones and they kind of go
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together or they might Inspire another lamp.
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I might make another one that's featuring teil Des because I'm
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kind of in the teal mode, you know, zooms like kind of
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autistic motor movements in a way like, you know, like how
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you'd hear about. Well, when I, when I was at
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school is always learning about like today where you lying about
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cubism. And now what I like about this
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movie is it's a similar like vein, yet you have like shifts
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as far as I could. Okay, this is the type of
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material that I'm really excited about right now and this is sort
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of the work that then comes out of it, but do you?
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Find yourself short. Yeah, do you find yourself kind
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of going to particular places? And then coming back and having
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your inspiration kind of Doubled or tripled, or is it just sort
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of thing that just comes freely from from everywhere?
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Anytime. I think it comes freely from
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anywhere anytime, you know, it's funny to me because being a
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songwriter, some of those rules apply, you know, you know, I
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just taken I take an ideas, you know, and I have fragments of
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ideas and and They come together, you know, I try to
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make them come together. Yeah, I mean you know it's
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interesting to see some of the similarities like sometimes when
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I'm writing is song, there's a line that's a great line and I
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want to use the song but a certain point I realized it just
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doesn't go in that song. It's a really good line.
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Keep it use it in the future, but it doesn't really work on
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this song. You can't force it in there and
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it's the same thing with certain pieces.
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You know, I'll have a certain piece and I love love this piece
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but I'm working on this lamp and I'm trying to make this piece
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work and a certain point. I realized it just doesn't work.
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It doesn't go of this piece, it's going to be some other
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piece and I just have to let that go as beautiful as it is.
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I have to just let it go and and let this piece develop
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organically and the best work I have is when I listen to that
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music and I let the pieces go and I dislike, okay?
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What does my gut? Tell me in the beginning, when I
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started making lamps, I put like, you know, eight pieces
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together and I say, oh, this is a really cool lamp and that was
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cool. But, you know, maybe they didn't
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develop shape and color wise. I'm so much harder on myself.
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Now that I, you know, s really has to work for me, it has to
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really make me excited. It's not good enough for me to
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just put some stuff together and say, you know, that's really
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cool. It's really Ali got to speak, to
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me. I make when I when I look at it
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I got to feel something, you know and I know I know what that
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feeling is now you know. And so the stuff that I'm making
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now, you know, every piece has to really work and then whole as
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a whole, it really has to speak. And that's when I just keep
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moving ahead with that when it comes to just well, yeah, I mean
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you create a whole company based around selling lamps and
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creating upscaling, I'm recycling lamps and turning them
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into essentially new products. But why specifically lamp?
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So obviously we know that you studied a course number of years
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ago, and that sort of do your interest in it.
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But what about lamps and light and lighting fixtures, kind of
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inspired you like, well, why not other things that why
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specifically lamps? Why do you like lamps?
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You know, I think that one-on-one, you know, I think
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I've always been drawn to interesting lamps and I know it.
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is never a collector or anything, but I always been
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drawn to interesting lamps, but I really think a lot of it is
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the ability to Mix the white. With the forms.
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You know, like somehow light mixed with interesting forms,
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just drew me in, you know, and draws me.
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And, and I'm always experimenting with not only what
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the shape of the lamp and colors and textures lamp.
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It's a lot of times to its, what does it light do?
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When it comes out like how does it spread?
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Some some of the lamps I make I make with various cutout shape
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so that they make an interesting pattern on the wall or the
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ceiling and just that, that's just all, you know, Connor
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fascinating to me and, you know, I think it, you know, it sounds
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really cliche to say bring light into the world but but I think
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you know, that's that's a part, it's just emotionally a part of
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my Foundation to want to do that.
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And that also takes me to you know like the last couple years
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I developed this whole series of the bro it called The Broken
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Glass series, its lamps made with broken glass in various
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ways, you know, taking a broken piece of glass and filing off
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the sharp edges and putting it into the structure.
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You know, like It's like making something in a broken world.
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You know, we have a broken kind of world and then being able to
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make something of that. You know, that's artistic and
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raises people sites. That's important to me.
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So, I've got pieces where the glass is like that.
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I've got one, I just made that I took the was a really beautiful
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bottle broke and I filed it off and I had a really interesting
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shape. So it's part of the desk lamp
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and Then I took the broken pieces and put them inside a
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clear base and integrated that into the hole so that the color
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and the pattern of the broken thing is reflected again, Lower
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and that's the kind of thing I'm working with in that Broken
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Glass series know, it's amazing stuff.
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I really like, particularly the fact that you kind of want to
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put it in a nutshell, fixing a broken world, and in a small
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way. And it's because this is
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something. Sometimes we could take for
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granted things like just having light having heating having like
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these basic things like having light, you don't really
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appreciate that until you have like a blackout or, you know,
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when I was growing up, my mom would often run out of
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electricity in our flat. So, you know, would happen often
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you have a candles out and all that stuff there by appreciate
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light even more. I mean, I think of you, it
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might, Family, like it, even before I started making let
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limbs, I was always giving it for presents, various kinds of
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Lights, flash lights and emergency lights and like I
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wanted to make sure everybody had, you know, like in the dark
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they would have white, you know, you could check with my kids,
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you don't like over the years. There's like, okay, first you
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give us this flashlight. Give us this emergency.
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Like is like the dude is Austin lights to.
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They would just tell you, like, please stop giving us Lambs
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enough lamps slump epidemic. Like I'd already given him all
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these lamps, and I found this sculpture of a woman that I just
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knew that my brother's life would love.
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I just knew that I was just a feeling I had and then I created
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this whole thing around and I made that game too and they
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really and they have it all with their piano and they love it.
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And so but I keep swearing that I'm not going to make the many
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more lamps you'll always do, it's good.
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But hey, if you're good at something, why not always keep
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doing it, you know what I mean? It's one up, you know.
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Yeah, and I think there's there's a certain amount of
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person ability in a gift when you give it and you've made it,
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you know, I mean, it's one thing to gift something that, you
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know, someone is going to love. But when it's handmade somehow,
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it just feels more like a more. There's more sentiment there.
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I feel like, you know, because because it especially they'll
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know how much time and effort went into creating that, you
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know. Yeah.
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Special. Yeah I did one project with my
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grandson. He he he the deal was that for
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birthday was he was going to pick a he was going to come and
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pick out the parts and I was going to make a lamb from it.
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Oh wow. So they came over.
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He looked in my garage, he was really definitive about it.
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He just, he picked out these parts.
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He came up with a basic idea. And then sometime later, I
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remember much later I started working on it, and I realized
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that the parts are great, but I needed to reverse the order of
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them. So, I did what I call a mock-up
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again, when I stick the pipe in there and I just put them
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together. They're not, it's not all wire,
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it's just mocked up and I sent them a picture and said this is
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what I think is going to be the best way to do this.
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Are you okay with that? Because you know, I wanted him
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to give it the okay cuz it was for him and he had picked up the
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pieces and he said yeah. And then I made it that way.
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And I really came out nice. He was very happy so let's talk
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a little bit about your business.
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I want to connect it to that previous Point as well.
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The company is called reclaimed Luminosity.
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Is it a you own a store or you operating just from your home?
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That's just from the home but I do have is shown here.
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People can come by word of mouth or by you know, appointment to
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see it, right? We do Open Studios.
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Because I'm intrigued a little bit about the business model.
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So presumably you have a, yeah, a number of just lamps that
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you've just created that. Hey, here they are, you can
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purchase them. Great.
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But do you in a similar way to how you made a lamp for your
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grandson? Do you do like a sort of a
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made-to-order Styles? People can kind of be like,
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okay? I want, you know, the lamps made
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from these materials. Can you please do it and then
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you follow the same process you did with your grandson of, you
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know, sending them a mock-up, sending them an idea.
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And then I'm finalizing it. Yeah, I haven't developed as
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much as I probably would like both in terms of people bringing
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me their stuff and saying can you make a lamp out of this and
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also people could come in and look at my stuff and say can you
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make a lab Adam? I like that that and that so
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yeah, that is a something I would like to develop a little
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more. I've been a little bit of that
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and yeah, I think that could be good.
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Business is not my specialty. I'm good at art.
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And but I have done a few things like that.
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So, you know, I have the Etsy site and then and then we do
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the, what they call East Bay Open studio, and it's now twice
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a year now, June and November, or people open up their Studios.
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And so people come, it's really nice.
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We put about 20 of the lamps out in the garden and people gets it
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out in the garden and come into the showroom as they will.
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And I've done pretty well at that the last couple years.
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Awesome also, I can always get a Vibe for this as well.
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Like I've gone to similar things here in the UK.
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I mean when it comes to, we're obsessed with antiques in this
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country in the UK were obsessed. Obsessed with.
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Yeah. And we have I don't know what
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the equivalent would be in the States but we have like a car
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boot sales which is just yeah a bunch of cars.
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Pull up in a field somewhere and people just sell whatever crap
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they have in their car. Some of its It's some of its
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not. But with at least with the art
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antique shops, you got a lot of, you know, just things from
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bygone eras, you can find a lot of gems in there, often worth a
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lot of money and speaking of which I kind of wanted to get an
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idea of your thoughts on just like Mass commercialized
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lighting and also just products in general.
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So like what do you make of Brands like Ikea?
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Like you know you see these like cheap lamps that you have like
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five ten dollars or something like does that Light, destroy
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you internally? Or is it just kind of like,
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yeah, that's one option and you know, I do my thing, they do
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this. I mean, you know, I make art for
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and the people who appreciate it, appreciate it and the
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people, you know, some people come and look some people come
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and look and by and yeah, I can't control that.
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I mean, you can go to IKEA or Target by lamp for twenty or
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thirty dollars, it's perfectly functional.
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And some there's some of them that are even kind of nice and
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And, you know, I can't even, that's not what I do.
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So it's not operating us. But yeah, I was just I was just
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curious kind of like your thoughts on that in general
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because I don't know for me like I think places like Ikea, a fine
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as far as yeah. Getting something functional
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that you might need or whatever. But when it comes to just
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general taste, I find that people will still opt for just
23:02
like standard commercial Brands supposed To going out there and
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maybe not everyone. But like they say, the majority
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of people, you know, like back in the day you could go and find
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all sorts of really, really nice furniture and goods and, you
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know, that you can have in your home but it feels like these
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days. There's less of a focus on that
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or it's considered less important.
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Maybe, I don't know. I mean, me personally, I'm very
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sentimental. So I love just random odds and
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ends and stuff, I could spend all day in shops like that.
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Yeah. Yeah, I think people's
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priorities may be a little bit different as far as when it
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comes to Art and what they're interested in not interested in.
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And everything in between, do you still hear me?
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It's been a struggle to keep to keep Robert here.
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So, you're very Lucky, are we making this work?
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Okay, let's move it forward a little bit.
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I just wanted to briefly touch on your sort of General thoughts
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and feelings about upscaling and recycling.
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In general. Like clearly it's important to
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you because of how you're creating these Goods.
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But in general, what are your feelings on it?
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Because I know that upscaling is becoming increasingly more and
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more popular and obviously, recycling is just part of life.
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Now it's an important thing. We all know why But yeah, just
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your general kind of thoughts on Recycling and upscaling in
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general. well, I mean We live in a world of, you know, that is,
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you know, it's so much stuff and so much stuff that gets thrown
24:51
away. So, obviously we've got a
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worldwide, you know, crisis in a sense of that, you know, I mean,
25:01
just look at what shows up in the oceans and that's enough
25:05
right there to, you know, make you, you know, worried about the
25:09
future. I think that You know, any way
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that people can find to reuse items and make them usable not
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going to a landfill is going to be a good thing.
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And you know this little bit that I'm doing is not going to
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affect the world that much, you know, but I you know, I do try
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to reuse just all kinds of items that mean and I collect stuff
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some of which may be will never be used, but I have ideas of
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using on the I literally We collect plastic caps from, you
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know, kitchen items, I have an idea.
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I mean, sometimes I use them as washers and a lamp.
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And, you know, I've even thought about making trying to
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artistically make a lamp that, you know, uses a lot of them.
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But I haven't gone there yet but I have them.
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They're there, they're ready. And we'll see if we'll see if I
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step up to that table or not. But yeah, I just and I just
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really like the idea of, you know, I'm, you know, I'll pick a
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metal washer up off the street and take it home and put it in
26:26
with the other metal washers. I picked up off the street and I
26:31
thing is, I will use all that stuff at some time or another.
26:34
I mean, I don't know if all you evolve, but I really use items
26:37
from so many places and, you know, mixed mixed Things, you
26:43
know, just I mean, it's the same way that artistic, I might I'm
26:47
not really antique person per se in terms of style, but like,
26:53
sometimes, somebody will bring me, some people know, I'm a
26:56
Gramps will bring me this lamp and it to my taste.
27:00
It may be the ugliest thing I've ever seen.
27:03
Except for, there's one part of that lamp that I really liked,
27:07
and I take it completely out of context and then when I go to
27:11
make things out, I hate that and you know, you'll never imagined
27:16
the lamp that it came from, you know.
27:18
And that's I like to do that. What would you say is the most
27:22
challenging aspect of being an artist working with lamps?
27:28
Well, so, I've got Matt for that from two sides.
27:32
One side is I have way more stuff than ideas than I managed
27:38
to find to create. So, like, I look around, I'm
27:42
like, I look around in my workshop that I'm like, oh my
27:46
god, I've got that, I've got, those are so beautiful.
27:49
I gotta make something out of that, that bottle.
27:52
That crazy ashtray right there. You know, I just think they're
27:56
so nice. I just got to get time to make
27:59
something from him. So that's the one side and the
28:02
other challenging side. It is just that commercial side.
28:05
I mean it's not it's you know, how do you reach people and you
28:12
know get them to see what I do and want to come and check it
28:17
out and possibly purchase, you know, and I would say I'm more
28:23
obsessed by the artistic side and I am the commercial side.
28:28
Did I answer your question? Yeah, yeah.
28:30
Yeah. I mean, it was that there are no
28:32
wrong answers, you know, I always kind of suppose I suppose
28:36
a lot of the time with my questions as well.
28:37
Sometimes I'll ask a question and I'm just looking to kind of
28:42
further the conversation and learn about the person, you
28:44
know? And sometimes the person won't
28:46
answer my question, but it doesn't matter because we go
28:49
somewhere completely different so I don't know.
28:51
That's that's, that's my Approach please.
28:54
Yes. To took us through some advice
29:03
that you could give to aspiring artists specifically lamp Iris
29:10
or any artists that. It could be anything.
29:13
There are no rules. Well advice, I would give gosh,
29:19
I'm old enough now that I can give advice that's really good.
29:25
Follow me is I mean, you know it's like you got something
29:29
inside of you that says I want to play music play music.
29:34
I want to play unto old. I want to play piano, get on the
29:38
piano and start playing the piano because you're never too
29:42
old. You never see, you know, you
29:45
everybody has talent artistic talent, musical Talent, most
29:50
people have been Taught by a society that is based on
29:56
practicality and earning a living that those are Pursuits.
30:01
That won't go anywhere and you know those are the Pursuits
30:06
basically that will save us musical art, you know.
30:12
So you know, you want to draw draw.
30:14
You want to sculpt Scopes, you think you want to make lamps,
30:18
start making some lamps, you know, like do.
30:22
What's inside of you to do and let the chips kind of fall where
30:27
they may? That's my advice.
30:31
Ben, thank you very much for sharing.
30:34
Let's talk about your music. She did mention a few times that
30:36
you are a musician. We said that at the top of the
30:38
hour, how did you get into music?
30:41
Talk us through your musical Journey.
30:44
That's another Journey. Um, so I grew up in a family
30:50
that was really pretty. Practical.
30:53
Again, my father was a plumber and but my mother had sung
31:00
played guitar and sung Jewish folk songs before.
31:05
I was born and then she stopped. And so there was a guitar in the
31:10
house and when I was about 10, my parents, we're getting me
31:21
guitar lessons, but we're exceedingly, boring guitar
31:25
lesson, just like Dad. This is what I was supposed to
31:34
play in the guitar and it so that ended pretty quickly.
31:38
But then when I was about 17, I still have this guitar.
31:42
I inherited this guitar. And at that point, I moved to
31:47
San Francisco and was a guy upstairs.
31:49
He played guitar. Are some came down.
31:51
Play a little guitar together. Still no serious.
31:55
Anything. but I always had to char and then, then I was
32:03
already then about Somewhere around twenty nine or so.
32:09
And I started to write a poem about Vietnam called, we ain't
32:14
forgot and in the middle of writing the poem, I realized the
32:18
Poetry was not that accessible form of communication that music
32:21
was and that I pretty much can identify every period of My Life
32:25
by what I was listening to music with.
32:28
So I went out, I think the other guitar may have a died at that
32:30
point. Went out from flea market got an
32:33
acoustic guitar started taking lessons and within a couple of
32:36
months. It's pretty hooked on.
32:39
Playing guitar and writing songs and started writing songs and
32:43
writing of songs is what kind of drove me.
32:46
Musically. And yeah.
32:51
So I started to buy then I moved out here to California and you
32:56
form some bands and played original music for a lot of
33:00
years. And this local see mostly the
33:03
local scene ever making very much of a living doing that.
33:07
and, They are basically was pretty pretty devoted for many
33:15
many, many years. Khan started to wear out in the
33:19
music business. Not so much on music from the
33:22
music business. and, Yeah, so that's the first part of that
33:29
Journey a certain point I was developing, my guitar style
33:35
played electric. I was playing more acoustic
33:37
electric and play with my hands. Hence, the nails and started
33:45
playing in kind of open tunings. And just trying to expand what I
33:49
thought guitar could do. And then one day, I decided I
33:54
needed another string, so it Started.
33:57
I literally got on eBay and found the 7 string, acoustic
34:02
guitar and I ordered that and then I started playing 7 string.
34:07
That's pretty much what I play smoothly.
34:08
Now and I put bass strings on the bottom two strings and some
34:13
sort of the bass player and the guitar player in my own crazy
34:18
way. Oh wow.
34:19
Okay that's interesting. I've heard of that before too.
34:23
But bottom two strings. Are based Rings.
34:25
Yeah. This guitar is 85 and 65 I think
34:33
in her flat wound so I never replace those.
34:36
I have never replaced one of those flat wound strings.
34:39
Do may sound as what I'm going for on those strings and the
34:43
other strings are other things that media and I'm yeah, those
34:47
are all change soon. Yeah, so I have you know some
34:56
well you know I have lately. I've just been doing sort of
35:00
what I call the living room Series right in this very place
35:03
where I am right now and I put just put that on Facebook.
35:10
Yeah, I haven't really been, you know, and I have some stuff on
35:13
YouTube. Also let say normally I have a
35:17
little listen before I check out my music.
35:20
Is it guests? But can actually find any of you
35:23
music, unfortunately. So, I have to ask this question,
35:25
what kind of style is it? What kind of music do you play
35:29
generally? Oh, I call what I do.
35:34
So folk its kind of Soul flavor Rock.
35:39
You know, I mean, I play acoustic and play with my hands.
35:42
There's some folk of ones. I always say, if you go to the
35:45
past to confound James Brown, Bob, Dylan, you have an idea of
35:50
what I do. I like it already.
35:56
Well, what's your approach to songwriting?
35:58
I mean, you said you've been a sort of writing music for For
36:01
many years. Yeah.
36:04
How do you approach somewhere to how do I approach to
36:07
songwriting? Well, the song writing?
36:13
Most most songs that I write are driven by an idea, you know, I
36:20
mean, I am a citizen of the world pretty conscious person
36:26
with a history of social activism.
36:28
So there's a definite, strong streak of that in in what I
36:32
write. And so often, you know, it's an
36:37
idea and I try to come up with with a it's really hard.
36:46
It's really hard to write about the world and not do it in a way
36:49
that is boring. And so you know, trying to come
36:53
up with an artistic expression of an idea that I think is
36:58
important as that's always been a challenge for me and And some
37:05
more successful sometimes and others you know I could tell you
37:12
that it'll have written a ton of the last couple years.
37:15
I wrote a lot for many years and I have books and books of songs
37:21
and partial songs. And two, most recent songs that
37:24
I've written are curiously, the big lie and tell the truth.
37:30
Hey, one focused on The obvious big lie in American political
37:37
system that's going around the other one.
37:40
About the latest thing of you know, not being, you know,
37:46
Banning books and keeping people from knowing true history.
37:50
So I'm about to put the big lie. Just my living room version of
37:57
it on Facebook and then hopefully soon I'll do it.
38:02
These conversion of tell the truth and put that on.
38:04
And as well process, you know, is get the idea.
38:14
And I try to go to music as quickly as possible because I
38:17
really like for the music and the words to kind of come
38:21
together. So I'm not a person, I'm not
38:24
going to write a whole Poem. And then put it to music hardly
38:28
ever. I can say never but hardly ever,
38:31
you know. Usually, you know, once I get an
38:34
idea, I'm trying to find the most powerful presentation of
38:39
that idea, musically. And because I play various
38:44
tunings, and I've got the seven-string, you know, to me,
38:48
I, you know, is a pretty large palette that's available for me
38:53
and probably one of the biggest Our goals is not to fall into
38:58
doing what I've always done. I mean, I've done enough this a
39:02
long time, I could write a decent song pretty quickly but
39:06
it's kind of like where I was. Describing my Lambs if that's
39:09
not really good enough for me anymore.
39:11
And part of the problem with my songwriting is because I've
39:14
written so much. It's hard for me to write
39:18
something that I think is truly new and Innovative and worthy of
39:23
me putting my energy and soul into and I said, you know,
39:27
that's a artistic. I don't know.
39:29
It's, you know, Julia Cameron artists way would say, you know,
39:34
just write it don't don't judge it, but it's hard for me not to
39:39
judge it. You know, when I've spent this
39:41
much time and energy developing that craft Tell us about your
39:46
best and worst live performances story.
39:58
I don't know if it is the worst, but I immediately.
40:00
The first thing that comes to mind is when I first had First
40:08
band that I had in Sam's well and Oakland San Francisco unruly
40:13
world. We played a gig at a club that
40:20
was pretty much a gay woman's bar in San Francisco and I think
40:27
it was called Sophia's, but don't quote me on that.
40:29
So long time ago and I'm old and, We had a TA, wasn't the
40:39
greatest PA. I didn't really hear myself, I
40:41
pretty sure from the cassette recording of say Guy saying most
40:46
of that gig Adams 20 like like basically didn't hear my and I
40:52
was Enix fairly inexperienced and I think I say most of that
40:56
game slightly Out Of Tune so that comes to mind as one of the
41:01
worst. There probably are some others
41:07
best gig. That's a good question.
41:14
I had a lot of good gigs, a lot of, you know I think of Gigs
41:23
where people really seem to appreciate what I did.
41:26
I can think of one, I can't remember the name of the place
41:29
that we did. I did up in Santa Rosa with a
41:32
friend of mine who's a singer songwriter and he opened and I
41:37
played after him and it was a con of I don't know, it was in
41:43
the middle of some political upward as we always are.
41:46
And I think that, you know, it was a nice crowd is listening
41:50
crowd, and they really appreciate it.
41:52
I did, I got, you know, nice Standing Ovation, you know, a
41:57
couple encores and that was pretty satisfying, you know,
42:01
day, I'm just, you know, being appreciated for, you know, what
42:07
I did was I put so much energy into was a really nice thing.
42:12
So it's good when you get that feeling coming up stage, as well
42:18
as one of the things I miss about playing live as well.
42:20
I'm done in a while. Well and when it goes well, it
42:24
goes really well. What's the best advice you've
42:29
ever received? Best advice I've ever received.
42:37
That's such a good question. I'm not sure that I've ever
42:41
really thought about that. I mean, it's a good thing to
42:45
think about I'm not sure I have a I do I feel like the best
42:53
advice but I can't say came from this one.
42:55
Person had to do with pretty much what I said, which is, you
42:58
know, to follow your Muse, basically, to to know who you
43:04
are and be willing to to run with that.
43:11
You know, despite what anybody else says, you know, and I think
43:17
I received that advice, I don't know.
43:19
There was any one person said it directly like that for the
43:22
world, number of people who set it to some effect like that.
43:26
And that's probably the best advice I've ever had.
43:31
Similar question. It's my favorite question to ask
43:34
all of my guests. What's the biggest life lesson
43:37
you've learned so far? Well, it does seem related to
43:46
the other question. I don't know how well I've
43:54
learned that. I think it is to follow him, use
44:01
to to live big to love big. Just throw caution, Connor to
44:11
the wind. And I think it's Leslie, I'm
44:15
still learning on the side. We're always learning.
44:18
At the end of the day, I'm way that Journey never stops, but
44:22
it's some, it's interesting to me because like, For instance,
44:27
for me, over the last couple of years, I've had time to sort of
44:31
decompress the last four or five years of my life and lockdown,
44:35
weirdly helped with that and the pandemic here, you know, I found
44:39
myself unemployed and those bunch of other things going on,
44:41
but had time to think, you know, not just consciously, but
44:46
subconsciously. And I think it's in those
44:48
moments that we learned the biggest lesson.
44:50
Sometimes we learn them, they just hit us in the face, really
44:52
hard and wake us up but more often than not, when we get
44:56
those To reflect the nice weather, real soul-searching
44:59
sort of occurs. As we as we draw things to a
45:06
close for today. Do you have any upcoming
45:08
projects or some final thoughts you'd like to share with our
45:10
listeners? Well, as far as coming projects,
45:15
I mean, we, you know, in June, will be doing the East Bay, Open
45:18
studio, and I always make a lot of stuff without a lot recently,
45:21
already made a quite a few new projects.
45:24
I am doing this big. It's a lamp because it's got
45:29
lights but it's big art project down and it's actually The
45:33
middle of the music studio, with a big black four-legged, guess
45:41
it was originally some kind of lamp and I put something inside.
45:46
I'm still on this letting that you know there's no pretense
45:49
that this being a practical ample though it is providing
45:52
light it's really just me trying to follow them.
45:56
Use on my on this art project creating something that I just
46:00
think is really cool and Are not sellable or not, I have no idea
46:07
and so that's that's happening and you know, theoretical have
46:11
that done before these spay Open studio and what was the other
46:17
part of your question? Just keep have final thoughts to
46:21
share. Oh, final, thoughts to share.
46:25
Um, No, I don't really I just appreciate you having me.
46:34
It's always nice for me to be able to kind of it helps me get
46:39
in touch that's really good because it helps me get in touch
46:42
with. You know, what am I doing?
46:45
Why am I doing it? Is there anything different?
46:48
I want to do about it. So yeah that's really that's
46:53
really kind of you. Try to put some new songs on
46:57
Facebook, like Nick is Robert Temple singer-songwriter making
47:03
new. A I mean, I'm leaving at this
47:06
point, you know, and I'm on the over halfway there.
47:10
Part of my life, you know, I'm able to, you know, I'm
47:14
privileged honestly privilege to be able to Make art, but people
47:20
have artistic talent, don't have the ability to do that because
47:24
of their life circumstances, and my life circumstances is now
47:28
allowing me to do this. And I just try to be worthy of
47:32
that privilege. Definitely think you are and
47:38
yeah, it's been, it's been a real pleasure talking to you and
47:41
getting to know you. And I wish you the best of luck
47:44
with all that and everything. Thank you.
47:47
Thank you so much. And to the listeners of the
47:50
Christian we've podcast, as always be safe, be well, and
47:54
I'll see you in the next one.