There was a guy I used to know, that planted a seed he couldn't grow.

It's been 15 years since I came across a listing in the distributor's new release newsletter for Chocolate Genius's Black Music on V2 records.  It was the first i'd heard of V2 or Marc Anthony Thompson.  I was sold on the album by the mention of Melvin Gibbs, John Medeski, Chris Wood, and Abe Laboriel Sr. who'd all gotten credits on other records I'd been listening to.

When I sat down with the album, upon hearing this song (Life is the actual title of the track linked in the title above) as the opening track, I was a happy man.  Around that time I was off on a big kick, transitioning my tastes from Hip Hop and Alternative to Singers and Songwriters.  Chocolate Genius was one of the first unknown or obscure artists I championed.  The raw emotional content of his songs were so real, it passed indie muster, but the quality of the music was so rich, courtesy of Craig Street, who I'd eventually learn to trust as an arbiter of all things tasteful.

At that time, the only other record I would promote as vocally as Black Music was Grace.  I'm nowhere near as vocal about either at this point, but their influence informed my taste, and my songwriting at its core.  I would not have been as keen to take an interest in Andrew Bird, Chris Whitley, Joe Henry, and other artists (used in the most literal sense of the term) sans exposure to Chocolate Genius.  Many of my friends were into Tom Waits at that time, which seemed the best litmus test for liking Chocolate Genius, but I was not keen on balladeers, so I only dug 50% of Waits material.  Chocolate Genius tapped into a soulful tradition, closer to the Isley Brothers or Bobby Womack when he slowed things down, making his melancholy and longing more palatable for my tastes.  Thanks to this, I developed and affinity for artists who  have carved out paths as songwriters that serve the craft of writing more so than their book keeping.

This song still strikes a chord, more so now that I'm closer to, if not older than Marc Anthony Thompson when it was released.  You are what you eat.  All things considered, I thought of this as a rewrite of People Are Strange, given it's jazzy melody, but it stands on its own apart from that gem of a track by the Doors.  It's aged well. Fifteen years ago it marked a pivotal moment in my time in College, in Kirksville in particular.  That summer would set me on the path that shaped the next 10 years of my life.  Now, Five years on from the end of that personal  journey, I'm going through an interesting transition on my professional journey.  It's high time I worked on my gardening skills.