WARNING! – This is a public service announcement. Before listening to Allan Goodman’s debut album, “Days With You, please, for your own safety and protection, sit down, get comfortable, strap yourself in real tight, crank up the volume and hold on for your life. This ride can get bumpy. First, let’s get this out of the way…The album reflects on a subject as old as the Garden of Eden and Adam and Eve. No new ground is covered here, its all been addressed at least a million times before, analyzed and over analyzed, only the names and characters have changed. But what Allan Goodman has done is to strip it to the bone, to be brutally personal in his reflections, bearing his soul to the world outside along the way, sometimes with a hint of humor to mask the hurt and pain and always with a sense of unvarnished honesty. And in the end, above all…to acknowledge that he understands you and to accompany you on your own journey and offer hope. We learn Allan is transparent but also guarded, the kind of man who restrains himself in relationships, using emotional distance as a suit of armor, a shield to protect himself. We are lead to ask the question; is he protecting himself from possible hurt and failure, or is he protecting himself from himself? It’s obvious at some point, maybe more than once, he allowed himself to drop his guard and be vulnerable, to offer freely of himself without restrictions or reservations, only to have his heart broken, ripped from his body and stomped into the ground. But here’s the twist, the typical response to such treatment is to strike back with a sense of rage and anger, to be the victim, proclaiming the unfairness of it all to anyone willing to listen. Allan however refuses to travel that road, he reacts with love, understanding and compassion. He chooses not to place blame or find fault as it serves no purpose other than to extend the hurt and pain. Rather than hide behind blusterous bravado he asks himself what he could have done better, how could he have prevented the outcome he so desperately feared. And in these darkest of personal moments he has the ability to help us see past our own fear and disillusionment and understand that as uncomfortable and frightened as he is, he will get to the other side, and he will be a better and stronger man for it. He won’t quit. He won’t accept failure. He will keep searching full well knowing there’s a price to pay. The message isn’t delivered as a dirge, as there’s no muffled beat or restrained guitars, and there’s no maudlin or overblown dramatics, only the longing sounds of faith, trust and possibility. Musically he hits you from all sides, from the bell like crystal clear ringing guitars to a wall of muscular “in your face” grunge. He takes you from high energy crescendos to the lonely decay of a single note. The music is his own in every way, honed by his lessons in life. But in it he has the good sense to learn from and respect the past. You can hear faint echoes of Hank Williams, Paul Simon and Tom Petty embrace his lyrics and you feel the “take no prisoners” guitar grunge of The Georgia Satellites, The Clash and ZZ Top. It’s California music and its Texas music. It’s rock and it’s country. It’s the happy carefree feeling of the Beach Boys and the intensity of Joe Ely. It’s the plaintive pleas of Neil Young and the rock solid resolve of Bob Seger. Even when my long time favorite bands release a new album I have to listen to it several times before I can really feel and understand it. Booming guitar hooks and catchy rhythms draw you in, but they alone will not keep your attention. As such it’s been a long time since I “got it” with the first playing of a new album. A feeling so strong you immediately hit replay. Today, listening to “Days With You” in my car I had that feeling. I remember the last time I felt this way about an album, it was the summer of 1975, the record was a product of a little known at the time singer-songwriter…the album was “Born To Run”.