Nifty Noodles/ Rain On Me

10/27/04 Redmon, WA
I don’t like to say “God send” too often but this week I’m in a studio writing with the NeoSoul Band at a fabulous studio in Samamish, just outside of Redmond, Wa. Called Rain On Me Productions. Derek Hoiem as donated his time and place for the effort… once more… God has to be in this! This place is fabulous… one of the nicest studios I’ve ever seen. The music has begun after so many months of dreaming.

We started with a jam and the excitement was high… it didn’t take long though for individual personalities to emerge in the process.

And we got bogged down in the “ nuts and bolts” for a while. Eventually we started dealing with the song idea we started in Nashville ..”If Only I” of course we broke for late lunch. When we came back the original fun groove was back along with the enthusiasm.

Creativity needs food!

Played for a few hours just exploring some grooves. In the end I had no huge bursts of inspiration in a song direction but that usually comes with lots of afterthought…. One day to jam is never enough… the band is scattered across three states literally in every corner of the North American continent… makes it hard to get together for the work.

Never the less we have around 6 songs at this point towards a new project. “If Only I”, “Nothing is forever”, “Second Chances”, “Chains”, “Still Dancin”, “Bring a New Soul”… what we still need is the Driving band tunes that make a live thing feel great.

I’ll keep you posted on the progress… So there’s that… Bryan D

Nifty Noodles/ 5 Days - 5 Gigs

Franklin, TN Oct.
Came to Nashville to write songs with Ricky B. We hooked up with Walter Finch too at Tim Gaines house (former Stryper bass player)… workin on a tune called “If Only I” for the upcoming NehoSoul project.

I’ve played everynight straight somewhere… Tuesday night had a whole live band and backup singers for a TBN show that aired Friday.

Not sure they loved the music on the show as it lacks a certain Pentecostal enthusiasm that comes to be expected on Christian T.V.

I was “reasonably happy” singing… and I was surprised at my own answers to the interview questions.

I was introduced as someone who had been around for years. So I was quick to point out that I was not defining myself by who I used to be. I covered the radio show and recovery generally, and talked of a new future with the NehoSoul band.

The band played again with me at the Mercantile in Franklin, Tn it was mostly a gathering of musician and Biz friends from way back.

Randy Thomas from my Sweet C days came and Dan Posthuma my long time producer and friend showed up plus lots of singers and songwriters. Dan Schafer, lead vocalist for Bad Company sang that night and also Rick Elias. Irene Kelly who sang back up with me did four or five songs of her own.

Thursday the band drove to Murfreesboro to play a gathering of Celebrate Recovery programs. It sounded pretty good considering the concrete walls and the gymnasium atmosphere. I wasn’t in a great place emotionally… but when I’m bordering on self pity all I have to do is listen to some of the stories of people in recovery. It has a way of changing my perspective or at least realizing everyone has trouble of some kind. “Stay connected” I tell myself.

By now I’m feeling uprooted and homeless and we still have gigs in Florida. There was 3000 people at the outdoor concert in New Port Richey, Florida where Phil Curry and Sam Mathews joined the rest of the real NS band. This was so cool… I was the only thing on the bill… not even a warm up act!!!! We started the show by having the drummer come out and start a groove on his own then he is joined by bass and then guitar and then keyboards as the sound keeps getting fatter. Finally I walk out and by then we are in to the opening groove for five minutes… “Clap Your Hands”… I was quickly aware of the missing background vocalists as we had no singers for this gig.

Played a lot of solo sections and just live jam sessions… I played the new Gretch acoustic electric guitar that one Mark Bortz bought me in Franklin two days ago. He was at the Mercantile when I borrowed someones guitar to play my two songs and offered me a near new guitar and connected me with an outlet facility in town. Wow what a perk. He also gave me an acoustic guitar for Ricky B so we could write songs.

Ricky’s bass got knocked over just before the show in Port Richey… broke a tuning key off.. so meeting Mark a day earlier was a God send… we called him to borrow a bass for next week.

Got calls that night from lots of friends that saw the TBN gig as it aired. Right when you think you know where God is taking you there’s these little “yea buts”. There is an enthusiasm among the band members and surrounding cast as we watch something new develop… it’s like playing cards and suddenly you’ve been dealt an ace of hearts… we just gotta play the rest of the cards right now.

Finally, drove to Lakeland, Florida… my old stomping grounds, to sing for a marriage banquet celebration. This was the tightest “by myself” gig I’ve done in some time I think. I didn’t offer much in the way of solid advise on marriage as I have no clue what makes a good one work… but I like what a friend told me… “it takes to yes’s and only one no, to determine the direction of a marriage good or bad. So the numbers seem stacked against it’s success. I’m certainly feeling humble when it comes to the subject but I played songs mostly that addressed the issue of love starting with “No Words”. Not many hung around after the event. Maybe they all have kids with babysitters I don’t know but I think the show was just right. back at the hotel the next morning around five a.m. I met the security guard who recognized me in my morning delirium. Turns out he sang with me back in the seventies with a group I was in called the New Sounds of Creation. Wow have things changed…. Except the ‘NEW” part. I call it “Neho” now… but I am still hopeful I told him “old things are passed away and all things have become NEW.

O.K. so I’m tired…. Bryan D

Nifty Noodles/ Everything

10/18/04 Las Vegas/ and “Nashvegas”

I’ve spent the last week with Bob Carlisle at his stately Pink House studio. I was there to tie up loose ends on a few songs we’ve written in the last six months. The hang time with Bob is always therapeutic. I helped him develop the “Client” Rec room at the studio… actually we put together some deck chairs on the patio so I could sit outside and watch the sun go down. We cleaned up a jewel of an old “park” style BBQ and did the hamburger thing. The Pink House is done up in an “Atomic” motif … like something straight out of the sixties but the tech gear is state of the art . His website will go up here in a month or two he says and you can get a feel for the artistic flair there.

We finished vocals on one song, “Nothing is Forever Anymore”… a sad but sexy love song…. I’m considering it for the new NehoSoul project. One thing we accomplished is to find out that neither of us were crazy about one song we had worked on and scrapped it entirely. I revisited a few songs Bob had sent me to work on and now plan to consider for the New Soul project as well… the Titiles? “I’m Still Dancin… Like This” “Thank You For The Second Chances”… and “Chains” … So I was most focused on how I might use the songs for my own new project with the NehoSoul Band… We’ve had some interest from a secular Record Company who is willing to listen to some new songs if we are aimed at “mainstream”… I personally am aimed at “Redemption” …

So now I’m headed out to Nashville to write with my Bass Player/ etc…. Ricky B…. to finish a song we were actually writing during the extra footage shooting for the Music City Live project… you’ll hear a rough draft of that on the DVD. Song is now called “If Only I”. Hope we can get it dialed in this week… I only heard the music that one weekend when Ricky Played it on guitar and I wrote the lyrics in my car without a track to listen to… that’s something I’ve never done…. And you know “if you want something you’ve never had… you have to do something you’ve never done”…

In the meantime it’s a busy week aside from writing… doing four concerts by Friday!!! Another first in at least Four years… Tuesday is TBN, Wednesday is a coffeehouse in Franklin, and Thursday is a Celebrate Recovery event on Murfreesboro then We fly to Florida for the next official reunion of the Real NehoSoul Brothers… (I’m using Rick and Walter in Nashville and Ricky’s bringin some Sit in friends…to cover these local gigs as most of the Neho Souls live in Seattle!

Ricky B and I have been planning to pursue club dates starting with “House of Blues” in L.A. and then start pursuing others in key cities…to go after a new audience… there’s “too many people in the world to be irritated with the ones who don’t get yer music…or don’t like yer lyrics…” Ricky B.. I don’t know exactly how my faith will be played out in all this… I don’t see this as “my effort” on God’s behalf. Oswald Chambers says “our individual effort for God is an impertinence; our individuality is to be rendered incandescent by a personal relationship to God” ( from Oct 13th of My Utmost) Read the rest of this… cause the timing here for me has been amazing in the last two weeks.

O.K. so you are seeing the really exciting part of the upheaval in my life. I’m not defining myself by who I used to be… old things are passed away and behold everything is changing. … Let me just say, that I have some tough months ahead on literally every front in my life. I have had enough time in my recovery program to understand that I must let go of “perfection” and find “the courage to change the things I can”… I have been frozen in time for almost three years… “waiting on God”… and then I discovered that it was becoming a fear of facing some realities rather than “waiting on God”… God has provided me with some amazing clarity AFTER I stood up and began to walk AFTER I made the leap of faith in the greatest moment of fear in my life. I’m having to grow a spine!

I found I could make up all kinds of stories about what was actually happening in my life trying to “diagnose” my own symptoms… but when the Doctor finally tells you what the results are… you can’t lie to yourself anymore and the pain you couldn’t quite place suddenly has a name…and suddenly things are clear to me.( I’m speaking metaphorically here…I’ve not discovered some terminal illness…) I’ve just gotten to the bottom of a lot of painful symptoms…most of it is my own fear to voice my convictions, Face my own feelings, confront my fears and proclaim my needs…I’ve been all around the picture defining every little nuance on my radio shows and still not seeing my own dysfunction!!! Absolutely paralyzing …. FEAR…… of the unknown… predicting only disaster in the “what if’s” of my life… refusing to let go of the past for fear of what others might think and say…choosing to stay close to the shore, dreaming about paradise just beyond the waves… and becoming more angry about how God doesn’t deliver that “Island” to my beach chair!!!

The Truth is I created much of my own unhappiness by a simple lack of choosing! Choosing anything at all!!! I’ll just sit here some more in these chains and think about freedom”… “chains come in every shape and size… don’t hardly feel em after while”…. From “Chains” by Bob Carlisle and Bryan Duncan

O.k. so there’s That….. Bryan Duncan

Nifty Noodles/ Belize Release Me

10/11/04 The Caribbean Sea
I just spent seven days aboard the Elation, Cruising and crooning in the Caribbean… We didn’t hit a single ice berg. We visited Cozumel again and Presidio and Belize, South America for the first time for me.

Had a great time… did two concerts and a thirty minute guest appearance at the piano bar. Then there was one night at Karaoke just for fun.

I spent most of my time in the Disco… dancing keeps the food consumption from getting out of control. Sat on my stateroom balcony every night and watched the waves in the day and the stars at night.

I met new friends, some were with the “Voyage of Faith” but many were just passengers I crossed paths with. I got a tattoo on my right arm… (it wears off 8))

Went down the water slide in my street clothes into the ships pool just to get in to the mood. Dancing all night was the highlight really. Listening to music and inventing my own dance moves cause once again I don’t know any others.

Most of my new creations inspired much laughter from my friends.

This was probably the eighth cruise I’ve done and it was by far the best. I never went in the water or hit the beach really. That was the only part I missed.

I had 15 phone messages when I got back all from friends who said they missed me this week. Now there’s something to be grateful for too.

O.K. so there’s that … Bryan D

Nifty Noodles/ My Caribbean Dream

10/2/04 Home…
I’m leaving today for a week on the Caribbean about the Elation… I hope to have some of that. I’ll be singing for Voyage of Faith.

I’m SOOOO looking forward to this… I plan to sing and write songs in my off time and consider the new frontier of my life.

Many changes are coming.

I’d like to say that the overwhelming support I’ve received on line and among my daily attachment of friends has been worth more to me than any problem I might face.

I broke into tears reading the responses on line to my “refusing to trust” noodle. There was another aspect of that noodle that I might have overlooked. I ASKED FOR HELP… in prayer.

I’ve always hated being needy and it takes a miracle of God for me to acknowledge my humanity in it’s weakness and ask for support. I don’t know why I have such an aversion cause what I have received as a result of asking has been off the map encouragement. I still have much time alone facing my demons, I get knocked down but I get up again.

One way we are getting up again is to pursue House of Blues for concerts with the NehoSoul band…( or a new abbreviation…”BryNeho”…. ) We are gonna be writing new songs for a new effort… I’m looking beyond even the new DVD that is in the works.

I am nervous about hitting the road too hard as I nearly lost myself through the years of touring. I was without community support and I became isolated and it nearly destroyed my faith in a Loving God. My decisions in the past for career recognition have come with a price. One that was too great to bear in hindsight. But at the same time I have followed my calling.. that was not an option. Unfortunately I made a few “Golden Calves” along the way. I’m still melting those down!

Pray for clarity of purpose rather than relief of pain. ..And peace on the inside in spite of the hurricanes… (which we will try to avoid this week on the “Aqua Sea”)

If I can get online in port somewhere I will give you an early update on stuff.

Keep Coming Back …. Bryneho 8)

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