Mindful Daze is my first full length solo album in over ten years. During that time I released singles and EPs, but I've never wanted to make an album just for the sake of making one. I've always felt that music should come from having something honest to say.

Over the past four years, life gave me plenty to write about.

At one point, my life had become something out of a country western song. There were plenty of hard lessons. Some of it was self-inflicted and some of it was simply life happening. Then everything changed. I met the love of my life around the same time my family learned that my dad had been diagnosed with an aggressive cancer.

It was a strange season to live through. I was experiencing the excitement of falling in love while also trying to be present for my dad and strong for my family. As difficult as that time was, it also brought us closer together. Looking back, I realize some of my hardest memories are also some of my most meaningful.

That is what Mindful Daze is about. It is about realizing that joy and heartbreak can exist at the same time. Sometimes the love surrounding us is what carries us through the darkest moments, and it is only later that we can truly see it.

While preparing for my dad's celebration of life, my family gathered old photos and home videos. Hidden among them were videos I had never seen before of my mom and dad before they had children, and of my sister and me when we were little. Watching those moments, I realized that beneath everything life had thrown at us, we were still the same family.

I decided to weave pieces of those home videos throughout this album. They are there to honor the memories we've shared, but also to remind me that while it is important to appreciate the past, there is still so much life ahead of us.

Love and loss, grief and hope, endings and new beginnings often happen at the same time. Mindful Daze is my attempt to capture what that feels like. 

- xo Zach