Trying Again

There’s a song I listen to where the dude says “I want something more than an apology to say when I look the world in the eye”. I’m tired of apologizing to you for going ghost and frankly, if I was actually sorry, I’d probably stop doing it. It’s a pattern though so maybe it’s just kind of baked into who I am. I wrote a song called Work When We Want, Surf When We Want back in 2020 and honestly maybe that’s how it is.

Realistically, this is just my nature. I’ve been the captain of my shit show since the day I dropped out of high school. I’ve been able to fund my life by working odd jobs and have never really conformed to a sense of normalcy. Even now, living the most normal I’ve ever lived, I support it by working as a bike taxi driver. And I own the bike taxi so even still, I work when I want and have no real boss.

This level of freedom has done me a lot of good in life but it admittedly comes with a few draw backs. The biggest of which is the fact that I never actually have to do anything I don’t want to. Sounds cool at first but in life, a lot of the good stuff isn’t easy and takes discipline. I’m not saying that I don’t have any but sometimes I just basically tune out and go do my own thing.

This is multiplied by the fact that I authentically hate social media to my core. You know how fucking bullshit it is for Mark Zuckerberg to be curating the way artists behave? Excuse the self importance here but I feel like art is so much more valuable to society than social media. We have arguably become worse as a species because of this bullshit invention and yet, it’s so interwoven with our lives that if you want to pursue a career in art nowadays you have to take social media seriously.

That’s just gross to me, man. You probably think I’m an idiot for even typing this and that’s completely fair but fuck it, that’s how I feel.

So yeah, sometimes I disappear. I want to stop doing it. Maybe this time I will.

I’ve discovered the pain of not sharing my art is greater than the pain caused by interacting with social media so maybe this time I’ll just play along.

Recalibrating

As the great Carl Johnson once said:

I’m sorry for going ghost on you. I shouldn’t have completely stepped away from posting music. The last two years were difficult, but not for the reasons you’d expect. I thought that leaving my van and moving into an apartment would make things easier but it didn’t. I also started back at my old job pedaling a bicycle taxi which really ate up a good chunk of my time and energy.

Also I’ll have to admit that in a lot of ways it felt like I failed. Looking back on it now I can see how false this is but in the moment though I took it pretty hard because for several years I was able to subsist completely from music. I had to live in a van so it’s almost like I got there on a technicality, but still, I was a full time artist and it showed in how much I was creating.

In five years I released four albums and toured the United States three times. I networked with heavy hitters, saw the country, created thirty videos with my friends, and really just believed to my core that I was on the right track. Progress was constant. When I moved back to Austin and got my old job back though it just felt like that scene in Toy Story where Buzz jumps for the window but breaks his arm instead. It felt like my dreams didn’t play out and that was really difficult to deal with, especially because of how relentlessly I’d pursued everything.

I’m grateful for my job though and I appreciate what it offers. Saving some money for the future feels non-negotiable at this point plus I was also able to get health insurance after like ten years of going without.

Long story short, I’m sorry I left. My spirit got crushed when Vanlife ended and my creative flame recessed into an ember. Embers are still fires though and with a little kindling, it is beginning to grow again. On January 1st of this year, I put out a new song called Roach-like Resilience. It’s available on all streaming services as well as YouTube.

The next one “Magical Solution” has already been submitted and should be up February 9th. Thank you for rocking with me and being patient. I hope everybody is doing well! I’m feeling pretty good about where I’m at in life and really think I can keep the momentum going from now on.

Thanks for everything y’all

- Ferrell