A.S. Coomer's Blog, page 18

Run – The Coomers – Chaotic Contributions Video

Andrew Johnson, Chaotic Contributions, brought his drone and cameras to downtown Elizabethtown & put together an awesome video of The Coomers playing our newest single: Run. There’s some really cool footage of Elizabethtown mixed in with the live shots of us setting up & performing at Luie Brangers original music showcase.

Run, with the B-Side: Badlands #3, is out there to stream/download/purchase/share/etc.

Nod yer heads.

-A.S. Coomer

Run – New Single from The Coomers

Happy Saturday, y’all,

What’s more summer than a cruise with all the windows rolled down? The way the breeze laps at the sweaty tips of your hair … man, that’s the bee’s knees.

Well, Run, the new single from my band The Coomers, is about a summer car ride, but this one is more business than pleasure. The song tells the story of a drug deal gone wrong. The singer of the song directs the driver of the car to a secluded place out in the country where things don’t go as planned.

Run (A.S. Coomer)

Start ‘er up. Get ‘er goin’

You ain’t really sure where we’re really going

It’s fine. Hey, baby, it’s fine.

Ain’t got no brakes. Ain’t got no headlights.

It’s getting dark but the night feels just right.

It’s fine. Hey, baby, it’s fine.

Let’s open ‘er up, man, & let’s get drunk

Don’t worry about what’s in the back of that trunk

Oh no, man. Na na na

Hang a left, then take the next right

Just past the barn & it’ll be in sight

We’re there. Sit tight, goddamn it, we’re there.

Keep ‘er runnin’ & don’t you go

This won’t take but a moment or so

It’s fine. Hey, baby, it’s fine.

You better gun it; that didn’t go well

They took the dope but they still said “no sale”

Run, run, run, run, run

The B-Side of Run is Badlands #3, which I originally wrote for the Badlands record I made, and recently released, with my buddy Z.P. Kunkle. It’s the story of a desperate man pushed beyond his means.

Badlands #3 (A.S. Coomer)

I got a job in the badlands working in the mines for a spell

I up & married this redhead, well she knows how to give me hell

I got this truck & this bad buzz real cheap

& it’ll take them both just to carry me on down

Down the road, away from the river where you first laid hands on me

Pushed me down, held me under, nary a light did I see

The sky was blue, the faces were smiling, your mother was singing to me

You cried & so did I. I tried but I couldn’t believe in you.

You & me just dancing under them cigarette trees

Smoking big rock candy mountains, wishing we had something to eat

Now we don’t even roll ‘em up, we just sit around

& have entire conversations without making a sound

I gotta leave these badlands, I gotta get out now

When they find your body, I’ll be well on my way south

I think I took the wrong stuff, now I cannot see

Is this your ghost choking the life out of me?

You can purchase/stream/download the tracks on all the usual places: Bandcamp, Spotify, Youtube, Apple Music, Amazon, Google Play, iTunes, Napster, iHeartRadio, Deezer, etc.

Both songs were recorded live with no overdubs in a barn in Evansville, IN by Brett Siler of Mother Brain Sound Infrastructure, who also mixed/mastered everything.

Ethan Coomer – Drums & Vocals

A.S. Coomer – Guitar & Vocals

Ross Clark – Bass

Nod Yer Heads.

-A.S. Coomer

Badlands #4

Z.P. Kunkle and I made a record of narratives together. We share a love for the macabre and folk music.

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Badlands #4 is the story of a heist gone wrong. Johnny, Marcus, and the singer of the song think they’ve got an easy payday. Turns out they’ve been setup. There’s a firefight. It’s not pretty.

Badlands #4 (A.S. Coomer)

Johnny got the keys to the store

I didn’t ask him how

I didn’t need to know more

I thought: here’s a payday

I just said: let’s go

I set it up for the next night

Johnny, Marcus, & me didn’t even bring masks

We thought we’d come off clean

They were waiting at the door

6 cops or more

I didn’t need to see more

I started dropping them

One after the next

I saw Marcus fall too

I put another badge on the deck

Back in the car, Johnny bleeding out under them badland stars

I seen men gut-shot before

I knew there was no hope for him

I said: take this Vicodin

He started in on his rosary

I told him we had one last stop to go

The Little Missouri: up & running from the rain

The Little Missouri: carry him away from the pain

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You can purchase/stream/download the track (as well as the entire Badlands record) on all the usual places: Bandcamp, Spotify, Apple Music/iTunes, Youtube, etc.

Mixed by Cory Gottron at Sub Par Studios.

Mastered by Tony Taylor at Rock Haus Studios.

Nod yer heads.

-A.S. Coomer

What We’re Reading: August 2019

Heavy Feather Review

We editors love reading at HFR—and talking books, writing, and publishing around the clock—so we decided to catalog our selections every month as the new feature “What We’re Reading.” Following are our recommendations for the month.

Novels

Memorabilia
By A.S. Coomer

“When adjunct professor Stephen Paul accidentally discovers the suicide note of his recently deceased friend, he unwittingly trips a wire into his own enigmatic madness. Within hours, the basic characteristics of his life rupture and are transformed by incarceration and psychiatric chaos. As a prisoner of the state and of his own body, Stephen’s existence appears absurd, ruthless, and barely stitched together. He must come to embrace that the only way out is through an associative mind, one that is as much invisible as it is material.”

EEG
By Daša Drndić

“Andreas Ban’s suicide attempt has failed. Though very ill, he still finds the will to tap on…

View original post 2,196 more words

Badlands #5

Z.P. Kunkle and I made a record of narratives together. We share a love for the macabre and folk music.

[image error]Cover by A.S. Coomer

Badlands #5 was written in the first fickle rays of a grey day after one of those long, dark nights of the soul. It’s the story of a family crossing the plains of the American frontier searching for a new life. They find it & it’s a hard one.

Winter comes early. The livestock has to be taken early. A mother-in-law dies. Things get so desperate that they’re reduced to putting clay in their gruel to fill their swollen, empty bellies.

You can purchase/stream/download the track (as well as the entire Badlands record) on all the usual places: Bandcamp, Spotify, Apple Music/iTunes, Youtube, etc.

-A.S. Coomer

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Badlands #5
(A.S. Coomer)

The crossing was hard

Oh how that rain had fallen

The stream swelled to swollen to burst

First went the young steer

Then snapped the wheel

The wagon washed down the Cheyenne

The plains wouldn’t settle

Oh how them arrows found home

Winter struck early: catching us off-guard

The stock had to go

Oh how that baby did cry

The ice spread over the Cheyenne

We lost your mother then Little Sally Mae

We peppered our barley gruel with little dobs of clay

We lost your mother then Little Sally Mae

The mountains they loomed

Oh how the wolves they called

We lived with great horned owls

All sorts of claws

The living was risky

Even them kids grew hard

We named the youngest after the Cheyenne

 

from Badlands, released June 28, 2019

Badlands #1-5 Written & Performed by A.S. Coomer.

James Kelly, Flood of ’81, Estella’s Lament, Eloise, & 3 Angels Written & Performed by Z.P. Kunkle.

Pickers, Singers, & Sinners: A.S. Coomer, Z.P. Kunkle, Michael Peters, Vester Frey, Vivian Kunkle, & Rachel Coomer.

Badlands

Happy Saturday, y’all.

Have you ever treated yourself on your birthday?

I’ve never really done it before, but this year I did.

Z.P. Kunkle and I released our collaborative record, Badlands, today.

[image error]A.S. Coomer & Z.P. Kunkle Present: BADLANDS

Happy birthday to me!

Badlands is a ten-song collection set in the Badlands. We each wrote five songs for the thing and recorded it all on a four-track recorder, most of it in my basement in south Toledo.

Badlands was a transformative process for me. The limitations of working with only stringed instruments and a four-track taught me a lot about songwriting as well as a great deal about home recording.

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There were some really special moments making Badlands. My wife, Rachel, and Z.P. Kunkle’s daughter, Vivian, sang on some of the tunes. Our buddies Mikey Peters (of Minglewood Labor Camp) and Vester Frey each supplied some dobro slide.

[image error]A.S. Coomer conducting the recording of the Rachel & Vivian’s vocals.

The record is for sale on our Bandcamp page (10 songs for $10, plus bonus material), and up for streaming/downloading/sharing on all the streaming services: Spotify, Apple Music, Google Play (for $9.49), Youtube, Amazon, iHeartRadio, Deezer, etc.

Here’s the HyperFollow: https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/ascoomerandzpkunkle/badlands

Give Badlands a listen. Share it around. Buy it, if the spirit moves ye.

All the best,

A.S. Coomer

 

 

The Flock Unseen – Preorders

My four-story collection of literary fiction, The Flock Unseen, is up for preorder on Clare Songbirds Publishing House’s website.

The Flock Unseen is 8.5″ x 5.5″, perfect bound, with a matte cover and will set ye back $12.99.

These stories first appeared in Flash Fiction Magazine, the Merida Review, GFT Press, and Oxford Magazine.

All the best,

-A.S. Coomer

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New Single From The Coomers: Cheesecake

Happy Friday, y’all!

Hope the beginning of the weekend finds you ready for some new tunes ‘cos The Coomers next single, Cheesecake, is out today! It might just be your new weekend anthem, you never can tell…

We recorded these two songs, live, in a barn in Evansville, IN with Brett Siler of Mother Brain Sound Infrastructure.

 

Stream/purchase at all the usual places. Head on over to our Bandcamp for the lyrics. Do us a solid and buy the single; it’s only $2.00, y’all. That’s cheaper than most fidget spinners.

Nod yer heads.

Bandcamp

Amazon

Spotify

Apple Music/iTunes

Google Play

Youtube

etc.

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“Bullying the Song” Out Now in Goat’s Milk Magazine

Good morning, y’all,

Hope this Tuesday morning finds you rested and ready for another day of productivity.

I’ve got a new poem out in the third issue of Goat’s Milk Magazine called Bullying the Song. It’s a songwriter’s poem, but I think there’s a bit more happening in there. Give it a read when you get a chance.

Thanks to poetry editors Elyse Grant & Colin James Sturdevant.

-A.S. Coomer

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New Novel Alert: Memorabilia

​Morning, y’all,

I’ve been biting my tongue for a while now. I have a new novel coming out this fall called Memorabilia. I accidentally let this slip a few weeks ago at Bike Rack Records during the recording of the Peapod’s On The Radar Podcast. Some secrets are just too hard to keep.

The good people at 11:11 Press and I have been hard at it for a while now, editing and editing and editing, chewing over cover designs, and all the rest of the things a book-baby needs to grow up into a healthy, published novel.

I’ll be talking more about Memorabilia as publication nears, but for right now I want you to know this story is very important to me. Writing Memorabilia was one of the those transformative experiences, both painful and liberating, where you learn what you think, at the time, might be too much about yourself and your craft.

What is this I’m making?
Or is this making me?
Just what kind of dream is this?

It was terrifying; it was freeing. It was needed.

Memorabilia will come out in the fall. More info to come!

-A.S. Coomer

 

From 11:11 Press:

When adjunct professor Stephen Paul accidentally discovers the suicide note of his recently deceased friend, he unwittingly trips a wire into his own enigmatic madness. Within hours, the basic characteristics of his life rupture and are transformed by incarceration and psychiatric chaos. As a prisoner of the state and of his own body, Stephen’s existence appears absurd, ruthless, and barely stitched together. He must come to embrace that the only way out is through an associative mind, one that is as much invisible as it is material.

​

Memorabilia is a Kafkaesque narrative driven by the existential nature of creation. It’s a novel of self-discovery, exploration, and understanding, risking more and more as it progresses. A.S. Coomer questions the nature of reality and the reliability of the mind.

​Coming Soon // Fall 2019

 

[image error]Memorabilia, A.S. Coomer, 11:11 Press