Not my handiwork, but I’ve been known to TP with authority. Game recognize game.

Thrilled to announce that I’m dusting off my walking boots and hitting the road with my buddy Kris Gruen in a matter of weeks. He is to singer-songwriters what Elmo is to Sesame Street: indispensable, universally beloved, and a highly lucrative symbol of pure innocence and childlike wonder. It’s his first time playing shows in the south so let’s pretend like hospitality is still our thing and make him feel welcome. Can’t wait to catch up with all of you.

THE JUICY DEETS:

MARCH 30 | NYC, NY @ City Vineyard at Pier 26 $
Tickets --> http://bit.ly/2tPSPjr
MARCH 31 | Baltimore, MD @ House Party
APRIL 1 | College Park, MD @ Milkboy Arthouse
Tickets --> http://bit.ly/2TGUTIM
APRIL 2 | Norfolk, VA @ Charlie's American Cafe
APRIL 3 | Greenville, SC @ Coffee Underground
Tickets --> http://bit.ly/2EFGxPp
APRIL 6 | Charleston, SC @ Redux Contemporary Art Center
Tickets --> http://bit.ly/2XN6Lbo
APRIL 7 | Columbia, SC @ Curiosity Coffee Bar %
Tickets --> https://squ.re/2J03K4s
APRIL 8 | Atlanta, GA @ Smith's
Tickets --> http://bit.ly/2NKFPVo
APRIL 10 | Charlotte, NC @ Evening Muse
Tickets--> http://bit.ly/2ESCiSc
APRIL 11 | Mobile, AL @ SouthSounds Music Festival
Info --> https://southsoundsfest.com/
APRIL 12 | Mobile, AL @ SouthSounds Music Festival
APRIL 13 | Athens, GA @ The Rooftop at Georgia Theatre
Free Show--> http://bit.ly/2XKsVep

$ with Benjamin Cartel
% with The Lovely Few

This greedy lil squirrel is hoarding awards and compliments, like we all do sometimes. Totally natural…

Pardon the horn-tooting but the sweet-little-record-that-could has somehow ended up on some ‘best of the year’ lists and I feel like listing a few of them might help me look cool. And also remind you that the record exists, because we’re not even a full month into 2019 and 2018 already feels like it happened five years ago. We are aging faster than the guy who drank out of the false grail in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, and we all know whose fault that is but let’s not sully this moment by naming him. Anyway if you want to cross reference your good taste with the good taste of others, here are some people who liked to get with this in 2018:

Ryan’s Smashing Life

SceneSC

Columbia Free Times

The Music Mermaid

It goes without saying but let me waste those words by just saying it: I am super, super grateful to the people who made these lists and helped to get the word out to other music lovers about me and the record. Great company to be in too. Hell of a year, all things considered. Let’s hope I make more lists in 2019 than the one I’m a dead lock for, ‘Humans Who Spent The Most Time On The Cereal Aisle Deciding Which Unhealthy Cereal To Buy In 2019’. I LIKE TO MAKE AN INFORMED DECISION OKAY???

So one day I get a call from Charles Newman, the music supervisor for the film All These Small Moments. He says Melissa (the brilliant director of the film) has an idea for a video and would I be interested. I was oh so interested. So I booked a flight and stuff around a date we were all hoping would work but weren’t sure. Brian had jury duty earlier that week. Molly Ringwald has more important things to do and could just decide ‘never mind’ at any moment. Charles suggested I write a little cello part to help fill out the performance and says he knows a guy. I say hold on, I KNOW A GUY TOO! So I call Ward Williams, cello genius and longtime Brooklynite and he is just as enthusiastic as me.

So the day finally comes and it’s just as dreamy and surreal as you’d expect. everybody is super nice and professional, they actually know my song and have worked out the harmonies I emailed them. Pros being pros. And here I am trying to contain myself despite getting bombarded with blue steel like this all day:

Brian D’arcy James, Molly Ringwald, and Renee the studio owner who was prob the most interesting person there.

Seriously how charmed do you feel and you’re just looking at the photo? Just a sweet, sweet guy. Molly was great too, but I must say you can tell when somebody has been famous for so long that it’s a part of their every instinctual interaction. You can see the toll it’s taken, how there’s an invisible barrier around them that they had to put up decades ago and have lived with ever since. It’s amazing she’s as normal and nice as she is. I envy the professional success but I don’t envy that burden.

So we rehearsed for a few hours, then started filming takes. I think we did four takes and ended up using the last one. We had started at 10 and were done by 3. Lots of small talk about kids visiting colleges and music preferences (BDJ is a big Gabe Dixon fan). Everybody said goodbyes and disappeared out the door, each back into their own charmed, complex lives.

The director Melissa Miller Costanzo and me, just joshin I guess. Renee back there like photobombing is still a thing.

You won’t be shocked to hear it was one of the better days of my life. So grateful to everybody involved for making it happen, especially Melissa and Charles. Never even dared to put something like this on my bucket list and ended up crossing it off anyway. What a world.

I’m going to go into the details of how this dream of a day went down shortly. For now let me just say that the biggest thing I took away from this experience was the totally obvious fact that famous, larger than life people are just regular-sized, normal people when you get in a room with them. Broadway royalty, object of a million white-hot teenage crushes, cello hero/dear friend, and me. And you and all the people you’re currently sharing a room with. We’re all just half-baby half-ghost humans doing our best not to let each other down. Anyway this was a hell of a day.

‘All These Small Moments’ is out now on VoD, the soundtrack is streamable everywhere, and both are worth your attention.

People! Got me a song in this movie and they were sweet/wild enough to use it in the trailer at this link right here on Entertainment Weekly which I subscribed to for many many formative years. The film is beautiful and you should see it when it comes out in January. Hell of a way for you to go out, 2018. Somehow despite being all larded up with tragedies and horrors you STILL made me love you.

60 years worth of home videos.  6 generations of family.  Some mullets.  Mild violence.  Bikes.  Hugs.  Cake.  Double Dribble.  Balloon showers.  All the necessary ingredients for a bittersweet lil meditation on the meaning of life itself.  I rate this video five teardrops out of five.

Real proud of this sweet sweet lil jam I helped write with my buddy William Fitzsimmons for his new record coming out later this month. His voice is like sweet buttered honey chicken on a bed of mixed greens. Please listen. 

*ok it just came out so technically not a hit yet but I mean come on. We can all see where this is going. 

Did a session with Scene SC a few weeks ago at Papa Jazz in Columbia and here go a song from it.  Go here for another performance, some cheeky interview questions, and then blow an afternoon watching other performances and reading about cool shit happening in SC.  Thanks David & friends.

Like a slightly-younger Jake Tapper with music to promote instead of a new book, I’m doing some media appearances this week. You know, promoting the new CD (available now at fine digital storefronts everywhere) and the show this Saturday night at Eclectic Cafe on Spring St downtown w/ Bill Carson. So if you want to experience any of that sweet sweet promo tune your various dials accordingly:

—Today (5/3) I’ll be on WYLA (97.5FM) at 2pm for live performance/interview

—Tomorrow I’ll be on Box in the Morning @ 8:30am doing the same (https://www.boxinthemorning.com/)

—Tomorrow sometime between 10 and 11 I’ll be on Lowcountry Live (WCIV-ABC) for live TV interview/performance

Going to try my best not to say anything that would get me compared to current-day Kanye. Early 2000s Kanye comparisons would be an honor though. Guess we’ll see! 

Welp.  Here we are.  Release day.  Hope everybody had fun getting in line for the midnight launches at Tower Records and other music stores all across the… wait what?  It’s 2018, Tower Records is over, and I’m not actually successful enough to warrant lines of people physically waiting to purchase my music?  And people don’t even purchase music any more?  Really??? Wait AND BIFF TANNEN IS PRESIDENT TOO???? My God.  What kind of hellscape did I wake up in?

Last year I was playing a show and decided to try and write a song so I’d have something new to play.  Hadn’t otherwise been writing much and was starting to think maybe my time would be better spent doing something responsible, like day-trading black market crypto on the silk road.  Anyway I wrote this song called ‘Burning Bridge’ and somehow it unlocked a secret trap door inside me, out of which tumbled an album’s worth of songs.  Now logic would tell a reasonable person not to invest hundreds of hours slaving over lyrics and string arrangements and themes that are hardly commercial or relevant.  Those black market cryptos (just made that up and really liking it) aren’t going to day-trade themselves, right?  Why waste all that time and effort lovingly crafting something only to throw it into the dark gaping maw of modern life, which will almost certainly swallow it, shrug, and keep slouching along unaffected?  Well it turns out I’m JUST dumb enough to go all-in on that kind of proposition.  Makers gonna make, players gonna play, dreamers gonna dream.

The Grammys.  Bring me them.  (thanks Cara for making this ages ago)

So here we are.  You can stream it on all the usual places.  You can buy a physical CD if for some reason you’re still clinging to that medium (let’s be honest, we know the reason: your car doesn’t even have an aux jack so it’s CDs or nothing).  You can also buy it in the usual digital places, including Bandcamp, where you can pay more than the low asking price if you want to help subsidize some art and feel good about yourself (think of it as a one-time Patreon subscription).  I loved the agony of making this record.  It’s my dream record.  I hope you listen to it all alone in your comfiest, safest spot.  Thanks.

Your favorite country mouse is traveling to the big city this week.  Going to be in New York for some stuff n things: 

--Going to the 'All These Small Moments' premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival Tuesday.  Really hoping I end up in an accidental photobomb of someone actually famous.  There's a chance.  I WILL get to walk the red carpet and then hear a song I wrote play over the opening credits of a movie that looks awesome.  So the ol' bucket list is about to get a little thinner.

--Playing a few songs in the Paste Magazine offices in NYC on Wednesday at 12:30.  It'll stream live on my Facebook page, or the Slow Runner Facebook page, or the Paste Facebook page.  Watch me pretend to be comfortable!  Will be playing songs off of the new record.

--Wednesday night I'm playing a show at Berlin featuring a few artists who all have songs in 'All These Small Moments'.  It'll be a fun night with lovely music, a bunch of people who worked on the movie, and probably a healthy mix of laughter and tears.  More details over on the tour page.

Ok, let's all try and keep our shit together this week and BE COOL.  Normally more than 48 hrs in NYC and I start clawing at the walls.  Appreciate your Ts and Ps.

Uh oh, shit's getting real.  The album is less than two weeks away and the fine folks at Vinyl mag were nice enough to debut another track off of it.  Go forth and listen.  Next I'm going to talk shit about how Friendster is ruining our lives.  Social media sillytalk + existential dread = #1 hits baby.

You can't release a compact disc without a compact disc release show, silly!  This is mine.  Eclectic Cafe in Charleston is nice and intimate and perfect for somber piano dirges.  Joining me will be longtime friend and musical spirit brother Bill Carson.  We're going to trade songs back and forth for two hours instead of going one at time.  This has always been one of my favorite things to do, just hanging out w/ him soaking up inspiration; it should make for a fun show too.  If not, we're done at 10 and you've still got the rest of the night to wander the streets of downtown using Cinco de Mayo as an excuse to behave irresponsibly while trying to fill the unfillable void inside you.  Good times!  Please come.  Tickets:  http://bit.ly/2GEBC0Y

Really happy today is here and I can finally share a song off of the new record and announce some more stuff. The song is called Greater Charlotte and I know what you’re thinking: did a tourism board commission this? Is the song about banking and outlet stores and vintage Kelly Tripucka t-shirts? Luckily it’s not. Just a little metaphor, uninfluenced and unaffiliated with the city itself. Listen here. It’s a good summation of what the whole record mostly feels like. 

To celebrate the song debut, and because the synergy is too palpable to resist, I’m also announcing a show IN CHARLOTTE June 1. Finally getting back to The Evening Muse, one of my favorite venues among all metropolitan areas.  Snatch your tickets here and come watch me trade songs with Young Mister. It’ll be a fun night. When I play Greater Charlotte IN GREATER CHARLOTTE I believe a Stargate will open up and we can finally see what inter-dimensional travel is all about. 

If you like the song and want to go ahead and lock in a physical purchase you can preorder the CD here. It will release Tuesday May 1. 

There’s an adorable, harrowing little movie called ‘All These Small Moments’ that’s debuting at Tribeca Film Festival in April and if/when you see it you will immediately notice that ‘My Love Will Bring You Back,’ a song I wrote for the last Slow Runner album, is all over the opening credits. There will be some cool stuff surrounding the premiere and more details to come. So honored to be a small part of such a lovely thing. It stars Molly Ringwald, Jemima Kirk, Brendan Meyer, and other smooth operators.  More info here.

Just a heads up that tickets for these fall shows with Jump go on sale TOMORROW at 3pm.  And they are probably going to go fast so plan accordingly and snatch em up like rare Pokemon.  These will be special shows in classy listening rooms.  In a flashback younger me is staring out a classroom window daydreaming about my musical future and these shows will be me LIVING THAT DREAM SEQUENCE.  Links for all the available tickets are at http://www.michaelflynn.com/tour/  Join my dream sequence!  Wear something you'd only ever wear in a dream!  Don't be like the guy who Indiana tossed out of the zeppelin.

Like Hugh Grant dancing down the stairs in 'Love Actually,' I'm kind of feeling myself.  I've got a new snazzy website thanks to the genius at Small is the New Tall, I've got some amazing tour dates on the books with my special boys Jump, Little Children (that are being announced today but going on sale March 1), and most importantly I've got a new record coming out later this year.  It's called 'Pretend Like' and it's pretty different than the last solo release but hey I'm just out here living my truth, hollering into the void while the world shrugs and keeps walking.  If you really listened to the lyrics of Bon Jovi songs growing up you knew damn well life wasn't going to be easy and sure enough he was right.  But sometimes it feels temporarily easy, or full of the possibility of easiness, and 2018 is kind of feeling like that to me so far.  Feels good.  Can't wait.  More to announce soon.  Thanks for being my special friend.

Oh hi. Is your face OK? Did I accidentally melt it with this searing white-hot dad ballad? I sure hope not.  If you rock with this you're going to LOVE 2018 me.

Guster is one of my all time favorite bands.  I was living in Boston when 'Lost and Gone Forever' came out and it had a profound effect, specifically that it was ok to make pop music that didn't sound like pop music but was still undeniably pop music.  As in, it was accessible and catchy and almost cheesy in some places but still challenging and organic and unique.  I also saw them play with Run DMC.  Run DMC opened.  It was at a college gym somewhere in Cambridge I think and they were great (Run DMC wasn't too shabby either).  I'm super excited to announce that my kickass band and I get to open for Guster at their Music Hall show here in Charleston on Wednesday June 10.  I'm going to try not to be That Guy.  I'm going to try real hard.

The very next night, June 11, I'm playing at the Pour House with a bunch of friends to celebrate my buddy Sadler Vaden before he gets married and loses all his cool points.  There will be lots of classic rock and white guys biting their bottom lip and really getting after it.  Not a Michael Flynn thing per se (I'm playing on lots but only singing 1 song) but the talent involved is no joke so maybe come on out to that too.  The week of June 10-11 2015 only comes around once and is then gone forever, don't let a missed opportunity for musical triumph haunt you the rest of your days.

Playing tonight at REDUX with The Lovely Few.  Some solo songs, some SR songs, a Hot Chip cover, a veritable smorgasbord of notes and chords.  JOIN US, BECOME ONE OF US