Between paying the bills and taking care of my sweet baby girl there’s often little time for rehearsal. Chris is a full time sound engineer and plays in several bands. Jason is a full time bassist for several bands. Between the three of us there’s usually about 2 hours a month when we are all available to practice. But I believe that “what you do becomes you” so several phone calls and texts and e-mails later we managed to get together on Sunday afternoon. I guess Gus is just going to have to get used to being a part of the equipment I take to practices from now on. Don’t worry….she seemed to like the music and Chris’s guinea pigs and she got to watch Kipper when we got home. She’s happy and now that we’ve worked out some of the kinks I’m feeling good about our upcoming show at The National Underground here in Nashville.

When I dreamed of being a musician I didn’t picture stopping a practice to change a diaper but I guess you do what you gotta do. I hope some day she’ll get to travel across the country and perhaps to other countries with me. I hope that pursuing my dreams will teach her that she can too.

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The National Underground, Nashville

The Tim Pepper Trio, Adam Burrows, Anna Johnson and Lower Valley Authority will be performing live at The National Underground, Jan 19th, 7pm-10:30pm.

There will be music and burgers and drinks of your choices,

Much jubilation and raising of voices!

Anna sings sweetly of M.U.S.I.C.,

While stories of reapers are recounted by Dean.

Old Burrows will croon out the folkiest tunes,

And the Tim Pepper Trio…well they’re gonna play too.

So drop down your glasses and get off of your asses,

And boogy on down to where fun can be found,

Nashville, Tennessee’s very own and relatively brand new National Underground.

My apologies folks….I’ve been reading a lot of Dr Seuss to August lately… But I really do hope to see you on Jan 19th.

Tim Pepper

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Nothing happens to you. That’s not exactly completely true because there are things…maybe lots of things..that are out of our control. But when you feel like you are doing a bunch of stuff with your life that you don’t want to be doing then you have to realize that you are deciding to do at least a lot of it.

There’s a great scene in Mad Men where Don Draper says to Peggy, “You’re good. Get better. Stop asking for things.” He says it all deadpan as is his way. It’s not often that I hear anything in a movie or on t.v. that I can take seriously. Entertainment is almost never like real life. Real conversations don’t sound like scripted ones. People hardly ever say the right thing at the right time if ever. Real scenarios never play out neatly or timeously like they do on t.v. So most of what I hear from that world I take with a grain of salt and I think that is probably as it should be.

But that quote has something of the real world in it. It smacks of wisdom. I think there are times when you most certainly have to ask for something. Sometimes you have to make your wishes or demands known. But a lot of the time we would do better to just believe in ourselves and accept the responsibility of getting better.

Asking for things is like some sort of expectation and I think it is the expectations that really get us into trouble. Life isn’t like t.v. and it also isn’t prone to meeting expectations. The sooner you rid yourself of those the sooner you can get on with getting better.

In 2008 I was playing music in pubs  three nights a week. I was playing festivals and open mics and pretty much anywhere I could. I was broke most of the time. I didn’t have a job really. I’d moved out of my old world and into a new one and I’d left a lot of my old life and associations behind. I was frustrated at my financial situation and I can’t even say that I was happy despite the fact that I was kind of living my dream. But I do know that I felt very much alive during that time. Very much alive…. I had no appreciation for just how completely amazing my situation was then and that’s part of the reason I wasn’t happy. My expectations were getting in the way. But in spite of all that I knew I didn’t want to choose anything else. I wasn’t doing fabulously but I was alright.Share on Facebook

January 19^th was a chilly Thursday in Nashville, Tennessee. An hour and a half before I was due to arrive at the National Underground to load in found me sitting at my computer in my underwear trying to attach a new button to my favorite pair of jeans. I’d made sure I got to work a little early that morning so that I could leave in time to get ready for the show. My gear was packed and ready to go but I still needed my favorite jeans fixed or I was going to be a little pissed before the night even began. I’d stopped at Walmart on my way home from work and found some buttons that would do the job but I still had to figure out how to get one sewn on well enough to keep my pants on throughout the night. Two buttons and some fishing line did the trick. I finished the job with just enough time to get dressed and hit the road.

I got to the show on time and there were no embarrassing pants moments. So here’s a few pics and a video to show you how the night went…

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