'Regime change begins at home': Back when it looked like another Democratic candidate for president was going to win the nomination, I decided to sit down and write a little diddy of a song: ["Regime change begins at home"]

I planned on including "Regime change ..." with a new collection of songs I have been trying to finish for a couple of years. Unfortunately, over the years, work, my other band at the time [Lunar Girl], and family, etc., distracted me from finishing this CD - until now.

My new musical project is rts:collab and I will soon be releasing the project's first CD - "the long lost lover's last long play" - a collection of 10 songs that I have been working on over the last few years. Some of the songs are very personal; others are just for fun. The CD, which was a collaboration with my long-time friend Joel Simches, of Sonic Enhancement Productions, plays with various musical styles while at the same time not straying far from my alternative/post-punk roots.

The first song to be released from the CD, "Regime change begins at home," will be shipped to college radio stations in limited release this week.

The inspiration for the song came when a friend of mine asked me why I never wrote political songs, being a songwriter while also dabbling in and following politics. I told this person that I'd written political songs before but never shared them with people because the songs always ended up being dated or sounding corny. You can almost hear some of the silly songs people could write about politics but then a few weeks later, the songs would be meaningless. There have been a few bands who have written hard-hitting, political songs well, bands like the Dead Kennedys or even some of the bands from the 1960s. Instead, as a songwriter, I try to play with metaphors and vagueness in an effort to get some political thoughts across without actually being overly political.

Sidebar: Some songs on the CD I am about to release are rather subtle. "Hate Ashe Buried," an 11-plus minute, three part track addresses the need to control anger with a play on words about the San Francisco neighborhood. So does the lead track, "Cleanse my soul," which has a spiritual bent to it. And "Redemption through lifestyle" pokes fun at commercialism without being too political.

However, the particular candidate I was hoping would win got strangled by the media and didn't win the nomination and I became a little depressed. I got distracted by other things - working on my blog, unfinished book projects and investigative pieces for my job - and the songs sat. Plus, Joel got busy - touring with and doing sound for All the Queens Men and Dresden Dolls, two big Boston bands really starting to make their mark - and we couldn't tidy up the loose ends. But this ended up being a good thing because I was able to spend more time with the material and we eventually went back, remixed a couple of songs, mastered the whole thing again, and now, it's finished and I can't wait to release it to the world. I probably won't do a huge pressing - just enough for radio, family, friends, and maybe some sales.

However, with the election coming up, it is important to get "Regime change ..." out to listeners. The link is here: ["Regime change begins at home"]. Enjoy the song. I hope it inspires people to go out and take back their country. If you don't like it, no biggie, you didn't have to pay for it and only wasted a few minutes downloading it. :-) However, if you are interested in checking out the rest of the CD, I will have more information soon at this site and the rts:collab site.