Hey! Spring is coming!

Sunday, 3/30/14 1:37 PM

Sunshine, blue skies, and open road! We are currently traveling from St. Louis back on home to Wisconsin. We've had a good few days in Illinois, Iowa and Missouri. We left Thursday, an early spring morning, light grey. A four hour drive took us to Rock Island, IL, where Daytrotter Sessions are recorded. If you aren't familiar with Daytrotter, click HERE. Recording there was pretty exciting- there's been a lot of talented people in there, and it's also a good warm up session for recording our next album in a couple of weeks. The recording went well. We did four songs and are excited for its release sometime in the next couple of weeks.

From Rock Island we drove up to Dubuque. It's such a beautiful city! Right on the Mississippi River, historic and sweet. The skies still grey and blue, the land finally just becoming uncovered from its white winter blanket. The world was looking especially different to me yesterday.

We arrived in Dubuque and checked out the venue we would be playing. We had the pleasure of sharing the night with Rebekah Rego and the Trainmen. This was our first show in Dubuque and the people there seemed really friendly.

I woke up Friday morning and walked around downtown Dubuque for a while myself. The streets were quiet and the skies were still grey blue. From Dubuque we headed on to Urbana, IL, sort of a twin city of Champagne. We played at a bar called "The Rose Bowl," naming itself as the home of country music. It was a fun show and we met some crazy cool people who let us crash at their place for the night. Lots of jamming was done into the night and in the morning they fed us with eggs, biscuits and gravy. I don't think that the realization of strangers' kindness and compassion will every grow stale. Seeing it, living it, and even somewhat relying on it is one of the best things about what we do.

Here we are in front of the Rose Bowl Tavern:

After hanging out in Urbana, we drove down to St. Louis. Saturday the skies were still grey- miles and miles of relatively flat land.. crossing the Mississippi. I have seen the arch before and I think it's astounding.

Our last show of the weekend was right in St. Louis at a venue called the Cherokee Performing Arts Center. We played with River Kittens and Scrambled . We arrived earlier in the day and there was an art show going on upstairs involving Harley Davidsons. Later in the day when we were getting ready for the show, hanging out outside, I had one of those great perspective moments when everything shifts and you sort of become aware of what you're doing and where you are from a slightly more subjective perspective. Many times when I have these moments I will say something like, "Here we are.. doing this right now, seeing this." We happened to be standing in St. Louis watching a group of bikers take off on their Harleys.

I'm aware that when we take trips like this, playing every day for several days in a row and spending a lot of time together in the van on the road, seeing and experiencing things together... our sets start changing. We become a little gutsier, a little more confident, a little tighter, and we all know that the set is the meat and potato to our day. Everyone stretches out just a little more.

Yesterday we also talked to Stephen Barncard who's going to be producing our next album. We fly out a week from tomorrow! There's been so much thought and feeling regarding making this album that I was relieved when I realized that in less than a month it'll be complete. Talking with Stephen set our minds at ease- I think he's going to be a good guide and it's going to be quite the honor to work with him in Heid Street Studio.

As a last minute fundraiser for our trip to California we are going to be playing a San Francisco send-off party at Deb's Spare Time here in Oshkosh on Friday. We sincerely hope to see you all there and jar up all your love and good vibes to take with us to California the following Monday. Show will start at 9 PM! 

Springtime and Bee Kisses

Well it's springtime (sorta) and I hope you all are enjoying the sunshine and relatively warm weather we've been having! It sure makes loading in equipment and riding in the van a lot easier.

I asked the boys what they're favorite things about springtime are.. They agreed that they're looking forward to watching the weather grow warmer slowly, but I think the most notable response was Dan's which was something like:
"Bees! Getting stung by bees... it's like getting kissed by bees."

It's been quite the last few weeks for us. We played in Decorah, Iowa, last weekend. The ride to and from was really beautiful. We saw a few bald eagles and crossed the Mississippi into Chickentown Land. We also played at the Shortbranch Saloon in Neenah. That show was exciting as one of our friends, Tony, proposed to his girlfriend during our set.

Last Sunday I also played a show at Malarkey's in Wausau with Adam Greuel of Horseshoes & Handgrenades. After our set he played another set with their banjo player, Russ Pederson.

I stayed for their set and really enjoyed it. Hanging out in a bar listening to live music isn't something I get to do very much unless I'm preparing to play myself. I had this realization about how it can be from a musician standpoint playing shows at all these different types of venues..

You have all these ideas. How you want the song to sound. How you want your guitar to sound. How you want your voice to sound. How you want the energy to flow. What you want the vibe to feel like.

And it's not necessarily that you want all these things a specific way, but I think you imagine them a certain way at the least..

And then you get to the venue and nine times out of ten it's completely different than what you had imagined for the night. There are a million different things that can affect this. On Sunday, we were playing the post Trampled By Turtles party. Most of the people at the bar had just spent the last couple of hours jamming to Trampled. (On a side note, I met some really amazing people that night...Lots of good energy in the room.)

You can be thrown off by a text you get right before your set. Or the lighting in the room. Or the background noise. Or the way the building and the room makes the sound. Or the person in front of the crowd...

And don't get me wrong- I think most musicians pride themselves on being able to play through all these things.

I write a song in my little bedroom, singing and playing.
And then I go into a crowded bar and play the song through speakers over voices and pool cues and ... the next day it's at a festival- you're outside and there's sunshine and bugs and dancers ... and most of all I think it's the people there- it's the energy in the room.. what's been in the room before... One single person in the room can change a whole show.

The reality of it is different every time....



Here's a picture our friend, Jack, shared with us :  Bread Horses

Mountain Top Music Festival- where everyone knows your name

This past weekend we had the pleasure of playing at Mountain Top Festival at Indianhead Mountain Resort in the UP.

This was one of my favorite festivals we've played to date. Some of our favorite bands were there such as The Last Revel, Sans Souci Quartet, Horseshoes and Handgrenades, and Charlie Parr. It was amazing to see so many of these people in one place. I've noticed that everyone plays a little better when there are a lot of musicians in the room.

The festival included music, music, music, skiing, a bikini ski race, lots of jamming late into the night, and a few inches of snow the night that we were there.

As a band we're in a very interesting place right now... we're all holding our breath a bit I suppose. We've been traveling and gigging and pursuing things in our own personal lives. We've been fundraising for this album, thinking about it...taking care of flight tickets and instruments...

And yet it seems completely surreal that in three weeks we'll be getting on that plane.

A good friend wrote to me about the correlation between risk and freedom. I've been focused on how excited I am about this opportunity, and I have a feeling that the boys would agree with me on that. However, as the date draws closer, I think we're seeing other sides of it... such as the risks we're taking, what we're really investing.. not just financially, but also how we're investing our lives in each other. There's a lot of other things too-- the pressure to make the album as good as it can be (and what is good art, anyway?) to be most all honest.. to handle the stress in a healthy way, to treat each other the right way. And in the midst of all of this playing every weekend and working throughout the week, dealing with one thing after the next.

I feel incredibly blessed to be working with Dan, Tim, and Pete. We had coffee together last night and talked about the things we're approaching.. we were honest with each other, said things that needed to be said.. grounded each other and ourselves in what we're doing and how we're functioning. It was a conversation that definitely put things into perspective, that gave me affirmation, and instilled some genuine excitement about the future.

And at the end of the day I find myself reminding myself to not take myself too seriously here. There's a million different ways to look at a picture but really what I keep saying is that I just want to play music. Dan reminded me the other day, "None of this is bigger than ourselves." And honestly there were moments last week where I felt like I was falling apart...like it was bigger than me, than us. It is in these moments throughout my life that I've learned to lean a little on others and to breathe... to fly out a bit for a different and maybe broader perspective.

"He is enlightened who joins in this play knowing it as a play, for man suffers only because he takes seriously what the gods made for fun."
-Alan Watts

Art is...

I asked Google, "what is art?"

Google said, "the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power."

I tend to think of art as really any form of human expression that reflects the human experience- or even just the experience of being. Maybe it's just any expression at all.

A question that has come up frequently lately has been, "Why do humans feel the need for expression at all?" Volumes and volumes of books could be written about that, but ultimately in my mind it comes down to the desire to connect with others... not just to not be alone, but because I feel that we are innately designed to long for that connection with others- and not just human beings, but animals or plants or rocks even or I guess maybe the entire cosmos.

Last night I was able to visit some dear friends in Blue Mounds, Wisconsin. They run Center Ground Studios, an art gallery attached to their home. I got to play some tunes while folks checked out the art displayed by Jessica Kaminski, Teresa Lind, and Janelle Holmstrom.

The gathering of these people... artists of all different types- photographers, painters, musicians, potters, welders, and the likes... it gave me such inspiration. The world seems like a beautiful place when you find yourself surrounded by those who support art, those who make a life out of examining and celebrating the human experience.

We all hung out through the night, went to the local bar across the street and had breakfast together in the morning. I found myself in conversation after conversation about art, ego, love, religion and spirituality, living as an artist... 

And I thought of how weekend after weekend as a band we find ourselves in front of these people... we're sharing our songs and talents maybe, but mostly we're sharing our energy. And everyone in the room is part of that sharing. 

And I asked myself, "why do we do it?" 

And I remembered last week at our show at the Minocqua Brewing Company. I honestly felt it was one of the best shows we've ever played. And why was that? 

Questions and more questions.

Art puts people in a room that maybe wouldn't normally be in a room together. Art is the connecting, the sharing of what I often call energy, but I wish I could think of a word that implied something more intimate than that.

And it feeds us! It nourishes us. All different types of people seek out all different types of art forms every day. Last night I wasn't surprised to be surrounded by a lot of people from different places around Wisconsin that all sort of knew each other through various ways and different connections. And these things are more than coincidental in my mind. For example, I got to the studio to find out that Jessica Kaminski, whose photography was being showcased, is dating the man who does my tattoo work. There is no question in my mind that there's a reason in all of us finding ourselves together in a space like that.

So? Celebrate art. Support it. Eat it up. Breathe it in. Make love to it.


In respect to all these words... here's some links I was able to find if you're interested in checking out some of the cool artists I got to spend time with last night:


Center Ground Studios

John Pahlas 

Heidi Clayton

Ross Bisbee

Jessica Kaminski

Kahlil Gibran

"When Water Comes to Life"

I was sleeping in the lilies

Or was I up all night?

These days it's hard to tell what's half asleep from fully alive

Cloud Cult is an "experimental indie rock band" originally from Minneapolis. Last weekend I got the chance to see them at Turner Hall in Milwaukee. I've been a fan of Cloud Cult for years and this was the first time I got to see them live. Check out their website by clicking here.

This show was pretty different from anything I've been to. Walking into the historic Turner Hall building I first noticed the mellowness of the crowd. One of my favorite things about going to shows is watching the people there- what do they seem like? And how does that correlate to the band or musician that's playing? I also noticed how relaxed everyone seemed, the vibe was really chill. I saw hipsters, hippies, families, John and Jane Does, old, young... A pretty good mix of a crowd.

Cloud Cult is a much better band live than they are on a disc from a studio. There's something I think they can't quite capture without a live presence. I was very aware of this at the concert and it made me think about recording our album this coming April and how we're going to try to capture a sound that has morphed into a very improvisational and flowing thing...

Anyway,

Picture this:
No opening band.
Cloud Cult walks on stage humbly and sits down on chairs. Guitar, cello, horns, keyboard... two canvases in the back which artists paint on throughout the show. Gentle, beautiful melodies.. four part harmonies... incredible dynamics. Intimate strings.
And the second set? Members exchange instruments. Electric guitar, electric bass, drums! Beautiful backdrop. Effects on vocals. Massive energy exchange.

I was also very happy to share the experience with Dan. It's not very often that we get to go see shows since we are usually playing, but it's so important for us to experience from the other side.


"A singer cannot delight you with his singing unless he himself delights to sing."
-Kahlil Gibran


Thanks for reading.. stay tuned for a post about what we're up to this month.