It's now 2011 and that means it is time to dig up some more music from the past. Seems like an odd thing to say, but I have to admit that I enjoyed digging through these old lyric sheets and sharing them. Here are two more songs from my music vault that I hope you will enjoy.
Divide
Sometimes amazing things happen when you sit down with someone, guitar in hand, mic turned on, and nothing but a few notes in the air. That is what sets the stage for this next song.
It was a cold January day as James Smola and I sat up in my bedroom fiddling around with a bass, a guitar and a microphone. The handy two track reel to reel recorder lay next to us on the floor ready to record anything inspirational, or not so inspirational. With the tape rolling, as it almost always was when we got together, I picked up the bass and began fiddling with a basic riff. James turned up his guitar and started playing along. For some reason I just started throwing out lyrics as we jammed. Nothing was premeditated, nothing was written down. It was all made up on the spot and captured on the reel to reel as we went. This continued on for about eight minutes before we were interrupted by my mom trying to get our attention from downstairs.
After answering her question, James and I rewound the tape and listened back to the "masterpiece" we had just recorded. Turns out that we actually liked what we heard. I quickly picked up a pen and paper and transcribed what I sang so that we could see what we had. After reading through the lyric sheet a couple of times, it was deemed that somehow the song actually made sense. With a minor change to the final "verse", James and I put the reel to reel on again and recorded the song in full with minor changes to the music we had put down just minutes before. That is pretty much it. Divide is the name we gave the song and it was the last time we played it together. Fortunately for all of you, I kept the lyrics in a binder and the song on cassette tape. For now, here are the lyrics for Divide.
Maybe Someday
Maybe Someday is a song I wrote about a girl I had a crush on at the time. She was younger than I was, but everybody knew who she was. I guess you could call her one of the popular girls that every guy seemed to have a crush on. By the time I first met her on the school bus, I knew who she was and that is about it. She was going to a friends house on our bus and the instant she said hello to me I was smitten. Nothing much came of it at the time because I was in the not-so-popular group of kids, so I didn't really bother to make an effort. Later I would get to know her through the high school hockey games she was cheerleader for with some of my friends. And then one day we actually started to hang out together. I went to her place after school one day and watched the Lion King with her and her mother. Slowly the crush was growing, but little did I know that another friend of mine was having the same feelings I was. I was very shy back in high school, and it stopped me from making any kind of move numerous times in those days. After hanging out for a couple of weeks I was done convincing myself to take a chance and ask this girl out, but I was too late. The other friend had beat me to the punch and that was the end of my chances. I went home after finding this out and wrote this song. I never played it for anyone but myself. I based the chords off the classic G-Cadd9-D chord progression that Bret Michaels of Poison makes so many songs out of, and sat down and wrote these lyrics. So here are the lyrics to the song Maybe Someday.
Part Three will be coming soon. I hope you enjoy this short series of blogs.
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/TheBrianThomas for some fun quips on music, wrestling and more.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Songs From The Past (Part One)
I was going through some of my old stuff and found a bunch of lyric sheets from songs I wrote back in the mid-nineties and thought I would share a few of them with you. Most of the back story has been lost to the ages, but what I do remember about them I will share here with you.
Your Memory's Strong
Let's start with a song I wrote after my grandfather died. Actually it took a couple of years to write it, but what came out was a nice song that foreshadowed what I would be going through again almost a year later to the date. The song is called "Your Memory's Strong". I wrote this song a couple of months before I graduated high school. My grandfather was a very important figure in the lives of my siblings and I. We spent virtually every Sunday with him growing up. I had fallen out of touch as I got older and work took up my Sundays, but I remember driving to my grandparents house to show them my new car (the 1991 Dodge Daytona). I am not sure why I decided to head over there that day before work, but I am so glad I did because shortly after he was gone.
My grandfather died of a stroke while making a snack in the kitchen one day. I still remember the day it happened and my dad being home when we came off the bus (very unusual for him). He let us all know and then asked us to stay upstairs while he broke the news to my mother when she got home. It is something I will never forget as long as I live. It's amazing to think that God gave me one more visit with him before he passed. An out of the blue visit at that. So here is my song "Your Memory's Strong".
Away From Misery
The next song I want to share is a song I wrote shortly after I started what I consider my first serious relationship with a girl named Julie. Up until that point I had a couple of short relationships and many crushes, but Julie was really the first major relationship I would have.
I had a rough time fitting in with everyone when I moved from private Catholic school to public school in seventh grade. It didn't really change much until some time around the end of my sophomore year. By then I had been playing music with my buddies in a garage band, and that opened up my social life a lot. I was no longer the recluse that I had been before that.
By the start of my senior year in 1995, I had a solid group of friends, a good job at Target, and was starting to really enjoy everything life had to offer. On top of that, my good friend Josie and I won our high schools homecoming king and queen honors (see image). This was a HUGE change in my life. I was never one of the popular kids, but thanks to my brother and his friends I was recognized by my peers in this one moment. This is really the backdrop to where this song comes from. I am homecoming king with my best friend Josie, I have started a relationship with Julie, I have a core group of friends that have made me feel great about life, and I have a fun group of guys that I enjoy playing music with. And as you read the lyrics, I believe it really captures the emotions that I was feeling at the time after a year of breaking out of the shell I was keeping myself in for so long. So here is "Away From Misery" (Notice the spelling error on Misery in my lyric sheet).
Part Two will be coming soon. I hope you enjoy this short series of blogs.
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/TheBrianThomas for some fun quips on music, wrestling and more.
Your Memory's Strong
Let's start with a song I wrote after my grandfather died. Actually it took a couple of years to write it, but what came out was a nice song that foreshadowed what I would be going through again almost a year later to the date. The song is called "Your Memory's Strong". I wrote this song a couple of months before I graduated high school. My grandfather was a very important figure in the lives of my siblings and I. We spent virtually every Sunday with him growing up. I had fallen out of touch as I got older and work took up my Sundays, but I remember driving to my grandparents house to show them my new car (the 1991 Dodge Daytona). I am not sure why I decided to head over there that day before work, but I am so glad I did because shortly after he was gone.
My grandfather died of a stroke while making a snack in the kitchen one day. I still remember the day it happened and my dad being home when we came off the bus (very unusual for him). He let us all know and then asked us to stay upstairs while he broke the news to my mother when she got home. It is something I will never forget as long as I live. It's amazing to think that God gave me one more visit with him before he passed. An out of the blue visit at that. So here is my song "Your Memory's Strong".
Away From Misery
The next song I want to share is a song I wrote shortly after I started what I consider my first serious relationship with a girl named Julie. Up until that point I had a couple of short relationships and many crushes, but Julie was really the first major relationship I would have.
I had a rough time fitting in with everyone when I moved from private Catholic school to public school in seventh grade. It didn't really change much until some time around the end of my sophomore year. By then I had been playing music with my buddies in a garage band, and that opened up my social life a lot. I was no longer the recluse that I had been before that.
By the start of my senior year in 1995, I had a solid group of friends, a good job at Target, and was starting to really enjoy everything life had to offer. On top of that, my good friend Josie and I won our high schools homecoming king and queen honors (see image). This was a HUGE change in my life. I was never one of the popular kids, but thanks to my brother and his friends I was recognized by my peers in this one moment. This is really the backdrop to where this song comes from. I am homecoming king with my best friend Josie, I have started a relationship with Julie, I have a core group of friends that have made me feel great about life, and I have a fun group of guys that I enjoy playing music with. And as you read the lyrics, I believe it really captures the emotions that I was feeling at the time after a year of breaking out of the shell I was keeping myself in for so long. So here is "Away From Misery" (Notice the spelling error on Misery in my lyric sheet).
Part Two will be coming soon. I hope you enjoy this short series of blogs.
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/TheBrianThomas for some fun quips on music, wrestling and more.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Sometimes A Song Just Moves You
It can happen at any time, in any place, and through any medium. A song plays and you instantly fall in love with it. It has happened to me thousands of times over my life, and this is the story of how a simple little tune came to mean so much more.
I can't exactly remember who introduced me to the song, but I know that the first time I heard it was by watching the music video. It's a simple video really; Tom Higgenson sitting in a chair playing guitar and singing as images of a girl flash across the screen. My first thought was, this is catchy. My second was, dude has a big nose. Mean, I know, but I am being honest here... that thing is quite large. Upon listening to the whole song I couldn't help but love it. It was so simple, so sweet, and so awesome! I knew then and there I had to learn it.
A couple of days later I received my latest copy of Guitar World magazine and what song would I see was transcribed in it? That's right, THIS ONE! I was pumped and sat down to learn the song immediately. I skipped right over everything else in the magazine, which featured Eddie Van Halen on the cover, and when straight to the song. Learning the music was pretty easy, but the lyrics kept getting jumbled in my head. Soon enough I had it down, for the most part.
You are probably thinking to yourself, what's the big deal with learning a new song? You're right, what is the big deal? Well, the song took on even more significance a few months later after my son, Riley, was born. As I have mentioned before in this blog, after Riley was born I started playing a lot more. I loved playing for him and he seems to have enjoyed listening and moving to the music. This is one song that as he grew up I continued to play over and over for him, to the point where it became "his song" and some of the lyrics were altered with his name in place of other words.
As the years have passed, I continued playing this song for Riley and his little brother Owen. Riley is now three years old and the cool thing is, he sings the song with me. So Tom Higgenson, you don't know me but I want to thank you for writing such a beautiful song that has become such a big part of my life. In honor of that I have recorded my own version of the song with some minor changes, but keeping it true to the original. I hope you enjoy my take on the Plain White Ts hit song, Hey There Delilah.
Song: Hey There Delilah
Music & Words: Tom Higgenson
Album: Plain White T's All That We Needed
Year: 2005
I can't exactly remember who introduced me to the song, but I know that the first time I heard it was by watching the music video. It's a simple video really; Tom Higgenson sitting in a chair playing guitar and singing as images of a girl flash across the screen. My first thought was, this is catchy. My second was, dude has a big nose. Mean, I know, but I am being honest here... that thing is quite large. Upon listening to the whole song I couldn't help but love it. It was so simple, so sweet, and so awesome! I knew then and there I had to learn it.
A couple of days later I received my latest copy of Guitar World magazine and what song would I see was transcribed in it? That's right, THIS ONE! I was pumped and sat down to learn the song immediately. I skipped right over everything else in the magazine, which featured Eddie Van Halen on the cover, and when straight to the song. Learning the music was pretty easy, but the lyrics kept getting jumbled in my head. Soon enough I had it down, for the most part.
You are probably thinking to yourself, what's the big deal with learning a new song? You're right, what is the big deal? Well, the song took on even more significance a few months later after my son, Riley, was born. As I have mentioned before in this blog, after Riley was born I started playing a lot more. I loved playing for him and he seems to have enjoyed listening and moving to the music. This is one song that as he grew up I continued to play over and over for him, to the point where it became "his song" and some of the lyrics were altered with his name in place of other words.
As the years have passed, I continued playing this song for Riley and his little brother Owen. Riley is now three years old and the cool thing is, he sings the song with me. So Tom Higgenson, you don't know me but I want to thank you for writing such a beautiful song that has become such a big part of my life. In honor of that I have recorded my own version of the song with some minor changes, but keeping it true to the original. I hope you enjoy my take on the Plain White Ts hit song, Hey There Delilah.
Song: Hey There Delilah
Music & Words: Tom Higgenson
Album: Plain White T's All That We Needed
Year: 2005
Thursday, November 4, 2010
A Look At The Latest Composition
In late August I began work on the latest song idea I had come up with. I titled it Tempting Fate at the time as I got the music written and a few basic words. The premise was going to be about a guy that went nuts on his girl, went to jail, was released and is living with the consequences of his actions. Crazy huh? Well, I scrapped that idea after many rewrites on the music side and decided I needed to get a little more personal in the song. I needed to worked with my life experience in order to make this song work, so that is what I did.
I really struggled with this one for a long time musically. I knew in my head where I wanted to go, but couldn't get it right on tape. After countless rewrites of the chorus music, style changes and rerecords, by October I had what I wanted musically. The next challenge was going to be steering the song lyrically.
To get the lyrics down I took a look at the handful of lyrics I had written for Tempting Fate. I basically tossed all of them out with one exception. The opening lines "A single tear falls from your face. It's an image I can't replace. It keeps running through my head." Those words stuck out like a sore thumb and brought me back to a very painful time in my life. It was after reading those lyrics that I knew what the song was going to be about.
The lyrics of this song came out of a couple of experiences towards the end of a very long relationship I was in. This is of course from my side of the story and she may have seen things differently, but from my vantage point this song tells the reason the relationship came to an end. I really think after all is said, the story makes for a very powerful song.
I would like to also acknowledge a few people for their help on this project. Special thanks to Matt Graunke for providing an excellent guitar solo to the song that really captured the mood and tenor of the composition. Awesome work Matt. And very special thanks to my good friend Jay for helping me get the mix, the music and the instruments right on this. Jay has heard this song in many different stages and has been a great help in telling me what worked and what didn't as this song took flight.
Lastly, this isn't complete yet. I am hoping to add some drums and a bass at some point, and probably to redo the vocal recording as well. I really wanted to share this work with everyone though, so here it is for now. I will upload a new version once it is finally completed; if that day comes. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing and recording it.
Song: Rejection
Music & Words: Brian Bartholow
Album: Reflections On Life
Year: 2010
I really struggled with this one for a long time musically. I knew in my head where I wanted to go, but couldn't get it right on tape. After countless rewrites of the chorus music, style changes and rerecords, by October I had what I wanted musically. The next challenge was going to be steering the song lyrically.
To get the lyrics down I took a look at the handful of lyrics I had written for Tempting Fate. I basically tossed all of them out with one exception. The opening lines "A single tear falls from your face. It's an image I can't replace. It keeps running through my head." Those words stuck out like a sore thumb and brought me back to a very painful time in my life. It was after reading those lyrics that I knew what the song was going to be about.
The lyrics of this song came out of a couple of experiences towards the end of a very long relationship I was in. This is of course from my side of the story and she may have seen things differently, but from my vantage point this song tells the reason the relationship came to an end. I really think after all is said, the story makes for a very powerful song.
I would like to also acknowledge a few people for their help on this project. Special thanks to Matt Graunke for providing an excellent guitar solo to the song that really captured the mood and tenor of the composition. Awesome work Matt. And very special thanks to my good friend Jay for helping me get the mix, the music and the instruments right on this. Jay has heard this song in many different stages and has been a great help in telling me what worked and what didn't as this song took flight.
Lastly, this isn't complete yet. I am hoping to add some drums and a bass at some point, and probably to redo the vocal recording as well. I really wanted to share this work with everyone though, so here it is for now. I will upload a new version once it is finally completed; if that day comes. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing and recording it.
Song: Rejection
Music & Words: Brian Bartholow
Album: Reflections On Life
Year: 2010
Monday, October 4, 2010
Oh What A Night!
Surreal is the word I would use to describe it. Here I am standing on, I guess you can call it a stage, guitar in my hands, microphone in front of my lips and about 15-20 people staring at me. "Hello everyone, I haven't done this in fifteen years." That is how I introduce myself, but it feels good. My knees feel like they could buckle at any time and my hands were a bit shaky, but I was determined to persevere.
To calm the nerves I decided to go with my old reliable Poison medley consisting of lesser known Theater of My Soul, and mega hits Every Rose Has It's Thorn and Something to Believe In. The crowd was a bit confused at the beginning as I strummed through the first verse of Theater of My Soul, but that is to be expected when you start a medley with the song nobody knows. Once I began Every Rose people seemed to get in the groove, and by the time I got to the opening of Something To Believe In I even heard a cheer! When I finished the Poison medley, my nerves for the most part gone, I was given a nice amount of applause. It feel good, it felt euphoric, it felt like I was king of the world... at least for a couple seconds before I remembered that the hard part was next.
My buddy Mike has been trying to get me to come out to the open jam for about a month now, but things always come up and I am unable to commit. He approached me earlier this week about going and I decided I should give it serious consideration. I was not booked for Sunday, so it was the perfect opportunity. The boys went down about 7:30pm after a fun day at Nana and Grandpa H's place, so with the wife's blessing I called up Mike and let him know I was in. We got there at about 8:30pm and sat down at a table. I ordered a cheeseburger and a water and listened to others as they went up and did their thing. It looked fun, hell it looked awesome, but I wasn't sure I was ready to do what they were doing. It had been fifteen years since the last time I played in front of people, and at that time there were four other guys playing along with me. This time I would be on my own. As the last of the musicians ran through their sets I asked myself what the heck am I waiting for? Nobody there knew who I was, so if I stunk it up what difference did it make? I went and talked to the lady in charge and asked permission to use the guitar on stage. She put my name down and I waited my turn. I quickly ran to the bathroom to make sure I took care of that before getting up on the stage (we don't want any accidents in public). Finally, I was called.
After the nice reception for my Poison medley I was faced with the decision to go ahead and play the song I wrote in memory of my brother (entitled Brother), or go to another old reliable. I had never really played the song in front of people, or all the way through for that matter (the joys of electronic recording allowed my to lay down the verse track and the chorus tracks separately and splice it all together afterward). I made the decision to go for it. It was a rough go at first, but I started getting in a groove and made it all the way through to the end. There were hiccups along the way, but nobody held it against me. I had done what I wanted to do and I felt pretty good about it. I slowly walked back to my seat to finish the night listening to the band play a few songs. It was about 9:30 and my wife texted to let me know she was going to bed. I told her I played with as much excitement as a text message can convey, and smiled when she responded back with a text that summed it up... "Awesome." And it was.
I hope to go back more often to play, and I hope to drag Mike up there with me too. It was a huge milestone for me and let me know that I could do this if I wanted to. I am already trying to decide which songs to play the next time I show up. I think I have a good idea of the three songs I would like to do, so in an undetermined but hopefully short amount of time I will be back on that stage playing and singing to strangers and fueling my inner rock star.
To calm the nerves I decided to go with my old reliable Poison medley consisting of lesser known Theater of My Soul, and mega hits Every Rose Has It's Thorn and Something to Believe In. The crowd was a bit confused at the beginning as I strummed through the first verse of Theater of My Soul, but that is to be expected when you start a medley with the song nobody knows. Once I began Every Rose people seemed to get in the groove, and by the time I got to the opening of Something To Believe In I even heard a cheer! When I finished the Poison medley, my nerves for the most part gone, I was given a nice amount of applause. It feel good, it felt euphoric, it felt like I was king of the world... at least for a couple seconds before I remembered that the hard part was next.
My buddy Mike has been trying to get me to come out to the open jam for about a month now, but things always come up and I am unable to commit. He approached me earlier this week about going and I decided I should give it serious consideration. I was not booked for Sunday, so it was the perfect opportunity. The boys went down about 7:30pm after a fun day at Nana and Grandpa H's place, so with the wife's blessing I called up Mike and let him know I was in. We got there at about 8:30pm and sat down at a table. I ordered a cheeseburger and a water and listened to others as they went up and did their thing. It looked fun, hell it looked awesome, but I wasn't sure I was ready to do what they were doing. It had been fifteen years since the last time I played in front of people, and at that time there were four other guys playing along with me. This time I would be on my own. As the last of the musicians ran through their sets I asked myself what the heck am I waiting for? Nobody there knew who I was, so if I stunk it up what difference did it make? I went and talked to the lady in charge and asked permission to use the guitar on stage. She put my name down and I waited my turn. I quickly ran to the bathroom to make sure I took care of that before getting up on the stage (we don't want any accidents in public). Finally, I was called.
After the nice reception for my Poison medley I was faced with the decision to go ahead and play the song I wrote in memory of my brother (entitled Brother), or go to another old reliable. I had never really played the song in front of people, or all the way through for that matter (the joys of electronic recording allowed my to lay down the verse track and the chorus tracks separately and splice it all together afterward). I made the decision to go for it. It was a rough go at first, but I started getting in a groove and made it all the way through to the end. There were hiccups along the way, but nobody held it against me. I had done what I wanted to do and I felt pretty good about it. I slowly walked back to my seat to finish the night listening to the band play a few songs. It was about 9:30 and my wife texted to let me know she was going to bed. I told her I played with as much excitement as a text message can convey, and smiled when she responded back with a text that summed it up... "Awesome." And it was.
I hope to go back more often to play, and I hope to drag Mike up there with me too. It was a huge milestone for me and let me know that I could do this if I wanted to. I am already trying to decide which songs to play the next time I show up. I think I have a good idea of the three songs I would like to do, so in an undetermined but hopefully short amount of time I will be back on that stage playing and singing to strangers and fueling my inner rock star.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
You Know You've Made It When...
Watch the video for Plain White T's - Hey There Delilah
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Coming to Terms and Getting It Out
I mentioned in my last blog that I don't usually write songs based in fact, but there are times when I let my experiences come out in song. I am trying more and more to express myself in that way, but I find that most of the time I just start writing the lyrics that come to my head at the time instead of trying to write about something I have experienced. Anyway, when my grandfather died in 1995 I wrote a song about it. It was really the first time I wrote a song about something that happened in my life. Two years later I lost my brother in a car accident. I had spent nearly every day of his life sharing the same room, and suddenly that changed. It took a long time to really come to terms with his death and I kept it bottled up inside for a long time.
As the years passed, I was able to be more open about it; thanks mostly to my wife spending many nights helping me talk through it and open up about it. As I started this journey to rediscover my music and my creativity, I realized it was time to put my feelings down in some way. I was married now and had two kids and I always wonder what it would be like if they had Mark in their lives. It hurts to know that he will never be able to meet them, play with them and watch them grow.
So in November of 2009 I began the journey of putting together a song. At the start I didn't set out to make this song about my brother, but as I put the music together and laid it down on the 8-track the feeling and mood was there. I unfortunately then got struck with a month long battle with colds, flu and the like and had to put the project on hold. Thankfully, I had already recorded all the music and just needed to sit down and work out the lyrics.
As January came and my health returned, I took a couple of days off of work and sat downstairs in my office/studio to complete my latest project. I let the music ring in my ears two times and then put pen to paper and began writing. I knew before putting one lyric down that the song would be called Brother and I went about writing the chorus first. After that was done, I sat back and let the memories flood in.
The first verse refers to an old wooden rocking chair that we had at the house growing up and as I sat in my leather computer chair I drifted back to that rocking chair and our childhood. At the old house on first street, we used to chase butterflies with nets made of pantyhose and hangers. We would catch the butterflies and keep them in the mason jars as pets. We did the same thing with caterpillars and also would catch garter snakes and frogs. It was your typical kid stuff. I remember that Mark had one snake that we all swore had blue eyes. It was a mean snake too as it would his and lunge at us from the cooler we kept it in. These are the memories that are focused on in verse one, and they are great memories.
Verse two focuses on the here and now. Thirteen years have passed since Mark left this world and I still can't wrap my head around that fact. It really only seems like yesterday that I got the phone call that he had died. A lot has happened in those thirteen years, so verse two focused on that element. My two boys are the light of my life, and I just wish they would have been able to meet their uncle. He would have loved playing with them and they would have adored him much like they adore their Aunt Jamie.
My mom always tells me how at unexpected times something will happen that tells her Mark is watching and communicating. She will be thinking of him and his name will show up on the radio screen. Things like that. so the final line "I know that your watching them, keeping them safe from harm" is a reference to that.
The song is a very emotional song, but a song I am very proud to have written and placed on record. I think it shows that I can write about my experiences more often and it will work out fine. So here is the song Brother, I hope you enjoy listening to it.
Song: Brother
Words and Music: Brian Bartholow
Album: Reflections On Life
Year: 2010
As the years passed, I was able to be more open about it; thanks mostly to my wife spending many nights helping me talk through it and open up about it. As I started this journey to rediscover my music and my creativity, I realized it was time to put my feelings down in some way. I was married now and had two kids and I always wonder what it would be like if they had Mark in their lives. It hurts to know that he will never be able to meet them, play with them and watch them grow.
So in November of 2009 I began the journey of putting together a song. At the start I didn't set out to make this song about my brother, but as I put the music together and laid it down on the 8-track the feeling and mood was there. I unfortunately then got struck with a month long battle with colds, flu and the like and had to put the project on hold. Thankfully, I had already recorded all the music and just needed to sit down and work out the lyrics.
As January came and my health returned, I took a couple of days off of work and sat downstairs in my office/studio to complete my latest project. I let the music ring in my ears two times and then put pen to paper and began writing. I knew before putting one lyric down that the song would be called Brother and I went about writing the chorus first. After that was done, I sat back and let the memories flood in.
The first verse refers to an old wooden rocking chair that we had at the house growing up and as I sat in my leather computer chair I drifted back to that rocking chair and our childhood. At the old house on first street, we used to chase butterflies with nets made of pantyhose and hangers. We would catch the butterflies and keep them in the mason jars as pets. We did the same thing with caterpillars and also would catch garter snakes and frogs. It was your typical kid stuff. I remember that Mark had one snake that we all swore had blue eyes. It was a mean snake too as it would his and lunge at us from the cooler we kept it in. These are the memories that are focused on in verse one, and they are great memories.
Verse two focuses on the here and now. Thirteen years have passed since Mark left this world and I still can't wrap my head around that fact. It really only seems like yesterday that I got the phone call that he had died. A lot has happened in those thirteen years, so verse two focused on that element. My two boys are the light of my life, and I just wish they would have been able to meet their uncle. He would have loved playing with them and they would have adored him much like they adore their Aunt Jamie.
My mom always tells me how at unexpected times something will happen that tells her Mark is watching and communicating. She will be thinking of him and his name will show up on the radio screen. Things like that. so the final line "I know that your watching them, keeping them safe from harm" is a reference to that.
The song is a very emotional song, but a song I am very proud to have written and placed on record. I think it shows that I can write about my experiences more often and it will work out fine. So here is the song Brother, I hope you enjoy listening to it.
Song: Brother
Words and Music: Brian Bartholow
Album: Reflections On Life
Year: 2010
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