By Lydia Nadal — More than once I have heard that a handshake is better than an autograph. But I’d like to think that most people would prefer a cup of coffee to a handshake.
It’s Valentine’s Day, and I have arranged for my husband, photographer Brett Nadal, to meet for a drink and a few portraits of one of today’s, arguably, more romantic songwriters and self-proclaimed, underground performing musicians, Vic Ruggiero. A writer and lover of his work, I have come along to get a glimpse into the personal life of someone as elusive and intriguing as Vic.
Vic Ruggiero’s multifaceted handy work can be heard on over 100 albums, recording with artists like, Rancid, Pink, The Pietasters, The Transplants, and his own world-renowned group, The Slackers.
It’s been two hours since our first surprise text message arrived from Vic, reading, “Yeah … Just woke up. Lemme see how the afternoon is lookin.”
After a 30-second conversation, Brett ends the call and stares blankly with a smirk for a moment before explaining that Vic’s words were nearly indiscernible through his hopelessly deep, thick east-coast dialect. But now he thinks he knows where to meet him.
We get a table at a local Cuban cafe in Chicago’s Logan Square but are meeting him at a friend’s place and really have no clue as to where things will go from there. There was no art direction or production … No stylists and no hair or make-up. It was only two artists meeting over some coffee. This was what movies are made of … Well, documentary movies, at least.
Vic tells Brett over the phone that he can be ready in about 15 minutes, and that he needs to meet some friends, suggesting that maybe we “ride around for a little while.” “Ride around for a little while?!” Brett repeated in a panic.
We began shooting each other painfully horrifying looks of desperation as nightmarish images began clouding our minds of awkward photos taken of Vic Ruggiero from inside a cluttered, drab, gray, Japanese grocery-getter.
Never having to play cabbie for anyone he’s ever photographed before, I’m not sure which part of this whole ordeal was more exasperating for Brett; that he hasn’t had time to plan a single shot of one of his favorite musicians, a “punk-scene genius” as he describes, or that in less than 15 minutes Vic’s first impression of him was going to be the inside of his family car.
Though Brett is an artist as well, he likes to think that as a photographer, he can hide behind an anonymity that offers him that luxury of being on the safe side of a microscope. A musician and world-traveler himself, he also has his quirks, but Brett isn’t thinking about that right now. Instead, he’s obsessed with the thought that the truthful and entirely objective Vic Ruggiero is going to observe the baby toys and stale fries and crackers strewn about the car, and take him for something that he isn’t. A hack.
Let’s be honest here, had Brett gone through protocol and producers, things would not have been so unorganized. But Vic doesn’t seem to work like that. After trying to orchestrate a meeting with him for years, I finally figured him out. I went to his show the night before and asked him myself.
Now parked in front of the place Vic is staying, I make myself comfortable in the back seat and watch through the icy windshield as Vic greets Brett at the door; Vic coming equipped with a guitar and a suitcase … Where in the Hell were we going to fit all that? (Brett’s already compact car comes complete with a baby stroller and a child seat for which he has designated the trunk as a practical hiding place). I listen as the trunk pops open and Brett apologizes for the clutter. Without a moment’s hesitation, Vic maneuvers his guitar to fit perfectly over Brett’s cargo, and happily offers to ride with his suitcase in his lap. We’re going to be fine.
Something I have always liked to believe is that people, for the most part, are good. Well, they have good intentions, anyways. When I asked Vic if he would do a portrait session, just before he played a gig in a little punk rock bar in Chicago, I had convinced myself with a few Rum drinks that the world really is a simple place when you treat it like one. His response to me was, “Yea, I’ve got a soft-spot for photographers,” which he later explained as being part of his personal understanding of what it’s like to be an artist.
So, while sitting in the back of the car, listening to the two of them talk, I began conjuring up ways I would write this story. I realized that the real story wasn’t about cramming an underground music icon into a tiny little car and driving him around – but that it was about the two of them maneuvering a conversation through Chicago streets, as artists.
As we walked into the Cuban cafe, where the two of them would indulge in a couple cafecitos and some fried plantains, Brett made mention of Vic’s constant traveling, to which Vic retorted with a deep, guttural, thick east coast-something-or-other about how he should probably give himself a break. A traveler by nature, Brett has not kept the same address for more than 3 months at a time for over 5 years. And after spending a few rainy nights under benches in unfamiliar cities all over Europe, Brett could not have understood more the importance of a “break.” They had found good company in each other and a common ground at the very least.
Brett’s photographic style is neither perfectly homogeneous nor concrete; it is his methodology which makes his art its own. One trick to portraying people, Brett says, is to make them comfortable. He does this by establishing a common ground between the subject and himself.
We journalists tend to delve into the lives of so many, often overlooking the sometimes quite intricate stories of our own – flashing right before our eyes. Sure, Brett may not sell out shows in cities all over the world, and sure, he may not have a fan page, but everybody has a story. He will tell you that it is his fondness of travel that guided his fondness of photography – because it, like so few careers, has the ability to physically take you places — sometimes glamorous, sometimes not — but most often into the lives of others.
Though I’m sure travel has made its impact in one way or another on Vic’s music career, it seems that his love for the art was crafted from a long line of his family’s devotion to it. On the subject of his Italian heritage, Vic laughed about how he had never met an Italian who couldn’t sing – except for maybe his own Grandmother.
“Did she at least think she could sing?” Brett asked.
“No,” he replied, smiling. “She knew she could.”
If I’ve learned anything from being around artists and as one myself, it is that humility truly is something of virtue as well as something one must come to terms with. While keeping perfect eye contact with both of us, speaking with his hands and smiling, Vic told us that “out of all the times I’ve played any single song, I have probably played it right only once.”
Many visual artists believe that their work is never completely finished, and that perfection is a fallacy. Regarding photographs, Brett believes that the snap of the camera is really just the beginning, and understanding editing is the true key to making beautiful images.
Modestly unveiling a bit of his photo knowledge, Vic mentioned that he had once heard from a professional print-maker that “a good photographer will show you 1 photo out of 99, and that a great photographer will show you 1 out of 999.” So, while we wait for that one song to go right, and for that one photo to be captured at just the right moment, we can be thankful that art is not about a final product, but instead about the process of achieving what was intended.
It is humbling how real a life like Vic’s actually is. As he sat with us, wearing the same pants he had performed in the night before, a blue-collared shirt with his name sewn into it and a thick, black, Russian-style winter hat, Vic explained to us that notoriety is neither something he had planned for, nor something he finds glamorous.
One conversation with him just made everything seem so easy. Maybe it’s the poet in him, or maybe not. But as he sat with his hands clasped around a tiny paper cup filled with espresso, seemingly enjoying himself on an icy-but-quaint Sunday afternoon in Chicago, he made the life of a traveling musician seem so appealing. “Book me a show,” he would say upon the suggestion of playing new cities. He made it sound so simple. I began thinking that maybe I should pick up my trombone and book myself a few shows.
Before everything was said and done, Brett offered to take a portrait of Vic with a friend and fellow artist; a modern-day beatnik and stand-up artist, as Vic described, who had coincidentally fallen from a two story rooftop the night before. Crutches-clad, with a hospital bracelet, foot cast and a cigarette, he and Vic sat together for a photo on the steps of a classic Chicago flat, looking like a scene from another decade.
It was all a classic reminder that the bohemians, the beatniks and transcendentalists of times past still exist, faithfully inspiring hearts of today’s artists, sharing coffee and car-pooling from show to show.
