ABOUT:
A record of big pop moments and globe trotting arrangements in technicolor, these songs focus on a five year period of struggle, self discovery, growth and renewal in the life of songwriter/record-maker David Karsten Daniels. During this time DKD got married, had a kid and experienced a crisis of self-identity. Losing himself in self-help books and the Enneagram, many of these songs appear as mantras for a new husband and father trying to trade control and ego for connection and meaning. While a few of the songs flash back to easygoing youthful times, most deal very directly with the day to day of trying to survive and thrive in a new reality (with a handful of the songs following DKD into alternate realities as Larry Ellison, a Ghanaian treasure hunter and a rabbit). End the end, the album is a sort of letting go - shedding a pervasively melancholic youth, discarding a fabricated self in order to participate in an ever-evolving and interdependent family unit. 

Along the way David fell deep in love with the sounds of Fela Kuti, Congolese and Indonesian music, fun. and Kanye West. Roughly half of these songs feature extensive collaboration with songwriter/producer/filmmaker Chris Walker (Driver Friendly/Hopeless Records/Danger Films) whose focus on rhythm, faster tempos and relentless hooks helps gives the record a feeling of urgency and buoyancy rarely found on David's previous albums.  

A handful of the other songs feature the inspired performances of friends and family - among them David’s wife and son, his brother and sister-in-law Dane and Abbey Daniels and friends Kyle Henson and Ben Jousan. In at surprising turn of events, Austin, TX singer Lex Land (NBC’s ‘The Voice’) and Dallas rapper -topic briefly appear... 

CREDITS:
David Karsten Daniels - vocals, guitar, bass, percussion, drums, keys, programming, violin
Chris Walker - drums, percussion, guitar, drums, keys, programming, violin, vocals

Dane Daniels - drums, percussion, vocals
Abbey Daniels - vocals, bass
Kyle Henson - drums, percussion,vocals
Ben Jousan - guitar, vocals
Lex Land - vocals
-topic - vocals
K8 - vocals
K. - vocals
Dashon Moore-Guidry - additional percussion
Juan Lopez - handclaps, vocals
Aaron Carpenter - handclaps

*written, recorded by DKD and CDW
^written, recorded by DKD
produced by Chris Walker and DKD
mixed and mastered by DKD

additional engineering/mixing by Aaron Carpenter for Fifty50Studios
additional engineering by Juan Lopez

THIS RECORD HAS NOT YET BEEN RELEASED TO THE PUBLIC. PLEASE USE DISCRETION.

all songs are either:
(c) 2013 david karsten daniels, all songs published by smll thngs (ascap)
(p) 2013 TBD

OR

(c) 2013 david karsten daniels / christopher daniel walker, 
all songs published by smll thngs (ascap) / classic cwalk (ascap)
(p) 2013 TBD

www.davidkarstendaniels.com

Rising Son (feat. The Many Hands)

Last Stroll On The Hillside

Juke Jazz/The Charm

Afraid to bleed

Songs like this seemed to pour from Jason, without end, snaking behind him like a gunpowder trail. I didn't know him well enough to know what else was behind his song, moving at the same speed. 

This song, from Jason Molina's "Let Me Go, Let Me Go, Let Me Go," was the song that caught up with me. I must've bought the record right after college cuz it was already an old friend by the time I bumped into the man on the street in Bloomington Indiana. I'd just started working on music and thanked him for this song that night in front of the Buskirk Chumley Theatre on my way to a friends' house. He didn't shrink from the compliment. Instead he thanked me back and then asked what brought me to Bloomington, what I thought of it, if I was a musician myself, if I'd like to play him a song, etc. I was pretty stunned by the social grace of this guy. 

Happy birthday, Jason. Wish I could meet you again now that I'm a little older. I wish more people felt the way I do about your music and I wish you could've found your health before things caught up. 

To everybody else, Happy New Year! 2016 will be a good year. 

- DM

Buy the original here: http://secretlycanadian.com/onesheet.php?cat=SC149

Get Out Get Out Get Out (Jason Molina Cover)

Here's a version of the song "Cone of Silence" which will be on an album someday in a different form. Recorded at the Doghouse, January 2016. Written, recorded and performed by DM Stith.  

Stay warm kiddies. 



SNOW CONE

Pigeonheart will be released Friday 29th July 2016
Available digitally and on heavyweight 12" vinyl

Pre-Order on iTunes: http://geni.us/3YrO

www.dmstith.com
www.facebook.com/stithbook
www.twitter.com/dmstith
www.instagram.com/dmstith

War Machine

I got snowed in / I cannot win / my friends / I'm trapped inside / a wall of ice / it's nice / I wear wool socks / and drink cocoa hot / warm as a lava rock / but if you're listening / feel free to start kissing me / let's get toasty / toasty, toasty, toasty / like bread from an oven / toasty, toasty, toasty / like homemade croutons / toasty, toasty, toasty / like an albino in the sun / toasty, toasty, toasty / give me your loving, loving / I got snowed in / drinking bourbon / watching Netflix / I'm trapped inside / with my sexy wife / close the blinds / I wear wool socks / practice crossword smarts / good for the heart / but if you're listening / feel free to start kissing me / let's get toasty / toasty, toasty, toasty / like bread from an oven / toasty, toasty, toasty / like homemade croutons / toasty, toasty, toasty / like an albino in the sun / toasty, toasty, toasty /