In 1990, my dad built me a recording studio. I had no idea how far I would go with music recording, but I think he did. Those two tiny rooms he constructed could have easily turned into storage, but they didn't — they became a foundry where my lifelong passion for studio recording was forged.

For the next three decades, that studio remained a fixture not just in my parents' home, but in my life. It was as much a hobby as it was a business. Most importantly, it was my happy place.

This is how the studio looked in 1992:

The studio in 2006:

By the early 2010s, the demand for studio recording by polka bands was fading out. In 2019, I closed my studio to the general public. From that point on, I only used it to record myself and a select handful of projects for a few musician friends. This is a photo of the studio from 2014:

In 2025, in preparation for the eventual sale of the house, I started gutting the studio. I set up a recording space at my residence, moved all my essential gear there, and liquidated the rest. By March of this year, the studio was completely cleaned out, leaving this haunting image:

The homestead that housed this small but venerable recording studio is now passed on to new owership, but it's all good. The timing was perfect. The studio served its purpose longer than I ever thought I would, and its end is not having any effect on my passion to create and record new music. There will be more music to come, and every button I push and every knob I twist will be a remnant of what was forged in this foundry — these two little rooms built into the basement of an old farmhouse — 36 years ago:

Thanks, Dad.

At the end of April, a major hack on a well-known web server management program caused problems for thousands of website owners all over the world. Two of my three sites went down. They were since restored, however, my ability to conveniently provide updates to those sites are still affected. My web hosting company is working dilligently to help me restore access, but for the time being, website updates will be slow and cumbersome.

To make matters worse, today I suddenly found myself unable to send and receive email through my internet service provider (Spectrum.) I don't think this problem is related to the one above, but I can't say for sure. All I know is that these concurrent problems have combined into a technical dilemma that is going to take time to fix.

For the time being, I can still be contacted through my website as normal, but direct emails sent to me at my wi.rr.com address may get delayed.

UPDATE MAY 10: My Spectrum email is working again. It just started working on its own, indicating it was a temporary glitch on Spectrum's end.

UPDATE MAY 13: My abilty to update this website using my preferred software has been restored.

UPDATE MAY 18: Everything is fixed and running smoothly. I've got to hand it to the guys at the website hosting service where my sites are hosted. Downtime is rare, but when problems occur, they jump and work non-stop to troubleshoot and get things rolling again.

I played a job in Ripon, WI today. The route was easy enough to remember — I-45 north to Hwy 23 west — that I didn't bother installing my GPS. But then I missed Hwy 23. I thought it was closer to Oshkosh. So now I'm winging it. I knew Hwy 21 would take me straight west, so I figured I'd head that way and get my bearings, but Hwy 21 west was detoured due to construction. The detour took me north to Winneconne.

Now I'm screwed because I don't know any roads up that way. I pulled over and got my phone out. My phone's GPS is disabled, but I could still Google a map of the area. Trying to drive while reading road signs and squinting at a tiny phone screen, however, proved to be impossible.

The blue route is the route I wanted. The red route is the one I took.

I rolled up to the venue just five minutes before the start of the gig. I was able to get my drums set up in less than 10 minutes, so it worked out okay. But I'm thinking I should get myself a backup GPS to keep in the car.

I truly feel bad for not being able to write April Fool's articles this year. My website traffic absolutely explodes every April 1st, so I know I'm going to be disappointing a lot of people.

If you look back at my news archives, you'll notice the frequency of my news articles dropped off significantly last summer. I have been preoccupied by other priorities over the last few years, and especially over the past several months. Don't worry, nothing is wrong. I've just been very busy and have had to take a significant amount of time away from my life to devote to other matters.

I had been hoping to release a music project this spring, but that will be delayed a few more months yet. Barring any unforeseen circumstances, I am estimating life for me to get back to normal by May. I'm looking forward to that!