April 21, 2025 • 30 mins
From painfully shy child to prolific songwriter with over twenty albums, Eddy Mann's musical journey defies easy categorization. Growing up in Philadelphia with a bebop pianist father and a mother who valued cultural heritage created the perfect environment for creative growth, though Eddy initially struggled to find his voice. That all changed when he picked up a guitar as a teenager – suddenly, the boy who couldn't read in front of classmates found himself performing in clubs before he even finished high school.
Eddy's remarkable transformation continued as he navigated the challenging terrain of secular music. Playing "seven nights a week" and surrounded by temptations, he eventually reached a pivotal realization that something deeper needed to guide his life. This awakening led him back to spiritual roots planted in childhood, fundamentally reshaping his musical direction.
What makes Eddy's approach truly distinctive is his refusal to be confined by genre labels. "I don't play a genre of music," he explains, noting that his work spans rock, country, Americana, and "Philly soul R&B." The consistent thread throughout his catalog is spiritual influence and optimism focused on compassion. Whether writing worship songs or exploring everyday struggles, Eddy creates music that encourages listeners to "love your brother, love your sister, live in a way that's compassionate."
Now working on his newest project "The Unveiling," inspired by the Book of Revelation, Eddy aims to offer comfort and hope in challenging times. As he prepares for his upcoming East Coast tour featuring more intimate venues than previous years, his mission remains clear: using music to create "a better place, a happier place, a more loving place." Eddy's parting wisdom? "If you have a voice out there, let it be yours. Don't feel like you need to be anybody else."
Discover Eddy's extensive catalog on all major streaming platforms and connect with him through eddymann.com, where authentic music meets spiritual purpose.
Want to be a guest on Living the Dream with Curveball? Send Curtis Jackson a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/1628631536976x919760049303001600
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Living the Dream Podcast with
Curveball, If you believe youcan achieve.
Welcome to the Living the Dreamwith Curveball Podcast, a show
where I interview guests thatteach, motivate and inspire.
(00:20):
Where I interview guests thatteach, motivate and inspire.
Today, I am joined byaward-winning and prolific
songwriter, Eddie Mann.
Eddie is known as a smile forthe soul.
He has a tradition of culture,living in an ever-evolving
(00:43):
neighborhood, so we're going tobe talking to him about
everything that he's up to, andhe has an impressive catalog of
20 albums.
So, Eddie, thank you so muchfor joining me today.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Joy to be here with you.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Why don't you start off by telling everybody a
little bit about yourself?
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Sure, I grew up in Philadelphia, pennsylvania so
I'm a Philly sports guy forbetter or worse and I grew up in
a home that my father was likea bebop pianist that was his
(01:23):
thing so there was a lot of jazzmusic played in the house
growing up and my mother wasreally cognizant of culture and
passing things down, and so Ihad a really diverse background
growing up and it naturally fedinto the creative side for me.
(01:48):
I was also in a home that was aspiritual home.
My parents didn't push andforce religion on me, but they
were weekly churchgoers and so Iwould tag along and have a lot
of seeds planted and at somepoint in my life when I needed
(02:13):
to turn to something else,that's where I turned, because I
knew it was there.
And I think that as aprofessional musician which was
the first leg of my adult life Iwas a secular musician out
playing at a very young age inthe worst environments that you
(02:35):
could be in, all sorts oftemptation for things to go
wrong and opportunities to makewrong turns, and after a period
(02:56):
of time when the next drink orthe next drug or the next woman
wasn't wasn't doing it anymore,I realized that there had to be
something else.
There had to be something elsemore.
There had to be something elsemore important, something bigger
that was going to drive methrough my life, and for me it
ended up being the faith thatwas, I guess, where those seeds
(03:19):
were planted started to blossoma little bit and I learned not
to just I.
I was just relying, I think,like a lot of people do, relying
on what I thought was my owncleverness to get by in the
world and and it wasn'tsufficient.
It wasn't sufficient.
And as I've, as I've got olderand grown into the person that I
(03:47):
am, there's just the worldleaves me dumbfounded often, and
I'm fortunate, I feel fortunatethat I have a place to go, I
have a place to turn whennothing makes sense.
Does that make any sense?
Speaker 1 (04:09):
Yeah, that makes perfect sense.
And you know, congratulationson turning things around.
So how did you, oh, go ahead?
Speaker 2 (04:20):
No, no, no, no, you go ahead.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Well, how did you originally get into singing in
the first place?
Speaker 2 (04:30):
I was a painfully shy kid, and when I say painful, I
think I would have rather goneto the dentist than read in
front of the kids in school.
I was just so painfully shy andI don't know why, because I was
brought up in this secure home.
There was no reason for me tobe that way.
But I was until my, I guess,early teens, and I put a guitar
(04:57):
around my neck and as soon as Idid that, I found my voice.
I couldn't play a lick, Iwasn't any good, but I could
talk a blue stream, I could talkforever.
I.
It's a really odd.
It's an odd time when I lookback on it.
(05:18):
Because I was, I was, I playedsports all my life up until I
fell into this music thing.
And I was a good athlete, youknow, I didn't.
I didn't have to ride the bench.
I was, you know, had quickreflexes and it got me out of a
lot.
It got me on into a lot ofthings that maybe I I wasn't
(05:40):
wouldn't have been able to playotherwise.
So I was active, I was onlysports teams I was.
But it's still there, wasn't,there was something there that
just prohibited me fromexpressing myself, and the
guitar enabled me to do that andI struggled with what it was
(06:04):
going to mean as an adult, myfather being a depression-aged
kid.
Father being a depression-agedkid, his music, his jazz and
playing and all was alwayssecondary, and he also grew up
in a time when there were lessopportunities for him to make a
(06:26):
living at it.
Not that I mean as a jazzmusician it might have been
actually better back then, butas a pop musician or and secular
musician, that kind of blew upfor me as a kid.
The business was just kind ofon fire and there were all these
opportunities to go out andplay, you know, seven nights a
week, and I fell into playingbefore I was even out of high
(06:46):
school.
I was playing in clubs, inplaces that I was underage.
So I ended up taking a twoyears of.
I was two years into college,my first in in business school
for com and I.
I decided to take the summer ofand just travel and play I to
get the music out of my system.
(07:07):
And a lifetime later,twenty-plus albums later, it's
not out of my system.
And a lifetime later, 20 plusalbums later, it's not out of my
system.
It's who I am, and once I cameto grips with that, who I was.
I didn't want to be one ofthose.
I never had any intention ofbeing a starving musician.
(07:28):
I wanted to work.
Any intention of being astarving musician, I wanted to
work.
So I made sure that I I wasplaying music that people wanted
to hear and this and once I inthe beginning it was fine
because I didn't realize thatthe driving force for me ended
up being composition and itturned.
It turned into songwriting.
(07:48):
And once that happened and Imade the change over to writing
my own material and going outand playing.
That road was a little tougherbecause I didn't have the
built-in income that I hadearlier.
But I've always been someonethat I don't live in debt.
(08:10):
I don't have any debt.
I own.
I own my homes, my vehicles.
You know I'm fortunate enoughto have a studio north and a
studio south.
So I'm at a point in my lateryears where I am completely
self-contained.
I do everything myself.
And technology the way it istoday.
If you're willing to put thetime and the effort to learn how
(08:33):
to use it, you can do that.
You don't need to be a slave tosome record company or someone
else that's put out some moneyfor you.
So, as a musician, I've beenpretty creative with making the
landscape, finding a way to makethe landscape work for me as
it's changed, because I think weall understand with technology
(08:57):
that the landscape of our worldis changing daily and we've
never really arrived as soon aswe figure we've got control of
everything that's in front of us.
They're creating new things andreleasing it and we're playing
catch-up again.
So, yeah, I feel blessed thatI've been able to do that okay.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Well, if somebody was to ask you what type of music
or what genre of music you do,what would you tell them?
Speaker 2 (09:28):
boy do?
I dislike that question, butit's the natural question.
Everybody asks it.
I don't play a genre of music.
I guess the only thing that'sconsistent through my music
catalog is that it's allspiritually influenced.
It's very optimistic influenced.
It's very optimistic.
(09:48):
It's all focused on being ableto love your brother, love your
sister, live in a way that'scompassionate.
It has nothing to do withwhether we agree on things or
not.
It has to do with respectingeach other and just loving on
(10:10):
each other.
So that's the thing that's atthe core of it.
Some people will say, well,that's a Christian artist.
Well, that's not just aChristian artist.
Being compassionate and lovingto other people is much more
than that.
It's much greater than that.
And there are three or four overthat catalog of 20-plus albums
I'll say five or six that aretrue worship albums.
(10:32):
They're albums that are songsin them that are sung vertically
to God, and the rest of themare songs about what it's like
to live in this world, for me,to live in his kingdom, how I
can survive each day, the thingsthat I lean on when things
aren't going well, that I leanon when, when, when things
(10:52):
aren't going well, because I'mnot foolish enough to think that
you know, I live any specialcharmed life.
I'm a blessed man, no doubtabout that.
But at the same time I havestruggles like anything else.
I I bought two girls into thisworld and they tried to save the
world, one guy at a time, anddrove me crazy for a number of
years.
Um, but, uh.
(11:15):
But from a genre standpoint,all those influences I had as a,
as a child, have come out in mywriting.
Um, both when I'm in thewriting in in in the writing
stage, when I'm in the studio,and then the third case would be
(11:36):
the live performance part of it.
I want the song to go where itneeds to go.
I don't want to be holding itback, I don't want to be forcing
it into a place.
That's not natural.
So I've got some stuff that'sstraight-ahead rock stuff today.
I've got stuff on countrystations today and I don't
(11:56):
really know how to definecountry music today.
It's all over the place.
But I'm glad that there's anaudience there that can listen
in and connect to some of thesesongs.
I've had very good results inthe UK with some number one
songs on iTunes out there in theAmericana music and Christian
(12:20):
country music.
But I'm a Philly.
I'm a Philly boy at heart, sothere's a lot of what for me is
is Philly solar RMB that it thatinfluences in there.
My first down was an albumcalled yes indeed, and the first
real review I got if it wasblue high gospel and I knew that
(12:45):
.
I knew the reviewer was tryingto find a way to connect the
fact that I wasn't doing whateveryone else was doing in
contemporary Christian music.
And as a creative, I've learnedthat I needed to find my voice.
(13:08):
The world didn't need me tocopy someone else.
I needed to find my voice.
I needed to find my voice.
The world didn't need me tocopy someone else.
I needed to find my voice.
I needed to use my voice andnot everybody's going to like it
they're not supposed to butit's there for those that it
connects with and I'm blessedthat it does.
And there's a platform for meto work.
(13:29):
And all these years 20 plusalbums I just released Turn Up
the Divine in June, putting thefinishing touches on what would
be the next album that willprobably hopefully be out either
in October or November.
And you know, to be able tomake a living and to do what you
(13:52):
have a passion for if you candiscover what your passion is in
life, you don't really feellike you're working.
It's a pretty cool thing to getup each day and be able to do
what you love and, like I saidin the beginning, there were
times when you know the moneywasn't great, but we didn't
spend money.
Then my wife has been anawesome support system for me.
(14:16):
Not everybody has that either,so again, that's just yet
another blessing in itself.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Okay, well, tell us who are your biggest musical
influences.
Who influences you to do whatyou do?
Who are your biggest musicalinfluences?
Who influences you?
Speaker 2 (14:30):
to do what you do.
Yeah, when I was a kid, thefirst guitar player that jumped
out at me was a guy named JeffBeck, an English rocker, and I
just loved the way he played Umand um from a, from an
(14:54):
instrumentalist, because when Ifirst wanted to play it was all
about how can I be the bestguitarist I can be?
So I was studying as much as Icould.
Um, I was listening to anybodyand everybody I could.
Jeff Beck was somebody againthat that that played things
that I didn't hear my fatherbeing, you know, coming from the
(15:17):
jazz place.
There was so much OscarPeterson in the house and that
just completely fried my braintrying to embrace what it was he
was playing and how theharmonies were changing all the
time.
So that ended up being a muchlarger influence on me than I
(15:40):
thought.
Um, as far as uh, I wentthrough a period when I realized
that it was about the songsthemselves.
I went through the the singer,songwriter phrase, looking into
anybody and everybody that werepopular um, lyricists and stuff.
I went through the Bob Dylanphrase and I never really caught
(16:02):
on to him from a melodic sensebecause that's not really what
he was about as a folk singer.
It was about the poetry in thewords, so I could relate to that
part of it I went through.
Steely Dan has always been arecording gold mine for me,
where in the beginning Iprobably wasted too much time
(16:27):
wanting to be perfect, liketheir albums always sound crisp
and perfect.
That wasn't who I was, that'swho they were.
I had to graduate, you know I,that wasn't who I was, that's
who they were.
I had to.
I had to graduate to adifferent place where, for me,
that, from a, from a spiritualpoint of view, I the performance
was more, much more importantfor me than having everything
(16:48):
perfect.
Um and uh, I had.
I had to learn.
Learn that um, probably thehard way, by um, pushing people
a little too hard to uh and indoing so, losing the spark and
the energy of the song.
Um, let me think who else hasbeen um?
(17:09):
There are any number of gospeland christian artists over the
years that continue to, artistsover the years that continue to
inspire me.
I don't know what.
I don't particularly like thestate of contemporary Christian
music right now because it'sbecome very formula-based.
A lot of it sounds the same.
(17:31):
There's a lot of great songs.
There are great melodies andgreat lyrics, but production
seems to be the same, and thathappens, I think, in all
different styles of music.
Whatever's popular, people tendto want to produce something
else.
The same way.
It just stagnates, I think, thepublic.
(17:52):
It stagnates us as listeners.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
Well, tell us about this upcoming project that
you're working on, tell us whatinspired it and what listeners
can expect when they listen toit.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Yeah, it's a funny thing, I usually don't write on
a topic.
I don't set out to write on aspecific subject.
I write almost daily and over aperiod of time I've accumulated
a number of songs that werewritten through the season I've
been living in.
So the theme that runs throughthem is whatever that season
(18:30):
looks like and how I'veemotionally been dealing with it
, how I've emotionally beendealing with it.
However, this particular albumwas a deeply religious one for
me in the fact that I haddecided to do a deep dive into
the book of Revelation.
(18:50):
I had never done that before.
I was always somebody that Inever bought into.
The fear preaching guy, you'regoing to go to hell, you know,
shaking the Bible at me, thatnever worked for me and so it
was never part of my ministry.
(19:10):
I'm the guy that I will getquieter to make people listen in
rather than screaming andyelling at them.
I will get loud to get theirattention at times, but that's,
that's not my thing.
So I so I knew the basics, butI did this deep dive and I did.
I wrote chapter by chapter.
(19:32):
I was.
I was writing songs and justwriting prose, writing some
poetry.
I thought this year when I hadreleased Turn Up the Divine back
in June I had promoted itheavily for about 12 weeks
through the Mid-Atlantic statesmore than anywhere else Came to
(19:55):
my southern digs here in florida, um, in january and, uh, I
decided I was going to revisitthe project in my studio down
here and start the recording.
Um, and as I opened up theproject I realized I had done a
lot of recording of it and itwasn't a year ago that I thought
I did it, it was actually twoyears.
(20:16):
Two years had passed and uh, soI started listening back to it,
was really excited about anumber of the songs.
There were 25, 30 songs thereand so I spent the month of
January and February justweeding through these songs and
revisiting them, resetting thetemplate for some of them, and
(20:40):
I've got it narrowed down now toabout 10 or 12 songs that I
believe will be on the album.
It'll be called the Unveiling.
It's not chapter by chapterthrough, but everything in this
was influenced by that book anda lot of it has to do with the
prize at the end, the reward atthe end.
(21:18):
The need in the world right nowis something that's going to be
harsh.
I feel like we all need stuffthat's going to comfort us,
that's going to bring ussecurity, that's going to bring
us hope, that's going to let usfind strength, um, to deal with
the things that we are, thatwe're living through personally,
and things the situations we'reseeing play out across our TVs.
So that's my prayer and, as Isaid, most of it is mastered at
(21:45):
this point.
The artwork's done.
It's just a matter now ofcrossing some T's and dotting
some I's and it'll be finishedand I can send it off and let
management decide what's a goodtime to release it.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
So, besides this new project, what are you working on
?
What else are you working onthat listeners need to be aware
of?
Speaker 2 (22:11):
I'll be heading out playing a 12-week tour again in
June through August, up againprimarily East Coast this
particular tour is pretty muchon the one coast A lot more solo
(22:38):
venues than in the past.
I don't know how I feel aboutit.
I miss when I don't play withmy band.
I really do.
I really do miss them becausewe get to expand the music so
much and I'm graced with justsome beautifully professionally
trained, faithful men that leavedates open for me every year to
(23:02):
do this.
But it just felt this year likeI needed to be in some smaller
venues which are much moreconversational, because you're
much closer to the audience, andit just felt that that's where
(23:23):
I needed to be this year.
I will be.
I'll close, I'll be closing outthis tour with a week's
residency in New Jersey,wildwood, new Jersey, at a at a
at, actually a boardwalk chapelright in the marketplace, just a
wonderful place.
(23:44):
So I'm excited about ending itthere.
It would be a great way tofinish it up and kind of put a
period on the end of it, and Ihaven't figured out.
I'm sure we'll be doing somethings during the summer that'll
be on this forthcoming album.
Having quite decided that yetI'm still in the process of
(24:04):
putting together what that, whatthat set, will look like for
this tour.
Having done this, as long asI've done it, my catalog is too
large.
I have to pick and choose fromdifferent albums.
I try to pick.
There's always a group of songsI have to do all the time which
(24:29):
are the favorites that peopleenjoy live events, and then
there's always the deeper cutsthat we don't do as often.
Often, and some of them arejust some of the songs aren't
the most popular ones, butthey're just a whole lot of fun
live and people have gravitatedand asked for them all the time.
So that's an interesting.
It's an interesting journey initself, just trying to reach a
(24:54):
point where you're happy aboutwhat it is that you're going to
be presenting to the people, andsometimes I get it wrong.
Sometimes I pick something andwe'll go out and play it for the
first couple stops and it'lljust lay there, no response at
all.
People won't get engaged to itand pull it out and replace it
with something else.
(25:14):
So it's not a perfect science.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Well, how can listeners find you throughout
your contact info?
Speaker 2 (25:22):
Yeah, uh, eddie, man, eddie, mancom is the first
place.
The websites E, d, d, y, m, a,n, n, Um I am on, uh, facebook,
um, instagram X I guess we callit now Uh, youtube channels full
(25:43):
of videos.
The music can be streamed,actually from my website, but
also from Spotify and Apple andAmazon, and, the way it is today
, the music's on sites that Idon't even know exist, and
that's a good thing.
That's a good thing.
That's that's the good thing.
That's that's the landscapetoday.
That's that's the how they havea business works, and I do
(26:05):
encourage people always to be,to be engaged with me in
whatever platform they like thebest.
I love being in conversationwith people.
I think that's kind of what oneof the big our, our biggest
purposes here on the planet, andI feel like we don't do it
enough.
We don't listen and talk withpeople from different oaks of
life, understand them, becausewe don't take the time.
(26:28):
We don't take the time to stepover something that may be
uncomfortable for us.
I'm not averse to somebodyreally having their buttons
pushed by a song and beingunhappy with it or not
understanding it and wanting toreach out and say what were you
doing here?
Or this song really irks me forsome reason.
(26:48):
Let's talk about it.
Nothing wrong with that.
Nothing wrong with that at all.
Just be in conversation.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
Okay, we'll close this out with some final
thoughts.
Maybe, if that was something Iforgot to talk about, that you
would like to touch on any finalthoughts you have for the
listeners.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
I don't know that there's specific.
I guess if there's anythingspecific at this point is what I
touched on earlier, is that, um, you know, I, I really have the
mission of my life at thispoint.
Um, time's the most valuablething I have, because I'm not
I'm a seasoned vet at this pointand, um, I just really want to
(27:30):
see this life, this earth, thisplace we live, a better place,
um, a happier place, a moreloving place, um, that's, we all
need to be a part of that.
No one person or no one thingis going to make that work.
We have to find a way to.
We have to find a way to knockdown the or step over the
(27:52):
barriers that separate us all.
It's really so silly.
I, I believe in a god and Ilove a god that made this
diverse place.
It's unbelievably diverse andit's probably the most valuable
thing that we have.
If we were all the same, itwould be one one hell of a
boring life, um, but we have allthis diverse stuff and we, you
(28:12):
know, we want to categorize itand put it in a box and say,
well, I don't like that, I don't, that's not for me.
Um, my prayer would be that wewould start chipping away at
that.
You know, each day, each one ofus would chip away a little bit
in our own little, our ownlittle world and, um, gradually
try to create a place that wouldbe more loving for our children
(28:33):
and our children's children aswe, as we go forward.
And if you have a voice outthere, be, let it be yours.
Don't.
Don't feel like you need to beanybody else, man, just be
yourself.
Speak what's on your heart allright.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
Ladies and gentlemen, eddie man, please be sure to
check out his large catalog of20 albums.
Check out the new project whenit Drops.
If you're going to be on theEast Coast this summer.
Check him out live.
Follow rate review.
Share this episode to as manypeople as possible.
Jump on your favorite podcastapp.
Check out the show.
(29:09):
Leave us a review.
Follow us on your favoritepodcast app.
Check out the show.
Leave us a review.
Follow us.
Check out our new websitewwwcurveball337.com.
Thank you for listening andsupporting the show and, eddie,
thank you for all that you doand thank you for joining me.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Thanks for the support.
It was wonderful to be here.
I'm glad to share.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
For more information on the Living the Dream with
Curveball podcast, visitwwwcurveball337.com.
Until next time, keep livingthe dream.
Welcome to the Living the Dream Podcast with
Curveball, If you believe youcan achieve.
Welcome to the Living the Dreamwith Curveball Podcast, a show
where I interview guests thatteach, motivate and inspire.
(00:20):
Where I interview guests thatteach, motivate and inspire.
Today, I am joined byaward-winning and prolific
songwriter, Eddie Mann.
Eddie is known as a smile forthe soul.
He has a tradition of culture,living in an ever-evolving
(00:43):
neighborhood, so we're going tobe talking to him about
everything that he's up to, andhe has an impressive catalog of
20 albums.
So, Eddie, thank you so muchfor joining me today.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Joy to be here with you.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Why don't you start off by telling everybody a
little bit about yourself?
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Sure, I grew up in Philadelphia, pennsylvania so
I'm a Philly sports guy forbetter or worse and I grew up in
a home that my father was likea bebop pianist that was his
(01:23):
thing so there was a lot of jazzmusic played in the house
growing up and my mother wasreally cognizant of culture and
passing things down, and so Ihad a really diverse background
growing up and it naturally fedinto the creative side for me.
(01:48):
I was also in a home that was aspiritual home.
My parents didn't push andforce religion on me, but they
were weekly churchgoers and so Iwould tag along and have a lot
of seeds planted and at somepoint in my life when I needed
(02:13):
to turn to something else,that's where I turned, because I
knew it was there.
And I think that as aprofessional musician which was
the first leg of my adult life Iwas a secular musician out
playing at a very young age inthe worst environments that you
(02:35):
could be in, all sorts oftemptation for things to go
wrong and opportunities to makewrong turns, and after a period
(02:56):
of time when the next drink orthe next drug or the next woman
wasn't wasn't doing it anymore,I realized that there had to be
something else.
There had to be something elsemore.
There had to be something elsemore important, something bigger
that was going to drive methrough my life, and for me it
ended up being the faith thatwas, I guess, where those seeds
(03:19):
were planted started to blossoma little bit and I learned not
to just I.
I was just relying, I think,like a lot of people do, relying
on what I thought was my owncleverness to get by in the
world and and it wasn'tsufficient.
It wasn't sufficient.
And as I've, as I've got olderand grown into the person that I
(03:47):
am, there's just the worldleaves me dumbfounded often, and
I'm fortunate, I feel fortunatethat I have a place to go, I
have a place to turn whennothing makes sense.
Does that make any sense?
Speaker 1 (04:09):
Yeah, that makes perfect sense.
And you know, congratulationson turning things around.
So how did you, oh, go ahead?
Speaker 2 (04:20):
No, no, no, no, you go ahead.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Well, how did you originally get into singing in
the first place?
Speaker 2 (04:30):
I was a painfully shy kid, and when I say painful, I
think I would have rather goneto the dentist than read in
front of the kids in school.
I was just so painfully shy andI don't know why, because I was
brought up in this secure home.
There was no reason for me tobe that way.
But I was until my, I guess,early teens, and I put a guitar
(04:57):
around my neck and as soon as Idid that, I found my voice.
I couldn't play a lick, Iwasn't any good, but I could
talk a blue stream, I could talkforever.
I.
It's a really odd.
It's an odd time when I lookback on it.
(05:18):
Because I was, I was, I playedsports all my life up until I
fell into this music thing.
And I was a good athlete, youknow, I didn't.
I didn't have to ride the bench.
I was, you know, had quickreflexes and it got me out of a
lot.
It got me on into a lot ofthings that maybe I I wasn't
(05:40):
wouldn't have been able to playotherwise.
So I was active, I was onlysports teams I was.
But it's still there, wasn't,there was something there that
just prohibited me fromexpressing myself, and the
guitar enabled me to do that andI struggled with what it was
(06:04):
going to mean as an adult, myfather being a depression-aged
kid.
Father being a depression-agedkid, his music, his jazz and
playing and all was alwayssecondary, and he also grew up
in a time when there were lessopportunities for him to make a
(06:26):
living at it.
Not that I mean as a jazzmusician it might have been
actually better back then, butas a pop musician or and secular
musician, that kind of blew upfor me as a kid.
The business was just kind ofon fire and there were all these
opportunities to go out andplay, you know, seven nights a
week, and I fell into playingbefore I was even out of high
(06:46):
school.
I was playing in clubs, inplaces that I was underage.
So I ended up taking a twoyears of.
I was two years into college,my first in in business school
for com and I.
I decided to take the summer ofand just travel and play I to
get the music out of my system.
(07:07):
And a lifetime later,twenty-plus albums later, it's
not out of my system.
And a lifetime later, 20 plusalbums later, it's not out of my
system.
It's who I am, and once I cameto grips with that, who I was.
I didn't want to be one ofthose.
I never had any intention ofbeing a starving musician.
(07:28):
I wanted to work.
Any intention of being astarving musician, I wanted to
work.
So I made sure that I I wasplaying music that people wanted
to hear and this and once I inthe beginning it was fine
because I didn't realize thatthe driving force for me ended
up being composition and itturned.
It turned into songwriting.
(07:48):
And once that happened and Imade the change over to writing
my own material and going outand playing.
That road was a little tougherbecause I didn't have the
built-in income that I hadearlier.
But I've always been someonethat I don't live in debt.
(08:10):
I don't have any debt.
I own.
I own my homes, my vehicles.
You know I'm fortunate enoughto have a studio north and a
studio south.
So I'm at a point in my lateryears where I am completely
self-contained.
I do everything myself.
And technology the way it istoday.
If you're willing to put thetime and the effort to learn how
(08:33):
to use it, you can do that.
You don't need to be a slave tosome record company or someone
else that's put out some moneyfor you.
So, as a musician, I've beenpretty creative with making the
landscape, finding a way to makethe landscape work for me as
it's changed, because I think weall understand with technology
(08:57):
that the landscape of our worldis changing daily and we've
never really arrived as soon aswe figure we've got control of
everything that's in front of us.
They're creating new things andreleasing it and we're playing
catch-up again.
So, yeah, I feel blessed thatI've been able to do that okay.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Well, if somebody was to ask you what type of music
or what genre of music you do,what would you tell them?
Speaker 2 (09:28):
boy do?
I dislike that question, butit's the natural question.
Everybody asks it.
I don't play a genre of music.
I guess the only thing that'sconsistent through my music
catalog is that it's allspiritually influenced.
It's very optimistic influenced.
It's very optimistic.
(09:48):
It's all focused on being ableto love your brother, love your
sister, live in a way that'scompassionate.
It has nothing to do withwhether we agree on things or
not.
It has to do with respectingeach other and just loving on
(10:10):
each other.
So that's the thing that's atthe core of it.
Some people will say, well,that's a Christian artist.
Well, that's not just aChristian artist.
Being compassionate and lovingto other people is much more
than that.
It's much greater than that.
And there are three or four overthat catalog of 20-plus albums
I'll say five or six that aretrue worship albums.
(10:32):
They're albums that are songsin them that are sung vertically
to God, and the rest of themare songs about what it's like
to live in this world, for me,to live in his kingdom, how I
can survive each day, the thingsthat I lean on when things
aren't going well, that I leanon when, when, when things
(10:52):
aren't going well, because I'mnot foolish enough to think that
you know, I live any specialcharmed life.
I'm a blessed man, no doubtabout that.
But at the same time I havestruggles like anything else.
I I bought two girls into thisworld and they tried to save the
world, one guy at a time, anddrove me crazy for a number of
years.
Um, but, uh.
(11:15):
But from a genre standpoint,all those influences I had as a,
as a child, have come out in mywriting.
Um, both when I'm in thewriting in in in the writing
stage, when I'm in the studio,and then the third case would be
(11:36):
the live performance part of it.
I want the song to go where itneeds to go.
I don't want to be holding itback, I don't want to be forcing
it into a place.
That's not natural.
So I've got some stuff that'sstraight-ahead rock stuff today.
I've got stuff on countrystations today and I don't
(11:56):
really know how to definecountry music today.
It's all over the place.
But I'm glad that there's anaudience there that can listen
in and connect to some of thesesongs.
I've had very good results inthe UK with some number one
songs on iTunes out there in theAmericana music and Christian
(12:20):
country music.
But I'm a Philly.
I'm a Philly boy at heart, sothere's a lot of what for me is
is Philly solar RMB that it thatinfluences in there.
My first down was an albumcalled yes indeed, and the first
real review I got if it wasblue high gospel and I knew that
(12:45):
.
I knew the reviewer was tryingto find a way to connect the
fact that I wasn't doing whateveryone else was doing in
contemporary Christian music.
And as a creative, I've learnedthat I needed to find my voice.
(13:08):
The world didn't need me tocopy someone else.
I needed to find my voice.
I needed to find my voice.
The world didn't need me tocopy someone else.
I needed to find my voice.
I needed to use my voice andnot everybody's going to like it
they're not supposed to butit's there for those that it
connects with and I'm blessedthat it does.
And there's a platform for meto work.
(13:29):
And all these years 20 plusalbums I just released Turn Up
the Divine in June, putting thefinishing touches on what would
be the next album that willprobably hopefully be out either
in October or November.
And you know, to be able tomake a living and to do what you
(13:52):
have a passion for if you candiscover what your passion is in
life, you don't really feellike you're working.
It's a pretty cool thing to getup each day and be able to do
what you love and, like I saidin the beginning, there were
times when you know the moneywasn't great, but we didn't
spend money.
Then my wife has been anawesome support system for me.
(14:16):
Not everybody has that either,so again, that's just yet
another blessing in itself.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Okay, well, tell us who are your biggest musical
influences.
Who influences you to do whatyou do?
Who are your biggest musicalinfluences?
Who influences you?
Speaker 2 (14:30):
to do what you do.
Yeah, when I was a kid, thefirst guitar player that jumped
out at me was a guy named JeffBeck, an English rocker, and I
just loved the way he played Umand um from a, from an
(14:54):
instrumentalist, because when Ifirst wanted to play it was all
about how can I be the bestguitarist I can be?
So I was studying as much as Icould.
Um, I was listening to anybodyand everybody I could.
Jeff Beck was somebody againthat that that played things
that I didn't hear my fatherbeing, you know, coming from the
(15:17):
jazz place.
There was so much OscarPeterson in the house and that
just completely fried my braintrying to embrace what it was he
was playing and how theharmonies were changing all the
time.
So that ended up being a muchlarger influence on me than I
(15:40):
thought.
Um, as far as uh, I wentthrough a period when I realized
that it was about the songsthemselves.
I went through the the singer,songwriter phrase, looking into
anybody and everybody that werepopular um, lyricists and stuff.
I went through the Bob Dylanphrase and I never really caught
(16:02):
on to him from a melodic sensebecause that's not really what
he was about as a folk singer.
It was about the poetry in thewords, so I could relate to that
part of it I went through.
Steely Dan has always been arecording gold mine for me,
where in the beginning Iprobably wasted too much time
(16:27):
wanting to be perfect, liketheir albums always sound crisp
and perfect.
That wasn't who I was, that'swho they were.
I had to graduate, you know I,that wasn't who I was, that's
who they were.
I had to.
I had to graduate to adifferent place where, for me,
that, from a, from a spiritualpoint of view, I the performance
was more, much more importantfor me than having everything
(16:48):
perfect.
Um and uh, I had.
I had to learn.
Learn that um, probably thehard way, by um, pushing people
a little too hard to uh and indoing so, losing the spark and
the energy of the song.
Um, let me think who else hasbeen um?
(17:09):
There are any number of gospeland christian artists over the
years that continue to, artistsover the years that continue to
inspire me.
I don't know what.
I don't particularly like thestate of contemporary Christian
music right now because it'sbecome very formula-based.
A lot of it sounds the same.
(17:31):
There's a lot of great songs.
There are great melodies andgreat lyrics, but production
seems to be the same, and thathappens, I think, in all
different styles of music.
Whatever's popular, people tendto want to produce something
else.
The same way.
It just stagnates, I think, thepublic.
(17:52):
It stagnates us as listeners.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
Well, tell us about this upcoming project that
you're working on, tell us whatinspired it and what listeners
can expect when they listen toit.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Yeah, it's a funny thing, I usually don't write on
a topic.
I don't set out to write on aspecific subject.
I write almost daily and over aperiod of time I've accumulated
a number of songs that werewritten through the season I've
been living in.
So the theme that runs throughthem is whatever that season
(18:30):
looks like and how I'veemotionally been dealing with it
, how I've emotionally beendealing with it.
However, this particular albumwas a deeply religious one for
me in the fact that I haddecided to do a deep dive into
the book of Revelation.
(18:50):
I had never done that before.
I was always somebody that Inever bought into.
The fear preaching guy, you'regoing to go to hell, you know,
shaking the Bible at me, thatnever worked for me and so it
was never part of my ministry.
(19:10):
I'm the guy that I will getquieter to make people listen in
rather than screaming andyelling at them.
I will get loud to get theirattention at times, but that's,
that's not my thing.
So I so I knew the basics, butI did this deep dive and I did.
I wrote chapter by chapter.
(19:32):
I was.
I was writing songs and justwriting prose, writing some
poetry.
I thought this year when I hadreleased Turn Up the Divine back
in June I had promoted itheavily for about 12 weeks
through the Mid-Atlantic statesmore than anywhere else Came to
(19:55):
my southern digs here in florida, um, in january and, uh, I
decided I was going to revisitthe project in my studio down
here and start the recording.
Um, and as I opened up theproject I realized I had done a
lot of recording of it and itwasn't a year ago that I thought
I did it, it was actually twoyears.
(20:16):
Two years had passed and uh, soI started listening back to it,
was really excited about anumber of the songs.
There were 25, 30 songs thereand so I spent the month of
January and February justweeding through these songs and
revisiting them, resetting thetemplate for some of them, and
(20:40):
I've got it narrowed down now toabout 10 or 12 songs that I
believe will be on the album.
It'll be called the Unveiling.
It's not chapter by chapterthrough, but everything in this
was influenced by that book anda lot of it has to do with the
prize at the end, the reward atthe end.
(21:18):
The need in the world right nowis something that's going to be
harsh.
I feel like we all need stuffthat's going to comfort us,
that's going to bring ussecurity, that's going to bring
us hope, that's going to let usfind strength, um, to deal with
the things that we are, thatwe're living through personally,
and things the situations we'reseeing play out across our TVs.
So that's my prayer and, as Isaid, most of it is mastered at
(21:45):
this point.
The artwork's done.
It's just a matter now ofcrossing some T's and dotting
some I's and it'll be finishedand I can send it off and let
management decide what's a goodtime to release it.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
So, besides this new project, what are you working on
?
What else are you working onthat listeners need to be aware
of?
Speaker 2 (22:11):
I'll be heading out playing a 12-week tour again in
June through August, up againprimarily East Coast this
particular tour is pretty muchon the one coast A lot more solo
(22:38):
venues than in the past.
I don't know how I feel aboutit.
I miss when I don't play withmy band.
I really do.
I really do miss them becausewe get to expand the music so
much and I'm graced with justsome beautifully professionally
trained, faithful men that leavedates open for me every year to
(23:02):
do this.
But it just felt this year likeI needed to be in some smaller
venues which are much moreconversational, because you're
much closer to the audience, andit just felt that that's where
(23:23):
I needed to be this year.
I will be.
I'll close, I'll be closing outthis tour with a week's
residency in New Jersey,wildwood, new Jersey, at a at a
at, actually a boardwalk chapelright in the marketplace, just a
wonderful place.
(23:44):
So I'm excited about ending itthere.
It would be a great way tofinish it up and kind of put a
period on the end of it, and Ihaven't figured out.
I'm sure we'll be doing somethings during the summer that'll
be on this forthcoming album.
Having quite decided that yetI'm still in the process of
(24:04):
putting together what that, whatthat set, will look like for
this tour.
Having done this, as long asI've done it, my catalog is too
large.
I have to pick and choose fromdifferent albums.
I try to pick.
There's always a group of songsI have to do all the time which
(24:29):
are the favorites that peopleenjoy live events, and then
there's always the deeper cutsthat we don't do as often.
Often, and some of them arejust some of the songs aren't
the most popular ones, butthey're just a whole lot of fun
live and people have gravitatedand asked for them all the time.
So that's an interesting.
It's an interesting journey initself, just trying to reach a
(24:54):
point where you're happy aboutwhat it is that you're going to
be presenting to the people, andsometimes I get it wrong.
Sometimes I pick something andwe'll go out and play it for the
first couple stops and it'lljust lay there, no response at
all.
People won't get engaged to itand pull it out and replace it
with something else.
(25:14):
So it's not a perfect science.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Well, how can listeners find you throughout
your contact info?
Speaker 2 (25:22):
Yeah, uh, eddie, man, eddie, mancom is the first
place.
The websites E, d, d, y, m, a,n, n, Um I am on, uh, facebook,
um, instagram X I guess we callit now Uh, youtube channels full
(25:43):
of videos.
The music can be streamed,actually from my website, but
also from Spotify and Apple andAmazon, and, the way it is today
, the music's on sites that Idon't even know exist, and
that's a good thing.
That's a good thing.
That's that's the good thing.
That's that's the landscapetoday.
That's that's the how they havea business works, and I do
(26:05):
encourage people always to be,to be engaged with me in
whatever platform they like thebest.
I love being in conversationwith people.
I think that's kind of what oneof the big our, our biggest
purposes here on the planet, andI feel like we don't do it
enough.
We don't listen and talk withpeople from different oaks of
life, understand them, becausewe don't take the time.
(26:28):
We don't take the time to stepover something that may be
uncomfortable for us.
I'm not averse to somebodyreally having their buttons
pushed by a song and beingunhappy with it or not
understanding it and wanting toreach out and say what were you
doing here?
Or this song really irks me forsome reason.
(26:48):
Let's talk about it.
Nothing wrong with that.
Nothing wrong with that at all.
Just be in conversation.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
Okay, we'll close this out with some final
thoughts.
Maybe, if that was something Iforgot to talk about, that you
would like to touch on any finalthoughts you have for the
listeners.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
I don't know that there's specific.
I guess if there's anythingspecific at this point is what I
touched on earlier, is that, um, you know, I, I really have the
mission of my life at thispoint.
Um, time's the most valuablething I have, because I'm not
I'm a seasoned vet at this pointand, um, I just really want to
(27:30):
see this life, this earth, thisplace we live, a better place,
um, a happier place, a moreloving place, um, that's, we all
need to be a part of that.
No one person or no one thingis going to make that work.
We have to find a way to.
We have to find a way to knockdown the or step over the
(27:52):
barriers that separate us all.
It's really so silly.
I, I believe in a god and Ilove a god that made this
diverse place.
It's unbelievably diverse andit's probably the most valuable
thing that we have.
If we were all the same, itwould be one one hell of a
boring life, um, but we have allthis diverse stuff and we, you
(28:12):
know, we want to categorize itand put it in a box and say,
well, I don't like that, I don't, that's not for me.
Um, my prayer would be that wewould start chipping away at
that.
You know, each day, each one ofus would chip away a little bit
in our own little, our ownlittle world and, um, gradually
try to create a place that wouldbe more loving for our children
(28:33):
and our children's children aswe, as we go forward.
And if you have a voice outthere, be, let it be yours.
Don't.
Don't feel like you need to beanybody else, man, just be
yourself.
Speak what's on your heart allright.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
Ladies and gentlemen, eddie man, please be sure to
check out his large catalog of20 albums.
Check out the new project whenit Drops.
If you're going to be on theEast Coast this summer.
Check him out live.
Follow rate review.
Share this episode to as manypeople as possible.
Jump on your favorite podcastapp.
Check out the show.
(29:09):
Leave us a review.
Follow us on your favoritepodcast app.
Check out the show.
Leave us a review.
Follow us.
Check out our new websitewwwcurveball337.com.
Thank you for listening andsupporting the show and, eddie,
thank you for all that you doand thank you for joining me.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Thanks for the support.
It was wonderful to be here.
I'm glad to share.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
For more information on the Living the Dream with
Curveball podcast, visitwwwcurveball337.com.
Until next time, keep livingthe dream.
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