A Vast Expanse of Emptiness

How Cameras in California found me.

"Miles of wires, four wheels and a motor that runs”

There is nothing out here. This is what the moon must feel like, a vast expanse of emptiness covered in dirt. The only difference is the smell of gasoline and the one long yellow line broken into easily digested chunks. Welcome to West Texas.

“Highways and road signs, melting in the sun”

Interstate highway 10 runs from one end of this country to the other, and I have driven every inch of it in small doses. This time I am in a Budget rental truck moving back to Los Angeles from Austin. Here is where ideas are born, minds are free to wander and all I can think about is her.

“I’ve been riding on a tidal wave, trying to get to you”

It was there in the raw bigness of the wide open sky that the first lines came to me. Up the small inclines of hills that are the humble beginnings of the Rocky Mountains I started singing. Later that night in a hotel just outside of Lordsburg, New Mexico I put the core of the song on paper.

“All the Cameras in California, could wash out to the sea
I’d still have your picture, in my brain like a melody
Snow’s falling over Milwaukee and the Devil’s in New Orleans
but the Cameras in California keep you right here next to me”

Tropical storm Arlene hit the panhandle of Florida on June 11, 2005. On June 10 I had spent my birthday with my best friend Michael deep sea fishing 25 miles out of Destin, FL. The ride back to shore was bone chilling in the truest sense. We escaped the storm.

To get to Destin we had taken the coastal roads through Mississippi. The blue highways as William Least Heat-Moon would say. There was one section so close to the water that it felt the Gulf of Mexico might swallow us whole. Two months later Hurricane Katrina did just that. New Orleans and the coast did not escape the storm.

"Hotels and airports, cell phone tower wars"

The hotel bed was empty without her. I kept thinking that all across America that night there were people feeling the same way. Separated by miles but connected by radio frequencies. Except when they were not. It is easy to feel the presence of a voice, familiar and close but when the connection cuts out. You might as well be on the moon. Lost in that vast expanse of emptiness.

"Laptop batteries that don't work anymore"

Ansel Adams once said "There is nothing worse than a sharp image of a fuzzy concept." Well my concept was clear, love. Whenever I am working on a song my wife will inevitably ask me what it’s about. I used to give long answers, go into details about the story or what kind of arrangement I was hearing. Now I just tell her, "It's a love song for you." And the truth is they are.