Archive for March, 2011

Life by the drop…

Thursday, March 31st, 2011

When I first started playing guitar, I didn’t know anything about singing, I didn’t know anything about girls, I didn’t know anything about drugs, and I didn’t know anything about the BLUES… but I sure wanted to. Growing up in Texas it was hard to play guitar and not be influenced by Stevie Ray Vaughan. He was one of my first guitar heros cause he knew about all those things (especially drugs and blues). I absorbed everything I could from his records while trying to play those songs in my bedroom. I will never forget coming home from school one afternoon and seeing my dad glued to the TV telling me Stevie had died in a helicopter crash. I remember exactly where I was sitting on the couch in the living room as a deep sadness came over me because all I could think was that I will never get to see him play live. I later would get turned on to the Beatles and start singing and writing pop songs, however, buried in some little pocket of my being are those SRV influences and on my recent trip to Sydney I pulled some of them out. I took a ride on a ferry with my acoustic guitar near the Sydney Opera house and started pickin’ one of my favorite SRV tunes for the passengers of the ferry. Here is a little taste-

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Love and Lessons from Australia

Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011

I would like to think that every trip and adventure you take has buried within some sort of insight or lesson that’s applicable to your life. Of course you have to be open to it cause these kinds of things WILL pass you by. It has become apparent to me that I had to travel to the other side of the world to learn two things in particular. I spent this past weekend in a secluded resort in Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains of Australia to take part in the union of two people that are IN LOVE. The ceremony and reception was littered with speeches and tears of love that even if your heart was as black as the night you couldn’t help but well up. There was so much emotion and heartfelt sentiments of love that I could puke. Of course that is my alternative to crying since my heart IS as black as the night, sometimes. Maybe it was because I have been very close to the groom for over 15 years or maybe it was because of my age, but hearing those commitments and watching him tell everyone out loud on a microphone in a banquet room was enough for me to realize that “I STILL don’t know what LOVE is”. No wonder I like that Ray Lamontagne song so much. Lesson #1 check.
MARRIAGE is one of those things that I am sure is wonderful but most of my life I have only heard about how things get complacent and you stop having sex. WTF? So this brought me to my second insight. A Tim Tam is MORE than just a cookie. It took a couple of Australians to teach me that. Evidently, you don’t just put these little delicious cookies in your mouth and eat them. First you bite off 2 opposite corners of the cookie. Then you dip the cookie in milk or tea and suck on one of the corners until the milk enters your mouth.

Finally, with one quick motion, before the liquid falls out of the cookie, you eat the whole damn thing and let the orgasm in your mouth just happen. It is awesome and I don’t even like milk all that much. It is more than just a cookie. Here is to finding out how to bite the corners out of marriage and long-lasting love so that it explodes in your mouth every time.

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Sunny and Sideways in Sydney

Thursday, March 17th, 2011

After a great visit to Los Angeles I boarded a 747 bound for Sydney with some of my closest friends I grew up with in Texas. I have never been to Australia so I was going to make sure this was to be something to write home about. I am now 3 full days in and at the moment have not really seen that much of the city staples or tourist type stuff. Truth be told I haven’t done much of anything except drink. But this is not to say that my time here has not already been memorable. I am here to celebrate the union of one of my childhood friends to an Australian girl- but before we head up to Blue Mountains for a beautiful wedding there are some things to do in Sydney first. Via the recommendation of a friend of a friend I found myself at the Australian museum for a special party called Jurassic Lounge. There was a band playing, a naked woman having her body painted by an artist while she laid next to a canvas, and a very thorough exhibit on the aboriginal people of certain regions in Australia. Educational for the whole family. My favorite was the dinosaur exhibit upstairs where there was a DJ spinning and a full on silent disco. I was drunken dancing to Michael Jackson while staring at a skeleton of stegosaurus and sweating up the museum’s headphones. If my memory serves me correctly I have spent a good time on Oxford St as well. Luckily we start boozing pretty early cause most great bars here close at midnite. Also, I did see the Opera house yesterday so I am pretty proud of that.

This city is pretty gorgeous and today holds a ferry ride over to Manly beach. The only bad part of the trip so far was last night, upon returning to the Coogee Bay Hotel, there was a guy with an acoustic guitar playing in the beach bar and doing an awful cover of Sweet Home Alabama. Obnoxiously, I said out loud to my friend “Ugh that shit makes me want to throw up in my mouth!” and we took our drunk asses back to the room. At about 4am I woke up panicked with my mouth full of liquid, the taste of bile and a hint of the Indian food I had for dinner. It was a volcano erupting but I managed to not get anything on the sheets and fell back asleep singing to myself “Big wheels keep on turning, carry me home to see my kin…”

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Spinal Tap and stuff…

Friday, March 4th, 2011

A friend of mine recently said that 2011 is the year that goes to 11. I believe her. I don’t know if it’s because the world is about to end and we should just crank it up to 11 and fucking rock, or if it’s because I watched the movie Spinal Tap WAY TOO much as a young rocker. Either way things are gonna get loud… REAL loud. Make that mean whatever you want to. Be loud. SO… some really cool things are happening and good music is floating around everywhere. Below I have included some good things to take note of. Also, up and coming for me in the very near future are some cool travel plans- FIRST if you are in the LoS AnGeles area next week come by and listen- I am playing an intimate acoustic performance at Genghis Cohen in West Hollywood. From there I am off to Sydney, Australia. I am planning on playing on the street mostly and capturing that on video. Who knows. Speaking of video I apologize for my slowed pace of YouTube content but I got one for ya… This is a song from one of my favorite records of 2010. The band is called The National the song is called Bloodbuzz Ohio. I was picking on my guitar, fooling around on the Rhodes piano and then developed this version. Hope you enjoy!

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