YONDER BREAKS

Here is the second post in conjunction with my album release: track number two, " More Beautiful ." In college I had dated a girl for about three years. We had a lot of ups and downs (to put it lightly), and out of that came several songs. Still, I kept trying to write a song about her , and not just about what we were going through. I had a lot of starts and pieces, but nothing ever came together. A few months after we broke up, I met the woman who would later become my wife. We met at Awendaw Green , at their first ever Rocktoberfest, where my band Campfield was playing. Truthfully, I didn't really want to go to the show. I had some other friends (including a girl I was interested in) that usually came to our shows who weren't going to make it; plus it had been raining all day and this was a two-day camping festival. I drove up with a negative attitude, planning to play our show and then go home. But then I was introduced to Katie, a friend of a friend of the ...

God answers prayer sometimes, you know? Maybe that's a silly or obvious thing to write, but it's easy to forget. My freshman year of college, I took a New Testament class and was surprised to find it was taught by a Jewish guy who spent the whole semester pointing out everything that didn't make sense in the New Testament. It was a huge blow to my faith, and I really struggled through it. My friend Eric helped a lot though (as he often has over the years), and somehow I made it through with my faith in scripture actually strengthened by the whole thing. It's like tearing down muscles so they build up bigger, I suppose. Anyway, over the last few years, I can tell my faith in the bible has wavered again. Talks with some of my smartest friends that are either atheist or agnostic have contributed, two of which once were believers. The focus of culture on self has played a huge part, because I've certainly bought into a lot of it. We try to work through these things...

In case you haven't noticed the images and little listen-boxes plastered all over this website, I released an album recently! I thought it would be fun to share the story from each song, along with a video you can listen to. Here goes, track number one: "Your Light." This song kind of started by accident. My good friend Zach came over one day and we went out in the garage and started playing music. He had sung in a hardcore band years prior, so we had always talked about starting something, but it never really came to fruition...until now. I put a capo on the fourth fret and started jamming on C and Am with a hammer-on with the first finger. Sounded pretty cool. He started mumbling some lyrics that fit, and playing a floor tom I had set up nearby. The mumblings turned into lyrics and melodies, which I made sure to write down, because I could tell this was turning into a cool song. Zach has the great gift for melody and a beautiful tone to his voice, which you c...

I blamed not having nice things on my kids, but sometimes it's my fault... A few months ago we bought the newest car we've ever had (not brand new, of course). I was going to register it for Lyft driving, and wanted to wash it before going in for the inspection (ultimately, I found out, it didn't really matter). The kids wanted to help me wash, and so I grabbed a couple rags and quickly went for it. As I chose between one rag and another, I had this feeling -- Take the grey one. But the white one was bigger and looked more effective, so I blindly wiped. What I didn't know, and soon found out, is that there was some dried paint on the white rag, which scratched the crap out of the top of my car. It's not the worst thing in the world, but on a new car? Ugh... After it happened, all I could think about was those scratches. It bothered me to no end. Even though I tried to dismiss it or distract myself, I would always remember I had just scratched my new ...

Tonight was a rough one. It was the end of my kids' soccer season and I was hoping for a fun "game" to go out on a positive note. (I have to quote "game," because they are 3-5 years old and mostly just run in circles chasing a ball.) Neither of my kids is super into soccer, so most of the struggle is spent getting them out on the field to at least try  to play. I'm not expecting the next Mia Hamm or anything, just asking for a little effort. Most of the time, they sit and pick the little rubber particles out of the artificial field. Tonight, however, one kid really stood out on our team, and right from the get-go, took the ball and scored a goal. Then he did it again. And again. And probably ended up with about twenty goals by the time the game was over. It was fun at first, since he was on our team and just destroying everyone else. We were winning! Hooray! I even congratulated his dad, who was standing by us, cheering his son on. But as the game wore o...