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With 2025 here, I am trying to get a release out at least every month. “Gloomy Skies” is the latest release put out in January. I also did put out a more up-tempo acoustic release of “Just like me” in December.
Gloomy skies was all done using my Martin X acoustic guitar for all guitar parts, along with a Nano Big Muff Pi Fuzz pedal for the distortion parts. Yea, I don’t expect it to be everyone’s favorite tune but I did write it to be gloomy in my own head as well. I wrote annoyances into it, like using the word ‘Out’ for the last word in each line of the last verse. Also, just using the word “Adulting” causes my eye to twitch. LOL. These writing decisions were intentional and make me cringe, but that’s kinda what the songs about… So I went with it.
“Don’t focus on those gloomy skies…”

I do have several more songs in the pipe line. Some new and some very old that I am looking to release over the course of the next few weeks and months. I do also plan to get out and play live in the near future, so if anything gets a solid schedule, I will post it here.

Yea I haven’t been on here for a good bit. Its a long story but I needed to take care of myself for a while. In December my best friend Jon Hardy died a few days before Christmas, and to be honest, I haven’t been feeling too musical since then. I would always be sending him my songs to check out before I put them out, to get his take on it and any suggestions he might have. So I kinda stopped after he died. wasn’t too inspired. I never stopped playing and trying to write, but I knew I needed to change some things in my own life too.

So I have been focusing on my health and self improvement. If you don’t have your health…What do you have?… Anyways… I’ve been losing weight and exercising. Staying away from sugar and its been great. I still think about Jon every day and I should be putting a song out in remembrance of him soon. It was one of the last songs I had him review and so I’m trying to put some finishing touches on it before it’s released.

It’s called “Been there Done that” but I just call it “BTDT”. I’ll post it here when it gets released.

Here is a collage I made of some pics of Him and I over the years. The big one is the last picture I took of him at our High School Reunion. He is wearing the Fish Sandwich Nametag I made for him. TCP means nothing but he always thought it was funny to say. It was almost like our gang call LOL. So I turned the Elvis TCB logo into that. When I had a low voltage business I would sometimes hire him for the day to help me hang TV’s back when they weighed a ton. I just wanted to spend time with him whenever I could.

Miss you Jon…

Tonight I am releasing the music video for my latest single “Butterfly SeeSaw”. I don’t really like giving a full explanation of any of my songs, but with the our current world events, I feel this does speak to some of those fears. The imagery of a butterfly on a SeeSaw shows an unequal balance of power. I feel over time the heavier weight has gone further away from the people and towards a bloated faceless government. Either way, the ride’s not exactly fun and a kid’s not gonna want to ride the seesaw with just a butterfly on the other end. The video is meant to be somewhat reminiscent of a character from the future, sending us a message in our time, warning us to contemplate our current existence. giving a warning on what can happen if we don’t pay attention. The ending was meant to be jarring but I hope it is thought provoking. I feel we are all in some form or escapism these days, always looking at our devices and not paying attention to real life. Just look at a modern news feed today. Almost all of it is celebrity news…Nothing with any substance or value. It’s people who matter and the relationship with family and friends. Don’t be ruled by any politician. Live locally and be kind to your neighbors. You never know when you might need their help someday. As the song goes, “Rectify through those emerald hills, testify through your passion and skills, I told a lie, it was heavy to fill. Hold the line they are coming to kill…. translation… Enjoy nature, show your talents, be truthful to you and the people around you and stand your ground when you know it’s the right thing to do.

I’m not saying I’m going anywhere, it’s just the name of my latest song release “So Long”. It’s been a busy 2022 and I told myself I’d do better on getting more songs out this year in 2023. So long was written in my usual, “Nothing in life is perfect” Style. I have noticed a pattern of this since I started writing music in the early 90’s. I’m not one to write a Beatle-esque type of song with flowery “All we need is love” type of language. I’d probably be a rich man if I could, but it’s never been my style. I think I must have listened to too much of the Cure and Joy Division as a Kid, LOL. So following that vein, I present you with “So Long”. I like it, and I hope you do as well. I do hope these songs reverberate with some. I have been told that this song is getting stuck in some peoples heads, which as a songwriter, is exactly what you want….In a good way. By the Way, the image is a heavily modified blurry photo I took of the blood moon on May 16th 2022.

I don’t get excited too often when I go to the guitar store, but I did yesterday. I saw this on the wall and was intrigued. I’m not usually drawn to Squires, but this one looked like a keeper. Even with a pretty big gash in the back, it didn’t deter me. With its vintage mojo, unique look and great playing I couldn’t put it down. It was super cheap too, so It came home with me. There is just something about this neck that made me feel like I was playing a 52 Telecaster. It’s worn and dirty but not gross. Like Goldilocks found on her third try, this one was just right. Its very simple but I need to fix some of the wiring. It’ll be better than I got it when I’m done and unique to any of the others out there.

I wrote a new song today. Started from scratch to see what I could do in one day. The video is now live on YouTube https://youtu.be/ldFUNLwcV40 , and its been uploaded to be distributed to Apple music, Amazon, Spotify and all the others. I really do like the way it turned out. I wanted to keep it short and sweet. It was going to be just an instrumental song, but I decided to add some lyrics in the end. I hope this song can find a place in you somewhere. I felt inspired by what I was creating.

The photo was one taken by my late father in October of 1974 as you can see on the left edge of the framing. I did need to stretch it height wise to make it a square for the Songs single cover image.

Enjoy!

I will be uploading a new song very soon (Before March 2022 is over). It’s different, but I really like it. The song may not be on the streaming services for a week or so though. It has been taking some time for those to go through lately. I’d love to do a high production video for it, but not enough time or money. I may do a video later.

My latest song “Saturday Train” officially released on Youtube.com today. It will be on the streaming sites in the next day or so.

This song has been in the works for quite some time, but I finally sat down and wrote it out at the end of 2020. It encompassed a lot of things personally. A Saturday train can be anyone’s commute to work, or life’s drudgery. It’s that time you have to think about where you are in life, and where you wanted to be. Where did you go right and where did you go wrong. What makes you happy and what made you sad.

The video was made using old and new video clips, old doodles and letters from when I was younger. I did my best Ken Burns homage with those photos and letters.