So, Sweet Road To Ride was almost an unintentional concept album. I had about seven tracks, if played in the right order, tell a somewhat depressing story of a guy meeting a girl, falling in love, questioning their love, falling out of love, and finally going a bit mad.

It was only seven tunes and I had 4 others that didn’t fit too logically into the mix. For those of you that have the album, and have it downloaded onto your computer, try listening to the following tracks in the following order and check out what I’m talking about.

1. Over My Head

Our character finds himself accidentally falling for a girl…uh-oh.

2. Sometimes

He’s full on in love, and professing it to the world.

3. Here With Me

He’s missing her…sounds like he’s torn a bit between his work and home.

4. Great Divide

What is happening to the relationship???

5. While You Were Sleeping

She’s audi-5000.

6. Sunburn

He is super bummed about it.

7. Love Went Wrong

Now he’s getting a little crazy…

So why not do a full on concept album, you ask. Well, we had these other four songs that didn’t fit as well, plus the concept I have going sort of devolves into loneliness and madness. I didn’t have the redemption of everything being okay as tightly told as the rest of the story. Watch Me Now is arguably the most redemptive tune I’ve recorded, but Halfway There, Ain’t Found Us, and Again didn’t fit quite right. The fact that those seven worked together like they did was pretty happenstance…certainly not intentional. Some of those songs were up to 5 years old when we went to record.

At any rate, it’s kinda cool to listen to the 7 in the concept order if you get the chance. Come see us at a show, and keep the faith…

Josh

My Deer Van,

I feel compelled to give a minute to pay respect to the most important component of my current business model…my big white van.  It gets us there on time (or would if we left on time) and is literally where we spend most of our time on the road.  For 177,770 miles I haven’t had even an ounce of trouble with her.  She and I have driven from San Francisco to Boston and all points in between.  She’s a good van, and she’s down right now.

My first band van was a ’96 Ford E-150 with the Chateau package.  I bought it from a fellow musician named Stuart Mann down in Corpus.  It was nice and served me well, but had a nasty habit of just not starting at weird times, and it would often stop running while driving it.  Exciting? Yes.  Dependable?  No.

I was in the market for a new van and gave a call to my cousin Zane up in Oklahoma.  He had one on his lot and cut me a smokin’ deal on a 2006 Chevrolet 12-Passenger Express Van.  I flew up to Oklahoma City and drove it back home, thus beginning a 177,700ish trip without incident.  We’ve crawled over mountain passes in Colorado snow, we’ve almost washed away in the Pacific ocean on Pismo Beach in California (tide came in while we were stuck in the sand, almost lost her there, not her fault), and we navigated lower Manhattan at 5:00 on a Friday afternoon this past June.  The only real maintenance I have done is changing fluids.  She still has the same brakes on as when I bought her, and there is still life in them!  She has been in constant service to every gig I’ve played over the past couple of years.  If I didn’t take her it was my choice, not because she couldn’t do it.  This weekend we’ll go out without her. 

Last weekend, on my way home from San Antonio, after years of Texas hill country driving, I hit my first deer.  I didn’t just hit a deer, I pulverized a deer.  East bound on I-10 this buck jumped out in front of me so fast I didn’t have time to hit the brakes.  I hit him going about 70, and the front right side of my van paid the price.  Mechanically she was actually okay, no fluid loss, no alignment or tire issues.  The cosmetic damage, however, was pretty extensive and her front right head light assembly was basically gone, and she needs a new bumper, grill guard, license plate, radiator, and other stuff.  Otherwise, it was like hitting a really big bump.   I may not even be typing this if I’d been in our Honda.

Right now she is at the body shop, getting tended to, and due to the holiday probably won’t be ready until sometime next week.  It’s cliché, but you don’t know what you got until…you know the rest.  She’s a good van and I can’t thank whoever was on the assembly line that day enough for making one helluva Chevy van.  I just thought some props were due…and now they are not.

Happy Thanksgiving everybody, count your blessings and eat too much turkey.  Like Todd Snider says, “enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think.”

Josh

“Trick or Treat!”  What a weird holiday.  I’ve always been a little perplexed by this one.  I guess because it is celebrated so diversely based on age…

For the young boy and girl it’s all about the fantasy…and the candy.  You really believed that putting on that cape, or that tiara, or that sword you really became a hero, princess, or pirate.  You would awkwardly amble up to the neighbor’s house, ring the bell, and “trick or treat”.  You return home with your bounty, eat a bunch of candy, and have a real hard time going to sleep. 

As you head into your teen years somehow the holiday becomes less about treats and more about tricks, or hooliganism in some cases.  After the little kids do their thing and have gone home and are getting jacked on sugar, the teens take to the neighborhood streets wandering in loose gangs with toilet paper and eggs stashed in their coats.  Otherwise good kids somehow feel the desire to “walk on the wild side”.  It is the devil’s holiday (or as close to one as he has), and it brings a little devil out in all of us I guess.

This phenomenon was never more evident to me than in college, especially for the girls.  The girls at my school all seemed to take normal costumes and make them “sexy” by either buying children’s costumes and squeezing into them, or taking them to the extra racy tailor.  College in TX was certainly like nothing I’d seen and Halloween at college in TX was mind blowing for a pretty sheltered guy from New Mexico.  As for the dudes, we’d try to do something just so we could go to the Halloween parties where the girls were.  The frat guys would all be something that required them to be shirtless, and we band geeks would do something ridiculous like taking a Coors Light box and making it armor so you could be “beer man” or a “knight in shiny beer case armor”…not that I ever did that, I just heard about a guy who did...

Post-college Halloweens (thankfully) haven’t really found me in costume.  I just never have had any luck with costumes.  I think I peaked on my first Halloween when I was a skeleton.  Since then I can recall some less than cool costumes; pirate, ghost, GI Joe, beer man, football player, construction worker (which just involved wearing the clothes I wore to my summer job in college), life guard (one of my biggest mistakes. In retrospect I looked like one of the party boys at Studio 54).  To say the least I haven’t done that well on this holiday.  

This year will probably be no different.  I have a great idea, but whether or not I get it pulled off we’ll see.  JJ is going to be a pirate, I doubt his mom will wear the Britney Spears school girl costume I first saw her in ten years ago…not that she couldn’t…it’s just not a mom sort of costume.  There is no doubt that when it comes to holidays I’m much more about eating turkey or opening presents than I am dressing up like someone or something else.  Luckily it’s just once a year, and this year I’ll be in Amarillo.  Who knows what’s going to happen…

Have a safe and Happy Halloween no matter which level of celebration you are on, and we’ll see you soon.

Josh

JJ is one.  I can hardly believe it.  I remember a year ago at this time Kristi and I were in a daze.  He was just home, we just wanted him to poop and pee at the appropriate times and not throw up too often.  Ain’t no ‘hood like parenthood.  While we were in the hospital I tried to keep a running journal of the events that were happening.  I was somewhat successful, and as in many instances in my life, before he was actually born I seemed to have a lot more time on my hands.  I read it tonight so this is where my mind is.

His birthday is kind of like my new New Year’s celebration.  We survived, and more importantly, he survived his first year of life.  In his first year I played a lot of shows, released an EP and a full length album, had a lot of fun, and moved to a sweet place in the country thoroughly debunking my fear that my life would somehow cease being cool after children.  We’ve watched him grow from a little lizard looking thing to a dashing little man who can’t quite walk, has seven teeth, and loves to put things in containers and then take them out, and then put them back in. 

Though still cool and fun, life is wholly different post delivery room.  Take for instance his birthday party.  I was prepared for a fiesta, an all day event of barbeque, beer, and washers.  I knew the children wouldn’t partake in said events, but I had never planned a kiddie party.  I didn’t factor that about half of the party needed naps and sippy cups an hour in.  I think total run time on the event was about 90 minutes.  I smoked the brisket for 10 hours!  Parties are different when you have little kids involved.

The funny thing was that I didn’t slide at all on the “who gets love and attention” scale this past year.  I maintained my spot in the 3 hole.  It’s Izz, our dog that really had to adjust.  The move from second to fourth on the love depth chart was not easy for her.   She’s still recovering.  I’d say she needs counseling, but I’d be joking, and there probably actually is doggie counseling out there.  How will I explain that to the boy?

All in all it’s been great, a trip like no other.  I am currently cranking out a lot of songs about coming to grips with the reality that you are in.  It’s a weird thing looking down the barrel of 30 with a boy and a wife, and no idea what’s about to happen.  You’ll hear the songs soon enough.

In the meantime buy the new album and come see some shows, we’ll be back to the southeast in November and we have a lot of TX shows on the books.  Thanks for indulging in my reminiscence (I don’t know if I used that word correctly).  I didn’t think I’d be the guy to sing songs about his kid from stage, but I have been, it’s kind of hard not to sometimes.  I’ll truly try to hold back from being the guy who wants to tell you he knows all about life and love just because he’s had a kid.  I’m as confused as I’ve ever been.   All I know is I love the little dude and can’t wait till he can carry my amp and guitar.

See you soon.

Josh

Well, I didn’t do very well blogging from the studio.  I found it quite hard to capture in words exactly what was happning.  It’s like trying to tell somebody about something completely subjective that they will be able to experience for themselves in a few months.

The things I can tell you, the teasers if you will, are that it is great—beyond what I imagined.  It is a much bigger (sonically) than I expected it to be.  Whereas the EP was pretty much just the three of us, this album has a lot more layers…like ogres…and onions.  If we had more arms the three of us could pull this album off.  We played nearly every part.  There are a couple of guitar things and couple of keyboard things that were played by our producer, Mark Addison, but by and large we played the guitars, drums, bass, keys, chimes, pots, pans, hand claps, and of course we sang like birds.  Right now it looks like we’ll have 10 or 11 tracks.  Some might be a little surprised by what they hear, but if you’ve been paying attention, I think this album will make perfect sense to you.  Featured in the approximately 45 minutes of music are…a full on fiesta, an instrument called an arp, backwards drums, bowed bass, and a guitar played with a sharpie.  If that isn’t a healthy serving of intrigue I don’t know what is.

Still don’t have a name for this project, though I’m getting close. 

It has been a great experience.  I really love going in the studio to make albums.  I always learn so much.  We have a very stout album on our hands.  I don’t know what kind of music it is.  I suppose it’s Americana.  There are country moments, and you can tell that’s the home I was raised in, but you can also tell that when I left home I was very unreserved in what else I let into my sphere of influence. 

Enough about the album though, it is my job to present it and your job to listen and form your own opinions.  We are hoping for a late summer, fall release on a label that we will be talking more about later (more intrigue).

In the meantime I’ll keep you updated on all things JG3, and keep you posted on album news.  Stay tuned for sneak previews, you never know if a new tune might turn up on myspace, or the website for a day or two  (even more intrigue).        Later On….Josh

All drum and bass tracks are done. We have tracked 15 tunes, of which I hope to have 10 or 11 for a new album. It’s been hard work, but very rewarding. My early frontrunners for favorite tune are Sunburn, Great Divide, and Again. They are all tunes that I haven’t ever really gigged, so perhaps it’s just the newness that has me so excited, but they sound awesome. It looks like I have three co-writes in contention. Drew Kennedy and I wrote one, Walt Wilkins and I wrote one, and there is a song that my long term songwriting partner Ryan Reese and I wrote. I think they all have a place on the album too.

I was sad to hear the Poodie Locke passed away today. Poodie was always kind to me, and I have some memories that I’ll never forget, and some I’ll never remember courtesy of him. RIP Poodie.

We seem to be ahead of schedule. We won’t record tomorrow on account of a gig in College Station. We’ll be back at it Friday and wrap it up next week sometime. I’m trying to shoot some video in the studio so hopefully and short documentary from the studio will be out soon.

Thanks,
Josh