In the meadows.jpg

Dutchyyy

Debbie.

Dedicated to my late mother... whom, like myself, always felt at peace at night when the world was quiet and peaceful.

 Debbie - (May 1st, 1953 - August 19th 2016)

Tracklist:
1.) Nocturnalis I 
2.) Nocturnalis II 
3.) Nocturnalis III 
4.) Debbie. 

Backstory,

   I was living in Los Angeles when my mother Debbie got sick in August of 2016.  She was the text case of a hypochondriac so when she told me,  I basically told her to walk it off in a nice motivational way.  A few days passed and she was admitted to the hospital.  My family all told me the Doctors said she would be fine.  At the time,  I just started a job doing master QC for Netflix.  I was on a probationary period,  living on my friend Josh's couch (Sunjet/Josh Jetson) and didn't even have enough money to get back and forth to work yet,  so my mom would paypal the little money she had to help. A few days passed and mom had to be intubated. Obviously things were more serious than my family led them to be.  My heart was heavy.  I just started this amazing job making $120/hour and all I wanted was to fly home and see my mother,  but my family insisted I focus on the Job my mom was so proud I landed and that it was in my best interest not to see her like this and that the doctors said she will be fine. 2 days later,  My probationary period ended and I finally started getting paid.   I was at work trying to keep my calm & stay positive by listening to [Redacted Sample] on repeat. My phone abruptly rang and when I picked up  my brother was crying his eyes out.   My heart dropped, He couldn't form many words so He put me on the phone with the doctor. They wanted my permission to take her off life support. At this point, I'm shell-shocked because the last time I spoke with my family, they downplayed how serious her condition was. The doctor passed the phone to someone specialized in breaking this type of news to people and she tried her hardest to comfort me and advise me that taking her off life support was the best option and what the rest of the family already had come to terms with, but I refused..  My mother was full of love and empathy & equal fear, doubt, trauma and doom,  she felt this world too deeply and it was difficult for her. As much as she loved us,  she always had a hard time navigating through this world (The same goes for myself and my brother,  we feel things deeply and always feel out of place).   I was listening to [Redacted Sample] when I got the phone call that my mother wasn't going to make it. A song once used to help calm and center me now had this traumatic energy attached to it.  I told my job what was happening and they told me to take a few days off to process.  The next day,  I got an email from my Job saying do not come into work before calling.  Apparently,  it was against policy to take pictures in the building, and I had posted a picture of me at my desk on twitter when i got 1st got hired saying verbatim - "thank you universe for 2nd chances,  I am eternally grateful"  - With regret in their voice,  they had to terminate me immediately.  It was a zero tolerance policy.  My boss was crying telling me this, because they grew fond of me during my short time with them and I was very very good at my job, plus they knew what I was dealing with, but it was flagged by someone very high up in the chain and no exceptions could be made.  My heart was smashed, I worked so hard to get that job and my mother and family were so proud of me.  I didn't know how to break the news to them.  I just kinda fell to pieces, paralyzed in the motel room I was in.  40 minutes later I got the call.   My mother had passed.  August 19, 2016.      I was on the next flight back to Tampa Bay to help take care of my family and became super numb.  The first time I touched music,  I decided to flip the [Redacted Sample].   I did it very fast,  didn't overthink or mix it down,  just quickly flipped the sample and uploaded it to soundcloud titled "...."  The following year on mothers day 2017,  I revisited the o.g. sample and made 2 more flips dedicated to her.  Nocturnalis I, II  and I also recorded a freestyle over one of them (that didn't make it to the ep).  One year later on mothers day 2018,  I revisited it one last time and created Nocturnalis I.
  
 I haven't ever truly recovered from losing my mother. I was immediately thrust into turmoil. My big heart grew cold. The defensive walls I built after such a traumatic experience have never really gone away to this day. I've been in survival mode ever since. I've never officially dropped an album since, like I'm protesting Finality.  The crazy thing is, I've made more music from 2017-present, than I made from 1995-2016.  Multiple unreleased albums, changed my entire creative process to real time, one take documentation as a form of therapy to be more in line with "The Reluctant Clap" (DailyRambles) Freestyle Series and "LongStoryShort" my one take improv ambient/jazz series and began "Evolving Portals" and just never stopped. Earlier this year I was encouraged to release a huge body of work that wasn't created with the intent of being heard publicly. I guess "The Reluctant Clap" (Chapter V) would be my first official album release since, which exists on Supercollector, So releasing this EP here makes sense to me.  I hope one day to feel light and at peace again, and I hope wherever you are mom.  You are finally at peace. I love you and miss you so much, you always loved my spacey, sleepy, mellow music, so I know you would sleep to these on repeat.  
Eternally,
Your Son,
Dutch.


Sidenote:
I used to fight with my mother constantly about engaging on my music posts on facebook with personal stuff.  I was pretty mean about it, and it wasn't until after she passed that I found out she created a secret tumblr account ( https://hopefulninja.tumblr.com/ ) so she could keep up with what I was doing and show love.  I cried pretty hard when I found it, cus she just wanted to support me and I was too worried about supporters/fans, seeing a bunch of personal stuff or stalking her page. I had no idea she was on tumblr. I just teared up looking at that page again haha. Fast forward to present day,  The entire social media space is ruled by engagement, sometimes i feel like karma is haunting me on twitter when i post all this art i'm proud of with nearly 3k followers, and maybe 4 people consistently show up (if they see it) You really don't know what you have till it's gone. 