Cheer yourself up and embrace your individuality by listening to my new album about life’s ups and downs, with love/relationships subject matter, in an acoustic rock style, containing more songs than usual, and to be out sooner than expected. This coming Saturday, search for "When You Need To Fly" by solo artist Scott Cooley in whichever music streaming service you like to use, and it will be there for your listening pleasure.
How do I describe it? Well, like my Grandpa Cooley once wrote on the inside wall of a shed he built next to the old outhouse behind his lakeside cottage in Michigan, this album is “good enough for who done it.”
This is the official announcement of my new record “When You Need To Fly,” which is the 13th studio album I’ve made and released publicly. By ‘studio’ I just mean it’s not a live album, and I should clarify that I didn’t record it in a real brick-and-mortar recording studio. I recorded it in a bedroom in my house with a single microphone and a few instruments. It has a whopping 19 new original previously-unreleased songs on it, so I’m considering it a “double” album, even though there’s no physical disc media involved. The “street date” that it will “drop” and be available for streaming from all the main places people stream music (Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, etc.) is on June 21st, 2025 (which is also my birthday). Now I should probably tell you more of the "behind the music" information.
Sometimes you have a bunch of songs that are just okay, and that’s okay. If you’re like me, you write songs because you were compelled to, and you let them become what they become, without ever intentionally trying to make them a hit or worthy of radio play or appropriate for a movie soundtrack or anything like that. You hope for popularity, but you don’t aim for it. Eventually, when contemplating releasing an album, you can listen back to what you have available, and be a little disappointed.
Ready for takeoff, yet still grounded in reality. As in life, we all can find ourselves plugging away at what we do, while not reaching our aspirations. Particularly in creative pursuits, making your dreams come true is what you strive for, and the results may fall short of what you envisioned. While wanting to write great songs, other songs get written along the way. I have lots of those. I guess my latest batch reflects where I am in life, acknowledging struggles while trying to remain positive.
I’m not all that excited or enthusiastic about it to be honest, but you might get into it for that very reason. I’m not sure I have an A game, but if I do, I definitely didn’t bring it on this one. It doesn’t have any really good outstanding songs on it like my last album - 2024’s “Sunrise” – did. That one had at least a couple “good-for-me” songs on it and was my most sunny and positive record, whereas this new one has songs that are all about the same low-quality level as each other, and it’s a little darker and more negative. You’ll notice the word “down” appears in the song titles and lyrics frequently on this one, but it’s not totally a bummer, because they’ve got that relatability factor in which somewhat depressing subject matter can actually cheer you up.
These new songs are all pretty mediocre for me, and I debated whether to release any of them at all. In fact, about half of them are songs I considered for release on past albums and previously weeded out, and the other half are fairly new and still should probably have been weeded out. I was seriously on the fence about all of them, but I just couldn’t bring myself to say that they were so bad that no one should ever be able to hear them, even though they were sitting in a folder on my computer I named ‘average’.
I am predicting this one will neither be commercially nor critically successful, but has a good chance to achieve some level of cult status like the rest of my output has. People like what they like. I’m a fan of a lot of “deep cuts” from other artists’ albums. A lot of my favorites can be angry, sad or cynical. I often enjoy songs from my favorite artists’ least popular albums too. As an artist, you never really know what will resonate, so it should be interesting to find out.
Any songwriter will tell you that they have to write a ton of songs before they write any truly great ones. This batch feels to me like I’m on the brink, still putting in my 10,000 hours toward mastery. Melancholy songs can be a good listen, so I’m hoping people can enjoy more of my gray side on this one. Checking out some amazing photography – albeit black and white - changed my mind when I saw one that sort of visually summed up one of the songs, which I then realized sort of summed up the whole collection of songs, and gave me the idea for that to be the title and cover of the album.
What is good about “When You Need To Fly” is that it’s available only one year after my last, which means you get to hear it one year sooner than you would have if I had chosen to stick with my typical every-two-years release schedule. It also has way more songs on it than the typical baker’s dozen track count that I usually go with. Although somewhat meaningless, in my way of thinking, every music artist should have at least one double album in their discography, and I had enough songs available for it to qualify, so now I can say I have one. Additionally, it has what I think is my first-ever use of an actual electric guitar on record, and it has a great album cover photograph.
The solo on the title track was played with a custom replica of Eddie Van Halen’s guitar that my cousin Mike built for me. The album cover art photograph of birds on a wire in Murcia, Spain was taken by my nephew Riley. So, I’ve got to hereby give a shout-out to Michael Cooley Electric Guitars in Michigan and Riley Hart Photography in Spain!
To sum up what you get:
• Great cover art: Outstanding professional-quality album cover photo.
• Less waiting: Time between typical album releases cut in half.
• Music videos: Check the official YouTube channel for a few new ones on June 21st.
Also a few notable “firsts”:
• More songs: First-ever double album in the Scott Cooley Records catalog.
• Electric guitar: First-ever usage of an electric guitar on record.
• Clavinet: First-ever usage of this sound, which I combined with ukulele.
What you don’t get:
• Really awesome songs: Hopefully, you’ll prove me wrong.
• Lenore on accordion: Sorry, just didn't have any appropriate ones this time. It’s hard to write a song for accordion, but I hope to write more in the future.
Why would I release a bunch of songs that are below my own standards? I made a rash decision that they were not so bad that I didn’t want other people to be able to hear them, and further decided I would not be too embarrassed or ashamed if they did. In other words, if they weren’t bad enough to just throw away by deleting them, and I couldn’t envision any ways to improve them at all, or maybe I could but didn’t feel like re-doing any of them, I then thought I might as well release them. On one hand, I’ve sort of arguably always released a bunch of mediocre songs on each album anyway, and on the other hand, all solo artists have bad albums and songs if you think about it. You can’t just keep getting better indefinitely, with each new album better than the last, right? Right.
There was no obvious cutoff point for this batch of songs. It’s not like when I self-evaluated them that there was a clear dividing line between definite keepers, borderline keepers, and non-keepers. This is an album of “all borderline keepers”. Every single song I would grade with a C, but it’s relative. I’ve written very few songs I would give an A grade to, maybe not any at all. I had more than 19 available, but did weed out some Cs and Ds. Maybe these are all in the B range, come to think of it, but it depends how I look at it as a body of work. They’re all about equally mediocre – I guess that’s the best way to describe them.
If that wasn’t enough, to entice you further, this album has a mixture of positive and negative songs, but they’re mostly of the negative, sad, and depressing variety. This might signal the start of what will later become known as “my dark period”. All artists have them, and now it’s my turn. Thinking back, maybe you don’t have to wait to be in a good mood to write a song, and no one is always in a good mood. Well, maybe my niece Madison, but she’s the only person I’ve ever been around who is like that, so it’s got to be very rare. It’s okay to be bummed out once in a while. For most of you who’ve been there, you’ll be able to relate, and as has been proven with music, especially blues, listening to the Debbie Downer songs can be surprisingly uplifting, so I encourage you to keep that in mind.
I suppose I should actually describe the type of music it is, which I dread, because I’m never sure, but in a word, maybe it’s Americana. Definitely Acoustic Garage Rock (AGR), and all those similar genre/style descriptors like singer-songwriter, roots rock, indie folk, etc. For those already familiar with my style, you’ll get more of that, so it won’t disappoint as far as the signature sound goes at least. For you newcomers who were not immediately offput by the word Americana, thanks for staying with me, and know that no one really knows how to define that, or any of these.
There are some traces of country, folk, blues, reggae, punk, funk, dance, maybe even pop whatever that means, and of course rock, or rock and roll, if you prefer. There’s also one song I would label as Acoustic Dance Music (ADM), and I may be a pioneer in this style. I have no idea what other people think they hear in there, but you should be forewarned that there’s a lot of acoustic guitar strumming, and also that I’m not considered a good singer at all.
The song lyrics are mostly about romantic relationships, love, feeling down, and doors. Don’t know why. It just worked out that way. A music journalist would have a tough time with this one, because there’s no obvious way the songs are connected to each other, and it doesn’t really have any overarching theme. Some are happy, some sad, some are deep, some are shallow, some are mean, some are kind, some are funny. They’re all pretty simple, and none are super long this time. I think they’re all under 5 minutes in length. Most have a rhythm section. Some virtual instrument sounds were made by playing a MIDI keyboard. They’re not all in the same key. They employ usage of different song forms. Some are faster than others, but are mostly mid-tempo I suspect. Many have bridge sections. Some have instrumental breaks, some don’t. Short intros. Subtle mistakes have intentionally been left in out of pure laziness.
Few, if any, people ever hear any of my songs before I release them, but occasionally, I play a few for my wife Lenore. Her most common reaction is to tell me that I “don’t sing with any emotion”. She says I should strive for the style of Michael Crawford singing O Holy Night, which she says is so emotional that it makes her cry. She says I can be a deep person who conveys emotion in my speaking voice, and wonders why I can’t do it with my singing voice.
I don’t have an answer for that. Maybe I’m sounding particularly melancholy because that’s how I feel about these songs, or maybe that’s how I felt in general when recording the vocal tracks. I have no idea how to even begin to try to sing like that dude. I think I was born with the singing voice I have and practice or training wouldn’t help me much. I just like making up songs.
Although I obviously haven’t been blessed with natural singing talent, I feel very lucky so far in my life. I’ve wondered why some higher power thought I should stay alive up until now. I’ve speculated that there’s a reason I have yet to find out about. Sometimes while waiting for my grand purpose to be revealed somehow, it occurs to me that maybe I’ve brought about some good in the world already. I’ve generally been a good person, despite some bad judgement along the way. I’ve made people laugh occasionally throughout my life. Pondering it a little more, it could be that I’m being watched over, or looked out for, because I’m making a difference in the world by making music. It’s a grandiose notion.
With that in the back of my mind, maybe it’s why I’m here, what I was meant to do, and why instead of questioning it, I should probably just keep doing it. That sounds good to me, and it keeps me going with my hobby of writing songs. I enjoy it, so it’s good for me, and other people have enjoyed it, so it’s good for them too. I’ve provided entertainment for some people in my lifetime, and it feels like something I can continue with. Maybe I haven’t written a really great song yet, but maybe I have one in me. Maybe my future includes getting better with my music. The dream is to write one great song at least, and maybe one great album, but this latest one won’t be it.
My last album, Sunrise, had two or three good songs on it, and most of them were not bad, and overall, it was a good album, especially when compared with the rest of my albums. The one before that, Lockdown Leftovers wasn’t as good, because it was somewhat intentionally a group of previously-weeded-out songs. “When You Need To Fly” is more like that one. It has a bunch of interesting, yet fairly ordinary and uninspired songs on it.
That’s okay. It can serve as a demonstration of consistency in that it doesn’t have any really terribly awful songs on it either…arguably. I felt like I needed to get these songs out to you so you can stream them. Maybe you’ll like some of them, maybe you’ll be entertained, and if you are not inclined to consider any to be your favorite Scott Cooley songs, I’ll understand.
I have no one to blame but myself for what you hear, as I was the only person involved in all aspects of making the entire record. “When You Need To Fly” is really about life’s ups and downs – the title track song and the album as a whole. Ups and downs happen to most artists. Typical music careers have some duds. I’m not immune, but it gets me thinking that if I don’t give up, some greatness may be just around the corner. That’s the attitude I have lately. I know that if I keep going with writing and recording new ones, maybe some greatness will emerge. I think I have hope that it will happen, and I think I feel that way because of being grateful for so many things in my life so far. Sometimes we can all find ourselves in a bit of a rut in life, and while in the miserable company of the status quo, you’re not afraid to be true to yourself and go against the grain as you wait to stumble upon something exceptional.
To have the chance to stumble upon a creative hobby and then make your creations public is scary but pretty cool. As with other aspects of life, you have to power through the tough times to get to better ones. I think that’s where I’m at now with music. I feel very fortunate to be permitted to give it a try, to have the freedom to do what I do. Sometimes in life you get a sense that you’re on the verge of something, and I have that now. I’m thinking that I need to trust myself, my process, and good things will happen eventually. I’m weathering a storm of mediocrity I guess, to learn how to get through it to better weather ahead. I need to fly, and I want to fly.
There are on average about 30 people who regularly read this blog, according to the stats, and I’m grateful to have you read my long-winded ramblings about myself and my music. I’m not sure a long-form post about a new album will make a difference in my streaming analytics or not, but it was worth a try, and no one minds typing on about their favorite subject – themselves. Just as in conversation, you get to hear the description from the horse’s mouth, or keyboard in this case. I sincerely appreciate the interest in both my blog and my music.
Sometimes you sound nothing like your influences, nowhere close to the quality of music you yourself are a fan of. I did not think I could just endlessly tweak these and keep re-recording them to make them any better than they are. I thought it was important to enjoy the moment without regard for the future and make the most of having a bunch of songs that were ripe for releasing now, instead of waiting for better ones to show up. I wish I could make records like Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon or Boston’s debut – great vocals, electric guitars, high fidelity, sonically perfect, with high production value.
That’s the kind of music I personally enjoy, and with those types of influences, you’d think what I myself make might be similar in some way, but it’s almost the complete opposite. At least I tried my first electric guitar solo on this one. I can’t help what the output of my creative process sounds like, but it’s me, and I feel fortunate that some other people out there in the world like you sometimes find my music to be entertaining.
The future may never bring any tangible rewards for my contributions to music other than the satisfaction I got out of doing it, but that alone makes it worth it. I am proud to add to the clutter and sea of irrelevant noise. In this age when amateurish long-tail artists like me with a cult following at best can easily contribute to the oversaturation of music streaming, my perspective remains optimistic.
Keeping the right frame of mind about it all is important when you feel like you’re ready for greater heights, and that’s what the title song and album are about. Weathering storms, staying on an even keel, not letting life get you down for too long, daring to be a little different. I guess that’s what this new record is all about overall. You’ll be able to relate to the hopes for higher times ahead, taking off into the unknown future, and knowing more good fortune is yet to come. Faith that if you don’t give up, things will turn around, and you’ll be flying higher again soon.
