February Shows

Greetings. It has been awhile since my last posting, I know. That's mainly because I haven't had much to do other than work on songs, and how exciting is that to blog about? Answer: not very. Here's something I'm liking....though these things aren't always finished.



I "filmed" this in Arkansas. Oh, I was in Arkansas, I did a nice weekend run through Alabama and Arkansas a couple of weeks back. Played 3 good venues - Moonlight On The Mountain in Birmingham, Poet's Loft in Hot Springs, and R. Landry's in Fort Smith (AK). In Birmingham I shared the bill with a new buddy, Kevin Gordon. Check out his website. He's got killer songs, and a refreshingly bone dry sense of humor. It also turns out we are East Nashville neighbors. Time for a few six packs and Stephen Wright DVD's, I say.

This coming week I will be playing in Louisiana and Texas.

Wed Feb 2: New Orleans, LA - Neutral Grounds Coffeehouse
Thu Feb 3: Baton Rouge, LA - Boudreaux & Thibodeaux
Sun Feb 6: AUSTIN, TX! - House Concert at Doug Marcis'
Mon Feb 7: Dallas, TX - Opening Bell Coffee

I feel like I've gone on about Austin in posts past. All I can expound is that it will be very emotional for me. And not just because of Torchy's...mmmm...Torchy's....my God.... er, but rather that Austin gave me some of the best years of my life. My home now is Nashville, with Kim and Alaska, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. But I do miss Austin. I love it like no other place, because it is like no other place. Like New Orleans, New York...entirely its own special world. So help me, Austin - let's all have a great night at the Marcis/Jarry house. Screw the Super Bowl!

I've got 4 songs done and in the can for my next record. It drives me crazy not having the means to go ahead and keep on working, recording more songs for it. Sometimes I feel the only moments in which I'm truly artistically satisfied are those few days every couple of years when I find myself in a recording studio, able to arrange and properly record new material. It's the moment of payoff for all the thinking, planning, and obsessing that people like me do for the other 364 days of the year. Opening presents with the family on Christmas morning? I'm there too, thinking about what type of organ sound I should try to get for the bridge on such and such song. Staring at the Grand Canyon? I'm thinking about vocal reverb. I have a friend who is going to help me move the CD through Nashville and try to drum up some interest - label, publishing, or otherwise - some capital. In time, there will likely be a Kickstarer campaign as well, where folks like you could donate towards a set financial target for the project. If we would fail to reach that target within a specified period of time, all the money gets returned. How about that? This would ensure that what wouldn't happen would be not enough money getting raised for the project to be done right, and me thus spending all of your money on whisky.

Making my own records is most important to me. A large percentage of writers here in Nashville write songs purely for the purposes of pitching them to other artists. I'm all for that. It's something I'm working to get into, too. It's the principle reason I moved here. But I look around and know it could never, ever be enough for me on its own, I'm also always going to need to make my own records, and play to my own audiences. That's what drove me to begin all those years ago. It pisses me off, but that's how it is.

Oh, last post I told you all about that Springsteen Darkness tribute I did. As you would imagine, I felt like Rush Limbaugh in an OxyContin lab, a kid in a candy store. Here is an edit of the entire show, courtesy of this very cool videographer in town named Steve Boyle. We all appear twice, once during the album sequence itself, once later during the encores:



More soon, be well.