When watching the news, it’s easy to feel helpless and that there’s nothing you could do to make a difference.

There is so much noise out there, much of it deliberate to try to mask out our voices.

And many people choose not to listen, not to see, not to care.

I can’t do that.

I see many good, kind, people misdirected through carefully curated falsehoods to believe that those less fortunate are the source of all their life challenges and not the ones who are pulling the strings.

And worse, because of the choices people have made, many now find themselves in a changed world where freedoms and opportunities are fewer or gradually stripped away.

To me, the most troubling change is the gradual erosion of our collective empathy, compassion and humanity. We are all connected and without these we are all more alone, poorer and weaker.

So to articulate some of my thoughts and feelings, I have written some new songs and reworked some older ones in my first EP under my new project, The Songs of Michael.

It’s loosely based on the five stages of grief for humanity.

-       Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance

Because I believe at first, we must face and accept what is happening before we move to the next stage and reset.

Michael, September 2025