-btw second time writing this, had no internet and deleted the first one…

We arrived Tuesday at LAX and I immediately ran into my Aunt and Uncle on their way to France for three weeks, ironically they had just got off the same flight as us. But as you’ll find out irony is starting to lose its effect, its got me thinking I have some ability to be at the right place at the right time.

My good friend Kory picked us up thirty minutes later. He’s originally from New Mexico but moved to California for surfing and marketing business with some modeling (I say surfing because down here it’s a trade in itself.). I know him through a mutual friend of ours, who ill talk about in a minute, and every since we met about 3 years ago, have always had a great time together.

We drove with him from the airport down to Newport stopping by a Costco to pick up some food for the week as well as handfuls of free samples. Driving down here would scare the Hell out of half of the drivers in Washington. Up there everyone drives in suspense that something is going to go wrong, but down here every one just does what ever they want so they made a few more lanes and decided to let everyone haul A** down the freeway. But K.’s got a V8 Chevy Tahoe, and I know you Greener’s will complain, but id rather be safe amidst the chaos than to lower my emissions.

And by the way, we’re carpooling. We got to the secret surf shack whose location will remain anonymous, laid out our stuff, breathed out, arrival: Check.

We surfed twice in twenty four hours, listened to a band play at a restaurant, Packed our recording gear and went back up to in to LA to stay with my childhood best friend where we have been for the past four days. He is a producer that started writing and recording his own music when he was thirteen. He has been on X-Factor and his bedroom-produced-version of their audition song Sunset Blvd sold over 100,000 copies on iTunes.

Him and his brother Wes and their roommate Tyler share a house that sits in West Hills with an amazing balcony to watch the sunset (I’m gonna put a picture right here of it). It is a always full of pop artists, fan girls, and social media celebrities working on music or videos or sitting around smoking hookah. The first afternoon we met a singer/songwriter named Spencer who had an amazing voice. He would have a final take in his first three takes, and his vocal rolls unbelievable. We got to watch Keaton do his work and how the creative process is approached in the pop genre.

Although Pop isn’t my favorite genre there is always so much you can learn in the studio from every single person in there. What I’m learning about how these artists draw inspiration is from all the things we used to listen to when we were naïve and just liked a kind of music or didn’t. When people really let go and let the music resonate with them, out comes these old styles and things you can hear from previous inspirers.

I can really start to feel the momentum now, and I love how much surfing has taught me about music and the process to building success.  So much is based just on whether or not you can continue to paddle out, but if you do every time you’ll see progress.  Just like in surfing you get thrown around in the waves to become comfortable enough with where you’re at, and with the music business it’s going to be the same way. But if I can continue to take the right steps, the way I manage those moments of chaos will make all the difference.

We have been reading All You Need to Know About the Music Business by Donald S. Passman and it’s ironic (again) that everyone we were meeting at Keaton’s place had been told by those in the industry to read that book. Its been very influential in helping me to see where I want to go with the brand that I am and the way I want to handle my business, especially in the “How to Build a Team” chapter. There are strong talented people that I choose to surround myself with, people with creative souls and lots to teach me. It’s important to keep these people around and be apart of what they do and have them be apart of what I do. This is really much bigger than I could have imagined, but all the pieces have continued to come together and I thank the people who got me here.

We are back Kory’s place enjoying a sunny April twentieth enjoying our veggies and waiting for the wind to die down a bit to go surf. Expect some posts of music we have been working on as well as a possible video or two down the road. …things are in motion…