Tag: Michigan

Personal Empowerment – Aspen Jacobsen Confronts Negative Emotions on ‘Shouldn’t Give a Damn’

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Aspen Jacobsen practices self-care on “Shouldn’t Give a Damn.” Photo – Scottie Magro

Filled with confidence and purpose, Aspen Jacobsen boldly shares a sense of personal empowerment.

The Americana-folk singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist confronts internal guilt and fear from toxic relationships on her latest defiant single, “Shouldn’t Give a Damn.”

“I struggle with people-pleasing, and at times, have given a tremendous amount of energy to others, leaving nothing for myself and getting nothing in return,” said Jacobsen, 17, a senior at Interlochen Arts Academy.

“What inspired me to tackle toxic relationships and the effects it has on someone was through my own personal experience. I felt powerless and used, yet guilty and afraid of putting an end to an unhealthy relationship to prioritize myself.”

Jacobsen strongly channels that “Shouldn’t Give a Damn” energy as steadfast acoustic guitar, pulsating drums, fearless electric guitar and earnest fiddle create a protective barrier of fortitude.

She sings, “3 a.m. caffeine I don’t want to fall asleep/‘Cause your misted over eyes are haunting my dreams/Yes it helped me but hurt my guilty mind/Now you’re cleaning up my ashes and what’s left of your pride.”

“The first two lines … I wrote after a sleepless weekend. I had constant nightmares that left me scared to fall asleep because of feeling guilty. It was through writing this song that I had let go of the guilt and reminded myself that it’s OK to be ‘selfish’ sometimes and take care of yourself before others,” Jacobsen said.

“That is healthy, that is self-love. This song is me declaring to myself and the listener that you don’t have an obligation to give a damn for someone with whom you have a toxic relationship.”

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Snapshot in Time – Pia Revisits Past Friendships on ‘Old Days’

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Pia gets nostalgic on her new single, “Old Days.” Photo – AC Backus Photo

Pia thoughtfully shares a personal snapshot in time.

The Detroit indie rock singer-songwriter reminisces about a past friendship and recalls vivid moments of connection on her nostalgic new single, “Old Days.”

“It’s the singular event of a friendship not really ending, but dissipating and changing the way that it used to look. It’s a shorter realization of like, ‘Oh wow, this person that I used to either talk to every day or had this certain relationship with, it’s now different,’” she said.

Throughout “Old Days,” Pia wonders what her friend drinks for breakfast and whether they remember summertime highway jaunts or stolen firewood adventures.

Alongside those inquiries, an emotive swell of wistful electric guitar, quavering bass, thumping drums, shiny cymbals and jingly tambourine seamlessly transport Pia to the past.

She sings, “It makes me sad something changed in your eyes/Ask how you’re doing seems like a big disguise/December’s long and we both know/That the sun is coming and it’s melting the snow.”

“When I reached the end of writing ‘Old Days,’ it helped that I similarly was realizing, ‘Oh friendships and relationships end, but not always for the worst, and that time is still special,’” Pia said.

Pia penned her sentimental track in May and recorded it with a talented team of collaborators, including producer John Katona of JK (Not Kidding Studios), Minihorse’s Ben Collins (lead guitar), Tom Mihalis (lead guitar), Stoop Lee’s Ade Olaniran (drums) and Matt Jones (bass).

“I recorded the demo and basis of the whole song with Ben Collins and myself on guitar and vocals and Ade of Stoop Lee on drums. Then, I sat on the song for a little because I got busy with residency, and then ended up finishing it up at John Katona’s,” said Pia, who’s also a pharmacist.

To accompany the release of “Old Days,” Pia dropped a thoughtful new lyric video, which features her roaming around Belle Isle.

“I asked my 16-year-old sister to videotape me doing random stuff on my friend Matt’s camcorder. She was like, ‘Oh, I get to use a camcorder?’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, try it out.’ She followed me around, and I used that footage in the video,” she said.

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Bounce Back – Au Gres Overcomes Obstacles and Chases Aspirations on ‘DYTWOE’

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It doesn’t take long for Au Gres to bounce back.

The Fenton indie pop singer-songwriter quickly overcomes obstacles and challenges on his latest aspirational single, “do you think we’re old enough (DYTWOE).”

“This song for me is all about what happens when ambitions and dreams are met with disappointment. I don’t consider it to be a ‘sad song’ though,” said Josh Kemp, aka Au Gres.

“The road to success is bumpy, and there’s a lot to learn along the way. The song comes from feeling let down, but I’m optimistic that dreams can be achieved.”

Au Gres keeps his perspective on “DYTWOE” as trilling synths, quaky drums, calm bass, contemplative acoustic guitars and spirited electric guitars melodically provide a reassuring nod.

He sings, “Take apart all the good things/Stripped away, what’s there to do/So many times I’ve tried/But I just don’t remember.”

“I think pursuing your passion is a wonderful thing to do, but it can be disheartening when things don’t go the way you planned,” Kemp said. “My hope for this track is that it will help people feel less alone in that pursuit and encouraged to keep going.”

For Au Gres, the “DYTWOE” journey started last summer with a draft recording. He later ventured to Cincinnati to finalize the track with producer Alexandre Hirlinger.

“We spent about three days working on it and had the best time,” Kemp said. “We’re inspired by a lot of the same music, including COIN and Mini Trees, and it felt like we were synced up the whole time.”

Au Gres also synced up the release of “DYTWOE” with a crafty companion lyric video, which features interchanging magazine cutout letters pasted against a crinkled paper background.

“The video has a sort of ‘scrapbook’ feel to it,” Kemp said. “I made the entire thing myself with found images, and I’m really proud of how it all came together (despite my lack of visual art skills).”

“DYTWOE” serves as Au Gres’ first new material and third single since releasing the self-comfort anthem, “At Home in the Dark” last February. His growing catalog of thoughtful indie pop gems continues to play on repeat in fans’ ears and heads.

“My 2022 has been fairly quiet so far, but I’ve been using the time to write a lot of music. I think I’m very lucky to have so many close friends pursuing the same things as me,” Kemp said. “Learning from them and watching them accomplish their goals has always been a great source of inspiration.”

With “DYTWOE” gaining traction, Au Gres wants to share additional new material later this year. It’s likely to be a compelling mixture of solo and collaborative tunes.

“This year is all about collaboration for me,” Kemp said. “I’m working closely with a lot of different artists and plan to release a lot more music, both as a featured artist as well as under my own catalog.”

Rise Above – Theandric Examines the Challenges of Mortality on ‘Flight Among The Tombs’

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Theandric’s Bill Bogue, Paul Tiseo and Aaron Wienczak provide an insightful route to self-awareness and personal enlightenment on “Flight Among the Tombs.” Photo – Robert Bruce Photograohy

Theandric majestically soars above the shadow of death.

The Detroit heavy metal trio of Paul Tiseo (vocals, bass, keys, guitars), Bill Bogue (guitars) and Aaron Wienczak (guitars) powerfully glides toward the beacon of life on their new supercharged EP, Flight Among the Tombs.

“Literature and poetry were a big inspiration for me. That was connected to the same time of when we all had to go home in March 2020. Life suddenly breaks, we’re all at home … it was a scary time. One silver lining for me was having that time and space to start reading again,” said Tiseo, who’s also inspired by Iron Maiden.

“I found this poet named Anthony Hecht, and I came across one of his poems that really struck me as powerful. He wrote this book of poems called ‘Flight Among the Tombs,’ and that’s where the title comes from. He wrote a series of poems that were different reflections on the person of death.”

Throughout Flight Among the Tombs, Theandric thoughtfully examines mortality amidst the challenging forces of choice, conflict, condemnation and pride. All four tracks provide an insightful route to self-awareness and personal enlightenment.

“To me, it also meant we’re flying among the tombs … we’re not dead yet, we’re alive. With the pandemic and what was happening, it was like every day we were confronted with death and sickness,” said Tiseo, who wrote the EP’s four tracks. “I wanted to think about how we’re gonna rise above this difficult time. We won’t deny that death is real, but it’s important to live.”

Continue reading “Rise Above – Theandric Examines the Challenges of Mortality on ‘Flight Among The Tombs’” →

From the Heart – Adam Plomaritas and Kylee Phillips Co-Headline Saturday’s Trinity House Show

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Two Michigan singer-songwriters will inject some heart and soul into metro Detroit Saturday.

Adam Plomaritas and Kylee Phillips will share emotive selections during their co-headlining Feb. 12 show at Livonia’s Trinity House Theatre. Both sets will melt away the wintry blues and provide a warm, spring-like welcome.

Ahead of Saturday’s soulful show, The Stratton Setlist chatted with Plomaritas and Phillips about their current inspirations, live sets and musical plans for 2022.

TSS: How has your 2022 been so far? What’s been inspiring you these days as an artist, songwriter and musician?

AP: 2022 has been off to a good start, all things considered. I started it off playing a Caribbean cruise for a week. Since then, I’ve been in the studio a bit and coaching high schoolers for the singing competition, Future Stars, in Ann Arbor. I’ll be the musical director for the show, which happens later in February.

What inspires me generally in songwriting are my wife and three sons. It’s also the struggle of being a professional musician and all of the trappings of fighting through insecurity and enjoying your own and others’ art, and being jealous of their success and reveling in it at the same time as they’re often my friends.

Two things I’ve taken in that have affected me greatly in the past year – The Ken Burns documentary on the history of country music and the “Cocaine & Rhinestones” podcast by Tyler Mahan Coe. Some processing of those will surely spill out onto the stage at Trinity House.

KP: I’ve been experiencing a lot of personal challenges and upheaval, but also so much growth and hope as of late. I’ve been more grateful than ever for the outlet that songwriting is to me. During this season, it’s felt more like a necessity than a choice.

Continue reading “From the Heart – Adam Plomaritas and Kylee Phillips Co-Headline Saturday’s Trinity House Show” →

Moving Forward – Allye Gaietto Searches for Closure on ‘I Guess I Don’t’

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Allye Gaietto processes a familial relationship on “I Guess I Don’t.” Photo – Rolando Ybarra

While mining past voice memos from her phone, Allye Gaietto discovered a future sense of closure.

The Detroit indie folk singer-songwriter’s surprise finding included the first verse of her latest cathartic single, “I Guess I Don’t.”

“I thought, ‘What is this?’ And then it made me cry listening back to it, and I was like, ‘Oh no, I have to finish it. I have to write the rest of this,’” said Gaietto, who started writing “I Guess I Don’t” in 2017.

“It’s about my relationship with my dad … I was processing this relationship in therapy and in life, and I was able to bring this song into it to push forward that conversation and express some things that were hard for me to bring up verbally. It’s like being able to open up your journal, and say, ‘Here, read it.’ You feel a little weird, but you also hope maybe someone will understand.”

Throughout “I Guess I Don’t,” Gaietto’s raw vulnerability and tender revelation instantly strike a chord with people experiencing family estrangement. Crashing cymbals, thunderous drums, tearful pedal steel, forlorn piano, hopeful electric guitar and melancholic bass unlock tightly bound emotional floodgates.

A spectrum of emotions quickly flow as Gaietto sings, “I’ve been writing the same song for years/And I’m not sick of it yet /I’ve been crying the same kind of tears/Don’t think I could forget.”

“A lot of parent-child relationships are estranged now. And it looks like for a lot of those people, there’s an active connection that they’re severing, like a lot of children are saying, ‘Do not contact me,’” Gaietto said.

“That was never my experience, which was more my parents got divorced, and after I moved away after college, we just stopped talking. Every once in a while one of us would call to check in on a holiday or birthday, and then it would just fall away.”

Gaietto continues to process those poignant experiences while singing, “Pretty sure you still have my number somewhere/Pretty sure you know how to dial/I’m not sure how much time I can bear/Not sure if you’ll still call me your child.”

“We just talked for the first time in a long time the other day,” she said. “The concept of closure … it’s never gonna be exactly what you think it is. I was getting to a point of just letting it go, and right as the song was gonna come out, I was like, ‘Oh no, we’re gonna kind of open this back up again.’”

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Perfectly Imperfect – Rin Tarsy Celebrates Life’s Contradictions on ‘Paradox’

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Rin Tarsy embarks on an emotional and spiritual quest of self-discovery on “Paradox.” Photo – Justin Snavely

For Rin Tarsy, life is filled with beautiful contradictions and imperfections.

The Grand Rapids folk singer-songwriter and guitarist embraces authenticity, yet re-examines her purpose on the aptly titled album, Paradox.

“For a while, people would ask, ‘What’s the theme of Paradox?’ And for a while, I didn’t know. Finally, it dawned on me one time when I was listening through all the tracks – it’s about self-trust and self-discovery,” said Tarsy, who grew up in Portland and started singing in church.

“I hope all these songs make sense together, and I really like them, but I wasn’t sure if they did. It’s comforting and scary at the same time. Are these thoughts ever gonna go away? Am I always gonna be questioning everything? Maybe I will.”

Tarsy’s lingering questions slowly spark an emotional and spiritual quest of self-discovery on Paradox that spans several years. Each poetic track celebrates intuition and explores emotion.

“The first songs I wrote for this album – ‘Stay,’ ‘Dear Heart’ and ‘Suitcase’ – were in the summer of 2016 after I got back from Africa. It was the first time I had examined who I was when I took away all of the pursuits that I had and the things I had wanted to go after,” said Tarsy, who visited Tanzania, Zambia and Namibia.

“At the time, I had asked myself, ‘Who am I if those things don’t go exactly the way I want? Or if my idealisms of what they could be don’t match up with the reality of what they actually are?’”

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In Perspective – Tom Alter Channels Society’s Creative Voices on ‘Poetry and Protest’

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Tom Alter explores the complex nature of the human experience on “Poetry and Protest.” Courtesy photo

Tom Alter deeply examines art and life from different perspectives.

The Fraser indie folk singer-songwriter and guitarist candidly depicts the thoughts, feelings and challenges of society’s creative voices on his latest insightful album, Poetry and Protest.

“I realized that so much of what I was writing about were things based on what I had read or had come from memories that had stayed with me for a long time and made me want to write about them. That’s the poetry side of it,” said Alter, who produced, mixed and mastered his own album.

“And the protest side blends in with that because a lot of the poetry is coming out and speaking to important matters. The last song I wrote for this was (the title track), and that was after thinking about this collection of songs. I’m trying to put myself in the shoes of somebody who has a very different experience from me.”

Alter’s Poetry and Protest provides an enlightening narrative filled with bold tales about humanity, sacrifice, loss and compassion. It seamlessly ventures from the vast emptiness of space to the sparsely populated shores of Hudson Bay to the tightly packed streets of Hamtramck.

“The Poetry and Protest idea came from me being out on a walk and thinking about this collection of songs that I was putting together and realizing where the influences for them came from,” said Alter about his sixth album.

“There’s a song, ‘Four Blue Horses,’ that is directly from a Mary Oliver poem, and it comes from Franz Marc’s Blue Horses. She wrote a poem about that series of paintings, and she got so personally involved in the paintings. I just thought, ‘I want to write about this; it was as simple as that.’”

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City Love Letter – Cashmere Washington Reveres Ypsilanti and Local Connections on ‘Life Is’

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Cashmere Washington pays homage to Ypsilanti and its people and places on “Life Is.” Photo – Mikael Dunn

Cashmere Washington openly shares a love letter to their current city.

The indie rocker expresses deep appreciation for Ypsilanti and the memorable friendships and experiences that accompany it on their introspective new single, “Life Is.”

“Ypsilanti is the first place I ever said, ‘I want to live here,’” said Washington, aka Thomas Dunn, who hails from Midland and recently graduated from Eastern Michigan University. “It’s the hometown I got to pick.”

Throughout “Life Is,” tender piano, fuzzy electric guitar, strolling bass, steady drums and glistening cymbals instantly evoke sentimental images of people and places along Michigan Avenue and nearby neighborhoods.

Washington sings, “Watched the best minds of my generation/Stumbling back home, coming down the avenue/Yeah, they don’t even stop at the venue.”

“It’s based on this memory that I have of my friend walking home in front of a venue on Michigan Avenue on their way from work, and this really wonderful conversation I had with another friend about how our favorite songs have the ability to let us focus on a beautiful sunrise when we know something awful is looming just beyond the frame,” they said. “The original goal was to mash those two scenes into a song (with a few artistic liberties taken).”

With that vivid imagery in mind, Washington closes “Life Is” with a thought-provoking verse that prompts listeners to take chances and pursue their goals. In a sense, the city of Ypsilanti provides the ideal backdrop for Washington to fully realize their true sense of self.

Washington reflects, “Cuz I know I’m not scared to die/I know that I’m petrified/To try and fail.”

“The line alludes to my own history with depression. Personally, the worst days have never been the tough day; it’s usually the day after,” they said.

“Maybe I’m too optimistic, but who knows, maybe tomorrow I’ll get a raise; or a week from now I’ll bump into someone funny in line for coffee; or someone will send a really nice, thoughtful email about a beat-tape I put online five years ago. You just never know what can happen.”

Continue reading “City Love Letter – Cashmere Washington Reveres Ypsilanti and Local Connections on ‘Life Is’” →