mikelewismusic

I have my own theme song

Yes I do.  It’s a catchy little number (if I do say so myself) called “mikelewismusic”.  Why it’s spelled in lower case and all one word, I can’t really say.  I guess you could say that it looked kind of cool all bunched together like that, and maybe sort of trendy with the lower case spelling.  I’m not exactly sure, I guess it just came about sort of like it had a mind of it’s own, it kind of birthed itself to be honest.

I was just messing around on my guitar one night, rehearsing and writing, when I noticed my name “Mike Lewis” spelled out perfectly over several measures of a riff I was working on.  It was kind of neat, the riff coupled with the perfectly placed spelling of my name was too irresistible to set aside, so I spent the next hour or so composing the song.  It came that quickly.

The lyrics revolved around my musical life up until that point in 2004. I thought long and hard of all the people that had touched my life musically.  Surprisingly, it was very easy to tell that story through verse within the confines of the riff.  As mentioned before, it seemed to have a mind of it’s own – when writing I have found that the better ones that “I” write are often the ones that seem to flow through me supernaturally, as if I were the vessel that guided the force from the pen to paper.

Breakdown of the song 

I was born with a song in my head, under the clouds and the skies were red

Played my guitar til’ my fingers bled, never worrying what the neighbors said…

I always loved music.  I always saw myself doing something in music.  I didn’t start with any talent, hell, I don’t really have much talent anyway, my lot in music has always come down to ambition and luck.  But even as I struggled to improve as a musician I kept at it.  And I always admired the songwriters.  Elton John/Bernie Taupin, Pete Townshend, Lennon/McCartney, Jagger/Richards, Bob Dylan, that’s what really drew me to music.  The song.  Learning the guitar – a means to an end to attain the ability to create “the song” –  was hard for me.  Although I was lacking in ability, I never stopped working at it, and I never stopped hoping.  The line, under the clouds and the skies were red, signified the struggles I had trying to become a musician – it seemed dark and maddening sometimes, but I knew there was a payoff down that winding road.

…Traveling down this winding road, it started with my friend Joe Mode

He gave me a start that I really need, don’t forget ol’ Thomas Sneed…

Joe Mode is Cliff Jomuad.

My first foray into any kind of an organized musical situation was with my good friend Clifford M. Jomuad, aka Joe Mode. We started a group called The Radical Molesters and I was allowed to bring my ham-fisted talents into a band situation for the first time as a bass player.  So, it started out with him.  Here we are at our first gig on May 22, 1982:

Cliff Jomuad on guitar, Mike Lewis on bass. 1982, Radical Molesters.

I played bass with Cliff in The Radical Molesters (two stints in the 80s), The USSR, NEIN, and in 2011 Cliff and I were part of The Magic Montgomery Brothers, the all-star band that consisted of ex-Montgomery High School musicians.  On top of his extraordinary musical talents (Cliff is a prolific multi-instrumentalist and songwriter), Cliff is also a great artist, easily the best I’ve ever known.  Without Cliff Jomuad leading the way for me, there is no mikelewismusic.  Without him giving me the chance to actually be a part of a band, I’m not here writing this little blog – it is really that simple.

Thomas Sneed is my lifelong friend Tom Sneed.

Started with my friend Joe Mode (left)…don’t forget ol’ Thomas Sneed (right)…

Tom and I grew up together on Blackwood Drive in San Diego, CA, and although he has moved around to various places around this country, we remain friends to this day.  Tom was there both with the Radical Molesters and the subsequent power trio Cliff formed called NEIN.  Tom served as a photographer, videographer, aide-de-camp, and inspiration; he was virtually a fourth member in both the Radical Molesters and NEIN.

…Fred and Roger and Steve and Jim…

Fred is Fred Allee.

Fred Allee – with the Magic Montgomery Brothers

A master drummer, he kept the backbeat in The USSR, the follow-on band to the Radical Molesters.  Fred is an accomplished musician who plays all over San Diego – he is a former member of N-E-1, best known for their local hit “1-2-3”, a staple of 91x radio back in the early 80s.  Today Fred plays for the Dixieland Jazz group The South Bay Jazz Ramblers, as well as a performs for the San Diego Concert Band.  Fred also plays all over town in thematic groups that celebrate Oktoberfest, commemorate the Civil War, and as an alumnus of Montgomery High School, Fred also played in our little “all-star” rock band The Magic Montgomery Brothers.

Roger is Roger DeLong.

Roger DeLong of The USSR

Roger was the lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist (and occasional drummer) of The USSR.  Roger served as the main songwriter with The USSR, and he was quite prolific – his songs often had a dark humorous side.  After The USSR, Roger became a full-time drummer and ended up playing drums for the L.A. rock band Pet Piranha, and these days he pounds the skins with the popular L.A. rock band Death on the Radio.

Steve is Steve Kelly, hailing from the Motor City, Detroit, Michigan.  He played drums for The USSR for several months before Fred Allee joined the band.  Steve started out as a fan, he would attend our shows and eventually joined in on the fun.  Steve got us a gig in Cardiff opening for the infamous Claude Coma and the IVs – this gig occurred on the same night in 1984 that Steve Garvey hit the home run for the San Diego Padres against the Chicago Cubs in Game 4 of the NLCS.

Jim is James Apodaca, guitar virtuoso.

James Apodaca performing with The Magic Montgomery Brothers

James is also a Montgomery High School alumnus and has been a virtuoso as long as I’ve known him – though I have no firsthand knowledge of this, I would venture to say he’s been a virtuoso his entire life.  James served in The USSR, and later on performed with the L.A. rock band Pet Piranha with Roger DeLong.  James was also a member of our all-star band The Magic Montgomery Brothers.  There’s so much I can say about this man’s talent, but I’ll just sum it up this way – being in a band with James provided me with a musical education that is immeasurable.  I learned a lot from him just by osmosis.

…Lloyd Ladrillono and my friend Chris Crim…

Lloyd Ladrillono was the drummer for The Radical Molesters.

Lloyd Ladrillono – “The Lad”

The Radical Molesters were essentially a power trio which also included Cliff Jomuad and myself (although there were times we expanded to a foursome with both Roger DeLong and James Apodaca).  An accomplished musician and singer also hailing from Montgomery High School, Lloyd had an intangible feel for the music  – the innate feel for music he possesses seems to run through his veins.  They say a drummer will make or break a band, and Lloyd most definitely made us; as Cliff once confided to me, “Lad knew just what to do in every song” – indeed he did!  Lloyd also briefly drummed for The USSR, and was also one of the lead vocalists for The Magic Montgomery Brothers.

My friend Chris Crim was our drummer in NEIN.

Chris Crim pounds the drums for NEIN

NEIN was also a power trio which also included Cliff and myself.  Chris was an energetic power drummer that also possessed a great feel for the music and an ability to apply finesse when necessary.  Chris was also an accomplished artist, one that Cliff respected so much that he allowed Chris to design the artwork for the sleeve to NEIN’s 45 of “Upside Down”/”Who Breaks a Wheel of a Butterfly”.

…Radicals and The USSR, just say NEIN we never went far…

A nod to the bands and the shared experiences we had.  One thing that was common to these bands is we never got far.  Music is a tough business.  You not only have to have talent and vision, but you need thick skin (to fight off both external and internal pressures) and the wherewithal to actually move forward.  It was hard to move ahead in the 80s, but we had our share of successes too – there were recording sessions and gigs in prominent venues.  We had a lot of fun, but we never really got on the map in the music scene, which was a shame because each of these bands were fantastic, each had their own unique sound and vision.

…CenterAisle and With Intent, those were precious moments spent

Harry and Brian and my good friend Ed…

In 1989 I took an extended hiatus from music.  In 2001 I resumed my musical career and joined a band called CenterAisle.  CenterAisle consisted of four musicians who worked together at the same company.  Harry was Harry Brandon (lead guitar), Brian was Brian Baxter (rhythm guitar), and my good friend Ed was Ed De Caro (drums).  We started out as four guys who wanted to get together and jam, but as we made music we found that we had good chemistry and had a desire to go out and play some gigs.  For three years we played around town, mostly covers but we added some original music as well.  At the beginning of 2004, CenterAisle broke up.  Harry and Brian left to join another covers band, and Ed formed his own group called With Intent.

CenterAisle, live at The Rhythm Lounge. L-R: Brian Baxter, Ed De Caro, Harry Brandon, Mike Lewis

With Intent at The Metaphor Cafe – L-R: Mark Schlaefli, Ed De Caro, Mike Lewis, Dan Stuart

Ed, who made the switch from drums to lead vocals/rhythm guitar, recruited me to be his bass player in With Intent.  We started out as a duo and in time we added two more members, lead guitarist Dan Stuart and drummer Mark Schlaefli.  With Intent lasted for about six months before both Dan and Mark left the band.  We had several substitute drummers and guitarists in the band after that, but it wasn’t too long thereafter that I left the band too.  I had three young kids and I needed to scale back my band time to tend to their needs.

…some things are better left unsaid…

Well, I was never completely satisfied that I was able to present my original material.  I was allowed to submit a few songs in both CenterAisle and With Intent, but I had a pretty decent backlog that I never thought would fully see the light of day.  So it was just as well that the band thing ended and…

…Now I’m standing here alone, I find myself here on my own, look around this empty stage, now’s the time to turn the page…

The final lines signified my transition into a solo artist.  Something I never really thought I’d pursue although I did play a few open mics in the late 80s.  I resigned myself to forever be a bass player in a band with no real outlet to share my songs.  My whole life’s situation sort of shoehorned me into the situation that I always dreamed of having – an outlet to write and perform my original compositions.  I not only was able to write, I performed publicly and recorded two albums.

“mikelewismusic” – the album. Released in 2006.

I became very adept in playing guitar in the Vestapol tuning – essentially the Open D tuning, though I often tuned up to Open E.  “mikelewismusic” was written in Open E, which allowed me to play those bluegrassy fiddle-inspired licks throughout the song.

“m…i…k…e…”

Yes, turning the page turned out to be a fortuitous thing for me.  It also taught me a pretty valuable lesson – sometimes if you just go with the flow of life, the things you want will come right to you.  Stepping back away from life in a band allowed me a situation that I really wanted – to write, record, and perform my own original songs.

“mikelewismusic” is a very personal song, but the theme is universal – we live our lives, we reach out for the stars to attain our dreams, and it doesn’t occur on an island – there is a fabric called life and the material that weaves it together are the people you encounter in your life.  Whether they remain or move on, they are always present in the fabric.  And life flows like a river, and if you allow yourself to bask in the mighty flow, just floating along downstream in beautiful harmony, you do indeed end up with the fruits of life – good friends, good experiences, and a full and satisfying life.  

And the song in question?  Well, here it is:

m-i-k-e-l-e-w-i-s….music…mikelewismusic…mikelewismusic…

Headin’ North was my second album, released in 2009 through Beautiful Boy Records and available via CDBaby.  It is a concept album, a “mini-opera” if you will, about an unnamed man and his journey to find himself through music.

Track Info

1. Intro

2. August 16, 1977

3. Blackwood Drive

4. Dirty Little Secret

5. Headin’ North

6. A Million Miles

7. Walking Tall

8. One Last Shot

9. It’s Coming Up

10. Light of Day

11. Reprise

Plot Synopsis of the “Mini-Opera”

Set in San Diego, California, the story basically starts at childhood, where our protagonist is affected by the death of Elvis Presley (“August 16, 1977”), and as he grows older becomes disillusioned with “normal” adulthood (“Blackwood Drive”).  He decides to follow his dream to become a rock star but harbors this desire, keeping it a secret from his friends and family (“Dirty Little Secret”).  Eventually he can no longer contain this duality so he heads north up the freeway to L.A. to chase his dream (“Headin’ North”).  Once there, immersed in “the scene”, he gets a taste of the not-so-innocent life of a musician chasing the dream – the rejection that breaks lives is witnessed by our fresh-faced protagonist who feels young, invincible, but sympathizes nonetheless (“A Million Miles”).  However, he too finds himself in the sausage grinder of endless toiling, humiliation, and rejection – despite this he still resolves to press forward, head held up high (“Walking Tall”).  But time passes, and our protagonist, constantly faced with roadblocks, rejection, and defeat, finds himself at the end of his rope – he decides to go for broke and make one last major push for stardom (“One Last Shot”).  However, the end of the road is nigh for our protagonist, with nowhere to turn he knows his time is up (“It’s Coming Up”), but at his darkest hour he finds a bright, shining light of salvation, a higher power, and realizes there is more to life than earthly “stardom”.  The story ends with the protagonist beginning a new journey to find himself through spiritual means (“Light of Day”).

The Individual Songs

Now truth be told, these songs were all composed over a period of several years, standalone, and not connected in any way with each other; I wrote these songs as the inspiration hit me, most of them were written during the period of 2004 through 2007, with the exception of “Headin’ North” and “Walking Tall”, both written in 2002, and “August 16, 1977” which was written in 1987 (one of the first songs I wrote).

I began the process of recording these songs in November of 2007.  I really did not envision this set of songs becoming a concept album until I had completed the basic recordings in early 2009.  During the mixing process I toyed with several iterations of song orders.  Although I had settled on the album cover and the back cover months before, I kept switching the album name from “Walking Tall” to “One Last Shot”.  The album was going to lead off with either “Walking Tall” (if that was going to be the title of the album) or “Headin’ North” (if the album was going to be “One Last Shot”) and the plan was to make “One Last Shot” the last song of the album regardless of title.  In the end, I decided to nix both album names and opted to go with “Headin’ North” – it seemed a more positive title than the other two.  So I settled on that as the album title and this song order:

1. Headin’ North

2. Walking Tall

3. Dirty Little Secret

4. August 16, 1977

5. Light of Day

6. A Million Miles

7. It’s Coming Up

8. Blackwood Drive

9. One Last Shot

As I toyed with the various mixes, a fleeting notion passed through my head about concept albums.  One of my favorite bands, The Who, was well known for theirs, and other bands I admired like Pink Floyd and Rush used this artistic device as well.  So I started outlining a basic story and amazingly was able to cobble the story together using the 9 songs I had recorded serving as the basis.  The mini-opera was born!  To support the structure of the story, the song sequencing on the album was rearranged to the order listed in the “Track Info” section up above in this blog (songs 2 through 10).  I decided to keep the title of the album “Headin’ North” as a physical and conceptual metaphor for the story – the protagonist physically headed north to Los Angeles to “find himself” and his destiny (stardom through music) but in the end he spiritually ascended “North” and in the process truly did find himself.

It was still missing something in my mind – to me it needed some kind of bookends that opened the saga and brought it to a close.  Without any new music recorded (or songs on the docket) I chose to use pieces of “Headin’ North” the song.  Created were  two short snippets, “Intro” and “Reprise”, to begin and end the album respectively.  “Intro” was basically just the vocal tracks from the bridge of the song, and “Reprise” was the bridge vocal tracks once again, this time with the lead guitar track mixed in.  While “Intro” starts out with a startling blast of vocals, “Reprise” gently fades in with guitar, the vocals appear with the familiar refrain, and as the lead guitar symbolically races up the freeway, it fades into the sunset.

The refrain is basically the theme of the album:

Looking for the sun to break out of the clouds

Looking for a vision to see

Looking for a sign on the side of the road

Looking for a reason to be

~ mikelewismusic

Mike’s second album. “Headin’ North”, released October 2009.

Just a short post to let you know where you can find me on the web:

My main website: http://mikelewismusic.net

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/mikelewismusicpage

Reverbnation: http://reverbnation.com/mikelewismusicnet

CDBaby:

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/mdlewis (“Headin’ North”)

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/mlewismusic (“mikelewismusic”)

Keep Headin’ North!

~mikelewismusic

Here is my musical bio, as of November 22, 2012.  This bio also appears in my “About” page here on WordPress.  Happy Thanksgiving!

– mikelewismusic

BIO:

Growing up my dad always played country music.  I got a very healthy dose of Johnny Cash growing up.  That was my first musical memory, and that left a huge impression on me.  When I started elementary school, I discovered popular music, and my first foray into that was the Jackson 5.  I remember admiring Michael Jackson most of all, and soon thereafter I discovered Elton John.  Those two were my first real musical heroes and the great music they made stuck with me:  From the Jackson 5: “We’ve Got Blue Skies” (my absolute favorite J5 tune), “The Love You Save”, “ABC”, “Never Can Say Goodbye”, “Ben”, and “Maybe Tomorrow” were my favorites.  Elton John tunes that I loved were “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down On Me”, “Someone Saved My Life”, “Bennie and the Jets”, “Harmony”, “Rocket Man”, and “Your Song”.  Soon I discovered FM radio, and I was introduced to the world of Rock ‘N Roll.

Rock music had grown from the 60s – arguably the greatest era of Rock ‘N Roll with The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Who, Beach Boys, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jimi Hendrix, and countless other great rock groups – into the arena-rock fueled artists of the 70s:  Led Zeppelin (who started in 1969 actually), Aerosmith, Boston, Peter Frampton, and KISS.  It was KISS that pushed me to the edge of wanting to play guitar, so at the age of 13 I talked my parents into buying me a cheap Sears Les Paul copy.  I taught myself chords through various Mel Bay books.

I stumbled along for years on guitar through high school until I hooked up with my first band, The RADICAL MOLESTERS.  We played Beatles, Who, and Stones covers, as well as songs of the day – this was the 80s, so this included a healthy dose of the Clash, The Police, etc.  It was in this band I made the switch to being a bass player.  It seemed that my attempts to teach myself guitar gave me a good idea of fretboard knowledge that translated well into the bass.

By now I was fascinated with The Who, and the songwriting of Pete Townshend in particular.  I always had an interest in writing, and songwriting seemed to be a perfect outlet for me.  However, I lacked the basic knowledge in chord structure, so I just focused on lyrics.  I must’ve penned over 100 song lyrics and poems in a 6 month period.  However, I was too shy to ever show them to anybody!  But I’ve always written songs through the years and continue to do so to this day (I’ll get to that soon).

The RADICAL MOLESTERS became “The USSR”.  I played with them for a few more years, and then hooked up with a band called “NEIN”.  All of this was fun, but by 1985 I earned my degree in Computer Science, and at the tender age of 22 made a foray into the workforce and put music on the backburner.

I continued to jam informally with friends, and in 1989 a brief RADICAL MOLESTERS reunion culminated in a show at the Del Mar Fair.  After that, I pretty much stopped playing.  In 1991 I got married and sold all of my equipment.  By 1997 I started getting the itch to play again, and this resulted in a purchase of a Fender P-Bass.  In 2000 I bought a Rickenbacker 4003 bass (with a Sea Green finish) and by 2001 I was back in a band called CenterAisle.  We stayed together for a few years and had an amicable breakup.  I hooked up with Ed De Caro from CenterAisle and together we formed With Intent.

This was early in 2004, and I remained in With Intent until September of 2004, where I bowed out because of family commitments. The time required to rehearse in a band was taking away valuable family time.  With three young children this was no longer possible.  But this turned out to be the blessing of blessings.  Although my time constraints prevent me from participating in a band, there are no constraints with me playing solo acoustic guitar.

While in CenterAisle I rekindled my love for songwriting.  I had actually started cranking out many songs.  So now on my own, armed with an acoustic guitar, I started working on a solo acoustic venture featuring my own songs, many that I wrote while in CenterAisle and With Intent.

I began playing original tunes on acoustic, informally dubbing this effort “mikelewismusic”, which happens to be the title song of my debut CD, released in 2006.  ”mikelewismusic” the song celebrates my musical history, and the many friends that I have been blessed to cross paths with on my journey are mentioned in this song.  I tip my hat to all of them, for their collaboration with me over the years helped shape me to what I am today.

In 2009 I released my second solo effort called “Headin’ North” – this was a concept album, a “Rock Opera” if you will, about a young man trying to find spiritual guidance through earthly means.  This album, along with “mikelewismusic” are both available for purchase on CDBaby.com and Amazon.com (physical CDs and mp3 downloads) and also available on iTunes (mp3 downloads only).  Links to CDBaby are linked on this site.

In 2011 I put together an all-star band of musicians I grew up with from Montgomery High School in Otay Mesa (South San Diego), CA, dubbing ourselves “The Magic Montgomery Brothers”.  Several of these fine musicians were bandmates of mine in both The RADICAL MOLESTERS and The USSR.  This supergroup was put together to play a one-shot performance at a benefit for a local school.  It was an honor and pleasure to be able to work together with the talented musicians from my youth, all of whom I looked up to in one way or another as a youngster just starting out in music.

2012 saw some activity from my very first band, The RADICAL MOLESTERS.  Working with my longtime musical partner and collaborator Clifford M. Jomuad, we released an album containing The RADICAL MOLESTERS performance from the 1989 Del Mar Fair.  The album, titled “TRSW Live 1989″ is available on CDBaby, Amazon, and iTunes as well.

Today I focus on writing songs, practicing my craft on both guitar and bass, and looking for the next big thing, be it recording, creating videos, working with a band, or simply noodling around.

Music, pictures and videos will be posted as separate blog entries as I work through my musical history via this website.

Keep making music!

Hello all!  Welcome to my new official website.  I wanted to standardize and simplify my web presence.  Here I will be focusing on my musical endeavors, past and present, as well as any musings that may come crawling through my head.  Hope you enjoy the ride!