Time Got Away
“Time Got Away” is an old song so it is an appropriate single from the forthcoming new album about time and space. You can listen to it now. How long does it take to write, record, and release a song? In this case, twelve and a half years. Many recordings on old hard drives from past lives. Audiode 59 is me trying to figure out how all that time got away so easily. It also features some musings on 2022 from treasured Audiode contributor Shelby WillowStar. I wish everyone a peaceful continuance of existence down here at the end of the year.
Time got away from me so easily
Running wild and free so easily
Oh my friend
We were so young then
Oh my friend
We were so young
We didn’t know then
It could get so bad
And it could get so good
Over and over
Over and over
Central & Southern California Bike Tour!
305.7 miles +13,169 feet of elevation in Central & Southern California! Wonderful tour with good shows, loved ones, and stroop waffles. I'll be staying close to home for the rest of 2022, but I have some big bike tour plans already simmering for next year. Where should I roll in 2023? Please feel free to get in touch at freedomtour2020 dot gmail dot com if you have some sweet bike trails near your zone and a good place for a singer/songcyclist to play a show.
Collaboration
This "Collaboration" album of songs written with friends over the years is now streaming on the streamers! Many memories of many chapters in many places are contained in here. Isn't it wonderful how the times we share with other people are the times we remember? I have written hundreds of songs alone and I can remember writing maybe three, but each of these has a whole mini movie attached to it. I hope they offer some nice accompaniment to your midsummer mini movie making. More details and information about the project is here. And this beautiful artwork is by Grace Rowland.
Long Pause
My friend Elam has been sending me voice memos for years now. I love his voice & I love his words. I added music to some of my favorites. If you are looking for a quieter way to contemplate this loud holiday, here is a collection of those recordings. We are calling the project Long Pause and this album The Push and Pull.
Touring Without Cars or Airplanes (Update)
A year ago, I made a commitment to myself to tour without cars or airplanes. How is that going so far? I’d say good not great? I’ll give myself a C (which hurts…my last C was in “Home Economics” in the 90s because my group forgot to pre-heat the oven for the final).
Perhaps I failed. I wanted to tour without cars or airplanes, but I used both cars and airplanes in the last year. So: F? Maybe. But this is a work in progress and we’ve inherited 100 years of car dependency and I had some pre-pandemic Southwest vouchers that were already paid for and a wildfire destroyed the train tracks in Northern California last summer and…excuses excuses.
There have been some great successes too. I toured the Northeast in March-April entirely by Amtrak train and bus (but I flew to get there in the first place). All my local touring has been done entirely without a car. I did a bike tour to Washington and back down last year and I took the Amtrak train to/from California to Texas twice and brought the bike. Strikes and gutters.
I performed at the Kerrville Folk Festival in Texas in June and I flew to and from that. I have one other commitment forthcoming that will also include airplane flights: going to Florida with Face the Music to support volunteers who are fighting for progressive causes and candidates down there. There’s also a distant trip to Europe materializing in 2023. So year two is already a somewhat mixed bag.
Which brings me to a growing understanding that this concept and commitment will require a deeper change of focus and routine. My friend Andrew says: “the grass is greener where you water it.” For twenty years, I’ve been traveling to far flung places by car or plane and building friendships and followings in those places. It makes sense that a friend in South Dakota would send me a Facebook message about playing his young and growing festival there. But South Dakota is a long way from where I live. So do I just shrug and fly there and rent a car? Do I take a train with my bike and turn it into a grand three month odyssey?
Maybe. I have not abandoned the cross country bike tour idea and I’m imagining that 2024 may be the ideal time for such an undertaking. Maybe. Maybe not though. Maybe what I’m realizing is that staying and playing closer to home is the next chapter. Maybe watering the grass that is a bike or transit or Amtrak ride from my apartment is what’s next. I’m beginning to think that it is. Carrying on as we always have is not an option anymore. At least, it’s not for me.
That is not meant as a slight or a judgement about how anyone else is dealing with their lives in the present moment. And I am not naive enough to believe that my decisions here will make a global impact. I am making these changes simply because I want to and because it’s fun and interesting and challenging to find new ways to do what I love in harmony with my growing and evolving values.
Hope
I have been made aware by the internet that it is Mental Health Awareness Month. Audiode Fifty Two, which is largely an interview with a beautiful earthbound human being named Bobby Jo Valentine, is aware of mental health. There is so much to share and discuss on this topic that I had to upload it in two parts. Bobby and I only scratch the surface, but I hope we scratch it without shame or stigma. The conversation will continue. My friend Leigh Ann killed herself earlier this year. Can you even begin to imagine how much she must’ve been hurting? I wish I could’ve been with her when she was in the midst of that pain. I don’t know if I could’ve said anything that would’ve helped or provided any kind of comfort or understanding that would’ve helped her get through, but I wish I could’ve tried. It gets bad, but it gets better? I could’ve sang my song, but I know Leigh Ann knew that song and it didn’t matter. So what does matter? Hope. Hope matters. And this morning the YouTube robot delivered me a Cornel West lecture from 4/27/01 and he says it better than I ever could:
Hope is not the same thing as optimism. Never confuse or conflate hope with optimism. Hope cuts against the grain. Hope is participatory. It’s an agent in the world. Optimism looks at the evidence and sees whether it allows us to infer that we can do X or Y. Hope says I don’t give a damn I’m gonna do it anyway…And of course if you are a prisoner of hope you will be wrestling with despair. He or she who has never despaired has never lived. You don’t know what it is to be human if you have never wrestled with despair. But never allow that despair to have the last word.
Car-Free JFK Promenade in Golden Gate Park Forever!
On April 26th, 2022 the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted 7-4 to keep a 1.5 mile stretch of road in Golden Gate Park car-free forever! I showed up to sing my 1 minute public comment expressing my love for the JFK Promenade.
And Twitter introduced me to the term “loonbag”…
Which is my new favorite way to describe myself:
All in all, a good day for activist folk music, civic engagement, and the war on cars.
Kindness Committee
I have a fun, exciting, and mysterious happening to share with you. Melanie Hoopes, a theatre artist in New York, wrote a play inspired by a performance of mine that she attended in 2018 and the show is happening Friday, March 18th and Saturday, March 19th at South Presbyterian Church in Dobbs Ferry, NY in association with River Arts. How cool is that? Melanie sent me an e-mail in the summer 2021 and told me about this project and pretty much blew my mind. Now it's actually happening! I will be in the audience for the show and I will be performing my own show presented by Common Ground Concerts in the same space the following weekend, March 26th.
Here is an article about the play’s creation and ticket information.
Here is a link to tickets for my show in Dobbs Ferry, NY on March 26th.
East Coast Tour and Transit
I’m looking forward to my first tour of the east coast of the United States since before the pandemic this spring! I am flying and I’m conflicted about it, but it’s a long way over there from here and that’s where the work is right now. When will I be back? I don’t know! So consider finding your way to one of these venues if you want to hear and see me sing and play. I’ve included local transit links for each date. All of them are accessible by train and bus. I’m going to attempt to do this whole tour without a car. We’ll see! Hope to see you out there. Don’t hesitate to send me an e-mail if your town is in this vicinity and you want to host a house show or suggest a venue.
Bethlehem, PA - March 25th - 8:00pm
Godfrey Daniels
7 East 4th Street // 18015
TRANSIT: Take the LANTA Bus to 2nd at Northampton. 5 minute walk to the venue.
Dobbs Ferry, NY - March 26th - 7:30pm
South Presbyterian Church
343 Broadway // 10522
TRANSIT: Take Hudson Line (Metro North Railroad) from Grand Central Station to Dobbs Ferry Station. 13 minute walk to the venue.
Portland, ME - March 31st - 7:00pm
Blue
650A Congress Street // 04101
TRANSIT: Take the Metro Bus to Congress St + 690 Congress St stop. 2 minute walk to the venue.
North Stonington, CT - April 2nd - 7:00pm
White Pine Woods House Concerts
E-mail host for more information.
TRANSIT: Take Southeast Area Transit.
Somerville, MA - April 3rd - 7:00pm
The Burren
247 Elm Street // 02144
TRANSIT: Take the Red Line T to Davis Station. 4 minute walk to the venue.
Two Years Since Last San Francisco Show…
Here’s me talking about some thoughts and feelings I’m having about playing my first indoor show in a venue in San Francisco in exactly two years. The last show was 2.20.20 with the Cowtown Serenaders at The Lost Church. Tonight is with John Smith at Amado’s.
All Too Well (Jake’s Version)
I was scrolling through the internet last Sunday morning and I was suddenly aware that Taylor Swift had released a new ten minute song. I was curious so I followed a link to You Tube and watched her performance on SNL from the night before. I was moved and inspired. What a beautiful song! Many favorite lines, but that one about dancing in the refrigerator light is still sticking with me. Some clicks later and there I was down the Taylor Swift rabbit hole. I did not know about the original version of this song from ten years ago or that everyone knows it is about Jake Gyllenhaal or that he and Taylor dated for three months back then. Something about the expansive emotion of this new version and the ridiculousness of Jake Gyllenhaal’s involvement really got my creative juices flowing. What does Jake think of all this? How does he remember those three months? Is he sorry? Has he changed? I couldn’t let it go and a week later here is “All Too Well (Jake’s Version).”
Also, thanks to KQED for getting the joke and sharing it! :)
This parody is a commentary on Taylor’s wonderful song. I believe it is covered by fair use doctrine and Section 107 of the US Copyright Act. More on this distinction here and here.
Texas Curveballs!
The nation of Texas is tricky; the country of Texas is tough. Song is "So This Is When It Comes" from 2011 album Backyards.
Los Angeles!
Five days playing shows, seeing friends and their children, and biking around Los Angeles. I lived there for eleven years, but I never had a bike -- there's a whole secret matrix grid of paths explore! LA bike statistics in this video: 105.3 miles + 4,304 feet of elevation. Songs: "The American West" & "Empty in the Heartland" from 2011 album Backyards.
Getting back!
Multimode fossil fuel and human powered assistance to get back home. The beautiful song in this videode is "Pedaling My Bike" by Kristin Allen-Zito from her beautiful album The Atlas.
Jamboree!
Bike Videode #8. Various meanderings, performances, and thoughts/feelings in Bellingham, WA and at the 21st annual Subdued Stringband Jamboree! Songs: lots of music from various artists plus bits and pieces of "The Ballad of Wallace Green," "The War on Cars," and "Opening Up" (a new one).
Two Day Haul!
Bike Videode #7. Show day in Oak Harbor, WA and next day ride to Bellingham for evening rehearsal. Statistics for this video: 101.2 miles + 4,514 feet elevation.
Audible Day!
Bike Videode #6! Show day in Bothell, WA and day off to travel that includes interacting with Interstate 5 and calling an audible.
Statistics for this video: 56.9 miles + 2,633 feet elevation. Song: "Every Car Is A Person" from 2007 album Before We Fall.
Seattle!
Bike Videode #5! What a joy to bike through Seattle! Excellent infrastructure the whole way, separate protected paths, and reconnections with many friends from many different life chapters. Thank you to Jimmy and Peavine Alley for having me back. I've never made it anywhere alone.
Statistics for this video: 34.6 miles + 2,259 feet elevation. Song: "Outlaw" from 2011 album Backyards.
Tacoma & Vashon Island!
Bike Videode #4! The journey continues and I find myself back where I was:
Statistics for this video: 26 miles + 2,216 feet elevation. Songs: "Give Me What I Want" & "Back Where I Was" from 2006 album The Hereafter.