The Early Years

As a young man, I walked the line between Folk and Rock music. In the late 60s I made one record with a band called the Lyrics and it did achieve some recognition, mostly in San Diego County. The two songs on that 45 were – “So What” and “They Can’t Hurt Me”. Many years later, I found out that both of these songs became fairly well known in the Punk or Garage Band genre, and were sold on a few of the Punk compilations in the mid 80s.

About a year or so later, I found myself in New York City, where I stayed for a short while with Sis Cunningham and Gordon Friesen. At that time they were putting out a folk magazine called Broadside. I recorded a couple of my songs for them and one of them, “Don’t Talk To Strangers”, ended up on the Best Of Broadside Compilation Set.

After not writing for about five years or so, I wrote a fairly interesting group of songs during the mid 70s, and of that group, the song, “Gun My Way To Heaven”, really stood out. It is probably one of my best songs, and it certainly seems to leave an impression on most people that hear it.

I have included the original recordings here for two reasons. First, I could never redo them, and second, I felt that they might serve to satisfy the curiosity of anyone that comes to know my later music. I had to put these songs on here in the best condition I could find them in, and I apologize for the lack of quality in the recordings, but there really was no choice if I wanted to include them at all.

Ray