Concerning "Love".

eventually this blog will be used more as an 'update from the road' sort of thing, but from time to time I'm sure I'll go off on a rant...I like to write and express my thoughts and feelings, doing so makes me happy, and therefor I write.

I remember my first Love...it was like nothing I had ever experienced, yet it took me a long time to realize that it had been there all along...there wasn't really an 'ah-hah!' moment or anything, but when I first sat down and started trying to write out my own music I realized that the feelings certain songs can bring to people could quite possibly be the most powerful weapons known to man...weapon isn't really the proper term because that word usually implies some sort of physical danger...but you tell me what isn't dangerous about the stupidity of the lyrical content of the party-scene music that has been plaguing the land and encouraging people not to care about anything but 'gettin crunk' or what have you...the ideas expressed through song are indeed capable of being harmful. That was never my intent though, I always wanted to sing about funny stuff and social/political issues I had feelings about...well, that was after my first band told me to stop writing so many songs about girls - which I am very thankful for them to this day for...I can weave lovely lines all day, but it gets old hearing about the same topic over and over...

There is a song I have been playing since I first got a guitar, and even more so after I lost the tip of my middle finger at work and had to rethink the way I play a guitar with three and a half fingers instead of four...I began tapping, sliding, and using pull-off techniques to create a melody and a new perspective on my Love for music. listen: www.myspace.com/StarfishandtheSun

I thought I was in Love a few times, but it never really stuck...of course there are those adolescent loves, but the topic I'm writing about is the real kind of Love. Some might argue that young love is still Love, but I guess I just never had one like that. Yes it was nice, and the emotions were there, but there was a girl I met later on in life that showed me how to Love with my Soul...I guess I can't really say I met her because to this day I still have yet to hold her hand, but I can honestly say I Loved her...it took me years to give her that word, but I think that is understandable considering the communication gap between us...I did feel it, but I had been hurt a few times before and nothing was scarier than falling in Love again so I wouldn't say it...'I Like You' was good enough and it pretty much meant the same thing, just in the developmental stages...off and on we tried to be Lovers, but our current demands in our own worlds created a distance that could not seem to be bridged...between the schooling for her ambitious career goals and my ambitious attempts at creating a career in the music industry we just never landed in the same place at the same time...communication was disconnected so badly that multiple attempts to meet turned into disasters...one time while she was working for the Red Cross helping with the disaster relief in Louisiana and Texas while I was scheduled to be on tour with my friends In:Aviate, which was cut short by one month, I was offered a spot guitar teching for my friends The Cab whom I had tour managed/ran merch/teched/driven for in the past...after hours of relaying messages through an angel of a National Guardsmen I was able to communicate with my Lover through a radio (at her camp out of cell range) that was being held up to a telephone (at another location) and we decided that it would be a good idea for me to take the tech job while she stayed to work on a special team (handling human bodies and parts) checking DNA and finding the names of the lives that were lost...an hour later I find out that I can't be given the position because the guy they had working for them was still under contract...she would have been in my arms two days later if I wouldn't have received that phone call. We made a strong effort, but recently gave up...I guess...she stopped talking to me and there was never any closure...or much of anything for that matter...just as she had popped into my life, she was gone...

And so alone and confused I waited and waited...two weeks later I received an email from her telling me she had received the gifts I had given to a mutual friend to deliver for me...it was a nice note, but pretty much said nothing about her absence which has continued ever since...eventually I realized that she wasn't planning on coming back any time soon and the best thing for me would be to move on...which would be much easier if I wasn't haunted by this woman...every night when I stare at the moon she is there staring back...distant as two people can be, yet somehow so very near...or maybe I'm just a lunatic. The point is, I have picked up my things and I am walking in the direction of my dreams...if she doesn't want to walk with me and hold my hand during the process, fine! I hope I at least get to meet her when I get there...meanwhile I'm going to focus on the Love that never let me down or hurt me...well, I guess thats not true, I'm 24 years old now and I've been playing music and working with every aspect of bands and live performance for about nine years, helping my friends live their dreams and calling it "school"...I guess I could write my own diploma and hang it on my wall cause I'm graduated and I'm ready to make this dream of mine a reality.

A couple years ago my friend Justin and I started this project we call Starfish and the Sun...well, thats really just when we decided to name give it a name and call it a 'band'...we created this awesome vision for a superband that was multi-dimentional...art, music, poetry, life...it has been mostly a side project since then, though it was around the same time I stopped touring with The Cab (just a few weeks before they rolled their van and trailer thanks to some black ice - I could have died!) and Starfish and the Sun was kind of a big reason for that...the first book of our series has been mostly completed for a few years now, just adding poems from a few new friends we've made along our journey and letting it collect dust while we dealt with our current lives...but now it's all finally coming together. The release date I'm shooting for is Justin's birthday on the 10th of October 2010...10-10-10...perfect tens across the board? I don't know...I don't really know if anyone cares, but somehow we're gonna make em care...or something...I think I've gotten a little off topic...but anyway for the past two and a half years I have been painting with Justin much like how we used to jam music in our old band Maricopa...working together to create something we think is cool...after we had a big stack of canvases I started getting us shows to set up displays at just like most bands have merchandise displays...we didn't play any music, but our music was seen throughout the night...some shows we've done live art and had as many as four artists as well as fans at the shows painting while the music was rocking and the lights were flashing...most recently we had a display at the House Of Blues in Las Vegas where we started painting the view we had from our booth spot...our good friend Coby Wilbur (or Walter Prescott depending on when you meet him) came down from St. George, Utah with his van loaded up with several pieces (that are all awesome) including a 3'x4' freehand of lil wayne...or someone like him...I don't know, I've been living in a cave for the past few years...if I went on a gameshow with pop culture as the topic of the questions I would fail terribly...I now have the piece we started painting at that show hanging on my wall begging for a live painting online video stream...still working out the when of this event, but I'll keep you posted...should be soon.

ANYWAY......

Love is an amazing thing...even in its most simple of forms...I Love music and painting only helped me see that everything you do in life is an art...create something awesome, even in the most simple form of it...even a little bit of awesome is still awesome! We want people to hear our words and find their own ways to improve the quality of their lives...feedback helps us to do likewise...so it becomes a big connection of people helping other people...and that seems like something awesome. So when I spend long nights awake and alone I focus on the Love I have for music, art, and poetry of my life and the lives of my friends...romance may or may not come my way, I'm really socially awkward, probably an effect of Loving someone through telephone calls and emails...but I don't need to waste time worrying about that because there is a whole world out there waiting to be explored! I've already been to lots of places in the US, but that was just while working for other people or small trips of my own making...this fall I will be going as many places as possible in 4 months time...I'm shopping for a booking agency to work with and a sponsor or two to help us get some merchandise to put up for sale while I'm on the road...I'll be bringing my friend from 3rd grade Donny with me and possibly others, so we'll probably do live art at shows and set up displays outside of gas stations and on busy streets...keep an eye out for a tour schedule...right now a west coast tour with Caravels, our friends from Las Vegas, is being booked beginning near Halloween going up through California, Oregon, Washington, on to Idaho, Utah, and back to Las Vegas...I'll be posting dates when we get them.

I guess the point of this blog was to say that I Love what I'm doing...and I'm really excited about the next 6 months of my life. The End.