Just rushed upstairs to see if my server had crashed. You see I was getting no e-mail on my BlackBerry, which sometimes is an indicator. But it turns out everything is up and running, so I’m gonna tell you what’s going on.

I just heard Seymour Stein and Tommy Ramone interviewed by this guy from "The Nation". At this point, Seymour is a friend, and I sat next to Tommy last night, but the interviewer managed to extract some salient points from these two gentlemen I was unaware of. Like Joey Ramone’s two favorite acts were Abba and the Beach Boys. When Seymour signed Brian Wilson, he sent Joey tracks. Back before you could e-mail them, when they had to be pressed into vinyl, or stored on cassette.

That’s all we’ve been hearing about in the music business recently. The future. But it’s history that’s important, it’s history that is interesting.

When Seymour starts talking about the records of his youth, going up to Harlem to buy discs he’d heard of but that were unbuyable in lower Manhattan, I get that rush. He’s addicted. I was. And probably you too.

I can tell you about guitarists for English acts that never made it in the U.S. Someone will name a city and I’ll say that’s where so and so recording studio is. Or where some band member was born. I didn’t study this for a test. I needed to know, I just couldn’t get enough.

To hear Seymour and Tommy wax rhapsodic about the seventies I’m reminded that even though the Beatles had already broken up, the scene was vital, music still counted.

I have a theory, Clive Davis killed music. Not single-handedly, of course. The album and credible acts ruled. But Clive believed in the single. Then he had two imitators, Charles Koppelman at SBK and his old protege Donnie Ienner at Columbia. The business flipped from one of soulfulness to one of profiteering. Where it was about the song, not the act. And the public tuned out. They wanted to live in a village more vital. Like in the realm of video games.

Felice and I are doing very well on tour. We’ve finally gotten out of London. We can play in Paris, Berlin and Stockholm. First we earned a van, now we’ve got a bus! But to get some roadies, we’ve got to play at a higher level, and we’re just not that good yet. I’m not anyway. But while we were playing on the continent, Rock Band told us we could now perform "Blitzkrieg Bop".

That’s one of teenagers’ favorite acts, the Ramones. They’ve downloaded all the singles, it’s classic material to them. Tommy said it meant everything to Joey to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. I’d like to tell him more importantly, he’s made it into a hit video game, not only anointing the band’s power, but introducing his material to so many new fans. Its power, its majesty. Awards are stashed in a closet, maybe put on a mantelpiece for a handful to see. Great songs, great records live on FOREVER!

As does Gordon Lightfoot’s "If You Could Read My Mind".

I bet Joey Ramone was a Lightfoot fan. He liked exquisite pop material.

To celebrate this guy John Brunton’s induction into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame last night, Gordon came out and played a couple of tunes. On a battered Martin one step removed from Willie Nelson’s weathered axe.

Gordon looks out of place. Like he’s a maitre d’ or the debonair greeter at a casino or something. Then he starts strumming, closes his eyes and starts to sing and it’s like life itself.

He’s known for his voice, but it’s his picking that mesmerizes you. His fingers glancing perfectly across the strings. The instrument remains the same, it’s the player that extracts the sound. The notes sounded only like him.

And his vocal, he’s not playing to the back row, rather the first. So the room goes completely quiet, everybody paying attention, straining to hear, like a congregation listens to a clergyman.

Gordon didn’t play my favorite, "The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald", nor the track I play most these days, "Song For A Winter’s Night", but one unknown to me, "Restless".

There’s a kind of a restless feeling and it catches you off guard
As we gaze off at the distance through the trees in my back yard

That’s what great music does, it catches you off guard. You don’t expect it. It sneaks up on you. And, as you listen to it, you can see that highway in front of you known as your life, waiting for you to drive on down. Meanwhile, in the rearview mirror, you can see the past.

And there’s this one change in the song that surprises you. Like the bridge in a Beatles number. The song transcends into greatness.

I didn’t want "Restless" to end.

Then came "If You Could Read My Mind".

I never thought I could act this way
And I’ve got to say that I just don’t get it
I don’t know where we went wrong
But the feeling’s gone and I just can’t get it back

That’s love. People tell you the breakup was mutual. Hogwash. Never the case. Then you’d stay together. One person left. Looking for something better, done with the pain. And you’re left there, wondering what went wrong. At least Gordon’s trying to explain here. Usually they never do. They’re too weak, too ashamed, they’ve just got to move on.

I’m not sure if the feeling evaporates that quickly. So many relationships can be rescued. But we can’t read each other’s minds, we don’t know what lurks in their past, what motivates them to behave this way.

And listening to "If You Could Read My Mind" you experience life in a way no movie or television show can accomplish. A great book can come close, but when music nails a feeling, an emotion, a story, it’s like being wrapped up in it. And every time you play that record you remember. Not only where you were when you heard it, but what you felt.

And it’s this power that draws us to this business.

Terry McBride said last night that he lived below the poverty level for ten years, the first decade of Nettwerk. He had a dream, he didn’t go work for the man, he pursued his quest. There was no safety net. Maybe that’s why today’s big labels are so bad. It’s not executives’ money, not their company, they’re not at risk. And the records too often are not those of the artists. They’re concoctions written by song doctors for a market, Top Forty radio. They contain no soul, we can’t relate to them.

But when we hear "Blitzkrieg Bop" we hear originality. While Clive Davis’ productions have faded into history (when was the last time you listened to Whitney Houston?), the Ramones live on, bigger than ever.

When we hear "If You Could Read My Mind", we’re reminded of a different era. When we were glued to our transistors, when music was the most important art form, the one that told you which way the wind blew, because it contained TRUTH!

The focus has become on lifestyle. What the moguls own, their private jets. But we all listen the same. Through our two ears. I’ve sacrificed everything in pursuit of this experience…love, children, real estate and cash. Sure, I’m hoping to make it big in the end, that’s the rock and roll dream. And we’re all dreamers. And the music has been the soundtrack to our mental pictures. We wouldn’t have it any other way.