I had a guitar emergency yesterday. Humidity / weather change took out the guitars I had been playing before a show. I went to the back of my closet and pulled out a guitar I hadn't played for a while. I was filled with memories and remember how this was the first guitar I really loved. This has been through many tour miles and I did a bridge repair on it myself... It inspired this song:

My Old Guitar: 

I'm so happy with my old guitar
it's full of memories and it's got some of scars
it's been covered in beer in the late night bars
I'm so happy with my old guitar

it's fulfilled wishes and it's processed pain
it's been soaked water in the portland rain
it’s help make sense when i’m stuck mundane
I'm so happy with my old guitar

it's been abused in anger and a tool for love
it's been used as tissues and splattered in blood
it’s product of earth and gift from above
I'm so happy with my old guitar

I'm so happy with my old guitar
it's full of memories and it's got some of scars
it's been covered in beer in the late night bars
I'm so happy with my old guitar

it's got some glue and it's not brand new
and the wood still smells like I want it to
it's slept in a van on Highway 2
I'm so happy with my old guitar

I'm so happy with my old guitar
it's full of memories and it's got some of scars
it's been covered in beer in the late night bars
I'm so happy with my old guitar

My Old Guitar (Demo) at The Storage Unit

Songs and instrumentals that don't have a definite 'destination' yet.

On a few of them I 'sing'. Please don't comment on how poor my singing is - I am aware of that. The vocals are only there as a 'placeholder', until I find someone who would like to be 'my voice'.

The sun is coming closer.
It's crossed the borderline.
Ever since spring, everything's been kept in.

The lawns are mown and battened down,
The crops long sown and sprayed.
Summer's something nature won't betray.

But breathe the air, sense the wild
One step outside.
Feel the life everywhere
Overwhelm you.
Don't be the weight that it bears.
Your presence leaves no footprint.

Domesticated nature,
Trained to tame design,
Pleases aesthetes, kept behind the frontline.

[Words, music & everything else by Stephen Oliver]



No Footprint

New music time! My good friend Nate Allen is releasing a new record and so we decided we should chat and talk about life, music, racism and how white we are lol. Check it out!

Take Out The Trash is 10 songs of punk influenced rock n' roll with folk and even some blues. It's an honest look at privilege, racism, unemployment and feeling burnt out. 

Project: Nate Allen & The Pac-Away Dots
Album: Take Out The Trash
Release Date: Sept. 18th

You can pre-order at www.iamnateallen.com or wait 2 days and buy all the things! 

Crazy Grace Podcast - Ep 4 - Interview With Nate Allen

Mark Rodgers recorded this song in the summer of 2001 at Haywire Recording. Engineered by Robert Bartleson.  Re-mastered by Robert Bartleson at Haywire Recording September 2015.

RIP Mark Rodgers

Mark Rodgers - Kissing Jesus

For more information see http://bit.ly/BWJ_4968 

God Don't Never Change: The Songs Of Blind Willie Johnson is an eleven-track all-star tribute album that features inspired interpretations of the iconic slide guitarist/vocalist's most seminal material. Tom Waits, Lucinda Williams, Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi, Cowboy Junkies, Blind Boys Of Alabama (accompanied by Jason Isbell on guitar), Sinéad O'Connor, Luther Dickinson with The Rising Star Fife & Drum Band, Maria McKee, and Rickie Lee Jones all deliver deeply moving reinventions of Johnson's otherworldly "gospel blues" music.   

From Tom Waits' virtual embodiment of Johnson himself on The Soul Of A Man and John The Revelator to Derek Trucks' and Susan Tedeschi's reverent reading of Keep Your Lamp Trimmed And Burning to Lucinda Williams' slide guitar-fueled lament in Nobody's Fault But Mine to Luther Dickinson's spirited take on Bye And Bye I'm Going To See The King (with The Rising Star Fife & Drum Band) to the Blind Boys Of Alabama's soul-baring Mother's Children Have A Hard Time, this record is packed with incomparable recordings that speak as much to the greatness of the performers as they do the enduring legacy of Blind Willie Johnson. 


God Don't Never Change: The Songs Of Blind Willie Johnson

Order from Alligator

Tom Waits - John The Revelator

Cover by Nate Allen. In 2012, we broke down 16 times between Oklahoma City and Midland, Texas - which is why I chose to cover this song. Thanks Matt for letting to take a crack at it.

Lord knows it’s a hard road from here to Midland Texas
Lord knows it’s a hard road when you’re always breaking down

Wanted in Texas so I was playing it cool in a Dodge City Saloon.
Who came in? It was that dreaded one, the deputy Wyatt Earp.
Handcuffed me. Collected his bounty. Set the bail. Sent me home on the rail.

Lord knows it’s a hard road from here to Midland Texas
Lord knows it’s a hard road when you’re always breaking down

Desolate prairies, these desolate winds I’m singing my hymns on a prison train

lord have mercy on an innocent man lord have mercy on me
Lord have mercy on an innocent man framed for robbery.
lord have mercy on an innocent man lord have mercy on me
I've been working on the chain gang while a criminal's living free.

Miss my wife,  she's a cabaret girl. Please, tell her, I've been framed.
In a cell where there ain't a light. There's no chance to escape.
See ya in ten if you're still around then otherwise pray for my fate.

Lord knows it’s a hard road from here to Midland Texas
Lord knows it’s a hard road when you’re always breaking down


Liar From Midland, Texas (slow cover) by Matt Weinman

Foxing is amazing, "The Albatross" is amazing, "Dealer" is amazing, this song is amazing, so I tried to do it justice. 

Check it out on YouTube here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClhlH6xla-s&feature=youtu.be

My debut album "Ayla's Diary" is available on iTunes and Spotify now!
https://geo.itunes.apple.com/us/album/aylas-diary/id1008319780?mt=1&app=music

Website: geenarenee.com
Facebook: facebook.com/geenareneemusic
Twitter: @geenareneemusic
Instagram: @geenareneemusic
Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/geenareneemusic
Bandcamp: geenarenee.bandcamp.com  
Booking/Contact: geenareneemusic@gmail.com


The Medic - Foxing Cover (Demo Version)

From Half-handed Cloud's "Jiminy Circuits" EP, out December 2016 on Plastiq Musiq.  Available as an eight song vinyl record (+download) from www.plastiqmusiq.com.  Music video with Super-8 film: https://youtu.be/W-g56BkeeVk

Jiminy Circuits (first master)

Antennas Extend

Jeff Rosenstock 86

This track is from the album The Sparkle in Someone's Eye and is available for purchase on CD Baby here: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/ymym

Propitiation

Working Class, Rock n' Roll and Folk Songwriter, Performer and Touring Artist behind (Destroy Nate Allen / The Pac-Away Dots, etc). When I’m alone on a stage you’ll often see more of my sensitive side that hates injustice, strongly loves people and is trying to embrace stillness.

Take Out The Trash is available now at: http://highendurancerecords.com  


Liar From Midland, Texas (slow cover) by Matt Weinman

Nate Allen

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