My fight with alcohol abuse

For a brief time in my life, I was an alcoholic.  It was not a proud time and it certainly wasn’t a fun party.  I would wake up and start drinking alcohol, sneak in either a beer or drinks during lunch, go home and pour another drink until it was time for bed.  I guess you could say I had turned into a functional alcoholic as I waited until the weekends to get completely blitzed.  Looking back on that time, it’s embarrassing and sad.  What pulled me out of it was (a) getting away from people who encouraged my drinking and (b) the 2020 pandemic.

When the lockdowns were happening in Houston, I was alone in my apartment with my bike, record collection and my day job (via online).  I had stockpiled liquor and beers and coffee for what we all believed was going to be a brief pause in day-to-day life.  

As the days moved on, I began to move away from drinking alcohol all the time and, instead, focused on reading for work and riding my bike more.  I got to a point where I didn’t touch any alcohol for two months and I was incredibly proud of myself because I was moving into a new chapter of being healthy and active while focusing on important life things such as my sons and my career.

Fast forward to a year later and I can now enjoy a beer or two without the need for getting hammered.  I’ve learned how to moderate my alcohol consumption to a point where I know to stop and just enjoy it.  I still don’t drink mixed drinks very much at all… mainly dark beers and, it’s usually just one.

Having said all that, I will say that I had help and I highly, highly, highly recommend doing the same if you find that you are also in that place in life.  My therapist gave me a lot of work to accomplish but also provided me with a safe space to express what I needed.  I sometimes look back on my alcohol years with regret, but I continue to cognizant of stopping myself and focusing on the road ahead as I still have so much to discover and learn!

TLDR: I like to chill with a beer every now and then.

Spurcycle - Original Bell (guaranteed for life?)

A bike bell may seem like a cute accessory for your bike - but it's super handy on crowded trails in urban areas - or even when you're just wanting to say hello to your fellow biker!

Like everything else, I did a bit of online reading and was down to either the Knog Oi Luxe Bike Bell or the Spurcycle.  The Knog looks so cool, but most reviewers liked the Spurcycle for it's loud (cuts through the mix) but pleasant tone, serviceable parts, and the lifetime guarantee.  That last part didn't factor to much for me until very recently.

I bought this bell in September 2020 and it remained a faithful and sturdy companion on my State bike until one night when I was out riding.  I was about to flick the hammer of the bell when I noticed the lever was... gone!  I have no idea when it happened or anything, it just randomly came off during the ride.

When I got home, I checked the Spurcycle site and saw the lifetime guarantee disclaimer.  So... I emailed them about the missing lever and asked about repair options.  The bell itself was still perfectly fine, I just needed the lever mechanism replaced.

Spurcycle was quick to respond - although a bit pedantic.  They offer a replacement kit for the lever but I was missing the spring as well.  So, they asked me to send it back for an inspection and repair.

When it arrived at their place, their contact person sent me a message about the condition of my bell.

"We received your Bell today. There is a decent amount of corrosion forming on the Dome, so I'm putting together a replacement Bell that has a protective clear coat over the black DLC." 

Cool, eh?  However - what's really interesting is that Spurcycle sent over my original bell with the repaired lever AND a new bell.  I wasn't expecting that!

So 1000% kudos to Spurcycle on their attention to their customers and for their outstanding bells.

Porch Culture (Tyler, TX) - Kamwangi Factory Peaberry Coffee

While I was in Tyler, Texas for a gig at The Green Room last November, I stopped by Porch Culture to try their coffee and just chill until my AirBnB was ready.  It was a beautiful, sunny November day with a bright sun and deep blue skies... perfect for quiet contemplation and coffee.

I have tried a few different roasts of Peaberry beans and while I like the coffee from it, it's not part of my regular selection of coffees. It's good, but the Peaberry coffees have lighter notes that are more in line with, say, an afternoon cup rather than a cup to kick-start your day.

This roast of the Peaberry bean from Porch Culture is very much in line with what I expected - and that's a great thing.  It's light and has sharp citrus notes.  The finish is mild, but still has floral notes.  This coffee is a great complement to an afternoon scone or muffin.  Some roasters (including Porch Culture) note spices in the roasted bean, but it's not obvious to me.

Here's a link to a roaster in Stockholm that talks about the roasting process at Kamwangi Factory.  And here's a highly technical post from a roaster in Northern California that shares information about the farm, the roast, and scientific details about the bean!

Overall, this is a great, light afternoon coffee.  It's good to have a bag available for occasions where a full, hearty roast would be too much.

Stockhausen and The Amplified Riot - a beginning

The Amplified Riot started off in January 2020 as a three-piece garage / krautrock band.  Just your basic guitar, drums, bass thing with an occasional synth thrown in for weirdness.  In those first few months, we had crafted seven songs and working on fine tuning those songs for gigs and a release of some sort later in the year.

Then the 2020 pandemic happened and things slowly down to a grinding halt.  However, that didn’t stop me from working on new ideas and recording demos at home.  As time passed and the future of civilization looked like it was unraveling each day, I kept working on music (and riding my bike a lot) with the anticipation of getting back with the band mates as soon as we could.

But the months dragged on.

Finally, when we could finally meet and start jamming again, it appeared that EVERYONE had the same idea.  And each of us got busy with other, more established bands.  But I still liked the songs we made together and wanted to test out the idea of playing them on my own.  Hip hop, rap, trill, electronic artists all use drum machines and backing tracks without remorse and it’s commonly accepted to do so in those genres… why not with rock?

I still liked the name too, but I wanted to extend it out to make it almost ridiculous for a one-person band to have a long band name.  Eventually, I decided on Stockhausen and The Amplified Riot - as a way to pay homage to the band's beginning as well as call out to one of the most influential modern composers.   

From there, I began to rearrange the music to accommodate just me and a drum machine and started testing out the music at small gigs around Houston.  The results were interesting and encouraging so I kept it going with building touring schedules and (eventually) booking studio time.  

Every once in a while, I consider adding a bass player to play gigs with me since I feel the live sound could certainly use some low end frequencies.  I suppose we shall see what happens, but for now – it’s just me on the guitar and my trusty drum machine.

TLDR: all about the start of the band.

January

Got a couple of gigs and rides lined up for January that I am eager to post about.

Saturday the 21st will be in Dallas at Three Links in the Deep Ellum district with Moon Phase (Houston), True To Form (Houston), and Wish Kit (Denton).   

Deep Ellum has changed a lot over the past four years from being a kind of dive bar district with a lot of savory and "interesting" characters to now being a very slick, urban setting with shops, bars, and restaurants that accommodate tourists.  While the district has lost a lot of its dirty charm, it still has a good amount to offer if you're looking in the right places.  I love stopping by Deep Vellum Bookstore, Murray Street Coffee Shop, Nylo Wool Vintage Clothes, and Merit Coffee.

And then, a week later, I'm in San Antonio on Saturday the 28th at Saige Cave - which is a punk house show.  I love house shows, but I worry about the PA capacity since I rely on the house PA for the drum machine.  I'm eager to perform with Gauze, Could Be Worse, Florish, and Gult (all from SATX).  I love that the gig poster references Johnny The Homicidal Maniac. 

The trail system around San Antonio is no joke as it's an incredible... almost zen-like trail system. They have an amazing system that circles the outside of the city as well as trails stemming out from the downtown area.  But also, there's a wide range of topography along the trails that feels like you're not in Texas at all.  I really can't recommend it enough.  Start at Eisenhower Park and go in either direction - it's so worth it!

Also, I make a point to stop by either Black Laboratory Brewing or Philoçoffee (both if I can!) when I'm in San Antonio.  Not only does Black Laboratory have fantastic beers on tap (and canned) - they also have limited batches of coffee beans available that are used in their brews.  Philoçoffee is a quiet and friendly little cafe that serves up great coffee plus a limited but well-crafted food menu.  It's not a place to go if you're in a hurry - but it's so dang worth it!

Oh right... I need to mention a couple of rides I have this month!

I signed up for the Texas MS 150 to be held at the end of April.  This will be a 150 miles ride over two days from Houston to College Station, TX.  I've signed up (once again) to be part of the Saint Arnold's Brewery Bike Team, which is an absolute honor.

My first time doing this ride was last year and it was a serious learning / growth experience.  I tested my body and mind to push further than I had gone before and I felt more accomplished than ever before.  AND... I did the ride on a single speed (the State bike) which many people claimed was an absurd and crazy proposition... but I DID IT!

So... I have a group ride coming up with the brewery team on Saturday (planning on 41 miles) and theeeeeen, I have an Alleycat Race for Sunday the 29th with the Coffee and Bikes group.  Much excite!

If you're keeping tabs - I'm in San Antonio on the 28th, playing a gig at a punk house show, and then participating in a bike race less than 12 hours later in Houston.  WTF is wrong with me?  I suppose it's all part of the thrill of testing my mind and body once again to a near-death experience with music and biking.  You gotta stay tuned to see if I survive.

TLDR: Gigs in Dallas and San Antonio with rides in Houston rides.  

Bicycles and Music

My recent passion for bicycling came about like many Americans – during the pandemic. Of course, I have been riding bicycles all my life and I vividly remember when I was seven and I rode my bike without training wheels for the first time.  It was terrifying but also liberating!

I got back into bike riding in 2018 when I was given a Trek Earl that was collecting rust and dust at someone’s house.  The Earl is a heavy beast – almost 30 pounds of steel. It’s a single speed and (at the time) was all I ever wanted: simple and fun and looked great. It had a 44/17 gear ratio and a split frame body (and a bottle opener!). I used my bike to casually ride around Houston and just have some personal time.

As I kept riding, I enjoyed it more and more and so, I starting tracking my miles. THEN I decided to buy a second bike to keep at my office because I worked in an area of Houston where great trails for walking and biking are easily accessible. Plus, my office is close to where my sons live and the three of us could go riding together after school/work or on weekends. 

So, I ordered a State Bike (a 4130 in “perplexing purple”) and didn't give it much thought beyond the State being a nice secondary bike.  

But once I had the bike assembled and gave it a test ride around the neighborhood, I was instantly in love! It is much lighter than the Trek (21 pounds v. 30 pounds), had slightly thinner tyres and was also a single speed. But the bike felt so… svelt.

I changed plans and brought the State to my apartment and took the Trek to my son’s place. Then all hell broke loose with the pandemic and I was stuck in my apartment with a perplexing purple bike, my record collection, and my cell phone for work. 

And it was around that point where biking changed from being a casual activity to one where I would track miles, challenge my body and mind, and dive deep into parts to make the bike “better”.  I'll talk more on the "better parts" aspect in upcoming posts. 

TLDR: I like riding my bike a lot.

Metropolis Coffee Company (Chicago) - Kenya Thiriku

This morning, I opened up the final bag of coffee I had picked up in Chicago back in OCTOBER.  Yes, I know it's January and this bag of whole bean goodness has been waiting since October 11th to finally see the light of day again, so here we are.

You may ask yourself, how long can a person store a sealed bag of coffee beans?  Let's ask!

While I was in Chicago, working on recordings for the next album and getting some gigs done as well, I picked up bags of coffee from several roasters and all of them have been outstanding!  Fortunately / unfortunately, I started this blog well after I had drank through all of them except for this final bag from the Metropolis Coffee Company.

Metropolis is not a coffee shop, per se.  It's a roaster that sells a wide range of coffee to large and small shops around the Chicago region (and beyond in select cities). Their storefront is small and they offer regular consumer bags of coffee (and complementary cups of coffee to try) for people wanting to grab a bag and go.

My AirBnB was about a block away from their office and on the way to the recording studio (Electrical Audio) - so I picked up a few interesting bags to try out.

I'm a fan of East African beans and medium roasting styles, so I naturally gravitated towards Kenya Thiriku.  The description says that it's "wildly aromatic, tangy, and complex like passionfruit, guava, late summer tomatoes, ginger, and lemongrass."  

Right off the top, I agree that this coffee is super fragrant and has a pleasant, ripe, fruity aromatic character.  It's so fragrant that my downstairs neighbor sent me text this morning commenting that my coffee smelled good.  That's a major endorsement!

As I'm sipping - I'm tasting sweet, dark fruit notes with a  clean, almost cleansing finish.  And yeah, I'm tasting the guava-like notes both in the front and within the finish.

In the front, it certainly has that ripe, fruity essence that's pleasant and not too sweet.  Medium roast is the way to go with this bean as a light roast would be TOO sweet and a darker roast might accidently squash some of those delicate notes found mid sip.

I didn't know anything about Thiriku bean production, so I looked around and found this fantastic site that explains the area and the process it goes through to get into your cup!

I can't help but think about the Fritz Lang film "Metropolis" (as well as the Motorhead song of the same name) when I look at this bag in the morning.  Imma dork, I know it! 

TLDR: This coffee is highly recommended.

Hit the trails!

I could not resist heading out this past weekend with the crazy warm weather going on.  It got up to 70 degrees (F) here, which is kind of bonkers when you think about it, but it certainly makes for a pleasant evening of bike riding.  

Since I didn't have any plans for New Year's Eve, I decided to head out at night on the White Oak Bayou Trail and made Senate Avenue Brewing my destination -- mainly because it's at the end of the trail on the far northwest side of the city.  Unfortunately, many parts of the trail's sections are torn up from construction, which turned parts of my casual ride into a full bore mud slosh.  

Thick mud had clumped over my brakes and into the fork and frame. I had to stop several times and use my knife to get the mud out.  When I started off again, I would eventually hit ANOTHER large area of mud and standing water.  Pedaling with your tyres all clogged up is not easy, but it was kind of fun battling the mud.

Oh yeah, about Senate Avenue Brewing: highly recommend their brews.  I tried their holiday ale called Die Hard Is A Christmas Movie (of which I agree) and it was quite delicious!  Dark and roasty with subtle hints of orange peel and... cardamon?  Wonderfully brewed and not too sweet. 

Got back to my place around 11pm and just chilled for the New Year while fireworks and guns fired into the night at midnight.

Was a bit sore on January 1 from the mud struggles, but it was also criminally beautiful outside... so  I took my bike to a local car wash and sprayed off most the mud that was still caked on and then casually rode another 20 miles along Buffalo Bayou Bike Trail. 

Oh yeah... I log all of my hikes and rides on Strava, if you're into that sort of thing. 

TLDR: It was warm and I went on a bike ride.

Coffee Coffee Coffee

I did not get into drinking coffee until well into my late 20s when I was living in San Francisco.  Even then, it was the sugary Starbucks stuff.  

No, my love of coffee arrived well into my 30s (I'm now 52) and it was truly a glorious revelation of what was missing from my palette.  And while I’m not the ultra-purist of coffee drinkers – I do appreciate a well-crafted roasted bean.

When I'm on tour or traveling for work, I usually buy a bag of beans from a local roaster as a souvenir – but also, I like supporting local businesses and.... coffee!  

Problems begin to mount when I’m gone for 3 to 5 days and I end up buying at least a bag a day… which means I’m stockpiling bags of coffee that will last for a few weeks.  The problem compounds when I find myself traveling frequently. 

For example:  At one point, I had seven bags of coffee from five different cities all sitting in my cupboard… waiting patiently as I would slowly grind through them during my week.  Because of the amount of time I'm holding these beans, I always request whole bean and keep the bags stored in the cupboard.

I don’t have a favorite roaster as I’ve been to quite a few and nearly all of them have something amazing to try – but I do have my favorite beans.  I prefer medium roasts and I usually gravitate towards Eastern Africa and South American beans.  Indonesian is also up there too.  Central American coffee is good too (especially Guatemala), but I tend to be very picky about the beans from there – just because I enjoy the other regions more.

TLDR: I like coffee.