Saturday
Mar292008
Entries from March 1, 2008 - March 31, 2008
Thursday
Mar272008
Thursday
Mar272008
On the way to Dallas
Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 06:53PM
I'm on an airplane from Houston to Dallas, on my way to tonight's Caedmon's show at The Door. I'm pretty excited to play this weekend, as I'm introducing two new elements to my rig. Fender sent me a Jazzmaster guitar, one I've been dreaming about for years. And it's wonderful. So tonight will be the first time playing that live.
And I've got my new pedalboard finished up. I'll have to do some final touches once I get to the venue today, but it's been up and in use for a couple weeks now. Josh, uber-assistant at Sputnik, finished up rehousing my Space Station pedal last night (way too late, poor guy) and that was the last piece. There will be a learning curve to the new board, I'm sure, so I may be in for some surprises tonight, but I'm ready.
I was able to finish up a couple lingering projects this week, and it's nice to not have stuff hanging over my shoulder when I leave town for a few days. Alas, I wasn't able to take pictures of the pedals, guitars and etc. that I'll be putting up for sale yet, so hopefully I can get that taken care of next week.
Well, the lady just told me to shut my computer off. Bye.
And I've got my new pedalboard finished up. I'll have to do some final touches once I get to the venue today, but it's been up and in use for a couple weeks now. Josh, uber-assistant at Sputnik, finished up rehousing my Space Station pedal last night (way too late, poor guy) and that was the last piece. There will be a learning curve to the new board, I'm sure, so I may be in for some surprises tonight, but I'm ready.
I was able to finish up a couple lingering projects this week, and it's nice to not have stuff hanging over my shoulder when I leave town for a few days. Alas, I wasn't able to take pictures of the pedals, guitars and etc. that I'll be putting up for sale yet, so hopefully I can get that taken care of next week.
Well, the lady just told me to shut my computer off. Bye.
Tuesday
Mar252008
Searching for the Song
Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 08:49AM
Yeah, I've started playing Scrabulous on facebook. It's their version of Scrabble, where you get to play your friends. I'm not going to lie to you, people. I'm good at Scrabble. But this Scrabulous. I call it "Scrabble that lets you cheat" because, well, it lets you cheat. Or rather, the fact that you're not at a table in front of everybody means you get to look up words (cheating) and try them out to see if they're valid (cheating) and beat me (cheating).
I've been starting to write some new songs, which I'm really excited about. It's interesting, I've been writing songs for a living for eleven years now and this is the first time that I've got a pile of music and not lyrics. Usually it's been the other way for me. I'm actually feeling like I have a lot to say with my guitar this time around. I'm fluent there in a way I never was before, and I'm just bursting with melodies and sounds and things there that are itching to get out, but finding what the songs are about hasn't come as easily.
I had lunch with Eric Peters yesterday, which was great, and he mentioned to me that he can't write if he's not reading, and I think I may be like that. I read so much and historically I've written so proficiently that I probably haven't noticed a connection. But recently our girls have been getting up so early that my reading time has all but disappeared.
When I do get the time to read, though, I'm really loving what I'm in the middle of. That book about the Underground Railroad I told you about, and one Randall has suggested for our neighborhood gang to all read; a very old book about prayer by Madame Guyon. It's a bit overwhelming in its simplicity. I think I've gotten used to shades of grey, and this book doesn't have any. It breaks it down so simply that it kind of unnerves me, but in a way that I know is good. (CLICK HERE and you can read it for free.)
All that to say, I feel like the songs will come. I think a few of them are on the way now. I think the next step is to start recording what I have and building from there. My hope is that my records continually get better than the one before, but I think they've also gotten continually more me, and less me trying to be someone else. It's going to be a good process, ever deeper in the search for my own voice and what I, and my guitar, really have to say.
So today it's back to the studio to finish up a little pedalboard wiring (pictures when it's totally done), sing a few bgv's for Mitch, and dive into these growing songs. I can't wait.
I've been starting to write some new songs, which I'm really excited about. It's interesting, I've been writing songs for a living for eleven years now and this is the first time that I've got a pile of music and not lyrics. Usually it's been the other way for me. I'm actually feeling like I have a lot to say with my guitar this time around. I'm fluent there in a way I never was before, and I'm just bursting with melodies and sounds and things there that are itching to get out, but finding what the songs are about hasn't come as easily.
I had lunch with Eric Peters yesterday, which was great, and he mentioned to me that he can't write if he's not reading, and I think I may be like that. I read so much and historically I've written so proficiently that I probably haven't noticed a connection. But recently our girls have been getting up so early that my reading time has all but disappeared.
When I do get the time to read, though, I'm really loving what I'm in the middle of. That book about the Underground Railroad I told you about, and one Randall has suggested for our neighborhood gang to all read; a very old book about prayer by Madame Guyon. It's a bit overwhelming in its simplicity. I think I've gotten used to shades of grey, and this book doesn't have any. It breaks it down so simply that it kind of unnerves me, but in a way that I know is good. (CLICK HERE and you can read it for free.)
All that to say, I feel like the songs will come. I think a few of them are on the way now. I think the next step is to start recording what I have and building from there. My hope is that my records continually get better than the one before, but I think they've also gotten continually more me, and less me trying to be someone else. It's going to be a good process, ever deeper in the search for my own voice and what I, and my guitar, really have to say.
So today it's back to the studio to finish up a little pedalboard wiring (pictures when it's totally done), sing a few bgv's for Mitch, and dive into these growing songs. I can't wait.
Wednesday
Mar192008
Carry the Dream
Wednesday, March 19, 2008 at 03:52PM
A few weeks ago I started reading a book about the Underground Railroad titled "Bound for Canaan". (CLICK HERE for more information on the book.) The book starts off with a brief history of slavery and how it came to America. Then it goes deeper into the abolitionist movement, how it ebbed and flowed, before more and more people decided to take action and we find the birth of the Underground Railroad.
It is a fascinating and deeply moving story. And it has opened my eyes to things I've gotten sadly numb to.
I live in Nashville, TN, a very racially divided city with a lot of Civil War history. Last week I put down the book to go eat lunch with some family. We went to a burger place in a very upscale part of town. Every customer was white and every worker was black. It was so obvious, especially after reading what I had just read, and I'm sure most people thought nothing of it. It's the landscape around us, in a lot of ways.
Rewind to our neighborhood group's meeting a couple weeks ago where I heard that two of our women are going soon to a prayer meeting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial where, 40 years ago, Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his immortal "I have a dream" speech. They're going to pray for how that dream can continue to be moved towards. They're going to pray for a country that has never formally apologized for allowing slavery, and that is still very racially divided.
So this has all been rattling around in my brain when I ran across Barack Obama's amazing speech on race last night. Whatever you may think about the man, his policies, his experience, you need to read/watch this speech. (And you can RIGHT HERE)
He talks about the racial divide in a way I've never heard. He looks at resentments and anger and the history that's fueled them, without any anger or resentment of his own. He condemns racism from both the white and black communities as well as giving perspective on where both come from.
(Also, very interesting to note, this was the first speech by a president or presidential candidate since a 1969 speech by Richard Nixon that was NOT written with the aid of a speechwriter. Obama wrote the whole thing himself.)
I was deeply, deeply moved by his words. I thought it was, without a doubt, the most Christ-like way of looking at people I'd ever seen from a politician. If I've ever seen one at all. He gave great dignity to people, and instead of dismissing them as hateful or racist or arrogant or ignorant, he appealed to the fact that we all have good and bad within us, and that race is only one of the ways this gets played out.
But I'm not writing about how great his speech was. I'm writing about how it connected with me and the other things that I have to assume God is bringing up in my life. I have a desire to be a part of the healing of this racial divide, and these things have further encouraged this desire.
So here I am, in a hotel room in Atlanta, trying to make sense of it all. There's no Underground Railroad anymore. I'm not in a position to give anybody a job. There are no immediate and obvious ways, of that scale, for me to act on this stirring.
But there are many other ways. I am a father, and a husband, and a man who prays to a God who listens. I'm a friend and a church member. In all these roles there are opportunities for me to try and help break down walls, both ones that exist out here in the world and the ones that more subtly exist in my own heart.
I'd love to know your opinions on this stuff. Read Obama's speech. What did you think? In practical terms, is it disingenuous to try to seek out and cultivate relationships with people of other races? What do you make of "the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning", and what can we do about it? Do you have stories of people who are doing things to start healing what is broken?
It is a fascinating and deeply moving story. And it has opened my eyes to things I've gotten sadly numb to.
I live in Nashville, TN, a very racially divided city with a lot of Civil War history. Last week I put down the book to go eat lunch with some family. We went to a burger place in a very upscale part of town. Every customer was white and every worker was black. It was so obvious, especially after reading what I had just read, and I'm sure most people thought nothing of it. It's the landscape around us, in a lot of ways.
Rewind to our neighborhood group's meeting a couple weeks ago where I heard that two of our women are going soon to a prayer meeting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial where, 40 years ago, Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his immortal "I have a dream" speech. They're going to pray for how that dream can continue to be moved towards. They're going to pray for a country that has never formally apologized for allowing slavery, and that is still very racially divided.
So this has all been rattling around in my brain when I ran across Barack Obama's amazing speech on race last night. Whatever you may think about the man, his policies, his experience, you need to read/watch this speech. (And you can RIGHT HERE)
He talks about the racial divide in a way I've never heard. He looks at resentments and anger and the history that's fueled them, without any anger or resentment of his own. He condemns racism from both the white and black communities as well as giving perspective on where both come from.
(Also, very interesting to note, this was the first speech by a president or presidential candidate since a 1969 speech by Richard Nixon that was NOT written with the aid of a speechwriter. Obama wrote the whole thing himself.)
I was deeply, deeply moved by his words. I thought it was, without a doubt, the most Christ-like way of looking at people I'd ever seen from a politician. If I've ever seen one at all. He gave great dignity to people, and instead of dismissing them as hateful or racist or arrogant or ignorant, he appealed to the fact that we all have good and bad within us, and that race is only one of the ways this gets played out.
But I'm not writing about how great his speech was. I'm writing about how it connected with me and the other things that I have to assume God is bringing up in my life. I have a desire to be a part of the healing of this racial divide, and these things have further encouraged this desire.
So here I am, in a hotel room in Atlanta, trying to make sense of it all. There's no Underground Railroad anymore. I'm not in a position to give anybody a job. There are no immediate and obvious ways, of that scale, for me to act on this stirring.
But there are many other ways. I am a father, and a husband, and a man who prays to a God who listens. I'm a friend and a church member. In all these roles there are opportunities for me to try and help break down walls, both ones that exist out here in the world and the ones that more subtly exist in my own heart.
I'd love to know your opinions on this stuff. Read Obama's speech. What did you think? In practical terms, is it disingenuous to try to seek out and cultivate relationships with people of other races? What do you make of "the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning", and what can we do about it? Do you have stories of people who are doing things to start healing what is broken?
