The People I Know: The Interesting Stories of Uninteresting People

While working for a now defunct website called Neighbour Knowledge I had the opportunity to meet with and interview many local business people. Typically I’d give these people a platform to promote their products or brand while getting them to open up about the community in which they live and/or work. These interviews were published online and in promotion materials and were intended to draw visitors to the site.

Well, visitors never really came to the site. But not because the stories weren’t interesting or engaging, there just wasn’t much else there. So Neighbour Knowledge went under and I had to move on to something else.

While working on other projects I’d often think back to how fun it was working for Neighbour Knowledge. While there, I made an effort to interview people who were excited about their lives because I found their enthusiasm infectious. Artists, activists and niche entrepreneurs, these were the people I’d look most forward to meeting and writing about.

But sometimes I’d manage to book some time with someone who you wouldn’t think would be terribly interesting: a dentist, a barista, a restaurant owner, etc. and they would captivate me with their story. To a brash young college graduate like myself the idea that most people, as bland as they may outwardly appear, are in fact really interesting, was a revelation.

In conversation I’ve always been interested in the particularities of people’s lives. In what really makes them tick. To my delight, most people, the interesting ones at least, were willing to share their thoughts with me and, in most cases, did so quite eloquently.

This line of thinking led me to the idea of interviewing and profiling my friends and family in the hopes of learning some interesting things about them. Of course, a short interview and one-thousand words isn’t going to capture a person’s entire past, or their intended future. It won’t describe all of their hopes or fears. Hell, most people could talk to me for hours about their first car.

But I’m not looking to tell anyone’s life story. Rather, what I’m hoping to do is uncover something new, something interesting that I didn’t know about that person before. I’m looking for the interesting stories of seemingly uninteresting people.

Choosing which people I’d like to take part in this project could pose a problem. A problem that I’ll admit, I haven’t really developed a solution for yet. I could wait for people to volunteer their time and story to me or I could actively seek out people and their stories. It’s something that I’ll have to figure out, but first I’d like to get your thoughts on this project. Please comment and let me know whether or not you’d find these stories interesting, what sort of questions you’d like to see asked, which people you’d like to read about.

Basically, I’m looking for spark and I’m hoping you can provide it. So, whaddya think?

Beatlemania 2.0

I like my life. I have a loving wife, good friends, a decent job and I’m not a complete rube. At this point in my life it’d be tough to convince me to trade places with anyone…anyone but Paul McCartney. I love Paul McCartney because not only is he one of the greatest songwriters of all time, he’s the only guy that could ever make playing the bass in Rock Band actually fun.

If you’ve never been stuck playing the bass parts on the time suck known as Rock Band or Guitar Hero, let me break it down for you. It’s not fun. Your friends, whom you will soon grow to hate, either get to shred through guitar solos, pound out drum fills, or wail out vocals while you have to play the same dumbass (get it?) bass line the entire song.

Bass is not cool, whether in real life or in video games. In fact a quick look at some of the world’s most ‘famous’ bassists reveals just how lame the bass actually is. Flea, bassist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Les Claypool, bassist for Primus, are usually considered the best known and most accomplished bassists in the world and I can’t take either one of them seriously. The Red Hot Chili Peppers, despite having John Frusciante as their guitarist, stink and Primus’ biggest accomplishment is having written the theme to South Park. In fact the only cool bassists in history have been the ones who aren’t especially known for their ability to play the bass. Guys like Geddy Lee of Rush, Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy and, you betcha, Sir Paul McCartney.

Last week the entire Beatles discography was re-released after having been digitally remastered. I’ve yet to hear any of the releases, but I’m sure that they’ll only put a bigger spotlight on Paul McCartney’s bass playing and show just how intricate it was to the Beatles. Obvious examples like ‘Taxman’ and ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ demonstrate how Paul’s bass can lay the foundation for an entire song, while tracks like ‘Something’, ‘Dear Prudence’ and ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’ show how he has the ability to add something extra, yet absolutely necessary, to a song.

It’s these ‘something extra’ moments in each song that will have me reaching for the bass when I finally pick up a copy of the Beatles Rock Band game. That is, unless the drums and guitar are available. I mean after all, as cool as those bass lines may be, it’s still the bass.