Diamond Dave's Retirement - Ode to Rock and Roll and the latter 20th Century.

Your Art is Also Your Ghost

When Eddie Van Halen died, I was and still am crushed that I'd never hear new creations from him again. For me, he stood as a pioneer, and the greatest innovator of my favorite artistic instrument - the electric guitar. Today, David Lee Roth announced he's finally retiring for good, after his residency in Vegas. Not a big deal in the scope of what's going on today, and I was not a fan of the modern version of DLR to begin with - but for me, it's another symbol of the end of an era that was golden for me - and it saddens me.

At the same time, I'm reminded of how fortunate I was to have been young and dumb specifically when I was young and dumb. From the 60's-90's, 40 years of artistic magnificence.

Van Halen and Pink Floyd were the chosen soundtrack of my youth, with EVH and David Gilmore the centerline on the highway of my life long love and personally earnest but ultimately failed attempts at music (Talent and desire often live in different universes for most of us).

There was so much great and fresh music and other art I witnessed as new creations during my life in those 40 years - and although I know I'll hear catchy tunes or perhaps even great new works - these works were specifically for my generation, and are therefore precious to me. I'm saddened by the passing of the practitioners and artists I shared this arch with. They are dying off, fading away, moving on as the earth inexorably spins them off.

Van Halen was fun, it was completely unique, and it was as raw and exciting - for me - as it gets when it surfaced. No music spoke to me like rock and roll, even though I enjoyed what had come before - but Van Halen shouted. This was new, and visceral, and it made my blood move a bit faster in my veins. Eddie Van Halen was a revelation; a true virtuoso in an era of music that, historically, was like a nuclear bomb - a blinding flash, and over in the blink of an eye - like all eras, I suppose, in God's time.

Of all the eons and ages, I was born in this one. I shared a life arch with some of the greatest musicians, authors, actors, and other artists in history. As did those before me and those that will follow - but these were mine; for my generation. We shared our youth uniquely.

Art isn't over - it isn't dead, by any means; but the art I find interesting probably is. God will bless the generations to come with art that speaks to their very different spirits and very different realities. My time of fresh realities and dreams is coming to a close, as it should. I cherish every moment of it, even the hard ones, because joy was found through my ears and my eyes, and it infused my spirit. I was meant to hear and see these things in my time.

I feel so fortunate to have lived in this era - and to have heard their music as it came into existence. God blessed me with the art I love and the artists that delivered it in my lifetime to perfection.

I hope and pray my children and theirs will be so fortunate in their artistic experience.

Art is the human expressive emotion of life in its unique time and place, later a whisper of the ghosts of youth - gone in its creative fervor, and never to be replicated exactly again. A living thing only as an expression from a living being. A marker in an eventually dog eared book of one person's life - but those pages can be read for as long as they physically exist. The expression can be immortal, but the creator of the expression is as fragile and temporary as the moment in which they emote.

Everything after the creative shout is an echo.

Rock and roll may not often be of or about God (Sometimes quite the opposite), but the inspiration for all art that makes you feel happy and positive came FROM God through its practitioners.

Adios, DLR, Eddie, and the artists of my youth - and happy trails.