Now only if The Fullerenes would get on board…

I have a show in the works that, if it happens, will be totally awesome.  It will take place in the Friendly Confines of my house and will feature a totally rocking jazz guitarist.  Mark your calendars for Saturday, March 12.  It will be invite-only due to space restrictions, so be sure to hit me up if you are interested in attending.

I will be opening up the show with some piano stylings in the vein of Cryns #3.

It was directed by the master of fancy names, Fifi 3PO, who also directed Run. Run! Run!!! RUN!!! RUNNNN!!!!

Five Iron Frenzy is a now-defunct Christian ska band from the 1990′s.  They were among the biggest bands on the Christian touring circuit for a while in the mid-1990′s, at the height of the short-lived pop-ska scene (remember Squirrel Nut Zippers?).  They were also one of the best bands of that decade.

They had 2 1/2 good albums followed by a bunch of crap, which is as good as we can hope for most of the time.

“Every New Day” is something of a rock-infused ballad.  It is up-beat and heart-felt at the same time.  It is genuine and caring.

While the lyrics were written in deference to the Big Man in the Clouds, I think a lot about Lisa when I hear it today.  It is about how someone can make someone else feel like every day is fresh, beautiful, and exciting.

One time back in 2001, I was waiting in line at a Dairy Queen with a former girlfriend.  We were fighting about something that was probably not worth fighting over when I saw a mentally challenged girl a few spots up order a chocolate fudge ice-cream sundae.  When I saw how happy the girl order became when the sundae hit her hands, I immediately lost all reason to argue.

Here I was with someone that I cared about, enjoying a summer day at a DQ, waiting for ice cream, and fighting about something dumb.  The fickleness of human interactions was visible, and I became instantly ashamed.

The girl with the sundae was beautiful, and we were raining on her parade….or maybe she was shining a ray of sunshine on ours.

There are people among us who are rays of light.  There are those of us that suck up sunlight, and there are those that radiate it.

There are great and wonderful things happening in this world all around us all the time. Sometimes it helps to be reminded of that.

The songs I sing are not well-rounded pictures of situations.  They are photographs of moments in time blown out to 2-5 minutes.  None of my songs give people a well-rounded concept about anything.  They are emotional and reactive and beautiful snapshots.

Unfortunately, when I sing about a snapshot in time that I experienced with another person many years ago, it is easy for people to get the idea that those snapshots represent the whole of relationships.  This is not the case.

When I sing about people who hold or have formerly held prominent roles in my life, it does not do justice to the complexity of those relationships.

Since Lisa and I rarely talk about past relationships, those 2-5 minute songs are all she has to work from.  It makes sense that she might increase the magnifying glass and turn them into her reality of those relationships, filling in all gaps with the contents of my songs.  But the fact is most of my relationships are scarily ordinary.  I regularly experience and have experienced moments of brilliance with friends, current and past.  But for the most part, nothing exceptional happens 99% of the time.

My music is the audio representation of 1% of my exceptional waking hours.

So, while 1% of the time I spent with former girlfriends and friends was exceptional, 99% of it was pretty unexceptional.

I would argue that 2-5% of my time with Lisa is exceptional, which is pretty exciting stuff for me!  The fact that I have only a handful of songs that reference Lisa and our experiences together is merely a factor of time and my lack of recent musical production.  Rest assured, they are coming.

I have songs in the works about cats, marriage, love, and family that Lisa has played a significant role in crafting.  Unfortunately, until they are finalized, my band will continue playing songs from past albums.  I love them and will probably always love them, but it is time to move on.

Over the past year or so, you have probably noticed that my band has been focusing on our more abstract songs and less on songs that call out former girlfriends directly.  This is a result of me attempting to bring Lisa into the fold.  I would do more if I could, but we are working from relatively finite resources here – 2 LPs + a number of odds and ends.  We are also continually rounding out our collection of songs that we cover, the expansion of which is partially owing to my desire to bring Lisa closer to the Cryns #3 community.

I will continue to talk with Lisa about things I can do to make my music more accessible to her.  I desperately want her to sing along with the rest of you, even though she is shy about singing out loud.  I know she’s got a beautiful singing voice buried underneath that shyness.

What if I had people demanding that I get in the studio to record, demanding that I make a music video.  And what if I was on the hook financially for those outcomes?

Would it produce better, quicker results?

I think so.

There is a newish thing happening on the indie music scene.  It is called “crowd-funding” or “fan-funding”.

The idea is that I get a bunch of friends and fans and family to invest money in my next project.  In return they get something based on the amount they give – i.e. a cd, a hug, a drawing, a song named after them, a party, etc.  It is like quid pro quo, except there is an element of awesomeness to it.

In addition to getting fabulous prizes, investors have a real impact on my production.

What do you think?

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Like yesterday, I will be unable to post this beautifully-haunting rendition of Mason Jennings’ “Nothing” on account of the stupid laws of this fair land we call, “home”.

Thankfully, YouTube has a deal with the big music publishing companies that allows me to post videos of Mason Jennings’ “Nothing”.  Here is one such recording from May 2008.  Email me if you want to hear the new recording.

BUUUUT, you can listen to me play the song on YouTube (recorded in January 2009).