Personal Projects

I started recording things when I was 6 years old. I had one of those old shoebox cassette tape recorders that I would do radio shows and little kid skits into to. By the time I was eight I had my first Casio keyboard with a built in drum machine. At 9 I got my first snare drum and crash cymbol for Christmas, and it was the was the best thing ever! I had a practice pad that I would do my doubles, triples and rolls with. And of course, I found a tape-deck way to record myself.

In between all of this, my mother made me take piano lessons, which, ironically, is the instrument I play the least well, while still having at least a modicum of talent behind the keys.

I started trying to learn my mother's classical acoustic guitar with the fat neck and the thick nylon strings, when I was about 14, but didn't make it very far. About the time I turned 16 I bought my first electric guitar on a whim. I spent fifty bucks in a pawn shop for a knock-off Gibson SG. For whatever reason, that night I was able to play along with the Beatles' "Day Tripper". After that I became a guitarist.

It wasn't long before I was taking two boom-boxes and plugging them together with spliced headphone cables plugged into the headphone jack from one, and into the aux input of the other, which allowed me to record on one, and then bounce and record onto the other. I could go back and forth between the two tape decks, layering track after track as I went. There was much degredation, and I'm sure all of those recordings are lost.

In 1991, my cousin Jonathan and I started playing music together. He got a whole trap kit before I ever could, and I did have my guitar, so I plugged into an old stereo and we started writing songs in his bedroom. I have been writing songs, and recording music ever since.

My methods have improved over the years, and I'd like to think that my song-writing has improved as well. My songs can be vary eclectic and span a large range of styles and genres. I hope you enjoy!