A world surrounded by pens.

A first little update of 2022 as I’ve been warming the lower tower and moving things around again.

New Music: I’m in the process of tracking “Long is the Road”, hey what do you know… a shorter song. I’m enjoying that notion. I hope that translates into the track being completed in a few weeks. I still have snowy mountains in my brain… but last night I blew the dust of the board and connected myself to the digital spike. I’m alive again. “Rivers End” will get a mixing day coming up here this January, I’ll probably do it during a rest day from new tracking’s. A mix generally takes about 5 hours or so… depending on the song. Looking forward to adding that track to the player. I’m super excited about the “River End” graphic of me on the boat riding into the falls with the ravens overhead… it’s a great representation of the lyric and how I feel at times… that graphic has been in my head for years. Other than that, a few days work on “The Crying Game” and ‘Dead Rabbit” and I should be able to sit back and listen to the first rough draft of Record #1. Wish me luck. I’ll post lyrics to “Long is the Road” in the coming days. Very cool track.

The Hadder Novel: I’m writing the next field note, I won’t give away the title just yet… but Zabble and Skylark are still in the newly discovered “Master Medlins” secret library… now that the mysterious knocking noise has been all sorted out, Zabble is sure to discover a few new clues as to why medlin was hiding all these secrets. Meanwhile, in the not too distant future, Diamonds Hadder and Lord Skynn are still on route the Gates of Europa and Diamonds first meeting with his mother. I decided that I had a few things that needed to be told before I returned to that part of the story, but I’m almost there. A few little books and coins and waterfall tales to go before I return to Europa and the people in Hadders dreams.

Other little things: My ideas were always so much grander than simple notions… always larger than what I could create… I’ve always felt like I was composing something so much larger than what other people could see or cared to see…. For that reason I never felt a need to try to explain it….. I just went ahead and proceeded to do what I could and hoped I would get a chance to complete the visions before I lost control of the ship..… I wasn’t upset about that, I’ve just always seen things in odd storyteller ways… and didn’t expect others to understand things that they didn’t need to understand… being a singer was something but it wasn’t the end all for me, it was just an incredible tool, brush or color on the palate..… the words I wrote always had other thing attached to them, visions, places, people, it was never just a song to me. Vocals were simply a string running through a dense landscape of paper dolls and puppet hands. There was always so much more to the delicate fabrics I was crafting than a simple string. Perhaps it was a curse that I couldn’t simply sing a song and be done with it… or perhaps it was a blessing…I suppose time will tell. Regarding words and stories… I’ve written many songs that seem like Novels and I’ve written conceptual records before… but this is my first attempt at a complete novel… the task is a bit daunting. I’m noticing that when the ideas come you really must stop and listen and make note of them instantly, otherwise they simply move on. More come of course, but best to grab each one quickly… they are all so important. I suppose this is true for all things in life, all dreams are ideas on the wind… and weather or not you carry a pen with you, well, that’s your call my friend. I live in a word surrounded by pens and I’ve methodically placed them everywhere that I roam. Look around you… what do you see?

The Stargazer Crew: As I stated last year, the stargazer crew was scheduled to record some new “Classic” cover songs, similar to our Stargazer cover. Studio time was pushed back till this year and now I’ve received word that Jan 15th is the new tracking day in LA. From what I understand we will be tracking ‘Headless Cross” and ‘Rainbow in the Dark”… and we’ll prob shoot videos for them as well. I’m hoping we can get Johnny Heinz on the tracks as well, but we’ll see.. I’m not really sure if someone else is slotted to do the bass tracks. I’ll be filming a lot of the process and releasing little clips along the way, so that should be a lot of fun and a nice little side project as I put the icing on the Hadder record and live show and start rehearsals here in the early part of 2022.

I suppose that’s all for today… I’m still feeling the effects of mountain withdrawals.. have a great first week of 2022. What a great year this could be, bring a pen.

-j

A New Year: The hoarder of Drips and Drops

Good day to you. It’s a new year… I just arrived back at the tower. I was away a long time.. it was quite the pilgrimage to close out the year of 2021. I was gone so long that when I arrived back in BOK, me and Ezra slept outside the first night because I couldn't stand the idea of being away from the moon and the stars. I won’t lie, it’s a little odd to fire up the tower.. I’ve been sleeping in the woods for days.. but although I was away the gears were still turning faster and faster.

I’ll be brief today as I just wanted to touch base and relight the towers fully… and to let you all know I’m back and very appreciative of all the well wishes and emails I’ve received on the road to archers bay. I had some great readings and met some great people on my travels. I also had some amazing reflections and clarity on the topic of Diamonds Hadder and art in general and I’ll share them later in the first week of 2022. It’s confusing sometimes to me… defining what it is that I’m creating.. and why.. and to what ends I’m prepared to take this specific installation of art. In fact, that's exactly what diamonds hadder is. It's not music alone or songs or a band, it's a little deeper than that. It really is a painting with every color on all levels of the canvas. It took a lifetime to build it and it serves no agenda. Little trips like this offer some space for little answers to find their way to me. It’s so true that the empty space inside the glass is just as important as the liquid itself that is defined by that amount of space. A full cup just kind of spills all over the place and leaves you tippy toeing around.. slowing you down to some degree, and why? So you don’t lose a precious drop.. ha… a precious drop of what? We can be greedy holders of things.. hoarding our drops and choking the life of art itself. I’m not interested in that any longer. Let thing spill I say and move along. Things just move to quick these days to guard against every drip and drop... every start and stop... every turn and rock.

I’ll stop there for now.. as this topic and the understanding of what Diamonds Hadder iz has weighed heavily on my mind most nights and deserves a post of its own. For some reason my wandering mind wants that definition desperately, that answer. It wants that puzzle finished… nice and tidy.. those odd puzzle pieces snapped together.. it’s actually part of the big picture.... solving the master riddle that is. I’ve gained some ground on that clarity.. and with that comes a freedom to now complete the first level of the maze. A few odds and ends these early moons of 2022.

Long truly is the road my friends. I remind myself again and again, this is a marathon and not a sprint and the view along the way is part of the prize. Perhaps you should too, in your own endeavors.

On the ever smaller priority list of little final Diamond things that occupy my Hadder mind as it relates to completing the first maze this new year:

Mix “Rivers End”

Complete “Long is the Road”

“Crying Game” - produce/complete

“Ballad of the Dead Rabbit” - produce/complete

Rehearsals.

Tour.

Lets see what happens along the way.

PS I'll be taking down the "The Crying Game "and "Dead Rabbit" soon from the music page...as I'm getting close to actually editing and finishing those tracks.. If your into collecting demos, download them now. The new versions will be a bit more focused and condensed, so to say, with several re-sings and musical edits along the way. I've mentioned this before, as they took somewhat of a back seat while I was finishing other tracks... but they are certainly on the chopping block soon and I'm excited about finishing them.. and bringing them to a more focused vision of the songs in general. Its more about taking away some times in life, rather than adding.. a lesson that will certainly serve those sketches. At least that's what I hear every time those tracks pass my ears. Sometimes it's a matter of cutting and running too... knowing when to do that is quite the trick in life... huh.. I guess your heart knows above all of such things... my heart says there's something in those ideas and so I haven't pulled the plug just yet. To some degree it's my failure to date in not capturing the magic of those ideas yet, but I'm determined to present them and to honor the lyrics with a better presentation. Looking forward to spinning that clay again. We'll see how it goes.

Farewell and happy new year to you.

-j

#diamondshadder #johnevermore #evermore #hadderupdate

Twas the Night Before Christmas

I felt like reading today.

#diamondshadder #johnevermore #evermore #hadderupdate #words #readings #happyholidays #twasthenight