Americana songwriter • producer • guitarist • vocalist • keyboardist
How would you describe your music?
As an extension of myself, like a phantom limb stretching out into the void. The lyrics, the music come from somewhere back in my brain that can most readily be accessed after a glass or two of wine has sufficiently sedated my inhibitions. I do not know how to label it in terms of genre, I mostly let other people do that. I just want my music to reach into other peoples minds and stimulate there emotions or even their own creativity.
What gives you the drive to create?
The thing that motivates me the most is a yearning for the satisfaction of a job well done and the hope of creating something that is new and different. Being around friends that are creating new things motivates me to do the same. I love being part of a creative community and sharing in the process, especially with my partner, Monko.
Does your best songwriting come from active, conscious thinking about what a song should say?
Sometimes yes, but mostly my lyrics come fast and without much thought about what I am trying to say or not say, and then I go back and edit out the things that don’t make enough sense later. I have found that if I start with a certain concept and try too hard to stick to it, I miss out on the creative flow that I can tap into if I just follow the train of thoughts as they come. It is common that I may start out a song thinking it is about a certain subject, but by the end of it, it is actually about something very different. One of my favorite things is when I think I am saying something in particular in a song, but it turns out that the listener interprets it as something completely different that fits into their own reality.
Could you provide a little bit of context to your featured song?
While on tour last year, Monko was playing around on the mandolin while we were driving through Boulder, CO. He came up with this percussive, trance like part and the words “Are you washed in the blood of the lamb” (which is from an old hymn I grew up singing), came out of me, and seemed to fit. This song is a perfect example of what I was talking about in the last question. This song means different things to different people. For some, it is a spiritual, a gospel song – and I am glad that it has that meaning to them. For me personally, I wanted to put together phrases from the bible or from hymns that don’t make any sense to me now that I am not a child with blind faith. I was raised in the church and am grateful for every bit of it, but I wanted to turn it around on the people who call themselves holy and ask of them “Are you sorry for the lies you’ve told?” I feel that when true justice comes down, it wont be the rich leaders who “saved” others in order to fill the coffer or those who gave the most money to the church that will be welcomed into heaven with open arms. Instead, it will be the ones who questioned everything and still made the right choices in life without needing to have the incentive of eternal life in heaven to do so. Freak Water said it best when they say “there is nothing so pure as the kindness of an atheist”. So, maybe Blood Of The Lamb is a gospel after all… just not the kind you’ll find inside the hymnals stowed in your neighborhood church pews.
Listen to the featured song!
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