in 2007, when I was at a memorial for my friend Bryan Casey, his father said something along the lines of not believing in an afterlife. Being an atheist, I had the same struggle with the premise, and Bryan at that time was my only friend who had died. His father finished the thought by saying that in life we influence one another, and the fact that we were all in the same place mourning Bryan, meant he had influenced us all, and that influence carries through us as we influence others - and maybe that continuous wave is what the afterlife is.

In my early High School years, I would come home from school and login to AIM immediately. I would usually see Music_Oddity (or was it MusicOddity or Music_0ddity ?) logged on too. Bryan, as I remember him, loved music and was unpretentious about it. He was never smug and legitimately wanted to share music recommendations because he was excited about them. Sometimes Bryan's recommendations would come through others - I remember a friend of mine asking if I had heard of The Velvet Underground, I had not. She told me to download the songs Stephanie Says and Sunday Morning and that Bryan had introduced her to the songs. I remember when Lou Reed died in 2013, I found out on a Sunday morning, and I listened to that track and also thought of Bryan.

I was adamant at that time to buy CDs from the record store and not to pirate them. I remember asking Bryan through AIM to just give me CDs to check out. I would drive to Lou's Records in Encinitas which took a quarter of the gas tank of my Toyota Previa. A good record store wasn't super easy to find in the suburbs and Lou's was, in my opinion, the best in San Diego. Might still be? Haven't been in years.

Bryan and I had an inside joke about starting a band (we were gonna call ourselves Joanne and Linda), not write any songs, and then sue the White Stripes for taking our idea for a two-piece band. It's one of those things that probably was never that funny, but we would keep it going in many conversations. We had a disagreement about which newer Bowie record was better, Heathen or Reality. When Bowie passed away I thought of Bryan too, I knew he would've loved Blackstar. In high school I wanted to buy the Goofy Movie soundtrack for those Tevin Campbell songs but the price on Ebay was insane. At Bryan's memorial, his mom brought all of Bryan's CDs and let his friends take one to remember him. I saw a White Stripes record and thought about the connection to Joanne and Linda, but then, somewhere in the pile was the Goofy Movie soundtrack. Of course Bryan would have it, and that's the one I took. I still have it, I looked at it maybe a week ago when rearranging the apartment.

And then when someone dies, your entire relationship with them goes from something between two people to something that lives only in one person. And with Bryan, it was the first time I had experienced it. The day he died I was going to someone's house, they were having a 90's themed party - just a half assed excuse to drink and play Bop It. On the way, the person I was driving with got a call. The party was gonna be mellow, Bryan had died early that morning - and that's how I found out. I had just seen Bryan a month prior, it was the first time in a long time since I had seen him. I had gone to college in San Francisco and hadn't been in regular contact with Bryan for maybe 3 years. We ended up not going to the party, I was in complete shock. I got home and told my mom my friend died, but I was ok. I got to bed and started crying, it took hours to hit me.

This was my first summer back from college, all of my high school friends had gone off and done other things. I was in a friend's band that summer playing keyboard for fun and hanging out with all of my new college friends who also went home to San Diego for the summer. Bryan's death was a sobering moment - high school friends I hadn't spoken to for some time started to all meet up. My friend Grant was playing an open mic in some café and he sang a Deathcab for Cutie song - another band that reminded me of Bryan - I can remember Bryan (poorly haha) playing a Deathcab song on a piano once. After that, a few of us drove out to a part of Poway that didn't have a lot of light pollution and watched a meteor shower. A moment Bryan manifested without knowing.

Most recordings I make don't see the light of day. I had started working on tracks to revisit my childhood in San Diego - to shine a light on it that wasn't just the disdain I had for it growing up. Bryan was one of those people that changed my life especially in regards to music. I was thinking of him today and knew the anniversary of his death was coming up. I was surprised to see that the 16th anniversary of his death was actually today. 8.13.23 - I had debated whether I ever release some of this stuff, or just keep it as files on my computer, to sit buried in folders. I'm choosing to take today as a sign, a circumstance that is a coinciGod - it is a sign because I choose to see to see it that way.

Dedicated to Bryan Casey
08.08.86 - 08.13.07