LYRE Notes

Visiting a Musical En'Clave

2008-09-02T04:39:00.001-07:00

Upbeat Music From Africa's Green Cape

It's been a rather challenging job to find live music to enjoy here this August. Lisbon has very few clubs offering live music, leaning toward DJs at discos instead. However I have managed to learn about some places worth checking out. The En'Clave in Lisbon's Rato district is a restaurant/music club/disco which caters to the city's Cape Verde immigrants and anyone else who just wants to enjoy that tiny african country's Moma music.

I took a couple other americans with me to this tiny hole-in-the-wall where a ring of the buzzer eventually brings a bouncer who opens a tiny door on the door and peers through, surveying the worthiness of all who wish to enter - speakeasy style.

Once inside we descended some stairs into a central dining/kitchen/stage room. I've been in larger living rooms in the US. The place had the unpretentious vibe of a basement room in a church and was filled with oilcloth-covered dining tables and wooden chairs and there was just enough room down the center of the room to function as a dance floor.

On the stage a young Johnny Mathis look-alike was leaning back in a chair and belting out joyously sweet tones in Cape Verdian Creole. He was backed by an enthusiastic trio of musicians and an electronic drum machine. I would never have placed this music as coming from africa. To me it had more in common with south american styles.

The musical highlight of the evening spontaneously occurred when a slight 60ish guitar player stood up to take an extended solo. He began with Elvisesque pelvic thrusts, which propelled him onto the dance floor, and then proceeded to play for at least five minutes with the guitar behind his head; Jimi Hendrix-style.

My friends and I had a thoroughly great time and only left at two in the morning when the band was taking a short break.

Cheers For Now,

Dave

Let The Necessary Speak

2008-08-30T05:30:00.001-07:00

What is Essential?

The idea of stripping down an idea to it's essence has had a big impact on me over the past year in terms of how i live in general and how I create music specifically. Famous artist and cultural icon Pablo Picasso said,

"There is no abstract art. You must always start with something. Afterward you can remove all traces of reality."

This theme is very much on my mind as I try to write an album full of songs driven by the idea of continuous personal growth and development and also driven by the music of the guitar. In both the ideas and music I am seeking to transcend the obvious in order to present the basic concepts.

Another abstract painter; Hans Hofmann stated,

"The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak."

It may sound trite, but one of the questions I often ask as I work on LYRE's debut album is, "What if Picasso were writing these lyrics or guitar part? What would he find he could not do without and still present the subject?"

Picasso also said,

"There are painters who transform the sun to a yellow spot, but there are others who with the help of their art and their intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun.

My goal is to pull off the musical equivalent of transforming a yellow spot into the sun.

Cheers For Now,
Dave

The Most Popular Music In Portugal

2008-08-20T04:51:00.001-07:00

Sinatra's Got Nothing On Fado Singers

Portugal's a tiny country of just over 10 million people, so I guess it should come as no surprise that I've never heard of the extremely popular traditional music genre of fado. How popular is it? Well the reigning king of fado is a 40-year-old singer named Camané. Earlier this hear hen he recently released Sempre de Mim, his first album since 2001, and it went straight to the top of the charts being certified gold within three weeks! Fado stars (or fadistas) are the Frank Sinatras and Barbara Steisands of Portugal. Check out the link to learn more about fado and it's origins.

In my quest for fado I went to Café Luso in Lisbon's famous Bairro Alto - a nightlife haven. I arrived around 12:30 and was immediately impressed with the cave-like interior of this tiny club. It couldn't seat more than 70-80 diners and it's fairly typical of fado houses around Lisbon.

The music is very melancholy with the fadistas striving to wring maximum emotion from each syllable. This is a very structured genre similar to classical where the rules are well established. The music itself had heavy Spanish references with moorish overtones. Vocalists are the superstars as with other sung genres and the best fadistas find a way to blend tradition, interpretation, and innovation into a pleasing twist on the time-honored theme.

Fado's not really my cup of tea, but as with all forms of experimentation, I had to experience it to know even that. Tonight my musical tour of Lisbon continues.

More Later,

Dave

Seize The Jacket

2008-08-18T03:28:00.001-07:00

Life Lessons In a Mall Dressing Room

Some say that understanding comes to you when you are ready for it. I guess that's one way of looking at it. I prefer to think of understanding and knowledge as a vast sea in which we live. It's around us all the time wether we notice it or not. Yesterday I noticed a bit more.

It all started two days ago at the massive Vasco de Gama mall across the street. I was in a store called Zara looking at jackets. I really like jackets as style definers and I was on the hunt for a new one for fall. Zara had several to choose from and I was having a hard time choosing. In fact this was my second trip to the same store to shop jackets.

Suddenly I saw one I hadn't spotted before. I went to the dressing room, put it on, and it all just sort of came together. I was so inspired by the look that I pulled out a camera and snapped a few frames. (I've never done that before.)

I thought maybe I should buy it right then, but then I wavered thinking what if I found another I liked better elsewhere in the mall. I put it back and left.

Over the following hours I never did find a jacket I liked better, or even as well as the one at Zara. In fact the more I thought about it and looked at the photos, the more I realized this was the jacket I really wanted. By then it was closing time so first thing the next morning I went back to buy it. I didn't immediately find my size on the rack so I asked a salesman if they had it. He went to the back and came out to say it had been sold that morning and they didn't have anymore in my size. Now I wasn't devastated, it's not that big of a deal, but I was disappointed. And that's when I became aware of a little piece of understanding that has been floating around me all along. And here it is.

Throughout life we are presented with opportunities to have, do, be what we want. These opportunities always come with the price of making a choice. You can have the red or blue balloon, but not both. You can a be a dentist or an artist, but not both. And many times it's the choosing that we find hard and frightening since we're afraid of making the wrong choice. What I realized with the jacket lesson is that just making a choice allows you to move on and experience more life and more choices. Choice A leads down one path and choice B down another. Neither is wrong. Neither is better. The important thing is just to choose.

The salesman said they'd have more jackets in later this week and you can bet when I go back and find my size I'll be taking it home this time without a second thought.

Cheers For Now,

Dave

Living "La Vida Lisbon"

2008-08-13T10:03:00.001-07:00

Imparting Some Portuguese and Moroccan Flavor to LYRE's Debut

With the main VIP in my life spending most of the past 4 months in Europe it has become increasingly difficult to maintain the kind of relationship we both seek to have. And since The Babe's planted in Lisbon until who-knows-when I decided to re-enlist the cat sitter, throw 150 pounds worth of clothes, recording gear, and instruments into bags and flight cases, and move tracking and mixing duties to the Tivoli Oriente Hotel in Lisbon.

Travel was pretty uneventful except for the airlines loosing the one bag with all my clothes, toiletries, a MIDI keyboard, and some fairly expensive microphones in it. That pretty much set my schedule back by a day as I scampered around the mall buying enough stuff to get by and trying to remain positive. The case did make it to the hotel this morning with just a broken zipper and all the contents in tact. I can't wait to see what kind of positive thing ends up being attached to this rather negative experience. I did become suddenly aware of and grateful for the fact that this is the first time in a lifetime of travel that I've ever had a bag misplaced. Seems I'm doing way better than the industry average.

With jet lag subsiding I'm turning once again to work on the album. I'll be posting to the LYRE Notes Blog almost daily and giving out links to some new Flickr albums while in Europe. I'll be making the most of this time by getting out to experience as much live Portuguese music as I can. I also plan to do some surfing and make a musician's pilgrimage to Morocco to see what north African tones and rhythms I can soak up.

Cheers for now,

Dave

Power To Your Purpose!

2008-07-10T15:25:00.001-07:00

It's all Around You

Flying into Lisbon, Portugal last week I couldn't help but notice a number of huge modern windmills; the kind used to generate electricity. With their towering white profiles they really stood out against the surrounding geography of the area. Later in the week I was making a two-hour long overland trip to the Atlantic coast to try for some surf action. I was barely out of metropolitan Lisbon when I began to notice the huge benevolent giants again; sometimes juxtaposed right next to an antique example of the kind of windmills used in the area for centuries.

Later, at the beach, the surf was rather small by Portuguese standards with waves only 1 to 1.5 meters high. Still, there was awesome power contained in each one. I was reminded of this fact more than once when I was caught off-guard and sent swirling through the surf as if in a giant washing machine. Here was another example of a persistent, consistent force in the universe that contains incalculable power. Some forward thinking companies, like Ocean Power Technologies, are beginning the important first steps toward using the ocean's power to light whole cities.

On the trip back to Lisbon that evening my mind drifted on the subject of power. I thought about how both the winds and oceans are abundant, inexhaustible, and completely ours by right of birth on this planet. It kind of blew my mind and here's why.

If you know me or read this blog then you know that I'm always beating a drum about finding your purpose in life, getting a vision for how to fulfill that purpose, and then setting goals and taking action to make it all happen. One of the many challenges to making all that happen is finding the power to propel it all into reality. Powerful physical and mental energy, powerful relationships, powerful finances. When you really get down to basics everything we need can be broken down to energy and the power it provides. There's a lot more to this subject than I can even skim in this post, but I hope you get this concept: Wind and waves are just two very obvious forms of power available to each one of us. There are many more forms of power and energy that are just as available and free if we are willing to the understanding to use them.

We are each surrounded by a sea of energy; more than we could ever use in our lifetimes. You, me, and everyone else on the planet has all the power we need to take the next step in front of us today to turn our dreams into reality, achie our visions, and fulfill our purpose.

Cheers,

Dave

This Is Your Life. Eat It Up!

2008-07-03T07:21:00.001-07:00

A Bite of Portugal

Woke up ready to take a big messy bite out of life. Walked over to the waterfront, rented a bike, and rode as hard as I could until the endorphin rush and pure joy was almost overpowering. Found myself in some barrio in Lisbon with only a scant idea of how I got there and knowing full well that I own my day. I hope everyone of you can find this in your own lives.

Much Love,
Dave

Mixing Music European Hotel Style

2008-07-02T09:22:00.001-07:00

It Ain't So Bad, Besides There's No Room Service Back Home

I just wanted to give you an idea of my situation for mixing in London and Lisbon. About the hardest thing is getting used to wearing earbuds for hours on end and knowing I'll have to leave all EQing until I'm back home with accurate monitors. Still, I can compose and even use my travel keyboard to record midi tracks of things like synth, piano, organ, and drums.

All in all I think it's working well and it does seem inspiring to take breaks and go on a mini adventure in the

hotel's neighborhood. The only thing I really miss is my guitars. I really like to record guitars when the mood hits and they do tend to be my musical security blankets.

More later.

Cheers,
Dave

Oh, I almost forgot...

I saw a werewolf with a chinese menu in his hand

Walking through the streets of Soho in the rain

He was looking for the place called Lee Ho Fook's

Gonna' get a big plate of beef chow mein.

Aioooo, werewolves of London...

New Album Update

2008-06-24T06:43:00.000-07:00

Dave Hoskins Becomes LYRE With a Debut Album in the Pipeline

I feel the need to interrupt my London posts and write a small piece to explain a little more about the name LYRE and what's been going on with the new album.

Firstly LYRE is the band name I'm going to be playing under from now on whether I play a solo show or with other musicians - eventually leading to a full band. I chose the name because I think of the lyre as a kind of small harp like by David who wrote the psalms of scripture played. The connection is not that I'm named David, but rather that, according to the story, young David played for Israel's king Saul when he was tormented by demons and the music drove the spirits away.

My vision is to create music that not only entertains, but also helps people live positive and fulfilling lives. I write songs that encourage, illuminate, strengthen, and otherwise help people in the struggle to get the best out of life. This is the light in me flows out through the music. My elevator pitch goes something like this:

"Many people glimpse a vision or purpose that leads straight to their fulfillment in life, but as they travel the road toward it things get hard and they doubt or they get sidetracked and soon they're no longer heading toward the life of their dreams. LYRE creates music that inspires, encourages, and helps us remember what passion feels like. LYRE gives a soundtrack for the journey."

So that's why I'm making the transition from playing under my own name into LYRE. It'll probably be just me for a little while longer and then others will be added to the band. I will also be moving into a new website by the fall when we get www.lyre.tv up and running.

And that brings me to the new album. I've been recording new songs written specifically for LYRE for the past 6-8 weeks now. I'm about half done with the recording but things are also going faster than at the beginning so I plan to have LYRE's debut album mixed and mastered; album art and show posters designed, t-shirt designs finished and the whole lot of it off for replication and printing by mid-August.

This means I'll have the finished products in hand by the third week in September. I'm really working to make this deadline for several reasons but if I feel it needs pushed back to keep the production quality high I will do that. I'd rather have high quality products to sell a few weeks late than get inferior stuff out on time.

So that's where I am right now. I'm trying to get out this week and make connections for a fall tour in London and then next week while in Lisbon I may get to some mixing and recording keyboards unless it looks like I should also be networking with venue bookers there too. Once back in the US I'll hit recording hard again and get this project back up to speed.

More to come.

Cheers,

Dave

Stinky Situation - So What!?

2008-06-24T05:22:00.000-07:00

Beauty From Nothing

This morning I walked through Prince of Wales Terrace, iPod plugged tightly into my head, letting Daniel Lanois'

transcendent album Here Is What Is slowly spill into me. Full of joy, full of gratitude, and yet still curious how the things I envision for my music will come about. Suddenly a track named Beauty came on which is just Daniel interviewing Brian Eno about great art. Here are Eno's comments.

"What would be really interesting for people to see is how beautiful things grow out of shit. Because nobody ever believes that. You know everybody thinks that Beethoven had his string quartets completely in his head - they'd somehow appeared there and formed in his head - and all he had to do is write them down and they would kind of be manifest to the world. But I think what's so interesting, and what would really be the lesson everybody should learn, is that things come out of nothing. Things evolve out of nothing. You know the tiniest seed in the right situation turns into the most beautiful forest and then the most promising seed in the wrong situation turns into nothing. And I think this would be important for people to understand because it gives peope confidence in their own lives to know that that's how things work.

If you walk around with the idea that there are some people who are so gifted that they have these wonderful things in their head, but you're not one of them, you're just sort of a normal person, you could never do anything like that, then you live a different kind of life. You could have another kind of life where you'd say, "Well I know that things come from nothing very much and start from unpromising beginnings, and I'm an unpromising beginning!""

That, boys and girls, tuned my thoughts to a whole different station.

Cheers,

Dave

Westminster in the Sunshine & Making New Friends in a Spitalfield

2008-06-23T10:05:00.000-07:00

Sunday's Just Don't Come Any Better Than This

Yesterday (Sunday) was pretty much our last chance to scout London on this trip since next Saturday we fly to Lisbon in the morning. We decided to take another London Walks tour (truly our favorite way to learn about this great city) and this time we chose "Old Westminster 1000 Years of History". Described as "The seminal London Walk. Miss it and you've missed London". Well there you go! We had our marching orders. It was around 70 degrees with almost full sunshine all day!

The Babe, who's been here way more than me said she'd never seen Big Ben in the sun - ever!

The tour was led by an older, cotton-topped gentleman with an encyclopedic knowledge of everything he need to cover (and more I'm sure). Unfortunately after about 30 minutes of the two hour tour I'm afraid much of it fell on overloaded ears where we were concerned. Henry the VIII crowned here, Sir Winston Churchill married there, Sir Walter Raleigh's torso buried here... and head buried there, and so on, and so forth. After awhile I just gave up keeping up and took lots of pretty pictures.

The other really cool thing about the day took place at Spitalfields Market; an open air market with a uniquely London twist. The Babe had discovered this mecca of local artisans and their wares on a previous trip and had managed to inflict a fair amount of damage to a VISA card amassing an ensemble of one jewelry designer's work.

While there I ran into the booth of Positive Tees; T-shirts with great design and positive, empowering messages. The shirt I bought and you see me wearing in some of the photos has a quote from Jack Kerouac's On The Road which reads,

"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous roman candles."

Those who know me know that's a sentiment I can wear without reservation! The owner/designer is Mal, and he's also a musician. In the few minutes we talked I could sense a connection. We just sort of resonated with each other. It was quick, strange, cool, and very real. And just like that I knew I had found a new friend.

Mal said his e-commerece site will be ready to accept orders within the next few weeks so I'd encourage you to check out his selection of life affirming designs printed on freely traded cotton with 10% of all sales going to a children's AIDs charity.

I guess that's about all for tonight.

Cheers,

Dave

Okay quit kidding you guys. Where's Peter O'Toole!?

Exploring Kensington And Unearthing Inspiration

2008-06-21T14:39:00.000-07:00

Poetry By The Pound (and others too)

Well I'm back in London for a little over a week and I plan to do some mixing on the still untitled LYRE debut album (LYRE is the band name I perform under whether solo or with other musicians), network with local bookers and venue owners about playing a club tour this fall, and spend some quality time with my sweetheart. This weekend it's all about the latter.

The highlight of today was taking a London Walks tour of Old Kensington, London's Royal Village. Since we always stay in Kensington and it basically feels like our neighborhood in London, I thought it would be great to find out more about the history. It was amazing and more than I can relay in one blog post so I'll just post a few photos and point out the one aspect I found particularly inspiring.

It seems that two of recent history's famous poets, T.S. Eliot, and Ezra Pound lived in Kensington during their heydays. In fact it seems quite amazing, but Pound's widow still lives in the same house and can be seen through the curtains at night moving among his books and photos.

You might well ask why all this means anything to me. It's just this. Both poets were American by birth, as am I, and both found a profound creative connection with London, and I have too. I'm not trying to say that any of my lyrics are as important or timeless as these literary giants' works - yet. But who knows what I might achieve if I only keep applying myself to growing as a writer of the musical poems we call songs.

There's something for me in London. Something bigger than a good time making short excursions and playing a handful of shows at a time. I felt it the first time I walked these ancient streets, and I feel it reenforced everywhere I go in this great city.

I guess that's enough for now. More to come.

Cheers,

Dave

Living Large In London

2008-04-04T06:53:00.000-07:00

On Getting The Life You Want

Thanks for all who sent such nice emails after my last post. Yes, life is very good and I'm living every moment as it comes.

The other day I worked up the courage to call British Grove Studios in west London and ask for a tour. Dire Straits' founder Mark Knopfler built it last year and recorded his most recent album there.

The Killers were in for a while last Christmas and just this past week legendary engineer Geoff Emerick was in to remix The Beatles' Stg. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. (He mixed that the first time too along with Revolver, The White Album, and Abby Road!) Anyway studio manager David Stewart was very generous in taking time to show me the place this morning. I'm going to put out a new CD this fall and I'm really thinking about recording it there.

Heady stuff to be sure. But one thing I've been learning this past year is that we all get the life we make and if we don't have what we want it's simply because we are unwilling to do whatever it takes to get it. As you may have guessed, I'm getting the life I want from now on - no excuses! From my health (I've lost over 40 pounds since last July) to my personal relationships, to my music career my goal is to plan like I'll live 1000 more years and act like I'll die tomorrow.

Whew, that was quite a rave, but I do get worked up on the subject of living my best life every day. Anyway here're a few pics from British Grove. Enjoy.

Cheers,

Dave

London: Like I Was Born To It

2008-04-02T05:18:00.000-07:00

Whirlwind Hop Across the Pond

The stars aligned in a rather sudden fashion over the past couple weeks and I found myself quickly saying yes to a couple weeks in London - my first trip.

I'm having all kinds of fun exploring and just generally soaking everything in. Another great benefit is that I had already been planning to play a short pub/club tour somewhere in Europe later this year so I'm getting the details on booking and playing clubs in the area while here.

This really is a great town. I feel so comfortable with everything that it's easy to envision myself spending a good amount of quality time here. I'll try and post a few more times this week and let you know what I'm up to, but for now I'll just leave you with a couple more photos and sign off.

Cheers,

Dave

Irish Pubs and Open Mics

2008-02-10T10:41:00.000-08:00

Jumping In With Both Feet

About a week and a half ago I was at American Music in Seattle and saw Liz Smith, whom I hadn't seen for quite some time. We got to talking about my music career and I told her I was getting ready to start playing live again and was just trying to figure out where to start. It turns out that Liz and her man Ricky run the Sunday night open mic at Conor Byrne Pub in Ballard. She invited me to come out and I took it as a great first step to playing live again.

Now I haven't played and sang solo live for a long, long, long time and my nerves that first night were more than I had anticipated. But after my three song set I felt so good that all I could think about was how to improve and expand on it. I ended up performing four times last week and received a gig offer from one pub owner! What an encouraging start.

I'll make sure and let everyone know as soon as I book a gig where I'm playing for at least an hour so you can come out and enjoy the show. It won't be long now

Cheers,

Dave

Writing Something New

2007-12-24T18:11:00.000-08:00

It's The Thoughts That Count

I'm pretty much consumed with trying to crank out some new material these days. To me writing's one of those things i love having done. I love having a finished song (or blog post for that matter) that I've churned out of my own noodle, but the actual process of writing - well that's another matter. It's not that it's hard, per se, it's just not easy. And that's not a bad thing. It's just a thing. It's a thing to be handled, dealt with, wrangled, etc.. Anyway that's my focus these days is writing. My goal is to produce enough new music to add to existing material and end up with a one hour set's worth of better than average songs in time for my first gig in mid-January. (More about that gig when it gets closer.)

Merry Christmas everyone,

Dave

Guitar Pedal Rescue

2007-12-14T15:59:00.000-08:00

My Pedalboard Redo

It's been a week since my last post and it's not for lack of trying that it's taken so long. I really wanted to write about my new pedalboard several days ago but I couldn't. I couldn't because life kept interrupting and it took much longer than I anticipated to get the new board put together.

Anyway it's done and I'm very happy with the final result. The bottom line is my rig for playing live is simplified and organized so I can concentrate on my performances. Now that rocks!

Cheers,

Dave