It Means Everything

I am not one to blow my own trumpet, unless it is actually the trumpet I own which is in a case... somewhere... so yeah, I wrote this lyrics and I'm pretty happy with them. So I thought I would share them with you. I keep meaning to post my lyrics up here but I always feel it's just self serving and slightly arrogant but what can I say?

The song is called "It Means Everything". It's about losing loved ones very close to you. I wrote it about two of the most influential people in my life, both my Grandfathers, and every time I sing it I can't help but start to cry. However, please ignore to rather emotional blogger and just enjoy my words.


Do you ever look up at the sky?
And ask yourself why
The more things change, the more they stay the same
Are these rules we live by?

Do you lay awake at night
Asking your god if a wish is too big to deny
And you don’t know what it means
But it means everything

Do you feel you’ve lost everything
And you’ve no one or nothing to believe in
You feel alone, can’t find home
Because it’s gone

Maybe home is an imaginary place
That people seek
It’s not where the heart it and it’s not where you started
But it means everything

When the wind blows, do you hear it call?
Our time is drawing near
But it mean’s everything
It means everything

We morn the cost of the lost
The dearly departed
But they’ve reach a higher place
And to me that means everything

This song was written for you
The ones I loved and lost
If you could see just how much I’ve grown
That would mean everything


peace.love.respect.unity
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

This is my all time low...

What do you hear? Nothing but the rain...

I don't say it nearly enough but I love my best friend, Taz. After a joking conversation with him on the phone and joking conversation with a friend over who loved their best friend more, it really made me realise how much I miss him. I know it's normally hard for guys to say, and almost always looked upon as "gay" or whatever but I really do love that man. It took me 19 years to find a friend I trust with my life, a friend who I can sit in silence with without it being awkward, a friend that I can always count on and a friend who I can share incredibly emotional moments with one minute and joke and laugh the next. The song below is a song that always reminds me of him and how much I care about him.

Taz -"what do you hear Lightyear?"
Me - "nothing but the rain"
Taz - "get your gun and bring in the cat"




peace.love.respect.unity
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

My heart stumbles on things I don't know...

The lights will inspire you...

One day...

What do you hear? Nothing but the rain...

I love those moments of clarity. I had one just now and it's down to these two songs. Hopefully they can give you, if you choose to listen to them, some kind of peace if only for a moment...







Peace.Love.Respect.Unity
So Say We All

-- Tom RDD

Destination unknown...

One of the better known songs from possible one of the greatest album's of all time...

Love it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you it will set you free

I just booked my ticket to the Hop Farm Festival. Excited doesn't even cover it! I will be seeing so many musicians I admire and respect including; Bob Dylan, Mumford & Sons, Laura Marling and Johnny Flynn! I cannot wait. It will be incredible.

peace.love.respect.unity
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

I'm going to hold on...

A playlist for a chilled out kind of day:

Slightly Stoopid - Collie Man
Xavier Rudd - Come Let Go
Westbound Train - Please Forgive Me
Long Beach Dub Allstars - Roll Up
Tim Armstrong - Wake Up
Bedouin Soundclash - St. Andrews
Matisyahu - King Without A Crown
Pepper - Bring Me Along
Slightly Stoopid - No Cocaine
Westbound Train - Good Enough
Bedouin Soundclash - Until We Burn
The Slackers - In Walked Capo
Westbound Train - The Test
Slightly Stoopid - Officer
Tim Armstrong - Hold On
Matisyahu - Close My Eyes
Slightly Stoopid - Wiseman
Bedouin Soundclash - Walls Fall Down

You're like an old friend come to see me again...

I have always been a nostalgic kind of person and over the last few days I have re-discovered something that my teen self would be shocked I had forgotten, that's right Myspace (remember that?). I have probably logged more hours on myspace than I have facebook and that's quite scary now I think of it. I can't remember exactly why I went back to myspace but I did. I completely changed my profile and all the information on there as well as going through all my old pictures and the "blogs" I used to write. I came across one I had written just after leaving Canterbury and it was all about how I think people are defined. This is an extract:

"I'm one of those people who believe doing something defines who you are and who you are to become. Everyone makes mistakes, some are unforgivable and others will be forgotten in time. But the things we do and what we believe truly define who we are. I wouldn't be who I am if I hadn't done what I've done, the rules I've broken, the boundaries I've crashed through and the friends I have gained and lost along the way"

And this got me thinking about, as usual, about the past, but not because I wanted to change anything. My past has defined me and brought me to this moment. All the happiness and all the pain has gotten me here. So what is "here"? Here is a young man who loves to create music, who puts his heart and soul into it and uses song writing as a diary. Here is man who loves his friends more than he express in words. Here is a man with a dream. I may have been broken along the way, the path may have changed but the destination is the same.



Excuse the ramblings of a nostalgic hippy, but to finish; looking back into my past, I wouldn't change a thing.

peace.love.respect.untiy
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

adults just learn to play the most ridiculous, repulsive games

I love The Shins

the water/ travel light

Two of my favourite musicians in the world. Enjoy.




peace.love.respect.unity.
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

I take back every word that I said...

You can't take my heart it's in the city behind

As you may have gathered by reading other posts on here that I'm a pretty emotional person. I hold on to things and I don't let go, not easily anyway. But in a time of my life where everything is confusing and where every emotion I seem to feel is contradicted a few moments later, I seem to have finally made sense of something. Below is something I wrote into the notepad on my phone (as I don't have roaming wi-fi) as I left the city of Canterbury this morning...

I write this as I leave the city I once, if only for a brief time, called my home. I started the University of Kent, Canterbury in September 2007 and dropped out in March 2008 and since then Canterbury has always been a place that has made me feel so much emotion. After leaving I was plagued by "should have, would have, could have" and what if? scenarios. In my first year at Worcester I thought about it a lot and I always felt like I didn't really belong there because my experience at Canterbury was very special to me as it was the first time I was really independent and the first time I had friends who were so close they were almost family.

Last summer I visited my friends and was overcome with emotion so much in fact I broke down outside the halls where I used to live. When I first stepped into the city I regretted my decision to leave even though it was the right decision because of the course I was doing. Just being there made me doubt myself and the decision I made and seeing old friends that I fell out with because I left made things a lot harder.

This time was different. At times it felt like I had never left other times it felt like I had been gone for a lifetime. It was great to see old friends again, sit on Tyler hill one last time and watch the view of Canterbury city as it changed over the period of the day. A part of me will always love Canterbury but after two years away I finally don't see it as a home anymore. You might think that two years is a long time to come to this conclusion but when I left I left a lot behind. I left my friends some of whom I have lost, I left my passion behind where it had been destroyed by the course I hated and in a way I left a small part of my soul there too. It's hard to put it into words, as human emotion and feeling often are and I cannot expect anyone to ever understand just how I felt/feel about the whole experience. I thank the people who made my time there so great and I will always be friends with the ones I still hold dear. But it's time to let go of the life I used to live and the regret I feel as I can't keep carrying it with me.

Come Let Go

I am in love with this song!

The Words He Spoke

I don't know who wrote or spoke them but I got these quotes from a guy I follow off twitter:



"Life is about falling; living is about getting back up"
"It's at your weakest point you are given the opportunity to prove your strongest."

Got to love a bit of optimism when you're feeling pretty down.

peace.love.respect.unity
so say well all

-- Tom RDD

I Gave You All...

...and here is one of the many reasons why Mumford & Sons are one of my favourite bands...




peace.love.respect.unity
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

Johnny Flynn: Been Listening

After all the excitement and anticipation I didn't get to see Johnny Flynn in Brighton today after all. Due to high demand it turned into a ticketed event and it was sold out by the time I managed to get down there. I wish I had known sooner as I've now listened to Johnny's new album "Been Listening" and it is possibly one of the best albums I have heard in a long time. I would definitely put it up there with Mumford & Sons' "Sigh No More" and Laura Marling's "I Speak Because I Can" for best CD of the year (so far anyway). The opening track is the first single released from the album (Kentucky Pill) and although a good song I wouldn't say it gives the listener an inkling as to how good the next 10 tracks are going to be. Tracks such as The Water, Sweet William Pt.2, Howl and the title track, Been Listening are nothing short of musical bliss. This is definitely an album for anyone who appreciates folk music and Johnny Flynn's latest album shows British "nu-folk" (or whatever NME wants to label it as) at its best!



peace.love.respect.unity
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

A moment of silence please...

Today I went to see a friend I haven't seen in perhaps 2 years. He is and always has been one my closest friends. I first met him 10 years ago when starting secondary school. Since then we've been the best of friends, but like all friendships it changed when I went to University. As much as I regret not seeing much of him since starting Uni it was great to see him today and have a catch up. So that was all good.

However, being in his home town brought back so many memories. It was the town I spent much of my teen years messing around in, I spent my college years there and it is those college years that have put a downer on my mood. I walked past the building where I poured my heart and soul into acting and felt nothing but sorrow. I walked through the field where I spent time with friends and grew closer to the girl who ultimately become my girlfriend for the next 4 years. I guess it is these memories that bring this self pity in my mind. It all feels like a life time ago. The happiness, the innocence, times I will never get back, moments I can only relive in my mind. I've never been much good at living in the present and walking through a town where so much of my life has played out was tough especially in my current situation. It all stems from what is currently going on in my personal life and I really do feel like I'm being torn apart by everything I feel.

The below is a quote I love and although it is part of a fictional story it can be put into so many different contexts.

"Sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something" -- Sam, Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers

peace.love.respect.unity
so say we all

-- Tom RDD

This Addiction

Why do I put music videos up? Well it's because on the one hand I love music with a passion and on the other hand it is the fact that the words I say have all been said before by someone. Most of our feelings have been put into music so why not let a music video explain how you are feeling when the words just aren't there for you to speak or type in this case. Call it un-original, less passionate but I find an escape in music and sometimes some artists have managed to put words to something I cannot. So that's why I do it, if any of you were wondering.

"living with the uncertainty, that I'll never find the words to say, which would completely explain just how I'm breaking down" -- City and Colour

peace.love.respect.unity

-- Tom RDD

Star Wars and... adidas???

Just saw this on a friends profile on Facebook and had to put it up. Made me laugh as I am a huge Star Wars geek!

Do you feel like you've lost everything you can loose?

Some times there are things that you just can't explain. Some times you hear the first note of a song and that song seems to capture everything you are thinking and feeling. In my first year at Worcester University I went through a big identity crisis, and to some extent I still am going through the same thing, but there seemed to be one band whose music would sooth my soul (as cliche as that sounds it's 100% true). I don't really know how else to explain it. It seems whenever I go through a hard time in life I find something that puts me at peace and it's always something I can't fully explain or seem to put words to. This year it was Loco, last year it was Angels & Airwaves.








Peace.Love.Respect.Unity

-- Tom RDD

Tom RDD - The City Limits...

Have pretty much booked my day in the studio to record my "solo album" titled "The City Limits..." On July 28th I should be stepping into the studio to record an album of short songs with my good friend Amy C providing her assistance in the word speaking department. I really cannot wait. It's taken a year to get of the ground but it's finally happening. I am very excited. If anyone would like a copy it will be free of charge to all those who ask for it.

On another note, Jimmy Eat World's album "Futures" is really good! I reccomend it!

Peace.Love.Respect.Unity

-- Tom RDD

"Truth is, everybody is going to hurt you; you just gotta find the ones worth suffering for" -- Bob Marley

Peace.Love.Respect.Unity

-- Tom RDD

Your words are ash and dust...

Will be going to see Johnny Flynn play at an instore show next week in Brighton. Really can't wait. Below is the video from his first single from the new album "Been Listening". Give it a listen.




Peace.Love.Respect.Unity

-- Tom RDD

Another Tragic Case...

I am really listening to a lot of pop punk at the moment especially New Found Glory. So here you are. Enjoy this video.



Peace.Love.Respect.Unity

-- Tom RDD

Today's pop-punk playlist...

It's been a while since I've put a playlist up and I know how much you all want to know what music is blasting out of my speakers that have survived since the 90's! So here you go...

New Found Glory - My Friends Over You
Bowling For Soup - Punk Rock 101
The Offspring - Pretty Fly For A White Guy
Blink 182 - The Party Song
The Copyrights - 57 North
Yellowcard - Breathing
Whitmore - October Ends
New Found Glory - Truth Of My Youth
Home Grown - Why Won't You Leave Me?
Chixdiggit! - Geocities Kitty
Blink 182 - Anthem pt. 2
Bowling For Soup - 1985
Midtown - Just Rock & Roll
Hawk Nelson - California
Saves The Day - Shoulder To The Wheel
Sugarcult - Stuck In America
The Starting Line - The Best Of Me
Good Charlotte - Anthem (surprisingly a pretty good song)
Jimmy Eat World - The Middle
Allister - You Lied
Home Grown - Give It Up
New Found Glory - Dressed To Kill


Hope you're having a good day planet earth.

Peace.Love.Respect.Unity

-- Tom RDD