Now I will tell you about myself. A little.
I’ve been writing songs for over 20 years, but this is my first full length album. I’m a late bloomer, but I’m blossoming. I used to be in a band called (wait for it): Jezebel County Hospital. They don’t give out Grammys for Best Band Name Ever… just another cosmic injustice we all have to learn to live with.
I love writing music, and want to keep writing and putting out albums for the rest of my life. I wouldn’t mind dying writing a song (with my boots on, as they say). I love the creative process itself, the inspiration and the struggle, getting from the abstract to the concrete. I’m not crazy about live performance, but… it’s like Groucho Marx said, “I’m not too crazy about this reality business. Still, it’s the only place to get a decent sandwich.”
This album is, in its entirety, though not exclusively, about a middle school classmate of mine, whom I only really knew and grew close to in the course of a year, named Don Garner. Don Garner was a real person, whom died tragically, young, in a car crash.
This album is about the memory of him, and memory in general, and grief, loss, and adolescence, manhood, sexual deviance, and video games, flowers, gods, and all manner of unknown tongues.
Which is to say, it’s only a little about a real person named Don and a lot about everything.
Everything I can go on all day about, you know?
Don remains a mystery.
I love my little life in Durham, North Carolina.
I love my hood, the North Street Neighborhood. I love my friends, my family, and the communities I’ve been a part of and been nourished and supported by in innumerable and incomparable ways, like Oak Church, who helped fund the making of the album, and Durham Friends Meeting, and Reality Ministries. I have a lot to be grateful for.
I think that this is probably enough information about me. If you listen to my music and have thoughts about any of it that you want to share, drop me a line. I’d love to hear how you’re connecting with it.
Thanks for reading and listening.
