It’s hard to believe that nearly a year has passed since my first March of Dimes March for Babies walk.  Last year Misty and I entered as a two person team and were able to raise just over $200 to help support the March for Babies cause.  This year we have pledged to walk again, and with the help of my readers and social followers we hope to increase this years donations even more.

The March of Dimes March for Babies is a walking event that helps raise money to support community programs that help raise awareness and help mothers to have healthy, full-term pregnancies. The March for Babies also funds research to find answers to the serious problems that threaten babies and cause premature births.

The March of Dimes March for Babies is more than just a charity event for me; it is a reminder of the value of life and of the battles many babies have to go through just to make it through those first few months of life.  I am a father of twins, and while they have grown to be happy, healthy toddlers, there was a point in time where my wife and I were terrified that maybe they wouldn’t make it. And even after they were home we continued to struggle with my daughter’s digestive problems and had to regularly monitor my sons heart murmur.

Sadly, many parents are less fortunate and many of their babies never make it home from the hospital.  Last year during the event we spoke to many parents who had lost their little ones and heard he heartbreaking stories of being given a life just to have it tragically stripped away again.

To learn more about why the March of Dimes March for Babies means so much to me, you can read about the day my life changed forever; October 7, 2007.  I know first hand the emotional turmoil that comes with a premature birth, and I know the heartache and the hardships parents go through those first months.  I can only imagine how terrifying it must be to be a baby in that condition, to be hooked up to numerous machines and tubes left to sleep in a plastic box only to feel the warmth of a parents touch when visits permit. It’s hard, it’s miserable, and no parent should have to endure it, or the loss of their child.

So please, help us to fight premature births and make a donation today.  Even if you donate only a dollar, your contribution goes a long way when added to all the other money raised by the March of Dimes for this cause.  You can donate to the March for Babies using the link below, or if you’re interested in other ways to help or to join our team that is walking in Riverside on April 24, you can contact me directly.

So since music has been the blast from my past lately I was ecstatic to find in the mail today the burned copy of my bands CD from years ago that an old friend had sent.  I was going to post the songs tonight, but the quality on a lot of them is really muddy, most likely due to the fact it was probably a recording of a tape, from a tape, way back when.  However, I am still hopeful that I will get the master copy off the DAT tape that was recently created and if I get that within the next week I’ll be adding MP3’s of these songs to the blog.  In the meantime I thought I’d share a bit about the recording and the lyrics to some of the songs.

The songs were recorded 11 years and 3 days ago, and were recorded, mixed, and mastered all within a day.  The band and I busted our asses for weeks prior to recording to make sure every note was perfect in time for the studio since our budget was limited.  The songs were recorded at Moonsong Studios in Riverside, California by Bob Moon.  At the time Bob was probably most known for his work with MxPx, OC Supertones, and Ninety Pound Wuss.  He would later work on a number of compilations and with bands like Backside and the Voodoo Glow Skulls.  Sadly these would be the only songs we would ever professionally record before our demise a few short years later.

Needle In A Haystack – This song was written about a friend of mine in high school who got pregnant by a guy who at the time I thought was a total douchebag. Drugs, alcohol, overall just bad news in most people’s eyes.

Well I’ve seen your kind here so many times before
Complain about all you can and then complain some more
You beg of everybody, you beg of everything
And then you leave her there, alone and crying to her mother

Do you hurt them now?
Did you hurt them then?
Do you give a damn about all your sins?
Do you care right now?
And will you care then?
When the life of your child slowly begins all alone

You don’t care that she’s in pain
You tell her that she’s crazy, and driving you insane
I really thought you loved her, or at least maybe cared
But a father to be, you musn’t be prepared, as a father

Will you hurt them now?
Will you hurt them then?
Do you give a damn about what you’ve been?
Do you care right now?
And will you care then
When the life of your child slowly begins all alone

Well next time you see me you best watch your back
They’ll try to find your body like a needle in a haystack
Well I thought you or at least maybe cared
But a father to be you musn’t be prepared, as a father

Well you think you’re mad now
You think you were mad then
I’ll see true anger once I begin
You may not care now
You may not care then
When the life of your child slowly begins all alone

Embarrassment – This song was written mostly about the awkward struggle of being in a relationship where someone wants to be with you, but they like to pretend they’re not when it makes them seem less cool.  Needless to say this was about one of the worst relationships I was in during high school.

Well I guess I’m not good enough for you
When all I did was try and please
I thought there was meaning in what I did
I still won’t forget just what you said
Well sorry I didn’t mean to care, I never knew that that was wrong

Chorus:
Sorry I fell into your life
I didn’t mean to scare you
Sorry I messed up what you had
I never meant to hurt you
Sorry I turned out to be an embarrassment

Well I guess that I’m your invisible man
I’m better to be heard of rather than seen
I thought there was meaning to our love
To bad your friends aren’t allowed to see
Well sorry I didn’t mean to care, I never knew that that was wrong

(Repeat Chorus)

So maybe I’m different than everyone else
And maybe I’m not the best looking
But I am proud of what we share
Sorry I’m not good enough for you

(Repeat Chorus)

When I see you lying there
When I see you drifting off to sleep
Baby I’m sorry
Baby I’m sorry
I never meant to hurt you
Embarrassment

Faces – Probably one of the darkest songs I have ever written, Faces takes a look at the hatred associated with racism.  The song was sadly inspired by real life events when a friend of mine who happened to be black was in serious fear of his well being thanks to a few severe racists on campus.  Fortunately, the events in the song are all fictitious and tell of a racist teen who kills another teen solely because he’s black, but in the end karma bites him in the ass because as he’s hiding from the cops he gets shot and then shanked, and then dies before the ambulance arrives.

Brother to brother, sister to mother, you cringe when you see him
You hate he’s alive, you pull out .45, he won’t see his family again
Your hand on the trigger you yell out hey nigger I want you to meet my friend
You pull up beside him, put a bullet inside him, another hate crime victim my friend

Chorus:
Woke up this morning with blood on my face
It’s not really there, but a curse of our race
Blood of ours, blood of others, blood of our sisters, blood of our brothers
Faces in a crowd, faces all around
Black, white, yellow, red, get those colors out of your head

Later that evening the sirens are screaming, the policeman calls, your son is dead
Mama is crying the children are dying, isn’t there any happiness left
The cops they come searching, in darkness you’re lurking hoping no one saw where you fled
A tear falls you’re crying, there’s no sense in hiding cuz everyone knows you wanted him dead

(Repeat Chorus)

Surrounded by violence a shot breaks the silence as blood drips down your head
A man stands right by you, a knife shoves inside you, an ambulance comes, you’re already dead

Faces in a crowd, faces all around
Black, white, yellow, red, get these colors out of your head

Valentine To Seattle – My tribute to the then dying Seattle grunge scene.  In high school I was one of the few teens who still grasped on to the grunge scene for dear life after the death of Kurt Cobain.  I was the last grunge kid to cut my hair (the metal heads still had theirs), I was the last one to give up the grunge fashion, and to this day I still have all of my Nirvana scrapbooks that include the People magazine from the week Kurt Cobain died.  From a lyrical standpoint I love this song because I had a clever way of intertwining lyrics to grunge songs, and albums into my lyrics to pay homage to some of the pioneers of the grunge movement.  Let me know if you find them!

Woke up this morning with a song in my head
Or maybe more like a rhythmic scream
And butterflies aren’t so bright up there no more
The seem to fade away with the scene

Valentine to Seattle
Suicide and broken homes
Valentine to Seattle
Well I’ve tried and I’ve tried to save your kingdom

What ever happened to the blonde haired blue eyed king?
Does he still exist in songs and dreams?
Put him away with your jar of flies on a shelf
That seem to fade away with the scene

Valentine to Seattle
Will it rain there all the time?
Valentine to Seattle
Can’t you hear all of your children crying?

And would you really sell your kids for food?
And does the weather really change your moods?
And once the angst has paid off well, and once you’re bored and old
Will you care about them or the stories that they told?

Valentine to Seattle
Sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll
Valentine to Seattle
Well I’ve tried and I’ve tried to save your kingdom

After recording we left our mark at Moonsong Studios the same way numerous bands before us had, and added to the wall of fame, or wall of shame I guess depending on the band.  Moonsong Studios is wallpapered from top to bottom with band posters, stickers, and other tokens of the bands that have used and abused the premises.  That day Another Alternative made our mark by utilizing a paper plate, our demo artwork, a Polaroid camera, and a sharpee.

There are two more songs on the disc I received today, but unfortunately I don’t recall the name of the first track so I have left it off the list for now.  The other song was titled ‘I Do’ and I posted the lyrics to it previously.  I have a strong feeling there were more songs than this on the original recording and that these six may have been used as a demo, but I won’t know for certain until I get the DAT and CD back.

I’ll end this post on a fun tidbit about the recording that ties in to today’s unfortunate death of director John Hughes.  The last track on the CD is I Do, and the song ends at 3:35, but the track continues on for another minute and twenty-one seconds.  At the 4:40 mark of the track Matthew Broderick chimes in from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and says, “You’re still here? It’s over. Go home, go…”  This had a similar affect in the film and appears after the credits end in the movie.

Those of you who follow me on social sites like Facebook or Twitter know there has been a lot of stuff floating around regarding my band in high school, Another Alternative.  I also posted the lyrics to the song I Do a while back here on the blog.  Since then friends and foe alike have come out of the woodworks with a number of things regarding old recordings that even I don’t posses at the moment.  The good news is that I should have a legit copy of our CD coming from the master recording hopefully soon thanks to a close friend, and I may have another copy headed my way via mail from an old friend of the band who used t be like an acting roadie for us.

However, nothing excited me more than the message I got today from my former lead guitarist, Art Paz, who now fronts the music project Zaptra.  I get a message on Facebook asking for my email address and then shortly after I get a message saying he is sending me the only “high quality” recording of our song ‘Chasing Dreams’, which was performed and recorded live at a battle of the bands show we played.

Because it was one of my proudest musical accomplishments of the time I’ve decided to share it with everyone both for the nostalgia of it as well as a way to give those of you who may have been seeing all of this talk of my musical past some insight into a world I spent a lot of time in.  Another Alternative was an alt rock quartet with influences like The Nixons, Nirvana, and Better Than Ezra.  Below is an MP3 of a live recording of ‘Chasing Dreams’ as well as the songs lyrics.  Hope you enjoy!

Chasing Dreams

Chasing Dreams Lyrics

It’s 12am and my mind still lies awake
It’s 12am and I still can’t sleep a wink
It’s been years since my minds been so damn clear
And this is the first night I’ve slept without you near

But as I chase my dreams of you and me again
And I cry my heart out late at night
And do we sleep underneath the same stars?
And is our love that far apart?

Sometimes the nights with you felt so cold
Sometimes our world was black and white
Your picture is here, but I still sleep here alone
And I guess for now I’ll do well on my own

But as I chase my dreams of you and me again
And I cry my heart out late at night
And do we sleep underneath the same stars?
And is our love that far apart?
(Repeat 2 more times)