I was thinking about how we, as musicians, advance and make progress in our careers. I've come up with something that rings true in terms of every situation that has helped me in my personal journey. It comes down to this: Anytime anything happens “for us,” it comes as the result of a recommendation from someone else. Or someone we knew thought of us.

I spent some time speaking with the guitar tech to then-GN’R guitar player Robin Finck. In one of our conversations, I asked him how often he changes strings on Robin’s guitars. Since Robin then traveled with about 10 guitars, I thought to myself that this is quite a lot of string changing. Chris said something I've thought about ever since then.

Just a few days ago, I spent a week with 42 metalheads aged 10 to 19 at a destination Metal Camp at Camp Lakota in Wurtsboro, New York. It was a fantastic, positive experience on several levels, fueled by young energy, enthusiasm and "go get ‘em" attitude from the young rockers. Many of them wanted to make metal music their life. While I was there, I started to collect my thoughts the definitiuon of "success," and what it could mean to them as metal musicians.