{"id":7697,"date":"2021-08-04T17:54:49","date_gmt":"2021-08-04T17:54:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/?p=7697"},"modified":"2021-08-17T20:54:20","modified_gmt":"2021-08-17T20:54:20","slug":"it-isnt-easy-being-golden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/?p=7697","title":{"rendered":"IT ISN’T EASY BEING GOLDEN"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Not me but all the phenoms I’ve known. I moved to Los Angeles in 1980 with bandmates Brad, Karla and Randy and our hopes of fame and fortune. The 45s were to open for PIL at the Olympic Auditorium. It was a big deal but we broke up mere days before the event. Like a Lost Girl I wandered, first to San Francisco then New York before returning to the City of Angels where I resided until 1992. I pulled together an exceptional group of musicians to form Heather Haley & the Zellots. Jon Wrasse on guitar, Jeff Moses on rhythm guitar, Mark Francis White on drums and a revolving door of bassists. We acquired a studio, rehearsed and played gigs and developed a strong following, nominated Best Pop Group by the LA Weekly Music Awards. It was a wild ride! Often we’d hear that an A&R guy from some major label was going to be at one of our shows and often it went nowhere. Always a huge let down and I came to realize those dudes had no power at all though they exploited the illusion.\u00a0 I also realized my shot at the brass ring was diminishing as I got older. This is Hollywood after all. I slipped into a downward spiral of drug and alcohol abuse, unable to see my behaviour was a consequence of feelings of failure, how it provided an escape from pressure. When I went down there I had no doubt I would become a rock star. Ah, the hubris of youth.\u00a0 I often joke, “I could write a book about it. Wait, I did write a book about it!” My “incendiary” novel, “The Town Slut’s Daughter<\/a>” depicts the perils of the music industry from a female point of view.\u00a0 Yes, I can joke about it. Human beings are resilient and c’est la vie.\u00a0 I found the North Star, survived and adapted other modes of being while continuing to write about the experience in poems like this. (A rough, first draft.)<\/p>\n

STRIDENT BIRTH RIGHT<\/strong><\/p>\n

Swoon worthy.
\nSome rock stars are.
\nSome rock stars never get old.
\nOthers never die.<\/p>\n

Photography came to canonize,
\ncharacterize mannerisms,
\nexalt sin, hips,
\nthe vulgate that is dance.<\/p>\n

Photographers subjectify sassy,
\nsingers swallowing microphones,
\nvirtuosic strummers riding bareback,
\ncommanding drummers commanding
\nfrom their fort-kits.<\/p>\n

Some rocks stars are regal
\ndespite tiny stages. Taunts.
\nTheir facility dazzles.
\nEssentially lost, rock stars
\nare trip takers.
\nSeekers
\nof song and snowberry clearwings.
\nFinders
\nof the lyric.
\nDiggers
\nunearthing a distinct call,
\ninimitable inflections,
\na new primitive narrative,
\nvoice,
\nturning the inward outward.<\/p>\n

The hard part; keeping it,
\nin spite of thieves and saboteurs,
\nin spite of despotic CEOs,
\nin spite of The Road,
\ndry states, dead-eye
\nmelt downs and plank walks.<\/p>\n

Hard to hold fast in spite
\nof blinding lights,
\ndeafening volume,
\ndizzying flights,
\nthe series of lavish homes
\nand incessant swooning.
\nPhenoms must find the North Star
\nin spite of all the din.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not me but all the phenoms I’ve known. I moved to Los Angeles in 1980 with bandmates Brad, Karla and Randy and our hopes of fame and fortune. The 45s were to open for PIL at the Olympic Auditorium. It was a big deal but we broke up mere days before the event. Like a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[149,236,246],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7697"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7697"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7753,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7697\/revisions\/7753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}