As Superstorm Sandy pounded New Jersey in October 2012, J.D. Spencer was hunkered down and praying in a Carnival cruise ship sailing in the North Atlantic.
“It was like cannons hitting that ship, riding up those waves and down,” Spencer recalled. “… I was praying, ‘Are we going to get to the end of (this)?’ I was thinking to myself, ‘Have I finally bitten off more than I can chew?’”
He was a crew musician on a boat that had ported in New York just before the storm hit. The next cruise was postponed, but the vessel took the crew about 50 miles out to sea to ride out the cyclone.
“It’s actually not as safe being in port during a hurricane than it is being in the ocean,” Spencer said. “I didn’t know that. Who would have ever thought that?”
If Spencer’s music never again put him in that much danger, he’d be fine with it. But at age 49, he’s still striving to find just how far his talents can take him.
Spencer moved to Columbus with his wife Ramona in 2019. He works remotely as a contract negotiator with Vanderbilt University Medical Center, while his wife works at Mississippi State University.
On nights and weekends, Spencer plays anywhere he can get booked — a festival here, a bar there — mostly in North Mississippi. When he’s not playing shows, he’s writing songs. He’s published almost 30 to his YouTube channel and written many more.
Some songs have a rock sound. Some are country. Others, Reggae.
“I would classify my sound right now as more Americana because it has more of an acoustic quality,” Spencer said.
He doesn’t plan to quit his day job to focus solely on music, something he’s done before, but he’s working to get his original work to a broader audience — whether he’s playing it or not.
“You’ve got a better shot at making a Major League Baseball team than being a (big-time) artist,” he said. “… At my age, I’m under no illusions about going the artist route. I’m wanting to go the songwriter route. That’s ultimately what I’m trying to work on is a distribution deal to be a songwriter and to try to get a movie to pick up one of my songs.”
A Corinth native, Spencer first found his love for music at age 5 or 6, playing the piano in his home and taking to it “like a duck to water.”
After a football injury in the eighth grade, Spencer turned to the school band, first playing trombone and later drums.
He used choir and band scholarships to study nursing at Northeast Mississippi Community College, later changing his major to business and earning a degree from Montgomery, Alabama-based Faulkner University.
Over the years, he learned to play the guitar and harmonica and started writing his own songs. By 2009, that landed him a spot with Carnival Cruise Line, playing six nights a week in piano bars or singer/songwriter stages on 11 ships over five years.
“On board, it’s just like a city,” he said. “To me that was the best experience I could have gotten because it was just like being on tour. I got to meet 6,000 people a week.”
It was the first “real money” he ever made in music. It was also where he met Ramona, a crew lieutenant from Romania who worked in the purser’s office. The two married in 2014, first settling down in Biloxi before moving to Columbus five years later.
The cruises stopped, but the music didn’t.
“I just can’t quit. I’ve got to keep going,” Spencer said. “… There’s something inside of me that says this is what I was born to do.”
Spencer is a regular act at Munson and Brothers downtown. Owner Ryan Munson said he tries to get Spencer on the restaurant’s live music calendar at least twice a year, but he’s willing to fill in more often when needed.
“He’s a hardworking musician with a nice repertoire,” Munson said. “It’s good to have him in the rolodex.”
Munson believes trying to build an audience in Columbus, then North Mississippi, might get Spencer recognized faster than if he was trying to make it in a larger city like Memphis or Nashville. A big fish in a small pond, he said, has its advantages.
“More local artists need to be leveraging the area in that way,” Munson said.
For Spencer, it’s starting to work. His highest performing song on YouTube has 19,000 views and counting. He’s booked to perform Thursday at the famed Blue Canoe in Tupelo, his first 90-minute show of all original work. He said he’s even having discussions about a distribution deal for his music.
“If you don’t play at all, then you’re never going to get it,” Spencer said. “… If you’re willing to put in the work, and you’re willing to really do all you can do, it usually results in something. It may not be what you had in mind, but if you love, you love it.”
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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