Hearing My Voice After More Than a Year

I haven’t sung in over a year… I mean, besides humming a song or two once in a while. So when I had the clearance to slowly get back in shape from my otolaryngologist, I was excited, but wondered what my voice would sound like after such a long time without being used… Especially that, after being intubated for a considerable period throughout my surgery and my first days in intensive care, it took me 3 months to talk somehow normally following that intense procedure. If I was eager to jump right back in, I was a little hesitant to find myself far remote from where I was a year ago. Singing is an emotional engagement, a form of letting go that needs to navigate through all the psychological aspects I’ve been carrying over the years; profound doubtfulnesses, insecurities that used to paralyze my inner will to scream, artifacts of my past still floating all over my head… My concern was more about the affective involvement of singing than the theoretical elements associated with it. It’s always all or nothing for me, may it be whispering or clamoring. And in order to be “all”, I have to reduce those distrustful and diminishing voices to “nothing”. It has always required a large measure of will for me to do so. I used to be concernedly sick before every single concert during my tenure as Your Favorite Enemies’ leader… 10 years is a long time when you are captive of your own limitative nightmares. It’s something I had to face before fully committing myself to my solo adventure… Meditations, visualizations, deprogrammation. It’s been a journey deep within before I could enjoy being on stage like I do now. So where am I at now concerning singing? That’s a frightening reflection for me to find answers to.
When I held a microphone in my hands after that long, with that highly disturbing stigmata, I was shaking inside. “What if? What if… What if everything stops being so great? What if my management stops believing in me? What if my producer is a worldwide genius and becomes disappointed? What if the album production starts in a few days and I’m not ready? What if I can’t sing? What if I can’t hold a note? What if I don’t have ideas for melodies? What if I suck? What if I let down everyone again? What if? What if? What if the whole band is in the studio control room with me excited and cheering me up and I still can’t do it? What if? What if? What if I’m being filmed? What if…?” And I felt Ben’s hand lightly holding my arm: “You’re not alone anymore, now it’s our turn to take care of you. Take your time, there’s no pressure, we can wait if you want. It can be only you and I or I can leave you alone as well. It’s your moment and we are there to live it with you if you want us to do so,” he said with a comforting smile. Then I felt Jeff’s hands on my shoulders: “You’ve been screaming at us all day to do this and that or not this or that… Spoken words will be a comforting motion for you to dwell on.” And I started laughing. He wasn’t wrong!

I took the mic I had somehow pushed away from me unconsciously, closed my eyes, saw music as a stream of wonderful colors, and started hearing my voice in the speakers. Nothing spectacular, nothing memorable if not for the uplifting sensations it gave me. What if I can? What if I feel great? What if I want to keep going? What if I want to explore more? What if I want to abandon myself deeper? Psychologists have established that we need an average of five positive thoughts to overcome one negative…
I can.
I feel great.
I want to keep going.
I want to explore more.
I want to abandon myself deeply.

That’s no mantra, it is the truth. Even if it is only the truth of a moment, it’s no less of a truth, and it’s enough of an acknowledgment to start building my newborn entity upon. It is reality, and the rest is a construct of my fears and other post-traumatic stress disorders.

I finished repeating my 2 lines, looked at Ben, and said: “Yeah, I have to find the proper emotional tone in order to naturally lift up with the musical waves blooming underneath.” Everybody started loudly laughing. “HE’S BACK!!!” Ben screamed. “What? What’s happening?” I asked seriously. “Bro! You haven’t held a mic in a year, you lost your voice, you are back in the studio for about a minute, you sang 2 lines and you are already commenting about the song’s motions…! We don’t care about that, let’s enjoy the battle won, the war will wait,” Ben answered. Miss Isabel was crying and Jeff came hugging me while whispering he was proud of me. I laughed, glad nobody had told me how significant of a moment it would become beforehand, as I would definitely have frozen…!

Moose came back with glasses of the Talisker whisky Ben had bought to celebrate moments such as this one. It’s been a wonderful day!