I've been writing and performing music since I was 16. For most of those years, the songs stayed with me. Now they finally have somewhere to go. I make music under the name Iron Paul, and here's how that happened.
Writing since 16
I grew up in Janesville, Wisconsin, on High Street. This year I wrote a song about growing up in that house, and one line from it says a lot: "We had each other, and that had to be." These days I live in Westminster, Colorado.
Somewhere along the way I had to choose between working as a graphic artist and designer or working as a musician. Design won. Part of the reason was simple. I had trouble finding anyone who wanted to play my originals in a band. So I kept writing, and the songs waited.
Songs that waited decades
Some of them waited a long time. I wrote "Here Comes The Light" in 1973. It was my Neil Young song. "Wineglass Innocence" came along around 1981, and I wrote it with my brother, Klaas Luiting.
Both of them have finished recordings now. "Here Comes The Light" has a country version and an EDM version. The EDM version of "Wineglass Innocence" is called "Turning Out The Light."
Suno is my studio
Now I write the songs and upload my music, and Suno acts as my studio. Suno is an AI music tool, and I use it to build out the songs. It fills in the arrangement and the instruments, the band I never managed to put together. The words and the melodies are mine. I set Suno up with my own recorded voice, so on most of these tracks you're hearing me. I write and perform the music, and Suno helps it sound finished.
Where the name comes from
The first song I wrote on Suno was about the "Paul is dead" legend. The story goes that Paul McCartney died in a car crash in 1966 and was replaced by a look-alike. Iron Paul is that look-alike, the one who has kept up the identity all these years. I later recreated the song with my own voice and edited the lyrics so they nod to both Paul and John Lennon. The version I put out is the fourth one.
I like that the name has a second meaning, too. Iron will. I've held on to some of these songs since 1973, and I never stopped writing. Maybe that's a little iron of my own.
The stories behind a few songs
"Spiral Bound Jesus" goes back to when I was eight. I nearly drowned at Lions Beach in Janesville. Jesus was there, and I chose to come back for my mom. Years later, at the Cabrito House, a halfway house my dad helped build in LA, Jesus appeared to me again, and that's where I got sober. Later still, at a low point in my life, I found a letter he wrote me in a spiral-bound notebook at a bus stop. That's why I wrote the song.
"Factory Floor Forever" is about what it felt like working in a factory in 1980.
"Stay There" is a song I wrote about Cory. One line in it is simply "I feel safest when I'm with you." I also wrote us an anniversary song in the style of AC/DC.
Here Comes The Light, with Mike Bollig
"Here Comes The Light" owes a lot to Mike Bollig. I played it live for Mike at the Porch Concert. Mike co-wrote it with me, and he's the reason the song was saved. Thanks, Mike.
I also help Mike turn his own songs into finished recordings. I wrote about that in Building a Home for Mike Bollig's Songs.
Listen
My first EP is called ironPaul. It's 16 songs I think of as hypnotic running songs, progressive psychedelic rock and deep house, with a four-on-the-floor kick under a long delayed guitar.
If you have songs of your own that have been waiting a long time, I'd love to hear about them. Say hello at hello@steveknowsweb.com.