Episode 22 – Erik Balkey

Singer-songwriter Erik Balkey writes and performs songs understated and reflected yet will move you deeply. Based in New Jersey, he has released numerous songs and albums over the years. And through his business, Hudson Harding, he promotes folk artists to radio stations nationwide.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_04 0:06

Welcome everybody to another edition of Acoustic Northeast, where we talk about the singers, songwriters, and acoustic music scene in the Northeast.

SPEAKER_03 0:15

United States.

SPEAKER_04 0:16

And we interview musicians who play live for us and you in studio. I am co-host George Malice.

SPEAKER_03 0:24

And I am co-host Dave Goldenberg. We're sponsored today by HearitThere.com, which is where you can uh find great places to go, listen to music, and um WBXO Internet Radio out of beautiful Hopewell Junction, New York, where you can actually hear this podcast. That's right. And Hudson Harding Folk Radio Promoters, which is something you may know a little bit more about by the end of today's uh podcast. You can listen to our podcast, well, right here, obviously, and wherever you get your podcasts, and also on YouTube, acousticnortheast.com and on wbxo.com. George, what do we got today?

SPEAKER_04 1:09

Oh, today we have Eric Balkey in studio. Eric, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Thank you. Yeah, good to be here.

SPEAKER_04 1:15

Yeah, that's great. Eric, where do you hail from originally?

SPEAKER_01 1:19

Um, originally from uh I grew up in South Jersey near Philadelphia.

SPEAKER_04 1:23

Okay, so cool. And now you're now you're in Jersey, I believe.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

Now I'm in North Jersey. Okay, it's a different state.

SPEAKER_04 1:29

Okay, cool. So uh we'd like you to kick off the show with a tune. Can you intro it for us? Sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:36

This one's the next song. Oh, wait, should I do something about the song? Okay, so the song is uh this is a song about uh uh the pursuit of passion and doing what you love to do.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

It's September, so the sun is low. The season's here, but soon we'll go the ball. Skips off the grass, I throw it back. The lights are on, the night is brisk. Oh, baseball god, I ask you this. Make it go slow, make this game last. Cause I've got baseball in my blood since the time that I was seven, it's all that I've dreamed of. I've got baseball in my soul. This field is my heaven. Don't ever make me go, don't ever make me go. Hey, yeah, don't make me go. I play shortstop for the Buccaneers. Local fans hold their cold beers, it's just the minor leaks, it's not the show. But don't tell them in Middletown, they're scared of when the mills close down. The Buccaneers are their last hope. Cause they've got baseball in their blood. Since the ball club's been around, this town has been in love. They've got baseball in their souls till the mills all close down and the stadium will go. Don't ever make it go. Hey, yeah, don't make it go. So it's me at short Doug's on the hill. Jim plays second at first, is Bill McGee. This year could be his last. Late night bus warm beer in cards. The minor leagues have aged him fast. But he's got baseball in his blood. Like the easy worn out feeling of a beat up baseball glove. He's got baseball in his soul till they drag him from this field. McGee will never go. This baseball bum is stealing home. Hey, yeah, he's stealing home. He's stealing home. Hey, yeah, hey, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:12

That's Eric Balkey. Baseball on my mind, and we are in high baseball season as we as we record this. I'm not gonna brag too much about the Yankees. Alright, I won't brag at all about the Yankees because it's early and we know what's gonna happen late in the season. Anyway, there's a tradition of baseball folk songs. Um, and somebody once said that every songwriter worth his salt has a baseball song. What are some of your favorite baseball songs?

SPEAKER_01 5:39

Oh, I don't I I'm not gonna I'm not gonna know too many of them, to be honest. And uh let me see, who's got baseball songs? I know Chuck Brodsky has a lot of them. Um uh Dan Byrne has one. I'm not really a connoisseur of baseball songs, but um Greg Brown has a great one too.

SPEAKER_04 5:59

Yeah, I can't think of the name of it off the top.

SPEAKER_03 6:01

But I love that image of the beat up baseball glove. I still have my Amos Otis from 1970 something.

SPEAKER_01 6:07

Yeah. There's a, you know, there's a comfort to the to the well-worn in glove that just feels great and it makes you want to go out and throw and catch a ball. Absolutely. It's just, you know, it's such a primary, I don't know what uh uh a primal. It's such a like I just you put a ball in front of me, I want to throw it and catch it. And I could if I had a partner to do that with. I mean, I'd as a kid you'd do it against a wall if you had to, but like man, it's just like the fulfillment of just being out on a nice day throwing and running and catching and yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:41

So you played ball as a kid?

SPEAKER_01 6:43

Nah, you know, I played a lot of sports. Uh I played baseball in the in the uh neighborhood park. I wasn't I didn't play a lot of organized baseball. Okay. Same with basketball. I played a lot of basketball, but never organized. Um the organized sports I did were were soccer and wrestling and cross country. But I I grew up doing all sports, yeah. Okay. That song I was um partly inspired by when I was in college and I I was playing uh I had a co-op job and I was the youngest guy on the team because I was college age. I was an engineering firm and I got to play shortstop and it was the summer and the weather was beautiful, and just being out you know, in in uh, you know, a neighborhood in Philadelphia at a park with a bunch of guys just playing baseball. I mean, it it couldn't be a better memory or better time just of something to do. So is there anything better taking ground balls at shortstop? Yeah, exactly. So sh playing shortstop, the thing about it is you you sit there at shortstop and you get, you know, you bend, you're like ready, you just feel like every ball's coming your way. Absolutely. You feel like if it's a bowling alley, you're like you're in the middle. You're like wait, like, you know, it might go right, it might go left. If I'm at second base, I feel like I'm leaning a little bit to the right because um, you know, right-handed batters, which you know, it summer leagues and most most most people just hit right-handed, and so it'll go down the right side, it'll go down the shortstop and third base side.

SPEAKER_03 8:12

Yeah. So there there are two kinds of um fielders in baseball. There are the hit it to me kind, and then the please don't hit it to me kind. Yeah. So I used to hide out in left field, but you were clearly a hit it-to-me kid.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

Yeah, no, I mean at that point when it was non-competitive guys, uh, you know, in uh from an engineering firm playing a non-competitive league against another engineering firm, and um we uh, you know, then I'm like, yeah, just hit the ball to me. Uh as a kid, I wasn't great at baseball. And I and I was never great at baseball or or softball, but um but it was so much fun. And I got good at it, like good enough to just like you know, hit it to me. Yeah, I can't wait to get the ball. So when did when did music find you? When and how? Uh last semester at college. Um I had a lot of semesters at college. But it was the it was the last one. And if it was if it was the first one, it might have also been the last one, but uh but I'm glad I I think it was good that I found guitar uh when I was almost you know I almost had my degree. I was taking a lot of the the final courses that were um that I had skipped earlier on, um general education courses in in in an engineering curriculum, but I was taking, you know, a gym class which was ballroom dancing. I was taking uh literature, um the things that I did that I kind of like skipped so I could focus on everything. So yeah, my last semester I bought a guitar and uh on a whim kind of, but I'd always loved music, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 9:50

But when you were a kid, you didn't fantasize about being Bob Dylan or being in a band.

SPEAKER_01 9:55

Yeah, I was probably the guy that that would have been so I grew up in the 80s listening to classic rocks, classic rock radio, and um I probably was the guy that was more into people like Bob Dylan than the rest. Uh Neil Young, Bob Dylan, um Paul Simon, uh the 70s singer-songwriters, the storytellers. Yeah, that was probably my thing even in high school. I still went to Pink Floyd with my friend at the at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia, but um but I was probably Crosby still is a Nash, like boom, blew my mind. Harmonies, the whole bit. Like it just lit me up. So yeah. So were you self-taught on the guitar or did you get any lessons or when I went to buy the guitar, they said they kind I I looked around and I was like, here's like the kind of the least expensive one. I looked at it and said, Yeah, I'll get this one. I wanted to check out and they're like, Would you like lessons? I'm like, oh yeah, you're pretty observant. Yeah, I could probably use lessons. I don't and so I took a couple lessons my final semester before I left, and then and then I wound up landing in Redbank, New Jersey, where there was um, you know, all this was new to me, but I just like I didn't I was working in an engineering firm and I didn't know anyone there, so I just went out into Red Bank downtown and found the you know the independent little movie theater that did independent films in the coffee shop that like, oh, they have an open mic. And you go to open mic and people are playing songs and original songs. So um that lit a fire under me. I had a guitar for six months, but I I didn't know what to do much with it. I showed up every Sunday. I played songs before I was ready to. Um, and uh I was determined each week to embarrass myself a little bit less, progressively get to the point where I was and I mean I flopped, man. It's like and I still to this day, if I'm not taking a risk, I don't I mean, when I'm playing, like, well, what are you doing it for? You know? Um that's what motivates me. And um, and uh yeah, so I I I started playing and learning from people at the open mic. I'd see them play a chord, I'm like, what's that chord? And uh so I've had lessons on and off, but mostly you see say self-taught. Like, I mean, I I observed, I watched, I asked. But um, you know, if you watch me play now and and I told you I played when I bought my first guitar 32 years ago, you might say that's pretty basic guitar, isn't it? Yeah, so I mean it doesn't take much to learn you know, three chords is chords is the joke, G, C, and D, but like E minor and A minor are easier than any one of those three, so now you know five chords. And unless you're doing something that's not your typical folk or pop, you know, um you don't I don't need to know diminished chords.

SPEAKER_04 12:47

It's what you do with those three chords. So so I you know, I'm off and running for a long time, and I and um yeah, so talk about um because you did go on the road for for quite a long time. And how old were you at that point? Uh how far out of college and whatnot?

SPEAKER_01 13:02

32 and eight years out of college. So eight year for eight years I worked uh different engineering firms, including mechanical engineering, consulting engineering, including a firm in Manhattan, Lower Manhattan. And um and then uh eight years out of college, I left engineering to travel to country and played music, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 13:22

So at that point you were well, you were obviously writing and writing a lot at that point. So take us through, you know, if you can, in in a couple of minutes or whatever, what it was like and what you did on the road and how you came upon places to play and so on and so forth.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

Okay, sure. So as I tell you this, I feel like I'll be uh telling this from the third person about someone someone that existed in the aughts. This crazy dude who left his job as an engineer to travel the country and play music when he could barely get booked anywhere. But um yeah, so what was it like? Um so for one, I'll start at the end, which is the conclusion is that there's some kind of you know, when you're doing something you love in your life, you're there's some kind of fuel that kind of is the reason to do it. Like there's no practical reasons when you you could take a you know, a legal pad and go left and right and like categories like the pluses in my like no, it's like I did it and I was lit up by it. I would travel, I'd I'd have lots of time in the car, I'd write songs, um, I'd show up at open mics, I'd I'd find out where I mean other people were doing it. Um so I'd find where they were playing, I'd call up that place and try to book it. When I found enough places in the Pacific Northwest, I wound up out in the Pacific Northwest playing for six people at a time in coffee shops, finding a radio station, meeting a friend and co-writing a song, um, finding work. So what uh as I'm traveling, I needed to find work. So I I painted houses. Um and uh I and I looked, you know, I'd dot the map with people I knew from college or relatives or my friends of relatives. My uncle's like, well, I know someone in Minneapolis if while you're there, if you need a place to stay, I'm like, Yeah, let's do that. So I'll go to Minneapolis. So that I mean I was it was futons and in basements and um and getting to the open mics and spending my spare time writing and finding jobs painting to keep it going.

SPEAKER_03 15:30

So you were a you were a musical vagabond.

SPEAKER_01 15:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:34

Which is it's kind of a romantic fantasy, I think, that a lot of people have.

SPEAKER_01 15:37

I would call it a romantic fantasy. What was it really like? So so it's great while it's great, and then it gets and then you know when you loot when you're out of that fuel. So I still I could romanticize about it now still, and I'd and at this point I'd call it a fantasy, and I don't know how I did it or why you know, I don't know what well I just all I can explain is that I was motivated to do it. I mean, I remember driving on 95 South going to Charlotte for a show and writing a song in my head, and um I'm I'm usually on time and early for things. That's how I plan it. You know, I and I I I travel midday rather than when there's traffic later in the day. So I'm I'm due to be there a few hours early, and I run out of gas because I'm focusing on this song I'm writing. I'm like, all right, well, I have triple A. I have this song in my head, let me call triple A, get in the backseat, get my guitar out, and finish this song that's in my head. And and I wrote a song and triple A got me gas, and I still got there an hour early. So what was that an answering a question to? It's just it like I was when I was traveling, I mean I like the time, I like the solitude where I could um do things like focus on on writing songs and and um and getting places and playing the new song that I just maybe wrote that day. So yeah. That's bold.

SPEAKER_03 17:00

Yeah, yeah. It really is, yeah. But I like that why not attitude. You know, either you do it or you don't.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Yeah. And I mean, I I don't know, if you're not taking like if you're not taking risks, I mean what do you what are you living for? So you've written you've written hundreds of songs.

SPEAKER_03 17:16

Yeah, yeah. And recorded quite a few as well. That's correct, yeah. Where where can people hear them?

SPEAKER_01 17:22

Um in your basement right now. Oh no. Uh uh, where can I hear them? So if if if they know how to spell my name and they get to the YouTube and places like that, they can find some of my music. There's a lot that really doesn't exist in online, but um if my name is Eric with a K, E-R-I-K, and Balky is B-A-L-K-E-Y. And if you look me up on the internet, you'll find some songs. So YouTube, Facebook, yeah, all the typical Instagram and search. Yeah, I don't have I mean there's only a fraction of what I have up there, like Spotify, I think, has an album and a couple singles. So, um, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 18:05

Yeah. So um why don't you give us another tune? Sure. And intro it for us, please, and for the audience.

SPEAKER_01 18:12

Yeah. Let's do this one. So um speaking of speaking of following your dream and having the courage or boldness or silliness to take chances and and write your own story.

SPEAKER_02 18:46

I followed my dad down into the mines, and we follow each other to the bar each night after five, and basketball is playing, the boys pull for the loosen team. It's easy to cheer for the underdog if you don't have a dream. Well, I won't be buried in this town. Digging holes in the cold, cold ground. I'm taking bets who thinks that I'll go far.

SPEAKER_00 19:27

Come on, who glee in the underdog?

SPEAKER_02 19:43

Well, word gets around in a small, small town. If you're thinking and leaving, you should be keeping that to yourself. Cause by the time I got home, he was pacing the floor. He said you think you're a big shot. What makes you think that you deserve more? Well, I won't be buried in this town. Digging holes in the cold, cold ground. I'm taking bets who thinks that I'll go far. Come on, who believes in the underdog Well I was ready by the morning. Mom was waiting by the door. She said I've been saving for this moment. You deserve more. Well, I won't be buried with this town, digging my hole into the cold, cold ground. I'm taking bets who thinks that I'll go far. Come on, who believes in the underdog.

SPEAKER_03 21:36

That's Eric Balkey standing up for the underdog here. And speaking of underdogs, what a great segue. I would say it's probably safe to say in the music world, all folk singers are underdogs and can use whatever support they can find or get to um to find their audience. And I know that you've actually helped build a business from that idea uh called. Hudson Harding, which I mentioned at the beginning of our podcast. Tell us a little bit about what Hudson Harding does and how it helps folk singers.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

Sure. When I recorded my first record 25 years ago, I I knew that there were independent radio shows that would consider playing my music. I knew it would take a long time to figure out all of them and get a list and do the work to actually send out and promote my record, but I wanted to do it and so I did it. And I did a pretty thorough job of it. I took my data collecting and sort of like um executive function skills from engineering into that. And I and I um and I did a good job of it. And the the reason it's hard to do is because then, you know, you don't have a record to promote for another three or four or five years or whatever. And by the time you try to do it again, like a lot has changed. So what I I just it's a simple concept. I figured out how to do it, and then I offered it to my friends and said, you know, I can send it to you to radio for you. And um, I've been doing that now for 25 years. It kind of built itself. It was a side hustle for a while. Um, and then uh uh it became my main job. Um, and so it's been it's been all I do for a couple years now. And I send out music to radio, to independent radio, and uh get uh airplay for independent artists.

SPEAKER_04 23:19

It's fantastic. Yeah. So doing this for 25 years, how have you seen the the folk industry change? Has it gotten smaller or you know, just give me an idea.

SPEAKER_01 23:33

Yeah, I don't know. I I I guess folk and industry, uh putting those two words together, I don't I I wouldn't I wouldn't generally do that. I mean, there's a lot of words I don't use. When I hear them, I'm like I sort of eye roll and I don't you know it's it career and professional and like I don't know what makes someone a professional and you know I just feel like it's it's just this is what we do. Like artists make make art and um yeah and you know I spent a lot a lot of the balance of my life has been at different times, you know, a whole lot of stuff that's not making music, but it's it's living and it's informing me as an artist. Um so how have things changed? Uh you know, um yeah, uh it's uh technology and and you know, I mean the all of a sudden everyone not spending that much time out and amongst people. I mean, I know we're it's not 2020, but like I mean, there's there's a significant change in you know uh on how how many people go out to enjoy live events, um including music. So so that's a big change. Um I don't know, the technology uh um from you know album to cassette to cd to zeros and ones, um digital digital music. Um so yeah, a lot of changes.

SPEAKER_04 24:59

I think um I I I uh let's talk about let's talk about how people can get in touch with you to get their music to you. So talk about that.

SPEAKER_01 25:10

Yeah, so the email address that you can reach out to me and uh is Hudson Harding. The two words as spelled as it sounds, Hudson Harding Music at gmail. I'm sorry, at yahoo.com, HudsonHardingmusic at yahoo.com. Also, if you know my name again, you can find me on social media and whatever, you know, reach out to me that way as well.

SPEAKER_04 25:34

And the process I believe is you put out like a double album like every two months, something in that range.

SPEAKER_01 25:40

And that's the album that you get out to all the stations and I have uh well since I've been doing this, I promote I promote albums of artists, and then as of about five or six years ago, I started promoting singles, and because the DJs, there's a significant portion of the DJs who still prefer to get submissions on CD, I put them I make a compilation. Sending out digital sing I'm sorry, sending out CD singles is just a is uh environmental irresponsibility and economic as well. So if I can put 20 songs on a CD um that the DJs are gonna get uh pay attention to. Um the other part of that compilation is that um it's a it's a carefully curated compilation and and I know what the DJs are looking for. Um and uh and I give them like I mean it it's for DJs, it's like I just put 20 songs in a group that like, whoa, like they're gonna the so when I say curated, it's it's called folk now and it I subtitle it as songs for these times. So um there's songs that are somehow re they're not just good songs and good recordings, they're good songs and good recordings that are somehow resonant now. And folk radio and folk DJs love that. You know, whether it's sea it could just be seasonal, um, it could be around a holiday, it could be around Mother's Day or Father's Day, it could be about what happens in Minneapolis when political yeah, political, right? It could be so it's it's all of that. And um and I, you know, I have an ear for after 25 years, I know what the DJs are looking for. So people send me stuff and I give them a reasonable idea of how much airplay I think it can go.

SPEAKER_04 27:28

And you'll master them too, from what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_01 27:29

Yeah, we master them.

SPEAKER_03 27:30

Yeah, what makes sense. So what are DJs looking for? What's in your head when you're going through a batch of submissions?

SPEAKER_01 27:36

So I listen, I mean, I can hear a great song and great production and great and great performance of a song and be like, yeah. And then I can hear something like oh yeah, because that oh yeah is that like all right, I mean you can hear a good song and it just like puts you in a good spot. But you can if you hear a song that like, oh this is what's going on now to me that communicates with me a little bit more with a little bit more urgency and like it grabs, it compels me to like listen more than like that's just a good song. So I mean I grew up, I got goosebumps growing up listening to Crosby Stills and Nash, like absolute goosebumps, and I still do to this day. And the songs and songs like from Neil Young, Ohio, you know, um Tin Soldiers and Nixon's Coming. And um, for what it's worth, you know, um something's happening here, what it is is ain't exactly clear. When I was growing up in the 80s, that was the coolest, most moving music to me for whatever reason. And um starting in nine starting in 2020, it's the it's the next time in my life. 1970, I was one. So this is like in the 70s and the early 70s, that's when the music was fun. I was listening to them in the 80s, but it was songs from the 70s. Um 2020 is the um is when it happened again where topical songs like just are just catch fire. Just like people are the DJs love it because their audiences love it, and it and it's just so to me it's really moving to hear songs that speak to our times.

SPEAKER_03 29:14

And it's nice that you it's it's so hard for I mean, there's some anybody can record now. Yeah, and the the the the curation that you provide to the people who are putting the music out there um is really a service to artists as as well as the industry.

SPEAKER_01 29:29

Yeah. I mean, if I don't care, I gotta I gotta serve the artists, I gotta serve the DJs. If either one of them aren't into what I'm doing, then it doesn't work. So yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:38

Well, Eric Balke, thank you so much for being with us today. Great to hear your stuff. I'm still thinking about my old uh Amos Otis baseball glove now. Yeah. Um, so why don't you um take us out with a song?

unknown 29:51

Sure.

SPEAKER_02 29:54

We bought that thing to travel, and we had big dreams, and we said we're born to wander, and we were just 18, but we never made it far before we turned around. Cause dreams are dreams, it's true. And so we settled down, and I swore I'd never leave her, or our baby girl, but we never got to Cleveland, or to see the world. Now the moss has grown round our mobile home. Now our mobile home, don't go nowhere. The tires are gone and the blocks are there. We settled down while the kids had grown. Now, moss grows round our mobile home. Yeah, mosque grows round our mobile home. We bought a little ranch out on the county road, and the mobile home is planted where the mower mode. Our kids will go out camping and tell us what they've seen. But the thing it never moves unless you care to dream. Our kids are getting older. Time is flying fast, and they'll soon be old enough to dream the dreams we had, and our dreams have grown round our mobile home. Our mobile home, don't go nowhere. The tires are gone and the blocks are there. We settled down while the kids had grown. Now, mosque grows round our mobile home. Yeah, must grows round our mobile. Home is where it started. Heart to home is bound, but dreams go on untethered. We remember them now. Remember now. Cause we have an empty nest. The kids have all moved out, and we're older now than then. To that there's little doubt. But the road out there before us that's always past us by, it goes into the sunset, goes for miles and miles. And I say I love you, baby. And I have no regrets. And of all the dreams we could live. I love this one the best where the moss has grown. Round our mobile home. Our mobile home, don't go nowhere. The tires are gone and the blocks are there. We settled down while the kids had grown. Now mosque grows round our mobile home. Yeah, mosque grows round our mobile home. And mosque grows round our mobile home. Our dreams have grown round our mobile home.