Neale Eckstein and his wife Laurie have been hosting the Fox Run concert series in their home for over 20 years. His interest in recording, photography and video led to the creation of a professional recording studio setup in, where he has Produced many albums for others in his Fox Run Studio for over 25 years.

This was all built upon a love of music that was grounded in playing Rock cover bands in college and getting to know singer/songwriters and other musicians throughout his life. Though he went into the career field of a pediatric dentist, he continued to support music in many ways.

Now, Eckstein will be releasing his first album, featuring 14 original songs and aptly titled Never Too Late, arriving October 11th, 2024. Never Too Late is co-produced by his Fox Run Five bandmate, Matt Nakoa, and features musical contributions from Eric Schwartz, Tom Prasada-Rao, and Jagoda, and vocal contributions from BettySoo, Greg Greenway, Kirsten Maxwell, and Rene Pfister.

Today, we’re very pleased to premier Neale Ecksteins song and video “Stormchaser”, here on Wildfire Music + News. The song will arrive for digital purchase and streaming this Friday, August 16th, 2024.“Stormchaser” is a song that benefits from careful thought and reflection, but even on a single listen, its emotional arc is compelling. It draws the audience in with its equally realistic depiction of both preparing for an impending serious storm and also taking a long look at a long relationship, including its pattern of conflict. The acceptance and the resoluteness of the narrator bring a quiet dignity to their choice and encourages the audience to suspend judgement on whether this is a destructive or productive situation. A secondary, but possibly just as important, idea is that the speaker has come to know themselves well over the years, and this self-knowledge can be as grounding as a relationship, too. The music toes the line between a meditative, quiet feeling and a downbeat, heavy realization, helped along by electric guitar. Meanwhile, it always preserves that suspension of mood that allows for the acceptance the song demands.

The accompanying video preserves the same mixture of moods that the guide the song, introducing seascapes with an impending storm on the way, including an isolated, tiny lighthouse that makes a great proxy for the speaker of the song. Then, Eckstein’s live, in video footage is interspersed in a way that adds poignancy to the lyrics and vocals, and also introduces audiences to Eckstein and his Fox Run Studio as the birthplace of the song. The two settings of the video nicely highlight the dualities of the song, poised between a very quiet, controlled space and a very energetic, stormy one, much like the two tones of the relationship discussed in the song, encompassing both “sun and snow”, among other things.

Neale Eckstein shares about the dramatic origin of the song:

We were expecting Hurricane Irene, a rare New England Hurricane.  I was staring at a dead pine tree near our house that I had intended to have removed and was worried it would fall on the house.  I started thinking that relationships can be like that.  You want the excitement, the wind, the lightening.  But you really don’t want the tree to fall on your house.  Matt and Haley had come here to shelter.  They had been teaching at a music camp that closed early because of the storm.  I had a bit of the song written and when they got up, I played it for them.  Then the power went out.  So we wrote the song.

“Stormchaser” was recorded at Fox Run Studio in Sudbury, MA, and mastered by Jonathan Wyner at M-Works in Somerville, MA. It was written by Neale Eckstein, Matt Nakoa, and Haley Dawn Roth. Neale Eckstein and Kirsten Maxwell performed vocals. Matt Nakoa played bass and acoustic guitar, electric guitar, and Rhodes organ. Jagoda provided drums.

The story behind Never Too Late is that realizing he was about to celebrate his 75th birthday and had never released a solo album, Neale Eckstein finally asked his good friends in his song writing group, Fox Run Five, if they would help him get it done they and gladly agreed. They, too, believed, that it’s “never too late.”