My name is Bobby Angel and I’m a singer/songwriter of the Before Phones Movement (BPM), some say folk star. The truth is, I only know three chords. | Songs | Albums | Concerts | Interviews
Intro - Nature balladeer
Critic darling of the Before Phones Movement (BPM)
Adored by his fans ...
As the king of the nature-folk genre:
Intro to Singer/Songwriter
The truth is, singer/songwriter Bobby Angel is just trying to get by. Rumor is he may go electric, and/or give up the guitar completely and study water full time. But his fans keep pulling him back in to the nature folk fold, around the campfire, and who is Bobby Angel not to oblige.
Bobby Angel writes and performs songs that strike at the heart of what it means to pursue a more harmonic state with that blue marble we all live on, Planet Earth. The truth about Bobby Angel: He never set out to be a songwriter, let alone a singer.
Fittingly, this albums and the songs were written and published in what would, at the time, unknowingly be my final days in the tranquil yet tainted paradise of the Big Cypress Swamp.
In a departure from my first two albums, these songs evoke a sense of a place that is neither here nor there, but rather everywhere — and inescapable.
Or was I in the midst of a major escape act?
All is revealed in the final song.
As for my fourth act (i.e. album)?
Making three albums was a major milestone. To me, with its release, I’d made it, much like Nick Drake. Or is that a curse? After all, the third was also his last. Thus begging the question: After over a year without playing a song, will there be a fourth?
My guess on that is that you never know and I wouldn’t rule anything out.
Remember the Rule of the Ninja: Never fear, never doubt, and never over think.
After an intense and prolonged period of songwriting – often deep in nature, in areas that have yet to be mapped, and sometimes but not always by a campfire – I am finally nearing completion of my second studio album. It’s theme? Much like my first album New Pangaea it strikes deep in the heart of what the Before Phones Movement (BPM) is all about.
Unlike New Pangaea, my second album takes on thornier topics that many other songwriters would shun due to their complexity and controversial nature. For example, with The Lusitania, I believe I official and forever knock the Titanic (including the movie, and quite possibly the soundtrack – although I’d love to collaborate with Celine Dion) off the top spot and elevate the sinking of the Lusitania as the most tragic and memorable maritime disaster of the past 200 years. Why? Because it’s also an antiwar protest song. Even more subtly, another song on the album – Old Jim Dill – recounts the personal devastation wrought by the Great War, also know as the War To End All Wars, or just WWI and how he, at least partly, overcame it by finding comfort in a nature retreat.
But I digress …
Tentatively, in our studio sessions, we’ve been referring to the album as simply “The Green Album,” although that may yet change. Other names being batted around include Preserved, The Blue Album (long story), Green on Green, and To All My Fans, With Love, Bobby Angel.
People often ask me: “Bobby Angel, what’s your favorite thing about your second album?” My answer is always and unequivocally the same:
Performing the songs to connect their meaning to others. And also, I must admit. I’m kind of itching to do a third album. So it feels good have the second one done, or almost done. As much as I’m an “ad hoc go with the flow” type of guy, I’m equal parts a finisher, too. That’s my secret to songwriting. Get it done and then move on. The longer a song sits the more it starts to lose its original intent. Songs in their truest form capture a moment and just flow.
Bobby Angel
A “moment catcher” is what a good song is.
At least that’s my theory (for now).
I don’t know much, but I’m inclined to spill whatever I do out at the campfire
In his debut album, Bobby Angel brings it with a cascade of farewell songs, one after the other and ten in all, each one followed by an exclusive interview about the song as only a singer/songwriter folk star could do.
And don’t miss out on the cryptic epilogue at the end.
Music aficionados beware:
This album runs on for over 4 hours. But who said the Before Phones Movement (BPM) would ever be served up in 15-second clips?
Try not to overthink a song. Go with what pops in your head, run with it, and don’t stop until you cross the finish line.
At least that’s the case with lyrics. And the untold story of the first draft is that it may have very well been preceded with an audio dictation. Really, writing is about getting your thoughts down, and refining. You know a draft is really coming to shape when the words on the paper talk back to you and tell you what to change, or what needs to be added, shortened or otherwise rearranged. People often mistake writing as a product. And just to be clear it is most definitely that, but more even more so and most of all it’s a process. Some may even say an art.
It would take another 15 years to record my first song. The reason? For one, smart phones didn’t become ubiquitous until sometime around 2010. Another reason might be that my songs were never planned events. Sometimes it would be a day before a farewell party and I didn’t have a song. Or I had a song that was half cooked and still being very unsure if I would be ready for show time. But I learned my lesson quickly: People preferred any song to no song at all. And I was pretty much a persona non-grata if I showed up empty handed without a song to play. The question still needs to be asked: How many songs did I sing in the great “blacked out” period between 1999 and 2014. If I had to guess — and just counting farewell songs — I would say a good two dozen, maybe more.
Many of them I wrote down. Just as many I forgot the chords. But maybe that’s the most incredible thing. One song called The Ballad of the Florida Panther I only sang once, and really even then when I sang it I was just trying to follow the chicken scratch page of lyrics I’d scribbled together in the day before Krista left. The year was 2005. How I managed to reconstruct the song (and the chords) fifteen years later is anybody’s guess other than I’m 100 percent positive I remembered the correct chords. I’m not saying I’m a great artist, but twenty years after singing my first song and barely being able to play more than a few chords I have a pretty good webpage. Next steps: Live performance. Ready or not world, Bobby Angel is ready, willing and able to tour. But not until I get done my third album, yet to be named.
It’s a new dawn with Candidate Burt Silver, but only because he stayed up all night to see it
The only known antidote: Get up and brush it off. And I don’t speak from experience. I’m only saying it as a last resort. These past few months I’ve been going through a song-writing lull. The good news: I’ve seriously gone through my archive and put my songs to memory. I am now capable of playing any number of song sets. The problem is: I’ve left a lot of half-baked songs languish on the window sill. I’m not saying I’m not going to eventually get back up on the horse and gallop full speed ahead. But there are times I wish I was a full time nature-folk balladeer instead of doing the balancing act of being a hydrologist, every night campfire host, performing late night campfire concerts, maintaining a podcast and also trying to put the finishing touches on a fourth installment of a major literary work. Bogged down? Only to the uninitiated. There’s an old saying: If you want something done, ask a busy person. The corollary is: being bogged down is just a momentary state of finally breaking through to the promised land.
The campfire is always crackling and visitors are always welcome at Campfire Park
Especially just after a beautiful sunset over the water. Bobby Angel brings it on this campfire concert. His three song set includes (1) There Goes Bob Three, (2) Marsha Marsha and (3) X Marks The Spot.
My name is Bobby Angel and I’m a singer/songwriter of the Before Phones Movement (BPM), some say folk star. The truth is, I only know three chords. | 
