Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Justin Clay. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Justin, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

I recently recorded and created a music video for a song I have called Green. Green summarizes a lot for me. I like to poke fun at the culture and for years, the neo hippy ideology has always provided me with plenty of troubling and humorous material. I suppose my main beef with it is it just seems so escapist. And this could be said of any vapid world view composed of randomly hodge podged fix it all philosophies.
My songs tend to typically be stories,
But this one was a true traditional punk rock song in the sense that I was stating my beef with a cultural thing.
And one of my favorite things about punk rock is it’s sense of humor.

My Cousin Michael and I were brainstorming about doing some sort of goat yoga video for a few years and finally circumstances created a story for us.
It’s also a song about letting go.
A compost anthem
Letting things die and pass and be reabsorbed.
I am a nature lover.
I find my peace in the ideal-free simplicity of being in nature.
I find terms like “all natural” silly even though I know what they are saying. I get it.
But on a natural history time scale
Who are we to say what is natural
We are big brained primates who have really just arrived on the scene
I find comfort in the fact that we don’t know.

And Green was a song where I kind of laid it all out in as humorous and clear a way as I could.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Justin, I am a dad, I work at a nature center and I do this thing Darwin’s Finches. I have always loved telling stories, Which is probably why I started playing music. Also it is in my family.
When I was a kid I used to tell stories at school during show and tell. I always told.
And DARWIN’S FINCHES is just another medium to do so. I like to connect dots between true stories, and discover what the point is.

I think agenda less and more reflective. My only goal per day is to reflect a story.

Words are powerful, and trying to get the most out of them is a fun game.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Oh I have one for you. Back in 2010 my equipment was stolen. There was a crime spree back then around a particular club. (Started with an M and ended with a ANGOS) my van was broken into and all my equipment was stolen.
Most tragically my father’s Gibson ES 125 guitar that he passed on to me. I spent years scouring pawnshops and almost a year later I found quite by accident, the pawnshop where my stuff was hocked. I realized this because I recognized an odd PA they had for sale. Well I had a police report and was able to get that back but I was really only searching for the old guitar.
The owners refused to tell me who they sold it to and lied and said they sold it for cash.
I was mainly just sad I lost something so sentimental. Not the object itself.
I never gave up on looking for it and every time I saw one of those guitars I checked into it.
Well, just a week ago, out of the blue a stranger messaged me on Facebook Messenger and asked if I had a guitar stolen a long time ago
It has been 13 years
It turns out my guitar was up in Seattle Washington and the guy who bought it through miracles of Facebook algorithms discovered it was mine.
He reached out to me and is going to mail it back across the country.
It is not so much a story of my resilience, but a story that gives me faith in humanity.
Sad stories are powerful but redemptive stories save lives.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

When you create something that connects to people it is almost like telepathy. Also uplifting things that are normally under the surface. Exhuming spirit.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.darwinsfinches.bandcamp.org
• Instagram: @Finchesdarwin
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Darwinsfinchez?mibextid=ZbWKwL
• Youtube: @DarwinsFinches https://youtu.be/0lNEkYADPxk?si=zvOFnnGgvqJd4Ca0