Pop Hymes, drummer extraordinaire, Natchitoches fishing legend and general all-around bon vivant, is fond of telling jokes, particularly ones that focus on musicians in some way. For example:
Three guitarists arrive at a studio to audition for a band. The first one is called, goes into a side room and finds the rest of the auditioning band waiting. He does his thing. When he’s finished, the listening drummer shakes his said and says, “sorry, man, you’ve got too much loft.”The first guitarist is not sure what that means, but understands the rejection. He returns to the waiting room, and signals the second guitarist to go on in. The second guitarist completes his audition, and this time, the bass player grimaces and shakes his head – “sorry, dude, too lofty.” Likewise rejected, the second guitarist confusedly goes back to sit down. The third guitarist finally goes in for his audition. When he’s finished, the lead singer says, “Nope. You’ve got desire, but your performance suffers from loft.”At this point, the third guitarist goes back outside and joins the other two previous guitarists, who are waiting to see if any of them got hired. One says, “I don’t know what these guys want. They said I had too much loft! What the hell is loft?”The other two guitarists describe their experiences too. None of them can figure out what “loft” is. So they decide to find out. They return together to the audition room and say, “what is loft, anyway?”The drummer shakes his head, laughing. “It’s not loft. It’s LOFT. Lack of F***ing Talent.”
This reminds me of things my father used to say:
“You should probably sing tenor. Ten or twelve miles away.”
“Why don’t you take a solo? So low we can’t hear it.”
“You ought to be in Hollywood. The walk would do you good.”
And my favorite …
“You should be on the stage. It leaves in five minutes.”
