There are stories that move quietly, without seeking applause or spotlight—stories that flow beneath the surface until, one day, they rise like a river breaking free. “Flow Like a River” is not merely a song. It is the result of a life lived deeply, with detours that few musicians ever take. It is a song shaped by decades of silence, spiritual discovery, scientific rigor, and a love that never let the music die.
This is the story of a man whose musical journey began not in the traditional sense, but on the open roads of America in 1977. As a young hitchhiker wandering through a country still healing from the Vietnam War, he encountered strangers whose lives revealed the extremes of the human experience—grief and hope, sorrow and tenderness. Those raw, unscripted moments planted the seeds of his songwriting: observations scribbled into notebooks, melodies forming in quiet rest stops, empathy growing with every mile.
In 1980, he arrived in Boston, and for a moment, it seemed that music would be his path. He co-founded Judy’s Tiny Head, a funk-rock band that gained traction with their infectious energy and socially observant lyrics. Their single “My Car” became a college radio hit, and they shared stages with genre-defying legends like Run DMC, Violent Femmes, and Deborah Harry. Their sound was bold, their message authentic, and their potential undeniable.
But as often happens, life made its own decisions. The economic downturn of the early 1990s prompted a drastic turn. He left the stage and returned to school, eventually earning a PhD from MIT in marine biology. From there, his journey transformed in ways few artists could imagine: working as an ecologist, running for political office as a Green Party candidate, teaching incarcerated men at San Quentin Prison, becoming a socially responsible investment advisor, and eventually training as a meditation teacher.
Each new path wasn’t an escape from music—it was a deepening of perspective. While his guitar gathered dust, his soul kept gathering stories. The kind of stories that don’t scream to be heard but settle into the bones until they find the right time to emerge.
That moment came in 2015, when his wife Erika encouraged him to return to his creative roots. And like a river that remembers its way back to the sea, the music returned. He recorded his first solo album Rust, a record that marked not just a comeback, but a transformation. Gone was the urgency of youth. In its place: a calm, clear voice steeped in lived experience. Since Rust, he’s released five more albums, each one more reflective, textured, and human. His sixth album, Beyond the Veil, is expected this summer.
But few songs encapsulate his inner evolution like “Flow Like a River.” The track was written shortly after a 7-day silent meditation retreat—days spent in stillness, listening not to the world, but to the mind’s quiet rumble. The chorus is inspired by the Buddhist teaching of the Three Poisons: greed, hatred, and delusion. These aren’t abstract philosophical ideas—they are, in his hands, the emotional tides we all face when we let cynicism cloud the light of life.
“Flow Like a River” is both a warning and an invitation. It warns of the dangers of hardening ourselves to the world, of letting negativity calcify into disconnection. But it also offers a way out: a return to flow, to openness, to letting life move through us again. There is a meditative quality to the song, but it never loses its melodic core. Musically, it recalls the thoughtful lyricism of Andrew Bird and Jason Isbell, blended with the atmospheric rock of U2, Tom Petty, and The Shins. The result is a sound that feels both intimate and expansive—like hearing your own inner voice echo from the walls of a canyon.
But perhaps the most moving part of “Flow Like a River” is not its sound, but its origin. This is music born not from ambition, but from awakening. Not from trend-chasing, but from truth-seeking. It is the work of an artist who has lived many lives, and who now understands that the most important art doesn’t come from performance—it comes from presence.
In a time when so much music is made to be viral, “Flow Like a River” dares to be vulnerable. It dares to move slowly, to ask questions rather than shout answers, to trust the listener's heart more than their attention span. It is a song for those who have been lost, who have sat in silence, who have felt the current of change and wondered if it’s too late to begin again.
But as this story shows, it’s never too late. Not when the river still flows. Not when the music still waits.
And when you hear “Flow Like a River”, you won’t just hear a song.
You’ll hear a life—finally, beautifully—coming home.
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