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Page 1
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Rivers' (lack of a) sex life is splashed across newsstands and magazine racks everywhere ...
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Page 2
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The Weezer frontman also gives up sleeping on a bed, eating after noon and speaking ...
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Page 3
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Rick Rubin comes and goes, Rivers returns to Harvard and everyone questions the future ...
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"Yeah, well, um ... that cover story was ... um ... I was really disappointed," he squirms. "The journalist pretended to really like me and understand me and I was really excited to talk to her, and tell her what I was up to. But then the article came out and she was just making fun of me and making me out to be a freak, which I'm really not."
The mere mention of the Rolling Stone cover story is the only time in our interview that Cuomo appears angry. It's also the only time he shows emotion of any sort, spending the majority of our chat looking at the floor, fielding each question with a vacant, plaintive smile. All of this could just be chalked up to Cuomo being some sort of slightly off-kilter, slightly strange outcast, the kind of guy you see in a laundromat or outside the post office. But it's actually the result of his dedication to Vipassana, the meditation he credits for "taking away the fear and sadness" in his life.
"There's no God or no worshipping, no chanting or incense, no beads or garlands. It's just observing what's going on inside your body at any moment and accepting that, not reacting to it," Cuomo explains. "Just accepting it and observing it as closely as you can. And it sounds like there's nothing to it, but man, it really has a powerful effect when you do it a lot.
"Everything I do is more spontaneous and instinctual. I don't worry about things as much," he continues. "And when it comes to writing songs, I'm happy to revise things and listen to other people's input. There's less ego involved in everything. It's just making music. And meditating helps me achieve all that."
But the road to happiness wasn't exactly an easy one. Vipassana is one of the strictest forms of meditation, requiring all participants to adhere to a list of precepts that includes abstaining from all sexual activity and all physical contact. Sleeping in beds is also forbidden, and all who undergo a 10-day Vipassana retreat are also required to fast after midday, taking only tea or fruit juice for nourishment. A vow of silence is observed, as one of Vipassana's main goals is a deep understanding of one's soul through close observation of one's own breathing patterns.
The average retreat is about as far from rock and roll as humanly possible, and Cuomo has been on nearly a dozen in the past two years. Through those retreats, plus his daily meditations, he's obtained an unparalleled level of mental clarity, though he says that one particular tenent of Vipassana, the awareness of the body's reaction to and rejection of emotional stimuli, has been particularly difficult to master. Which, given his occupation — rocking out in front of thousands of screaming fans — seems understandable.
"Well, that's difficult, but through practicing every day, and by going to the intensive courses where I practice all day long, my mind is just in the habit of staying detached and balanced with whatever I'm experiencing. I can't say I'm totally calm when I get up there, but it's a lot smoother experience for me," he says. "That goes for everything. When we first put out the album and started doing promotion, I hadn't done it for several years, so I was very cautious, and I didn't know what it was going to be like. Now I'm a meditator, and everything I do — music, interviews — is easier."
Things might be easier, but there's still the occasional hiccup along the way.
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Photo Credit: Geffen
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