Dale Henry Geist
The Music
I write songs, sing them, and play the guitar to accompany myself. I've been doing it since I was 13, and that was over four years ago. (Well over.)
My music has been called "folk poetry with a rock'n'roll heart." It's been called that by me, actually, but you can call it what you want. Elvis famously said, "I don't sound like nobody." I don't know who I sound like, but I sure wouldn't mind sounding like the great rock'n'roll songwriters that I admire: Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, Steve Earle, guys like that.
The Past
When I was a kid in upstate New York, I listened to Top 40, back when Stevie Wonder would follow Tammy Wynette. I played trumpet in the school band, but I was writing Top 40 songs for the mirror. When I was 15 I got re-adjusted by the Stones, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, Pink Floyd - rock, in other words - and started playing bass in cover bands.
I finally picked up a guitar when I was going to Northwestern on a Navy ROTC scholarship. I played Dylan and Neil Young songs, and wrote poor imitations thereof. Dropped out, moved to Colorado, dropped back into Hampshire College, studied film/video and collaborated with Talking Heads-style art rockers. Evidently I was still looking for my voice.
The pieces started coming together when I moved to the Bay Area in the mid-80s and started digging deeper into the roots of American music. I've been walking that path ever since, with Dylan as a lodestar.
The Present and Future
I've been keeping up a persistent, low-key musical career for a good while now. Cassette releases, real bands and party bands, a slick CD, open mics, Cur-ville, and always the songs, sometimes just one or two keepers in a year, but brother, they add up.
The birth of my son in 2007 seems to have set off a period of prolific writing. Following a shoulder injury last year, I started playing and writing on piano, and I'm making glacial progress on recording newer tunes. My writing's better than ever. Sez me.
DHG CD
American Stray
CD, 1999
Produced by an honest-to-God producer (Johnny Harper) and recorded at a serious studio (Sharkbite Studios), this disc is chock-full of Dale Henry Geist originals, eleven of them, including such favorites as "Another American Stray," "Two for the Price of One," and "Woman Like That." I'm proud of it.
You can buy the songs individually at my MySpace page, or send me $10 and I'll send you a shrink-wrapped CD.
American Stray
aka Dale Henry Geist
361 Lawndale Rd.
Kenwood, CA, 95452
MySpace Page
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Check out the Dale Henry Geist MySpace page. And if you've got a MySpace page too, maybe we can be friends.