I put this in another thread of mine after watching a doc I hadn't seen about Bill Hicks, but I wanted to start a new thread about it because I think he deserves it:
Quote by Soberlicious: "G...there are lots of sober musicians around here. I personally know of three ppl right off the top of my head that play in our local venues. If the thought of performing sober scares you then that's good. What a great opportunity for growth. I love doing sh*t that scares me."
Now, with in mind--last night I watched a documentary about the late, great American anti-hero, Bill Hicks. (Who you may have noticed, I used a quote of his for my signature.) I've been a Bill Hicks fan for about a decade, and I have little idea how I missed this documentary, as it came out about 4 years ago. I guess living on a small remote island for a number of years is similar to living in a cave. Watching his story, inspired me in terms of sobriety. After nearly a decade of abusing alcohol and cocaine, losing gigs and audiences, he came to the realization that he was going to well and truly f*&ck up everything he'd been working for since he was 15 years old.
In any case, for those of you who don't know who Bill Hicks was, he was a a ground breaking comedian who started working as a comic when is was 15 years old in Houston, Texas. Raised in an upper middle class suburb of Houston to a family of Southern Baptists, he grew up rebelling and ultimately questioning the values, ideas, and ideals of the culture within which he was raised. Bill did not want to be an "average" comedian. He did not just want to yuck it up and tell a few jokes for a laugh or find himself on some banal sit-com. He was constantly striving to break out of the box, break the mold, and ultimately Blow Your Mind. This goal remained elusive for a number of years, and eventually took a nose dive while he was partying like a rock star.
Here is where story becomes relevant to the subject of sobriety for me: After he quit using and abusing, he began working on new material, and ultimately transformed himself into the visionary comic he had aspired to be for so many years. Bill always new had something to do here on this earth. He didn't want to just tell jokes--he wanted to tell the
truth. After he quit drinking and using drugs, he became absolutely FEARLESS--equal parts comic, preacher, mystic, and rebel. But what interests me most about this story, is how his sobriety actually seemed to free him to be more raw, brave, and more fearless than ever before. It is also ironic, as he became a great defender of your right to do all the things that got him in trouble in the years before. However, his best material and most riveting performances were in the years after he sobered up, and before he died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 32.
In my life, whatever it is that I chose to do, I want to be FEARLESS and RAW, like Bill.
“If you want to understand a society, take a good look at the drugs it uses. And what can this tell you about American culture? Well, look at the drugs we use. Except for pharmaceutical poison, there are essentially only two drugs that Western civilization tolerates: Caffeine from Monday to Friday to energize you enough to make you a productive member of society, and alcohol from Friday to Monday to keep you too stupid to figure out the prison that you are living in.”
― Bill Hicks
This is Bill at his most intense, and it's not even that "comic," but it is about as RAW as it gets. Some of you might not agree with his conclusions, but ironically, he was sober for some time when he did this material.
P.S, not for the faint of heart, or for children.
Bill Hicks - Play From Your ******* Heart - YouTube