One of the joys of writing a music blog is having wonderful folks make comments on what I write. Often they agree with what I’ve said, sometimes they correct my crazy typos or stupid mistakes. They make suggestions for what else I should listen to, for what I might also like. And some of them stick around and read me on a pretty regular basis. That is a factor that blows my mind even though I’ve become a regular reader myself of a few blogs, most notably of Song, by Toad (well more of a resident troll, but a loved one I hope.)

A couple of my readers have reached out and become folks I’ve emailed with over the past few months. It’s nice to have people to bounce ideas off of when coming up with posts and opinions on new artists and to compare notes on shows we go to. One of these friends/regular readers recently confided in me that he is himself a musician. Well, that is a goldmine! Finally I have someone to go to and ask all my stupid guitar questions!

Today he made the following comment about songwriting on my post about Bad Veins:

“The best tunes seem to come out in no time. I know I’ve carried a melody in my head for the longest time. Played it over and over for months. Then suddenly one day it just clicks.

The other method is if I have an idea I will jam on it with my friends for a while just to see if the music works, but I don’t really tell the guys that I’m trying to work something out. This is usually the first test to see if what I am onto really has legs. Later if the music takes some shape I’ll say “hey you know this lick we have been playing, what if we went into this chord change at the end” and I sing a little. Then, voila! A song is born.”

I still don’t get how that happens, how it just “clicks” or how it “takes shape” but Andrew’s Look Around was born and recorded sometime in 2001 on Long Island at Stillwater studios with The Lime Green, who played live from 1997 – 2002. It’s a good, bluesy tune with a nice harmonica opener. I had it on one of my iphone playlists for the past month and the first couple of times it came up I had to check to see who that guy was. It’s funny to think that Andrew and I probably passed on another on the LIE sometime in those years. I moved away from NYC in 2000, after doing my 6 year sentence there.

Andrew is that kind of musician that just blows me away with his humility and lack of assumptions about what constitutes good music. We’ve discussed everything from Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros to Loretta Lynn in the comments here. And back in August Andrew sent me Funny, from the same time period.  Of course he didn’t say it was him. And I didn’t connect the dots at first, being the ditz that I am. But I liked it, quite a bit in fact. And being raised in the South, this kind of music is exactly what I grew up on.

Now both those tracks are demos, so you’ll notice that they’re not mixed professionally, not exactly balanced and polished like you are probably used to hearing. But you can hear the talent there and the guitar work is just gorgeous. The final track I want you to give a spin is a live recording of The Live Green from the Viking Pub. Blues In The Night is a sexy, long, rambling blues number and it shows how much of what Andrew does as a musician is about performing. So hey, if you’re into this kind of music and you’re pretty good at playing it, get in touch. He’s in San Diego now and I have a feeling he’s itching to play again, xoxo

(he didn’t send me a pic, so you’ll have to do with those limes, I’m afraid. I tried to find you a sexy girl in a lime bikini but they were all way too naked!)