About

Fire & the Blacksmith is a band from Orlando, FL, founded by Paul Smith. With that said, instead of trying to make this sound like it was written by an objective publicist or critic, I’d like to say… hi, I’m Paul, and I’m the Blacksmith.

I was born and raised in Orlando and have been kicking around the Orlando local music scene since I was about 15 years old. Let’s just say that adds up to more than a couple decades.

The Big Break

When I was 20 years old, another local band called 7 Mary 3 picked me up and took me on tour as their lighting guy/guitar tech. This life-changing opportunity led me to spend the majority of the next 15 years living on various tour buses seeing the world and living my rock and roll dream. To make this long story a bit shorter, here are some bullet points of what I did on the road:

  • Lighting Director for 7M3 on the “American Standard” tour

  • Lighting Director for The Verve Pipe on the first two legs of the “Villains” tour, including a two week stint on the KISS reunion tour in ’97

  • Lighting Director for Tonic during the “Lemon Parade” tour

  • Guitar Tech/Studio Guitarist for 7M3 on “Rockcrown” and “Orange Ave”

  • Touring Guitarist for 7M3 for both tours supporting the above mentioned albums, including a six-week stint opening for Aerosmith on their “A Little South of Sanity” tour

  • Lighting Director for Train on the tours supporting their self-titled debut, “Train”, “Drops of Jupiter” and “For Me It’s You”

Music First

While running lights gave me some incredible opportunities, which led to some pretty awesome experiences, I’ve always considered myself to be a musician first. The original music projects I’ve been involved with include:

  • Dynaride (founding member)

  • Von Ray (Elektra Records)

  • Megaphone (founding member)

Words To Live By

“Find what you love, and figure out how to make money doing it.” This is the best advice my dad ever gave me. Over the last 15 years or so, I’ve figured out how to make a decent living playing music. Paying the bills as a musician without a hit record or a record label throwing money at you comes down to a fairly limited set of options. 

I was fortunate enough to find myself on the path of playing covers, thanks to a few successful auditions for the Walt Disney World Company. I started playing for the company in 2008, and continue to play on a seasonal basis in various shows on property to this day. 

In 2015, I was also hired to play a crazy 96-stringed instrument called a Zither for The Blue Man Group in their Orlando show, which closed in March 2020. (Big surprise!)

I currently play in multiple bands with some of my closest friends and stay about as busy as I need to be. These bands include:


While She Sleeps

That brings me to the reason you clicked on this page. I’ve had a goal for years to make a record by myself. Since I bought my first ADAT and Mackie 1604, the intention was to write a collection of songs, and play all of the parts myself. I briefly started the process about 9 years ago when my first daughter, Samantha, was born. The idea was to use electric drums, and “in the box” guitar amp plugins to quietly write and record my original songs while she slept. It was a great idea, and I made some headway writing some of the demos that are on this new EP, but I was never quite happy with the sounds I was getting in my home studio. In short, midi drums are not for me.

Fast forward to 2020. I was in a new place with — in addition to some upgraded recording gear and a real drum kit — two daughters. I no longer feared the wrath of a waking toddler, stirring at the sound of a pin dropping, let alone a Les Paul through a Marshall 4x12. Couple that unrestricted audio freedom with some newfound time on my hands — thanks to a little thing we all know as Covid — and it was Game On!

While She Sleeps is a collection of six tunes (five originals, and a cover) that each represents an important story to me. I think it’s a pretty easy 27 minute listen, and it is a very accurate representation of what it sounds like when I go into a room by myself and make music. 

I hope you’ll check it out, either on CD or streaming wherever you do such things. 

Thank you for supporting this and any other independent artist in our quest to make the world a little more beautiful, a little more interesting, or just a little bit cooler.

- Paul