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Do you write songs? If you do, The Song Confessional podcast wants you to write a song that could get recorded in KUTX’s Studio 1A.
Here’s how it works.
- Listen to this episode of the Song Confessional podcast. You’ll hear an anonymous confession that they collected at our KUTX Live at Scholz Garten series.
- Write a song inspired by that confession and record it – Anything from an iPhone memo to a full-on bedroom production, whatever puts you in the zone.
- Submit it to kutx.org/confession by Wednesday, April 8th
- Some of the songs will be featured on the April 15th episode of the Song Confessional podcast
- The winner will be able to record their song in Studio 1A!
The full transcript of this episode of Song Confessional is available on the KUT & KUTX Studio website. The transcript is also available as subtitles or captions on some podcast apps.
Walker Lukens: Hey, this is Walker Lukens and you are listening to the song Confessional, the only podcast that turns your anonymous stories into new original songs. So let me explain how we do this, right? We, we go all over the country. We collect your anonymous stories, we call them confessions, and we give them to songwriters and bands.
Who write and record a new original song based on your story, your confession. Now, normally on these episodes, we, we feature. The confession, and then we feature the song and inspired, and then there’s an interview with the band. But this episode, a confession call episode is slightly different. All you’re going to hear is the confession, and then we’re leaving it up to you, the listener, to write a song inspired by this and send it into us.
Okay? Maybe you won’t write it. Maybe your friend will write it. Maybe your old lady will write it. But give them this episode. Tell them they’ve got until. April 8th to write and record a song and send it in to us here at Song Confessional. It doesn’t need to be a fancy recording, it can just be like a voice memo, or you can make a demo in Garage Band, whatever you want.
’cause here’s the deal, we’re gonna go through every single submission. We’re gonna feature some of our favorites on the response episode to this, and then the winner. We will choose a winner. The winner gets to come in and record a version
Confessor: live
Walker Lukens: in Studio one, A-K-U-T-X. Okay, but I’ve gotten a little ahead of myself, uh, because first I need to tell you about this confession.
Which we collected at KUT X’s annual South by party at Schultz Garden, the oldest, continuously operating bar in Austin, Texas. I could Google that. I won’t. I won’t. I won’t. Now we get all sorts of confessions in here. We get a lot of, uh, dirty deeds. Like our, uh, our last confession call episode, which featured one woman’s story about having a relationship with two brothers at different times.
There was more elements to it than that, but uh, I think that classifies as a dirty deed. We also get lots of, uh, really heavy, uh, heart wrenching stories like our episode from Rayland Baxter last year, uh, who wrote an amazing song called Albatross. Inspired by, uh, one woman’s really shitty. Year where her grandparents and her brother died in a plane accident and then her mother died shortly thereafter.
That, uh, we also get lighthearted and fun things like our episode featuring Golden Dawn Orchestra, uh, who wrote a song for us called Orgy. And um, I don’t really need to fill in the blanks for you on that one. I think you know what that one is about. Our confession today. Uh, it’s, it’s heavy ish. It’s the only confession I can remember where the confessor is just offering advice, uh, to you, to me, to all of us listening about how to deal with something we’re all gonna go through, and that is losing a parent.
As I listened to this, I thought, damn, I wish I had this guy’s dad. I also thought, man, uh, I hope I am a dad like this. That’s all for later. But for now, confession.
Confessor: Howdy. I live in Austin, Texas, and I have a confession. Uh, not really much of a confession. I just kind of wanted to spit some advice for, uh, any of you nerds listening to this.
Um, so, uh, essentially my old man, my father, he passed away January. 2023 and, um, essentially, um, this man, you know, he raised me being my dad and everything like that, and he was always my go-to confessor, if that makes sense. Um, I would go to him with all of my problems, all of my troubles and everything.
I’ve been a bit of a delinquent my entire life. Well, now I’ve cleaned up my act, but back in the day I was definitely delinquent. And so, uh, I feel like my father had a very good way of, um, punishing me when necessary and not punishing me and encouraging me when he thought it was bullshit. So, like, for example, if I wanted to build like a skate ramp and like a parking lot and like pour some concrete or something like that, he would encourage that saying, I really like your creative energy.
But if I wanted to, uh, tag and spray the back of my local gas station and I would get in trouble and caught, uh, he would punish that. But I think one of his most influential, or one of our most influential conversations was, um, when he was put on hospice and he was, um, you know, told he was gonna have a, basically a couple weeks to live and, um, before he kind of lost his consciousness and kind of like, um.
He lost his ability to like be a person while he was transitioning into death. Um, we had a very serious conversation about, uh, my future, uh, our family’s future, and, uh, what to do and what my role would be and, uh, what the challenges would be going to. Forward. And, um, it was a very, it was a, it was an easy conversation to have, but it’s always a hard thing to think about.
Uh, one thing that I really miss the most and yearn for the most from him is, uh, being able to have someone to confide in and who gives really good advice and. When he was getting ready to pass away, when he was getting ready to die or ascend, uh, depending on what you believe in, he, he just straight up told me, Hey son, I’m gonna die.
That’s it. That’s the end of the road. There’s nothing else to do. Uh, this is what you need to do. This is what’s gonna happen, and, uh, this is, this is it. And just be ready. And honestly, a conversation like that, I think a lot of people need to have a conversation like that. You know? Um, I, I understand a lot of people pass suddenly, but, um, one thing that, uh, with my father and I are.
Entire family is, we kind of had like a fight till the very end, uh, idea about his illness. And so, uh, no matter what it was victory at all costs. But then when we realized victory wasn’t necessarily possible, um, he straight up owned it and was like, I’m dying. And, um, I think that really helped me a lot in terms of mourning because I was able to, one, be there for him and then two, like have, have him, have me understand that this is the end of the line.
This is it, you know, and I need to start getting ready now and, um. I’m like the oldest in my family, so I’m the first born child. And so, um, when I was, uh, he basically told me like what my role would be in kind of installing like this, uh, hierarchical ideal. Like, I have to take care of my mother. I have to look after my brothers and what my challenges would be.
But one of the things that he said, uh, well, that’s really stayed with me, that’s really impacted me the most was that, um, he’s not gonna be there to give me advice anymore and that I would have to seek him out in my dreams. When I was ready. And I mean, uh, to be, to be honest, I don’t know what the fuck that meant, but I have seen him a couple times.
He has done the Obi one Kenobi Force Ghost visit me in my dreams. And, uh, either it’s my brain being very nice to me and, uh, playing some very perfect dreams for me and feeling like my father is actually there. Or what I truly like to believe is that, yeah, he mastered the force, go stability, and he comes and visits me in my dreams and gives me all the advice that I need.
And, um, as of the time of the recording, some of the dreams are a little cryptic. I. Not gonna lie, he was invested in some occult shenanigan than some really goofy religious philosophy. So it doesn’t surprise me that he comes back as a forest ghost. What does surprise me and frustrate me is how cryptic he is.
Like, it’s like he’s speaking in some sort of old English occult like language, and I just wish that he would just, uh, speak English and just be a kind of like normal, like how it was back in the day. But I assume, uh, when you ascend into some higher plane of existence, you know, you kind of get a little intelligence boost as well.
So maybe I’m just not. There to understand it. One thing I noticed with my family is in the stages of grief, there were two different types of people. There were those who were, uh, uh, rack up in anger and hatred for like, uh, the person who had passed my father. Like, why didn’t he take care of himself? Why didn’t he take care of his health?
Why didn’t he stop smoking? Why didn’t he stop drinking? And then there were others who were totally immobilized and incapacitated by sadness and grief and a sense of loss. You know, they couldn’t comprehend the idea of, uh, my father not being there anymore. And um, then there was me and my brothers and you know, it’s like, you know, maybe he’s not here physically with us, but um, I’m here and my brothers are here.
And in a sense like that, you know, he is still here. We are his creation, you know, and, uh, although we are a totally individually and unique people, you know, um, he is the one who raised us and he is the one who made us. You know, and, uh, a little bit of us is in, uh, a little bit of him is inside of us, and um, you know, uh, in that sense, is he really gone?
Is he really dead or, you know, uh, just a bigger idea and a bigger legacy is with us to this day, you know, pretty heavy conversation. But anyways, I hope you nerds have a good south by Southwest.
Walker Lukens: Let’s just go ahead and get the elephant out of the room. Is this guy ne us because. He called us nerds twice, and that just feels like he’s trying to, um, make us feel insecure so that we start seeking his approval, but we can’t ever get his approval because he is just some faceless voice on a podcast that now you regretted even listening to now.
But in all seriousness, I think this guy is coming from a really good place and I think what he has to say, while it might seem obvious. Is rare, an actual lived experience. I mean, s speaking from my own life, uh, I had two of my elders, my father and my grandfather, both who were ill for a number of years before they died.
And, uh, they didn’t want to have these kinds of conversation. And so there’s that, but then there’s the other side of it, which is a lot of times you don’t know that someone’s gonna pass away. And to hear a guy who was able to get this kind of closure from their parent is honestly kind of beautiful. And, uh, I think that’s what moved us all over here at the song Confessional team and made us choose this confession.
I mean, there’s also the part where his dad said, I’ll come visit you in your dreams, which, uh, woo. Uh, I’ve experienced that after losing people before, and it’s cool that his dad just said, Hey, see you later buddy. And then. Is doing it. There’s a lot for songwriters here, and I’m excited to hear what you guys send into us by April 8th.
You can find that submission form in the show notes of this episode wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also head over to kutx.org/confession Head there. Submit your recording with the lyrics. It does not have to be fancy, y’all. We are just gonna choose our favorite one, and then you get to come in to the KUT Studio one A and make a recording of it.
With Jake Perlman and co. Uh, that’s the head engineer at K Tex. It’s gonna be so cool. I can’t wait to do this with you. Uh, so get working, send it to your friends, send it to your estranged sister who’s a songwriter. Send it to anyone you can think of who might be inspired by this. Okay? Thank you so much.
This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.
