New Album Update

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!?

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

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

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

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

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