"NO! You suck"

[jonathansorensen]

I want to share something personal and a little embarrassing. I was reading some recent returns and checking the feedback when I noticed I apparently haven't read a lot of the feedback from taxi listings over the past 3 years. I was very focused on yes/no. If they said no, I didn't want to hear it. Today I went and read 2 years back. I realized a couple of huge things.

1. of the feedback I read, there were extremely positive things said. A lot of them said, tweak this and that and I'm sure you're going to get a forward from this. Out of the whole thing there would be one or two constructive comments and that was the only thing I remembered. And I also remembered it as MUCH harsher than it was. Without fail, most of the feedback was engaged, there was genuine appreciation and people kept telling me that I WAS CLOSE. I just needed a little tweaking. All I heard was “no, you suck”. One screener said, this song isn't right but with your level of talent I'm sure you have something in your library that is right for this listing. I just heard, “NO, you suck”. I could have gotten placement years ago if I hadn't slammed myself and gotten depressed every time I heard a “no” I even had one piece of feedback that said, do A, B & C and resubmit it. I'll forward it. I only heard "No, you suck"

2. Even dumber on my part; most of the “no's” were very very positive about the song but the song wasn't anywhere close to what the listing was asking for. Screeners were telling me over and over that it was a great song, they loved it but they couldn't forward it because it wasn't on target. They even told me what genre to target but often I would never submit the song again because all I heard was “no, you suck”. I even took a year off and didn't submit anything because I got discouraged. Screeners have been telling me I'm a talented writer. They've been telling me, do a, b & c and you're there. All I heard was “NO, you suck”.

Conclusion: I have a positive filter, i.e. I filtered out the positive. I only heard "no". What absolute BS. That thinking has slowed me down by 2 years, at least.
I'm sure many of you don't have this problem but if you do, take it from me. Get over it as fast as you can.

Sincerely,
Jon

[guitaroboe]

PLEASE DO NOT POST YOUR RANTS allover THE FORUMS!

relax and take a deep breath.

Adonis

[brandonamatias]

PLEASE DO NOT POST YOUR RANTS allover THE FORUMS!

relax and take a deep breath.

Adonis

Adonis,

I don't feel like this is a bad rant at all (or even really a rant). I feel like Jon is saying that if it wasn't for him taking things the wrong way, he would be a lot further than where he is now with Taxi and his songwriting. At least this is how I am interpreting it. If this is how you're feeling Jon, I applaud you. It's always tough to hear that you're not good enough for something. But what Taxi is SO GREAT at doing is picking up the positives, and letting you know of the areas where you might need to improve, IN A NICE WAY! lol (Not so much in other areas of the music industry)

Have a good one guys!

Brandon

[Casey H]

PLEASE DO NOT POST YOUR RANTS allover THE FORUMS!

relax and take a deep breath.

Adonis

Not sure I understand this response. Am I missing something?

Casey

[guitaroboe]

Ok, folks.
As (most of) you know, English is not my first language so I may not be
too familiar with the true meaning of the word 'rant'.
Basically I meant that we should not put the same post in more than one place in the forums.
Never meant to offend anyone.
Peace
Adonis

[Casey H]

Sorry.... I didn't see the post in multiple places- that must have been fixed. So I was confused.

No worries, Adonis!

Casey

[ottlukk]

Adonis: This definitely was not a "rant". To confuse you further, it was a "mea culpa", and an excellent one at that.
Ott

[kshore56]

I think we ALL have filtered out the positives at one time or another - or most of the time even!
Learning how to see feedback as useful information and NOT "rejection" is the key to surviving this crazy music world. (or this world in general!).

A quote on my office wall:
Success in life consists of going from one mistake to the next without losing your enthusiasm.
- Winston Churchill

Thanks for the comment, Jon. (whoever called this a "rant" didn't read the post!)

[jonathansorensen]

I think we ALL have filtered out the positives at one time or another - or most of the time even!
Learning how to see feedback as useful information and NOT "rejection" is the key to surviving this crazy music world. (or this world in general!).

A quote on my office wall:
Success in life consists of going from one mistake to the next without losing your enthusiasm.
- Winston Churchill

Thanks for the comment, Jon. (whoever called this a "rant" didn't read the post!)

Thanks all for the responses. Yes, it's a tendency that is probably common but it's quite surprising when you put together 2 years and see that it has slowly and surely led you to exactly the wrong conclusion. I guess that was why it was so surprising. I know that I often filter out the positive and focus on the negative but I'd always assumed that I readjusted and continued on a path reasonably connected to the real situation. I guess my message to myself and others was that if you have these sorts of thinking processes, you might be really surprised at how insidious they are and I can say for sure, I had no idea how much it was, in very real and concrete ways, slowing me down.

It was a great realization for me because when those moments come, I can really jump on it and redirect in a more successful way.
Anyway, thanks for the thoughts.

Jon

[matto]

GREAT post Jon!

You're definitely not the only one suffering from this type of 'positive filter' condition.
I think we're all really focused on "going somewhere" with our music. When we receive a 'return' we tend to focus on the fact that this time, this particular song didn't "go anywhere", which of course is frustrating. Instead we should try to remember that the feedback provided with the return may be the very thing that helps the song, or future songs, "go somewhere" in the future.

Of course it's easier said than done, but this is one of those cases where a simple change of perspective may make the difference between success and failure...

matto