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Like his
song, "Will I
Die
Alone", about the poignant fear of putting a revolver to
one’s own head;
says performing songwriter Tommy
Dunlop, “I'm an average guy who's
life has taken a natural
course of doing and seeing many things. In my travels, I'd
always hoped that no matter what path I was on, it would lead me back to writing songs the
average person could relate to.”
Warehouseman; truck driver;
helicopter pilot, filmmaker; father and husband, all roads, dirt or
otherwise
have eventually led Tommy back to writing and to music.
Through the Late 70’s and 80’s,
Tommy worked in a staff and a faculty capacity with the late Jan
Tangen’s On Stage Music,
formerly Family
Light Music in Marin County,
California - (no affiation with the current On Stage Music). There Tommy had the chance to work with such greats as Bobby
McFerrin; Brian
Auger and Norton
Buffalo
to name only a few. “I was truly
blessed to have had the
opportunity to play along side these talented musicians –
they shaped
my
musical world, and for this, I will always be grateful.”
After taking time out to raise a
family; in 1999, Tommy played bass for and toured with Americana
recording
artist Arthur Godfrey, “The new and
improved version” as Tommy says. “Arthur
was great to play behind - he never made a mistake. It forced me to
keep my
chops tight.” Then in 2002, Tommy got back into the
local scene and
took on
the monthly open mic and songwriters night at the Wooden Nickel Bar and
Grill
in Watsonville, California. Tommy passed the torch onto multi-talented
Michael
Gaither, where Michael organized the monthly event into something
better than
any of us could envision.
Leaning toward a song with a story;
Tommy tells the
tales of his experiences
growing up on the left coast of this great nation. His soon to be
released 2008
debut record, "Overdose of Honesty"
shoots from a very low place on the hip. An eclectic mix of folk;
country and
American songs that seem to lend themselves to the paradoxical: from
the ironic
consequences of a cheating lover in, “Hell
Before China”, to the unrequited love of a high
school romance in
the title
cut, “Overdose of
Honesty”, onto how one man can become so overwhelmed with
life that his ex-wife lives just one
bridge down in, “Homeless
in his Own
Home Town”, and finally to the tragic tale of one
man’s witness to
the loss
of America’s greatest musical city, New Orleans, in, “Lover
Comes A Time.”
Besides
performing his own material, Tommy performs many songs from
celebrated
Americana and folk artists from Woody Guthrie to Townes Van Zandt. Currently Tommy performs in and
around Santa Cruz, California and is a menber of the Canyon Acoustic
Society
– check local listings, or go to
www.myspace.com/tommydunlopmusic for more
detailed information.
As a footnote: Tommy's screenplay, The john
Doe
Component,
(the fictionalized accounting of how Elvis Presley contracted out his own dissapearance) has made it
into the final round of judging of the
Fade In Screenplay Competition
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