Agent Palmer

The Netflix original film Quincy isn’t just a great documentary about Quincy Jones’ prolific music career. It’s a great reminder that, as an icon, Quincy’s reach and the scope of his work went far beyond entertainment and into social justice and the ongoing inspiration of generations.

Whatever you conjure in your mind when you read about Quincy Jones on the page or in this post, is just a fraction of what he has accomplished…

Tom Petty is iconic with, and that’s without the Heartbreakers or Traveling Wilburys. On his second solo album, 1994’s “Wildflowers,” Petty cemented himself as a legendary singer-songwriter. While he already was an icon to most of us after eight albums with the Heartbreakers and another two with the Wilburys, this removed all doubt.

“Somewhere You Feel Free” is a documentary with some modern interviews peppered in.

If you have been listening to The Palmer Files podcast or following me on Twitter, then you know I am interested in the process. I love figuring out how it’s done, how to do it better, how to create and recreate. I’m intrigued by all of it, and “It All Begins with a Song” is absolutely about the process.

It’s the story of Nashville as the songwriting capital of the world, but it’s also about the process of songwriting, which is applicable to any and all creative endeavors. For this reason, every creator should watch this documentary.

I have been out of work. I have been networking and applying and battling depression throughout a pandemic. But I have also maintained this blog and a podcast and kept up to date with digital marketing trends.

And yet, commonly, people I respect ask me “what of this have you done for money?” I’m sick of the sentiment. If a runner runs a few laps on their own because they got to practice early, most coaches will count that. If a musician practices on their own time to get better that’s experience that is important to the craft. There are many other examples of this.

“On the evening of July 25, 1965, Bob Dylan took the stage at Newport Folk Festival, backed by an electric band, and roared into his new rock hit, Like a Rolling Stone. The audience of committed folk purists and political activists who had hailed him as their acoustic prophet reacted with a mix of shock, booing, and scattered cheers.

It was the shot heard round the world—Dylan’s declaration of musical independence, the end of the folk revival, and the birth of rock as the voice of a generation—and one of the defining moments in twentieth-century music.”