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Coffee Shop Country: A Work in Progress

Last year when I was debating on  which format to do for  "Coffee Shop Country", I was sort of in a quandary  in many ways. I was in a hurry to get it done because I had it all played out in my head, but the production wasn't going as smoothly  as I had hoped.  Some of the songs the band and myself had only just begun to play. We had to do several takes in the studio because we had not really even played the songs before in a live atmosphere. I also wanted to add fiddle and pedal steel to the project. This translated into more and more money. Still, I was holding out on my vision of a prefect Vinyl/CD format release- with creative art work and liner notes and photos!  I was thinking that this might be a break through for me, not really counting on it being a hassle . However, because of financial issues and going back and forth to fix things in the studio, the idea of cutting another Full Album release  seemed highly unrealistic. I talked to the studio engineer and weighed the pros and cons. At one point, I even considered 8 track and cassette tapes- only to discover they cost just as much ,if not more to produce than a record or a compact disc!

Because making records in any physical format costs a great deal of money- mainly in terms of mastering and production release (including artwork, etc), I decided who is going to buy this thing? I mean I am hardly a house hold name, and as bad as record sales are now, the only artist making a living these days is Taylor Swift. And I'm not quite as pretty! So I decided the best solution is a digital download in EP form. Its cheap, easy, and effective- just neither as glamorous nor as exciting.   So with that figured out, it sure did ease my burden a bit. . It was only a few years ago that I released my first complete LP. Why push another one so soon? Its not as if anyone is going to buy it.  I'm not a practical person, but I am a logical person.  If I had any sort of decent following where I knew people would buy the record without question, it would make sense.  But I'm just an obscure Country singer from Richmond.

Now behind it all- the album was inspired by music critic Ned Hepburn who described my sound as "Coffee Shop Country" in his highly anticipated blog "Death And Taxes". From there, came the title track, and the ideas seemed to flow like liquid from a stream.  But it wasn't intended to be a theme album. I was going to feature my casual set list- what I play in the coffee shops. What folks request most often. Not included would be the "hits"- "sweet tea", "hipsters ruin everything", "they called me porker", etc. But it would have some coffee shop songs and then just plain Country music after that. I didn't count on being this poor.. So anyways, it will happen one of these days, just not as soon. But digital downloads will have to suffice for now. Any sort of official release for "Coffee Shop Country"- will probably not be out til late 2015.If I were  a Punk Rock band or something, I bet anyone would buy it.
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