Rawhide. A word known to me by "Blues Brothers". Still don't know if they actually sang about the town I suddenly bumped into.
Suddenly an instagram post really got a hold on me after shearing parts of the towns story - A town that "lived" three-four years (according to Wikipedia, which is my referance). 

Prospectors discovered a rich gold and silver deposit in the area that was named Rawhide i 1906. 
Within two years the town had grown to a population of 7000(!) people.
Sadly, in September 1908 the citizens of Rawhide where harmed by a giant fire. A year after this, they were unlucky enough to experience a flood as well. Many did not rebuilt after this. In 1910, only 500 people remained in the town. 

It is unbelieveable to imagine the turbulence of this town. Even more impressive that in the two years the town grew up from nothing, Wikipedia says they built three banks, four churches, a school, twelve hotels, twenty-eight restaurants, a theater, and thirty-seven saloons. 

In the song I wrote you also hear me mentioning Mrs. Rechel. I have the impression she is an imdependent, tough gal'. History says Anne (her first name) was considered the last true resident of Rawhide. She lived there until the late 1960's, when circumstances forced her to leave. Her house was one of few houses still remaining in the 1980's. Therefore I felt she had to be mentioned in the song, along with her "wooden floor".

"Rawhide" is probably the song I am most happy with, and also the song that has taken most of my time to get right while recording it in my home studio.
I have tried making the rhytm of the song very strong, without adding drums (which I don't have...), but also very playful.

When creating a music video for the song yesterday, we decided I was going to quickly paint a piece of Rawhide. I used a lot of grey in this painting, symbolizing emptyness, but also yellow for the gold, and red for tragedy. 
The sing will be out on Spotify in april, along with the music video. 

This is the painting I made yesterday, while making the music video;

Every time I ride past the old farm "Åse", I get overwhelmed by thoughts and memories that belonged to my great grandfather. My grandfather told me about his fathers jurney.

The old barn last fall

My great grandfather grew up in a world that wasn't accepting him as himself.
His father was not the father of his siblings, therefore he was rejected by them. 
I believe it was his mother who gave him money for a jurney to America.
A jurney to a place where he would not be rejected because of his mothers choices.

Later on, he came back to the small town in Telemark, Norway.
He married a girl named Signe, and they settled only 2 minutes drive from his family home. 
Halvor (which was his name) and Signe had 6(?) children. One of them was my grandfather.

One of Halvors siblings; Gunhild, felt bad for his brother, and gave him a property next to Åse (his family homestead), which he was to take over after their brother had moved out/passed away. Halvor never moved to this property himself, but he gave this property to my grandfather.

This is the place where I live today, and after this story you probably understand why I feel attached to the place. 
Like I said in the start, I often ride past the farm; Åse.
In these moments I often become sad, knowing the place is too far gone now.
The main house is the only building still standing - with a roof. But in time the old cooking stofe and the carpets made out of old clothes will soon bear the weight of the top floor. This brakes a piece of my heart. 

In the late 1800s, Åse was the home of a family, 1 horse, a few cows, two pigs and some chickens. They even had a forge.
I would love to go back to 1880 and see this place in the fall, when the summer work was done, and the family was sharing a home made meal, like Norwegian "lapskaus". I'll just leave it to the imagination for now.

Here are some pictures of the place, taken in january last year.

Inside the barn