August 13, 2024
Time to Come Clean
I’ve resisted making this public, but it’s time. I struggle with Alcohol Disorder, which is the new medical term for alcoholism. I like the new medical term better. Most of you know that I also suffer from the disorder, really more an incurable disease, of Multiple Sclerosis. Okay, that’s getting off point. I’ve been struggling with Alcohol Disorder for well over a decade and beyond. I was just released from the Cleveland Clinic today after five days of detox and the start of Recovery. The amazing doctors and nurses helped save my life. I was in really bad shape. I mean REALLY bad shape. But, I’m tough – being back to be me. I have a hard, long and painful road ahead. This is just the truth. Addiction is an insidious, evil monster that wants to destroy you. And, I’m going to stare it down with a big fuck you. I have too much in my life worth living. I have all the wonderful people in my life that I love dearly. And, I promise I will not let you down. The first step in Recovery is healing one’s self, and I’m back on that journey. It’s a never-ending journey.
The opposite of addiction is connection. With that said, I would be horribly remiss to not acknowledge the wonderful people I share my affliction with and the incredible bond we developed in an extremely short amount of time: Scott K, Amber J, Gregg W, and Justin K. Thank you!
Black Spectre
Follows
Wherever you go
As midnight rings
On bended knee
The Prince of Darkness
Turns you to
Dust
This is addiction if you let it over take you. Fight hard and long. You might lose one battle but the war can be won. Thanks for reading.
One of my favorite Charlie Rich songs:
https://youtu.be/rUYT2OT93G4?si=kLbH859h92FLPcyE
Peace and love to you all.
Michael
October 3, 2023
Farewell, Ducky Carlisle
So much music has just been left on the floor, never to be heard.
My friend Ducky was a complicated genius. But, he meant the world to me and everyone else who got to know him or even the people who just spent a little time with him. We had a complicated relationship. He taught me a lot. I believe I taught him a lot, too. That word, complicated, is the most honest way – and not in a negative sense but in an all-encompassing way – to describe our relationship. We started out as band mates in The Savages in 1999. We first met in 1995 going into 1996 when Barrence Whitfield and the Savages and The Radio Kings brought in the New Year at the Original House of Blues in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
We played our first gig together as the Savages on my birthday in 1999 as a co-bill with The Real Kids at Maxwell’s in Hoboken, New Jersey. We mixed a song on my birthday in 2006 that would garner us gold and platinum awards and number one singles as producers. There were so many records. There were so many gigs. We became the production team known as The Tremolo Twins. There is our own record label Trem-Tone Records that licensed Eddie Floyd’s “Eddie Loves You So” to Stax Records. I can still hear the little kid joy in his voice when I asked if he wanted to produce Eddie. We had a lot of moments like that.
Ducky had an enormous, boisterous, and loud personality. As much time as we spent working on music, we spent an equal amount of time talking about the Red Sox, the stupid things people do, going to Felicia’s (his favorite restaurant), the intricacies of life, and he was equally passionate about all of it. There were countless nights spent on the back porch – even more in the kitchen listening to music. It all came back to music for him. We would spend hours discussing the differences between Northern Soul and the R&B/Soul that came out of the Golden Triangle of Memphis, Nashville, and Muscle Shoals. We would break into these discussions during sessions, which meant our clients were subjected to listening to what we were talking about in between takes. They had no choice. He always had something new to play for me; both some recently reissued old record or his current project in the studio. I was lucky to be there while he was working many a great record that didn’t involve me. For a bunch of years, Ice Station Zebra was more my home than anywhere else. I’m pretty sure there are a lot of people who feel that same way.
He’s going to be sorely missed by me and the hundreds of others that he touched. We didn’t see each other as much as we once had after the start of my time in Nashville but still tried to talk as much as possible. And, I got by there as often as I could. The pandemic hurt spending time together too.
Love you, David, you complicated genius.