"If God isn't dead, then I'll kill him myself."

I've already professed my love for Creative Commons and the music produced under it, so what follows shouldn't set the world on fire, at least from the prospective of me. The music I have for you today however, should the world ever choose for a day to be fair, could very well light this planet up.

Josh Woodward (Website/MySpace/Facebook/Twitter/YouTube) is a relatively (word used lightly for comedic effect) proficient, self-run singer/songwriter from Ohio who has produced an extremely large amount of music over the past five or so years, all of which is available for free. Yes. Again the key word is free. You don't have to pay for any of this, unless you want a physical copy of a CD or are feeling extremely generous. After you get done going through this collection, I'm going to have a hard time believing you aren't going to do at least one of those two things.

I could go on forever just on the merits of his collective work but, for all our sakes, I'm going to focus on his October release, Breadcrumbs.

Free Download/Listen/Buy

Welcome the winter.

At least that's the feeling I got over the eleven tracks of this album. It starts out upbeat enough, with Swansong providing a nice, bouncy acoustic riff to offset the lyrics of a man coming to terms with the end of a relationship. As other instruments come in, the song keeps your head moving, swaying back and forth, up and down, Josh's voice never overpowering or being overpowered, a perfect compliment to a very well produced track. A song you'll find it hard not to smile through.

Which will be enough of that. Everything slows down with the next song, 20/20, and doesn't really pick up until the back-end of the album. The music suddenly starts to make you feel like you're trapped in a gently falling snow and you would really like the record to act as your blanket. I use such a stretch of a metaphor only because the songs here really do give that effect, most effectively Border Blaster, a soft lament of illegal immigration from the point of those who the necessity of which affects the most. If you don't want to take the time to download this album, then at the very least download this song alone.

However, if you do take this lazy way out you'll miss out on the most disturbing of tracks, Under the Stairs, a story of what happens when you mess with the wrong person. With music as haunting as the lyrics, this happens to be another stand-out of a record full of stand-outs, especially when you take into account that this what happens when music is made for love and not money.

Tirade aside, the album is a bit melancholy, there's no getting around that, but not every artist can be Lady Gaga. Sometimes an album like this is needed for the listener just to lose themselves in, to help clear their mind from their own problems for a little while. And, in that respect, this CD works really well.

Less sad songs on the album (in music at least) include the aforementioned Swansong and Once Tomorrow and well, that's about it. The last two songs continue the cold tone of the record, ending with I'm Not Dreaming - a slow, steady, deliberate and beautiful tale of a man forever changed by war. It doesn't preach, but the only way for me to prove that to you is for you to listen to it for yourself.

Truly do take the time out for this. Breadcrumbs is professional music in every sense of the word - only it doesn't suck.

No. No. I didn't forget. I was trying to. But, no. I didn't forget.

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Now playing: Josh Woodward - I'm Not Dreaming
via FoxyTunes