A Sense of Doubt blog post #1612 - No Walls and the Recurring Dream by Ani DiFranco

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1612 - No Walls and the Recurring Dream by Ani DiFranco


So, I am this HUGE fan of Ani DiFranco. Even though I might list other artists above her, I have seen her in concert over a dozen times much like the Indigo Girls, another HUGE favorite of mine.

OOPS - flawed memory. Maybe eight times. I have seen her eight times. Still, that's a lot.

I had the pleasure of going to Portland and seeing Ani interviewed on stage to promote her book. The signed copy of the book pictured above came with the price of the ticket, and I took a friend of mine to the event. We rode the Max train and the street car to get around. It was my first time on the street car, and we over shot our stop by three stops because on the street car, you have to signal the driver to stop if you want to get off.

I was sort of surprised and sort of not surprised that Ani did not play any music live (recorded tracks played before and after the event) and just talked about her book, fielding questions first from a local author chosen by Powell's Book of Portland and then from the audience.

I considered submitting a question to find out something about which I have always wondered: "who is the person she singing to in the song 'Napoleon'?" But then in reading the memoir, I found out that Ani probably wouldn't have answered the question as she hopes her songs are multi-faceted enough that there's not just one subject of the song, even if she did have someone in mind when she wrote the song.

Farther on in this post, I will share links to former content that I have created about Ani DiFranco and my written description of THE DINNER PARTY, but before all that, her book.

I loved it.

Ani DiFranco has been an inspiration for me ever since I discovered her music and started going to her shows back in the 1990s. Her memoir was also inspiring. It's funny and warm and full of heartfelt passion and realism. Ani goes through some dark times, but she shares her story about these times with humor and grace. It helps that she narrates her own story. She confessed that this was the hardest thing about the book, narrating the audio book, but her voice is the ONLY voice for her own story and she did a masterful job, as she always does with everything.

The book is smartly sectioned into short chapters each with its own theme, scene, time period, and/or message. Interwoven between these narratives are some of her poems, recording of which have appeared in her albums, and one song lyric, most like a poem, for "Grey" from Reveling and Reckoning, and one of my favorite songs (one of her favorites, too).

The book is arranged chronologically though there are time periods left out or not detailed. Still, DiFranco hits the highlights: creating her first few albums, forming her own record company, touring, her most significant relationships with women and men, and the making of her music both lyrically and instrumentally. Along the way, she shares thoughts on issues that are important to her, such as inclusivity at the Michigan Women's Festival, abortion rights, and Ms. Magazine choosing her as one of the best feminists to follow for her successful business and not for her songwriting or even her outspoken political views. She even answered her critics, the women who felt she betrayed her gay audience when she married a man, which is something I always felt was kind of ridiculous. Why did Ani have to defend to her audience who she loved and what she chose to do with her life because of who she loved?

Given that I followed up her memoir by listening to Moby's second memoir, Then It All Fell Apart, I was struck by the contrast of the openings. DiFranco begins her memoir with anecdotes about times on stage when she felt like she wanted to die or disappear. It's her own self-effacing scrutiny that makes her both real and relatable. She's human, but she's not defeated. She will admit to weakness, bad decisions, vices, and screw ups throughout the book, but she rises above these iniquities. She carries on. And she does so with humor, determination, courage, and positivity. It's for all these reasons, and her smart, well-meaning, liberal attitudes and soul-seering art work that I find her a motivating and captivating inspiration.

In contrast, Moby's book begins with a contemplation of ways to kill himself and a suicide attempt. I will review Moby's book in another entry, but the contrast couldn't be more stark and diametrically opposed. Don't get me wrong. I like Moby. But of the two books, Ani's is inspirational; Moby's is self-pitying and depressing and not nearly as funny.

One of my favorite parts of DiFranco's book came when she was describing her guitar playing style.

The section is called "Silences" and start on page 57. DiFranco writes about the limits of strumming an acoustic guitar, and how it is more of a percussive instrument than melodic one. She urges those who play to find the spaces, the silences.

"A hollow box with strings running across it is like a drum with a supernatural ability to feed tone and color into rhythm... I believe an acoustic guitar's ability to make sound and silence sit right next to each other is at the core of its power... strumming an acoustic guitar erases the beginnings and the ends of its sounds and eliminates the spaces. It ignores the instrument's potential to produce intense dynamic contrast. To put it opinionatedly, strumming an acoustic guitar isakin to scratching on the surface of a drum: antithetical to its nature."

ONE THING that I loved about DiFranco's book is that she confessed that if she were to write it over again that it would all be different. She seems aware that her memory is a flawed thing and the choices of what it include and what not to include were a product of the time when she made them and on a different day, the choices would be different.

I can see myself reading this book again, at least a second time.

Also, sidenote, she mentions my home town of Kalamazoo!! Page 80: "Then off I go to play Blady Blahfest in New Brunswick, or a student union hall in Indiana, or a take-back-the-night rally in Kalamazoo."

Ani DiFranco's story has a powerful end and a better final message: "Don't worry" because the human spirit is "ever expanding and infinite." This is a message I can get behind.

In the end, Ani DiFranco turned inward and dedicated herself to learning and to finding a way to live on her personal relationships with integrity. In the end of one of the final sections, "Platforms," she meets Joan Armatrading, and managed to tell her the important thing, much like I would tell Ani or Bowie or so many others:

"I have loved your music since I was fifteen. Thank you."

And that's the important thing. The art and thanking someone whose art has meant so much.

Hey, Ani, your music has been close to my heart for more than twenty years, it has inspired me, motivated me, given me courage, and helped me through tough times. Thank you."

As she writes in the poem "Platforms":

i got knocked off my platforms
so i dusted off my first pair of boots
bought on the street at astor place
before new york was run by suits
and i suited up for a long walk back to myself
closer to the ground now
with sorrow
and stealth

It's more than just gratitude for the art; I have great gratitude for the whole of her being. Thank you Ani DiFranco.

AND NOW SOME OTHER CONTENT

As for my love of Ani DiFranco and her art and her whole being, Ani made my top ten list of women artists, here:

https://365-tshirts.blogspot.com/2014/03/t-shirt-360-ani-difranco-my-top-ten.html

But did she make an all-time artists lists? Not sure if I have done one.

However, though my memory said that the Indigo Girls did not make my top ten bands, the post I wrote in December of 2013 proves otherwise:

FROM- 
https://365-tshirts.blogspot.com/2013/12/t-shirt-273-u2-vertigo.html

U2 is definitely a favorite band, but would it make my top ten? I don't think so. Here's a quick list of absolute top ten bands:

The Jam, Cocteau Twins, 10,000 Maniacs, The Indigo Girls, Pink Floyd, Steely Dan, Everything But the Girl, King Crimson, Radiohead, Stereolab, Spyro Gyra, Sigur Rós, The Clash.
Okay, that's thirteen. But I was going by iTunes playlists and most frequent listening stats. And there's a secondary list, and this is where you will find U2:

Kraftwerk, The Innocence Mission, Japan, Talking Heads, U2, REM, The Art of Noise, Genesis, Hooverphonic, DEVO, Simon and Garfunkel, Haircut 100, They Might Be Giants, New Order, Joy Division, The Style Council, Cabaret Voltaire, Lush, Dead Can Dance, This Mortal Coil, The Pixies.

And I am still leaving out many great bands and groups of artists who function like bands, such as Aphex Twin and most especially Machine Love (note the link to my entry on them in my other blog). I have given Machine Love some LOVE on my pages before, but in 273 posts, I am not sure where.

Okay, back to the subject at hand.

I love Ani DiFranco. I have four DiFranco t-shirts and I wrote about them all during my year of T-shirt blogging. The proof:

The one above again -

https://365-tshirts.blogspot.com/2014/03/t-shirt-360-ani-difranco-my-top-ten.html
the others:

https://365-tshirts.blogspot.com/2013/07/t-shirt-121-ani-fuckin-difranco.html

https://365-tshirts.blogspot.com/2013/09/t-shirt-173-ani-difranco-little-plastic.html

https://365-tshirts.blogspot.com/2013/12/t-shirt-255-ani-difranco-purple-every.html

And so, when I heard that Ani had written a book and even better she was coming to Portland to promote her book, I bought two tickets and took a friend with me.

The tickets came with a signed copy of the book. Bonus!!

I used one of my Audible credits to get the audio book because it was narrated by Ms. Ani DiFranco herself, and even though she said it was an ordeal to record, I knew it would be great.

Monday's blog featured some content about this book and my next read, Moby's:
https://sensedoubt.blogspot.com/2019/07/a-sense-of-doubt-blog-post-1600-eight.html

I also made an Ani Mix centered on her poem, "Grand Canyon," which I often read in classes and which is published in her memoir:

https://sensedoubt.blogspot.com/2018/10/a-sense-of-doubt-blog-post-1326-grand.html

ASIDE: THE DINNER PARTY: Readers of this and my other blog, 365 T-SHIRTS, will know about my Dinner Party concept -- based loosely on Judy Chicago's seminal art project -- which I last wrote about here for DAVID BOWIE'S BIRTHDAY: HEY MOM #185. But if I am really honest, there should be two dinner parties: one with those larger-than-life figures -- like David Bowie -- and others with people I have not idolized all out of proportion. Because I could see that Monica Byrne and I would be great friends if we had grown up together, went to school together, and/or lived in the same city. Likewise, I could see being close friends with John Scalzi, Warren Ellis, Suzanne Vega, Joss Whedon, and Ani DiFranco, who are among the other dinner party guests. It's a distinction worth making at this time because of the way Monica Byrne relates to her audience. There's goofiness in her video, and yet there's profound sincerity and insight, too. I really "get" that about her, and more importantly, appreciate it. Those things sealed the deal for me, just like Twitter interactions with Scalzi, Ellis, and long ago brief email correspondence with Neil Gaiman also made me feel a part of their worlds and their lives, which hardens the cement of my patronage. BTW, Neil himself (Gaiman's Twitter handle) probably should also be at the party and is only left off the list because I have an aversion to the popular and the expected, which is really silly. These are all people I respect as artists and love their work, but because I have not fan worshipped them out of proportion (as I have with Bowie, Margaret Atwood, and Erykah Badu among others.... Bjork is like an alien that I want to comprehend by sharing a meal with her), I can see being friends with them as well, and this makes a difference in how I regard their art. A Monica Byrne story, a John Scalzi novel, a Suzanne Vega album seems like a letter from a friend as much as each is transmission of art, creativity, and inspiration. This feeling closes the gap, the distance. Whereas Bowie's work always seemed to me to be like a message in a bottle from another galaxy.

ONE OF MY FAVORITE LYRICS FROM ANI DIFRANCO

"but then what kind of scale
compares the weight of two beauties
the gravity of duties
or the ground speed of joy?"
~ "School Night" - Ani DiFranco From Reckoning/Reveling



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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1907.20 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1477 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.