Everything Craig's Brother: ~An Ode to Craig's Brother~

~An Ode to Craig's Brother~

I get tired of it sometimes. I've been listeneing to them play the same songs with little variation for just about the last 10 years. Go to a show, go to a practice... it's all the same.

Over the last few months I repeatedly found myself wondering why they still do it. There's the obvious reasons, of course. We all like to play music. I have the desire and the descent from musical heritage, I know what it feels like... but it's not the need to play that makes me wonder. It's the unwillingness to really give up on The Brother that sometimes confuses me.

Some of you may think I'm selfish for feeling this way, but during the year and half or two years they were broken up I was happy, at least in that regard. I had my husband all to myself. He was able to continue making songs, but he was all mine. Save for school and work, of course. Then when the band reunited, there was excitement, but also a little dissapointment on my part.

Since they have gotten back together, there have been highs and lows. Busy times, but mostly down times where not a lot is going on. I think a couple of them blamed me for the lull. (I remember when they split up I was likened to Yoko Ono by one Tristan Pardee and a few of his friends. Lol. Besides the fact that I'm a vastly better singer than her, you can't compare a little Santa Cruz band to the Beatles... but I digress).

I feel as though a couple people in Craig's Brother... ok, one in particular, thought I was holding the whole thing back. I know that person is over it, whether he still holds those feelings or not, but we've all come to terms with where the band is now, and that leads me to my musings. Why? Why do they keep at it?

I was at a Youth Brigade show just about two years ago. Now THOSE guys are old. Fear is still at it. D.I., all these bands. B.R., Nofx, etc., etc. How can they do it for so long? When I start to wonder why, I settle for the simple fact that it is enjoyable for them to do it. The bigger bands make a considerable amount of money... but the little guys like Craig's brother also keep going... even if the band costs us more money than we (they) earn from it.

(The fact that we get people flying over from Australia, Canada and various parts of the US just to audition for a spot in the band... and that we get emails about how people are playing CB songs at their best friends funeral because the band meant that much to an individual, the small, but loyal, international fan base... all of that also gives power to their determination, I'm sure)

Last night I went to the beginning of the Craig's Bro practice. It was semi-unwillingly, I admit. I'm jaded and over it. I have a bad attitude. But last night, in the thick of the new song called "The Mistake of Caring" I was forceably reminded why I love them. It's not that I finally understood why they keep going, it was that I was reminded why I love them.

Don't they deserve it? In spite of the money, time and pain the project has caused my family over the years... I wouldn't change it. Not now. Not after all we've been through together.

I stood at the back of the room last night, staring at the back of Ted and Glade's heads. How odd it seemed to me. These men, who really are now men instead of the boys who began the journey, seemed so real. In earnest. I suppose this is all sentimental blither that isn' really conveying what I feel in a coherent way... but they seemed as boys standing there, and perhaps it was a mothers love that welled up inside of me... and I couldn't help myself.

They work so hard to keep it all going. Day job, blue collar Joe's (except for Ted and Heath, they're technically white collar but who's counting?) Sometimes, their "work" is just wheel spinning, I really believe that, but they still work hard, and whatever their motivation; to create, to get attention, to have a family... it's all ok. It doesn't need to be understood. It just is.

I love it. The music and the people. My people. My family. My Brothers.

I've been to amazing places and met amazing people because of this band. How proud I am to know them...lol.