As the story goes, a young boy, hungry and road-weary wanders into a small village with nothing but a small rock in his hand. He enters the village tavern and walks straight into the kitchen where he greets the cook and proclaims that he will teach him the secret to the greatest soup in the world if only he will offer him the pot to demonstrate. Bemused and intrigued, the cook hands the boy a well-worn cast iron pot.
“I shall return with it promptly” the boy promises and heads back out into the village and over to the first house on the left. Knocking on the door, he is promptly received by the old woman who resides there to whom he shares the same story, promising the same result in exchange for a donation. She has nothing but some wilting parsley which the boy modestly and accepts before proceeding.
He continues in this fashion moving door to door until he has acquired celery, beets, carrots, venison, potatoes and so on. Having raised considerable curiosity among the townsfolk, he now assembles them at the town square where he asks for a match which is quickly offered. He takes a moment to consider the various contributions he has accumulated and decisively selects the most complementary which he then drops into the pot.
The fire beneath the cauldron is lit and the ingredients set to boil.
“Behold!” shouts the boy at length, drawn from the kindness and variation of your respective hands and good will, I now summon the forces of magic to deliver to you the greatest recipe in the world!”
The boy begins handing out bowl after bowl of the resultant stew and the townsfolk, thusly congregated partook of a communal and bounteous culinary experience.
Well, in so many words, that is how we made the record. Two in fact. I started despondent, out of luck and resources, or so I thought, until one day, exhausted with exhaustion, I forced myself to begin, with one hundred percent commitment. Not 99.9% but 100% – which meant at all costs, take no prisoners, whatever it takes. Without ever harming an animal or an ego, without over imposing or burning a bridge, we are almost ready to share the communal result of this experience with the general public.
“Box” is a set of acoustic material that needed it’s own space and time to be presented and will precede the release of the full rock record “Come To Life”. And until the very last minute, we will still be making rock soup; drawing on the talents, enthusiasm and good will of musicians, engineers, designers and music fans to bring together these new musical projects.
Where so many people are concerned with getting the cash together so that they can then do what they want, we are proving again that tenacity, audacity and pragmatism, coupled with passion, curiosity and a good will together make a powerful force indeed. Even today Josh and I were welcomed to Darcy Macguire’s studio in Toronto to track some last minute vocals for a pair of songs we decided to append to the Box album, one of which was written by Paul Gallinato that we recorded on his brief visit to LA from Buenos Aires.
Josh and I have been capturing video chronicles of the process and we want to share it with others who may be interested in creating their own indie ventures. The first episodes of Rock Soup will be premiering on YouTube within the month of November, so keep an eye out. And more importantly, keep an extra 10 piece aside for the release of Box, coming to you before xmas.
If you have a cool story about how faith and dedication manifested something amazing in your life, I would love to have you reply to this post and share it with our readers.