Songs of Wanderlust: About the Music & Lyrics
Shedding light on some of the stories behind the songs.
November 19, 2021 birthday night show with Agave. Pictured with my better half, my wife Dina. Photo by Wally Marx.
Most of my youth was spent in a small house shared with 4 other siblings, two parents, and a grandmother (both grandmothers by middle school). If you pull the siding off the old part of the house, beneath reveals a log cabin, the basement floor was dirt. In 1868 an ancestor on my father’s side bought the property outside of Downingtown, PA from saved civil war union army pay. 100 years later, I was born.
In the 1970s roaming on a bike was one of the expressions of freedom which came to define our generation. I knew all the unpaved roads around the rural Pennsylvania family farm, like the back of my hand. I had a motorcycle without the motor, a steel precursor to the mountain bike (not invented till the 80s) which I rode everywhere. Even though that thing was heavy AF, movement preceded all else. I had to get out of the house, or else I would be put to work. In the evenings, I’d look out the window wondering where the car that came by every hour or so was heading. Anywhere but here. Even today when I visit my childhood home, the walls seem to close in. Claustrophobia.
My wanderlust sometimes pits me against myself, due to the fact that I love my extended family. I’m close with my siblings, and was raised with plenty of love to spare. How can a house make you feel one way, while the people that live in the house make you feel the size of a vast ocean? Everything I have is thanks to my family. Still to this day, any prolonged time away from my home or siblings, I’m hit with profound homesickness. Perhaps I don’t need to make sense of the two opposing forces inside me that fight for my attention. It’s a contradiction of character best described during the beautiful opening of Bruce Springsteen’s Western Stars:
There are two sides of the American character. One is transient, restless, solitary, but the other is collective and communal. In search of family, deep roots, and a home for the heart to reside. These two sides rub up against each other always and forever in everyday American life.
Part of the reason it’s both exhilarating and painful to watch the beginning of that movie, is because it reminds me so much of home. Home feels good, it’s a feeling you can bathe in. Bruce’s voice against a backdrop of stunning visuals reminds me (to the core) of my huge communal family, of all my heroes that are now gone, and what I’ve chosen to leave behind, but nothing ever gets left behind.
My brother Tommy takes care of our farm in Pennsylvania with my mom and my niece Margo. After years of being our matriarch on the farm, my sister Maura passed the mantle to Tommy and moved to coastal North Carolina. I miss them both across the continent, overlooking the Pacific Ocean is where I let my roots take hold. Tommy’s heart is the bedrock of our entire family, just like my father Buzz. Through selfless actions and decisions, they helped the rest of the family understand where we came from. If my father’s stonework of stability, determination, and hard work defined the family’s strength. My mother’s side always represented pure compassion, unconditional love, and healing. So many nurses, teachers, physical therapists.
Two sides of the same coin, both sides gave me the freedom to move without even knowing it. Coming from a large family instills trust. No, it commands and demands trust. Every single one of our actions speak for the rest of the family for better or for worse. Through the collective lens of my family, I see the world moving around me. This trust and inherent responsibility, is what’s needed to be a self sufficient individual.
My family created this heart that yearns for the road, while at the same time pulls back the reigns to stay in place long enough to help build local communities. I’m a scout, sent ahead by the leaders of my family to send news back to our tribe. I remember when all of my friends looked to backpack through Europe, I set my eyes on America, a vast tryptich of endless farmlands, ranches, wilderness with two massive oceans on either side of it.
What does it mean to be part of the American Tryptic?
The American Tryptic is the name of one of my first excursions into recording. The foundation of the songs were that our country is not defined by ancient texts, we have our own sacred (and profane) texts being written, acted out, lived right now in present day. From this recording project, my first songs were born.
The triptych is a commonly used format in ancient religious paintings. The threefold layout is usually Christ or an important religious figure flanked on either side with their supporting cast of people, metaphors, and symbols. I can clearly see my supporting cast when a stranger’s actions remind me of distinct traits of family members. Finding ones place in a large family makes navigating the world easy. Family is the compass that lets you make decisions with the heart. I don’t need to agree with someone to love them, I can be in a knock down fight with someone and still love them with all my heart. Our difference, disagreements comes from the same place that allows us to inspire one another. To see how alike we are, you need to get out and see with your own eyes.
Motor Kine
Imagine a Jeep Cherokee packed with close friends and surfboards deep in Baja, 2 hours south of Ensenada, Mexico. We embarked on a strategic strike mission to score the surf of a lifetime. In the distance, coming up fast in the rear view mirror is a huge dust cloud. We pulled off and looked back in awe as 2 super trucks and a few other race vehicles passed us by. It’s Baja 1000 season, the annual race is coming up and preparations are in order.
Every time I sing the chorus, it transports me back to that trip and the countless other excursions into San Diego’s backyard and spiritual cousin, Baja Mexico.
Race down the Pacific Ocean, run down those Mexican sands Just for nothing, just because I want to, gonna fly all across these lands
Here’s recorded footage (2008) of me singing the song from words freshly written in a notebook in the garage of one of my best friends. It was the first time I wrote a song that had the power to close a show properly.
I had just written Motor Kine, and took it to the Hunt brothers. If you look behind me you’ll see two taps of a converted kegerator fridge. Two flavors of beer, frozen mugs in the ice chest.
Do It Right
I love this song. It sounds like something my father or brother would say, such a cool guy. When my oldest child was a baby, I’d play what would become “Do It Right” as he was chewing on his knuckles and feet. I could see my father in that little man, even as an infant. It seemed like every time I was being productive as a songwriter, I was also waking infants from their needed sleep. My wife would come out with a baby, and it was up to me to lull him back to sleep. Those years went too fast, every day we’ve got to appreciate what we have. It’s tragedy when life takes our loved ones (of previous generations) right about the same time we have start to have kids.
This song came into being during the last months of my father’s life. To this day he is missed. The lyrics are simple, appreciate the ones you love. Squeeze them with everything you have, every chance you get, because they might not be here tomorrow.
It’s a Saturday Night
Years ago I read Bobby Key’s memoir “Every Night’s a Saturday Night”, shortly after enjoying Keith Richards’ “Life”. My friend Doug visiting from Denver left the book with me, which I recommend to all fans of the Stones. Bobby Keys was from Texas, where they live and breathe the philosophy of giving it everything you’ve got, regardless of what night of the week it is. It’s a blue collar way to look and the world, and it’s how I was raised. Pensyl-texas, Pennsyl-tucky, well shit there you have it. Doing your best, giving 100% is all that’s required when doing anything. The unwritten part of it, is being true to your word. It’s what makes our work sacred. It’s what makes the stage sacred.
As a performer, I used to dread stepping up onto stage. Almost paralyzing fear and anxiety came right before each and every gig. It came out of nowhere, I guess from the fear of being under prepared. This fueled incessant practice and woodshedding, because the only way to defeat fear is hard work. These days, I prepare as much as I can, but I try to enjoy the musicians I’m working with. If you think about it too much, messing up becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. When I surf, its pure joy, I’m not thinking about anything, just laughing my ass off.
Yep I’m surfing here, but as I recall you could hear me laughing for miles when my buddy ate it in the tube and I took off on the wave that was supposed to be his. I didn't think at all, just let go and enjoyed the experience.
New Day Dawn
One morning in Upstate New York found me on a rooftop drinking a little wine, and smoking some weed with the surviving members of a party from the night before. It was the day my cousin Salty graduated college by Lake Seneca in western New York State.
Ain’t no right, ain’t no wrong, when you sit and watch a new day dawn
Visiting any college town was always an irresistible proposition during the years I went to university. Each college town was a new group of people of the same age group, making something out of nothing. Little else mattered back then. Every time I sing this song I laugh about the policeman who tried to talk us down from that roof. First threatening us, almost slipping off himself, then cussing us as he departed into his frustrated morning duties of crushing doughnuts.
Cut Loose
As mentioned above, my family illuminates the darkness around me. My heroes are mostly from the generation that raised my generation. Those women and men were equals, most of the families were large, and everything was learned by interaction and observation. Only a few of the old timers from my family are left, which is the heartbreaking reality of life. Just at the point one generation achieves fiscal security/prosperity they witness their parents get ravaged by time. Loosing my heroes is, and will always be devastating. Writing down and singing about the experience, is the way I cope with the reality before me. It’s for all of them, disbursed across the continental United States.
This song is a prayer to my Aunt Sally. She along with so many of her peers gave me every thing that I am today. A rare gift that I will always be grateful to have earned in the eyes of my beloved aunt.
Ragtop Car
My eldest brother owned a ragtop Barracuda from the 1960s. It was the chariot that took us on so many roadtrips and concerts in the 1980s through the early 1990s. This was the era where I traded my Pennsylvania farm raised roots for a home base in New York State, and eventually NYC. If any song contains the secret to all other songs on this album, or contains the glue that binds all the songs together, it is this one.
Some say that the love of WANDERLUST Is just another live that won’t amount to much A man born with rambling shoes, is just another man born to loose
During his Rolling Thunder tour, there was a filmed interview where Dylan said “you don’t go out on the road to find yourself, you go out to create something or create yourself”. His words were a clear correction to the widely misunderstood novels of Kerouac, those uniquely American books were my generation’s (Generations X) biblical texts, travel was part of being an American.
Wanderlust brought me to live in America’s greatest city, and it’s what forced me to leave 6 years later. Time and time again, it’s given me life changing opportunity, while it has also gotten me into heaps of trouble. I wouldn’t trade these experiences for anything else. Wanderlust, storytelling, sending news back to the family from the road, set the stage for all else to come.
Outside the City
This song brings me back to Springsteen’s poetic introduction. It’s my heart, torn from my chest, still beating because of its deep connection to my family. The beautiful woman crying, is my grandmother Dorothy. The last time I held her was in coastal North Carolina on the night before I flew back to California with my then young family 15 years ago. She knew what I did not, called me to her room before bed, held me, and just wept. Tears flow thinking about that night, while at the same time, I smile with everything I have knowing how lucky I was to have her as a grandmother.
A few weeks after I was back to life and work in California I received news of her passing. All of us were devastated, but knew it was not a life to be mourned but to be celebrated. She lived to over 100, maintaining her excellent wit and humor all the way to the end. I can still feel her. I can still hear her. She was my girl. We’d spend so much time laughing, and smiling with each other. Here eyes always said, ‘I love you boy’ without even having to say anything.
She is where I am from. When I feel her presence, I am always home.