Just One Break

Great songs are born from simple truths.

Josiah and The Bonnevilles at Kalamazoo State Theatre on Sunday, September 24.

In 2022, I thought my career was over. A decade devoted to a music promotion company ended in disagreements and hurt feelings that forced me to completely rethink my outlook. I spent months interviewing for music and software companies, and somewhere in the deluge of multi-round Zoom and phone interviews, I began to lose touch with myself. Was I looking to make more money doing the same thing, or was I betting on myself? Was I over it altogether?

Every person I turned to had the same advice. "You're more than good enough to find something new, something better." But nobody could tell me that would be or where I would find it.

Sometimes, I think about the countless drives, nights, and dinners I spent complaining about my predicament to Laura and wince with regret. "Why won't anybody give me something," I would gripe with a ridiculous, unearned arrogance. "That's not how it works," she would peacefully explain for the hundredth time. "Nobody gives anyone anything, and anyways, what do YOU even want to do or become?"

I didn't have an answer.

The one idea I had felt delusional. After watching fellow "elder emo" Jesea Leech find a massive audience sharing music and headlines about alternative music on TikTok, I knew there was space for similar people in other areas of music. For whatever reason, the one that called to me was country.

But I didn't make TikTok content, and I didn't know anyone in country music. I don't dance, sing, or create in a way that matches what I'd seen in short-form vertical video content. I'd made my living with words and podcasts discussing things like pop-punk and Warped Tour. Any video content was focused on the art of promoting music, not music promotion. Also, I was (am) in my mid-30s and battling persistent body dysmorphia I'd held since youth. 

Laura doesn't see any of that. She sees a guy she met fourteen years ago on the street at SXSW who couldn't stop talking about how his music blog would take him places. She hears the guy who launched a record label, toured the country, and worked to actualize his wild ideas because he knew nobody else gave a damn. No mountain too high, no valley too low. The world is what you make it, and you can make it anything.

I don't know when we lost touch, but somewhere amid the calamity of that year, I lost that guy. The man in the mirror couldn't believe the wide-eyed optimism of a small-town kid thinking passion alone could improve the world. 

Then, one day, I grew tired of listening to the broken record of negative self-talk on my mind and decided to try Laura's perspective. I made a TikTok, and you know what? It tanked. I was terribly awkward and looked as confused as the people watching it probably felt. But still—I liked it. Creating itself was fun, and I could feel that tiny hit of serotonin that all sparks of inspiration bring. It was intoxicating.

The next video did much better. The one after that was even bigger. TikTok knew nothing of my life before those clips, and they didn't care. I was good enough to entertain them for three seconds or more.

One of the first artists who made me feel comfortable in my pursuit was Josiah Leming, better known as Josiah and The Bonnevilles. His story is familiar, though he's younger than me. Josiah has been chasing his dreams since his youth, but after multiple label deals didn't pan out as imagined, he began to lose hope. That is, until he took one last chance on himself through TikTok, and his world quickly began to change.

Josiah has this song, "Just One Break," and over the past few months, it has become the quiet anthem of my life. I say "quiet" because it makes me feel incredibly alive for a song that is comprised of one man and his guitar. Here's an excerpt:

You're walking in your darkest hour
Running out of power
Right before the dawn
Lookin' for a ray of light
In the midnight sky
Time keeps moving on

Maybe you could roll that dice
One more time
See if the number's strong
All it takes is just one break
And you were all right all along
All right, all along

Great songs are born from simple truths. "Just One Break" distills the frustration and anxiety of any pursuit into its purest form. We dreamers give everything we have until we are exhausted, and then we push a little more. We risk our financial security, health, and relationships to do what many consider impossible until that little voice of doubt grows so loud it is the only thing we can hear. 

But then something happens. It can be as little as engagement on a random social media post, but something occurs that refills your creative tank. Someone somewhere makes you feel seen, heard, or understood; that alone is enough to keep you going. That 'one break' reminds you that all the noise in your head is only as loud as you allow it to become. 

I couldn't tell you the first time I heard "Just One Break," but I can recount at least a dozen plays on early morning commutes that have left me with tears. I have a one-hour commute each way when I'm needed in the office, and that's a lot of time for an overthinker like me to be left alone in their head. Whenever the darkness gets too close for comfort, I turn on Josiah and convince myself to try again.

One of the unwritten rules of music journalism is that you never show your cards to the person you interview. When Josiah was in town this past week, I broke that rule. For the first time in years, I tripped over words and struggled to make eye contact as I spilled my private moments of doubt to a stranger. He listened, hugged me, and thanked me for my input. He brought it up on stage later that night. 

I've learned you can quit many things in life, but music isn't one of them. You can smash the guitar, put down the microphone, stop attending concerts, and subscribe exclusively to true crime podcasts. Still, the music won't leave you alone.

Music lives in our blood and bones. The melodies that serve as the soundtrack to your life exist in your bloodstream, surging through your system as the moment demands. The DNA of every person contains an ancient connection to the first sounds produced in celebration of togetherness and the endurance of the human spirit. Before cities, religion, or sports, we had music. 

I no longer expect someone to hire me. Jobs were never the goal. This journey began with me wanting to share the joy and comfort music brings with the world through whatever means were available to me, and that's what I continue to do. If money and sustainability follow—GREAT! But I cannot and will not allow a lack of instant gratification to deter me from a pure pursuit. I can do whatever I want, even if my mind sometimes argues otherwise.

The same is true for Josiah as much as it is for you. Every adult I know has found themselves increasingly disconnected from the passionate young dreamer they once were, and I don't know if anything can prevent such evolution from taking place. What matters isn't holding onto those ambitions but harnessing that belief in yourself to create something you can take pride in. Everything else is secondary.

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