{"id":20248,"date":"2020-01-17T08:00:41","date_gmt":"2020-01-17T16:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.drumeo.com\/beat\/?p=20248"},"modified":"2022-08-19T12:19:35","modified_gmt":"2022-08-19T19:19:35","slug":"jared-falk-play-like-its-your-last-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.drumeo.com\/beat\/jared-falk-play-like-its-your-last-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Play Like It’s Your Last Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

I started playing drums when I was 15, and like many people with a new hobby, I became obsessed with it.<\/p>\n

Within 6 months, I was playing with other people. And within a year of starting, I took on my first student. I was so infatuated with drums, I wouldn\u2019t even consider buying a car unless it could carry a kit.<\/p>\n

My parents had five kids. I\u2019m one of four brothers and a sister: Joseph, Jared, Joshua, James, and Jennifer (my parents liked \u201cJ\u201d names). During the summer, my mom wanted us out of the house and doing something, which I completely understand. I don\u2019t know how she didn\u2019t go insane dealing with us, but somehow she was fine.<\/p>\n

I spent a few summers working on my dad\u2019s construction crew and absolutely hated it. I would be doing roofing in 40 degree weather on a metal roof 20 to 30 feet up. One day, I almost slid off the edge and could\u2019ve died, but luckily someone caught me as I was sliding down.<\/p>\n

At the time, I was playing in this band called Doxa. Rick Enns, who\u2019s still a good friend of mine, ran a lumber mill. He said, \u201cYou should come work for me.\u201d Rick offered me an extra couple bucks per hour, almost 20 percent more than I was paid to work for the family business. I took that job and quit the farm.<\/p>\n

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Looking back on this now, I realize it was quite an ungrateful thing to do. I should have valued the opportunity to work and earn money in the family business. If I had to do it all over again, I would put my head down and just work.<\/p>\n

But as it turns out, lumber mills are much more dangerous than I thought. I almost got my hand cut off twice doing stupid things. At the end of August, it was almost time to go back to school and start my grade 12 year. Dan Kim, the guitar player, came out and we rented a digital four-track machine so we could lock ourselves in the studio and record all weekend.<\/p>\n

At the mill, we were loading in the lumber on carts. They had two wheels in the middle and a couple of stabilizer wheels on the ends. There were two lifts of lumber on this one cart. The length of a \u2018lift\u2019 can vary, but the width and height is usually about 4\u2019 x 4\u2019. The lumber on the cart was about 15-20 feet in length.<\/p>\n

I was standing by a roll-up door between the lifts of lumber and the cinder block doorway to guide the cart in. Rick was nudging the cart with the forklift because it was too heavy to push by hand, which is how we normally moved them. As the wheel went over the concrete lip into the unit, it broke – and several thousand pounds of lumber fell across my chest, pinning me up against the doorway.<\/p>\n

All I remember is standing there and seeing the lumber fall in slow motion. I heard a crunch, and I was out.<\/p>\n

Several thousand pounds of lumber fell across my chest and pinned me up against the doorway.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The other guys were like, \u201cAw, shit, we have to clean up this mess now.\u201d They were on the other side wondering how they were going to move it without dumping it all over. For about thirty seconds, they had no idea I was pinned. When they came around to the other side, they saw me there, unconscious, my face apparently completely purple.<\/p>\n

You\u2019d think five or six guys would be able to get the lumber off me, but they couldn\u2019t. It was too heavy. They had to use the forklift. They pushed enough of it back that I dropped to the ground, and as I woke up I realized my foot was caught underneath. My lungs were filling up with fluid and my breaths were getting shorter and shorter.<\/p>\n

They called 911 and emergency services were en route.<\/p>\n

The fire department showed up and secured everything to make sure it wouldn\u2019t fall on them. Then they took off my shoe, put me on a stretcher, and brought me outside. Blood had started to come out of my nose.<\/p>\n

On the drive to the hospital, I remember checking for my wallet because I was like okay, I\u2019m going to die for sure<\/em>, and I wanted them to be able to identify my body and call my family. I couldn\u2019t really breathe and kept saying to the people around me, \u201cPut me out.\u201d I couldn\u2019t take it anymore.<\/p>\n

Eventually I passed out.<\/p>\n

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They hooked me up to about ten tubes and a catheter in the ICU. I had a punctured and collapsed lung, a lacerated liver, cracked ribs…everything was out of whack internally. The lumber had actually ripped my chest apart just above my left pectoral. I was so hopped up on medication I was out for around three days.<\/p>\n

The doctors initially told my parents, \u201cWe don\u2019t think he\u2019s going to make it.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

You can probably imagine how that went. But after a while, they were able to stabilize me. I was in the hospital for ten days, and during that time I lost a ton of weight and couldn\u2019t walk until the 7th or 8th day because of the chest pain.<\/p>\n

The doctors initially told my parents, \u201cWe don\u2019t think he\u2019s going to make it.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I was so eager to get out of there. A hospital isn\u2019t a fun place to be. My friend brought me a Discman (yup…the kind with 10-second antishock). My bandmates also brought in the recording unit to show me what they\u2019d been working on. I was scheduled to play a gig in a few days and just wanted to go home. The doctors said, \u201cYou shouldn\u2019t do that.\u201d But I had to play. At that time in my life, it was all I really did in my spare time. Everything I did for work – construction, the lumber mill – was only a vehicle to let me play and buy more drums.<\/p>\n

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So I showed up at the venue and couldn\u2019t lift anything, even the drums. I was leaking out the side of my chest. I was white as a ghost and had hardly eaten anything for the last ten days.<\/p>\n

But I played the gig.<\/p>\n

Maybe it\u2019s a drummer thing.<\/p>\n

There are jokes about how drummers aren\u2019t always the smartest. I don\u2019t think we aren\u2019t smart, I think it\u2019s more to do with how much we just love playing so we make bad decisions.<\/p>\n

When someone is truly a drummer in their heart, they have to play, and that sometimes means going against doctors\u2019 orders. Scott Pellegrom flew out to film lessons at Drumeo with a broken leg. Thomas Lang jammed a few days after carpal tunnel surgery. Rick Allen found a way to keep playing after he lost his arm. If we injure our left hand, we play with our right hand, left foot, and right foot. Because that\u2019s just what drummers do.<\/p>\n

We do whatever it takes to play. It\u2019s what we live for: playing that next groove, that next fill, that next gig.<\/p>\n

This August was the 20-year anniversary of the accident. It\u2019s something that has definitely shaped my perspective and view on life. Play like it\u2019s your last time.<\/strong> You hear drummers say that all the time, and we might think, \u201cOh, that\u2019s the common thing to say\u201d…but it\u2019s true.<\/p>\n

We never know when it\u2019s our time. We could die at any moment. I was gung ho to go record on the weekend, but got crushed by a pile of lumber and was in the hospital for ten days. I never thought it would happen to me.<\/p>\n

The fact that I get to play drums, teach drums, and jam with other musicians is such a huge blessing. That\u2019s why I still play pretty much every single day, and at 38 years old, I enjoy it just as much as I did back then.<\/p>\n

I will never, ever take it for granted.<\/p>\n

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Jared Falk<\/h3>\n

DRUMEO<\/strong><\/h6>\n\n\n
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