Paul Schiernecker

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  • What’s the story?

    I spent the weekend trying to write and record music, a project that I eventually gave up because I figured I will never get it to sound as good as it will in my head. I can’t work out why I’m not satisfied with anything I’m doing at the moment. Maybe it’s a sign that I need to change tact or that I need to put in more practice or something, all I know is that I’m wasting hours on ideas that are obviously not as realised as I had first thought.

    I don’t think it helps that I’m not particularly settled at the moment, I want to move around the whole time and that’s obviously not possible if you’re supposed to be working. Maybe something will give and that tiny shift will enhance everything else. Here’s to hoping anyway.

  • Rain on me.

    This morning you find me tucked up in my girlfriend’s bed. She has made me tea and is preparing for work. Even with the blinds drawn I can see the grey of Sunday and hear the rain. It’s a different rain to Paris though, I’m bothered by it.

    Yesterday I did actually manage to get some work done in between running about but I need to go back to it today to see if it is worth a damn. That’s the rule of working. Give it a day to settle before you look at it again. There have been far too many occasions where I’ve continuously tried tweaking and resolving issues I thought I was having only to find on inspection that I’d royally fucked the whole lot up and It was fine as it was before.

    I also spent some time with a very good friend of mine for lunch yesterday. We realised that we hadn’t seen each other in about three months and came up with the genius move of going to play mini golf in Southend. I often forget that I live near enough in a seaside town. Southend never feels the way Brighton or Bournemouth do to me though. With the sporadic patches of brilliant sun we had I enjoyed some time away from my desk with someone who makes me laugh and genuinely cares about what I’ve been up to. That’s what friendship is.

  • Another weekend.

    I had planned on getting up impressively early and working all day today. As it is I’ve just rolled out of bed now and I’m going for a run. Then I’m seeing a friend, then I’m busy this evening so my weekend of getting things sorted becomes just another weekend.

    I know I shouldn’t kick up a fuss but I need time and having a Monday to Friday 9-5 job means that the weekends are my precious own time. I guess I should just take it easy and relax, drink too much and put on Facebook that I can’t move because I’m so hungover but that’s not where I’m at or what I want to be doing anymore. I need this time to get things done and it frustrates me that I can’t because I have a social life.

    I know, this is awful as a post.

  • Mancrush Friday – Heath Ledger

    I recently rewatched The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus, the 2009 Terry Gilliam film which halted production due to the untimely death of its leading man Heath Ledger. They later decided to tweak the story and got Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell to play Tony in varying depths of other worlds. It’s an enjoyable yet somewhat disjointed film that gives a glimpse of what Ledger could have done had he completed the film.

    I’ve been a fan since 10 Things I Hate About You which at first I dismissed as nonsensical 90’s romantic comedy which seemed to be doing the rounds at the time. It was only when a close friend told me that I was really missing out that I watched it, and appreciated the work that had gone into twisting The Taming Of The Shrew and taking it to an American high school. After that I kept an eye on Heath Ledger through Monsters Ball, Ned Kelly and A Knights Tale.

    He seemed to come from the same school of acting as Johnny Depp, it was as though he had other objectives and acting was the means of getting to it. He was a rock and roll actor. It shone through in his performances in Lords of Dogtown, Casanova and I’m Not There. There was something rebellious and yet something wholesome and likeable about him at the same time.

    It’s just a shame that we have a finite collection of his work now, but what a body of work to call your own.

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  • Just run.

    I managed to drag my skinny arse out of bed this morning and go for a three mile run. I can’t seem to get cool again. It did give me time to think though, and that’s why I do it.

    It’s so easy to get wrapped up in all of the little things that we think our lives consist of that it’s really good to just run them off. That’s my approach to it anyway. I do some of my best thinking whilst running (and also in the bath (yes, like Archimedes)). What I like to do is spend the first half mile just getting used to running, on the basis that twenty minutes before my body had been rolled up in a duvet dreaming of electric sheep, quicksand or forced marriages.

    After that first half a mile I open my mind and I think about what I’m working on, whether that be a novel, script, song, my actual job. I’ve written entire chapters in my head doing this, it helps to be away from being able to do it if that helps, it gives me a chance to think the whole thing through, not just to jump into it like I tend to.

    This morning I was thinking about a long-stalled project that I’ve been pondering on and off for over a year, I won’t say anymore than that because it may never evolve beyond being an idea I had whilst running. The important thing is that without a tool to hand I can just think, and it’s a nice break from everything else.

    Go and do it now, just do a mile, you’ll be amazed how you snap out of thinking about running. You let your body do what it does, and get on with some thinking.

  • Passion.

    Last night I had a wonderful evening with some of the best people around. My girlfriend served up duck and dauphinoise potatoes that would blow your mind.

    Over the course of a couple of glasses of wine I got into a lengthy discussion with her brother Joe who has set his sights on self recording, producing and releasing an album. It’s a goal I have thought and written about at length and it’s nice to be able to swap stories on technique and heartbreak. The joy of these conversations is that Joe has that fire to do it, it’s a rare quality to find in someone. We both work full time but are intent on trying to do what we love.

    We talk about the problems of just getting someone to listen to what it is that you are doing, and how isolated it is as a hobby. We have both literally spent entire days sat in the dark in front of a screen and emerged with little more than a basic drum track. It’s what I talk about so often though, you have to try. Talking to someone who has similar goals is the only anchor you can have when it’s entirely your own project, it’s our own private Musicians Anonymous meeting and I thank our girlfriends for being so understanding.

  • Are you gonna go my way?

    Feel a little conspired against at the moment. A lot of it I can’t go into which is obviously frustrating to anyone reading this. All I will say is that you can’t trust anyone’s word.

    What I want is for things to tip back the other way, it wouldn’t take a lot. I’m giving fate and chance and coincidence a lot of opportunity so I hope in the coming weeks I don’t feel quite so humdrum.

    Don’t get me wrong, I’m very lucky to be young, in love, have a job and an excellent jumper collection but I’m being greedy and that’s human nature so it’s fine.

  • Grindhouse.

    Back to standard every day work. It’s not that I don’t enjoy my job, it’s just that the last two weeks (at my leisure) have shown me the life I want. I can sit and write or make music for days on end, I can spend some quality time with my girlfriend, I can get things in motion.

    I miss Paris. I know that’s the point of a holiday but I don’t usually get this hung up on things. It is one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen (if not the most) and I got to enjoy it all with the girl I love.

    I think what this two weeks has given me is an insight into how things could be if everything goes my way, if I get picked up by an agency or a publisher and catapulted. I know it’s unlikely but a boy has to dream, otherwise what is there?

  • Petit singe.

    Woke up this morning back in England. All I want to do is wish people bonjour but it just doesn’t have the same impact as it did in Paris. It doesn’t help that I’m home alone. I really wanted to be able to regale my family with the tales of my travels but nobody is about to listen. I might tell the dog, he seemed happy to see me.

    Went downstairs to make myself a cafe au lait and found a manilla envelope with my own handwriting on it. It’s my first rejection letter for my novel. It reads as though they don’t think it’s commercial enough, but it’s just a standard response, there’s nothing specific about what I’ve written, they didn’t even bother to print my name, it’s just handwritten. Guess it is just not the right agency for me. I know there are thousands of others out there and that eventually someone will see in Situation One what I see in it, I know it’s a good story, and that it could have a market, just got to find the people who know how to forward that on for me. It’s not a disheartening thing, it’s quite uplifting, it’s just another person to prove wrong, another little obstacle to overcome. I read yesterday (in Patti Smith’s Just Kids) that when you hit a wall the best thing to do is kick it down and that is what I intend to do. I’m in the process of submitting two short stories to Dazed & Confused, I’m working on an article for an online magazine, there’s a Rocliffe New Writing competition for comedy writers coming up, and there are other agents and publishers who might get me.

    Until then I’m very happy in the universe I inhabit.

  • Sanctuary!

    Yesterday was quite the adventure. There were still a couple of key visiting Paris hot spots that we needed to check out and from what I can tell we hit them all.

    We set out early for Notre Dame in the hope that the place wouldn’t be full of tourists (yes we appreciate the irony in being tourists ourselves). We were there just after nine and it wasn’t too bad. We sat through some of the service, lit candles and made our own version of prayers before realising that to go on the tour of the towers, belfry and rooftops you had to exit the building and join the queue of people down the far side of the building. We queued for about an hour, in sporadic bouts of rain but kept ourselves amused by watching a funeral procession.

    When we got into the tower we were told that as we were under 26 the tour was free if we had proof of ID. There’s a lesson here. Take ID with you. Kate didn’t and I had to seriously flutter my eyelashes to get us both in gratuit. It’s definitely worth doing, the individual gargoyles are beautiful, the whole thing is like a gothic dream. The views were impressive and the Disney version of events will come to mind.

    We then set out for Sacre Couer which is set into the hillside overlooking Paris and is therefore also worthy of a visit. They are quite strict on their no camera rule inside the cathedral itself but the external is the real treat. The overlooking steps and platforms were used to brilliant effect in Amelie alongside many of the local buildings and roads. We managed to find the cafe Amelie works in and while it took far too long to get served because one waiter seemed to have an inability to wait I wasn’t going to let it spoil what it felt we were a part of. Cafe Les Deux Moulins is just around the corner from the Moulin Rouge which is another iconic Parisian landmark secured on film via Baz Luhrmann.

    We then headed for the Louvre but by the time we arrived and saw the queue settled on sitting in the surrounding gardens and dipping our feet in the pool above the gallery. In hindsight I believe this was a better decision. The only piece we could name in the Louvre was the Mona Lisa and to be honest I’ve seen more pictures of the Mona Lisa this week than I care for.

    Once rested we took to the Latin Quarter for another brilliant meal, this time shrimp cocktail and moules et frites. We couldn’t resist another quick trip to Shakespeare & Co so I’m going home with more unread books than I came out with.

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Paul Schiernecker

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