My album, All Through the Summer, is a collection of tracks dealing with various stages of grief, loss, acceptance, death, and what it means to keep living despite unmeasurable trauma. Some of these songs have lived with me for many years, bubbling and brimming with life, carrying themselves through some of my most desolate and depressed moments. Songs like “Yellow Haze of the Sun”, “You’re All that I Know”, “Let’s Run Away”, and “Without” have lived between performances at coffee houses and backyard DIY shows. Many of these pieces are inspired by two of the most destructive experiences of my life; the death of my father and the chaotic incineration of my home during the Woolsey Fires. With such heavy and depressing material weaving throughout my compositions, these songs needed to be recorded out of a place of inspiration and deep thought. I acquired a TASCAM Portastudio and began to collect demos onto cassette tape, limiting creative potential for these tracks but capturing them in their truest essences. The beauty of music recorded onto a physical medium is a form of art that I hope we never lose, but rather than a complete and total retransition into the medium, I believe the marriage between digital and analog was the perfect way for me to record this record. After countless frustrations and disappointments with the TASCAM, I returned to the digital workspace with a newfound sense of artistic identity. I knew what I wanted my songs to sound like, and for the first time I could orchestrate them in my head before even approaching a screen. I put limitations on myself so that I wouldn’t obsess over filling these tracks out in ways I couldn’t afford, and through a creative decision as such, I was able to make the album that I wanted to make. The Portastudio taught me valuable lessons in experimenting with just the basic recording of vocals and guitar; finding the right space and even the right corner of the room became my drive. These are songs that I wish my dad could’ve heard, this is a year that I wish my dad would have witnessed, and despite his absence I still sing these songs to him. These are songs for my father.

Special thanks to my mom for all of her support and helping me to make the toughest decisions. I love you now and forever- Gabe