Category Archives: Lifebook

10 Years Ago I Scored Music for Liquid Imagination

It was 10 years ago today that my original compositions produced for the LIQUID IMAGINATION web zine first went live. Today I am reissuing all 16 tracks in one complete compilation under my instrumental music project Brandon: Unsung.

This featured music was composed, performed, programmed, produced and recorded by Brandon L. Rucker. Originally published on the web by Liquid Imagination web zine.

On December 1, 2009, John Arthur Miller (“JAM”), then-publisher of the online web zine LIQUID IMAGINATION, contacted me via email to, firstly, pile on enough kind words to make a grown man blush, and secondly, to discuss the possibility of merging my music-making abilities with the featured poetry published in the Liquid Imagination web zine. He had read my bio. He saw that I had spent over half my life playing music in various underground bands, and had evolved into something like a one-man musical franchise of sorts, composing, performing, recording and releasing my own original music all over the web as well as on CD.

Ultimately, I was asked to join LI’s amazing staff as the Music Composer/Coordinator, working very closely with then-managing editor (and now publisher) Sue Babcock. What a wonderful opportunity and journey it was. I remain truly honored and grateful for the opportunity, and I admit, quite proud of the work.

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The way it worked was: a web page was created for each individual poem, with a layout creatively adorned by photos, graphics and the poem’s text. Once that was in place I then took inspiration from the words and images and composed the musical piece from my own unique interpretation of the whole — whether the results of my interpretation was accurate to the author’s intentions or not was not the point of the confluence and sum of the parts in conjunction.

I wrote more extensively about the process and each piece in an article published in the fifth issue of Liquid Imagination, which can be accessed via: The Synergy of Poetry and Music.

Coming soon: I have plenty more music to upload and reissue on Bandcamp for the ease of sharing.

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My New Music Project w/ Upcoming Show

So I’ve been doing this music thing for while, right? But I’ve never been in a cover band, I’ve always created original music. But recently I joined an Alice in Chains tribute band that actually has a show coming up on July 5th at Radio Radio in the Fountain Square neighborhood of Indianapolis. How crazy is that? The guys I’m playing with have also played in other tribute bands for such classic rock icons as Soundgarden, Guns n’ Roses, AC/DC and The Cure. I am splitting lead and rhythm guitar duties as well as helping out with the multitude of harmonizing backing vocals that Alice in Chains are very notable for executing very well.

We’ve had four rehearsals so far, getting tighter and tighter with each one.

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Death Angel & Man Eating Giant at BCBC in Indianapolis

Above are just a few photos from our Tuesday night of which the highlight was the Death Angel show (w/ special guests Mothership, Photian Schism and Man Eating Giant) at the Black Circle Brewing Co. in Indianapolis, IN that I attended with my lifelong best friend and brother (from another mother) Joshua Hooten.

The photos, clockwise:

  • The Death Angel U.S. Tour t-shirt I bought from the band’s merch table (the back also has a design along with the U.S. Tour itinerary. Also a guitar pick and drum stick personally handed to me by lead guitarist Rob Cavestany and drummer Will Carroll, respectively.
  • Man Eating Giant (MEG) logo t-shirt from their merch table, where I also nabbed a 3-song CD and a drink koozie.
  • A pic of Josh and just prior to Death Angel’s face-melting set to a packed house.
  • Pacos Taqueria where Josh and I dined. I got the asada quesadilla which was delish and came with creamy sour cream, cilantro-strong pico de gallo and lettuce. I washed it all down with a Sprite.  By the way, their tomatillo green salsa verde was one of the best I’ve ever had. I introduced it to Josh who tried it with blind faith (saying I’ve never lied to him) and he dug it as well.

It was great being front-to-the-left to witness one of my guitar heroes nuke my brain with is ridiculous riffing and scintillating solos. The whole band was very tight and precise.

Death Angel is a pioneering American thrash metal band from the San Francisco/Oakland, California Bay Area, formed in 1982. We discovered them around 1988 on their sophomore album Frolic Through the Park.

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Resolution: Regain and Retain Attention

~ Lifebook #19 ~

Like many, I consume a lot of media. Be it social media, websites, research, daily & weekly podcasts, television, music, books and comic books — altogether it’s too much. Something’s got to give because I need my own damn attention back. I need my focus. I need to make a change, like pronto. Of course it won’t be books and certainly not music that I eliminate. However, I’ve already cut back on my weekly/monthly comic book/graphic novel reading. Over the recent years my television consumption has increased quite a bit because we are in a new golden age of television after all (although I’m still under the national average, at only 2-3 hours per day). Yet, still it’s too much. I could probably cut back on a few podcasts, but really those lovely things get me through my workday while I do very repetitive and monotonous work at the Day Job. That means the obvious place to make a drastic change in consumption (read: time suckage) is in social media and, well, the Internet in general. And what perfect time to make that behavioral adjustment than the New Year? Getting the damn phone out of my hand more and replacing that physical activity with even more books and more writing. It is precious time that could be better spend writing, say, daily microfiction like 100-word drabbles and 50-word dribbles, or jotting down the half-dozen story ideas that percolate through my brain daily. These are activities that I wish I could simply do on my phone with ease, instead of scrolling Facebook, Twitter and Instagram — however, the soft keyboards on smartphones are very aggravating interfaces for writing.

But I digress. The point is, WE ALL need to regain and retain our attention so that we may focus on more creative and productive things in our daily lives. In short . . . we need to PUT DOWN THE DAMNED PHONES!

One way of looking at it is: anything that is great . . . anything that is worth a damn hardly ever comes easy.

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Early last year I presented this article by Craig Mod (via Backchannel and Wired) as a guest blog where he writes about his determination to snatch back his attention. It’s worth a read.

2018: What Will Be, Will Be

~ Lifebook #18 ~

So I exited 2017/entered 2018 in a rather foul mood and before turning in for the evening (which was not long after midnight because apparently I’m an old man), I wrote this rather sour New Year’s Resolution.

Usually I go into a New Year with a positive outlook and attitude. I go in with a plan and mindset to do new things, better things and simply be better at everyday life.

Well, this year I’m not doing that. For 2018 I’m going into it with a negative attitude for once. I’m embracing a certain realistic cynicism where usually there’s an idealistic optimism. In its place is a fatalistic realism?

I’m done trying to make things be what they should be — or what I believe they should be. I’m done trying to make things right that don’t want to be right.

The one exception might be my heath. I’ll do what I can (as a diabetic) to make that better, I suppose.

But everything else?

What will be, will be.

Or something like that.

I did mention that I was in a foul mood when I wrote that, right?

Sour notes aside, still, what will be, will be.

What will not be, won’t be.

P.S.: I did wake up in a much better mood and with a better attitude on this fine first day of the new year . . .

In Full Swing in Spring (it seems)

~ Lifebook #17 ~

Spring always brings turbulent weather and this year’s season of renewal has been no exception. A monsoon season in both April and May? C’mon, now, that’s going a bit overboard. May is usually my favorite month of the year because of a few reasons, such as it being a period of time (usually) beyond extreme weather, a time of moderate temperatures (usually), the flowers are in full bloom and the NBA Playoffs are happening. It’s arguable that May, along with October, is the most beautiful month of the year. I do like beautiful things.

This Spring brings things that seem to represent my getting back into the swing of things. To wit:

  • Started a new job recently, effectively returning me to the mortgage business. The new position comes with my highest salary yet. That’s kind of the idea as you progress through your working life, whether transitioning to a new industry or remaining in the same one. It’s rare that your cost of living decreases over time in this society, so continued growth in earnings is just what the accountant ordered. Now . . . if I could just get used to working 8-to-5, meaning having to go to bed no later than 1 AM . . .
  • Recently rekindled my burgeoning creative partnership with my old writer friend Jennifer Macaire. We’ve been kicking around the idea of co-writing a book or small series of books (likely a trilogy) the past two years and that’s still the plan. After presenting her with an idea for a different approach to a collaborative novel experiment, she has tasked me with the initial conception of our project, which, funnily, was the opposite of what I wanted to do. But I’m glad she did because I got started on it (tentative codename: Project Seven) right away that Friday and have conceived what I think could be a very interesting YA urban fantasy series. The brainstorming sessions I had last weekend also got my creative juices finally flowing on an older idea (codename: Project Arcana) that I’ve kicked around in my noggin probably since Moses reportedly parted the Red Sea. So it’s good to be back in a creative and productive state of mind and I can’t thank Jennifer “Sneezy J” Macaire enough for indulging and inspiring me to get the ball rolling.
  • The band has been about as active this year so far as we were in all of 2016.  A month or so ago we put the finishing touches on our initial 5-song EP (although we still need to mix it, master it and release it). There are rumblings of finally returning to the stage by this summer, but as I’ve learned in the 2.5 years of this band’s existence, I need to curb my expectations, if not my goals for it altogether. We’ve only played one show (in January 2016) and written eight songs in all that time. Yes, we are men in our 40s, all four of us married, three of us with kids and jobs, so naturally a band at this point in our lives is going to be a part-time venture. One would be foolish to think that what we did in our youth and 20-something years as musicians could ever be replicated now. The dedication of time, hell, the availability of time for guys not far from middle-age just isn’t there. It can’t be. And that’s a hard, inconvenient truth I had to come to grips with in 2016. For now I’m happy to ride the wave as it comes (and goes).