SOLD ON sobriety
Singer-songrwriter finds happiness on road to recovery
Life is ever-changing and full of learning experiences.
This is what Mishka Shubaly has learned over the years. Nights of debauchery used to fill the days. The songwriter and author has turned his life around, and he’s writing books and songs about it.
His latest book, “I Swear I’ll Make It Up to You” was released earlier this year, and he’s working on new material.
Shubaly will perform in Santa Fe as part of his trek across the country.
“I’ve been out on the road performing and selling everything at my merch table,” he says. “I have to earn enough to get to the next gig. And the songs for me are challenging because the songs are from my old life.”
For the past few years, Shubaly has chronicled his road to recovery by writing as well as taking up running marathons.
He’s traveled across the country telling his story.
And his tour started off with a few readings from his book, but that has since subsided.
“Playing guitar and singing is way more fun than reading from a book,” he says. “I was doing readings early in the tour, and then I would play a couple songs and then do a question-and-answer portion. I’m finding that I am enjoying the music a whole lot more.”
Shubaly will try to keep the show loose and confusing.
“It’s a rock ’n’ roll show,” he says. “You have to keep an element of surprise.”
Before heading out on tour, Shubaly was working new material while living in his sister’s backyard.
“It’s a wobbly fortress of solitude,” he says. “It puts me back into my life at 15.”
Although his book was recently released, he has been asked by numerous people about the next book.
“The answer is that it’s going to be a record,” he says. “I haven’t been writing about sobriety and running. I feel like I still have a hangover of darkness. I still have plenty of humiliation, and I’ve made the happy discovery that you don’t need this darkness. My goal is to keep making books and records, because if I have to get a job in a call center, I don’t know what I’ll do.”