I Don’t Want A Career In Music

I don’t want a career in music, I want to move mountains with it.

I’m not playing music, I’m using it.

What I want is to generate, reclaim and redistribute multinational-corporation-level energy and influence for the betterment of mankind. That reclamation of energy could be directly by me or any organization I may set up or partner with via money or influence, or simply person by person as my songs move through the zeitgeist.

Music is a means to an end for me, not the end itself. The end is helping you remember how special it is to be human. Helping you remember that you are in control. Helping you take a hard look at life and decide if it’s the one you wanted.

You decided to come here and have this human life. You deserve to live it freely and you deserve to know a life beyond constructs, fear and limitation.

That is why I sing, dance, write and make music.

***

That was the original note I shared on Instagram a few days ago, but today, while I was doing some admin work trying to book a show or get on a festival, and after running into the same old red tape that I always do (not in a band, hard to pin down genre, no solid fan base, etc,) I was guided to expand this thought into a post here on my blog in an attempt to further explain who I am and what I do.

Just last night I uploaded a documentary that covers my life from birth (1989) through October 2025. I made this documentary as an anchor for and “proof” of the sincerity and authenticity with which I create and perform music, because it is getting lost in the noise of a short-form world. This post is an expansion of that intention.

Perception of Music Itself

Based on my 15+ years observing and participating in music as 1) a personal art form, 2) a community and 3) an industry, it is safe to say that 99% of artists and bands are in it for the music. Well “duhhh,” you might say. But lately, I have been realizing that I am not in it for the music, but something greater.

All my life, especially pre-social media, I was under the impression that music was top-down in its purpose. Meaning: most artists knew that music was a special, sacred magic, and therefore most artists treated both the craft and its effect on the listener with reverence and responsibility. I thought all artists used music for the betterment of mankind, like Michael Jackson did. Whether that was for the betterment of the people in the living room listening to records, or the betterment of thousands at a live show, it was still about something greater than themselves.

Growing up, I wasn’t aware of a difference between entertainment and enlightenment through music–it was all enlightenment to me.

Note: When I say enlightenment, I simply mean using music to understand that we are greater than this human body; greater than that which we experience in the third dimension; that we are greater than the steel skyscrapers of our modern cities, and that energy is more than the crude oil that powers our machinery.

This lack of awareness that there is a difference between entertainment and enlightenment was partially because I was parentally and culturally blocked from some of the more negatively-tilted music until I was a teenager, so I truly didn’t know any better, but for that I am grateful. Because of that positively-partitioned foundation, and because I had a traumatic childhood, I was, by default, seeking out and attracting positively-charged music from a young age.

However, after a culturally sheltered childhood, of course I eventually wanted to be free to explore what was previously unknown. Of course, then, through my teens and mid twenties, I bought and “loved” music that was vapid, superficial, materialistic and misogynistic, but that was also because I didn’t know any better. I didn’t know I was being programmed. I didn’t know that the music I was listening to was “just fun” on the surface but was conditioning me for a low vibrational life as I listened over and over.

However, even during all that exploration of ego-driven, hyper-sexual, numbingly-hypnotic and materialistic music, my north star was and always will be Michael Jackson, and because of his being the uncontended #1 in my life, I was (and am) perpetually locked into the idea that music can be a tool to unite humanity, not just distract, placate or diminish it.

Oh, How Perspective Changes

For many years, I lived from this perspective of music being a tool for uplifting humanity, but with stern judgement. I thought I was better and more important than other artists because I was consciously and consistently putting positive messages into my music.

Now let’s fast forward a few years into my early 30s. I’d since dropped the judgement but doubled down on the purpose and intention. In the removal of judgement and the fermenting of intention, the distortion, tunnel-visioning and manipulation affecting how society was being conditioned to perceive, understand and consume music was becoming clear, and I was not fitting into that perception.

Currently, from my perspective, the majority of the modern world and the musicians within it, see music as either 1) entertainment or 2) escape, with a smaller portion of those seeing and using it as a way to relate and share messages, and almost no portion of those driven by a higher purpose beyond their ego, both listener or artist. (This is outside of religious music, which is not being referenced here at all.)

It is because of this idea that music is music in the same way that cars are cars and TV is TV that I believe I no longer fit into the community and industry of music. I believe I have come to the realization that for me, music is a means to an end, not the end itself that it is for most singers, songwriters or guitar players; a la traditional musicians looking to make a living from their craft.

That Just Ain’t Me

I absolutely love that more and more people are able to play popular music for a living, but I don’t want to play music for a living. I want to use popular music to free the mind and soul of the listener, and the truth is, the music business is incompatible with that. There is no template for what I want to do; no blazed trail to follow.

I consider my songs and live shows akin to that of psalms and sermons, but without the boundaries of organized religion. This boundless, enlightening music was, if not prevalent, at least marketed and readily available in the pre-digital age. From what I found, most pop-leaning recording artists released one, if not a few genuine songs about making the world (or their inner world or the listener’s inner world) a better place at some time in their career.

I can’t say with confidence that the same is true today. I can’t even say it about indie and unknown musicians, let alone major players. From what I see, songwriting has been whittled down to what the artist wants to say about their life in an effort to connect with an audience at that same level. Virtually no one is making songs about connecting at a higher level, both higher than the listener–in effort to challenge them and lift them up, or higher than the artist–in an effort to challenge themselves and explore higher than their current purview.

I believe–this–is what I am doing with music. I believe this is what sets me apart. Challenging, lifting, exploring and questioning. Not recounting, commiserating, complaining, hypnotizing or escaping.

I also believe this is why I am so misunderstood. It seems that the general public, both artists and listeners, can’t wrap their heads around the idea of merging spirituality/self help/consciousness–and popular music, even when this exact thing was happening quite often just decades ago.

One For All

Still, even though I believe what I am doing is wholly unique (at this moment in time,) I believe what I am doing does not subjugate others. I believe my mission is for the betterment of all, not some and not just for myself.

What I am doing with music is not to bolster myself for status or validation. I believe my ego has been put aside and my divine spark is steering and leading the way, and I believe this is what will ultimately help me break through.

I don’t know where or when. I don’t know who or what. And every time I try to make it happen based on the template of the music business, I am met with both internal and external resistance that simmers into a boiling anger within me. Now, when I feel that, I retreat back into myself. I continue to rest, refine and remain open–because no move known to man has worked for me yet. Hence, I am no longer searching for the right move to make, but calling for the right move to make me.

I don’t want a career in music, I want to move mountains with it, and move mountains I shall.