I Was A Real Rock Star On A Stage Made Of Hay

If the Godfather of time held an ounce of humanity he'd write into law: Each that has been given life must return to a single moment of their tattered, torn or brilliant life and sit with a committee of laid back decision makers to decide if but for one day you should or could redesign how it was played. Unlike Back To The Future...it wouldn't change your present stage. Where would you go? The teens? Twenties? The vision quest that tested your parents belief in your self guided ability not to follow policy? Being young and wild in this unions fourth largest state only seems boring to city slickers financed by bright lights, busy intersections and something to do no matter where you're moving through. Growing up in a pair of Montana boots muddied my half witted trails fed by guitar riffs and the need to steal starlight from the Big Sky. Rather than hunt, fish, ranch or explore mountains so tall that each scraped cloud is later be found in Louisiana; I found my place of peace high atop a stack of hay. They'd pay me 25 cents a bail to tightly connect fields of once green leaves now yellow stems sharp enough to cut into the toughest mans skin. Three maybe four days it took to make my stage. The local farmers didn't understand. I was the hired hand that kept to himself, constantly thinking, bending notes through garden hoses that offered just enough delay to make me feel alive at a giant festival located somewhere between realities nibble and bite. I took those jobs for one reason; to perform my music on days when everybody else decided to hunt, fish, ranch and explore. Each stack featured an easy to get to set of steps. I put them there. If you've ever stood next to a stack of hay then you already know the most difficult part of the journey is the attempt to scale the walls of cattle food. So, for 25 cents a bail I'd carefully craft easy to locate steps to take the stress off my teenaged back addicted to constantly finding reason to hoist a microphone stand and six strings to the top of what my imagination called the World's Biggest collection of people that felt the same way I did about music. If the Godfather of time held an ounce of humanity he'd write into law: This one can go back. To find the people that cheered invisibly on lands once shaped by warriors called Crow. To share the simple songs that would stretch from the curved corners of sharp jagged Montana mountains to the smooth rounded chunks cut from rocks that swim by the hour in rivers whose destination is the ocean. Let him sing to the festivals he saw only in his mind... The empowerment of music is but the diamond located in the cores of daily chores. Mind not the rules that keep you from reaching your Heaven. Take on the challenge of escape through means of everyday. For it is what you see within that so often comes across as the private place, a peaceful easy feeling, a dream, fantasy or even pinch of reality...in the eyes of the child who saw something while the rest of the world saw nothing. I currently sit in a radio station production room shaking my head. Such stupid talk or wishful thinking brought to life again and again by the willingness of RollingStone Magazine's Andy Greene whose writing instrument attached itself to Led Zeppelin's 1995 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and how it came at a very awkward time for the band. The previous year Jimmy Page and Robert Plant reunited for a tour, but they failed to invite bassist John Paul Jones. He first learned about their plans when he read about them in a newspaper. At the podium to accept the award, Jones couldn't resist a dig at his bandmates. "Thank you, my friends," he said. "For finally remembering my phone number." Despite the tension, the group agreed to perform a three-song set that featured John Bonham's son Jason Bonham on drums. They brought out Steven Tyler and Joe Perry for their opening number of "Bring It On Home," and at the end Neil Young joined them for a sloppy, eight-minute rendition of "When the Levee Breaks." Toward the end of the song Plant sings a bit of Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth" as a tribute to Young. It was the last time that Zeppelin performed together until their 2007 reunion concert in London. According to Jimmy McDonough's Neil Young biography Shakey, the experience was so thrilling for Young that he briefly thought about recording a whole album with Zeppelin. Needless to say, that never happened. Page and Plant did agree to one more album and tour in 1998. John Paul Jones wasn't invited to be a part of that, either. The video