Happy First Anniversary For So Many Roads

It is hard to believe that it was a year ago today that I put up the first post on So Many Roads To Ease My Soul. A lot has happened in those 365 days and the end result is nothing like I had imagined when I started. When I finally decided to start my own blog, after several months of sharing bootlegs with other sites, I really had no concrete idea of what I planned to do. Nor did I have any conception of what would be involved. I figured I'd post a classic rock bootleg from a band I liked every now and then, maybe write a few words about it, and then be done. I estimated 5 or 10 minutes of work, every 3 or 4 days, no big deal at all.

Within a few weeks, I realized I had taken on far more than I had expected. Finding good sounding shows wasn't easy, and uploading them with all the proper information, including artwork, took time. Writing something interesting about each show also consumed more time than I thought it would. I enjoy writing, and take pride in my work, so I spent plenty of time researching and editing each post. I soon realized that you could post a thousand concerts, but what good was that if no one knew your blog existed! Therefore, I had to spend time finding ways to publicize my blog, such as linking to other sites, and posting on blog search engines, such as Captain Crawl and Prognotfrog. In addition, I learned that I needed to post more frequently, and add more features, such as pictures, counters, gadgets, links to other blogs, etc., if I wanted So Many Roads to become a place folks would return to on a regular basis.  Updating the site to include all of those features took even more of my time,  Above all, I began to understand that I needed to establish a unique identity for So Many Roads, something that would make the site standout from other music blogs.

I finally hit on that unique idea in January. I decided to make each post on the site reflect that day in rock history. If the date was January 16, then I'd find a concert from January 16, sometime between 1 and 50 years ago. As I was a history major in college, that concept was right up my alley. That was the good news. The bad news was that I just made my life a thousand times more complicated because now I just couldn't post any old show on any old day. Now I needed a bootleg specific to whatever date was showing on the calendar. What the heck was I thinking?

So here we are, 1 year after So Many Roads To Ease My Soul was launched, and I must say, I'm feeling good about what this site has become. I never would have imagined that over 130,000 folks from 122 different countries would visit in year 1. Nor would I have believed that I'd be averaging over 550 visits a day. The Internet does make the world a much smaller place. I've also made some great friends through sharing this music, folks that I chat with daily over at Dino's incredible site. In addition, I've received some amazing comments about this site from visitors. On those days that I've wondered if all the time and effort is worth it, that positive feedback has helped me to stay motivated to keep So Many Roads alive. In fact, I plan a post later this month as part of our anniversary celebration in which I'll share some of those wonderful comments.

I took the title of this blog from one of the last songs Jerry Garcia wrote before his death. For me, all the different types of music I enjoy are like "so many roads to ease my soul". Now, as year 1 of So Many Roads comes to a close, and year 2 begins, I'm reminded of another famous Grateful Dead lyric ... "what a long strange trip it’s been". Here's hoping that this is just the start of this blog's long strange trip, and that many more years of sharing the music are still to come.