Creating vivid stories through his music has been an enduring passion for San Carlos native Paul Kamanski, whose best-known songs, including “Hollywood Hills” and “California Kid,” were recorded and popularized on albums by the globe-trotting San Diego roots rock band. Beat Farmers band. His sudden death from heart failure at the age of 68 on October 6 silenced Kamanski’s voice, but his music lives on.

“I play Paul’s songs at every show I do, and for the last few years I’ve introduced each one by saying, ‘Paul Kamanski is San Diego’s greatest songwriter,'” Beat Farmers mainstay Joey Harris said. Highly respected San Diego bands like Fingers, Comanche Moon, The Pleasure Barons, The Rock Trio and Country Dick & The Snuggle Bunnies.

“Paul is right up there with Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and Smokey Robinson as one of my favorite songwriters of all time,” said Beat Farmer member Jerry Raney. “They were well written and thought out, the chord progressions were really good and the lyrics were very clever.”

Kamanski’s work is similarly highly regarded by former San Diego troubadour Steve Poltz, who co-wrote Jewel’s 1997 chart-topping song “You Were Meant For Me” and has a dozen solo albums to his credit.

“I’ve always been a fan of Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen and Paul Westerberg, and I think Paul Kamanski comes from the same mold as them,” Poltz said. “I learned a lot from Paul by watching and observing what he did. Paul wrote thoughtful songs and told a story that gave them an edge.

Kamanski lived in Mission Hills from the mid-1980s until late 2020. He and his wife of 28 years, singer Caren Campbell-Kamanski, later moved to the small Northern California town of Walker, located between Lake Tahoe and Mammoth Lakes. He died in Reno on October 6.

“It was very sudden,” said Campbell-Kamanski, who often performs with her husband. “Our last show together was on September 21st at a small music hall at the Andruss Motel in Walker. Paul played for three hours straight.”

The set list that night mixed Kamanski-written songs, including “Blue Chevrolet” and “Nickels and Dimes,” along with favorites by Neil Young, Gram Parsons, and San Diego’s Farrage Brothers. Also featured was Kamanski’s “Bigger Stones”, one of the standout tracks from Beat Farmers’ acclaimed debut album “Tales of the New West”.

The song was inspired by Kamanski’s friendship and sharing his dreams with Coronado High School student Joey Harris. The duo rose to local fame together as members of the Fingers, one of San Diego’s best original music groups in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and later many other groups.

“Paul and Joey were great friends,” Raney said.

“Bigger Stones” begins with the lines: “Sometimes I just want to fall asleep and die in a dream / Music takes me back to my old past when I was young and felt bad / And looking in the spotlight, it’s like I’m driving in my car / We had our daughters, our will and a bill for a stolen credit card / A We say we’ll be stars one day, Joe.”

After another verse, the chorus kicks in: “It seems like we rolled bigger stones back then/It seems like we rolled bigger stones back then.”

“That song still rings true to me, because Paul talks about Joey Harris (in the lyrics) and how they grew up together,” Poltz, a Canadian native, said by phone Thursday as he and his friend Kamanski headed to a concert near Toronto. fan Danny Michel.

“I grew up in Canada listening to Beat Farmers and Paul’s songs, and my band toured with the Beat Farmers here,” Michel recalled. “I never met Paul, but my high school band covered his song ‘Hollywood Hills’ when I was 16.”

Kamanski’s love of music took root early. He was born December 16, 1955, in the San Diego community of San Carlos to Charles and Robin Kamanski. His lawyer father was also a songwriter by profession.

“His father was a great storyteller,” said guitarist Billy Thompson, lead guitarist of the band Fingers. “Paul was an adventurous wordsmith as a songwriter. He loved searching for new brushstrokes to paint double meanings and many metaphors. “He was a very funny, wild and crazy guy in his youth.”

A talented singer and guitarist, Kamanski had rock star looks and considerable charisma. But songwriting was his forte, and Beat Farmers recorded nearly a dozen of his songs. One of them, “Hollywood Hills,” was performed by actor Kevin Costner and his band Modern West. The song also earned Kamanski a music publishing deal with Los Angeles-based Bug Music.

Comanche Moon, the band that Kamanski founded with Harris and led for more than a decade, has recorded several albums. The first, “Electric Lizardland”, won Best Local Recording at the 1995 San Diego Music Awards.

“Paul enjoyed being in a band and recording his own songs, but I don’t think he really wanted to go on the road,” Raney said. “And I don’t blame him; It’s a hard life.”

When he wasn’t making music, Kamanski enjoyed rebuilding old motorcycles. He wrote more than 400 songs and recorded most of them in his home studio, first in Mission Hills and then in Walker, where a musical celebration of his life is planned next spring.

In addition to his wife, Kamanski is survived by his daughters, Tennessee Snow Cree Kamanski Dennis, and his brothers Brad and Charles WP Kamanski, Jr. Survived by. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in Paul Kamanski’s name to the Antelope Valley Lions. Club, PO Box 157, Coleville, CA. 96107.