Well‚ I've gotten some really cool answers from jazz musicians about that‚ where they talk about losing themselves and closing their eyes. I think it was Kurt Rosenwinkel‚ he was like‚ "You know‚ last night‚ I was on stage and the band was really hot and I was hammering away on my guitar‚ and I closed my eyes and I was on a spaceship. I know this sounds crazy‚ but this was the vision that came into my head when I was in the thick of this jam because I was really making this wonderful noise." And I was like‚ "Wow‚ go on‚ tell me more."
I got this song that I wrote recently called "My Portal Guitar." There's a YouTube version of it up. What really inspired that song was that idea of being transported to someplace else through a song‚ and how surreal it can be sometimes when you get transported really far away by a song and then all of a sudden the song ends and you get zapped back into the room in the place where you are‚ and you realize‚ "Oh‚ I'm sitting here on stage and there's a bunch of people looking at me. That's really weird‚ where did you guys go?" [Laughter] There's something a little vulnerable about that‚ but I love that. A lot of my songs‚ in my mind‚ when I'm playing them‚ there are references of me hearing a choir join me or an orchestra pounding drums and all of a sudden I'm transported to this other realm. And then you come back‚ and you're on the stage and all these people are looking at you and all you can do is hope is that they came with you‚ but you don't really know. Definitely a vulnerable feeling. One of the lines of that song is‚ "When someone cries out for something familiar‚ I'm afraid of my portal guitar." Because you're looking for this transporting‚ transformational‚ transcendent moment‚ whereas someone may want to hear something familiar.
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