Category: my music & performances

After five years of production, I launched MANTRAS on New Year’s Eve, Dec. 31, 2018 because it is an album of resolutions. You can stream it below or at Spotify, YouTube, iTunes, and purchase at CDBaby or Bandcamp. For hand-decorated CDs and t-shirts, buy em right here, directly from me.

MANTRAS uses reggae and ska-infused tunes to chant my intentions, like…

• No more shitty gigs
• Get Outside
• No more waiting to be discovered
  No more waiting to get signed
• I use my system to capture information
  I use my system to structure inspiration
• Show up for practice
• Everything’s connected, everything’s changing
  Pay attention, this is what it’s like right now
• Keep your word and do your best
  Don’t take it personally or make assumptions
• I’m not gonna to try to change anyone but myself

My dreams of having a horn section came true working with Mark Gonzalez, the trombonist and arranger for Grupo Fantasma, Brownout and others.

Robert helped me turn my sketch of my dreaming head with repeating thought bubbles into a great graphic that can be filled with the mantra of your choice. Maile, Anais and I decorated the first 50 CDs by hand with watercolors.

I made tees and stickers for patrons and fans, and this site now features a shop where you can purchase all the j stuff.

For the third time, I am grateful to have recorded my album with Thomas “Tbone” van der Brook at Tonehaus. In the video above are Gray Parsons on drums and Doug Snyder on bass (getting sounds at the original recording session in 2013) who supported me every step of the way personally and musically. And I would likely not have finished if not for months of great help from Danny P. finalizing and mixing. Thank you all, my brothers in music.

Big thanks to Mark “Speedy” Gonzales for arrangements and trombone parts, and to Dan Bechdolt (sax) and Kevin Flatt (trumpet), especially for their trippy solos on I’m Not Gonna Try. Thanks to Derek Morris for playing keys on few tunes, especially for such perfect accompaniment on Bright Eyes Shine. Thank you, Karla and Maile and Anais for singing backup on several tracks. Thanks to Brad Bell for mastering. And thank YOU for checking it all out, I hope you enjoy the tunes!

Gray and J will be performing their new albums while Rob spins gourmet pizza out of his wood-fired cob oven. Minor Mishap will perform throughout the evening with a dramatic conclusion at midnight.

FEATURING Minor Mishap Marching Band!

Space and food are limited. RSVP required. 100 tickets total. Get yours NOW!

This will be an old-school backyard party. Original, live music, great musicians, handmade pizza, firepit, beer, and party spirits at the Pennsylvania Ave. compound.

Open your mind, leave your ego behind. Dress like a star and BYOB. Wear a warm jacket. Kids welcome. Prophets and psychics provided.

Gray’s “Eternal Return” and J’s “MANTRAS” are ready for this weary world bringing transcendence and transformation. Join us in celebrating their earthly arrival upon the threshold of the New Year.

Listen to singles from their albums:

• Gray’s Thought Like Birds.mp3
• J’s No More Shitty Gigs.mp3

Connect with the collective and feel the love as these brothers bring the diamonds they have mined to a dazzling celebration of years of creation.

Have you voted yet? I’m lucky enough to have an early voting station in the lobby of my office building, so I already got to cast my ballot in what feels like the most consequential election of my lifetime. Precarious times.

For me, this is not just about hoping to snatch democracy from the jaws of tyranny but the future of the planet from the claws of those that deny climate change.

When my buddy Ron recently put out the call to make some art to get out the vote, I said “I’m in!” So he sent me some lyrics, aimed at getting younger folks out, to make into a song.

I made a few little adjustments – worked some of Pete Seeger’s participation in – and cranked out this one-minute punk rock Vote song. Please share.

Vote!

You will listen to bad music
You will wear dumb clothes
You will sport extreme haircuts
You will awkwardly make out
Who cares. It doesn’t matter. You’re young.
One day you’ll look back
At all those selfies
And laugh your ass off

But not voting is different

It really matters
It’s never mattered more
Only way to save the nation
is participation
Your chance to stand up
and save the planet

Get off your ass and vote
Get off your ass and vote
Get off your ass and vote
Vote Vote Vooooooooote!!!

by Jeff and Jane and J

On one of our walks around campus a few years ago my friend Dan shared some Buddhist phrases that he uses as mantras. First: “Everything changes. Everything’s connected. Pay attention.” And second: “Right now, it’s like this.”

Those stuck with me and I made some slight adjustments to make them more singable, ending up with:

Everything’s connected
Everything’s changing
So pay attention
This is what it’s like right now

After a little searching, I discovered that the first three lines can be attributed to poet Jane Hirshfield, who wrote, “Zen pretty much comes down to three things — everything changes; everything is connected; pay attention.”

The last line seems to come from a Buddhist monk named Ajahn Sumedho, who advises us “to see things the way that they actually are rather than the way that we want or don’t want them to be (“Right now, it’s like this…”).”

I like the way singing these lines brings me back to the present, focussing me with a sense of curiosity and wonder on how much is happening at this moment. I hope I’ve made the song catchy enough to stick in your head and bend your attention for a second to the interconnectedness of things.

The video of tall grass with cattails in the wind comes from a lovely city park we stumbled upon one spring day in Boston. I hope you can get lost in the beauty of the wind through the grass and trees.