Many singer-songwriters strive to create their own unique sound. Few, however, take it a step further and create a term to describe the experience of that sound.

But that's exactly what local acoustic artist Domenick Swentosky has done, and he calls it "grey time."

While not exactly a time per se, grey time is more of a place -- one "without a past, without a future and without worry," according to Swentosky's Web site, www.greytime.com.

And through his music, which includes about two dozen originals and hundreds of covers, Swentosky wants to take you there.

"[Grey time] is a state of mind where you forget about all your troubles," Swentosky said. "That's what I want people to experience ... without sounding cheesy about it."

With a regular Monday night gig at The Gingerbread Man, 130 Hiester St., and Wednesday nights at Café 210 West, 210 W. College Ave., Swentosky has emerged as a one-man act with a range of musical talents: vocals, guitar, saxophone and harmonica.

Using a phrase sampler, a musical tool that records music and repeats it in loops, he can play instruments simultaneously. During songs like the Dave Matthews Band's "Say Goodbye," Swentosky swings the guitar over his back and plays the sax while the guitar part continues looping.

"That's what gets people to turn their heads," Swentosky said. "It deviates from the purist roots I have, because it's a computer, almost. But it's my sound; I just played it."

Gingerbread Man employee Adrienne Gammiere, who worked during Swentosky's first G-Man show last week, said the crowd enjoyed the performance.

"It was cool for just one person to be playing all those instruments," Gammiere said.

After three months of shows, things are "so far, so good" for Swentosky at Café 210, owner Hal McCullough said. "He's up and coming in the State College music scene."

Swentosky's wife and booking agent, Becky, said his set includes "a lot of crowd pleasers," as well as original songs Swentosky describes as "peaceful regret."

"I'm a sucker for melancholy stuff," he said, although he has also written some "straight-up happy stuff."

Swentosky said he would eventually like to get recognition for his original music but at the same time, enjoys playing covers, especially classics by Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, the Beatles and Led Zeppelin.

"You just can't go wrong playing some of the greatest music of all time," he said.

And how is this for service? If someone requests a song he doesn't know, he learns it.

"Every cover that I learn, every new song that I learn, there's a whole new technique I learn, too," he said.

Frequent requests for "Say Goodbye" prompted Swentosky to record the song for a three-track CD called Exhibit A that he hands out at shows. Also included on the disc is "Saturday," which he wrote for his wife when he proposed. "There are so many people out there who have a dream but kind of give up on it," Becky Swentosky said. "But he is out there doing the one thing he loves, and succeeding at it."

Swentosky has been tinkering around in his recording studio and expects to have a full album out within six weeks. Its title, of course, will be Greytime.