My life as a sound guy in rock and roll bands, and that kind of life, was pretty much dragging me down.
I had left home when I was seventeen. I finally got fed up with my father and moved out. I moved into an apartment with a friend of mine, worked a job, and was the sound person with a band that was pretty darn good.
They had gotten somewhat popular, and they wanted to have a record label and all of that. They had all the dreams people have of being big rock and roll stars.
But it never happened.
I do not think any of the bands I played in, or anybody I ever played with, ever became famous in rock and roll. You have to know people, you have to have money, and you have to be in the right place at the right time. For some bands, that happens. For the vast majority, it does not.
Lloyd Clayton Bowen II told me a long time ago that if I really wanted to make money in music, I needed to go to Europe and play country and western.
He was probably right.
Another friend of mine growing up had a dad who was a professional bluegrass player. We would get our guitars and go over to people’s houses and jam with the old-timers. There might be four or five of us sitting around the room. Maybe one person had a banjo or a ukulele, and the rest of us had guitars.
We would all jam together, playing blues. It was kind of a cross between bluegrass and country and western. I do not know how to explain it. We just called it blues.
Even though I have never really been a country and western listener, there is some really good, classy country and western music out there. My dad had a lot of country and western music around, and there was plenty of that influence around me.
But the rock and roll life I was in was bringing me to a crossroads.
I never did hard drugs because people around me did them, and they told me, “Don’t do that, or you’ll be addicted and you’ll die.”
And all those people are dead.
It was no joke.
So I never did hard drugs. I am lucky, and I am fortunate in the Lord, because when I was nineteen years old, people came up to me on the street and led me to the Lord.
That changed the direction of my life.
The songs I had written up to that point were folk songs. Not many of them got recorded on the four track but some through a mic directly to cassette player. Not many of them are really worth putting into AI and saying, “Regenerate this for me.” There are probably a few I might do for my own personal listening, but I would not put them out to the world.
For one thing, they did not have much real point to them. I was up all night, and what does that have to do with anything? Does that have any relevance? No, not really.
But when I became a Christian, I started writing songs with the guitar because I had this talent.
I had the ability to write lyrics, write a song, put the lyrics to it, put it together, and then sing it as well.
When I became a Christian, I thought I was going to be a Christian artist. I thought that was what God wanted for me. I thought He wanted me to write music to help change the world through music.
So I tried very hard to get into any place I could.
I tried to play along with people who were playing Christian praise songs in home meetings, small groups, events, or anywhere I could get myself into the Christian community with music.
But it just did not work out.
Finally, I begged a guy who lived way outside of town to let me play guitar. I just wanted to play second guitar to the main guy who was leading praise and worship at a home group. It was at a big house, and it was a big group meeting.
I finally got in there, and I was playing second guitar to somebody else during that time. I was trying to use my talent for the Lord.
But the Lord never really opened that door for me.
Even when I eventually went to the mission field, there was really no room for me to get up and play. I would fill in for people sometimes. Even though I could play drums, keyboards, bass, and guitar, I did not even ask to fill in most of the time.
Basically, music was not something God wanted me to do publicly.
That may come as a surprise for people listening to my music today, especially now that it is highly produced with AI. But back then, it was not something that opened up for me.
Nevertheless, I continued to write songs.
They were for me.
That is what happened throughout my early Christian years. I always had an acoustic guitar.
I had an old 12-string guitar that my dad bought for me at a pawn shop. It was broken on the back end. It had a dent about the size of your hand, and there was a hole in it. But it was a Yamaha dreadnought 1970s 12-string guitar, and it had the most beautiful sound.
It was so mellowed out. The top of it was white pine, but it had mellowed into a darker brown. The sound was just out of this world.
I would bend my head down over that 12-string guitar and write my own music for myself.
I would listen to it for myself too.
I had a little cassette player strapped to my belt, and I would put my cassettes in it.
For me.
No one else.
My songs were kind of like David in the Old Testament, where it says he consoled himself in the Lord. David probably made up songs to console himself, before and after he was king.
Basically, that is what I was doing.
Some of my songs were evangelistic. Some were praise songs. Some were just me and life.
I was writing songs, carrying an acoustic guitar around, and experiencing life. I did not know where it was all going. I had no real music career. I had no open door into Christian music.
But I kept writing.
I kept playing.
I kept singing.
Those songs were not really for the public at that time. They were not polished recordings. They were not radio songs. They were not part of a career.
They were songs I used to console myself in the Lord.
Read Chapter 7: Seminary Love Songs That Cost Me a Broken Heart — The Story of Ailie Mae