I’ve only participated in the whole open mic scene for a couple of years, but I’ve attended regularly for at least fifteen. Most of them consisted of pearl-snap shirts and cowboy hats. Lots of blues and sad stories about the one who got away. Big, bearded, husky f*ckers with tales to tell.
Let’s set the mood:
Then, technology jumped as we, collectively, raped another alien for his cell phone information. Same as authoring; everyone is now a recording artist. Unfortunately, since most of them failed to log the mileage that goes along with the little successes, the talent doesn’t fit the outfit. That’s why I show up in cargo shorts and a Jurassic Park t-shirt; I still feel as though I’m beginning my journey. Time is not a luxury anymore, so forgive me if I’m share-happy from time to time. Also, don’t come here. We do good things here. You know you you are, but I digress.
Those old school open mic guys from back east were all bikers and farmers whose souls were metaphorically circling the drain; like myself. They’d lived, and now they were telling you all about it. There was emotion enough to share.
That sh*t’s rare in the city.
When I first sought a sort of musical home, this place boasted the longest running open mic in Dallas. I was sold and, ironically, so was the venue. I walked in the door along with the new owner. It may have switched hands again already.
Their website instructed the unknowing into believing covers weren’t allowed, acoustic only with no effects, and that many of the vanity-talent television shows boasted participants who got their start on their stage.
Fast-forward a couple of years, and it’s covers, mp3 back tracks, and skin tight dresses for the Instagram feed. It’s boyfriends bargaining for their girl to get extra songs, and special time slots if you’re in the clique.
I show up 45 minutes early to get a good spot. By the time the hand jobs cease, I’ve been there an hour, I’m rock hard (artistically), needing to piss, and wanting to leave.
I don’t know; I guess it all felt more real when the musicians barely got a chance to knock the barn manure off their boots before their name was called. If you looked at your phone while that cowboy cried, you were a dick. The end.
Or was I just drunk, and five years of sobriety has lifted the veil?
Was it like this all along, or was I merely infatuated with a handful for normal Joe’s who spoke a language I’d craved since first seeing Gene Simmons vomit blood on stage during a late-night HBO concert? I was on my knees in front of one of those massive console televisions (the death bringers), and my grandmother angrily drug me away for the sake of my five year old soul. I remember being drug from my uncle’s sin-dungeon on several occasions. Grandma obviously wasn’t quick enough. Rock got me, but I repressed the urges for the most part for the next forty-five years. It took a back seat to amateur sex god and mediocre writer.
I’m still all of those things, but I’ve added wannabe musician. It’s okay to live in meh, because the chicks were never as picky as the John Hughes movies claimed they’d be. Just owning a guitar in early nineties Greenville, Texas could get you blown; you just had to break up with them before they asked you to play it.
Preach truths, toke jokes, and shoplift Amazon. I live in the heart of a North Texas Metropolis, and there’s a possum ten feet behind me giving it everything he or she has with its back claws to ascend a plastic dumpster. Part of me thinks we should sell the condo, and buy some land in the East Texas pines; or near Santa Fe…
I’m not done with Dallas, though. Not by a long shot. As a matter of fact, I don’t even believe I’ve begun to scratch the surface of what I could do in Dallas, whether that be as a musician, a story teller, a journalist, or all goddamn three. I need to find some friendly, strumming hippies, and I need to find them yesterday.
An artist is only as good as the energy he/she keeps. I’m flickering, man. I could use a recharge. The hard part is finding a cool place to plug in without an adapter. Adaption was never really my thing. At least, not at first.
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To most, 1865 was an eye-opening year. The American Civil War was officially over and the soldiers fortunate enough to survive the bloody conflict returned home to collect the pieces of their former lives. To young Arizonan, Robert Jack, the fateful desert homecoming marked the end to all he once knew. Forgiveness is overrated. Death is final. Revenge, however, dances between the fine lines of mortality and eternity. Love always finds a way.
“Reading Jim Walker and the Redemption Hymn is equal parts quirky fun and riveting action. Cloud’s confident, entertaining voice draws the reader in like an old radio western: the perfect bite-sized story with a main character you’re ready to follow through every adventure he finds himself on. So, tune in next time…”
– Megan Stockton, author of Lovely, Dark & Deep
The history books would read that Jim Walker was brutally executed after the Battle of Goliad, but a few promises in the right ear blurred the contrast between blood and ink. Now an aging bounty hunter on the verge of retirement, his services are requested in the Northern Arizona Territory to solve the terrifying mystery of the Verde River Massacre. With guns from a local Deputy, courage from a saloon proprietor, and a deathbed confession from an all-too-familiar Medicine Woman, Jim sets off on what could be his final adventure. Will he lay the ghosts of his past to rest once and for all, or is he simply whistling his Redemption Hymn?
“Someone call DC and tell them this is how you write a female hero character!” – Lisa Lee Tone, Bibliophelia Templum
Angel Burns is a young firefighter with a shrouded history. During a routine night at work, she stumbles upon a demonic ceremony that brings her memories out of hiding – as well as her repressed supernatural powers. Angel soon learns her life was intended for things greater than extinguishing fires for mortals. Now on the payroll of the Vatican, Angel embarks upon an epic quest to protect the Gutenberg Bibles from evil. If successful, she will secure peace for generations. If she fails, the power of the ancient books will bestow an eternity of darkness upon all humanity!
Toby Liberman is nearing the end of his rope. After a fateful confrontation with his wife’s lover, he is chased into the woods only to be discovered by an unidentifiable creature. He is attacked and rendered unconscious. Upon waking at the scene of a gruesome triple homicide, Toby is arrested as the sole suspect and thrown into a jail cell with a strange man that knows way too much about his predicament. The stranger reveals to Toby that he now possesses the curse of the werewolf. Using his new-found strength to flee his captors, Toby begins to discover that things are not what they seem in the sleepy town of Twin Oaks, TX. Now hunted by law enforcement, as well as the town’s gun toting civilians, Toby seeks vengeance against his false accusers and embarks upon a quest to clear his name once and for all.
A Curse Beyond Comprehension. A Power Beyond Belief. A Girl Far From Home. Katie Liberman is your typical eighteen-year-old college student…or at least that’s what her family thinks. Picking up five years after the events of A Taste of Home, Katie has dropped out of school and embarked upon a dangerous quest to find Kurt Jimmerson, the New York City attorney responsible for her family’s werewolf curse. Unknown to her, the attorney’s grip on the ‘City That Never Sleeps’ is tighter than imagined and she’ll need any and all help available to be victorious. But… where do you find friends when you’re Far From Home?
Twin Oaks, Texas is at war! Taking place immediately after the Far From Home events in New York City, Katie Liberman has returned to rescue her birthplace from the clutches of her nemesis. As the paranormal battle of North vs. South rages in the shadows, the tiny town must decide to fight against the odds or become one with the darkness. Blood will be shed and only one will survive as the final battle of the Home Series concludes.
I know this is the part where I’m supposed to talk about the book, but I feel as though the synopsis needs its own preface to truly understand. 2023 was quite an eye-opening year! I began it by living my dream as a vintage steam locomotive fireman, but that dream was soon squashed thanks to my writing career. It won’t matter that you wrote your extreme horror offerings years ago and under a pen name. Also, it won’t matter that your publisher and author friends from days gone by express pleasantries and kind, nurturing words to your face, because they’ll clique-up and talk trash the minute you turn your back. F**k the biz, create. Create for art, not clicks. Click for love, not hate. Those are words true artists should have no issues living by, yet most seem to hide behind their keyboard shields, flinging ill-thought words of destruction toward once-trusted ears. Don’t pour something into everything; pour everything into something. Do it all by yourself if necessary. With any luck, 2024 will be the year of The Reverend. I’m not exactly sure what that means yet, but we’ll find out together. Anyway, here are a few short stories and poems I wrote as C. Derick Miller in 2023. I stole them from myself. Fair and square. Enjoy.
Poetry has always come naturally to me. Whether it is an expression of emotion toward someone I care about, or a display of humor pointed in the direction of those I loathe, it is my true outlet. Several of these works were written in a passenger seat while exploring the highways of the United States and somehow managed to survive “The Great Ex-Wife/Ex-Girlfriend Poetry Purge” of 2019. Others were penned during COVID-19 quarantine. Although it may not be the most epic poetry collection you’ve ever read, it all contains bits of blood and soul. You will feel something. Guaranteed.
“This profound collection of horror brings classic monsters into new light in the modern day” – B.L. Blankenship, God Walks The Dark Hills series.
The modern world is a crazy place. Worrying about childish politicians, empty grocery store shelves, and our pending membership to the “global disease of the week” club, it leaves very little time for the average reader to finish an entire novel. This is where Six from Five Seven: Short Stories from a Short Man comes in clutch! A story per day to keep the impending apocalypse away, with a single day left over to contemplate why you purchased this book in the first place. That sounds like an entertaining week when compared to the one you were destined to have regardless. What do a cursed husband, a privileged brat, a curious prostitute, a repressed savior, a vengeful son, and two hell-bound soldiers have in common? Their stories lie within the pages of this collection and invite you to tag along on their journeys of fate, redemption, and demise. When finished, you, dear reader, can hide this book inside your basement with the rest of those important documents you wished you’d never taken home. The FBI won’t be happy, but at least they’ll know you’re a cool person for owning a copy while conducting the raid. That must count for something, right? Let’s hope the judge thinks so!
Also, there’s a few other things not listed here that are floating around out there. Best of luck with the hunt.
Current Projects
Rev. Dare Cloud
Reverend · adjective. worthy of adoration or reverence. synonyms: sublime · sacred.
is a Dallas author, musician, and gonzo journalist. Some of his works include the controversial splatter-western Starving Zoe (written as C. Derick Miller), the Taste of Home trilogy, and the ongoing Jim Walker series. His literary crushes are (of course) Hunter S. Thompson, J.D. Salinger, and Kevin Smith. Preach truths, toke jokes, and shoplift Amazon.
“You’ve got to press it on you You’ve just been thinking That’s what you do, baby Hold it down, Dare!” – Gorillaz
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