nouns
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random journal entry
🕑 Added 2025-09-05 02:46:21 +0000 UTCanother long hour day of working.
hope i can make the sound i want.
it's weird how sound is always so hard to actually grasp.
you know.
going to ramble a bit, just for the sake of it. i don't mean to be self-interested, but i am tired, and i'm just in the mood for typing.
i was diagnosed obsessive compulsive as a teenager. i had spent 12 years prior obsessing over justice, health, sin, filth, you name it (thinking it fairly normal to loop thoughts about sin all throughout the day,) and 18 years thereafter obsessing over what it means to make something worthwhile. i was always consumed with dreams of the future. first, it was the dream to move to new york to work for stan lee, and make comics. i was a toddler. then, around age 11 i decided i wanted to be a filmmaker working in the big city. i still would do, if the opportunity arose, but, when i was a child, the world seemed endless. dreams, very far off. my ambition felt free, with time ahead of it. i was pretty obsessed with the war in iraq as a kid. i had no concept of geopolitics, of course, but through punk music i was influenced to be against bush on principle. eventually, i became interested in culture jamming, and dreamt of making documentaries about the topic. i went out and placed tags here and there once i could drive. i enjoyed stencil work. with my band 1955, i was able to explore politics at the time. i was lucky to meet other people in my area that shared interests in that regard-- especially given that i grew up in a town of only 600 people. i had many dreams. but, i got too far into the album making, and the concept records, and that pretty much sold away most of my future– i wasn't going to leave my post anytime soon, at least until i was finished with my job.
it's been since 2007 that i've been steadily producing music from a bedroom, regardless of releasing it or not, and though the four walls around me change frequently through the years, they always seem to be quite close, closer than i'd like, almost constricting. you know, they're always quite beige, in truth. in the early morning, when i try to fall asleep, there's a great panic that comes over me about all this, about getting through to the sound i want to achieve, about being understood, about health... about making my loved ones proud. any and all of that. it's funny how music can become an obsession so arresting. consuming. i can't help but stare at the window unit; the current temperature sits around 63 at night, and it bothers me because it's not an even number, but i stare all the while wondering if it will change to 64, or 62. the top of the 3 is satisfyingly flat. the 3 in general, looks like a backwards E. i just lay and wait and watch the thing until i decide it's time to turn over. i think of melodies then. i take 50,000 milligrams of vitamin D every other day. i cook. i watch films and think of what it might be like to have been on the set of them. i scout out talented session musicians, and scrawl in my notebook who will do what where, and when, and how i will fit it all together when i can, and what reference will be put here, and what is necessary for the audience to know here, and there, and this and that. i stare at 63 again the next night, into the morning. repeat, repeat. it's not profound, or interesting. it's just... another night.
if i'm not thinking about the album, i mostly think about film. in 2019 i finally began directing short films again, for the first time since high school. those were fun. now that i'm a bit far away from my loved ones that i enjoy making movies with, i've been a tad somber. and always concerned with health. goodness, me; the ever-casting shadow of health.
a few years ago, in the middle of while of unsound mind, it became clear to me that i could no longer hear very well out of my left ear. in fact, i couldn't hear most frequencies some days. knowing that i would not be stopping the recording of the album, pacing 14 hours a day, for 5 days a week, for 3 months straight. i decided to slow my roll a little, taking every other day off, and perhaps limiting my 14 hour days to every other day. in order to mix my music properly-- i mix as i go-- i would consistently switch the L/R output cables running from my interface and judge the levels accordingly. the vertigo began shortly after this sudden discovery, and the tinnitus, and then it became apparent that i was no longer the same person i had been growing up. i had either done damage to my vestibular system over the years between playing shows with local bands while working at the sawmill, or this could just be something that lied dormant in wait– maybe comorbid with celiac. who knows? we've landed on meniere's for now, but it's difficult to tell.
there's only so much context i can give to people for them to be in on what nouns always was. i would like that though. i think in the early days i relied heavily on reaching out to those that were in on it with me already– i didn't think many people outside of my local friend group would listen, and when they did, they would laugh knowing what i was doing. i mean, it was a goof . the author robert moore, aka red hawk, was my college english teacher and he said these words frequently: "tell the truth, no matter how bad it makes you look." well, i had been writing these overly-poetic lyrics for 1955 for about 4 years at that point. i decided, wouldn't it be interesting to just start writing bluntly, conversationally, and even make fun of all of it at the same time? it would make me laugh. i became conflicted though-- amazing spider-man, which was not a very good film by any means but effective nonetheless, had come out around that time, and i saw it in theaters 3 times. i became obsessed with the idea that i must be a just person, like peter parker. almost altruistic. it didn't help that henry rollins had done a bit of a speech about the importance of young people being altruistic around that time. for me, doing good in the world meant making art that could help people. i knew bands like RVIVR did such a thing-- something wholesome, that felt like music a hero could make. i wasn't much of a hero though. i was, and am, just a nerd. my whole life outside of making music was, is, collecting comics, watching anime, and playing videogames... i didn't have much of a backstory to really shape me into some kind of person that knew what being good meant. but either way, it seemed like the best thing to do for me was try to walk the line between bluntly talking about mental health, and making jokes about just how silly one can feel when they feel so bad for so long. i mean, hell, i was NOT feeling well, in any sense of the word. it was a hard time. so i thought, it would be nice to tell the truth without mincing words, wouldn't it? so, i decided to try to make music that a "good," "honest" person would make, while also being a bit contrary. in the same breath, i found the notion of celebrity a bit ridiculous and thought it funny to misshape the narrative of what nouns was. i don't know. i started writing 'still.'
i'd like to say: i thank god for red hawk's many inklings of wisdom. he changed the course of my life.
while working on still, i was putting together a collection of songs that i thought could become the basis for a project that would make fun of the then-current state of post-punk revival and midwest emo– self-indulgence, self-pity, all of it. this wouldn't be too far off from 1955's dealings: we were fairly combative toward the punk and hardcore scene and subsequent attitude, and especially toward the christian metal scene around us. we were rude, political, and proud. we thought of it as a sort of kayfabe; DJ and I are both big fans of wrestling. people with the context knew that many of us from southeast arkansas were quite a bit facetious. it just ran in our veins down that way. everyone was silly. hell, strike the choir jokingly outlawed "two-hand tapping" on guitar for a minute there because more than one band decided to do it in our scene. i miss those days. we all had something.
still bummed is more funny to me in retrospect. i didn't know the first thing about making noise music, or making good satire, or making anything really. i was just doing something in my bedroom. i knew i thought emo and post-punk had become so far removed from their origins that i despised the notion of them (you had to see the strokes around the time of still bummed and my face in horror watching them on television.) well, i would show DJ or Dustin what i was working on, and they'd say it was pretty alright. or, i'd write up the songs, hoping they'd be used in some kind of live band one day. it wasn't that important. my hopes were tied up in a local crust band i had recently joined. i put the album out a few minutes after it was finished. i wrote most of the lyrics mocking myself, my woes, my many interests that i came to think of as pretentious... i named the thing 'still bummed.' i nicknamed the dog on the cover "consume dog." it was my third solo album. i knew it would not turn heads with my friend group, and continued playing in bands. i did send it to topshelf records in hopes it would get picked up (as 1955 had done with its album 'lions', but still bummed was turned down) i ended up attending sxsw very shortly after its release, and passed out CD-R's of it, some of which ended up on the ground or in trash bins (which made me laugh.) after watching a loma prieta set, i walked to the topshelf table and gave them a copy of still bummed again. maybe they filed it away somewhere. i always think that's amusing.
anyway, i continued working on 'still': the name an homage to still by joy division. and now that i had the name nouns to myself, i wanted to put out an actual album with it. something worth being proud over. and after that, i was going to change sounds, explore jazz. since i didn't have a fan base really, i could do that. change it however i felt, as many times as i wanted. i felt that from the beginning, it would become apparent that nouns was just me exploring music.
everyday back then was bad. i made sure of it. i wasn't a happy kid, and i was never determined to be happy. it's only looking back that i wish i could somehow tell myself to enjoy those years. i would come home from school and just turn on star trek and fall asleep to it within the first 10 minutes, then wake for supper, eat, and go to my room and record music until i felt tired again. some nights i'd forego recording to play games. on the weekends, i'd work some, and i'd drive two hours to a comic shop and buy comics. really, that seems like a good deal now. i had health, and i had the future. and most importantly of all, i had less pressure than i would in the future. i should've known that. hindsight and all. hell, man. you had your dog, and your folks were in good health. you had your best friends. look... they're all going to move off one day. you don't know that yet. it's gonna get real lonely. so if you feel lonely now, well, buckle up. just make movies with your friends. play shows with the other southeast arkansas bands. have fun. laugh.
as for nouns, i always said that this would be a long project for anyone that wanted to come on board– always wishing for it to be more than a bedroom project– that it would be a project where each album played into another, and each one with a great change in sound, paying homage and celebrating many different artists that had come before, celebrating every kind of music any one of us could possibly try to make, celebrating do-it-yourself production, relying on storytelling, hoping to slowly push the many punk subgenres toward a shift in direction. a positive shift. i think of it as a celebration of creativity. nothing fancy. just what a person can do. there were other musicians in southeast arkansas that wanted the same thing and we all got onboard, but of course everyone eventually has to die, move, get married, or stop playing in rock bands. i feel silly sometimes, now further into composition than i ever was, obsessing over albums. i see the shift against albums and i can only say "oh, huh." i guess it doesn't matter one way or the other, since i seem incapable of changing my life's goals. i'm stubborn. no matter the direction of music as an industry, i intend to just stay the course and do what i think must be done. i know that sounds a bit serious. i'm smiling, if it means anything to you.
Comments
jully
thank you for being vulnerable. your thoughts on just being a person- just wanting to be good and honest - really resonates with me. i feel like we're expected to become more and something exciting. but really it's just okay to be the best human you can be. leveraging your art to fill that need is awesome and really that's what it's about. music creates community through sound and common ideals. it's hard to find decent people who just want to create and be "good". it's the most human thing we can do - especially in a world like ours right now. tbh the great thing about music is you can put that in short films, you can really do anything with it. combine those passions and see what comes out. i hope that makes sense. i love the nouns lore dump. i have been listening for years and i have been chasing the sound you've created. nothing sounds like nouns. i am constantly chasing the high of hearing ski mask, weird beard, or coma wall for the first time. when unsound mind came out i listened to it on my headphones. i struggle with hearing loss too from local shows and just trying to drown out my mind. that album was so devastating and haunted, but so hopeful at the same time. lonely place of dyin also equally devastating but hopeful. i love that about your music. it's incredibly powerful, emotional - you feel it in your chest and in your gut. to this day i have not found music that hits me like nouns does. i'm not trying to be a kiss-ass, just being honest. to see the other side was absolutely insane. the parts where you talk about sending someone off to afghanistan and seeing your family in one place again brings me to tears. i remember my cousin coming home from basic and being shipped off. my folks moved far away and i see them maybe once a year. the idea of them all being in one place again. of unsound mind got me through my first year of sobriety, really just thank you. take care of yourself. take care of your health. thank you for staying true to what you want your music to be. stoked as fuck for the new album.
Phoebe Griffin
Very interesting read and very relatable as well. I think as someone who’s been trying to do something creative with herself for pretty much my whole life, it’s overwhelming to think of so many things to do across all of these different artforms and mediums - things to dip your toes into. I’ve also bounced between wanting to direct films, make music, make games, or just YouTube videos, so that hits home. Also just being proud of something you made at one point only to come back down and think you could’ve done so much more with it. It’s daunting, and this read really hit me in that way. Very excited for the new album, glad you’re taking your time with it. Also, wasn’t aware you’re a wrestling fan! Much love <3
