A Critical Transmission
What’s up guys? Well, it’s been a busy year for me. Back in December of 2022 I released my latest album, “Critical Transmission” on good ole’ fashioned cassette tapes and CD’s! Of course the music is available on all streaming services, but I’m much more into creating and buying physical media, playing live music and meeting people in person. So that’s why I embarked on a pretty impressive run of shows that started back in December of 2022 and went all the way through June of 2023. It wasn’t a straight run of shows, I did a 4 day tour in December, then a 17 day tour in January & February, followed by 8 days in May and 2 days (with local shows scattered in between) in June. So I basically toured for a duration of a month over this first half of the year. I’m really stoked on how everything went! I hit up some classic spots and saw some old friends, but mostly I was playing in front of new people. I got rid of about 100 copies of my new album, a mix of CD’s and cassette tapes. Not to mention I sold many t-shirts and other merch items, thank you for that! I know for many musicians that’s chump change, but for me that’s pretty damn good! There were some spots where people already knew my new songs, which after all these years of playing music still surprises me when it happens. Feedback on the album was really good, people seemed to be really getting the message that I was putting out there. I feel more and more people are seeing past the two party illusion and starting to focus on our common denominators and not what can divide us. Obviously, in reality not every show is a banger, and some shows I could tell it really wasn’t my crowd, but you just play on and enjoy yourself the best you can. I’m thankful for every opportunity.
So I do not foresee me grinding for the rest of the year, but I will be playing live shows and working on a couple videos. Many of you know that I also have a punk band called Assemble, and I’m working on writing some new stuff for that band and we have a busy schedule coming up, and with all the other things I have going on I’m trying not to overbook myself (like I have for the first 6 months of this year). For those of you who don’t know Assemble you should check us out https://linktr.ee/assembletheband. One of the most common remarks that I get on the road is,”You should be fronting a punk band”. Well, if I didn’t sell you an Assemble record on the road then there you go.
I also write a lot and I try to post my tour blogs. It’s a lot of work to transcribe everything and sometimes it’s months before I end up posting anything. When you own a t-shirt shop and play in three bands you end up being hard pressed for time. But that being said I just started a Substack page! I have a tumblr (Hello!) that I have used for years, and I have some other blog spots that I have used and gave up on. I also used to have a newsletter with followers but I haven’t sent that out in years. I really like how Substack works and I like the layout. Either way I have many tour journals that need to be edited and posted. In the past I would just post the whole lot at once, but I think I’ll just post them periodically so I can continue to have content. I also believe that long tour journals can be hard to read, they get boring and redundant. That being said people have told me that they do enjoy reading them. Some like to hear about the mundane adventures of the solo touring guy, and others like to see where I played to give them ideas for where to tour and how to tour.
In conclusion, thanks to all who have helped me out over the past months with booking me shows and giving me a place to crash, buying my album, making me food or just being friendly. It is much appreciated!
Links to my music, screen print shop and other things that I do.