Mike's Career, Car, and Home at Risk: Lend a Hand
This is my fourth or fifth attempt at doing this today. Why you may ask?
Because I am beyond embarrassed…
I have wanted for nothing more in my life, then to create and play music and connect with other people.
It has been a dream come true driving around the United States and making new friends and performing for folks from all walks of life. I am humbled and honored to have had this privilege.
The reality of my situation though as a touring musician:
I have put an extensive amount of mileage on my car. The timing belt became a notion of something that needs to be changed in my car when I got to around 120,000 miles last year. That is easily an $800 to $1,000 repair, as a lot of car parts need to be removed to reach the timing belt, which unfortunately is made of rubber in V6 engines, and not a metal chain timing belt like four-cylinder engines. No one wants a timing belt to go out when so far away from home. It causes irreparable damage to the engine, especially when in motion as it happens.
So, I was planning on not touring as much in 2025, because of this. $1,000 is a lot of money to me. I was exploring the option of trying to change it myself, buying the part and using Youtube to fix it like I do most other issues and repairs, not car related.
However, things have gotten worse for me.
When I took my car in for a tire rotation and oil change around mid-December, I was told that my car has serious suspension issues that will cause my brand new tires to wear in sporadic spots (I had a tire blow out in late 2023 in Texas). They refused to do the tire rotation, and quoted me $3,000 plus, to do the repair work on my Suspension and Shocks.
Okay.
However, things have been worse beyond this yet still, and this is in addition to the added uncertainty caused by the Wild Fires in Los Angeles, which is where I live.
I am two and a half months behind on rent.
Also, I owe nearly $2,000 to LADWP which is Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.
I have a company that I did a bunch of work for back in October of 2024, that owes me a significant amount of money, but I can’t seem to get this money from them, let alone an email response. I have been writing and communicating with the recruiter who brought me on to their booking agency, and that has been my only line of communication with the company. This issue, in itself, is so convoluted that it makes me sick to my stomach. My liaison did inform me today that the company is sending me $360 from that significant chunk of money. Nonetheless, its been three months now of waiting for those funds.
My landlord wrote me today that he needs to get this $2,250 I owe him ASAP, and I owe him another $950 as soon as February comes around.
I am also two months behind on nearly every bill I have that is not credit card or auto insurance related: phone bill, cable bill, car payment.
My monthly Car Payment is $464.
I am in dire straits.
My initial reaction was to fold into myself today and cry.
I deserve everything that comes to me. All of this is my doing.
It doesn’t matter how hard I work, how well I book, how often I contract, how many miles I drive, how many times I setup and breakdown a PA system, how many new skills I learn, how well I promote myself, how many lives I affect, how many shows I play, how many videos I make, how much music I write; record; and mix, how many covers I post, how well executed my release strategies are, how much I communicate on social media, how many festivals or conferences I attend, how many emails I write, how many doors I knock on… everything costs money, my pay stays the same, and cost inflates—and the bill always comes due.
This is going to sound insane:
On the flip side, I have never been happier in my life, than I am right now, creating every single day.
I have been at home for the most part given both, my financial situation, and the scarcity of work during the winter as a performing artist.
However, I have been trying to make the most of the time
Starting in the Fall of last year, I resolved to create high quality videos of me performing covers, to sell myself to clients for new cover gigs for the Winter months. I started to canvas Southern California with these new videos, writing emails to local businesses: Temecula Wine Country, Inland Empire, Orange County, Los Angeles County, San Diego County—I am reaching out to as many new places as I can find.
Simultaneously, I had been posting each of these efforts to Youtube as I make them. I even started chopping them up into tiny pieces, making them vertical videos, and posting those to Youtube Shorts.
Much to my utter surprise, each of these videos kept attracting more and more and more attention from people on Youtube. So, I doubled my efforts further. Even more people began to engage and like the things that I was was posting. My Subscriber count went from around 1,200 people to 1,400 to 1,600, to 1,800.
Just now, it reached 2,000 subscribers as I am writing this. I’ve gained nearly 800 subscribers in the past few months.
I can’t help but see optimism in every video I have been posting to Youtube.
I see that something I create or have already created, can and will reach a lot of people—one day very soon. I see this in real world metrics and statistics on the backend of Youtube.
However, I am quickly running out of time, especially when it comes to having a roof over my head, a car to drive (and repair), and power and water. Despite my best efforts, most of my work that I have been getting is down in San Diego, Carlsbad, or Southern Orange County. They are low paying and the gas used to get there and back, eats into my profit margin further.
As proud, humiliated, and fiercely independent as I may be—there is no other way out of this. I need your help.
I created a GoFundMe Campaign yesterday and last night after consulting with my friend Susan who has hosted me out in Ann Arbor, Michigan the last two years to perform. Here is a link to the GoFundMe Campaign:
Any money raised from this effort, will be used to try and make a small dent in what I have listed above.
For those willing to contribute and to those unable to contribute, I will perform a daily Live Stream on Youtube in Vertical Format, 1080p HD and high quality audio, at 11AM PST Monday through Sunday starting today January 15th 2025 all the way through the month of January.
So, even if you are unable to tune in during the week, there will be options on the weekend as well.
Here is the link to watch my Youtube Live Streams either from your phone or tablet browser or Television, in the Youtube App, or on a home computer:
You can also visit my Youtube Profile and click on the "Live" Tab. Here is a link to the channel:
The Live Stream I performed recently on Saturday January 11th felt like magic to me. All of my live streams are archived under the "Live" Tab.
If you are unable to attend any live streams, I can also provide you downloads of any of my albums that you might wish to own.
I want to be useful to you—please let me know what I can do to be useful to you. I can write a song for you, record it, and mix it. What can I do for you?
