Untitled

Garden Statement

So since announcing that my cd is definitely going to be titled “Garden Statement” I have gotten a few questions asking me why, or what it means. Well, here’s the deal.

In 2004 a film by the name of Garden State came out.  The movie was written by, directed by, and also starred one of my favorite actors, Zach Braff.  If you’ve never seen the movie, you might know him as JD from the television show Scrubs. Well, the movie is about an actor (Braff) who goes back to his hometown in New Jersey after his mom dies.  There he meets a girl (Natalie Portman, my biggest celebrity crush) and the movie revolves around Braff trying to figure out his life and where it is going. 

The first time I saw the film I fell in love with it.  I could relate so much to Braff’s character Andrew Largeman that it was insane.  As I was trying to come up with a title for my cd I thought back to the movie and realized how much it reflected my music and my views on life.

First off, one of the main themes in the movie is to live life in the now. You can’t wait for something to come your way, you’ve gotta do what you want to do and do it as soon as possible because you never know when your life is going to end. At one point in the movie Andrew Largeman says, “I’m 26 years old, and I’ve spent my whole life waiting for something else to start. Now I realize that this is all there is, and I’m going to try to live my life like that.”

Throughout my teenage years, I always expected to do something with my life at a young age.  I always wanted to be that musician that everyone was like, “wow he’s so young and doing so many things.” Well, time has passed and all of a sudden I’m not a teenager anymore, I’m 20 years old and I haven’t done shit with my music yet.  I spent all of my teen years waiting for something to come along that would propel me to greater heights, and it never came.  So with this cd and the time I spend after I release it, I’m going to stop waiting for something else to come along and realize that whatever I want to do, I should do it now.

Andrew Largeman’s dad in the movie is the kind of dad who is holding his son back.  He prescribes him meds to  help with his depression, but the meds don’t allow him to deal with reality.  He wants the best for his son, but doesn’t realize that he’s really hurting him more than helping.  I’m not going to go into too much detail with this one, but let’s just say my dad doesn’t support my music.  I know he just wants what’s best for me, but in this case, I don’t think he gets that doing this whole music thing is what’s best.  I mean, he’s never even been to a show, so I’m sure he has no idea whether or not I’m even good or not.

At another point in the movie, Natalie Portman’s character Sam tells Largeman to do something out of the blue.  Anything.  Make a movement, a sound, just something that no one else has done before.  It’s weird to think that just by being spontaneous in your actions, you can actually be the first person to ever do something.  That’s the way I want to look at my music. I want to be the first person to do something.  Obviously the acoustic genre is over saturated with shitty ass artists like Nevershoutnever.  I’m not saying he’s not talented, cuz he’s probably a better singer and a better guitarist than I am, but I am saying he writes shitty, heartless music.

The way I see it there are two ends to the acoustic spectrum.  The indie artists who look far too deep into everything and seem to only be enjoyed by the pretentious hipsters who walk the streets of New York or LA and get shit on in songs that Max Bemis writes, and then there are the ones who write cheesy lyrics, dripping with the ball sweat of a prepubescent asshole who is in music for all the wrong reasons.  I want to be the first to really bridge that gap.  I want to play music that is infectious enough to get stuck in everyone’s head, but meaningful enough to not be annoying once it’s stuck in your head. I’m not going to write songs about “Jane Doe” and talk about how “I know fo sho” blah blah blah, I’m going to write about real experiences, real shit… but turn it into a good song. 

So after I realized that all these themes from the movie were present in my music, I really wanted to incorporate the movie into the album somehow.  I could have just called it “Garden State” or done what the Ataris did with The Goonies on their album “So Long Astoria” and just referenced something from the movie, but then I remembered a song by one of the most underrated bands ever.  The song “Garden Statement” by Hidden in Plain View.  I know taking an album title from a song name is kind of lame, but I felt like it really fit, and I felt like I could turn it into something more than just a stolen song title.

The cd I’m going to be releasing in a few months is my “Garden Statement.”  It’s chock full of songs about me living my life the way I want, when I want.  It’s got it’s share of heartbreak, much like the movie.  It’s got songs about me wanting things I can’t have. It’s got songs about drinking. It’s even got a song about Taylor Swift.  In the end though, all the songs are about me.  They’re real, they’re in your face and I hope they make you think.  I’m not going to sit around waiting for something to come my way, I’m going to record this cd and work my ass off so it will take me as far as it can. I’m not going to conform to what this genre of music is turning into.  I won’t make this about my image or about how many hearts I can put on my page so girls think it’s cute that I’m all about spreading love.  That’s not who I am, but the songs on this cd are. 

“I dream too big.
I think too much.
I sing too loud.
I drink too much.
I fall in love with girls I can’t have.
And I write songs about all of it.”

That’s my “Garden Statement,” what’s yours?

So there are exactly 7 days till I head up Rochester, Michigan and hit the studio to record my first album, which is being produced by Craig Owens.  I can’t even begin to explain how excited I am right now.  I also can’t begin to express how stressed I am due to the fact that I still have 3 songs that I want to go on the album that aren’t done yet.

First off, it’s been over a month since I found out that I was going to have Craig produce my cd.  The anticipation has been killing me and the fact that it’s only 7 days away is really giving me a boner.  It’s just amazing to me that I have worked hard enough, saved up enough and stuck at this whole music thing long enough to work with one of the guys that I can honestly say made me want to be in a band.  When I was 15 or 16 I went to my first show at the house in DeKalb to see Chiodos, a band that I had really been falling in love with. The man with the microphone blew me the fuck away.  I got sweatier, sang louder, and lost my voice faster than I ever had before, and possibly ever will.  Craig commanded the stage and got each and every kid in the building into each and every song.  I knew at that moment that I wanted to get the same reaction out of kids with my music.  At the time I went to that show I was just starting my first band, The Standard Form of Falling.  Since then I have been in about 5 bands, none of which succeeded much (Your Atlantic Summer playing with Boys Like Girls, All Time Low, The Audition, and Valencia still being the highpoint in my musical career).

Now here I am, almost a year after deciding to do this acoustic thing, recording with one of my heroes.  It’s an amazing feeling.  Next weekend will be a defining moment in my life, which is exciting and scary.  I could kill it in the studio and get somewhere with this EP, or the 5 or 6 songs that will be on it will just be another 5 or 6 songs that go up on my myspace for a few people to hear and never actually move me anywhere.  That being said, I am in love with these songs and I think if I can put my love for them into the recordings then that will translate into other people loving them as well.

Who the fuck knows, though?  These next few weeks will be filled with promo pictures, getting album artwork done, figuring out how I’m going to pay to get cds pressed, designing merch, and promoting the fuck out of every little thing I do.

I’m hoping to get the cd put out on January 5th, with a cd release show on January 3rd in Aurora, IL.  That show is happening no matter what, it’s just a question whether I’ll have super awesome real pressed cds to give out, or a bunch of burned cds.  Either way, I think it’s going to be awesome.