Imagine him.
Imagine him embarking on a musical project in 2011.
Calls it the Doomed Babe Series.
Writing songs about love gone wrong, love destined to fail, love lost, and love never moving beyond the platonic stage.
Songs about yearning, jealousy, heartbreak, obsession, regret, and all the messy, beautiful wreckage that comes with wanting someone you can’t have.
Imagine him thinking this would be a solid endeavor for ten releases or so.
Write catchy rock ‘n’ roll songs to deal with some personal demons.
Get it out of his system.
Imagine him finishing the tenth installment and discovering his well of inspiration is far from drying out.
Imagine him always writing and recording songs, everywhere he went.
In his car.
Parents’ house.
Girlfriends’ houses.
Imagine it accumulating.
Hundreds of songs.
Thousands of gutpunchy, witty, dumb, and smart words on the human experience.
Self-releasing these songs on his own dime.
The occasional label release.
Imagine music bloggers thinking: didn’t he just release something last week?
Imagine music bloggers writing about the release anyway, because how could they not?
Imagine just 10% of these songs being hits.
But what if the hit rate is much, much higher?
It is.
Much higher.
Much, much.
There are so many songs.
Finding a bad one is hard.
Finding a new favorite is easy.
See the man now, 15 years later.
Announcing he is done.
Had a rough couple of years.
Body battered and beaten.
Mind ready to quit rock ‘n’ roll.
50 is a good number to wrap it up.
Now that his decision is final, he wants to get it over with.
Releases #48 on February 6th.
Releases #49 on March 6th.
Releases #50 on March 19th.
The last one features some of his best songs yet.
Quit while the going is still good.
Proud, he is.
He should be.
He is J Waylon.
Criminally underrated writer of catchy garage power pop punk songs.
Man of a thousand broken hearts.
Generous human being who gave us 50 killer releases and asked for nothing in return.
The Doomed Babe Series 2011-2026.
Don’t cry because it’s over.
Be grateful it happened.
To the man about to quit rock ‘n’ roll:
We salute you.
Add to wantlist: Bandcamp