I play in an alt and classic rock cover band. I’m also working on some originals for a side project that I’m eager to share. Follow @jaytoeleven for updates.
Clean blues improvisation over a backing track © ElevatedJamTracks | View on Instagram
Background
At 13, I begged my parents for a white Pearl drum kit. They said no—and handed me a guitar instead. My dad, a talented guitarist, got me started, and soon I was spending afternoons in garages, cranking up amps, learning my favorite songs, and occasionally pulling out an acoustic to impress girls.
Though I loved music, I never saw myself as a “serious” player—until my early 20s, when I walked into a church service that looked nothing like the pipe-organ Sundays I grew up with. Multiple vocalists, guitars, keys, and a drummer behind plexiglass—it was my first exposure to contemporary worship, and it left an indelible mark.
When invited to audition for the church band, I knew zero worship songs and had never played for an audience. So I stitched together a medley of Hendrix, Zeppelin, Metallica, Nirvana, and Guns N’ Roses riffs—probably the strangest audition in church history. Somehow, it worked.
For years I played three nights a week, learning, growing, and building friendships that turned into a new project: Doxa (later Sun Stood Still), a faith-rooted hard rock band that wrote original songs, played local events, and even earned local radio airplay. That chapter closed in 2004, when I moved to Virginia—but the experience stuck with me.
Fast-forward to 2021: jam sessions with good friends and fellow musicians evolved into something more. In November 2022, FTL played our first gig and has since worked aggressively on our sound and catalog.
Now, 35 years after first picking up the guitar, I am (finally) diving headfirst into my music projects.
Visit weareftl.com to learn more.