BONES (BURY ME DEEPLY & SWEETLY)

Photo by Madelynn Elyse.

I can’t believe it’s finally out. 

‘Bones (Bury Me Deeply & Sweetly)’ is the first track off our next album, ‘Mechanical Clouds’. And it’s a song that’s very near and dear to my heart. 

There’s a bit of history behind it… I started Johnny Stranger in 2006 as a studio experiment in Washington State (where I grew up). I had a circle of friends contributing to the record and we were all very enthusiastic about the project. We self-released two albums and built a little community around us. 

I would have been 22 or 23 at the time. And I wanted to pursue Johnny Stranger as a career. The drummer from Johnny Stranger (who was an incredible player and major cheerleader for the group) was moving to Boston for college at Berklee… so I made plans to follow, to keep that musical connection sizzling. 

It took me a few months of saving money and teaching guitar lessons, but I finally built up a little nest egg. I found a cheap apartment over the internet and arranged to fly out to Boston in January 2008. I had never visited, but I was going to move and pursue Johnny Stranger with all I had. 

Unfortunately, things didn’t go according to plan. After about a month in the city, the other members of Johnny Stranger were off to pursue other projects and I was left alone. Luckily I was able to convince the players to record one last record with me (what would become ‘Galacticus 9’). We played a sold-out return home show at the Capitol Theater (in Olympia WA).  But then - upon returning to Boston - things fizzled out. 

I spent a lot of time wandering around Boston, freezing cold and upset. I did my best to soothe my bruised ego, but I was 23 and not well-equipped to see outside my narrow point-of-view. I got a job at a Blockbuster in Central Square and just sort of… existed. 

But I never stopped working on Johnny Stranger.  And I was never truly alone. My good friend Blake (and his incredible family) lived an hour train ride out of town and they even allowed me and Blake to track ‘Galacticus 9’ and ‘Iliad & Odyssey’ at their farm. I made some great friends at Blockbuster too. And I especially valued the musicians who offered to join Johnny Stranger to help it grow. I might have felt alone, but - in retrospect- I was blessed to have so many incredible friends. 

Over the next two and a half years, I rebuilt the Johnny Stranger lineup and wrote a batch of songs for a record called ‘Mechanical Clouds’. For me, the songs just hit different. More serious and dark, with even more jazz chords and progressive song structures… it felt like my experience in Boston.   I moved before we could track the ‘Mechanical Clouds’ material in Boston. But - as you can likely surmise - I have held onto these tracks, waiting for the right time. 

‘Bones (Bury Me Deeply & Sweely)’ was one of the first songs I wrote for Mechanical Clouds. And I wasn’t entirely sure what I was singing about at the time… but in retrospect I was singing about holding onto my confidence in the face of defeat. It’s about believing in your intuition. It’s about trusting in yourself. I needed to hear that back then. Heck, I still need to hear this. But it was especially intense at the time. 

Maybe I’ll do a more focused deep-dive into the lyrics if anyone is interested. Let me know if you are. 

But to zoom out a bit… I am in an incredible place and so fucking thrilled with all of you Johnny fans out there. More singles and videos are coming. And vocals for Album 7 are being tracked as we speak. And demos for Album 8 have already commenced. My hope is to just keep music rumbling out of the station, year round, till we hit album #12. 

Thank you all again for your messages and shares. You know how to make an indie band feel HUGE!  🦁 

BONES

Hey Strangers,

It’s finally happening. Our 6th album has been delivered and songs will soon start dropping. First up is our song ‘Bones (Bury Me Deeply & Sweetly)’, which is available to pre-buy now on iTunes. The song is being released June 15th.  This is a really special song to me, but I’ll save that explanation for another time. 

We’ve been hunkering down and rehearsing our little booties off. The band is in good spirits and sounding great!  We’re very excited to play Los Angeles again, although we aren’t looking to actually perform till this fall. 

We’ve also been putting together merch, recording album 7, demoing album 8, and preparing to re-release the original 4 records on Bandcamp. 

So lots coming.  Thank you all who have reached out and kept in touch during these last 3 years of Covid. Things are feeling good and we’re grateful to have had the chance to get so ahead of ourselves. We’ve hit GO and there’s no stopping until we hit album 12. 

“All energy flows according to the whims of the great Magnet. What A fool I was to defy him.” - HST

Peter

June 27th update

Hi everyone. Just a bit of an update, since I’ve been quiet for a while.

First, thank you to all of you who have been reaching out and checking in. It’s amazing to be connected to so many of you who have been along for this JS journey, from fans of the old records to the new records!

Album #6 has been done for a couple months now and I’ve even (mostly) completed demos of album #7. I have single art for all of the album #6 songs (still not entirely sure what will be released as a single). As I’ve been putting artwork together, I’ve had a few ideas for how to diversify how I approach social media for JS. I’m not personally a big social media guy, so it’s a slow process, but I’ve got some fun ideas… including a podcast I’ll be doing with Adal Jamil called ‘Naked with Strangers’. That one will be more about being a musician in general and less about JS specifically.

Things are opening back up here in LA and the band is going to be getting back together to start rehearsing. Very excited to start playing with these guys again and hope to be playing shows again by Fall 2021. Music from album #6 will start coming out in 2022 (likely January for the first single).

Back to work. Thank you again to everyone who keeps reaching out! Lots of good times ahead.

Writing "Cleopatra"

You have a rotten soul. When I first moved to Boston, I got a job at a Blockbuster in Central Square. It was a 20 min walk away from the room I was renting. The job was terrible but I got 5 free rentals a week. So the first show I binged was HBO’s ROME. 

I’ve always been a fan of history and really loved ROME, especially the first season. The second season ends with the death of Cleopatra… and there was something about the scene that stuck with me. I wasn’t able to find a video of the scene, but I have HBO’s description…

Cleopatra then met with Octavian regarding his proposal that she be allowed to keep her kingdom, but soon realized that Octavian's true intent was to keep her as a trophy and to parade her around in chains in Rome. Cleopatra decided that she would not be Octavian's pawn and ordered that preparations be made for her suicide. Her method of death was via the bite of an asp to her breast. Tipped off that she was in the process of killing herself, Octavian rushed to Cleopatra's chambers in an attempt to prevent her death. The dying Cleopatra rose to meet Octavian and spoke into his ear, "You have a rotten soul." Those would be her final words as immediately speaking them, she collapsed onto her throne and died.

Cut forward a couple years. I had just moved across the country with Maddie and our little daschund Meatloaf. We had managed to rent an apartment in San Diego in the West Palm Beach.   There, sitting in an empty living room, I first stumbled across the song ‘Cleopatra’. 

I don’t recall exactly how everything came together. I’m pretty sure the intro and the main refrain (“let the Devil have his way”) came first.  I was particularly excited by the rhythmic idea for when the track really kicks in. That scene from ‘Rome’ swam to the surface of my subconscious and I based the lyrics on the moment when Cleopatra committed suicide, as the forces of Rome bore down on her family.

I think what really connected with me was the idea of someone standing up against insurmountable forces. Cleopatra was powerless to stop what was coming, but - rather than be used - she stood for the honor of her legacy. 

“Cleopatra” was written around the same time as “Pharaoh”, in that empty apartment.  “The Warlock” came soon after. Those songs were the first inklings of an album that would become “Valkyrie”. They’re foundational ideas.  They encourage other similar ideas to flesh out the story of the record. 

A couple other tidbits about the song… the rhythm when it all kicks in (at 1:29) was inspired by Beyonce’s “Single Ladies”.  The acoustic breakdown (at 2:27)  starts with a Dmaj7+6+9 with a minor melody on top… it creates a creepy vibe that reminds me of Sondheim.

In other news, I’ve been singing my little heart out.  My good friend Yan Perchuk (Vibrant Productions) has been helping me out.  I’ve been working with Yan for about 7 years.  He engineered the vocals for ‘Valkyrie’, as well as a nearly every recording for my other band, Polaris Rose.

Finishing the album is just the beginning.  The amount of artwork that I have to make is pretty tremendous.  Plus I’ve been collaborating with other artists for some fun merch designs.  There is gonna be a lot coming next year, so I appreciate everyone who has reached out looking for the new songs to drop!  You guys keep me going during these quarantine times.

More soon.

Peter

Makin’ Covid Records

Life has really turned upside down since my last post…

First off:  Maddie and I are doing well and our families are both safe and healthy.  Covid has been a strange time for us.  The music industry here in LA has been severely clobbered, especially touring.  But (outside of our creative projects) we work primarily in marketing and label services, which have been thriving.  So we are doing well.

Back on February 28th, we played our album release show at The Resident in downtown LA.  The room was packed and a lot of special people were in attendance!  My sister even flew down from WA (garbed in her vintage Lucid-era JS hoodie) and I saw Skrillex hanging out in the back of the room.  The band played amazingly and it was so much fun.  Brad Dickert slayed the drums, Alan Sosa slayed the guitar, Maddie Elyse slapped the bass while she sang along, and my old pal Adal Wiley brought something special with his keys, samples, and dancing.  We played a fun combo of new songs off Valkyrie and older, classic Johnny songs like “Escape”, “Stain”, and “The Devil has the Best Tunes”.  It felt like a very special night… oh and I hit the high note at the end of ‘Cleopatra’, so I was happy about that.  Haha.  

I thought that our album release show was the start of something new… we planned on performing more around LA to promote.  We were putting together tour plans for the west coast and the PNW.  But then Covid hit…

At first, I think we were all caught unaware and unsure how long it would last.  I took it as an opportunity to relax and sorta catch my breath.  But before too long it became clear that the music world as we knew it had changed and wouldn’t be going back to normal for a long time.  Maybe never. 

I stopped posting on social media for a long time.  It just felt inappropriate - what with everything that has occurred since - to post some sort of ‘look at me and my weird prog rock project’.  Even writing this blog is a bit strange to me.  But I wanted to let those who have reached out know: we’re doing great and there’s a lot of new music being prepared for 2021.

Like a lot of my musician friends, I’ve been making Covid Records haha.  Johnny Stranger’s Album #6 is nearly done.  I’d say it’s at the 80% mark.  I have one more song to finish tracking all the guitars/keys and then I’ll be recording vocals for the entire thing.  I’m very happy with how it’s all coming together.  The majority of the songs on this next record were written back when I was living in Boston, long before my life in LA began.  These songs are very special to me and contain some of my personal favorite songwriting that I’ve done.  They’re also connected to a tumultuous time in my life.  I was recently explaining some of the song themes and what was happening in my life at the time and my best friend/partner David remarked, “Damn. That’s dark.”  I laughed.

Finishing the album is just the beginning though.  Being an indie musician means releasing a massive amount of content.  We’ve been planning out something that is - for us - a real step up from what we’ve been able to do before.  Having this covid time has allowed us to slow down and really put some thought into what we’re doing.  Personally, one of my greatest pleasures with JS is being hit up by fans about the music… Hopefully we’ll be seeing more and more opportunities for outreach.

I miss playing shows so much, but it looks like that’s off the table for a little while.  But that’ll just give us more time to really share the story behind the next album online.  So stay tuned.  There’s a whole lot coming.

Oh, and one last thing.  I get asked all the time about our old albums, especially ‘Lucid’.  I will definitely be re-releasing those original 4 albums, I just haven’t decided exactly how to do that.  One more outlandish idea was to do a 6-CD box set (the 4 albums, an album of B-Sides, and an album of live stuff), but I’m not sure it makes sense to get a CD box set made when so few people have CD players anymore.  I can always just release them digitally but I still want to do something a bit special.  If you have any ideas, let me know.

Stay safe,

Peter