My latest release is called
My Aim Is Uke, and is a best-of collection featuring the previously unreleased song "Fanbase of Operations," a remix of "Joss Whedon Is My Master Now," and two live bonus cuts!
I've been busy these past few months recording and performing with indie-pop band
THE SHAKE UPS (http://theshakeups.net). Our latest disc is called
Warm Fuzzies, and it's been getting rave reviews! We're planning to hit the studio with a new batch of songs in the very near future. I have also been writing, recording and performing with
FIVE YEAR MISSION, a Star Trek-themed band that is endeavoring to write and record a song for every episode of the original Star Trek series! And if all that wasn't enough, I'm also writing and recording with
THE MADEIRA and
DESTINATION: EARTH! for new albums to be released late this year or early next. Check out the "Links" page for a chance to check out each of these bands!
A BRIEF, NON-ANNOTATED HISTORY
Hi there. I'm P.J., and I play the ukulele. I also play the guitar, sing, and write songs. I reside in Indianapolis, but have also spent a lot of time recording and performing in southern California. You may remember me from such bands as The Shake Ups, The Madeira, Mr Muggles, Hipster Zero, Destination: Earth!, Film At Eleven, In Stitches, Mind Rift?, Larry & Rita's Boy, or Happy & Plaid.
It all started in the late 1980's when I began playing the electric guitar. It was a time of long hair and ripped jeans, when pyrotechnics would have been welcome, and sometimes even appropriate. But something was missing... Inspired by the death of Tiny Tim in the mid-1990's, I picked up a ukulele for the first time, wondering if it might be that something. I promptly put it back down, and completely forgot about it for several years. But eventually I picked one up again, purely by chance, while vacationing in Hawaii. Then I got one of my own, started writing songs on it, and covering songs by both artists I admired (They Might Be Giants, Leonard Nimoy, King Missile, the Dead Milkmen) and some I didn't (Poison, Bon Jovi, Kiss).
I released my first uke-based album,
Uke-a-holics Unanimous, in the Fall of 2006. In early 2007, the song "Joss Whedon Is My Master Now" was discovered by hoardes of adoring Whedon fans, and it became a worldwide internet hit. Around that same time, I participated in the RPM Challenge, an event where musicians write and record a full album over the span of a month. The completed disc, dubbed
Keep On Rockin' In The Flea World, was released in the Spring of 2007.
I released a third album,
Ukes Not Nukes, in the Spring of 2008. The song "Number Six," a tribute to Battlestar Galactica, received much attention from the show's fans. The song "We Could Be Heroes," a tribute to the show Heroes, received such a positive response from that show's constituency that its official fanclub included
Ukes Not Nukes in their giveaway contest promoting a new season of the series. In late 2008, I was asked by the producers of Fans, an original web series, to produce a theme song for their show, and that song became "Fanbase of Operations."
A 20-track best-of compilation entitled
My Aim Is Uke was released in the Spring of 2009. Collecting most of the high points from my previous releases, the album also included the aforementioned "Fanbase of Operations," and a remix of "Joss Whedon (Is My Master Now)."
