David Senra

And he jumps right into his childhood and he describes the way he grew up.

We were pretty near poor, though I never thought about it.

We were clothed, fed, and bedded.

Our house was old and decrepit.

One kerosene stove in the living room was all we had to heat the whole place.

You woke up on winter mornings with your breath visible.

I was a timid little tyrant.

And this is how he describes it.

but they also live in a very decrepit house.

There was one bathroom, the only place to relieve yourself, and no functioning bath.

My grandparents fell into a state of poor hygiene and care that would shock and repel me now.

My grandma slept on a couch with me tucked in at her side while my grandfather had a small cot across the room.

That was it.

This was where I needed to be to feel at home, safe, loved.

It ruined me and it made me.

It made me in the sense that it would set me off on a lifelong pursuit of a singular place of my own, giving me a raw hunger that drove me, hell-bent, in my music.

It was a desperate, lifelong effort to rebuild.

For my grandmother's love, I abandoned my parents, my sister, and much of the world itself.

Then that world came crashing in.

My grandparents became ill.