The last time I did one of these solo records(2016’s ‘An Overnight Low’), it was necessitated by me having amassed a glut of material that I was quite proud of, but that my band couldn’t really put to good use. That last time was also my FIRST time doing something like this on my own, or at least something I intended to actually release commercially. As anxious as I was about financing said effort, and assembling the players to help me make it worth sticking my neck out for those songs, I’ve never once regretted it.

While it could have amounted to little more than an exercise in fiscal irresponsibility, it was remarkably liberating, restored a bit of the faith I think I’d lost in myself as a writer and artist, and actually managed to turn a profit, in spite of the fact that I did very little in the way of proper promotion for it.

Now, a few short years later, I get a similar itch and make quick work of gathering a crew to realize the vision for what would ultimately become ‘From The Dark’: 10 songs about untimely passings. unexpected diagnoses, unrelenting addictions, and the unfortunate reality that such is life sometimes, when a younger man’s days are behind you.

I wanted to strip away some of the artifice that can go along with doing the straight-up Rock ensemble thing, and maybe see if I could cut a little closer to the core, and tell stories that seemed less like they’d been viewed from a distance or through some lens, lived vicariously. In fact, I didn’t really want to “tell stories” at all I, what I wanted to do was get some things off my chest as truthfully and un-self-consciously as possible.


-Denny Smith
October 2019