Cheap Seats at the Cartesian Theater is a conceptual collection of 22 short song experiments that's been in development since I was finishing my 2010 album In Not-Even-Anything Land. Lyrically, the album explores the vast and brilliantly contradictory life of the human mind, drawing upon metaphysical philosophy, cognitive science, and especially the ever-shifting and subjective lens of personal experience.  Aesthetically, the music and words reflect my continued development of the goals I pursued on the last album, including increased attention to the poetic content of the words, and a further effort to imbue the music with experimental elements of the avant-garde without losing sight of songwriting tradition.  You can expect further exploration of electric, full band sounds, as well as more experiments with genre eclecticism, intricate counterpoint, through-composition, progressive song structures, polyrhythm, found sounds, field recordings and musique concrete, jazz harmony, dissonance and atonality, free improvisation, and spoken word!

Trust a Professional

Cheap Seats was professionally recorded at my expense at Cloud City Sound in Portland, OR, by engineer/sonic warlock Justin Phelps from December 2011-May 2012, mixed in July and mastered in August, instilling the often challenging music with an exceptional level of professionalism and sound quality.  Apart from the supernatural drum kit contributions of Drew Shoals and Russ Kleiner as well as guest appearances by Peter Bruckner (piano) and Nick Manwell (guitar), every instrument is played (with varying degrees of ineptitude) by yours truly--including guitar, bass, piano, alto saxophone, bass/soprano clarinets, dulcimer, synthesizer, musical saw, hand percussion and vacuum cleaner.  The record is almost ready for duplication, with an expected release date of October 2012.

Finish Strong!

As mentioned above, the professional recording of this album has been funded straight out of my own pocket--a hefty feat for a bartender/singin' poet!  The past 9+ months have been extremely creatively fulfilling but have also involved a lot of financial and personal sacrifice.  Making my artistic and personal lives less mutually exclusive is one of my biggest goals as my musical life moves forward, and getting the word out about the music is the best thing I can do to accomplish this goal!  Your preorder Kickstarter contribution will help fund the remaining post-production work the album needs, like CD duplication and promotion of the finished album--effective publicity utilizing third-party promotions assistance for submission to blogs, college and independent radio, and other print media will help get this challenging music heard by the kind of music fans who make up my untapped potential market.  The more money I can raise, the better publicity I can afford, which will make my next project something that can help pay for itself through the help of more and more people who are excited about the music!  The best part about contributing to this project is that you're rewarded with the music I've been working so hard to make--I'm very proud to finally share these sometimes bizarre songs with you, and I'm confident they'll take your ears and brain someplace they've never been before!