Where’s my mojo?

I played full time/ part.time s and studio for almost 40 years .
Then stopped and for 5 years fooled with some other instruments at home and ,studied jazz theory at home.
Now I play for fun at home and with others , record at home.
I will always love music ,however I don't miss the travel, the hours and and the drunk crowds that show up at many venues or not .
Now music to me is all about fun , education ,fellowship sharing and self improvement. Blessed to be able to be in this mindset.
 
I haven't been very into playing much really since covid started. At first I thought I'd have a lot of time to play, but then life / building a sustainable business got in the way... now we're years later and I really haven't found the mojo again (and I still have a good job but not a sustainable business, lol). Once in a while I'll pick it up and love all the sounds and stuff, maybe even record a sketch for a new song, but that's as far as it goes. The motivation will be there for a moment, then evaporates. Or I'll see some of the new Axe features, listen to somebody's demo on here, and be all fired up but nothing comes of it. And similar to OP, I was invited to play a gig last summer and had hoped it would turn into something. It was fun but nobody seemed to be into doing anything with it.

Between being busy, being tired at the end of the work day, and feeling like I 'should' be working or building clients rather than playing, i just don't have the drive. I've had a couple other times when I really didn't want to play for 6 months or so; I once had a girlfriend who said "I don't know why you call yourself a guitar player, I never see you play" but that was after band breakups or just playing a ton of gigs and wanting a break... I always knew it'd come back around. This time feels a bit different... but maybe it's just a more general lack of creativity in life as a whole right now. Or maybe at 64, that phase of my life has ended but I haven't realized it yet.
 
I took over a decade off at one point, sold almost all of my gear other than my guitars and one amp that was too cheap to bother selling.

Then, eventually, I saw my guitar case sitting caked in dust in my basement and got sad....and that's what rekindled it.

I don't exactly recommend taking a decade off, but....if it's not your "job", sometimes a break is the best thing, maybe focus on a different hobby for a little while.

I'm kind of going through it again now, actually. A really good friend died a couple months ago and everything still feels a bit weird. This one doesn't feel like it'll be a decade, and my guitars are still out on the rack. But, it's hard for me to want to play for very long. I'm not worried about it at the moment.
 
pauly said:
Hi all,
As the years flow by, I’m less and less inclined to enjoy playing music.
Recently, I got a couple of guys together which was going to be a semi regular thing, but the drummer couldn’t even be bothered listening to the songs we were going to play, so the other guy said “that was fun” and got the hell out of there. I was soooo looking forward to getting some tight blues recordings together with a semi regular unit, but that (I think) was pretty much my last chance.

Now, I pick up a guitar or bass, play it for a short time, and just don’t ‘feel’ it anymore. What’s wrong with me? What is the cure??

Thanks
Pauly
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My remedy for this is to keep playing. Just put on a movie and noodle. That way, the moment you get interested again you have routine and handspeed. I always hated the uphill part where a lot of effort goes into getting back where I was. The joy of picking up the guitar and being able to play stuff that you like is like a drug. This and listening to guitar oriented music always pick me up.

But then again, that's just me..

Harm
 
NeoSound said:
"Feels like I'm cursed" sounds like a great song in the works to me.

Seriously, I'm thinking maybe us old guys need to embrace the modern way and start posting our own music on the different media platforms. Sometimes I feel the need to share with (or torture!?) others...
Pretty sure no one is going to call and hit me up to go on tour. Making $ is difficult for even the best musicians nowadays and there are almost zero places to play around here live except for a random festival. Music is in a funny (or not so funny) place. Many are interested but few want to make the commitment.
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I know some folks have great success with it, but the social media thing seems like a lot of work to get ignored in a different setting. 🤣 Will probably give it a shot eventually, but for now we've taken a different approach.

We've started a monthly acoustic jam event in our home....and so far so good. We've attracted some pretty talented characters on our first try, including a gent who's usually on tour with a major tribute act, an amazing young recording artist from France who saw our invite while on break from her U.S. tour, and a Swedish country singer (who somehow became a country artist in Sweden 🤷‍♂️, but is a local now).

Probably thanks to our acoustic only rule, everybody who's shown up has been very chill. Hope our luck holds.
 
I just checked out her YouTube channel - very talented voice there… like ‘special’. I hope she does well in this shitfuck industry. You must get tears in your eyes when you hear some of her earlier work.

Thanks for sharing
Pauly

Admin M@ said:
Yeah, it's not my world but she has FIVE MILLION LIKES and 100+k followers on TikTok.
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