Around the time Spotify debuted in the U.S., a couple of the first albums my friend Angelica sent me were Pickin’ Up The Pieces by Fitz And The Tantrums and Innerspeaker by Tame Impala. If there are two things I know about Angelica when it comes to music, it’s that she loves The Beatles and …
I moved to California from Michigan back in 2005, driving out west with my buddy Brian the week after I graduated from college. I had another friend, George, who was going to San Diego State University at the time and allowed me to crash on his crouch while I tried to get my footing. It …
My dad worked in a few different machine shops for most of his life. By the time I was getting towards the end of elementary school, he worked the day shift pretty regularly, but earlier in my childhood he mostly worked afternoons and nights. I would usually be asleep when he came home for the …
For the longest time, I thought Rod Stewart was strictly a solo artist. I didn’t realize that part of his career was spent in a group called Faces, though I had known a couple of songs by the group even as a kid. It was just one of those things where I had never heard …
The only time I’ve ever been to the Echoplex, one of the smaller music venues located here in L.A., was back in 2009 to see a band called Russian Circles. I was jamming regularly with a coworker of mine around that time, and he had given me a copy of their album Station to check …
The guitarist I used to jam with in high school started to get into the TV show Hawaii Five-O sometime around our junior year. Subsequently, he also became a fan of the show’s theme song, particularly the version recorded by The Ventures. I never really watched the show myself, but when he eventually mentioned the …
One of the longest workweeks I ever had was just north of 97 hours, split between two jobs. At the time, the second job had me working on multi-track tapes for a live Michael Jackson concert that was going to be part of the Bad 25th anniversary release. I would start my regular gig in …
Everyday after I get home from work, one of the first things I typically do is wash dishes from the morning. While attending to this chore, I’ll usually listen to some kind of sports talk video by Dan Patrick, Rich Eisen, or Chris Broussard, amongst others. One show that has definitely grown on me over …
Yesterday morning, after tying up some loose ends with a previous project, I started to do some work on the Yes album Going For The One. In so doing, I came across a few articles online that mentioned “Parallels,” one of the songs on the album, was originally written by Chris Squire for his debut …
One summer many years ago, I was hanging out with some friends in their backyard, enjoying the clear night sky and feeling a complete sense of euphoria. It was just one of those moments where everything felt right with the world and nothing could bring me down. After being out there for a little while, …