Writing music by myself has always been a nervewrecking process. I am constantly working with limited resources, and trying to conduct these huge efforts of sound with two mics and two hands. While I love the pressure and the intensity that is brought about with recording by my lonesome, it's also extremely aggravating and many times infuriating to try and achieve a sound that I want. I'm inspired all the time by tones being created all over Columbus, and I get jealous with the fact that so many people have found a sound, or style, or formula that works for them. It seems as though as soon as I hit some sort of formula, it works for only one run.

I've been writing songs since high school straight through my time at Heidelberg University. I created a bed of songs that I now despise and don't seem very attached to. I was trying to pull lyrics and tunes from within 'me' or what i was 'going through.' Which, wasn't alot. I was healthy, and when I wasn't I had good company. I had great friends, made great memories, made even greater adventures. When I'm content, I don't necessarily want to write about how great I feel. There's no interesting way I can put "Bro, life's great" in music. So this here is an attempt at creating something new. A small collection of songs that are moreso stories than anything else. Like little trading cards of characters that if you flip over, start to give you a taste of what exactly these characters are going through. For example, "Oh Well" is a thought process of an inmate at death row. The song starts as he finishes his final supper, and is taken to the electric chair where he meets a narrow fate, whether he deserves it or not. "Babies in Red" is about a writer who dreams every night that his wife will kill him in his sleep. "Young Dumb Scuffle" is about a young 6 year old boy bullied everyday by a girl named Gertrude, and one day just flat out punches her right in the mouth. So on, and so forth.

These songs gave me the ability to create these characters with these unreasonable or extravagant issues. Most songs end up circling back to a journy or story out at sea, because to me nothing is more unpredictable or epic than a story out at sea. I was able to rip myself from a frame I deem boring and dip into the shoes of these extravagant people. Once I did that, I didn't care where it went musically. If it got weird (which, it very well does) then I let that grab me by the horns and shake me around. I let the music take control, and where ever these songs went, they went. These songs are a product of me at my barest. No one else co wrote these songs, no one else played on this record. Every sound you hear, I put together. I didn't have a set up drum set, so I leaned random toms up against my wall and banged the hell out of them. I placed cymbals on my finger and hit them when I needed a crash. I recorded sounds, put them in as blips, bleeps or static. I did all this, and I can safely say that I'd like to share it with you.

This record is being released on Wednesday, and it's free. More than anything, I hope you pick it up and can find something that connects with you.