Tad's Acoustic Series Part Six - The Turkey Sandwich Song

This is a song that wrote itself very easily.  It's laced with double-meaning...but literally at its core only about a girl who was hesitant to give me a bite of a sandwich I bought her at Magic Mountain.  I was poor.  My friends were poor.  In fact, one of my best friends actually called his credit card company on the way to the amusement park to see if they would give him a limit increase so he'd be able to enjoy all that was offered to those more civilized than we (which was pretty much everyone)...and god bless you Discover Card...you didn't disappoint!  Without further ado, the lyrics:

hey whatcha got there looks mighty fine

just a little taste could free my mind

if you leave yourself open I might sneak right in

Cause if your playing games baby I'm gonna win

i gotta feeling that it's time to begin so here i come

Oh baby

Can you not see

I got no money And nothin's free

Oh baby

How can it be...It's all so tempting…

oh my god what I need

is right in front of me can't you see

put on display looks even better

i'm thinking any way it don't even matter

if you leave yourself open I might sneak right in

Cause baby playing' games just means that i'm gonna win

i gotta feeling that it's time to begin so here i come

I wrote this song, progression, lyrics, and all sitting alone in a my bedroom where I could really hammer out the important stuff.  I was literally crouched next to a paper bag filled with planned parenthood condoms...ostensibly preparing me for the next phase of life that was impending...and intentionally made it sound as such...but at its core...it was just about a sandwich that I was hungry for.  Hope you enjoy...and if you don't...well, that's your fault!  :)

Tad

2016

Goodbyes

Had to say goodbye (or see you soon depending on your beliefs) to two wonderful people today.  Really the hardest thing I've had to do in recent memory.  I made it through...but just barely.  I've always had to use humor to...not mask...but to get through life's emotional curveballs and hold my shit together.  I'll summarize just briefly b/c I want to.  

These two taught me what funny was...what laughter was...and most of all what love was.  I was their only grandchild and most definitely received all the benefits that came with.  CDs I wasn't supposed to have, games I probably should have learned at a later age (poker), songs I probably shouldn't have heard until older still (Elvira comes to mind for some reason) and definitely words I shouldn't have used until grown ("damn it" over a dropped sandwich or something...Nan in horror, Pop w/ a sly proud smile on his face).  They were what grandparents should be (and what I can see in my parents now as I've been fortunate enough to make them grandparents)...the purveyors of harmless, but necessary joyful mischief.  The "yes's" to the parents "no's".  The we can skip school today to the parents regimen...the keepers of the fun.  

Nan's been gone a long time, and Pop was the last of my grandparents to go which in a way has been the hardest part of this whole thing so far.  I miss them, I miss them all.  But more importantly...every story I tell, ever sarcastic remark I make, every time I make someone smile or feel like they're "normal" when they may feel differently...well...I don't really miss them at all, b/c that is them.  I certainly didn't have the capacity to take all they had to give...but I thank God they had the willingness and love to give me all they had.  I pray someday I can do the same...pay it forward as they say.  Parents teach and love...guide and mold...but the reward of being a grandparent is you get to fill in the cracks with fun, love, and a dose of "Don't tell mommy or daddy".  

I love you nanny and papa, grandma and grandpa...I'll try my hardest not to miss you...but to keep you around by making others feel the way you would have. 

Nan & Pop

5x7 Folded Card

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Tad's Acoustic Series Part Five - Changing Once a Day

This is a fun one and well represents a touch of maturity in my song-writing (I just threw up in my mouth typing that out).  Before this song I was always trying to emulate the bands that got me into music, Smashing Pumpkins, Pearl Jam, Live, Alice in Chains, etc.  Granted, listen to the stuff that I wrote during that period and I wasn't even close to anything that resembled those bands...but that's what I was trying to be in my head.  Once this song came around...with this vibe and these weird chords that I felt I invented at that time (because I have an enormous head...figuratively and literally) it was a whole new world (author's note:  Came across a UK copy of Aladdin on eBay recently...and my 3 & 4 year old have watched it in the neighborhood of 25 times already...so that may shape some of my writing in the near future).  But without further ado:

Some say they're the same as any other day

But they're not the same, why is that?

It's not that hard to be the same as you were just one day ago

Maybe there's a disease spreading change that no one's ever heard of before...

A different thought a different feeling is a new you coming out

Is there anything you can do to stop it?  I don't see why not

A new yourself a new beginning or just another f***** up you

Why not just hang on to what you're feeling and try and see something through...

With this changing once a day how will you ever really find out who you are?

Will this pattern you've succumbed to ever stop?

How will you ever really know you?

Personalities come and go like the travelers at the bus stop

These days reality is very shaky but some things never change

The hubris of these lyrics is awesome!  Coming off a break up...judging an 18-19 year old girl for having the audacity to change her mind about the way she felt about me...or not even that...just wanting to get out of high school and see what life had to offer outside of her high school boyfriend.  I spent a significant amount of time scouring the deepest recesses of my brain to come up with basically, "Hey!  What's the deal??".  Brilliant stuff!  I guess these lyrics are a shining example of the extreme self-centeredness of youth combined with having yet come to terms with true human nature.  Ah to be young and dumb(er) once again!

Getting away from all that...I guess it just begs the question...do we change...or are we just we?  And is we nothing but a conglomeration of static and erratic behavior where change takes place on a daily basis, minute by minute even...but that "change" is nothing but the sum of what we actually are?  Changing once a day?  Maybe I was aiming way way too low.  Everything we experience from the moment we leave the bed to the moment we return...does it change us in any way?  Does it take a "life-changer" to bring about true change or can picking a different route to work or a new flavor of coffee creamer cause a ripple effect that can honestly alter the course of who we are?  

Or do we actively seek to constantly "change" in order to find out who we really are?  Maybe I had it ass-backwards!  Maybe life is nothing more than a series of auditions and we're trying to secure the role of us?!  By the way...if that's true and I'm auditioning to be me...although I would truly like the part, I would expect the Big Casting Director in the Sky to go with a much younger, slimmer candidate...you'll definitely get more asses in the seats that way.

But enough about me.

As I feel with every one of these...certain there's not much sense to be made...but grateful for any eyeballs trying to find some.

Love y'all.

Tad

Tad's Acoustic Series Part Four - Unseen Love

This one we can go ahead and have a little fun with as to what it actually means...or who it's actually about...or who in the hell did I think I was busting out "vigilance", "sprang out of consciousness", "flower of my love" and "enraptured" in the same verse at the age of...oh...we'll call it 20.  I'm going to say I was coming off of my first long-term relationship...or I guess you could just call it my first relationship...period (no guessing...that's what it was...not sure why I said "I guess" when there's no guessing needed...but I'm leaving it in).  So...if I have to try to figure out where I was going with this I'd have to say...oh, well first, please enjoy, and don't judge too harshly:

Sing softly echoing

I'll bring you anything

Unspoken shuttering

I'll be your everything

You're everything I've wanted you're wholly beautiful

You're everything I need of this I am for sure

You're everything I've wanted you're wholly beautiful

You're everything I need

I would leave this song for another day to hear your voice sing on responding

Wrapped inside your heart just to make you say nothing could destroy my longing

I misplaced my plans take a different way surround yourself I'll be your haunting

Three words once said never quite the same...vision cleared a new understanding

Not a look nor move just vigilance I am convinced

Utter loss of self in your presence you're everything I ever wanted

Open heart sprang out of consciousness the flower of my love unbroken

Capture me enraptured by loveliness my love for you goes on undaunted

As I was saying...my best guess would be that this song was about her...or the idea of her...mixed in with the idea of the next her and how I felt she needed to be honored, respected, and pedestalized (40 Year Old Virgin reference intended).  Also, knowing myself as I do the thought of a next she was nothing more than a pipe-dream anyway as I've apparently been gifted with the self esteem of a prom-night wallflower.

Not sure why that is actually...but I'm guessing it has something to do with only child syndrome and the feeling (while maybe only just that) that your existence is so important to two people that they have no choice but to instill in you the fact that you're special...and you have no choice (being a newer addition to the planet) but to believe what they believe about you.  Once you get out there in the real world and realize that we're all nothing but different shaped/sized/colored versions of the same thing...I think it can take any self-esteem you have packed into your vault and blow it up like unstable dynamite and Doc Arzt of LOST fame (my references are intolerable).

All this to say...the dude who wrote these lyrics makes me nostalgic for the times when his optimism for the future felt so pure...but also annoyed at his naiveté (but not nearly as annoyed as I am w/ myself for my continued use of parenthesis and flowery words such as naiveté) that such feelings can be secured for any lengthy period of time.  These honeymoon phase feelings are merely possible for fleeting moments in our lives.  But, perhaps the best way to live is jumping from fleeting moment to fleeting moment, steeling your heart against the bitterness that life can imbue in you with it's disappointments and struggles and keeping your course steady towards the next fleeting moment.  Maybe with a change in perspective each day can be its own fleeting moment and we can live in utter, silly happiness for the rest of our days...

Is it that simple that the key to a fulfilled and happy life may just lie in the angle from which you choose to observe it?

I don't know much...but I love you for reading this.

Tad

Tad's Acoustic Series Part Three - Untitled

If there's one thing that drives me crazy it's the pretentiousness of an "artist" to not even have the fortitude to name their art.  May I present to you an extremely old song, boldly called, "Untitled"!

This was written probably around 2000 as an unlisted track for an album we were actually making (by we I mean my first band Some Friends of Mine...SFOM to the cool kids).  We had some pretty crazy gigs for being so young...one youth group, two elementary school chapels, and 2 or 3 self promoted gigs at our local church.  We were about as hard core as hard core could be.

Anyways...I wrote this as a solo piece to sort of tag on to the end of the album (recorded in a beat up old garage in Torrance, CA by a really awesome dude, Ken Roberts).  We were a "christian" band...a band full of church-going christians...and as the guy writing the lyrics, pretty much everything had to have a christianity laced tie-in or else I wouldn't go with it.  I guess it was sort of at the beginning (if there ever really was one) of the can a band full of christians just be a band or are they required to be a "christian" band...and is that even a thing...I don't know.  Certainly not the most honest of song-writing approaches...and perhaps a bit contrived...but not in this song, there was definitely sincerity in this one.  Please enjoy:

Goodnight, goodbye my angel

May the gift of silence follow your drifting eyes

May the weight of the world pass over your heart without a fear

And the memories of before lose themselves in the hope of new life

When I look at you I see a light so true

But what you do is not the real you

Goodnight, goodbye my darlin'

Lives can change as the world spins away

Don't believe in anything you hear banged in your head

Don't believe in anything, the world's mistake

As soft as the dawn bringing brand new day

A touch on the heart can bring you all the way

It can bring you all the way

And I'd do anything just to hear your say you're through with looking elsewhere for something

And I'd give everything if you'd find your way

An unbelievable chance for a love free of pain it's not out there in the shadows of life's complaints

But I'm still sitting back waiting for today

Because today is no better time for everything you want

Pretty cut and dry...the concerned narrator pleading with his protagonist to wake up and believe in the treasures that lie beyond what we can see.  Turn off the noise of the world and succumb to the "truth".  I can't say this song was about anyone in particular, just a likely subject-matter for the songs written at that time of my life...but now, 14+ years and many lifetimes later...maybe the protagonist is me?

Thanks for your time as always...hope you enjoyed.  Love y'all.
Tad

Tad's Acoustic Series Part Two - Out of My Mind

If there's one thing I've learned, it's that I'm definitely out of my mind (I've also learned that I judgmentally snicker when people misspell definitely as defiantly...but that's another story).  In fact, if you dig back into those parenthesis I may in all actuality be defiantly out of my mind as well, but I'm not sure any of that has to do with anything...which is sort of my life's view at this moment.  Now, for the lyrics:

I feel your heart beat next to mine

And I listen as it dances right in time

To the music in my head

Good God I think I'm fallen

I whisper something to you so sincere

In an instant all the clouds have turned to clear

And I know I’m not okay

Good Lord now I know I’ve fallen

Out of my mind and out of my head

My spectrum’s been shifted to green from red

And the color of your eyes leave nothing unsaid

And I know, I’m as good as dead

I watched the sunset yesterday

And I smiled as the rays blurred to a haze

And I thought ain't it beautiful

Good lord could I think I've fallen

My heart nearly stopped as you walked away

Then stopped for good when back you came

Now I know my mind has changed

Good god I know I’ve fallen

Looks like I’m fallen in love

I'm pretty sure this was written on my bedroom floor (as most of these songs were)...and I'm also fairly certain it's not about anyone in particular.  In fact, I think it was written at a time in my life where being "fallen" in love was just a hope...coming off another 2+ year "failed" relationship and feeling as I often did in those days as there was no one out there that would want me (boo-hoo I know...leave me alone, I was, and perhaps still am, a bit of a romantic pessimist).  

Lastly, this song came from a time when the "band" (my buddies Carl & Luke at the time) were starting to play open mics on a weekly basis and we felt (probably I felt most strongly) that we had to have a new song each week.  I taught them the chords and structure in the parking lot about 30 minutes before we went up...it was just how we did things.  Looking back on those times...knowing that I wanted a new song each week and was able to keep up w/ that "demand" for quite some time astounds me.  As I may have mentioned before, I have not written a meaningful full song in some time...if I had to put a number on it, my best guess would be at least eight years...so these songs defiantly came at the height of my creativity (FYI - the defiantly was on purpose).

Thanks all for checking it out, liking (hopefully), and commenting if you like.  This sort of exercise really gets me fired up...and I'm excited to find the time to record the rest and give insights as I can...as well as dig up old memories that keep the fire going (and may even stoke it to some degree).  A dear friend of mine recently asked me to write a song about where I'm at right now in life, w/ all the stresses, joys, and pains of Happily Ever After...well, she knows who she is...and my goal is to have that done by the time I get around to finishing this for her (and for me).

Thanks and love to y'all (I have a best friend and best friend-in-law in TX so I can use y'all w/ no hesitance).

Tad