The Art of Happiness

On a personal note, this past year and a half or so has been kind of rough. I'm sure that a lot of you can relate to some degree. 

Entropy, from Better Days (2019):

    In this state of entropy

    Empathy is everything

    In someone else's shoes

    Would you choose the same...?

Back in July of 2020, my dad died unexpectedly of a heart attack. Not long after that, my mom got sick with covid. By the time she recovered, due to the pandemic, my job teaching English and tutoring students in the writing center at a community college had essentially dissolved. This, in turn, may have contributed to my marriage of sixteen years falling apart, which left me little choice but to move back to the place where I grew up and have spent most of my adult life trying to get away from. I now live over two eleven hundred miles away from my two kids, whom I miss dearly. 

Life Preserver, from Good Night, Fahrenheit (2017):

   

    Wherever you are, I hope you hear me

    Wherever you are, I want you near me

    I'm sending you a life preserver

    Put it on, kid. You deserve it... 

Haunted, from Petrichor (2021):

    Is it everything you wanted?

    Is it everything you hoped it would be?

    Because this old house is feeling haunted

    By the ghosts of memory...

Music and writing are what gets me through it. While I generally try to not conflate art with therapy, sometimes these things do overlap. Besides, art is usually cheaper.

Quicksand, from Embers (2021):

    I don't expect you to understand

    How it feels to be swimming in quicksand...

Don't Forget Who You Are, from Good Night Fahrenheit (2017):

    Don't forget who you are

    Is unforgettable to me

    Your eyes are lit up like the stars

    And only you know what they see

   

    Share your mind, share your heart

    And let yourself be free

    Because only you know who you are

    And all the possibilities...

    

Since the pandemic began, I finished and fully revised the novel that I had started writing back in January of 2020. Coincidentally, it's about an event that disrupts and transforms the lives of all Americans, causing a sudden reevaluation of our priorities. Sometimes life only makes sense when you step back and look at the big picture, and sometimes it takes years for this to happen.

Life/Time, from Good Night, Fahrenheit (2017):

    I know you wonder what might have been

    If you had taken the other road instead

    But you know it's only in your head

    

    It takes a lifetime to get it right

    And only sometimes do we recognize

    It takes a lifetime, takes a lifetime...

I also recorded two albums last year, the first of which I began writing back in late autumn of 2020. Embers is essentially about trying to save my marriage and find meaning in existence, while Petrichor is largely about accepting what I can and cannot control. 

Original Miles, from Embers (2021):

 

    Take me as I come

    Because this is who I am

    I'm not fooling anyone

    I don't even think that I can...

Wasted, from Petrichor (2021):

    It's not what you anticipated

    I know it's always complicated

    But everyone would be so devastated

    Another day, another night, another life is wasted...

As I mentioned in a previous post, I haven't played an actual show since before the pandemic began. Now that I'm back to living in the very small town where I grew up, I don't even know where I would perform if I wanted to. I still practice, and I've toyed with the idea of writing another album, but my priority right now is in finding a viable way forward from my present situation. I certainly never expected to be here now. 

Holiday, from Petrichor (2021):

    Restless again at two a.m.

    Trying to dream

    Myself away to another place

    Where everything is as it seems...  

Gravel Roads, from Weather Patterns (2017):

    Where do we go from here?

    It could be anywhere

    We don't know where we're going

    Until we get there...

My mom appreciates the help around the farm, and I am thankful for the time that I get to spend with her, especially since it's time that I never really got with my dad. Besides, who knows where I'll be living after this? I am excited by the possibilities. At the same time, being here is kind of therapeutic in its own way, an opportunity to recharge for whatever comes next. Life is precious, and it's easy to take the things we have for granted. Right now, I'm just trying to make the most of what I've got, one day at a time, while trying to create and pursue new opportunities to look forward to.

Dandelion Wine (If Only...), from Petrichor (2021):

    Got my life, and it's ok

    It will be brighter another day

    Can't blame the rain or curse the night

    It will change again by morning light...

 

It's also nice to be reminded that I have friends who care about me. When I lived in Ohio, most of my friends were in the graduate program with me and have since moved on to better things (i.e. the fuck out of Ohio). I had expected to be there for five years and ended up staying for about nine. In the end, it got kind of lonely, while being quarantined and unemployed certainly didn't help. 

Contrails, from Weather Patterns (2017):

    You and I are drifting by like contrails

    Parallel lines through the sky, don't know where

    Don't know why, that's just life and all it entails...

Signs, from Mechanical Bull (2017):

    Home is a house in the dark

    The rough stone that makes you sharp

    Don't let it fall apart

    Don't want to go back to the start...

I am sharing all of this with you not only as a means of self-therapy, but with the hope that you might get something from it as well. Fundamentally, I think the most important thing we can do is to see to it that the world is better off because we're in it, whatever that means. Our contributions do not need to be grandiose in order to be significant. 

Better Days, from Better Days (2019):

    So make today a better day any way that you can

    Make today a better day like only you can

    And we'll keep making our own better days

    Isn't it just like fate to change...?

To everyone who is reading this, I wish you the best. I believe in the beauty of the soul, and that art and love are its greatest forms of expression. That in mind, I hope you will find the beauty within yourself and share it with others, whether through a song, some other work of art, or a simple act of kindness. 

Simple, from Good Night, Fahrenheit (2017):

    It seems to me

    That life could be

    So simple....

Love. Create. Find happiness wherever you can, and try not to take it for granted.

If you like what I'm doing, please share it, add my music to your playlists and follow me wherever you listen. This is how it spreads, and I can't do it without you. 

As always, thank you for supporting independent art. 

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[Here are all fifteen of today's songs in a Spotify playlist:]

  

4-60 AC

A friend of mine with an old car once told me that it had 4-60 AC. When I asked what that meant, he said that if he drove 60 mph with all four windows down, then this was the closest that his car had to actual functioning air conditioning. Hence 4-60 AC.

Not to be confused with blinker fluid, which needs to be changed every five years or fifty thousand miles, whichever comes first. 

Today's songs that I would like to share with you are both good for playing loudly with the windows down. I have tested this myself and can confirm. That said, I should also note that the first of these songs made me inadvertently drive faster when I turned it up. 

This was one of (if not the) first songs that I wrote when I picked up solo songwriting again about five and a half years ago. It's still one of my favorite songs to play. It's called Gravel Roads, from my 2017 album Weather Patterns. It's about the unexpected places that life takes us and the winding, often bumpy roads that take us there. [In reference to the article above, this song also features a progression that was born in Micronesia.]

The chorus goes like this:

    Where do we go from here?

    It could be anywhere

    We don't know where we're going

    Until we get there

The other of today's songs comes from Petrichor, the album that I released in June. It's called Dandelion Wine (If Only...). It has since become one of my favorite songs that I have written. Crank it up with your windows down and see if you agree.

If you want to sing along with the chorus, it goes like this:

    Planted like a wallflower

    Sipping dandelion wine

    Daydreaming about tomorrow

    When everything is fine

    If only...

    If only in my mind

As a bonus track, I'll share one more for today. This song is also from Weather Patterns. It's called Meand'er (and here is a live unplugged video of it). This one actually is about going for a drive with the windows down, so it made sense to include it here, even though it is the only of sixty-five songs that I have released over the past four years that does not have a drum track. As such, it may not rock quite as much as the other two. In other words, you might have to roll your windows up.

Thanks for listening. If you like what I'm doing, please share it with others.

Also, there's no such thing as blinker fluid.

Swear Jar

Today's songs that I would like to share with you come from my "casual swearing" collection, where each of these tracks was labeled explicit on Spotify and Apple Music, often because of a single swear word that I wrote into a verse for emphasis. This might be the only context in which my music could be categorized with the work of 2 Live Crew.

It's called artistic license, damn it. Yeah, that's right. I said damn. Take that, the man. 

These songs also all happen to come from my 2017 album Good Night, Fahrenheit. I won't include embedded links to the lyrics of each song this time. I'll let you see if you can find the naughty words all by yourself. I guess the main thing is to not let them corrupt you. 

The first track is called Life Preserver.  It is about always wanting to save the people you love. I've said this before, but this is probably my best example of "dad rock," and I think that this opinion is supported by both the rockin' guitar solo and by my purposeful wielding of the F-bomb in the last verse.

Track number two is called Carry On. It's about getting through it, whatever it may be. 

The third track that I am sharing with you today is called Modern Inconveniences. It's about bullshit; I'll let you unpack it from there. In addition to spotting the only swear word in this song (but not this article), you get a bonus point if you can find the allusion to the work of French philospher Guy Debord.

As a bonus track (with bonus cuss words), here's a song called Begin. It's the last track on Weather Patterns, which I also released in 2017. I often like to close sets with this song, in part because I like the idea of ending with a song called Begin, but also because the last line gives the audience something to chew on as I exit the stage.

Enjoy the music. Share it with your friends and add it your playlists if you dig what I'm doing. As always, thank you for supporting independent art. 

 

 

Song #3

Sometimes when I write a song, I know right away where it's going to land in terms of the tracklist of whatever album I'm working on. Certain songs just feel like a track seven or a closing track, for example. 

The songs that I would like to share with you today are each the third track on their respective albums, which I knew they would be as soon as I wrote them. 

From Better Days (2019), here is my song Entropy:

From Embers (2021), here is Living in Oblivion:

...and from Petrichor (2021), here is Rat Race:

See if you can find the commonalities. Thanks for listening. 

Greatest Hits

Happy Friday to my fans, casual listeners and random stumblers upon this site.

Today's songs that I would like to share with you are my personal favorites from each of my albums. Click on the song titles to open them in Spotify or click on the embedded links to play them through YouTube. If you use a different streaming service, you should be able to find these songs there as well.

Track one comes from my most recent album, Petrichor (2021). It's called Dandelion Wine (If Only...):

From Embers (2021), here is We Are All That We Need:

Track three of today's selections comes from Better Days (2019). It's called Be Civilized:

From Good Night, Fahrenheit (2017), this next song is called Modern Inconveniences:

Track number five comes from Mechanical Bull (2017) and is called Screen Memories:

Finally, from Weather Patterns (2017), here is a song called Gravel Roads:

Thank you for listening and for supporting independent art. If you like what I'm doing, please share it with others.