Well… where do I even begin?

Maybe we should start here: I ended up quitting my band, River Mann, at the start of November. Another one bites the dust.

An entire article could have been written about it, but ultimately, it just wasn’t a good fit. An EP we had been working on for over a year is really what did me in — aside from it dragging on and on, I never found myself satisfied with the sound and direction of it. With the quality of our one and only single, I just didn’t have the heart to go through that again.

I can make it sound more dramatic than it probably is; we don’t have a huge following or much of a catalogue, but walking away wasn’t pleasant, as there were a lot of things I did like about River Mann, and I put three years of hard work into making it my passion project. It’s disheartening to leave behind a lot of exciting ideas that will never see the light of day. I certainly have an easier time understanding why musicians walk away from seemingly attractive arrangements.

As for what comes next, I really can’t say, since finding a new band is never easy. (It would be band № 6, but who’s counting?) In the meantime, to stay motivated to practice, I dusted off an old DW3000 double pedal I picked up back in high school, and have been learning the ways of the double kick. I’m interested in writing an update in a few months to share my progress and the things that have made it easier to learn double pedal after playing single pedal for about 20 years.

That’s another thing to comment on: I’ve been drumming for a little over 20 years. More or less anyway — this is the earliest date I can find in my practice materials, from page four of Syncopation, naturally:

This is another thing I could have written a full post about, and I wanted to, but the words were not coming easily. Unsurprisingly, I’ve been really considering what kind of drummer I am; how my style has evolved, how it will continue to evolve, the ideas that interest me, and my raw ability. There has been a lot of insecurity around that, being someone who has been practicing this thing for two decades and struggles to be the kind of drummer he wants to be. But it’s good not to be complacent, I suppose. 

With a pretty much non-existent discography, it’s tough to properly hear and appreciate learn how my playing has grown. I’m at least becoming more aware of how different licks and ideas move in and out of my vocabulary. It’s another reason why it’s good to periodically record yourself. Or, in the absence of that, writing things down.

This website is currently my biggest connection to this instrument, and while I enjoy writing, it’s never been my intention to be known primarily as a blogger. But my blog is the most popular it’s ever been, with a couple thousand visitors each month, so that’s neat. I’m not thrilled with my output — back in 2020, I could get an article done each week, but an article each month is about all I can reliably muster lately.

I really admire Todd Bishop for (among other things) his output, but he can make a lot of short posts work (often inspired by his own teaching practice), while articles have become such an event for me. Maybe I should think more about how often someone writing for The Atlantic or something similar gets stuff out. 

I also don’t do this full-time, lest we forget. I don’t even do it part-time! I have considered monetizing the site, but with my audience being on the smaller side, I don’t want to annoy it for what would likely be insignificant income. 

And hey, send me an email if you have a song you’d like transcribed — if it clicks with me, I will 100% write about it. 

Twenty Twenty-Five has been a pretty ugly year across the board, and I have it pretty easy. It seems incontrovertible that my country has completely sputtered in ways that feel both ridiculous and unrecoverable. I don’t know how anyone is happy or optimistic right now — unless, of course, you are blessed enough to be riding the gravy train of an economy that’s tenuously propped up by little more than superficial AI and rampant, pestilential gambling. 

There are any number of things I could point to from just this past month, but here’s one that hits close to home: just about ten years ago, CU had to close campus in the middle of finals because of a huge snowstorm. In 2025, campus closed again — not for snow, but because the state is suffering a concerningly dry and warm winter, to the point where the main power utility had to shut its lines off to prevent another winter wildfire. The entire city of Boulder pretty much closed down on the 17th to brave a windstorm.

So, naturally, the day before all this happened, our government decided to shutter a huge weather research station in Boulder. I guess somebody doesn’t like how people are growing *concerned.*

I don’t think you could write this. Seriously — if you cooked up a story where some windbag decides to close hospitals just as catatonic people find themselves in the emergency room muttering “brainssss…,” you would get panned. I mean, that’s just lazy storytelling. Right?

It’s almost quaint to think of American politics before everything that’s happened in the last ten years, but that kind of naiveté and ignorance is one of the ways that we find ourselves in this situation. America has long been a deeply flawed place. It’s the only way to explain all of this. Still… the past year has certainly felt different! 

In memoriam, the big stories in the drumming world were the deaths of Al Foster (82) and Jack DeJohnette (83). Last year I described Roy Haynes as one of the last great jazz drummers, and this year were are about as close to the end as we can get.

I’ve come to learn that I’m not very good at writing obituaries; when someone like Jack DeJohnette dies, how could you possibly whip something up in a day or two that does him justice? I hope sometime in the near future I can at least write about a performance of his. Same for Al. And Roy. And all the other drummers on my embarrassing to-do list.

Other drummers we lost include Rick Buckler (69) of the Jam; “Snowy” Fleet (85) of the Easybeats; Bob Bennett (70) of the Sonics; Les Binks (73) of late 70s Judas Priest; Clem Burke (70) of Blondie (and the Ramones, as “Elvis Ramone”); Terry Draper (73) of Klaatu; Frank Gibson Jr. (79); Larry Lee (78) of Ozark Mountain Daredevils; Louis Moholo (85) of the Blue Notes; Ray Mayhew (60) of Sigue Sigue Sputnik; Viv Prince (84) of the Pretty Things; Thomas Price (69) of Scandal, Blue Öyster Cult, Billy Idol, & Joan Jett and the Blackhearts; Maury Baker (82) of Ars Nova, Tim Buckley, Janis Joplin, and Frank Zappa; Gilson Lavis (74) of Squeeze; Hilly Michaels (77) of Sparks; and “Jellybean” Johnson (69) of the Time.

I should also pay respects to Rupp’s Drums, a big store in Denver that closed up shop this past summer after 41 years. 

There’s just one last thing to share — my top bands of the year. The list makes about as much sense as anything else that has happened in the last twelve months:

1. Lynyrd Skynyrd (I took a number of road trips, what can I say?)
2. Cream
3. Sungazer
4. Plini (he has been dethroned!)
5. The Allman Brothers Band
6. Steely Dan
7. Dave Brubeck
8. The National 
9. My Morning Jacket
10. Fleetwood Mac

(NB: My WordPress theme has been acting up lately, so I might be switching it in the coming weeks. Don’t be alarmed if you come back and things look a bit different.)