HEADLINES

Dwayne Wegley, Just Passing Through The Debut Album that Kicks Off His Career

As an art director for most of his professional career, Dwayne Wegley worked on famous brands such as Bushnell, Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, and Disney Cruise Line. He worked at several agencies around the U.S. and won hundreds of awards in design. But, his real passion is music and he always loved the idea of being a singer-songwriter. The simple joy of writing songs that people can listen to and escape the worries of the world for a while has always been appealing to him. 

Dwayne started writing music when he started playing guitar in the late 90’s. All throughout high school and college he wrote songs as a hobby. He always dreamed of music as a profession but knew he had to make a living and be able to support his family first. Now, he is 36 years old and just recently began the journey of making his music dream a reality. His debut album called “Just Passing Through” released in August. It is a collection of songs he wrote and recorded at various places in Oklahoma, Nebraska, Alabama and Mississippi. 

His smooth vocals, catchy melodies, infectious guitar playing, and captivating story telling lyrics really stand out against other artists of today and people are starting to notice him already. Before his album even officially released he started getting radio play on various internet radio stations such as NPR’s WHRO. Several songs from his album have been playing on a Sunday morning radio show called “Hunter at Sunrise” out of Norfolk, Virginia. Dwayne is also starting to get noticed in other parts of the world especially the United Kingdom and New Zealand. Being that he is a brand new artist, at least to the world, he is excited to see where this new adventure in his life will lead him.

“I grew up listening to music from my parent’s generation. I’d always take my parents cassette tapes and explore the past in the music that came before me. I think that’s where I developed my love for it and it set me off on a journey I have yet to come back from. In the beginning I just kind of dove into the artists I could find from the past. James Taylor, Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Creedence, The Eagles... It just really opened up my mind to all the possibilities that music could be when I was just a teenager. I loved listening to old country, blues, motown and anything I could get my hands on. I love hip-hop, R&B and rap especially from the 90’s. 

I remember the first time I heard Tupac. I just kind of fell in love with his way with words and getting a feeling from someone else’s life that I never experienced before. It’s amazing really. What music can do. The fingerprint of a song from an artist who created it is something that blows my mind. When someone creates something that didn’t exist before and it has the ability to speak to another person in some way. You just can’t get that with anything else. You can get a lot through art and design but it’s hard to explain the feeling you get when you fall in love with a song. Some of my favorite artists I am really influenced by are Elliot Smith, Iron and Wine, Josh Ritter and Bon Iver. I gravitate to them because they are raw and take a different approach to music than what you hear on the radio. I tend to like really chill acoustic music but I go through phases all the time. I don’t stick to a certain genre that I listen to. I even like some heavy metal and love various kinds of electronic. But, I seem to write music that is laid back and has a story to tell,” Dwayne said. 

His debut album “Just Passing Through” is on iTunes, Amazon, Spotify, Apple Music and many other places. So many years of love and dedication went into creating this album and you can hear it in every song. Just Passing Through, Tiptoes, Hearts & Arms, Pocket Watch, Mister Sampson and Down by The Waterfall are the essentials, but each song is beautifully written. It is remarkable that you can find them all together on this very first album.

Though he was featured in recently released Lifoti's September 2019 issue 09, you can check it from below link's for your country:

No comments