OFF THE ROAD

It was 1990. My major label debut “Blind To Reason” was released on RCA Records in September 1988. After auditioning and rehearsing a brand new band for two months, my agent Jonny Podell had me opening for Dickey Betts and his band on a U.S. tour that lasted two months. After that tour, my band and I opened for Ian Hunter and Mick Ronson for another tour of the States. After month of that, Ian added Jack Bruce into his band and I toured with them for a tour of mostly western states. Minneapolis in the dead middle of February is colder than Alaska. While I was touring, my home address was in Southhampton, New York. I was barely there in between tours. My cat lived there and I had someone going over there to feed him, keep his "areas" clean and just spend some time with him so he wouldn't feel so alone. I hated having to be away so long but he was a pretty independent spirit. After all the tours in support of "Blind To Reason", I rented a farmhouse in the hinterlands of eastern Long Island, way out near the tip, not far from where Montauk Lighthouse stands. I lived there from 1990 to 1993. It was my writing hideaway. In my living room I had an 8 track cassette recorder set up, a couple good microphones, my keyboard connected to a bank of sounds and my Hammond B3 organ. I wrote alot of songs in that house. For inspiration, I'd take long walks all around that town, going past the windmills, past the farms and fields, out to the cliffs and beaches. I'd drive out to the lighthouse and walk around. Sometimes I'd take the ferry over to Shelter island or over to Block Island. I would always bring my camera with me. Photography has always been another arm of my whole artistic self. When I think of those years, off the touring road, memories of scrub pines, sunlight on seawater, windmills, dunes and beaches flood my brain. These songs were all recorded in that living room in the pines, and it's me singing and playing everything.

(Note: Though these songs were written quite a few years ago, they seem to me to be even more meaningful today. Everyone was forced to be "off the road" during the awful pandemic that began in 2020. The cover photo was taken by my wife Polly Messer during one of our many walks through the woods that helped keep us sane during that time.)

• Grayson Hugh