Folks, I had the good life. A haze of badly rolled joints, shit food, warm free beer, and tons of strangers who already knew who I was. A crazy life for a teenager. All those years ago, my band Mutha's Day Out was touring constantly, usually with bands that, unlike us, knew exactly what they wanted to do musically, and had been perfecting their crafts for years. Some of them had been playing music as long as I had been alive. Yet there we were together in metal clubs and dive bars all over the country. Touring with bands like King's X (download their latest release below please), Sugartooth, Godspeed, and playing random shows with bands like Macabre, Jackyl, Pride And Glory... it was great as I look back, but at the time it was quite awkward for me, mainly because I knew our music was as naive as we were. Really though, I learned more in those years on tour than I would have ever learned in a classroom. More importantly, I learned about things that really matter in this world, like how to read people, how to treat strangers, and how to be a friend to everyone. But like all things, Mutha's Day Out had to end. It just had to. Internal conflict, maturing minds, drug and bible addictions. We had to end it.
Once it was over there were a few years of insane body-destroying drug abuse for me and in those times it became clear that music was more than just my fate. It was my fate to share. Not only could I hear what I wanted to play, I could hear it through the world's ears. It's importance was unfathomable at the time. I struggled with these apocalyptic visions and end-time soundtracks that dominated whatever buzz I had at the time. Actually, some of the music I wrote then, already have, and still do re-surface from time to-time in new material. It wasn't until I hooked up with the Little Rock people that the paths I am on now really opened up. Meeting Bobby Redd, Chris Terry, Clay Latch, and Jay Lytle, was one of the best things that ever happened to me. We all knew great music was to come. It was already there in Sickshine, Crankbait, and Shredded Corpse. The first real project that came from my relocation was Copsopdomy. I really enjoyed getting away from the bass for a change. Plus playing music with Bobby Redd and Chuck on drums was the power I knew I needed. Our first show at Vino's was pure fucking magic. We had the entire crowd in our fists, and like I said at Bobby's funeral, it was really like we could just pick the whole crowd up off the floor and the crush them back down to the ground with the sludge. Total power. 
Then by living in the jam house, I had time to work on my drumming, which I had been attempting my whole life. One night when Sunny Daze's drummer couldn't make it to practice, I sat in with them and that was the beginning of what now is Rwake. Throughout the next couple months, Sunny Daze needed a drummer more and more, and we actually wrote a couple tunes so we formed Wake. We just got stoned as hell and jammed for like a year or so, played some shows, then after a serious speed/ DM/ acid binge I had a revelation. I remember we were having trouble with our bass player, trying to incorporate our new 2nd guitar player, Chris Newman, who was one of the best things that ever happened to us, and we were all gathered in the house we were living in an I remember we were trying to change the name due to the million other bands named Wake, and something snapped in my brain and I told the rest of the band that I could no longer play music to just have a good time and just be in some party party stoner rock band. If I was going to keep playing music in Wake, we would have to do something cosmically relevant. We had the talent and the abilities. I knew it was time to open the spiritual gates. I don't really remember everyone's reaction that night but that was the end of Wake and when we added the R and became Rwake. Also a very relevant part of my life. 
Rwake start was slow and rough. Alot of really poverty-filled years that although they where hard, it was never enough to change my focus. The music was becoming so spiritually rewarding, it was O.K. to live off of pizza crusts and stolen frozen burritos from Kroger. It was in these times that we had an endless party in our house and a Levy girl named Brittany started coming to the drunken drugfests. It didnt take long at all for the hands of fate to put us together, as we still are, almost 11 years later. Rwake continued to do better and better with the new cosmic drug nightmare sound and things got better and better. The next couple of years were killer, for the first time I was absolutely proud of what I was doing musically. I had a couple of other bands that I was really excited about. 4 Way Anger, Hellhawk, and Copsodomy were at their best point musically, although at the bands were to be short lived. Then about five years ago the inevitable reality of middle-age showed it's ugly head and my life started to change quite dramatically. Children were being born, people were working more and more to pay to live alone instead of everyone living in two or three houses. We just started to grow up, as crazy and inconceivable as it sounds. Music, always in the forefront of all of our lives was harder to do on a bigger professional scale. In reality though, being able to step back away from the band for a minute and see it from a distance has been crucial in the writing of our best material. The last two Rwake albums are light-years ahead of our older stuff. But life was just changing in alot of ways. B became pregnant right before the "If You Walk Before You Crawl.." studio session and gave birth to Charlie not long after we got off tour with Alabama Thunderpussy. Shortly after he was born he was diagnosed with Rubenstein-Taybe Syndrome, a genetic disorder that means that he'll have special needs and require extra attention throughout his life. At first the news of this was obviously soul-shattering, mainly because the more I read about kids with RTS, the more I realized that there is extremely different levels of it and there's no way to tell how severe a kid is affected by it until he or she gets older. Luckily, Charlie is more mildly affected than alot of kids and although he will have special needs, he is really not that far behind kids his age. I often say and I truly mean that if I could go back and change him genetically to make him normal, there is no way in the world I would do it. I am inspired and even envious of his levels of purity and simplicity. I have always loved the things in people that make them unique, so Charlie is a dream come true kid for me. Raising Charlie is a little tough for us because we have a house in the hills of Northern Arkansas and his therapy is in Little Rock, which means that he and B spend their weeks there so he can get therapy and so she can run her tattoo studio.
I have returned to life on a forklift working nights at the Wal-Mart distribution center also known as "The Stomach Of Satan" because that is where all the shit in the world is received and shipped to the Wal-Mart stores or "The Assholes Of Satan". Life has changed dramatically from the days of waking up in the van, not knowing what state I was in, what day it was, or really even who I was. I now know that I am a total heavy metal, burnt-out, apocalypse obsessed, raging, screaming, half deaf lunatic and I'm cool with that. As long as I'm eating ramen noodles because I want to, instead of because I have to.
Then by living in the jam house, I had time to work on my drumming, which I had been attempting my whole life. One night when Sunny Daze's drummer couldn't make it to practice, I sat in with them and that was the beginning of what now is Rwake. Throughout the next couple months, Sunny Daze needed a drummer more and more, and we actually wrote a couple tunes so we formed Wake. We just got stoned as hell and jammed for like a year or so, played some shows, then after a serious speed/ DM/ acid binge I had a revelation. I remember we were having trouble with our bass player, trying to incorporate our new 2nd guitar player, Chris Newman, who was one of the best things that ever happened to us, and we were all gathered in the house we were living in an I remember we were trying to change the name due to the million other bands named Wake, and something snapped in my brain and I told the rest of the band that I could no longer play music to just have a good time and just be in some party party stoner rock band. If I was going to keep playing music in Wake, we would have to do something cosmically relevant. We had the talent and the abilities. I knew it was time to open the spiritual gates. I don't really remember everyone's reaction that night but that was the end of Wake and when we added the R and became Rwake. Also a very relevant part of my life. 
Rwake start was slow and rough. Alot of really poverty-filled years that although they where hard, it was never enough to change my focus. The music was becoming so spiritually rewarding, it was O.K. to live off of pizza crusts and stolen frozen burritos from Kroger. It was in these times that we had an endless party in our house and a Levy girl named Brittany started coming to the drunken drugfests. It didnt take long at all for the hands of fate to put us together, as we still are, almost 11 years later. Rwake continued to do better and better with the new cosmic drug nightmare sound and things got better and better. The next couple of years were killer, for the first time I was absolutely proud of what I was doing musically. I had a couple of other bands that I was really excited about. 4 Way Anger, Hellhawk, and Copsodomy were at their best point musically, although at the bands were to be short lived. Then about five years ago the inevitable reality of middle-age showed it's ugly head and my life started to change quite dramatically. Children were being born, people were working more and more to pay to live alone instead of everyone living in two or three houses. We just started to grow up, as crazy and inconceivable as it sounds. Music, always in the forefront of all of our lives was harder to do on a bigger professional scale. In reality though, being able to step back away from the band for a minute and see it from a distance has been crucial in the writing of our best material. The last two Rwake albums are light-years ahead of our older stuff. But life was just changing in alot of ways. B became pregnant right before the "If You Walk Before You Crawl.." studio session and gave birth to Charlie not long after we got off tour with Alabama Thunderpussy. Shortly after he was born he was diagnosed with Rubenstein-Taybe Syndrome, a genetic disorder that means that he'll have special needs and require extra attention throughout his life. At first the news of this was obviously soul-shattering, mainly because the more I read about kids with RTS, the more I realized that there is extremely different levels of it and there's no way to tell how severe a kid is affected by it until he or she gets older. Luckily, Charlie is more mildly affected than alot of kids and although he will have special needs, he is really not that far behind kids his age. I often say and I truly mean that if I could go back and change him genetically to make him normal, there is no way in the world I would do it. I am inspired and even envious of his levels of purity and simplicity. I have always loved the things in people that make them unique, so Charlie is a dream come true kid for me. Raising Charlie is a little tough for us because we have a house in the hills of Northern Arkansas and his therapy is in Little Rock, which means that he and B spend their weeks there so he can get therapy and so she can run her tattoo studio.
I have returned to life on a forklift working nights at the Wal-Mart distribution center also known as "The Stomach Of Satan" because that is where all the shit in the world is received and shipped to the Wal-Mart stores or "The Assholes Of Satan". Life has changed dramatically from the days of waking up in the van, not knowing what state I was in, what day it was, or really even who I was. I now know that I am a total heavy metal, burnt-out, apocalypse obsessed, raging, screaming, half deaf lunatic and I'm cool with that. As long as I'm eating ramen noodles because I want to, instead of because I have to. downloads:
Sugartooth - S/T (torrent)
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