Mike McCleary's "So Surreal": The One Song That Led to a Whole Musical Journey

Mike McCleary is the one-person band from not-so-small Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, who came through with the single launch of his career. "So Surreal," his first-ever release, is quite literally the story of an event. It was written while he was driving to a show he had just performed at a music festival and is imbued with the artist's feelings of improvisation and self-examination. The whole experience is the actual time when the artist's creation was born, and it's still very much alive, unprocessed, and distinctly human.

"So Surreal" is a deeply emotional song, despite being recorded with McCleary's minimal home studio resources. McCleary single-handedly wrote, recorded, and produced every component of the song, thereby demonstrating that no less than genuine can flourish even beyond the presence of studio walls. The sparkling guitar sounds and the heartfelt singing of the track can be seen as inspired by the likes of Canadian indie artists Shotgun Jimmie and Hawksley Workman. However, McCleary's vocals are in line with these artists, yet unique in that they are sincere, exposed, and based on real-life experience.

"So Surreal" is about the fine points that divide doubt from faith, the places inside one's mind where, upon meditating, one sees the way to personal development. It is not just a piece of art; instead, it was the decisive moment when an artist caught his calling. McCleary uses his experience of being alone as a source of motivation and, therefore, makes the point that artists' works seldom have as their beginnings more than a single honest spark.