New Player

My friend Pete is helping me make an MP3 player for my site. That should help to clean it up and make it so that people can browse the site and listen to tunes at the same time. I spent the last couple of days working on making the player, now I'm gonna hand it off to him and he's gonna write the code.
He's got a lot of skills. I would love to have him produce an album for me, maybe he wants to be my manager as well...he he he.

St. Patrick's Day

My gig at Dan and Louis' was a lot of fun. I got a chance to play a bunch of Irish drinking songs, a few bawdy folk songs and of course some originals. Obviously bars aren't the best places for having an attentive audience, but it was packed, actually alternately loud and then quiet (maybe when people were slurping down their oysters), and everyone was having fun including me. And it was non-smoking... and they pay.
Here are four of the tunes I played: Three Irish drinking songs and one original blues.
Finnegan's Wake
You Wouldn't Know The Blues
Wild Rover

I almost forgot, this one is kind of suggestive...hey, these are Irish pub songs right? PARENTAL ADVISORY...
All for Me Grog

I've spent many hours this week working on design for various things. I put together this one-sheet to send to reviewers etc... I got a request for a review CD from a U.K. Magazine called Leicester Bangs the other day and realized that I needed something written specific to the disc. Here's how it turned out. If I say so myself, my design skills are improving.

Soon

Going to seminars and hearing 'professional' songwriters talk, I hear I should be writing 100 songs a year. 2 a week. Well, it looks like I'll get a little more than half of that. At this rate I don't think it's going to be hard to do more than 50, but I seriously doubt I'll make it to 100.

Considering how much there is to do in life, it's a wonder I'm able to write as many songs as I've been able to, chalk it up to lack of sleep. It's possible that my sleep deprivation actually helps the songwriting process...it definitely alters my perception, breaks down the mental blockages. It's probably not good for my health though.

I wrote this yesterday afternoon after attempting to take a nap -finished it about 2am this morning. It's sort of a surreal song from the point of view of a guy who just met a girl the night before, she almost chokes to death, now it's the next night and he's hoping that things will work out. I call it Soon. Trying to get these songs recorded as I write them is a challenge too, but I think this one turned out descent all things considered...
Play tune

This Recycleman rock show is pretty funny. I never had visions of being a rock star, but I sure do get treated like one by the kids that I perform for. Yesterday after the show there was practically a stampede when I said 'I have 3 extra guitar picks.' A kid ended up getting knocked onto the floor. I was arguing that 4th and 5th graders were too old for the show, but we had 5th and 6th grades!

Parents warn their kids about rock concerts, we bring the rock concert to them.

Anyway I still haven't had much time to relax and I don't see the opportunity any time soon if I want to get the things done that I want to. CDBaby.com has gotten my CDs and of course the scan they mad of Samantha's beautiful artwork doesn't do it justice. You can't even tell what it is. I've been posting my stuff all over the place like mp3.com and Skratch magazine, and Garageband.com, who knows if it's gonna pay off any time soon.

9 Muses Songwriter Night

Well, I made it back to the 9 Muses Tavern on Monday, and had a great time.

I've never had someone tell me that my tunes give them goose-bumps before, but that's exactly what the bartender told me. I blew the place away with an angry rendition of Free Man (here's a link to an old live version of it). Luckily it was the last song I played because I blew out my throat belting it out. They booked me on the spot for April 5th with another songwriter opening for me.

Free Man

I was skeptical of the place at first, because they booked me when they first opened last year and when I got there the place wasn't even open yet... I imagine it's pretty difficult to make everything happen on schedule when you're just starting out.

The great thing about the place is that they only want original acoustic material. It's the perfect place for someone like me. A great audience and staff, non-smoking (though there's some bleed through from the upstairs smoking room, very supportive, and they're trying to do something for the musicians that do well. They've got radio tie-ins and they pay their performers, etc. My friend Dan Rhiger does the sound over there and as part of their twice a year songwriter competetion He's giving away 10 hours free studio time at his excellent studio Medicine Whistle. And they give away $1000 bucks twice a year to lucky (and talented) performers. Their last 'winner' has got a spot on the famous syndicated radio show River City Folk, and I guess just signed a record contract.