Tuesday (Peace For Your Soul)

The daily grind. I know that Lynyrd Skynyrd said that Tuesday was gone with the wind…. this sounds nothing like Skynyrd. Traditional blues chord progression and Twilight Zone style narrative. The video was fun too.

Worry (feat Zoe)

Written for my wife, shared with family, given to my dad for his 80th birthday present after cajoling someone to sing for the recording. Just a guitar, vocal, piano, and very light percussion.

No Money

Throughout my teenage years I was told that I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket. I took classical piano from age 8 to 18…. and really loved jazz and blues and boogie. Enrolled in engineering school and only gazed sadly at the music building as I walked by each day. This isn’t melancholic, but a wise look back.

Coexist (and All Grow Old)

Whatever happened to being polite and civil? Empathy is not weakness. What started in the 80’s culture wars has been stoked with Social Media. Every niche philosophy can find an audience and feel like they’re “mainstream.” …I’m still an optimist. Here’s to keeping up the fight.

Hope (feat. Zoe)

One of the first poems I ever put to music. I was playing one afternoon and Zoe started singing over the spoken vocals. I pestered her until we recorded it. This version is different, and in a lot of ways better than the original.

Ashes and Snow

It started in the backyard listening to Modest Mouse over an ipod speaker while stoking a fire and contemplating the early evening. Alphonse laid down on the concrete beside me and it started to snow.

Country Song

So, often when I start playing this one it morphs into a Grateful Dead tune… (guess which one.) This is a little playful frustration about trying to write something deeply gritty and blues/rock but instead sounding to me like classic country. (not that stadium stuff…)

Lie to Me

I sat in a hospital room, watched my father sleep, and listened to the slow beep of the IV drip.

It started as an experiment in percussion, and ended up as something else entirely.

Memory’s Goodbye (feat. Zoe)

I wake up each morning with a melody in my head (doesn’t everybody?). Sometimes it is some song from the radio or something from very long ago, but more often than not it’s not either. Noodling around later one day trying to recreate what I woke up to, I recorded this as a voice memo and sent it to Zoe. She responded about 10 minutes later with the lyrics sung in a voice text. This is what became of it.

Project J

Lights dim for the evening hours in the basement speak easy. A haze of smoke hangs in the air while an old man in a tattered suit mumbles into his whisky. The buzz of conversations dies off with “it’s tragic” when a solo spot light shines and the drummer kicks into a slow canter. The words are sung that the whisky forgets.