One Awesome Thing: Music Release Days

It's been over 6 months since my last blog, so it's high time to pick up the habit again. There's so much attention given to satire, negativity, or passive mocking that it's hard for millennials, like myself, to find encouraging daily reads, so I'm hoping to get back into providing these One Awesome Thing posts on a regular basis again.

When I was in high school, I was introduced to the music "scene". To this point, my main source of quality music was The X (or The Force, if you remember that far back), which was the only modern alternative station in Pittsburgh and played a heavy dose of Green Day, Nirvana, and Pearl Jam. Throw in some Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit on MTV and you have me at 13.

My good friend, Brandon (who is now co-executive producer for Travel Channel's Dangerous Grounds, introduced me to music that was not on the radio in 10th grade (after establishing POD as my favorite band the year before). He gave me albums from MxPx, Value Pac, and Ninety Pound Wuss. These Tooth and Nail staples introduced me to wholesome Christian punk and, more importantly, the fact that there was great music that was NOT on the radio!

Over the next few years, learning about bands and listening to music became my main source of entertainment. When you are constantly entertained by what's new and hip, your favorite day becomes record release day. In high school and into college, Best Buy offered new release for 10 bucks, so this was where you'd find me on Tuesdays.

Well, times have changed. My love for new music still exists, but the Internet has changed everything. Albums started leaking online several years ago, so now bands put them online for us before the album release. More attention is given to having an album release show so fans can pay SOMETHING to see the artist instead of just listening for free online.

Today's One Awesome Thing is record release days, or, more specifically, Noah Gundersen's debut full-length album, Ledges, which is out today via Dualtone Records (The Lumineers, Delta Spirit). This album is beautiful. I've had the pleasure of seeing Noah play his own stuff 3 times since moving to Seattle, in some of the most unique settings (house show, Timber!, Triple Door) and look forward to seeing him a 4th time at the Neptune Theater for his release show this Saturday. I could go on and on about Noah Gundersen's unique songwriting ability, but I'll let my friend, Greg Jones, at Ear to the Ground do that instead.

Great Expectations

A friend asked how I'm doing and I began explaining that I'm in the mood to read and play music a lot, realizing that this has been an ongoing struggle. I deactivated Facebook, refused to get cable in my new apartment, and am considering ditching the internet at home or on my phone. These things are all such distractions.

This is your turn to keep me accountable. I picked up Great Expectations and am intending to read more so I can get my creative juices flowing. The opportunity is here to write songs and play at open mics, see shows and review bands for Ear to the Ground Music, or even start writing prose again and publish a little something in the UW Tacoma literary publication, Tahoma West.

The time is now. Facebook is gone for a bit; hopefully a long while. Genuine human interactions and real, valuable alone time is in the horizon. Hopefully creation follows. Check back soon.