Commit to What You Do

Tonight is the Academy Awards for movies.  But I'm still thinking about something Foo Fighters' Dave Grohl said at music's Grammy Awards two weeks ago.

I'm biased when it comes to music, so I'm not the best judge of who should get a Grammy Award.  I hate most pop music because it's less about the music and more about the performer.  Pop stars build followings based on being outrageous, and putting on concerts centered around lavish sets and showmanship.  Their music is the slickly produced product of careful studio tweaking.

Give me hard-driving rock and roll.  I want long-haired freaks who spent their high-school years in their basement practicing chords and scribbling lyrics in spiral-bound notebooks.  Spare me the glitter and the posturing.

That's why I was happy to see the Foo Fighters win several Grammys.  What really struck me was how they made their album "Wasting Light."  They made it in a garage.  Just like a thousand unknown, struggling bands make theirs.

In their acceptance speech, Dave Grohl said, "To me this award means a lot because it shows that the human element of making music is what's most important.  Singing into a microphone, learning to play an instrument and learning to do your craft, that's the most important thing for people to do."

"It's not about being perfect.  It's not about sounding absolutely correct.  It's not about what goes on in a computer.  It's about what goes on in here (he pointed to his heart) and what goes on here (he pointed to his head)."

Brilliant.

No matter what you do.  Whether you play music, write books, paint houses, build furniture, teach math.  Whatever.  Commit to doing your best at your chosen craft.  That is what's important. 

And it's a philosophy we should all take with us when we get to work on Monday morning.

Here's the video from YouTube: