TRANSMISSION 26 & 27

I landed in Paris this morning after playing a show last night. I've had about 2 hours of sleep. I'm typing this to you from the bed in my hotel room that I am very excited to use after I hit send on this.

Yesterday, I debuted a new song called Suffer during my set. I used the show as a way to motivate me out of writers block and to finally make something out of the stack of ideas I had laying around. I started this track a few months ago and thanks to Lucas Polo, I was able to get some studio time to record ambient synths and watch him lay down some guitars and bass. I play guitar on this song too and synths. Lucas and I tag teamed and it was rad to watch him munched over a pedal board smashing knobs while I plunked away. Did you know I play guitar? I also wrote and produced it thus far. 

Anyway, I was working on this track right up until I had to leave my house for sound check. In record time I took a super basic demo and made it into something listenable. I was proud of myself for how far it came in 48 hrs. 

Here are the lyrics if you wanna read them. They are also a work in progress but some of them will survive the chopping block. I wrote it about relationship power struggles and wanted it to be wide enough conceptually to fit the current situation we are living in. Lemme know if any parts resonate with you, *|FNAME|*. I hope it all does. 

It will be better with headphones as it has not been mixed AT ALL. It's a raw dog, OK? I didn't have time to get into the dynamics but that's what punk is all about. 
______

SUFFER - Demo_7.13.25 

LISTEN NOW HERE: https://freakdaddy.bandcamp.com/track/suffer-demo-71325

TURN MY HEART LIKE AN HOURGLASS
UPSIDE DOWN LIKE YOU’RE WAITING FOR THE SUN
TURN ME OFF LIKE YOU TURN ME ON
TORTURE ME UNTIL YOU
LOVE YOURSELF                       
SILLY ME
SOON OR LATER WE ALL BURN DOWN
GOT A LONG WAY TO GO TO FEEL SOMETHIN

YOU WANNA MAKE ME SUFFER
YOU MAKE ME RUN FOR COVER

TREAT MY LOVE LIKE A LAZARETH
TOO AFRAID TO TOUCH BUT YOU’LL RAISE THE DEAD
DRAIN MY BLOOD FOR THE SACRAMENT
BUT YOUR LOADED WORDS UP AGAINST MY HEAD
YOU GOT HOLLOW TIP ROUNDS
AIMED AT YOUR TARGET
GO ON AND TAKE ME DOWN

YOU WANNA MAKE ME SUFFER
YOU MAKE ME RUN FOR COVER

Thanks for the kind words about my new demo! Means a lot to share a rough draft and get good feedback to keep going. I’ll let you know when it’s finished. 

I am home from Paris and feeling exhausted. This week’s email is making up for missing last week. I had to go straight from the train station into work as we prepared to celebrate the 20 year anniversary of Imogen’s record Speak for Yourself Friday and I feel like I’ve been hanging on by a thread. Feels like major highs and major lows. 

Right now I’m laying on the floor after an exhausting day of doing the tech set up needed for her live stream which is happening as I type. She launched a beta chat space that me and the team worked very hard to launch today and so far so good! ;) 

I’m watching her stream talking about the record and instantly I’m transported back to 16 year old me who heard that record for the first time. Speak for Yourself changed my life as a producer and allowed me to see a future for myself beyond the cookie cutter industry I had been brought up in as a teenager. It also was the soundtrack to me surviving one of the worst years of my life as my family fell apart and I lost my development/record deal. So many traumatic things happened that year personally that would require a trigger warning to get into and the only way I coped was by driving around in my car blaring those tracks and holding out hope that there was a future for me worth staying alive to see. 

In 2023 when I dropped my record SGSM, I cold DM’d Imogen and told her that. To my surprise she responded and to my even greater surprise, she fucked with the music I was making enough that now, a few years later, I am here at her house helping her celebrate its 20th anniversary. To say this feels like some kind of cosmic full circle moment is an understatement. 

+++ j'adore ça ici +++

This weekend in Paris was incredible. I saw so many beautiful places and experienced the incredible food and the culture there. Met some very beautiful people. I felt free and happy for the first time in a while despite also holding the weight of the world and my worry for my sick mother behind twitching eyelids. 

The first night in Paris, I took myself to this performance of Mozart’s last requiem at Place de la Madeleine and sat front row center in a giant, blue, skirt as an orchestra filled the incredible church with music. The sound bounced off of 20 foot tall angels carved out of marble that hoisted up Mary who looked down over the crowd with her eternal love.

When I arrived, I was delighted to get to sit front row center. The empty seat next to me didn’t stay that way as a mother and her son arrived and she asked me in French if he could with there. I silently agreed. He wiggled his 9 year old body onto the seat and could barely sit still as we waited for the show to begin. Unaware of himself, he jostled me over and over as he turned to speak to his mother sitting behind us. I found myself feeling very annoyed by him and when he started to hiccup I was internally squirming. I invited my judgment, anger and annoyance to come sit with me on that front row too. I decided to ask the emotions some questions and see where they were coming from. 

“Who made you feel this way when you were a little boy?” I thought. 

Easy, my dad. 

He couldn’t stand it if I showed any signs of life much less the messiness of being a human brand new to the world. I couldn’t make him look bad in front of other adults or get on his nerves that were always fried from last nights hangover … so I learned to be almost silent…to have no needs. 

I felt into my frustration at this young boy and saw where my father got it wrong. It felt like the gaze of Mary fell on us both and a green shoot of nurturing compassion managed to squirm up through the layers of self judgmental cement I poured to keep myself safe. 

I stopped struggling to find ways to control him or feel sorry for myself for having to deal with his annoyance. Like the clouds parting and rays of sun emerging, I felt compassion for him having no control over his diaphragm that made his small body lurch every few seconds. Instead, I sat with him while he shook and quietly read the book he pulled out of his pocket. I felt a kinship to him - like I saw myself as a child. I was able to rewrite the way my father responded to me even if it was just a silent conversation in my own mind. 

Internal dialogue resolved, I relaxed and waited for the show to begin smiling at the entire thought experiment. His hiccups faded and soon I noticed that as I would shift positions in my chair during the performance, he would instinctively copy me. Taking cues from me as an older man of how to hold his body and watch this public performance. It was a profound experience to witness and feel so much healing energy from being open to something aside from my own self judgement and projection of the pain I didn’t deserve and neither did he. 

+++ TikTok Talks +++

I took to TikTok this week to talk about the things I mentioned in my email last week. After watching a trans man get publicly crucified I figured it was right to not leave him out there on his own saying the things we all feel but don’t want to face the public backlash of recording and broadcasting to the world. 

I want to write more about the subject but for now I’m just trying to finish this email finally without having a panic attack. I can feel my heart racing in my chest and my head spinning over wanting to be less consumed with grief and fear of the unknown but I’m not. I’m a mess inside my head. I’m trying to cope and it’s on a razors edge right now. I’m looking around myself trying to focus on how grateful I am and it’s helping but I miss my friends. 

//////

XO- Freak

P.S. What you read above is a portion of the full letter I email to my fans each week. If you want to see it, hop on my email list. To read previous letters, subscribe to my Substack.

In light of the loss of suicide prevention hotlines in the US, please take advantage of the community I started over on Discord. If you still need access, just text me. If you feel like you’re on the brink and can’t get a hold of anyone to talk to just shoot me a text. I am always happy to listen.

DARCHNERVE TEXT LINE: 323-657-3474