Still Has That New Song Smell

I wrote another song. Here is version #1 of it. I expect I'll re-record pretty much everything in it, and the lyrics may be subject to change as well. Basically, this song is so fresh that it might not even be ripe yet. 

I've said before that if I'm ever going to have a greatest hits album, then I'm going to need more songs with parentheses in the title. If staying up until three in the morning has ever taught me anything, it's that greatest hits albums are loaded with parentheses. To that end, here's another one for my own collection. Check back tomorrow and it may sound totally different. This is how it goes. I'm just letting you in on the process. 

Thanks for listening.

Fresh Cooking

Yesterday, I wrote a bassline and then a guitar part to go with it (which is backwards of how I usually work). Today, I wrote some lyrics. Tomorrow, I'll see if I still like what I wrote. 

That is to say that I might have another new song pretty soon. I'll keep you posted...

Weekenders

Happy Friday.

The first song that I would like to share with you today comes from my latest album, Embers (2021). Welcome Back, Jack Kerouac is basically about the role of improvisation and experimentation in art. (Also, I teach college-level English and Film Studies, so there's a little bit of textual analysis thrown in there, just for fun.) The chorus goes like this:

    Welcome Back, Jack Kerouac

    Where have you been? 

    Were you on the road again?

    Say hello to Carlo, Moriarty and Old Bull Lee

    We're still looking for the beat

In Keruoac's 1957 book, On the Road, Carlo, Moriarty and Old Bull Lee were the stand-ins for Allen Ginsberg, Neal Cassady and William S. Burroughs, respectively, all of whom were key figures in the Beat movement. In my song, I also reference the narrator, who is essentially Kerouac himself. In the book, he goes by the name is Sal Paradise. 

    All looking for something nice

    In Paradise...

The other song for today is one of my yet unreleased tracks, all of which are works-in-progress. The Regular is pretty self-explanatory. It's about that guy at the end of the bar. You know the one. 

So basically, one of today's songs is about a drunk who wrote a severely overrated book. The other is about the same guy, minus the literary career. Yeah, that pretty well sums it up. 

Enjoy the music. If you like what I'm doing, please follow me wherever you listen and share my songs with others who might appreciate them, too. Thank you for supporting independent art. 

Sad Songs to Make You Feel Better

Hello listeners, fans and people who randomly stumbled upon this site. Welcome to my music blog, where I like to share songs that I'm working on or that I've already written, and then I talk about them a little bit.  

The first song that I would like to share with you today is one of my yet unreleased tracks, to be included on my forthcoming album, which presently remains untitled. I wrote this song a few weeks ago. 

Haunted is about the memories left behind when a person is gone. My dad died unexpectedly last year. This song is basically about that -- but for anyone who is experiencing any kind of irreversible personal loss, I hope that maybe you can get something out of this song, too. 

The other song that I would like to share comes from my 2021 album, Embers. This one is about depression. It's called Quicksand. Again, if you or someone you know happens to need it, then I hope you get something out of this song. At the very least, it's got a cool groove, delivered to you by way of my baritone guitar.

Thanks for listening to and sharing my music. Original Miles has now been streamed over 22,000 times! For the sake of perspective, that is about seventy times more people than which currently live in the town where I grew up. No joke. That amazes me. If you like what I'm doing, please spread the word. I can't do what I do without your help.

Sometimes life sucks, but things do get better. Whatever it is that you're going through, I want you to get through it, and if you happen to need it, then I hope that my music helps.

As a bonus track, for those of you who may be feeling a bit stir crazy after more than a year of quarantine, here is another unreleased song that I recently wrote called Holiday. This song is me saying, yeah, I can totally relate. 

Enjoy. Share. Have a great summer. Stay cool always.

Plasticity

I did some more mixing and mastering on Plastic Flowers. I think I might be happy with it for now, even though I'm sure I'll revisit it when it comes time to put another album together. I suspect that this will happen sooner rather than later, if the first four songs are any indication.

You can hear the latest version of it here:

This song is about re-imagining the American Dream to adapt to a changing cultural context, which is one of the things that makes it so resilient. 

I've got another big project that I'm working on right now, which is not music-related. Once I'm done with that, I've got a few other songs that I'm developing but have not yet cracked. As always, faithful listeners, I will keep you posted. 

Thank you for listening and for supporting independent art. If you like what I'm doing, please share it. That's why I wrote it. (Music is meant to be shared.)