The Deviant Dulcimerist

I had such a blast writing and recording this album. It originally started out as a three- four-song EP with no intention of doing anything but putting the songs up on the internet. But as the project grew, I kept writing and recording.

I had just moved back to San Diego when this began to unfold. One day towards the end of the recording process, I was listening back to the album to see what was needed besides recording the real vocal tracks. I was sitting on my couch with Bosco and my cup of exotic coffee and was shocked. This album had magic to it. It was fun, musical, different, and yes deviant. With renewed energy, I sang my ass off and put the finishing touches on the tracks. Then I thought I really needed to go back on the road and sing these deviant ditties to people. In a strange way, this album surprisingly brought me out of a decade long hiatus.

I had three dulcimers built for the project. One was by Jerry Rockwell, who crafted a four-string hourglass dulcimer I call “Uncle Eddy,” and then another was built by Bernd Krause which was a double dulcimer with a bass fretboard on one side and a treble on the other which I nicknamed “Bubba”. I played that on Banksy and Stormy Weather. Ron Ewing built a beautiful backpacking baritone Dulcimette for me which I used on the song Adrift. The only other instrument I played besides some keyboard was my Guitarcimer.

My original cover art came in the middle of the record. I couldn’t get the eyes right, so I gave myself sunglasses. Perfect solution. Bosco turned out better than me, but I like the beatnik look.

I don’t know why some albums have magic, while others just seem to be good. I’m very grateful this turned out the way it did. There are new songs being written now, and no doubt more to be recorded.

In a mostly traditional folk dulcimer world, I’m very glad to be deviant.

Kevin Roth- San Diego

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Songs

Click the Song titles for lyrics and samples of the songs.

Crazy Love

01 – Crazy Love

Come, sweet darling, sit down beside me I love looking in your eyes

Their big and round, honey-colored brown, our love was a sweet surprise

Chorus:

Some people day I’m crazy, maybe who knows.

All I know is I love you baby and I’m glad that it shows

Angels show up in unusual ways

We fell in love and you carried my heart away

When I met you I was feeling blue, life was a lonely ride

You know It’s darkest before the dawn, sometimes the light takes so long

But now I’ve got an angel by my side

Chorus

Some things are meant to be like me for you and you for me, love always finds a way

We’re a song that must be sung, our harmonies blend as one

You lighten up my darkest day

Chorus

Swami's Cafe

02 – Swami’s Cafe

Down at the Swamis café, south of LA

I’m sipping some brew with a brownie or two

There’s a painting inside, with the Swami’s arms spread out wide

On a surfboard he rides, the big wave in the sky

Chorus:

If you’re feeling uptight, if things don’t seem right

I know a special place for good vibes and sacred space

If you’ve got the money and time, you can buy some peace of mind

Even get your chakras aligned, down by the Swami’s café

Down at the Swami café, there’s a woman who plays

Her guitar out of tune, a little buzzed as she swoons

Across the street, there’s the sea, blue and calm as can be

It’s always a beautiful day down at the Swami’s café

Chorus

Everyplace that you see has got some mystical, magical, mystery

Even the Yoga and the Taco stores have some deeper meaning that you’ll want to explore

Chorus

Dorothy

03 – Dorothy

I told a friend I was moving to Kansas he said; “What kind of person decided to move there?”

I said, “I’ve got a feeling it will be a respite, so I’m packing up my Toto and all my affairs

I said, “I’ve got a feeling all kinds of things will turn around and come around and be what I need

Just like Dorothy landing in Oz, riding the tornado into make believe”

Chorus:

Dorothy are you there I could use some company

Don’t forget to leave those ruby slippers for me

I’ve got a fast track for making my way back

To the Lion and the Scarecrow and the Tin Man

It all turned into quite a cosmic Kansas, who would have guessed, who would have known

And no one would believe the crazy life I’m living between the yellow brick road and the twilight zone

Chorus

Don’t mind the man behind the curtain, smoke and mirrors is his game

Take the time to find the answers, isn’t that the reason that you came?

Well I packed my bags and moved back to California

You know there really is no place like home

You’ve got to have the heart, the courage, and the brains

To follow your rainbow wherever you roam

Chorus

The Incredible Lightness of Being

04 – The Incredible Lightness of Being

He headed west with nothing left, just a broken dream and a new beginning

He turned the headlights low when it began to snow

Sometimes you’ve got to just ride right into your own sweet sunset

A second chance again to let it all go

Chorus: Oh, the incredible lightness of being

Colorado, Arizona, California one long highway

Life’s a byway, just one long song

He drove for hours steeped in silence, only heard the hum of eighteen wheelers

Riding through the night into the light of dawn

Chorus

It doesn’t matter where you’ve been, and it doesn’t matter where you’re going

Life’s for knowing, what will be is gonna be

He used to have a lot of expectations, now it’s come down to the realization

That only love is gonna set him free

He pulled into his new apartment, four white walls and big wide window

He closed his eyes and leaned against a sunny wall

He heard the dog bark in the distance while the cars rushed past his window

Everyone’s in a hurry, going nowhere at all
Chorus

Rollin' in a RV

05 – Rollin’ in a RV

Some days everything seems possible, other days you just want to cry

Life is what happens while you’re making plans, no rhyme, or reason why

I told you don’t hold onto to anything, nothings gonna last

The future is now and in a cosmic eye, time flies by so fast

Chorus:

So, take that RV head down your inner-state, the red road is waiting for you

Either roll it, chew it, either way you chose it- just lighten up those blues

Don’t look back there’s nothing left behind you, just memories chasing some dream

It all comes down to row, row, row your boat navigating the stream

One day you’re going to just close your eyes and be absorbed into the milky way

They’ll find a memory of you in a photo somewhere, looking like a renegade

Chorus

Some hear the call of wanderlust, some hear the same old lie

Some let go of the life they know when hitting bottom opens their eyes

You don’t need bucket lists or analysis, you know what your heart desires

Its scrambled strangers in some greasy spoon, while burning up those rubber tires

Chorus

Some live for their stocks and bonds, some for retirement dreams

Some long for the world to change, but they don’t even know what that means

Some find Jesus, some find Buddha, sitting Za-Zen in trance

Some sit on their ass in Washington, never giving man a chance

Chorus

Deeper Than Blue

06 – Deeper Than Blue

Just when our love found its cadence, you changed the rhythm to our song

Our harmony was so appealing, until you turned the dissonance on

Now I’m deeper than blue, deeper than blue

You said our love could not sustain itself, you were happy playing solo being free

But your improvisations were so misleading, you modulated everything in me

Now I’m deeper than blue, deeper than blue

I remember the colors of the chords you played, they were wide, wide open full of hues

Then you muted, and you left me there suspended the moment I sang I love you

Your melody runs around my head, my foolish heart repeats the same refrain

The rhythms and the rhymes have all been left behind, as this maestro misguided love remains

Feeling deeper than blue, deeper than blue

The Butterfly Boy

07 – The Butterfly Boy

He was in his cocoon wrapped up and immune to living the dream in the sky

You could see in his eyes the look of surprise when he finally learned he could fly

Discovering himself he became something else, his enigma he never had known

Feeling vibration in each situation, he discovered a world of his own

Chorus

With his butterfly wings and the song the wind sings, he was musical art flying high

Landing on flowers for hours and hours lived the butterfly boy in the sky

The look on his face showed surrender and grace as the epiphany came to his eyes

Once his body was spreading, now it was shedding like watercolor rain from the sky

Everything changes, life rearranges, and nothing is quite what it seems

And on his last day in a colorful blaze, he flew right into his next dream

Chorus

He was a pallet of color form one wing to the other like Monet taking flight

He painted each scene as he flew through his dream, going gently into the night

The Holidaze Turkey Tune

08 – The Holidaze Turkey Tune

There’s a turkey farmer I know who one day decided to grow

Turkeys that fed on cannabis instead of the usual grass seed and so,

He sold them as organic birds but never mentioned a word

And on the holiday, all I can say are families acted strangely absurd

All the families that don’t get along after three bites broke into song

And everyone laughed as they fell on their ass, the entire day nothing went wrong

And the next day when they were asked, how was the family they said ‘What a blast”

With a snicker and sneer and a sweet little tear they said: “I just can’t wait till next year”!

Stormy Weather

10 – Stormy Weather

In the city that sits below the sea he stares at a refrigerator in a tree

As Jazz sizzles in the humid breeze down on Bourbon street

Sixty-knots of angry wind and rain, there’s another storm about to be named

It’s churning up the gulf again, towards what levies remain

Crypts in crowded in the cemetery, are ghostly architecture of eternity

He stares wondering how his life will turn out to be, there’s something eerie in the air

Chorus:

Nobody knows you’re here, you can be who you want to be or disappear

But sooner or later you’re gonna have to face your fears and find out who you really are

At the spotted cat club, the trumpet blew, he numbed out on whiskey and bourbon too

Checking out the waitress in her high heeled shoes, strutting her rhythm and blues

Stumbling to the refuge bar on the block, He orders last call on the rocks

Trying to avoid the ticking of the clock that tells him it’s time to choose

On Basin the street he gets his fortune told, he hopes the tarot tells him what his future holds

He hasn’t had much luck watching life unfold, so he slaps twenty-five bucks down

The psychic speaks in tongues as she begins, spreads the tarot across the table with a sneaky grin

For twenty bucks more she lights a candle for him, that absolves him of all curses and sins

And he’s pulled right in – thinking maybe with a little luck something will change within

Sitting alone with Jambalaya stew, he doodles on his napkin a thought or two

But reaches no conclusion, not a damn thing new to the quandary on his mind

The boarded-up shops on nervous streets are a sign to head north in retreat,

But you can’t outrun the storm way down deep, still he keeps looking for a sign

Banksy - (Love is in the Bin)

11 – Banksy – (Love is in the Bin)

Subversive epigrams
Are painted with satirical hands
Dark humor from the anonymous man
Banksy takes yet another stand

As the gavel at Sotherby’s falls
‘One point four million sold! ” is called
The painting shreds itself on the auction wall,
And the artists laughs somewhere ‘screw you all.’

At the Chardonnay affair
Jaws drop and the rich look scared
As ghosts of Van Gogh everywhere
Ask; ‘who sets the price on my despair’?

The artistic vandal made his mark
From walls in Bristol to children’s parks
And in this day and age the worlds a spark
From bombs in cafes to artists hearts

Adrift

12 – Adrift

We come spinning out of nothingness, scattering stars like dust

We’re just waves of possibility there really is no us

There is no time, there is no space it’s only just a dream

There really is no birth or death, and nothing in between

He asked me, well then how do you explain this life to me

I said: It all exists as a dream my friend within relativity

It’s a picture show on a cosmic screen perceiving through your eyes

The only question left to ask yourself really is who am I

Some say that it all began with the big bang long ago

But what created that cosmic bang, no one seems to know

No words can explain the infinite, yet silence speaks to me

So, let come what comes, let go what goes, adrift in the cosmic sea

Bonus Track - The Gift

13 – Bonus Track – The Gift

What can you give to the one who has everything
What can you give when they need nothing at all
What can you buy that’s a sweet little somethin’-
The last gift you gave them, you can’t even recall

Maybe this time you’ll find something funny
Maybe a gift card, to the funky new store
But something inside you says this time should be different
Your heart wants to give just a little bit more

Chorus:
Tell them you love them like it’s the last time you’ll see them
Don’t leave a hug or a kiss left behind
Hold them in gratitude a little bit longer
Embraced by the gift that only love finds.

You may find it odd when they look at you strangely
Asking if there’s anything wrong
Just look in their eyes and smile when you tell them
You’ve just rediscovered where your heart belongs

Chorus

There isn’t a day when I’m not thinking of you
In every song that I sing, in everything I do

You can give them a gift, with ribbons and wrappings�
You can give them some flowers and a sweet card that rhymes
But the gift they’ll remember, and never see coming
Is the way that you tell them you love them this time.

Chorus

People who helped make this amazing album!

The Team

Mike Tappero

Engineer Percussion

Steve Dillard

Trumpet

Nicholas Morales

Cello

Mitch Schecter

Drums Bass Percussion