Album Notes

I was raised in a small town by two crazy alcoholics who one day took a break from beating the crap out of each other just long enough to buy me a nylon stringed acoustic guitar. I was 12 and all about the rock (especially Def Leppard) but I got bored playing riffs on an acoustic so I started teaching myself to play classical guitar out of a book. A year or so later I convinced my mom to pay for classical lessons and eventually I got an electric guitar too. I played a lot with my brother who had just gotten a drum kit and when I was 14 we played in a band with two other kids in front of our entire high school. When I was 15 I started trying out my super twisted songwriting on friends. I remember grabbing my acoustic saying "hey listen to this!" and I'd sing a song about killing my date on prom night for fresh blood. Pretty much all of the songs I wrote as a teenager were meant to be funny and to entertain. Over the years I think I've gradually become more comfortable with expressing my (ahem) feelings, but lyrics even now that are supposed to be funny are still pretty dark, a theme that just suites me I suppose.

When I was 18 I moved to Portland and took music classes at Mt Hood Community College delving way deep into classical guitar and music theory. (I could dork out all day talking about music theory.) I hooked up with a girl from class who played drums. We played my funny little songs together at house parties, on the street, for friends and pretty much anyone who would listen since we were too young to play in clubs. I banged away on my nylon strings and she played a snare drum with brushes. We recorded a handful of songs with Chad Crouch for a Hush Records compilation calling ourselves simply "Morgan & Jolie". It got written up in the Portland Rocket saying that we added "unexpected sparkle to the singer-songwriter vibe" of the comp and it was pretty exciting to see our name in the paper. Finally we both turned 21 and had our first real show at NXNW 1998. I went crazy booking shows and I remember having a pretty fun year before we split in 1999.

Since those days I've traded off alot between playing solo and having a band. I've always really enjoyed watching a song morph from group to group. In May 2004, shortly after my last band split, I opened for Gothic Outhouse and met Sam Henry. We started working together on a recording project out of which emerged this new and amazing band I'm playing with now. Sam and I are hard at work on my second album and I've decided to take a break from playing shows until its finished...

But for now this album The Rules of Dating was released on my own label Lady Lush Records in April of 2003. Most of it was recorded live at Rocket Science by Sean Flora, some tracked by my old band and the rest in front of an in-studio audience as part of an open house we hosted for Last Thursday. (Rocket Science is on ALberta and 20th) I hope you enjoy it. My new record should be out by early 2005.

Thanks for stopping by!

Morgan Grace
Nov 2004