Well… I am officially off again. For nearly three whole months. Today I am in Tulsa, OK and will be here at the Mabee Center for the next three days. The band I am traveling with requested a certain anonymity, and I can only imagine it’s because of certain privacy policies. So, for the next three months, it will be, “so long self” because I am here to serve and work behind the scenes. And if any other band approaches me in the next three months I will be forced to let them them know that I am spoken for.

Although, I’m not quite being honest when I say that I will be gone the entire time. There will be days during most weeks that I will have three days off. That will be a nice time for coming up to breathe, but for four days of the week I will be away from my family. It’s weird when you hear the word of God speak though, and tell you that what you are doing is the right thing. So for now, I am in Tulsa, with an undisclosed band, working on an undisclosed tour. I will try to post as often as I can. Adios.

“Family Man” -Andrew Peterson

I’m saving my vacation time
For Disneyland
I know every line to every song in Peter Pan
This was not my plan
It’s so much better than

The evening started with dinner on an open flame. Veggie hamburgers, corn, asparagus, and fruit salad. Tonight was “camp-out night”. Four dads, Nine Kids and enough “smores” ingredients to sugar up a small city.

With the help of some borrowed tents, and a little imagination we were camping. Led by Shaun, we sang songs including “On Top of Spaghetti”, “Old McDonald”, and some other one about “gopher guts” around a small camp fire. We roasted our processed puffed sugar, and listened to the night noises.

Ok so we weren’t exactly “roughing it”. We were in my backyard, and the “small camp fire” was a portable barbecue, but to those nine kids, ages ranging from three to nine, we were in the wilderness. We had a great time last night, hopefully creating some memories with our kids, bonding as men (like you do in the woods) and enjoying what I refer to as “commune-ity”.

In the morning, more playing, breakfast and never having to get out of pajamas. We had a great time. Now I think it’s nap time for all the dads.

The kind folks in the Square Peg Alliance are offering entire shows online for free at IndieRiver.net. At first glance this is a great thing. The catch? You apprently have to posses a degree in computer science to understand how to get it. I have usually been able to figure out ways to do things on the computer, and consider myself relatively “computer savvy”. Not today. And not on this site.

I would love to promote these concerts and tell everyone about them but I can’t figure out how to get them. If there is anyone out there that can explain to me how this works on a mac, it would be greatly appreciated.

And by the way…. If you do figure this out, there is one song in particular that I would advise checking out. On the August 22nd show Andy Gullahorn sings a song called “Holy Ground”. He said it was one that he was trying out for the first time live and it was the most powerful song I have heard in a while. Check it out, if you are geeky enough.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Consumers nationwide should not eat fresh bagged spinach, say health officials probing a multistate outbreak of E. coli that killed at least one person and made dozens of others sick.

Food and Drug Administration and state officials don’t know the cause of the outbreak, although raw, packaged spinach appears likely. “We’re advising people not to eat it,” said Dr. David Acheson of the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.

Eight states were reporting a total of 50 cases of E. coli, Acheson said Thursday.

The death occurred in Wisconsin, where 20 people were reported ill, 11 of them in Milwaukee. The outbreak has sickened others — eight of them seriously — in Connecticut, Idaho, Indiana, Michigan, New Mexico, Oregon and Utah. In California, state health officials said they were investigating a possible case there.

The outbreak has affected a mix of ages, but most of the cases have involved women, Acheson said. Further information on the person who died wasn’t available.

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nT0cnQve-P4]

Jars of Clay has been a favorite band of mine since the beginning. The lyrical content of one album alone rivals most bands entire careers. They are artists in the true form. This post goes beyond my “Music I Wish I Had Written” series and deserves it’s own post. This is a band that has not only written several songs that I wish that I had written, but continues to be a staple of the type of musicianship and artistry I can only one day hope to attain.

Nashville-based Christian rocker Derek Webb has a simple explanation for why he decided to give away his third studio album, Mockingbird, for free download over the Internet for the next three months.
“Survival,” said Webb, 32, who spent a decade with the group Caedmon’s Call before heading out on his own with Brentwood-based Ino Records, home to acts such as MercyMe and CeCe Winans.

“I’m looking at my career and trying to figure out ways to make it work. I’m trying to embrace the technological tools that are available to me and broaden my mind to every possibility….”

…And Webb reports that merchandise and CD sales doubled on the road following his announcement to give away the album for free download.

John Styll, president of the Nashville-based Gospel Music Association, who has been involved in battling music piracy alongside his peers in the industry over the past few years, said if Webb finds a way to make the model work, he expects other artists and labels to follow suit.

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A friend of mine sent me this article today by a guy named Hugh MacLeod. In the article he discusses creativity as well as lists 31 things he believes, are ways to ensure a correct mindset while being creative. I thought it quite nice.

1. Ignore everybody.
2. The idea doesn’t have to be big. It just has to change the world.
3. Put the hours in.
4. If your biz plan depends on you suddenly being “discovered” by some big shot, your plan will probably fail.
5. You are responsible for your own experience.
6. Everyone is born creative; everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten
7. Keep your day job.
8. Companies that squelch creativity can no longer compete with companies that champion creativity.
9. Everybody has their own private Mount Everest they were put on this earth to climb.
10. The more talented somebody is, the less they need the props.
11. Don’t try to stand out from the crowd; avoid crowds altogether.
12. If you accept the pain, it cannot hurt you.
13. Never compare your inside with somebody else’s outside.
14. Dying young is overrated.
15. The most important thing a creative person can learn professionally is where to draw the red line that separates what you are willing to do, and what you are not.
16. The world is changing.
17. Merit can be bought. Passion can’t.
18. Avoid the Watercooler Gang.
19. Sing in your own voice.
20. The choice of media is irrelevant.
21. Selling out is harder than it looks.
22. Nobody cares. Do it for yourself.
23. Worrying about “Commercial vs. Artistic” is a complete waste of time.
24. Don’t worry about finding inspiration. It comes eventually.
25. You have to find your own schtick.
26. Write from the heart.
27. The best way to get approval is not to need it.
28. Power is never given. Power is taken.
29. Whatever choice you make, The Devil gets his due eventually.
30. The hardest part of being creative is getting used to it.
31. Remain frugal.

Read More Here

A few photos I have taken over the past few years. Most are of my kids, because well… they are cute.

Leeland – Sound of Melodies
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQjG1ZzjuiU]