Demo Love

Since I first sat down at my grandma's piano at eight years old, I've never really heard songs the way most people do.

I was always wondering what was happening underneath the surface. Where do the drums belong? What's the bass line doing? What kind of groove does this song breathe with? Long before I knew what producing was, I wanted to do all of it.

If I could spend every waking hour creating music, I probably would.

And trust me, I wrote plenty of terrible songs along the way.

The last decade has been a roller coaster—marriage, becoming a dad, leaving my band, changing directions more times than I can count. But somewhere in the middle of all that, I started looking at songwriting differently.

Instead of chasing perfection, I focused on writing songs I loved. Songs that told honest stories. Songs that people could connect with—and FEEL something from.  That would make them want to listen to them again and again.  

Eventually, I found myself with about twenty songs I believed in... and absolutely no time to record them all myself.

So I did something that wasn't easy: I let go of the reins.

With the help of some incredibly talented friends, these songs slowly came to life. Along the way they took on influences from all over the map—

-Rock,

-Emo,

-Indie,

-Americana,

.....and everything in between. Even letting someone else sing a few of them was harder than I'd like to admit.

But here they are.

At the end of the day, they're still demos. They're not perfect. They're not polished major-label releases. They're snapshots of ideas, seasons, mistakes, lessons, heartbreak, hope, and over ten years of growing pains.

There's an old saying in songwriting circles:

"Demo Love."

--used in a sentence:  "Man those guitars sound so good I think they need some Demo Love.." 

-meaning:  Instead of re-recording everything for the final song, these guitars should just be left alone and re-used.  

.....I think these songs have a little of that magic.

So rather than leave them buried on a hard drive, I decided to share them.

I hope you enjoy listening to them as much as I enjoyed creating them.

Cheers!  -Mike