Matt Wahl On-Line

I use this page as a journal of my tours and travels. I hope you enjoy it, but please, no comments on spelling and grammer :)

04/02/07: I was right about Flipperstock being a great time. It was a wonderful weekend. I put the photos up already on the Photos page. We went to bed about midnight and the alarm went off at 3am Friday morning. We pulled out of Knoxville about 4:30am and arrived in St. Louis about 8 hours later. I never really caught up on my sleep and tried to just live off coffee the whole weekend. There was so much going on that I didn't want to miss it! I was sort of out of it from lack of sleep and wired from the coffee all at the same time! The weekend flew by and we pulled back into our driveway at about 8pm last night. On the CD front, if I can get my work done this evening, all of the stuff will go to the manufacturer tomorrow night. I should have the finished CD's in my hands by the end of April. I am leaving early Wednesday morning for Eau Claire and I am excited to be back up north. I'll be hitting the Barley Club next Wednesday (4/11) for show and it will be great to be back. Enjoy the day!

03/26/07: Happy Monday! I am very excited about Flipperstock this coming weekend. This will be my first time visiting St. Louis and the whole state of Missouri for that matter and it's going to be a great event. There are quite a few acts scheduled to play and I'm thrilled to be included in the line-up. The ones I have heard are wonderful and I'm guessing the same is true for those I haven't yet heard. Cynthia gets to come with me. We are going to leave pretty early Friday morning and make the drive over. Next week, I have an even bigger drive in store as I am making my first trip back to WI since moving down here and it will be great to be back. My brother is flying in from California and we are going to have some good family time. The folks at the Barley Club have been nice enough to let me sneak in a show while I am in town. So on Wednesday, April 11th, I'll be back at the Barley Club for the first time since September! That's all for now. New CD news coming soon!

03/15/07: I just got a package from my friends Dale and Peach. Peach found an article I have to share. It is from the Associated Press. The headline is "1 burned, 1 charged in 'Jackass' stunt" Here is the body of the article: "Attempts to duplicate a movie stunt landed one man in the hospital with burned genitals and another facing criminal charges. The men were trying to do a stunt from one of the "Jackass" movies, in which a character lights his genitals on fire. Jared W. Anderson, 20, suffered serious burns to his hands and genitals, according to the criminal complaint. Randell D. Peterson, 43, who sprayed lighter fluid on Anderson and lit him on fire, was charged with felony battery and first-degree reckless endangerment Tuesday. Witnesses told police that Anderson, who was drunk, volunteered to do the stunt Sunday after watching the movie, the complaint said. After Peterson ignited Anderson, he ran into the bathroom, jumped into the tub and put the flames out, according to the complaint. He was taken to Luther Hospital and eventually treated at the Regions Hospital Burn Unit in St. Paul, Minn., for second-degree burns. Anderson told police that he didn't want anyone to get in trouble because of the stunt. Peterson was freed on a $2000 bond. He has a hering scheduled April 16. If convicted he faces up to 10 years in prison." And where did this whole incident take place? Eau Claire, WI!!!! Dale and Peach just heard "Hold My Beer...Watch This! for the first time last Thursday at Rapscallions! And then they find this article in the paper. Wow! They said "Now we know where you get your material!!"

03/15/07: Life has sure taken a turn for the better! Last Sunday afternoon, staring at me from the shelves of a Food City grocery store in Knoxville, almost 900 miles away from it's birthplace in Chippewa Falls, WI were several six packs of Leinenkugel's Sunset Wheat! I bought them all! Then yesterday, I was in another Food City in Maryville, TN and they had it too. I bought them all! This has been my favorite beer since Leinies released it last spring. It's so good to have it readily available again. I am headed home in April and I was going to stock up. No need! That's not the only good news. If all goes as planned the audio portion of the new CD will be done by the middle of next week. It's really coming along. Cynthia was nice enough to take some photos yesterday and I think I got one that I will use for the back of the record. I hope to have it in my hands sometime in April. I owe a big thanks to everyone who came out last Thursday and made my debut at Rapscallions in Land O'Lakes, FL such a great time. What a fun place and a wonderful crowd. Billy and Dale took some photos of me out by the lake and I hope I didn't make any goofy faces and that I might be able to use some of those on the CD too. I just posted all of my current dates through the end of September. I'll be adding some more but what I have so far is on the Tour Dates page. Take care!

03/07/07: It is with a bit of sadness that I get packed up and ready to leave Naples. I am looking forward to getting home but it has been such a great three weeks. I owe the Naples Parrothead Club a huge THANKS for taking me under their wing (heee, heee, heee) coming out to see me, hanging out and giving me my first oppotunity to buy socks from a vending machine :-) I'll let everyone else wonder about that. I've had great shows, golf games, boat rides, dinners, etc, etc, etc, So THANKS to everyone for making my South Florida stay such a wonderful time. I hope to see some familiar faces up at Rapscallions tomorrow night and I hope to post some photos soon too. Enjoy the day!

02/21/07: I have confirmed the rest of my shows here in Florida and they are all a go! Just a reminder to anyone thinking of going to the Marco Beach Ocean Resort that there is a dress code. You have wear long pants and full shoes. In other words, no shorts or sandals. At least for the guys. I think ladies can wear dresses and such. I had someone come to see me last year who had shorts on and they made him leave! It's a very nice place and I sure don't want to discourage anyone. I guess those are just the rules and I wanted to pass them on. Have a great day!

02/20/07: My Grandma had a wonderful saying, "What holds you up, holds you down." The south west Florida music scene is strange. It runs pretty fast and loose compared to what I am used to. I am used to booking gigs well in advance and doing my best to promote those gigs. It doesn't often work that way down here. In fact last year, I think I booked 5 or 6 extra shows while I was in town. Sometimes I would get a call that morning and do a show that night. So it seems that if someone is hanging around here for a while and is ambitious enough to track down gigs and professional enough to actually go and play those gigs the fast and loose, "we'll see what happens" attitude toward live music can be an advantage. (That's the "hold you up" part) It can go the other way too. I showed up at the English Pub yesterday to get set up for my show and the guy that ran the pub and booked the music is gone and apparently so are all the gigs he booked. They didn't give me any details but I guess it happened just a week or so ago. That would have been nice information to have any time prior to showing up there to play but again, that seems to be par for the course with some places. So I apologize if you happen to be in Naples, FL and happened to come out to the English Pub to see me last night. I'll keep my fingers crossed about the rest of the shows and now I have to get my Sharpie out and change the several hundred post cards I made again with the apparently illogical idea that you schedule shows in advance, promote them and they will actually exist when it comes time to play.

02/14/07: Happy Valentine's Day! I'm running around like crazy trying to get ready to hit the road. I'm headed for Naples tonight. I'm trying to plan it perfectly so I avoid rush hour in Atlanta and Tampa. I can't wait to get back down to Florida. I have a really nice schedule with some great shows and a bit of time off. I'm really looking forward to it. I feel like I'm still catching up a bit from this past weekend. Cynthia and I went over to Pigeon Forge for Trop Rocks the Smokies. It was a wonderful event. The music sounded great and I saw a bunch of people I haven't seen since Key West. I stayed out too late and maybe had a beer or two too many but it was worth it. Some dear friends from Milwaukee made the trip down and I talked them in to stopping by our place on the way to the airport and singing on my record! I'm going to keep packing and get ready for the sun! See you soon.

02/04/07: Happy Super Bowl Sunday. I like games where I don't really have a strong favorite to win. I should be loyal to the NFC North and cheer for the Bears but I like Tony Dungy and it would be nice to see him win a Super Bowl so either way I hope for a good game! I have some some big music news. First, my debut show in TN was a great. I played at the Lost Savant last night. I have done a couple of open mics there but this was my first actual show here in Knoxville and in the state of Tennessee. A bunch of great people came out and made it a fun night. So thank you very much if you were there. It is exciting to be back playing again. Speaking of exciting, we went to a fun Christmas Eve party where I met a talented songwriter/guitarist named Brian. Brian and I got together again about a month ago. We shared some songs and talked a bit about music and the idea of starting a little side project. If you have seen me play live, you probably know I have a passion for playing the music of Johnny Cash. I told Brian that I would love to put together a band that did nothing but Johnny Cash music. He called his drummer friend Lou and we got together on a Saturday night in early January and things clicked right away. We have been practicing once a week ever since and we are putting together a nice show of tunes. I told the folks at the Lost Savant about this and they wanted to book the band. So on Saturday, March 24th Cash Please! will take the stage for the very first time. We have been having a lot of fun rehearsing and it will be fantastic to get out and do a show. Enjoy the game and have a great week!

01/29/07: Time for a long over due update. Things have been pretty crazy down here in TN. I'm back on the home-improvement horse. After all the work we did to our home in Eau Claire, we had been thinking of how nice it would be to find something down here that didn't need any work. Truth be told, the work is usually fun and very rewarding when it's over. So we ripped out all the carpet and put in new floors in all the rooms but the kitchen and bathrooms. We have the tile for the kitchen and that will go in when I get home from Florida. Speaking of Florida, that trip is coming up fast! I have been trying to practice a little bit every day. It's something I haven't had to worry about for a long time. When I was playing as much as I was before the move, all the songs were pretty fresh. Now I'm not sure I remember all of the words to all of my songs let alone all the covers! So I'd rather figure those out now as opposed to at a gig :-) It also seems to be a good idea to get my voice and fingers in shape too. The songs I'm not having any trouble with are the songs on the new CD. Listening to them each a billion times has pretty much burned them into my brain. The recording is done and as of today, I think the mixing is done too. This is the part I was worried about. I'm not sure when I will be able to quit analyzing it, call it done and send it in but I think I am getting close! That's about all from down here in TN. I have my first local gig this weekend so that is exciting. Talk with you soon.

01/06/07: Happ New Year! 2007 is off to a great start. I have added some more tour dates to the Tour Dates page including a great stop on my way home from Naples, and my first show in my new home of Knoxville, TN! I have also been invited to join a fantastic line up of entertainers in Laughlin, NV for Phins to the West in May. It will be my first time flying to a gig and I am very excited to be a part of that event. That's it for now. I promised myself I would finish some harmonica parts on the CD today.

12/28/06: I hope everyone had a great Christmas and that you are gearing up for a fantastic 2007! People have been asking about tour dates so I put my February and March dates up today. I am still hoping to add a few dates while I am in Florida and I will post those as they come up. But that is all I know right now. We closed on our house last Thursday and spent Thursday night, Friday and Saturday getting all our stuff moved from storage and the apartment to the house. That went smoothly and we were starting to feel a bit settled when, through the help of our cats, we found out that free, with the purchase of our home, came fleas! We treated the cats and moved them back to the apartment and fogged the house. After we were clear to go back, we started washing everything. The cats are back and seem to be OK, everything we own has been cleaned and things are starting to get back to normal. We are going to spend the weekend getting our stuff organized and unpacked and hopefully, by the first of the year, we will feel moved in. That will be just in time to start ripping up the carpet, painting and putting in the hardwood floor! Despite all the work, it is great to be back in a house. For the first time in my life, I own a dishwasher, a flat top range, an attched garage and garage door openers. I have visited homes where people have been lucky enough to get both cars in the garage and open and close the garage door from the comfort of their car. It seems like a simple thing but it feels great! If you ever saw our house in Eau Claire, you know that we had a huge garage, but it only had one small garage door. We could never get both cars in at the same time, it wasn't attached and we didn't have garage door openers. Life is good! I hope everyone has a safe and fun New Years Eve. Talk with you soon.

12/8/06: Happy Sunny Saturday from Louisville, TN! I hope your weekend is off to a great start. I just got back from a very hilly, but wonderful bike ride. I do miss the bike trails back in Eau Claire but these hills are sure a workout. It has been what they call "cold" down here this week. It is 39 now. On Monday it was 24 in the morning and the guy on the radio said it is "dangerously cold" outside. That made me laugh. A couple of business notes. I have had a few folks tell me that they found it difficult to order CD's from my web site. It always made sense to me, but then again, I built it. I think the trouble came from the fact that, over the years, I have added different ways to buy my CD's. At first it was only at the shows or by sending me a check. Then I hooked up with CD Baby. They are an independant, on-line, music store. I ship them CD's that they keep in inventory. People can then visit CD Baby.com and buy CD's, securly, with a credit card and CD Baby bills their credit card, ships them the CD's, keeps a bit of money for their troubles and send me the rest. That is slick because I don't have to worry about taking credit card orders over the web. Now, CD Baby has teamed up with many of the folks doing Digital Distribution. This is like the iTunes Music Store for example, where you can purchase and download a single song for $0.99 or a whole record for $9.99. I love this. You get the music instantly. You can play it on your computer, your mp3 player or burn it onto a CD. You don't get an actual CD and I miss reading all the notes inside but you also don't have them laying around! I have not bought a physical CD in quite a while. I decided yesterday to try to clear up the confusion. I took a break from recording and set up a "On-Line Store." You can access it from the home page or from the CD page. It outlines, I hope clearly, the 3 different ways you can buy my CD's, tells you how each option works and, in the case of CD Baby and iTunes, gives you direct links to the pages for the last three of my CD's. I would love to have people take a look at it and let me know if it makes sense. I also revamped the CD page. I think part of the confusion was that the different links and ways to purchase CD's were spread all over a long page. This is much cleaner and I hope clearer. I will add sample songs from each CD eventually. They are all still there for the Fun Side of Life but I only have a couple from the first 3 CD's. Speaking of CD's, the recording on number 5 is coming along quite nicely if I can say so myself. I have rhythm guitar, bass and piano done on all of the songs and vocals done on 4 of the 12 songs. I may go back and add piano to one more and I still have a bunch of harmonica to record. Cyndi has a conference next week in Balimore. I am tagging along. We are staying right on the water just blocks away from Fells Point. That is the Duval Street or the French Quarter of Baltimore for lack of a better description. It should be a great time. That's all for now. Have a great weekend!

12/01/06: Happy December. It is a weird day in Knoxville. It is 72 degrees right now at 7am and will be down to 40 by this afternoon. It is really windy with lots of stormy looking clouds. But the high in Eau Claire today is 27 so I'll take it! We may be the proud owners of a house. We'll find out today. That has pretty much occupied my whole week. I did take some time this morning to put up a new page with all of my photos from Meeting of the Minds in Key West. If you go to the photos page and click on the photo all the way at the bottom. That is me at Kelly McGuire's event at the Lighthouse. That will open up the page with all of the photos, descriptions and links to the web pages of all the musicians I played with in the photos. It was such a great time. Have a wonderful weekend.

11/22/06: I got a couple of emails from people and they said this wasn't current so I thought I would add an update. Not much is new so I guess it is current after all! :-) Things are good down here in Knoxville. I have been recording a bunch and things are moving along on the new CD. I knew there would be good things and bad things about trying to do all of this my self. In the studio, after we record a part, we listen to it a couple of times and if we like it, that's it, it's done. Since it's just me, one day I might think something sounds just fine but when I go back to it later, it doesn't and I end up redoing it. So it is a slower process but completely hands on and I like that. We are headed to Kentucky tomorrow to spend Thanksgiving with Cyndi's dad, his wife and some of her family. I hope everyone has a fantastic weekend and I'll up date this more often.

11/7/06: I just slept for over 12 hours and that's good. Right before I did that, I spent 18 hours in the car, mostly driving, sometimes sleeping (hopefully not while driving!) and stopping once in a while for gas and coffee. But I made it home and it was sure worth it. I have been hearing about Meeting of the Minds for years and finally, with some prodding and booking help from my friends Rick and Sherry in the Milwaukee club, I made the trip. It was a blast! I met so many great people, musicians and Parrotheads alike and got to hear a ton of fantastic music. It was such a good week. I played more harmonica in the last few days than I have ever played in my life but it gave me a chance to play with some incredible musicians. I sat in with Jerry and Mike from Stars on the Water at the Conch, I played harp with Kelly McGuire, Rob Mehl, Hugo Duarte and a bunch of other folks at Kelly's Songwriter Showcase at the Lighthouse and Kelly even let me join him with Sunny Jim at the Blue Heaven. I played so much harmonica that one person, when they found out I have CD's of my own asked "Do the songs on your CD's have any lyrics to them?" Since he had only seen me as a harmonica player, I guess that is a valid question. It still made me laugh. But my favorite part of the week were the times I got to play and sing my own songs. Jerry and Mike would take a break each night and give me a chance to jump on stage and play a few songs and Kelly McGuire let me do a few slots at his Lighthouse showcases. And I did get to do several of my songs for all the great Parrotheads that joined us on the Fury Catamaran on that rainy Thursday evening out in the Gulf. I was really hoping to get the chance to share some of my music. I didn't know if that would happen but thanks to Jerry, Mike, Kelly and all the folks on the cruise, it did, and I got to, for the first time, play and sing my songs in Key West. Thanks to everyone for making this past week such a wonderful time.I hope to see you all soon.

10/27/06: I know that those headed for Key West might already be on their way. My good friend Jerry Gontang is in a band called Stars On The Water out of San Diego, CA. Jerry has invited me to sit in with them on harmonica and play solo during their breaks at their shows at the Conch Seafood Republic: Wednesday, 6-10pm, Thursday, 6-10pm, Saturday, 7-11pm and Sunday, 6-10pm. I will be late on Thursday but I'll join them as soon as I can. It is so nice of them to share their stage and to give me a musical home for my first Meeting of the Minds. For those who are going, travel safe. See you soon.

10/26/06: Hey There! I hope everyone is doing well. I am finally back on-line down here in Tennessee. It took a while and a couple of trips to Office Depot but I always feel a bit more in touch when I have constant internet access. I am getting packed and ready to head down to Key West for Meeting of the Minds. MOTM is the Parrotheads in Paradise annual convention. I have wanted to attend for several years and now that the drive is cut in half (compared to a trip down from Wisconsin) I am going! I have one gig booked as a solo act, that is a Great Lakes Regional Meet and Greet Sunset Cruise on Thursday. I know they do have a few spots open if you are going to MOTM and want to see the sunset from a boat before catching Jerry Jeff. I may be sitting in on harmonica and strumming and singing a bit more. I'll post those as soon as I can confirm them. Have a great weekend and maybe I'll see some of you in Key West!

10/20/06: "I need nobody to tell me now that we're in Tennessee." Johnny Cash, Hey Porter.

I made it! It's Friday afternoon and I am sitting in a Panera in Alcoa, TN. I just dropped off the truck. After we sold our house, I was offering the advice, to anyone who would listen, to pretend you are putting your house up for sale so you can enjoy all the cleaning and repairs that you would do before you turn the house over to someone else. I thought that was good advice. Here is some more advice: Don't ever, under any circumstances, move your self across the country! It seemed like a good idea on paper and even an adventure, to drive a 26 foot truck 900 miles, towing my car, loaded down with everything we own by myself. I even did a test run on the interstate with a full truck and it handled great.....until I hooked up the tow dolly with my car on it. I couldn't go much faster than 55 mph and I couldn't take my eyes off the road for a second. The whole trip took 19 hours and 15 minutes. I stopped once for about a half hour nap, otherwise just for gas and coffee. Sometimes, on long drives, the left side of my neck will tighten up and hurt a bit. With the big truck to drive, my neck started hurting about Black River Falls (an hour south of Eau Claire) and by the time I got here, it felt like I had a knife stuck in it and someone was twisting it! So with all that, it was SO great to get down here. I arrived about 3:30pm on Wednesday. We got all of the stuff unloaded, some into our townhouse and some into storage. I had to weigh the truck full and empty and all of our stuff weighs 5, 640 lbs!!!! I think we have too much stuff :-) But the townhouse is starting to look like home and I will be back on line on Tuesday. Thanks so much to all the folks who have sent their thoughts and well-wishes. I'll update the Tour Dates page soon. I am headed to Key West for the Meeting of the Minds and I'll post what I know ASAP. Have a great weekend!

10/10/06: I can't believe the way it went from summer to fall in one day and now we have the threat of snow by Thursday. It's a good time to head south! Last Wednesday, the Chippewa Valley Parrothead Club threw a little party for me at the Barley Club and it was so much fun. I am used to playing for things like that, not being a part of them so that was a nice change. So a big "THANKS" to everyone who came out. I really appreciate it. Applefest was wonderful. I slept in a tent as usual but we had a tropical Applefest. It was in the 70's during the day and never cooled off much at night. It really made for a fantastic time. I am leaving Thursday morning for Caseville. The weather is not looking the best for the festival over there but knowing Caseville, it will still be a great time. I will be back in Eau Claire on Sunday evening. Monday morning, I pick up a 26 foot truck, load it down with everything we own, hook my car up to the back and by sometimes Tuesday, I'll hit the road for Tennessee. It's been a long time coming since we have been talking about it since Cyndi took the job in February and things have been in kind of in limbo ever since. I'll miss living here in WI but I am really looking forward to starting life in TN. Have a wonderful week!

10/01/06: Technically I'm typing this on Sunday 10/1 but the day I am describing is Saturday, 9/30. I had my alarm set for 5am but sometimes, when I have to be up early to get on the road for show, I get a bit nervous about it. I woke up Saturday morning at 3:50 am and I couldn't get back to sleep. It is now exactly 24 hours later, to the minute. I drove for 321 miles today and sang for 9 hours and 30 minutes! Now that's quite a day! I didn't sing for 9 hours and 30 mintues straight. I did two shows, one for four hours and one for 5 and a half hours. I did take one break during each show and since one show was in Cable, WI and the other in Durand, WI, I had a break between shows. :-) I was in Cable for the Fall Festival and I had a wonderful time. That is a great town full of nice people and I had a blast being a part of the Fall Fest again this year! Normally a four hour show is enough for one day but I have been playing a party in Durand two times a year for the past 5 years and we really wanted to get one more in before my move south and this was the only date we could make it work. If there was any place that could help me bring my energy level up to not only do a second show in a day, but to do a second show of 5 and a half hours, it would be this party in Durand. They have been so good to me and so supportive of my music I can't even begin to find the words to say "thanks" to this great group of people. I have been up now for over 24 hours straight and I only got 6 hours of sleep the night before so I don't even know if any of this makes sense any more. But THANKS Cable, WI and THANKS to all those great folks who make it out each time to the party in Durand. I hope to see you all again soon! Next weekend is Applefest. I'm going to bed now.

09/27/06: I'm at the Barley Club tonight. I was hoping for a beautiful fall evening as this is my last Eau Claire show before moving south. But we just have mid 50's and it is supposed to rain so I might have to be inside. I have avoided thinking of any of these shows this summer as my "last" show somewhere. And that is especially true for the Barley Club. They booked me to do my first ever Jimmy Buffett night about 8 years ago and they have been so good to me. And my (formerly Thursday) Wednesday night at the Barley Club has been, by far, my longest running regular show. I will certainly miss them but I hope they will occasionally let me come back and strum and sing every once in a while.

9/17/06: A Tour Dates update. I got a called last Wednesday from the Julia Bell Swain Riverboat. There had been a mix up and they had to cancel me for the boat trips on Tuesday and Wednesday of this coming week. My original plan was to try to take the big moving truck down to Tennessee next weeked. So after I heard about the Riverboat, I called the guys at the 5th Quarter and they were nice enough to let me tend to my moving details this week. I'm not sure how this will all shake out with moving but I will not be on the Riverboat Tuesday and Wednesday and I will not be in Little Chute on Friday night. I hope this doesn't cause too much trouble. Have a great week!

8/29/06: I had just finished sending out my emails of my September schedule when I got a call to book a Tropical Night at the 5th Quater in Little Chute, WI on Friday, September 22nd. I have added it to the Tour Dates page but it did not go out on my emails.

08/24/06: The past few weeks have been crazy. I played at the Barley Club on 8/9 and some folks there got me scared about the traffic and construction in Chicago that I left that night for Caseville, MI and drove all night! I arrived in Caseville at about noon on Thursday 8/10, put my hammock up in the park and slept for a few hours. Cheeseburger in Caseville was a blast as it always is. The people there are so friendly and so ready to have a good time. I did some spur of the moment playing in a bar on Thursday night, at a campsite Saturday during the day and with a band at our campsite on Saturday night. I even got to play while riding around on a tropical golf cart! Only in Caseville! I finished my show in Caseville on Sunday, 8/13 and drove straight down to Knoxville, TN. It was so nice to see Cyndi again and we had a great time. We had some wonderful dinners and looked at a bunch of houses. It seems like a really nice place. It was tough to leave but I took off about 12:30 am on Saturday and drove up to Milwaukee. I got to kick off the MAPA PHlocking last Sunday and that was so much fun. The folks in MAPA have been so good to me. They are a great group to play for. I finished my set and got to play harmonica with Johnny Russler and the Beach Bum Band. Man can those guys play! I hardley ever get to sit in and play harp so that was a real treat. I've been back in Eau Claire for a couple of days now and we have been getting some bad storms. I got lucky and snuck in an outdoor show last night in Chetek. Unless something changes quickly, I'm not even going to try to be outside at Boston's. It's dark and mean looking out now and I have to set up in an hour and a half. Oh well. Saturday looks nice and I have two shows. I'll be at the Festival in the Pines from 11am-1pm and then up in Birchwood at the Tagalong Resort that night at 7pm. Have a great weekend and I'll see you soon.

08/06/06: I hope everyone is having a fantastic weekend. I am in Harbor View Park in Egg Harbor, WI in beautiful Door County. What a great place to get some work done! This is my 6th year playing in Door Co this first weekend in August and this year, as always has been a great time. I see many of the same folks here each year and some have become good friends. The shows have been wonderful and I put up my lucky tarp (a few years ago it poured the first night and soaked me and my tent, the next day I bought a tarp that I hang over my tent and wards off the rain) so the weather has been great. I have one more show tonight at the Northern Grill in Sister Bay and then I am headed back to Eau Claire. I'll be on the deck at the Barley Club on Wednesday and then off to Caseville, MI for the Cheeseburger in Caseville festival. I am taking the week after that off and going down to TN to see Cyndi. That's it for now. Enjoy the day!

07/24/06: There, all done! 30 hours and 15 mintues and 1376.4 miles later I'm right back where I was (in Eau Claire) and our two cats now live in Knoxville, TN. The drives to Louisville, KY and back were long but thankfully uneventful. It was so great to see Cyndi again and the cats are doing just fine in their new home! I have a great week this week. Barley Club Wednesday, Higher Ground Thursday, a fun party on Friday and then my night of Johnny Cash music in the park in Chetek on Saturday. Have a great week!

07/21/06: I hate to wish for the passing of time. Days and weeks fly by quickly enough without me wishing they would go faster. I am very lucky from the standpoint that I get to do something I love and I really do enjoy most of what I do from day to day. Every once in a while, something will come up that I just want to get through it as fast as possible and put it in the rear view mirror. I suppose that's true with everyone. I've even known people who hate their job who are trying to get through 15 years or so as fast as they can! Fortunately, my current situation is only a couple of days. If you read this, you know that my wife moved to Tennessee to take a job and I am joining her in the fall. The sale of our house went smoothly and so far things are going just fine. The one wrinkle is our cats. We have two. They are named for characters in the movie The Princess Bride. The huge cat is Fezig (Andre the Giant in the movie) and the little one is Vizzini (INCONCEIVABLE!) We had an Inigo but they all didn't get along so we found a home for Inigo. My sister was kind enough to take them for the last two months but now she has to think about moving and we were only postponing the inevitable, getting two cats from Eau Claire, WI to Knoxville, TN. We have explored air travel, pet moving services, etc. and we have finally settled on how they will make the trip. I have a show tomorrow night (Saturday) here in Eau Claire. I will be done by about 9pm. I will then unload all of my gear, load up the cats and head south. My wife has to work Monday morning so she is taking the shorter leg of the trip and we are meeing in Louisville, KY! The obvious silver lining is that I get to see Cyndi but 10 hours in the car with two cats, one who just cried all the way from St. Paul ( I went and picked them up this morning) is something I am really looking forward to putting behind me! I am headed down to the Country Jam grounds shortly. Wish me luck on the cat trip and have a wonderful weekend.

07/13/06: Eau Claire Express Game News! Here is what I know about the Tropical Night on the fan deck at the Eau Claire Express game next Thursday (7/20). The price of a fan deck ticket is $25. That includes admission to the game and all food and beverages. I have been on the fan deck and the Leinie's flows nicely! The gates open at 6pm. I am going to do a set from 6pm until announcements and the anthem start a bit before 7pm. After the game, the music will start right away and they will have beer for sale. They will open the fan deck up so those folks who bought genreal admission tickets can come and enjoy the party on the fan deck. No one has told me how late we can go so I'll just play that by ear. Remember your Hawaiian shirts! I am out on the deck at Boston's tonight, I'll be in Ellsworth at a new spot for me called Snowballs doing a tropical party tomorrow night, at the post race party for Paddle and Portage in Olin Park in Madison Saturday, at the Cheeseburger Sunday afternoon and then back on the deck at Northwoods in Chetek next Wednesday. Enjoy the heat! See you soon.

06/27/06: From the fun attitude on the deck at Northwoods last night, I'd say the holiday weekend is upon us. The weather is supposed to be great and I have tons of fun shows. I am taking Saturday off to hit the lakes south of the Twin Cities so I'm fired up for a great weekend. Hope you are too! If you need to mellow out after the 4th, I'll be at the Heyde Center in Chippewa for a concert on July 5th. That is a beautiful venue! See you soon.

06/20/06: It has been a whirlwind weekend. I took off Thursday afternon from the Twin Cities and Cyndi picked me up in the airport in Montgomery, AL at about 9pm. It was so great to see her again. I had some folks tell me that in reading this news, they thought we had split up! Only geographically! So you don't have to scroll down and read a bunch of entries, my wife took a new job at McGhee-Tyson Air Force Base in Knoxville, TN so she is down south for the summer and I am playing all my fun outdoor shows here in the Midwest and I will join her permanently in Knoxville in early October. I thought, since I had caused some confusion, I would clear that up. She is down in Alabama for the month of June and we had such a great weekend. We drove down to the Gulf Coast and spent the weekend in Florida and found a wonderful little town called Mexico Beach. We had a great dinner and sat in the sand and watched the sunset. It was fantastic! She dropped me off at the airport at 5am on Monday and I made it back in time for a beautiful evening for Music on the Mall at the University here in Eau Claire. Wow! I am at the Barley Club tomorrow night and then out at Country Fest all weekend. I just added a very fun show over the 4th of July weekend. I have been invited to do a Sunday afternoon show at the Leinie Lodge in Chippewa so if you are still making your 4th of July weekend plans, that should be a great time. See you soon!

06/11/06: I hope everyone had a great weekend. I was thinking of all the folks headed to Alpine for the Buffett show. I kept watching the weather and cheering for a beautiful day for you. 50's and 60's is not ideal but hopefully it didn't rain. I had a great weekend of shows. We had gorgeous night at Lake Harriet on Thursday and a very nice crowd. I did a private party on Friday night and they did such a great job pulling off an outdoor party with all the rain! Last night I had the honor of playing for the Military Ball for the 133rd Airlift Wing and that was a wonderful night. I hope folks read the last update and are not trying to find me at the Pottery Festival today. That's about it for now. I will be on the deck at the Barley Club on Wednesday and then I'm headed south for the weekend to spend some time with Cyndi. Have a great week.

05/24/06: A quick update. I have made some schedule changes. I spoke with the Pottery Festival folks this morning and they have had to pull the plug on all the music for this year :-( That is a great event and I will miss it. I also added a few dates including a Labor Day weekend show at the Mallard. That is always a great time. Sorry for the lack of updates. I have been running crazy now for about a month and managed to get myself sick. So I am not headed to Ashland tonight. I am going to get better and stay quiet. See you soon!

04/25/06: I didn't even mention that last Wednesday, at the Barley Club, on April 19th, I played outside! I don't think I have ever done an outdoor gig in Wisconsin in April before. We had a full deck until the sun went down, then it was just a few hardy folks but fun! I have some advice: if you own your own home, pretend you are selling it. Cyndi and I keep laughing at all the updates I have done in order to get the house ready to show to strangers. If we had done these things years ago, we could have enjoyed them! There is a "For Sale" sign in my front yard and the house is officially on the market. I put together a photo tour this evening, you can find it here: http://www.mattwahl.com/1215vine.html. Enjoy the photos and as I said before, if you know of anyone looking for a house in Eau Claire.....I have always wanted to keep this website music related and I hope I am not abusing the site by putting up pictures and trying to sell our house. I have never owned a home or sold a home before and it has been a ton of work to get it ready to sell. Honestly, since Cyndi left, it has occupied much more of my time than my music has. I hope to change that now that the bulk of the work is done (hopefully). The other reason I wanted to put it up on my site is that now that it is actually for sale, I am feeling much more attached to the house than I thought I would. On the main floor, there is probably not one square inch of this house that I haven't sanded, painted, replaced, refinished, etc. and I guess it would be neat if someone I know personally would be interested in it or if someone that I know personally knew someone who ended up buying it so it ends up in good hands. That's all for now.

04/24/06: What a fun weekend! I owe a big thanks to a lot of Madison folks for coming out Friday night. I really appreciate that. I was at a new place and it was great to see many familiar faces. Thank you. Saturday night I got to hit one of my favorite towns. I did a show in Durand at a fun bar called the Construction Zone. Durand's summer festival is call Fun Fest and the attitude of fun seems to carry over all year in that town. I have been doing a couple of parties a year in Durand for some of the nicest, most supportive people I know and they all showed up. It really was great couple of nights. Thank you all!

I called our realtor this morning and told him I am done! He is coming tomorrow to take some photos and the house should be officially for sale sometime this week! It is looking as nice as it ever has. I finished a couple of outside paiting projects yesterday and put in a new tub surround. So if you know of anyone looking for a house in Eau Claire....... I am going to take some photos and hopefully put up a house page on this site so people can see how it looks. Enjoy the day!!

04/17/06: Sorry for the lack of updates. If I am not playing and singing I am cleaning, painting and otherwise preparing our house. I hope to have it up for sale by next week. I just added a neat show a week from this coming Saturday. It is for Market Day at the Montessori Charter School here in Eau Claire. They will have all sorts of vendors and fun things going on most of the day. I will be there from 10am until 1pm or so adding some music to the event.

03/30/06: I've been attacted! By a cold! Why is it than when I get a cold, it goes right to my voice. I used to get colds all the time, now maybe once or twice a year. Cyndi came with me up to Duluth Tuesday night as I had a show there Wednesday morning. We both love Duluth and we were looking forward to a fun night in a great town. I was in bed by 8 o'clock :-( I made it through my day show just fine but by the time I had to start at Fischer's it was pretty bad. I'm too stubborn to cancel a show, or quit once I have started so I played. By the end of the night, all I could do were Johnny Cash songs that he did on his last few albums where he almost speaks more than he does sing. So sorry to anyone that had to hear me sing last night. I have a week off and a list from our realtor to get done so we can get our house up for sale so plenty of time to rest my voice. Have a wonderful weekend!

3/20/06: Lots of exciting stuff: I just added several dates to the summer schedule and that is shaping up nicely. Summers are always so fun to plan. I pictures the sunny days and long warm nights, playing outside, all that good stuff, so visit the tour dates page to see some new spring and summer dates. We found out that Cyndi may be on orders and headed south as soon as this weekend! That is exciting but also sad as I won't be able to join her down in TN until the fall. We are giving away tons of stuff to clean out our house and getting the rest boxed up to move. On a bit of a sad note, I called and cancelled my registration for the NACA Northern Plains conference next weekend. For those who don't know NACA, that is where I do my college booking. As nice as it is to book the shows, one of my favorite parts of the conference are the people I get to see. I haven't missed one since 1998 but this is a regional conferece and since I am moving out of the region I thought I would skip this year and see how things shake out. I have a fun week planned. I will be in West Bend on Wednesday morning at UW Washington County, Fischer's on Thursday, I haven't been there yet this year, and the Northern Buffett Night in Chetek on Friday. Enjoy your day!

03/05/06:

The photo on the left is the view of the sunset from the terrace of the Marco Beach Ocean Resort. I took that last Saturday before my show. The photo on the right is the view from the top of the ski hill at Lutsen Mountain. I took that this Saturday morning on my snowboard! One of my favorite parts about the view at Lutsen is that it is tough to tell where the lake ends and the sky begins. What a week! I've got another great one coming up. I'm in Rochester tomorrow and Tuesday and Thursday night is the Buffett Night at Northwoods!! I will be a part of the AIDS Benefit at UW Eau Claire Friday night and back at the Creamery Saturday night. So that's my week. Hope to see you all soon.

02/27/06: Happy Monday! What a strange couple of days. I left Naples, FL at about 11pm Saturday night and pulled into my hotel in Bloomington, IN a bit after 5pm Sunday. 1202 miles straight with coffee and sandwich stops! It feels like someone sole one of my days. To me, yesterday was Saturday yet today is somehow Monday. That is the longest drive I have every done straight through by myself and I still am quite out of it today despite about 15 hours of sleep. It feels like I exist in a different plane than the rest of the world. I just ate lunch and I am having coffee at a very busy Panera right by Indiana University. I am in a crowded room with lots of othere folks but it feels like I am in my own world. It is very weird and kind of cool. It should be an interesting show tonight at the Cheeseburger :-) and I hope to be in Eau Claire tomorrow. And to all of you sending constant emails about the Buffett Tour Dates please STOP! I can't take the torture any more! Out of all the weekends he could have picked for both the Alpine and Chicago dates, he picked two where I have contracted shows booked and set in stone! Even if he adds a Thursday show in Chicago like always, I still can't go. I am holding out for a Minneapolis show but that is a long shot. For those of you going to Alpine, I hope you have already booked your hotel rooms. Those are harder to get then the tickets! See you soon.

02/23/06: A couple of business notes: They have moved me to a new location on 3rd St. tonight. I will be at the 3rd St. Plaza right across the street from Campiello's. And, as I discovered last night, if you are thinking of coming to see me Saturday at the Marco Beach Ocean Resort, they have a dress code. You have to wear long pants and no open toed shoes. I felt horrible as some very nice folks came to see me last night and could not stay because of the dress code so to them I apologize and I wanted to post this in case others are thinking of coming out. Have a great day!

02/20/06: I have heard some horrible things about the weather up in Wisconsin. Not to make it worse but it's nearly 80 today and tons of sun! I'm back to work this week after a week off. Cynthia flew down last Sunday and Monday morning we headed for Key West! It was cool down there Monday night. I think it got to the 40's. We were camping out and it was nice tent weather. Remember, we have camped up in Bayfield for Applefest and woke up with snow on the tent so I don't think Key West could ever get too cold for us to camp. We had a great time. Ate too much, drank too much, spent too much time in the sun and so on. We drove back to Naples Thursday night. I had a great time in Goodland on Friday and we went back down Saturday for the annual boat parade. If you ever get the chance to visit SW Florida, spend some time in Goodland. I love it there! Yesterday (Sunday) we rented Kayaks at Delnor-Wiggins state park and paddled in and out of these little waterways and eventually out into the Gulf! I got Cynthia on a plane last night and I have shows tonight, tomorrow, Wednesday, Thursday and maybe Saturday. I am waiting to hear about that one. If Saturday pans out, I will play on Marco Island and then drive up to Indiana for my show at the Cheeseburger on Monday. I will finish my show there and be Eau Claire bound, hoping to arrive sometime on Tuesday. It will be great to be home. Things have changed since I left Eau Claire. As many of you know, my wife Cynthia is a Master Sargent in the US Air Force. This past fall she attended a leadership training school at McGee-Tyson Airforce base in Alcoa, TN, just south of Knoxville. She liked it so much that she applied to be an instructor. The day before she flew down to Florida she found out that she got the job so we are moving to Knoxville, TN! She has to report on May 1st. I have shows booked in Wisconsin through mid-October so I will be hanging around until then and I will join her in TN sometime in the fall. I'm still not sure what that will mean for my tour schedule and how it will all shake out but we are both very excited to get to hang out in a new part of the country for a few years (it's a four year position) So that's my big news. I'm headed over to the English Pub for my show tonight. See you all soon.

02/09/06: I have my location for tonight! I will be in front of the Zen Restaurant which is right on the corner of 5th Avenue South and Highway 41. So if you know Naples, it is right where you would turn off of Highway 41 into the 5th Avenue downtown area. Hope to see you there!

02/08/06: I wanted to do a quick update. Not much is new here. Just enjoying the sun. The shows have been a lot of fun. I played at a place called The English Pub last night here in Naples and it was a blast! We are going to do one more there on 2/20 which is a Monday. For anyone planning on coming to the show tomorrow (Evenings on 5th) I still don't know my exact location. I am waiting to hear just where on 5th Ave I will be and I will post it if I hear in time. Cyndi is flying down Sunday night and we are leaving Monday morning for Key West! We are going to stay down there until at least Thursday and then head back up to Naples. Other than that, I have shows tomorrow and Friday. Have a wonderful week!

01/26/06: A scheduling note, the date of the Jimmy Buffett Night at Northwoods in Chetek has been changed to Friday, March 24th. Northwoods had a conflict with the original date. The date has been changed on the Tour Dates page.

01/26/06: 25 Hours in the life of a traveling musician. This saga begins Monday morning, January 23, after playing from Noon-3pm and 6-10pm at the Cheeseburger in Greenville, SC. Here goes: 9am-Noon, wake up, work out, shower, get ready, pack up and check out of my hotel in Greenville, SC. Noon-3pm, travel from Greenville, SC to Atlanta, GA in the pouring rain. 3-4pm locate the Cheeseburger in Paradise, introduce myself, set up and sound check. 4-7pm kill time in book stores and coffee shops checking email, etc and grab a bite to eat. 7-11pm perform at the Cheeseburger in Atlanta. 11pm-Midnight, tear down, say good-bye, gas up my car and purchase provisions for the road (sandwiches, Twizlers, Combos, coffee, etc.) Midnight-10am, travel from Atlanta, GA to Naples, FL. This included several stops at Dunkin Donuts for giantic coffees and getting stuck in Tampa rush hour traffic which totally ruined my record breaking travel time. But I made it, then I slept! It was worth the trip. Things are beautiful here in Naples and I have added another show to the schedule. Have a great day!

01/23/06: Florida Bound! Almost. I am in Atlanta, GA and I have one more Cheeseburger show tonight. It has really been fun to hit all of these on the way south. I had a really neat drive on Saturday morning. I left Kentucky at about 5am on Saturday and headed for Asheville, NC. The road from Knoxville, TN to Asheville, NC twists and winds through the Smokey Mountains. It was great, except for the driving rain! I kept singing Ronnie Milsap's Smokey Mountain Rain. The scenery was great. It has been raining on and off ever since. I play until 11pm tonight, then I am going to get a keg of coffee and head for Florida. I don't know how far I'll get but by sometime tomorrow, I'll be in Naples!

01/18/06: News From the Road: It's Wednesday afternoon, just before 4pm Eastern time, my new time zone for the next several weeks. My days consist of fueling up on caffine and hunting for free highspeed internet connections. I have found one! I'm all set up and ready to go at the Cheeseburger in Paradise in Bloomington, IN. It's fun, all the Cheeseburgers look exactly the same. This one in Bloomington is the same as the one in Wisconsin. The one in Fishers, IN where I played Monday night was almost the same but the front door and the stage were switched around, as were the bathrooms...oops! I left for Indiana from Alpine Valley on Monday morning. I lived and worked in Minneapolis for years so I always think I'm ready for big city traffic until I do a daytime drive through the Chicago area! It was 60 and sunny when I got to Indianapolis on Monday. I got to the Cheeseburger in good time and got set up and went on a computer store hunt. I forgot the adapter I need to plug in my laptop. I have never bothered to see how long the battery lasts but I doubt it's 6 weeks. After about a half an hour of driving around I found an Apple store and $83.46 later, I had my adapter. Why couldn't I have forgotten my toothbrush? That was an expensive mistake, but now I have two. I finished my show Monday and drove down to Bloomington. I hung out here yesterday and the weather turned nasty. We got about 5 inches of snow but today is sunny and it is warming up. I am headed to Kentucky tonight after the show and then on to the Carolinas. Again, I really appreciate all the suggestions of Florida venues. I'll update the schedule as more gigs come up. Have a great day!

01/11/06: It's coming down to the wire. I have never been on a 6 week road trip before and I am running around like crazy trying to get organized. It will be great to hit the road. For those of you in Eau Claire, I will do my last local show until mid March tonight at the Barley Club. It is a "6 Months Til Summer" party. I'll keep this as current as possible while I'm on the road. Thanks to those who are suggesting Florida venues. I really appreciate the help. Take care.

01/03/06: HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday and that your New Year is off to a great start. I survived my New Year's Eve show at 5th Quarter. That is a really nice spot and I should have known that it wasn't going to be too out of hand. I realized that I have never worked a New Year's Even as a solo act and I had visions of having all my gear showered with champangne! We had a great time. 2006 is already rolling along. I have a few Wisconsin shows over the next two weeks and then I head south. I will be hitting most of the Cheeseburgers in Paradise between here and Florida and then spending the last week of January and all of February in South Florida. I just posted the gigs today. I was hoping for a much busier February and I think some more shows will shake out down there but if anyone knows anyone in the Naples, Marco Island area that might need music for a party or a house concert, please send them my way. I'll be at Alpine Valley (the ski resort, I'm still working on the big one :-) ) this weekend if you need an excuse to hit the slopes. Have a great week.

12/15/05: I have decided that snow looks much better when I don't have to travel. We got dumped on all night Tuesday and all day yesterday and aside from the shoveling, it was fun! I spent all last week on the road and I am glad to hang around here for a while. I had some great shows in Madison, Appleton and Milwaukee. I have, in the past, described the glamorous life of a touring musician. I had last Friday night off and a hotel room in downtown Milwaukee. I was very excited and ready to paint the town! I have never had any back trouble before but I did something last week that caused my back to tighten up and I was walking around like I was 100 years old. By the time my night on the town rolled around on Friday, it was so bad that all I did was lay in bed and read my book. Again, the glamors of life on the road! I am in Altoona at Fischers tomorrow night for the first time in a long time, the Creamery on Saturday and the Barley Club next Wednesday. Then I am off until New Year's Eve. If you saw the schedule, you saw that I have added a New Year's Eve show at the 5th Quarter in Little Chute. I haven't played a New Year's Eve in years, so if you have no plans....... Thank you for a terrific 2005, have a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year. Take good care and Enjoy your day!

11/27/05: I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. It was a great long weekend but it sure went fast. I had a show at the Creamery last night and had a wonderful surprise as some friends came from Milwaukee, from Marshfield and from the Twin Cities. It means so much to me that folks made long trips to come and see me. What fun! I'll be down near Madison this weekend. Please note the different show time on Sunday at the Cheeseburger. We have moved the show to 3pm, so I will start after the Packer game. Tune into Wisconsin Public Radio on Saturday night to hear me on the live radio show Higher Ground with Jonathan Overby. I have also added a show on Wednesday, December 7 at Gilda's in Milwaukee. Have a great week!

11/21/05: Well, I got my deer. This past weekend was opening deer hunting season in Wisconsin and getting my deer would, I suppose, be a good thing, only I don't hunt! My weapon of choice was my, just back from the body shop, 2004 Toyota Camry :-( What a mess! The deer was killed right away which I guess is better than having her suffer. I feel bad when bugs hit my windshield let alone animals. I've been traveling the Wisconsin highways for year and never hit a deer. I assumed the deer and I had an agreement. They don't run out in front of me and I won't hit them. So my Toyota is back at the body shop and I have a rental Ford Taurus. Otherwise, the weekend was a blast. I did a wild and crazy bar show Friday night at the 5th Quarter in Little Chute. That is sure a neat place. Then Saturday, I had about the best time ever with the Green Apple Friends of Folk. I got to share the stage with some great performers and play to one of the most attentive crowds! What Fun! I'm off to Rochester today for a couple nights at the Redwood Room. If you need an excuse to quit eating leftovers, Saturday night I'll be at the Creamery. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

11/15/05: To say that it is good to be home might be pushing it. It is good to be back in my house. That would be more accurate. Yesterday afternoon, I was laying by a pool in the San Diego sun and today I'm trying to will it not to snow! We had so much fun in California and packed so much into a long weekend. Things start rolling along again right away. It's a good time to hear some Sunny music, with the threat of snow and all. I'll be in Eau Claire tomorrow and Thursday and then over to Appleton for the weekend. Have a great day!

11/08/05: "I'm leaving on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again." Actually, I do, I'll be back again on November 15th, but until then, I'll be in SAN DIEGO!!! Sorry for yelling, I don't get too many chances to go on vacation without there being a bit of work involved. It is very rare for me to leave the house and travel without a guitar and this will be one of those times. I think it counts, even though I had to ship a guitar out to El Cajon, California to the Taylor factory last week and that is only 18 miles from San Diego and I am going to go to the factory on Thursday for a tour so I guess I will be in the same building as one of my guitars, but it's purely recreational, I swear! Have a great week.

10/31/05: Happy Halloween! I hope everyone had/has the chance to dress up for Halloween. I played both Friday and Saturday night but went out for a bit after my show Saturday. I didn't get too dressed up. I just wore a mask with funny face on it. I like Halloween. I noticed this several years ago. It seems that when adults get in costume and go out we loose some of the fear we have of each other. Everyone is more friendly, we are more likely to talk to strangers, dance and generally enjoy ourselves simply because of a weird shirt, a wig, a mask, etc. It's neat!

As an independant musician, one of the things I am supposed to do is send out my CD's with hopes of having them reviewed by music critics. We (us musicians) hope to get favorable reviews from respected publications and then use those reviews to further our career. I hate it. I still send out CD's from time to time but for me, the important thing is not what one person with the title of "Critic" has to say about my music. What matters to me is how my music is touching the lives of those who hear it. And given that criteria, I got about the best "review" I could ever hope to get. A woman came over to the Creamery this weekend. She picked up my 4th CD, The Fun Side of Life, a few weeks ago at a festival. She told me that she is a breast cancer survivor and when she goes for treatment, she gets to listen to a CD. At her last treament, she listened to The Fun Side of Life and it kept her spirits up and helped her feel better. How great is that?!!! I will keep her name out of this since it is the Internet and she might not want to have her name on a web site but that sure makes me feel good about what I am doing. I think we all, maybe especially those of us in the "Arts" wonder if what we are doing makes a difference. It is wonderful to know that I song I wrote could help someone get through a tough time. If you happen to read this....THANK YOU! It also reminds me of how important it is for us to let people know when they have made a difference in our lives. Have a fantastic week.

10/18/05: It's home improvement week at the Wahl's! We moved into our house just over three years ago and have been slowly but surly fixing things up. The house has beautiful old maple wood floors throughout and I finally tackled the last one, the kitchen. I have been putting it off forever because I didn't want to live without a stove, I didn't want the refridgerator in the living room (which it now is) and we need to go through our kitchen to get to the laundry room and our only bathroom. Our two cats need to go through the kitchen to get to the basement where we keep their food and litter. Last night I finished all of the touch up sanding and put on the first coat of polyurathane and crawled out the laundry room window, went through the front door and went to bed. This morning, the floor is still not dry, so we keep running around the house, crawling through the window when we need to get to that part of the house. ( Not the cats, their stuff is also in the living room) This will continue for at least three days! I had a wonderful weekend down at the Cheeseburger. The weather was fantastic and they had the garage doors open both days (one whole wall of the restaurant is made of garage doors and they open up to the patio when the weather is nice.) A bunch of the MAPA crowd made the trip for the Sunday show, as did some other dear friends so it was a blast. I am back up at Julie and Dave's in Barron on Friday and hitting a new place Saturday in Durand called the Construction Zone for a tropical party. Have a great week!

10/11/05: It's been three weeks since I have updated this. It feels like three months. Here's a recap and in reading this, you'll know why I didn't have time to make any updates. Friday, 9/23, I'm running a bit late and in a hurry to get up to Sammy's to get set up for the show. I get behind an SUV full of kids. They keep slamming on their breaks and speeding up again, the girl in the back is yelling out the window at people they are passing on the street. I should have known to keep my distance, but like I said, I was in a hurry. The driver slams on his breaks again right where the road splits into two lanes and signals a left turn, I move into the right lane to keep going straight, he decides instead to turn right, very sharply, very suddenly, from the left lane right into me! I'm fine, my guitar is fine but the whole left side of my Toyota is crumpled. I went and yelled at him and went back to assess the damage. Just then a squad car pulled up, took my info and sent me on my way. The car was sort of drivable and I made my way to Sammy's (and started on time!)

My mom was nice enough to lend me her car and my parents said they would help me get the whole insurance and repair mess started as I was to be out of town for the next week. I took off very early the next morning, Saturday 9/24, for Cable for the Cable Fall Fest. They had everything, vendors, food, a beer tent, a bus running from Cable to Hayward, the entertainment (me) it looked to be the makings of a perfect fall festival. Unfortunately, we got a very fall like Wisconsin day. It was cold and drizzly all day. I had a tent so I was able to play and there were some fun folks hanging around but the weather sure worked against us. By the time I got torn down and headed for home I already had a full blown head cold!

I got home and got to bed. I got up early the next morning, Sunday, 9/25, got packed up and hit the road for Fargo. It rained all day but started to clear by the time I reached the Fargo Cork and started to set up. I hate being on the road when I am sick. I went to the grocery store and after showing my ID and signing my life away, I bought about $30 worth of cold medicine (no wonder they thought I was a meth-head (that is why they make people show ID to buy cold medicine in North Dakota)) I played at some of my favorite places for the next several days and even got to be on stage at the Alerus Center in Grand Forks for The Rally For Relief for Katrina victims. It was a great trip, but again, I hate being on the road when I am sick. I would sleep as much as I could, get up, play the shows and go back to bed, fueled by a lot of cold medicine.

So far, a very busy couple of days. It was Thursday, 9/29, when I cut across the top of Minnesota and made my way back into Wisconsin. It was that day when the craziness really kicked in. My wife Cynthia left for an Air Force base in Tennessee at the end of August. She was doing a training there and would graduate on October 5th with a banquet the night before. That Thursday, the 29th, I had dinner with her dad and we started scheming. Cyndi and I had already talked about how I wouldn't be able to make it to her graduation with my shows in Rochester on Monday (10/3) and Tuesday (10/4) and having to be in Bayfield for Applefest that Friday (10/7) but over dinner, her dad and I realized that if I could find someone to fill in for me at the Redwood Room in Rochester, I could fly down and surprise her for her graduation and be back in time for Applefest. I knew it would mean the world to her if I could be there and there have been way too many times that I have been a musician first and a husband second, plus the words of my song "I Never Took The Time" popped into my head and we went to work to make it happen. I got in touch with the folks in Rochester and they were great! No problems there. I booked the flight and got in touch with my sister and she said she could get me to the airport. So Monday morning, 10/3 I flew out of Minneapolis and into Lexington, Kentucky. I med Cyndi's dad and his friend Cathy at the airport in Lexington and we spent the night in Kentucky. Tuesday we headed for Tennessee. It was so much fun and one of the biggest surprises I have been a part of. Cyndi never suspected a thing and it was great to see the graduation and meet all of her classmates. The weather down there was beautiful and the time went so fast. By Thursday afternoon, I was back on the ground in Minneapolis and by that evening I was loaded up and headed for Applefest.

I have been going to Applefest for years but never have we had two days of sun and nice temps like we had this year! It was a great time as always. I owe many "thank you's" to many people for making it so. Cyndi made it back from Tennessee and up to Bayfield by Saturday night so we got to spend another Applefest together and got back to Eau Claire yesterday by noon. So on 9/23 my car got smashed and on 9/24 I got a bad cold, but by 10/10, I had played 13 shows, driven from Eau Claire to Cable, to Fargo, to Grand Forks, over to Bayfield, back to Eau Claire, over to Minneapolis, flew to Lexington, KY, down to Knoxville, TN, back to Kentucky, flew back to Minneapolis, drove to Eau Claire, back up to Bayfield and home! I was a crazy couple of weeks but so worth it! I apologize to anyone who showed up at the Redwood Room last week. Hope you understand. Barley Club tomorrow, Heather's in Rockdale on Friday and back at the Cheeseburger for the first time since May.

9/19/05: We always hear how things happen for a reason and that is supposed to keep us feeling good, or at least OK when things don't go the way we want them to go. But every once in a while, when things don't go as planned, they turn out even better! That is what happened to me this past weekend. I was booked to be a part of the Wine and Harvest Festival in Cedarburg. This is a huge festvial in a really neat town just north of Milwaukee. I was scheduled to play outside the Quilt Musuem both Saturday and Sunday. I was excited. I pictured Applefest without the winter hat and gloves! I arrived in Cedarburg very early Saturday morning to be sure to get a good parking spot and started to get worried when I asked about the Quilt Museum and people didn't know where to send me. After several stops I found it, about 1/2 mile outside of town, not anywhere near the main festival area. Well, at least parking wasn't going to be a problem and the site was beautiful. I set up right outside an old barn where the quilts would be displayed. There was a bake sale and a few other things going on and this area was a stop on the hay ride that goes all through town and the Quilt Museum was on the map of the festival with some musical notes letting people know there would be live music. But people didn't come! I didn't find out until Sunday that a volunteer was supposed to make fliers and didn't. We would watch the hay wagons full of people pull up, the wagon would stop but no one got off. At first, I was pretty disappointed. But I had already booked a hotel for the night and agreed to play Saturday and Sunday so I decided to stick it out. I am sure glad I did!

The people I met and go to know this weekend are some of the greatest people I have encounted in my 10 years of playing and singing! The couple displaying the quilts are doing such a wonderful things. Their son is a Marine and they, with the help of folks from all over the country, are making quilts for the families of fallen Marines. They had some of the quilts with them and they are beautiful. If you wan't to learn more, visit: http://www.one3quilts.com We got to know each other on Saturday and visted quite a bit between songs and between sets. Then I had a great group of folks track me down at the Quilt Museum. They hung out and listened for a while. After I packed up, I met them in town and we hung out and had a few and then got dinner. It was so nice to spend time with them and get to know them better. Then on Sunday, we moved the bake sale up near the quilts and I got to visit with the couple running the bake sale and they were wonderful too! I guess to make a long story short (maybe it's too late for that) the weekend didn't turn out at all how I thought it would. I suppose that is true for all of us, I was hoping to have huge crowds listening to my music, I'm sure the couple with the bake sale would have loved to have had huge crowds buying their baked goods (I don't need to tell you about the pluses of playing music right next to a table full of fantastic baked goods!) And the quilts sure deserved to be seen by tons of people. And despite the fact that there weren't huge crowds and things didn't go at all how I had planned, I got to spend my weekend with a group of wonderful people and really enjoyed it and that's good enough reason for me. Have a great week!

9/14/05: I haven't had time to update this in a few weeks. Sorry! The trip down to Chicago with the Milwaukee Area Parrothead Association was so much fun! It was really neat to see Buffett do a day show. I have never seen that before and it was fun to watch the crowd. We didn't get back to Eau Claire until about 1am on Tuesday and I had to be in River Falls by 10am for a noon show on Tuesday. The thing that stuck me as funny is that we made a stop in the bus Kenosha on the way to and from Wrigley and picked some people up at a place called the Brat Stop. Well, after my show in River Falls, I had to drive to Kenosha to stay over night Tuesday for a noon show at UW Parkside on Wednesday. My hotel in Kenosha was right next to the Brat Stop! So at 8pm Monday night, I was standing in the parking lot of the Brat Stop dropping people off after the Buffett show and with in 24 hours, I had driven back to Eau Claire, slept a bit, driven to River Falls, set up, played my show, tore down, drove back to Eau Claire, got packed up, hit the road and by 8pm Tuesday night I was in my hotel right next to the Brat Stop! Wow! Time to fire my booking agent! It sure was worth it. I'm in the wonderful town of Cedarburg, WI this weekend for the Wine and Harvest Fest. Have a wonderful weekend and I'll see you soon.

09/01/05: A pre-Labor Day Weekend update. I had a show last night at the Barley Club and we had a great deck full of fun people. About 9:30pm a fine mist started to fall and very quickly turned to a thick mist, soaking me and all of my equipment. I got everything packed up quickly, brought it home, set it all up in my living room and dried it all off and it all works just fine. I couldn't help thinking of all of the people we are seeing on the news who were in the path of Katrina and now everything they own is not just wet, but underwater. I was doing a noon show at Chippewa Valley Technical College in Menomonie today and met Liz from Louisiana. She works at CVTC and she was collecting money today to use to buy supplies to take to Fox 9 News in the Twin Cities. They have a truck they are taking to New Orleans full of supplies (see www.fox9.com) so I dontated all of my CD sale money and Student Government dontated all of the money collected for the picnic lunch and we were able to help out a bit and that feels good. But it sure does put things in perspective as I get set for a fun and exciting holiday weekend. To think there are probably musicians down on the Gulf who not only don't have places to play, but don't have homes, cars, equipment, water, etc. I was glad we were able to give a little. Enjoy your weekend.

8/22/05: Man can the Milwaukee Area Parrothead Association throw a party!! It was a marathon day of music for me on Saturday. I got out of bed here in Eau Claire at 4am, left at 6am and arrived at Matty's in New Berlin just before 10am. I was on the big stage under the biggest tent I have ever seen at noon and played until two. That was my chance to play my original songs and had a blast. There was a great group of very supportive Parrothead there and we had a wonderful time. I then tore down and threw all my stuff but my harmonicas in the car and sat in on the big stage with Don Middlebrook and Living Soul from 3-6pm. I have heard great things about Don's song writing so it was great to get to hear his music and I had a lot of fun sitting in with Don and Chris who is about the best keyboard player I have ever heard! I then set up my equipment outside next to the Parrothead's turf and played Buffett tunes from 7-10:30pm. Wow. After that I needed a Cheeseburger and a long night's sleep. All the hard work was well worth it! I met a bunch of great people and has so much fun with everyone and Rick and Sherry and Paul and all the MAPA folks took such great care of me and even found room for me on the Labor Day Weekend Show Bus! So my streak of Buffett shows will continue thanks to the Milwaukee Area Parrothead Association.Thanks for making it a great weekend!

8/19/05: Some fun news! I was on TV18 this morning and had a great time. I had to be at the studio at 6am. I don't know how they do that every day. I will be on TV13 here in Eau Claire Monday for the noon show. And Monday morning, I get to join George House on WAXX, one of the big country stations in town to "co-host" the morning show. I will be on from 6:30-8am! So wake up early and tune in!

8/18/05: My circle tour of The State of Michigan Road Construction Projects is over. That obviously wasn't the intent of my tour but they have every road in the state torn up! Last Friday, I drove from Eau Claire to Taylor, MI just outside of Detroit to stay a night with family. From there, on Saturday morning, I made the trip up to Caseville for The Cheeseburger in Caseville Festival. That is such a wonderful time. I don't know if Lyn and Mike will see this but thank you both and thank you to everyone in Caseville for making my three days there three of the best days I have ever had on the road. I really felt right at home. I left Caseville on Tuesday morning and drove up across the Mackinaw Bridge to St. Ignace. I played tourist for the day and took my bike over the Mackinac Island. A couple of years ago, I played on Mackinac for three nights and while I met some very nice folks, there were a couple of guys that worked at the bar that were about as rude as any people I have ever run into and most of the people that would listen were the drunk college kids working there for the summer and I swear all they wanted to hear were 80's hair metal songs! So needless to say, my first trip to Mackinac was not that enjoyable. It was nice to go back with nothing to do but enjoy myself and I did! Yesterday morning I headed down the shore of Lake Michigan to Escanaba for the state fair and again had a wonderful time. Thank you to all of the people who listend and picked up CD's and a special thanks to the very young boy who gave me the nicest and cutest compliment. After much prodding from his dad, he come up to me and in the cutest voice told me "I think you are better than Pearl Jam!" I am gearing up to have a wonderful Saturday with the Parrotheads down in Milwaukee. Have a great weekend.

08/09/05: We did have a glorious time in Door County. Thank you to all that made it so. The shows were wonderful as was the time off. We even got to ride a Segway! Sunday in Door Co and the past two days here in Eau Claire have been clouded with the news of the death of a truly wonderful man. If you knew John Kell as so many in the Eau Claire area did, you know how kind, fun-loving and generous he was. Our hearts and prayers are with the Kell family as they deal with the loss of John.

08/01/05: We had a blast this weekend at the Buffett Substitute Party. We were at a little resort a bit north of Eau Claire. Buffett didn't show up, but it was still a great time. This is going to be a busy week with tons of great concerts in beautiful settings. I kick it off tonight with my Music on the Mall show at the University here in EC. Then I take the show on the road to Forest Lake tomorrow and spend the rest of the week in Door County!

07/25/05: I hope everyone had a great weekend. It was sure fun to be back at Country Jam. I have been going to that since I was a kid and it is like a giant reunion. So thank you all for making it another fun time back there. For anyone who needs an excuse to go to an Eau Claire Express game, I have the honor of singing the National Anthem on Tuesday 7/26. The game starts about 7pm. One of my favorite movies is the Naked Gun and I have been practicing hard so as not to do a Frank Dreban version of the anthem from the Naked Gun! See you soon.

07/18/05: When I was still in college, a good friend of mine, who lived in our wild and crazy college house decided to start his own business and enter the world of "self-employed." The rest of us would be planning some stupid drinking trip to some fun destination and he would say that he couldn't go because he had to work. That didn't make any sense to me, he was his own boss, why couldn't he give himself the day off? I didn't get it until I became self-employed and now I understand the struggle he must of felt between taking the time off to have fun and doing the things that he needed to do to run a great business.

As many of you know, Buffett was "supposed" to play at Alpine Valley on July 30th. So everyone marked that weekend off and made plans to go to the show. Once it became evident that he was not doing Alpine this year, the group of us that always go to the Buffett show made plans to have a substitute party at a resort a bit north of Eau Claire. That will be my only Saturday night off from mid May through December! I have had so many people ask me about playing for some kind of event on July 30th. I had a gentleman that wanted to a party at a Marina in Milwaukee, another person wanted to do a party on a beautiful lake in Southern WI and just this morning, I got a call from a very nice woman who needs music for her own substitute Alpine party. Each time I have gone through the struggle and believe me, I have wanted to say "yes" to all of the wonderful invitations to perform and I am flattered that they would think of me. It's tough but I am going to keep my commitment to my family and my friends and we are going to pretend that Buffett is playing at a tiny resort between New Auburn and Bruce, WI on July 30th. We can dream! Thanks to all of the folks that made this weekend a blast and braved the heat and the dust storms at Lake Harriet yesterday. Have a wonderful week.

07/12/05: I have never been much of a fashionable guy. I made my last attempt to look "hip" and with it in college. Abercrombie and Fitch had just became popular and I went to the Mall of America and spent way too much on a flannel shirt. They were all the rage at the time. That weekend, I donned my new duds and went to a party and there were about 6 guys wearing the same shirt. That was it for me. Now my wardrobe consists of 4 pairs of shorts, all Carhartt that I mix and match with several Hawaiian shirts and occasionally a super hero shirt. That's it! My theory is that popular fashion is merely a social experiment conducted by some folks with a great sense of humor. They think of the stupidest thing they can, put it out there as the latest fashion craze and sit back and see who actually adopts the "style." One of the dumbest, in my opinion, has been the winter hat. I am sure you have seen this. It is usually worn by high school and college aged guys and they wear their winter hats all the time. Indoors, outdoors, always. Winter hats have never been comfortable but this doesn't seem to matter as long as the wearer is "in." Today, comfort has certainly taken a back seat to fashion. It is July 12th, my car thermometer said 93 here in Eau Claire and as I pulled up to a store near a college house, I saw a guy getting into his car wearing, you guessed it, a winter hat! Now that is hip!

07/11/05: I haven't updated this in a little while and sometimes I feel like I just type the same thing week after week about how great all the shows were. But it is the truth. I meet so many kind and wonderful people as I travel from place to place and sing my songs and this past weekend was no exception. The Barley Club was packed on Wednesday night. It was a beautiful, picture perfect summer evening. Then I got to go to Marketfest on Thursday. I love Marketfest! If you haven't been to it, it is amazing. They put on a festival every Thursday night! Then I got to do a noon show at a beautiful park in Eden Prairie on Friday and I got to see some old friends there. And there was a great crowd at the Tagalong on Saturday. So it really was a fantastic weekend. And to top it all off, Jim Hoehn & Kevin Mulvenna were in town for a couple of shows at Jake's and a show last night on the fan deck at the Eau Claire Express game. I sat in with them on harmonica on Friday at Jake's and last night at the game and it was such fun. I rarely get to play with others and these are two of the nicest guys. So it really was a wonderful weekend. So thank you all for making it so. Have a great week.

06/28/05: What a week! I had so many fantastic shows, I don't really know where to start. I had a great time with the folks at SBC. We did a very sunny, tropical themed lunch party down near Milwaukee. Then it was on to Oshkosh for Country USA. I was on the Y-100 Country Club stage and played a fun set to a bunch of great people. I then headed for home and spent the rest of the week out at Country Fest in Cadott. That is always such a neat festival and it is so nice of them to include me. I did a set Sunday morning on the main stage and that is a real treat. So THANK YOU to all of the people that made this crazy week a blast. I hope you are enjoying the CD's and I hope to see you soon. One schedule note, the show tomorrow at Loring Park has been cancelled. I guess they want to try to reschedule it for an evening later in the summer. I will be at the Barley Club tomorrow night. See you soon.

06/20/05: An old man sounding rant: Kids these days! I was playing at a bar up north this weekend and there were a couple of families with kids that looked to be about middle school age and the kids were drinking beer. I couldn't believe it. Their parents brought them into a bar and were buying these kids beer. That is outrageous! When we were that age, if we wanted to drink, we'd have to steal our booze, sometimes little bits at a time and store it baby food jars. Then we would have to drink it in an alley or under a bridge or in the woods in the freezing cold and the snow while bears clawed our faces, mixing it with whatever we could find, juice, soda, dirty puddle water, snow, other better tasting booze, anything, all while running from the cops on our bikes. Damn kids these days! I am country festing it all week. I am in Waukesha tomorrow for a party, then up to Oshkosh for Country USA then it's Cadott for the rest of the week for Country Fest! If you are going, set your alarms early on Sunday morning, come out the main stage, say hey, watch the show and then go back to bed! Have a great week!

06/13/05: I owe a big thanks to the folks in the southern part of the state for making my weekend a wonderful one. I had a great time at Emigail's on Friday and two great days at the Pottery Fest in Cambridge. Hope everyone is enjoying the CD's they picked up and I hope to see you all soon. The rest of the news today is made up of a couple of observations: Here are two things that have been a part of our lives since before I was born but are now almost completely meaningless: the yellow light in stop and go lights and storm warning sirens.

It seems the more time we spend in our cars, the less willing we are to put up with inconveniences like stop lights. The yellow light used to mean that you had better stop because the light is now turning red. Maybe, just maybe if you just hit the light as it turned yellow, you might sneak through. Now it simply means, “go like hell!” Even the first couple seconds of a red light seems OK to run. And remember the trick when you had to turn left at a busy like, you'd just hang way out in the intersection until it turned yellow and then you'd make the turn. Forget that. At yellow people are still bombing right through and will do so for the first part of the red light too, leaving you stuck out in the middle of the road in on coming traffic.

My theory is that soon they will have to create a new color light. Maybe orange. That will become the new yellow light. So it would go from green which means go to yellow which means you just have a bit more time, to orange which means stop now because it's turning red, and finally red. If you haven't noticed this, watch people on main highways that are controlled by lights. It's amazing!

This might make me sound old but I remember when we were kids and the storm sirens went off, that meant get to the basement now! The cities only used these sirens when something very serious was about to hit. We knew that if that went off, we were in trouble. Now, every city, county, municipality, etc is so afraid that they will underestimate a storm, not sound the sirens, have something serious rip through and then get sued so they sound it all the time! It is now meaningless. We are left to our own judgments about the severity of any oncoming storm. Maybe they need a new siren like the new yellow light! One siren means that a few people think something serious might develop but it's really no big deal and then a new siren that means, “run like hell.”

05/31/05: if you have heard the new CD or at least read the song descriptions on the CD Page, you know that the song “A Place I Know” is about trying to find a balance between certain aspects of life. And I suppose the song “I Never Took The Time” is what can happen if some kind of balance isn't obtained.

The hardest part about this balancing act seems to be determining what is truly important, not when we are immersed in the day-to-day stuff, but in the big picture and then finding ways to be sure we find room in our lives for those items.

I once heard a great line as people were trying to figure out why they didn't have time to read and one person said “books don't ring.” And it's true, books don't ring like a phone or beep at us like an email. And time with our loved ones isn't stamped with a due date like our bills. The point is that things that are the most important don't always seem like the most pressing. I know there have been times (many times) when I need to remind myself that one of the reasons I work so hard is so I can occasionally take some time off and relax. That is part of the balance.

So this past weekend was a nice balance. I played Thursday and Friday and then took the rest of the weekend off. We got some things done around the house and had time to just hang out. I'm very lucky to get to do something I love which I suppose makes it even harder to take time off but as another great line says, “no one on their death bed wishes they had spent more time at the office!” I hope everyone else had a wonderful weekend. See you tomorrow night at the Barley Club in the sun!

05/25/05: This past weekend I was down in Madison for some shows at the Cheeseburger and an Arts Board meeting. My schedule left me with Friday night off and it was a beautiful afternoon/evening. I got dinner to go and took it to a table on the Monona Terrace overlooking the lake. And as I ate dinner, a thought popped into my head. I thought, “chances are, I will look back on this moment and wish I had lived it differently.”

Now I don't mean that exact moment. It would be tough to beat dinner at a table over looking the lake on a perfect Wisconsin spring evening. But I mean this time of my life in general. As I look back on my life, I can find many regrets, not huge regrets, but little things. But those little things add up.

I regret not sticking up for myself, or for others who needed it. I regret not asking out girls I found attractive. I regret trips and parties I missed because of work and the main thing I regret is wasting time and energy worrying about things that seemed so important now, but a day, a week, a month or a year later didn't make a damn bit of difference.

There are not too many things I would trade about my life now and I know that all those things I did or didn't do got me to this point. But I know I worry too much now and I know there are opportunities that I am missing now and it would be nice to be able to catch them in the moment instead of looking back at them at some point down the road.

There might be a way to do that. It seems, at least in my case, that most of the things I regret are things I did or didn't do out of fear; fear of rejection, fear of failure, fear of looking stupid, etc. So maybe if I can catch myself when I am feeling afraid and do the things that are causing the fear, I can eliminate some of those “I wish I would have” moments.

So I guess a better way of saying it would be, “chances are, if I don't face the fear and do it anyway, I will look back on this moment and wish I had lived it differently. Have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend. Take good care. - Matt

05/16/05: A quick note to let you know that The Fun Side Of Life is now for sale on the internet. Just visit the CD page and click on the link. And for the Eau Claire folks, they are on the shelves out at Borders.

05/16/05 Happy Monday! It's tough to do but I finally took a weekend off! Cyndi and I went down to the Kalahari Resort in the Dells. I have driven past the place thousands of times and we have always been curious. It was awesome! I am not being paid to say this, if you even need a great place to go for a night or a weekend, this is a fantastic spot. It has everything. We parked the car on Saturday afternoon and didn't move it until we left on Sunday. We shopped, ate, drank, swam and SURFED! That's us in the picture. They have a surfing simulator called the Flow Rider. Most of the time they use it for boogy boards but during select times, they open it for surfing. It took a little while but we got it and man was it fun! I hope everyone has a great week. See you soon.

05/10/05: IT'S HERE! I can finally quit writing about working on the CD, finishing the CD, getting the CD's etc. Now I can write about having the new CD's! I wanted to leave about 2:30pm on Thursday for Fort Atkinson and the UPS truck showed up at 1:45pm. We quickly unloaded them, I listened to one just to be sure it is really me (some of you may remember the female rap group that ended up on Chasing the Daylight!) It was me, so I loaded them into the car and hit the road. The new CD page is up with song samples of all 14 tracks. Happy listening and have a wonderful week!

05/03/05: I got some big news today. "The Fun Side Of Life," my brand new CD will be here on Thursday so I should have it with me at the Carpe show Thursday night. So for those of you who need another reason to spend Thursday night in Fort Atkinson, you can be the first on your block to have the new CD!

5/2/05: Happy May! It snowed today :-( I have some great shows this week. I am back at the Barley Club on Wednesday and it is supposed to be in the mid 60's and sunny so I might get to be outside again. Thursday I head down to the Cafe Carpe. I hope all the email's I have been sending out get some people to come and spend Cinco de Mayo at the Carpe. The next night, I'll be at Emigail's and that is always a great time. Saturday it is supposed to be 70 in Madison and I am going to be outdoors at the Olbrich Botanical Gardens for an Art Fair to benefit the Madison Audubon Society. How is that for a great week of shows! The new CD's are shipping out to me on Wednesday. I don't think I'll have them for the weekend but we'll see. Have a great week.

4/26/05: I just got a call from the Sawmill Inn in Richfield canceling the show we had booked for May 7th. They didn't just cancel my show, they pulled the plug on all live music! If you've been to the Sawmill, you know that it is a great place and the owners are great people. This isn't the first time I've heard of this situation. There are a couple of performing rights organizations in the US. They are supposed to collect royalties for songwriters when their music is played mainly on TV and radio. These organizations also call small bars and restaurants that have live music and tell them that because music is being played in their establishment, they need to pay a huge fee to these organizations. They have no formula and no way to determine who is playing what song, by what artist and how often. They sure don't take into account people like me who are playing a majority of original material. They say that they do this as a service to their writers so they make sure royalties are being collected for live music and music on the stereo at these small bars/restaurants. Most places, like the Sawmill, decide that it is just easier and more economical to not have live music than to deal with these licensing fees. So these organizations, that say they are out to serve songwriters are essentially shutting down music venues. I would like to think that the writers that are earning these tiny royalties for people covering their songs in small bars and restaurants would rather waive the fee and keep more live music venues open. That's my take.

4/25/05: What a fun weekend. I spent the weekend down in the Madison area. That is such a great place to be. They have a wonderful attitude toward live music there and it's always fun to play in that area. As I type this, I am listening to the final, mastered version of the new CD. Unless I hear something weird that I missed the first 10 thousand times I listened to these songs, I will be able to approve it and they will start the presses! I am hoping to put some samples on the CD page this week. If you are in Eau Claire and need a "Margaritaville Night" I will be at the Higher Ground doing just that on Saturday night. Higher Ground is on the upper campus of the Univeristy of WI Eau Claire in the Crest Wellness Center. It is a great place for live music. Have a great week.

4/18/05: A sad day for Parrotheads or at least this Parrothead. I spend an hour and a half this morning both on line and on the phone trying to get tickets for Jimmy's show(s) at Wrigley Field with no luck! Just after noon I checked eBay and there were 88 different pairs of tickets for sale, some for many, many times the value. And it's looking like the rumors might be true and Buffett will not be playing at Alpine this summer. If he doesn't add a Target Center show this fall, my 15 year streak will come to an end :-( But on the bright side, the tickets for Wrigley were $130 each and the hotel I called was $350/night! And even more on the bright side, I should get to see the proofs of the new CD this week and I have a bunch of great shows! See you soon.

4/11/05: I had a wonderful weekend in Rochester at the NACA conference. There are a bunch of people that I really enjoy seeing and spending time with that I only see at this event each year. That always makes for a good time. The CD is done! With any luck that will go off to the manufacturer this week so I should have them in about a month! Have a great week.

4/5/05: I'm in Rochester right now, ready to rock the Redwood Room. Try saying that like Elmer Fudd! Tomorrow night is the first of many Wednesday evenings at the Barley Club/Pine Meadow. We will still be inside for a while but we are hoping to make Wednesday nights as much fun as the Thursdays we have done for the past many years. That's all for now. I couldn't resist the Elmer Fudd line.

3/28/05: I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. Much CD progress was made so that is good news. I went for a walk this morning and the show was melting, the birds were singing and the sun was shining. I wrote a song that will go on the new CD called "It's Finally Summer!" And I wrote it about the day that we know winter is over and we will start to move toward summer. For me, this time of year is one of the reasons I love being here in Wisconsin. I hope everyone has a great week. I'll be at the Cabin at UW Eau Claire this Friday night.

3/21/05: Happy Spring! I hope everyone survived the snow this weekend. That was pretty wild. After my show Saturday at the Cheeseburger I went to the Boys State Basketball Final Game. I haven't done that since high school . We had a lot of fun but it sure isn't as easy as it used to be to drink 36 beers before the game. I'm just kidding! But it brought back a lot of memories. For all the Eau Claire folks, I'll be at Sammy's Friday night. See you soon.

3/14/05: Thanks for a wonderful tropical week! I was down at the Cheeseburger on Tuesday and there was a small crowd of die-hard Parrotheads there and they made the night a lot of fun. Boy did we have a good time at Northwoods on Thursday. A big thanks to the Chippewa Valley Parrothead Club for making it such a great time. We were set to do it again on Friday but about 4:30pm a blizzard came through and made the roads so bad. But several folks still braved the elements and we had a wonderful night. Then on Saturday, I was back down in Durand at the garage. For those who have been, you know how much fun that always is. It was a great week and it made Wisconsin seem a lot warmer and less snowy than it really is. Thanks for all the fun and support! Have a great week!

3/6/05: Good Sunday morning. I just got back from one of my favorite places in the world. I spent the weekend at Lutsen Resort right on the shore of Lake Superior. It is so nice up there. I went snowshoing yesterday morning and went for a hike yesterday afternoon. I met a buch of great people and even got to catch up with an old friend from college! Then I saw the sun coming up on the lake on my way home early this morning. Robin from the Parrothead Club here in EC made me feel lazy for only having Tour Dates up through April so the summer is up there. At least what I have booked so far. Speaking of Parrotheads, don't forget the Buffett Nights this week. It's going to be wild at Northwoods! See you soon.

2/23/05: This just in: I have agreed to do some music Saturday morning for Younker's Community Days at Oakwood Mall in Eau Claire. This is a big charity event for Younker's where a big portion of their sales go to different charities. So come out at shop and hear some music. I will be there from 10am-Noon.

2/21/05: Hello from Appleton. I am in town to do a show at Fox Valley Tech tomorrow morning. What a great weekend! Thanks to all the folks who hung out at the Sawmill Friday night and the Cheeseburger on Saturday and Sunday. I got to see some people I haven't seen in a while and meet some new people too. On the way to Appleton I saw a billboard that reminded me of a wonderful marketing idea Cynthia and I came up with for Hummer. They have a new SUT (sport utility truck) don't you think they'd sell more if this billed it as a Sport/Leisure Utility Truck? Just a thought. Have a great week!

2/3/05: We are back in Wisconsin! While it's nice to be home, I already miss South Florida. I just wanted to give you a quick show change note. The folks at Spring Creek in Whitewater e-mailed me and cancelled the show :( But I will be up at Julie and Dave's that night so it worked out just great. The only trouble is all of the e-mails that went out. I hope to be putting up some new pictures from the trip soon.

1/28/05: "I went down to Captain Tony's, just to get out of the heat.." And we sure did. It was in the mid to high 70's yesterday and we were in Key West! I first visited KW when I was 19 and my first stop was to Margaritaville for a Cheeseburger in Paradise so that was our first stop yesterday. We found a couple of other less well known spots for a couple of Coronas and ended the day with a beer at Captain Tony's. We took a boat shuttle from Fort Myers Beach. The island was awsome but I would only recommed the boat as a last resort. The ride each was was four hours and it goes so fast that it is freezing cold, especially at night on the way home. They don't have enough seats inside for everyone and not for anyone as tall as I am. I did get some wonderful sunset photos. The first one is Cynthia and I with our Cheeseburgers in Paradise. Ever since I got out of the car last Tuesday I've had Buffett's "I Have Found Me A Home" running through my head. It's getting louder.

1/24/05: Hello from South Florida! If you are up north and reading this, you would laugh at all the talk here in Florida. It has been in the 60's for a couple of days and it gets down to 40 at night and everyone is talking about how cold it is! People are wearing winter hats! They think I'm crazy in my shorts and short sleeves. We've been having a blast! Today we went kayaking at Lover's Key and spent some time with a dolphin. The dolphin would swim right by the kayaks. It was hard to get a good photo but I got one of the fin. I've included another one of Cynthia and I at the beach to keep you warm if your are still shoveling yourself out.

1/18/05: We are in FLORIDA! I haven't updated this for a while because things have been crazy trying to get ready for this trip. This is the first time I have traveled this far and for this long to play and sing so I am pretty excited. My wife Cynthia is with me and we brought pretty much everything we own. My little Honda was packed so full we couldn't move. I had a couple of shows at the Cheeseburger in Middleton so Saturday after the show we went to REI and after and outlay of several hundreds of dollars and three hours of braving 10 below weather, I successfully installed a roof rack and a luggage box on my car. It took me three hours because after I would work for a bit, I couldn't feel my hands so I would alternate working on the rack and warming up in the car. The folks at REI thought I was nuts! I had a horrible image of it ripping off of the roof the moment I pulled out of the lot but I kept checking it everytime we stopped and it made it to Florida too. We stayed Sunday night in Kentucky and then left Monday afternoon and drove straight down to Naples. It is wonderful. I'll try to keep some updates coming as things progress down here. The photo above is the view out the back door. Look at that cool roof rack! More later!

1/4/05: Happy New Year! I hope everyone's 2005 is off to a wonderful start. I'm so excited about this year. I have a feeling it will bring new and exciting adventures. I'm looking forward to a new CD, an updated web site and promo material and a bit of a new approach to life and music! After a few weeks of laying low, I'm ready to hit the road. I'm at a wonderful place in Eau Claire called Destini Artworks. It is called an art incubator with great coffee and fantastic art. Then I'm down at Alpine Valley (just like Buffett!) actually it's the bar at the ski resort but I can see the back of the big theatre. Then I head over to Rochester for a few days, then down to the Madison/Milwaukee area then Florida!!! For two weeks of playing and singing in the sun. See you soon.

12/20/04: Happy Holidays! I have a show at the Cheeseburger (for real this time) tomorrow night and after that, I am taking a couple of weeks off. Thanks for making 2004 a fantastic year for me and my music. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and I will see you on the road in 2005.

12/9/04: Happy December! I hope no one headed out to the Cheeseburger on Tuesday. I don't know how I screwed that up. I was just about to leave when I decided to check the Cheeseburger web site and I wasn't on the schedule. I called and they didn't have me on any of their calendars and when I pulled up the e-mail about the November and December shows, the 7th wasn't there either so I guess I just made the date up! It was certainly a blessing in disguise. I would have finished at the Cheeseburger at 12:30am on Wednesday and then hit the road getting to Eau Claire about 4am. I had to be at Delong for MusicPalooza by 7am on Wednesday so like I said, a blessing in disguise. I'm going to be at Boston's tonight in Eau Claire so come out for some fun and some great pizza!

11/23/04: I've always heard about the dangers of the temptations of the road. I feel the need to come clean and admit that on Friday night, I fell prey to those temptations. I played at Emigail's which is always a great time. I hung out and had a couple of beers. It went downhill from there. I stopped at a gas station, got a bag of Combos and an extra large Lunchables, went back to my hotel and stayed up until 2am watching Classic Jerry Springer "I'm Pregnant By A Transexual." I feel much better admitting this and getting it out in the open. I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving. Travel safely if you have to travel. If you are in Eau Claire, come to the new Sammy's Pub on Friday after you are done shopping. I'll be there from 7-10pm. We are also in the studio all day Friday and Saturday so hopefully we'll make some good progress on the new CD. See you soon.

11/15/04: The benefit show last week at Memorial was a great time. It's always fun to get together with other musicians, especially for a good cause. We spent Saturday in the studio and the recording of the fourth CD is officially underway! I have a great band behind me and I am very excited about this project. I think it will be the best one yet! I'm headed out of town tomorrow for several shows down in the Milwaukee/Madison area. I am going to get to hang out with some great friends and I am hitting some of my favorite spots and some new ones too. Hope to see you soon.

11/8/04: I just put a great show on the Tour Dates. Aaron Spina is a high school student at Eau Claire Memorial High. He was injured this Fall in a car accident and there is a benefit for Aaron and his family tomorrow night at the High School. All proceeds go to the family and there is a bunch of great music. Be sure to attend if you can. I'll be spending some time this week in the studio and hopefully making a bunch of progress on the new CD. See you soon.

10/31/04: Happy Halloween! I hope no one headed to the First Baptist Church tonight to see the Chippewa Valley Fellowship event. I got a call this afternoon letting me know the event had to be cancelled. I posted that on the Tour Dates page right away. The organizer had a family emergency so I hope they are doing OK. This week is going to be very exciting. I do have some fun shows but I think the election will be taking center stage in most of our lives for the better part of the week. I hope everyone will get out and vote. I know that my job is to write and play music, not to give political commentary. We have way too many people doing that already. With that said......I would never tell anyone how to vote. That is such an important, personal decision that each person needs to make. I would just advise everyone, especially the younger folks, to be sure they are making as informed a decision as possible. It is easy, especially for folks still in high school or college to get caught up in a lot of uninformed hype and go along with the crowd. In the end, we are voting for people but my advise would be to look past the person and vote for the ideas, viewpoints and philosophies you feel passionate about. I am not going to tell you who I will vote for, but I will tell you that I am casting my vote for individual freedom. I am so scared that we are giving up too much individual freedom for personal security. When I say security, I don't mean national security, I mean personal security (i.e. being taken care of) Think of it this way, when we are infants, most of us had a ton of security. Everything was taken care of by someone else. Our food, our bed, our diapers, we depended on someone else for everything. How much freedom did we have? Virtually none. Everytime we cast a vote with hope that our chosen politician will empower the government to "take care of us" (be it with health care, social security, etc.) we are taking one step further away from individual freedom. Are there people who need help? Absolutely. But if we each focus on how we can use our gifts and talents to make a difference in the world and find a way to give back, even if it is just a little, we can help those in need and empower them to do the same. That is our job, not the government's! One more thing and then I am done with this rant. I hear so many misleading statements about what I think is a wonderful step toward personal freedom and that is Health Savings Accounts. I have heard so many people claim that these are tax shelters for the rich. I have had a Health Savings Account for three years and I'm a damn folk singer! It puts the responsibility of my health care cost on (are you ready for this) ME! If I choose to drink 47 beers a day and eat nothing but cans of Crisco, I'm going to spend a lot on health care. If I decide to take good care of my self, barring any accidents or disasters, I won't spend a lot. An affordable way to make each person responsible for their own health and health care costs, gosh what a concept! Here's another thing to ponder, is health care a right? I owe credit to Neal Boortz for this next line of thinking, if health care is a right, who has to administer this health care that you have a right to receive? Obviously a health care professional, a doctor, a nurse, etc. That would mean that this health care professional is bound by law to be in your servitude. I believe we worked hard to abolish those laws that bound others to our servitude. (Notice how none of our other rights, religion, free speech, etc. require others to serve us by law) Something to think about. Have a happy election day and wonderful week.

10/22/04: IT'S OVER! Outdoor music season that is! I am at the Inn on Lake Superior in Duluth all weekend and did my first show there last night. When I arrived, they told me it was up to me as to where I wanted to set up (inside or out) Outdoor shows here are so cool. I stand about 50 yards from the shore of the lake. I get to watch all the wonderful colors as the sun sets and see the big ore boats coming and going. It's great, so when possible, I always want to be outside. So that's what I did, I set up outside and froze! I literally couldn't feel my fingers for most of the night. But I had a great group of people hang out and listen. They lit the bonfire early and it made for a great night. So thank you to everyone who helped me make it through my coldest show ever (colder than Applefest!) You made it worth the cold. But it's raining tonight so I'll be inside! See you soon.

10/8/04: Just a quick update before I hit the road again! I had a great time at UW Whitewater last night. That's a fun place to play and the SEAL folks always make it feel like home! I was on the riverboat on Wednesday for a beautiful trip from La Crosse to Winona. Applefest was a great time as always. It poured all day Friday so I didn't do anything musically until Friday night but from then on, it was constant playing and singing with an occational break for Applefest Ale! I'm headed to Duluth tonight and then over to Fargo and I'll spend the next week in North Dakota/Northern MN. I'm still working on details but it may work out for me to head to Florida for a few shows this winter. Have a great weekend and for those of you in the Eau Claire area, don't forget about the big Children's Museum Benefit show a week from Sunday. Go to Tour Dates for more info.

9/25/04: What a wonderful night in Bayfield last night. Thanks to all the folks who made it so. It was worth the trip. I've added on to my Applefest schedule for next weekend. I will be back at Mama Get's on Thursday, out front of the Outfitters on Friday, back at Mama Get's Friday night, Outfitters Saturday all day and then at the Captain's Deli on Sunday. Have a great week.

9/22/04: While it makes me very happy to report that I had a very nice (small but enthusiastic) group of people listening at the Cheeseburger last night I am sorry that I can't add another wild adventure to the Cheeseburger saga.It was a great night. I got home at about 4am this morning so that kind of kills the day. I have a question for you to ponder. I just got back from the grocery store and I was told to "have a great day" by several employees. While their voices said "have a great day," their tone of voice was saying "I wish you were dead, or at least not at my store." I am wondering how many less than half assed "have a great days" does it take to equal one genuine one?