My new insomnia.

Hello friends.

I have a new thing going on in my life.  I have stopped sleeping.  Well, I have stopped maintaining a normal pattern of sleep.  I do sleep, certainly, just not at the right hours.  Also, my sleep intervals have gotten smaller.  I'll sleep for 4 hours and wake, sometimes for the entire day.  It doesn't bother me too much, however it catches up and I pass out.

Enough about my sleep.  Happy Holidays!  I have coincidentally posted on Christmas day!  This seriously wasn't planned, I just woke up and thought, what the hell, I'll write a blog.  Merry Christmas!  Hours from now, many hours, the wife will wake and we'll open some presents under the tree.  Then we'll enjoy a nice lazy, rainy, Portland day together.  I'm really looking forward to it actually.  Doing nothing sounds amazing!  Not working sounds amazing!  Clocking out and playing cards, sounds amazing!  I hope everybody out there can enjoy some quality time with family and friends or both if your lucky enough for that today.  All those loved ones, that's what the holidays are about.

Not too soon after the holidays, I'll be performing a show.

Saturday. Dec. 29th. 9pm @ Backspace in Portland OR

http://www.facebook.com/events/202178829919589

I have taken a little time off performing, and only gotten back into the swing of it recently.  I played a show in November, and another in mid December, both shorter sets and starter shows.  Now on the 29th, I'll be bringing my swagger back.  I am looking forward to it.  I feel as though I found some element in performing in the past two shows that I never had before.  It's odd.  After performing so much in so many years, it's hard to think that something feels different about it, but something does.  Something positive and good.  Some sort of uninhibited drive.  So, here we go.  I'm ready.

I'm still making a tape.  I know I was talking about it in my previous blog, and it's still a plan in the works.  I think it'll just be a small limited run.  I'll keep you posted on that.

Enjoy your time and day my friends.

Cheers & Happy Holidays,

Mark

bringing blog back.

So, it's been about a year since I posted on this blog.  I created it twice as long ago with the intensions of writing weekly, even daily.  That seemed to fall away.  Of course I had a completely different perception on what this blog was and could be.  I will be taking a different approach.  I will still share some random wordiness, but I'll also just be keeping you up to date on music by : macminn.

I have a few new projects.  One of those is a band.  It's still my songs, but told through a different format, with a different voice.  I have four folks that are performing with me under the title, Bare the Butcher.

Online we only have a small facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/BaretheButcher

It has been a really good time playing with some musicians again.  I seem to have forgotten that brotherhood that can happen.  That connection is certainly what I have missed most about not having a band all these years.  I am really looking forward to seeing how far this project can go!  I just plan on letting it go and seeing what happens.  We have a show coming up in January in Portland, send us your positive thoughts!  If your in the area, please join us.

Sunday. Jan. 20th. Alberta Rose Theatre.
https://tickets.aftonshows.com/BaretheButcher

I have also crawled out from my hole and taken on some more solo shows.  I played for the first time in a while last month.  It was strange to take the stage and realize that I hadn't been on one for three to four months!  I was a little nervous because of the time lapse.  My fingers got a little shaky and stiff.  They didn't want to work with me for a few moments, but it all came together.  After about four songs, everything felt normal, as it always does.  Funny thing was, I was only suppose to perform four to five songs.  I ended up playing an entire set worth of material and was on stage for at least an hour!  It felt good.  So, now I'm back.  I have another show coming up.

Saturday. Dec. 29th. 9pm @ Backspace in Portland OR
http://www.facebook.com/events/202178829919589

This will be the first of many to come.  I finally found a friend to help with some booking!  So, I expect to get back up on that horse, and hopefully ride it into the sunset, or down the highway, or across state-lines.  First things first.

My other fun little music project on the brain, is making a cassette tape!  I haven't made one of those since I was in high school.  Back then I had an acoustic group called the Kool Kats.  I hustled a two song tape around school, sold 100 or so.  Quite a successful venture for me at that age.  In fact it was my first taste of musical success.  I thought it was all gonna be easy after that!  Silly children.
So, I want to make another tape.  This time I am considering either reissuing and older recording….

 "Mr. Brown's Darkside"
 https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/mr.-browns-darkside/id281871528

Or, recording some new material, and making a tape out of that.  I do have some new songs that I am proud of, and would love to share.  It will likely take sometime to record them, and get them ready to put out, so maybe the Mr. Brown's Darkside tape will come first.

Well, here I am.  I'm alive.  I'm well.  I'm bringing blog back (my blog that is, don't think blogging went away or anything).

Cheers,
M

Cigar smoke, scotch sipping, and a bad attitude.

Notebook dreams, reality checks.
The rules are different, the bar is low.
You are not as controversial as you'd like to be.
You are not a star.
You are nobody, and nobody cares.
You are matter in a body, as this world is matter in the cosmos.

You are plastic, disposable.
You are a sticker on my trash can.
I can write your history, I already lived your life.
I already fought for your goals, I already fucked your groupies.
They told me I was special.
I believed them, like fools gold.

We are lost, insignificant, and self important.
Naked and loose, carefree cannonball.
As artistic as jazz from days gone by.
In a moment that is lost in a time that is forgotten.
Part of the movement that won't be heard.
A piece of language never translated, never respected, invisible.

Once. A long, long time ago...

when was that?  A long, long time ago.  Another life.  Another era.  Years have become decades, days fade off over the horizon.  Do you remember that?  That long, long time ago?  We were much different weren't we?  Or were we?  Are we the same now?  We can't be.  There is no way.  There is no way to be the same, to much has happened, to many moments have passed.  But, are we the same?  When it comes right down to it, when we get to the core, when we get to the root, when we get so far that I see you, and you see me, are we the same then?  When we are staring blankly at each other and realize that although years have passed, it seems like merely days, merely moments, merely minutes since our last conversation.  Are we the same then?  No.  Maybe.
Are we so equally different that we are the same?  Has life aged us in a similar fashion?
Are we mutually forgotten memories in each others minds?  Do we suddenly flash at one and other, are we glimpses to each other of times gone by.  Memories of how we use to think about things, fantasies we use to have.  Aren't those silly now?  Are they?  Was what was once good, still good?  Can some things still make sense?  Can any of this ever make sense?
Does any of this make sense, can you honestly say that it does with an answer that doesn't include a God?  I'm not interested in that version.  I am not looking for option "D"  all of the above.  In fact, I'm not looking for an answer, because there is no answer.  Is that ok with you?  Can it be?  There is no answer.  That's fine, right?  It's casual.  It's cool.  Just coast.  Just float. Just let it happen.
Just let what happen?  Things are not meant to just happen.  Things do just happen.  You just happened, now what are you going to do with that?  Blind faith, hard work, the casual float?  Not my problem.  Well it is, because you affect me.  In some way, in some fashion what you do affects/effects me.  I'm not even sure if it's the "a" or "e" version, could be both.  Could be both.  M.J. was right, "you are not alone, I am here with you."  I am.
I'm not, but I am.  I'm not there with you, physically.  Perhaps I never will be.  But that doesn't mean I'm not there.


Once upon a time we sat on a porch and talked all day.  Once upon a time we saw a random movie on my last night in town.  Once upon a time we took a road trip.  Once upon a time we were all riding in the van together.  Once upon a time we had pancakes with applesauce for breakfast.  Once upon a time I watched television at your house while my parents were at work.  Once upon a time you had me look at my first dirty magazine.  Once upon a time we kissed.  Once upon a time we screamed at each other and ran chasing one another street to street.  Once we played a game, and I won, and you were mad, but not really.  Once we played guitars in the garage until it was time to go home.  Once we snuck beer, and drank it, and thought we were cool.  Once upon a time we met.  Once upon a time we spent an awful lot of time together.  We were close.  Now we are memories.  Or living ideas.
Once.
Sometimes that can be enough to remember forever.

transitional.

It's once again been too long since I last posted.  This is something I hope to remedy in the future, but I usually find some other way to occupy my time other than writing this blog.  It's also been a busy month.
Transitions are a brewing, and these transitions are almost over.  They have almost become the new norm.  I knew the process would take a little while, but have been so absorbed by that path, that I hadn't seen the finish line, until now.
My lady and I have moved across the country.  That is not news to any of my friends, through the wonders of the internet you are all perfectly aware that I now live in Portland OR.  My Nashville friends have seen that movement, and while I was there just last week, it was as if I had just been on an extended vacation.  However the truth is I was not, I live in Portland.  My Los Angeles friends have seen me move twice, my Austin friends have seen me move 3 times, unless you count the 2 and a half months I lived there before Nashville, then they have seen me move 4 times.  Still, none of us are strangers, although we are, the world wide web keeps us in contact and makes us feel as if we are still united.  In some ways we are, in the day to day we're not.  It's a strange life.
Before I left Nashville I had perfect strangers ask me why I would move.  I had one perfect stranger tell me that I had moved too much in my life.  He advised me to stop and settle in somewhere, find a community to become a part of, partake in that life.  He honestly had a slew of advice, especially for a man I had never met before.  I tried to take his advice into account, although initially I was annoyed.  I mean, this was the first conversation I had ever had with him, who was he to tell me how to live my life, or advise me towards the proper path?  Still, I couldn't completely ignore his logic.  Although it wasn't truly for me at that moment, he did have a point.  There is a peacefulness in being part of a bigger picture, there is a void to fill when you are constantly changing your surroundings and starting over.  Although I have grown from all of my experiences, I have maintained a certain state of being.  Always looking ahead, not focusing on the present.  Always thinking that if I went somewhere else, things could be different, life could be new and more rewarding.  In some instances that's true, in some instances it's ignorant.  I suppose it's the difference between searching and running.  Which one are you doing?  For myself, I think it was a combination, until now.  Every destination I moved to was for a goal, a purpose, a bigger picture.  It was a means to achieve an objective.  I wanted success.  I did what I thought was right to find that.  This time was different, this time I moved for myself and not for a goal.  This time I think I have found the right path for me, this time I created a plain that I could expound on.
So, here I am.  My new life.  It is different than I thought it would be, but it always is, and at least this time I expected that.  In my new manner I am practical.  In my new manner I am in the present.  In my new manner I know that the things that I want can come to me in due time, but if I want them the way that I do it is best to be true to myself and not worry about what's popular or what others say I should do.  Lot's of folks throw that novelty advice around, "follow your heart," blah, blah, blah....but I don't know that many of us truly understand what that means.  Or at least, I didn't exactly know what that meant.  I think these days I have a grasp.
So, lead me on my little angel, my little buddha, my little monkey, lead me on.

somethings burning...

no really, something is burning inside.  I don't mean in a funny way or that I have an aching desire, I mean my esophagus is burning.  The first swig of coffee I took this morning charred my insides and now everything is painful.  I think I am suppose to drink milk or something like that, but all there is, is almond milk, and I don't think that has the same effect.

All of this is beside the big picture point here.  That is unless I am showing the first signs of a great illness, in which case, it is entirely the point.  The point is, I'm thinking, that I moved across the country again!  The move to Nashville was suppose to be it, that was suppose to be my final move.  I'm not sure why in my mind, that was the final move, but I remember that it was suppose to be.  It wasn't.  I live in Portland now.  I brought a girl with me too!  Seriously.  Growing up is odd.

I still think of myself as a child.  I act the same as I always have.  It's just when I was young I acted too responsible and now, maybe not responsible enough.  It's like the whole idea of responsibility lapsed over my head somewhere mid/late twenties and now I'm behind the ball instead of in front of it.  I can't really worry too much about that one, I have far too many practical things on my mind for the near future.  Working would be a good one.  I do like, not working.  The folks that don't have to work too much and get to travel the most, oh, the lucky ones.

There are so many things to see, so many things to do.  I fear that I'll whined up working for someone else's dream for the rest of my life and not see the things that are out there.  And speaking of all the beautiful things out there to see, sometimes I don't see the things inside me, like my goals, my drive, my vision or my burning esophagus.  Sometimes I forget their there until they reach out from within and squeeze.  It's those moments when I know, I'm either not paying attention to the moment, or I'm being and asshole for no real reason.

hey.  best we can right.  best we can.

Come again?

Sometimes the earth just seems to move slowly.  You can sense it, and you stop to grasp it, but you cannot, and then it seems to move again, still slowly, but just out of reach.  It's not that you even know what you're reaching for, but you feel the need, the desire.  You're not even sure why you are pausing or what has made you stay still to absorb the moment.  Time just stops, and then slowly starts again, but everything has changed.  You are no longer listening to music in the car, you are no longer driving it.  You are pulled over, you have turned the stereo off, even though the lyrics of the tune you were listening to were speaking to you for the first time, even though you have heard that song more than a few times, suddenly that time it was speaking to you, suddenly that time it made sense and struck a chord within your body, but it still became less important than the feel of the earth, and the wag of the trees, the wind blowing, softly.  You're not even sure what is going on, what you are feeling.  You are not sad, you are not angry.  You are not hungry.  You are not drunk, you are not stoned.  You are stone cold sober, and moved.
It's the silent mystical pause that you wish could last a thousand lifetimes.  The security of the moment is the security you try to maintain daily and yet never achieve.
As soon as you realize it exists, and it exists all around you, it's gone.  Like a vanishing ghost that merely brushed you by.  Like a blanket of hope, understanding, acceptance and love that you could smell but not touch or see.
Is that God?  Is that Mother Earth?  Is it the presence of a lost friend, a lost love, lost family?  The further you dissect it the less special it becomes.  You just have to leave it.  Actualize it, and move forward.  It's gone.  It's over.  It will come again though.  Around and around, it will come again.