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Here's a nice private intimate performance of a Christmas classic for you.
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Happy Holidays, Everyone.
I hope everyone has a delightful holiday. I'll probably be off of the Rockumentary for a few days.
Don't forget, if you are getting a First Night Northampton Button, come see us play at one of our shows. Also, January 7th at The Iron Horse is the big Tom Petty Tribute night in which we are playing a major part.
See you real soon.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Gettin' Ready for Petty
December 22 huh? Big deal. So the days are getting longer. It's a fools immortality.
The Rub Wrongways gang is currently deep in throes of Tom Petty's world. We're starting to try to figure out what we will be doing and how we will be doing it on January 7 at The Iron Horse for "Don't Do Me Like That - A Tribute to Tom Petty."
The Rub Wrongways Caravan is ending the night with a multi-song set. Each of us singers will be singing a song and we'll be in charge of the encore finale as well. I'm also playing with two other acts so, I think it adds up to nine Petty songs for me.
I really dig Tom Petty. I thoroughly enjoyed and highly recommend the documentary "Runnin' Down A Dream" by Peter Bogdanovich. It's long and awesome.
Petty's got this way with simplicity that I really admire. Most of his songs are based on four or five chords. The melodies are simple but melodic and therefore sing-along-fodder. The Heartbreakers are amazing at understated yet crucial playing. I think I'm learning a thing or two while learning these songs.
Tonight we are getting together for the first time to try to figure out exactly who's playing what instruments on what songs. We've got all of our songs picked out, and we know who is singing each, but we don't yet know who is playing what part. It should be fun tonight. And it should be fun on January 7. You should come out.
The Rub Wrongways gang is currently deep in throes of Tom Petty's world. We're starting to try to figure out what we will be doing and how we will be doing it on January 7 at The Iron Horse for "Don't Do Me Like That - A Tribute to Tom Petty." The Rub Wrongways Caravan is ending the night with a multi-song set. Each of us singers will be singing a song and we'll be in charge of the encore finale as well. I'm also playing with two other acts so, I think it adds up to nine Petty songs for me.
I really dig Tom Petty. I thoroughly enjoyed and highly recommend the documentary "Runnin' Down A Dream" by Peter Bogdanovich. It's long and awesome.
Petty's got this way with simplicity that I really admire. Most of his songs are based on four or five chords. The melodies are simple but melodic and therefore sing-along-fodder. The Heartbreakers are amazing at understated yet crucial playing. I think I'm learning a thing or two while learning these songs.
Tonight we are getting together for the first time to try to figure out exactly who's playing what instruments on what songs. We've got all of our songs picked out, and we know who is singing each, but we don't yet know who is playing what part. It should be fun tonight. And it should be fun on January 7. You should come out.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Show Today CANCELLED
Attention winter time revelers and outdoorsy cold weather lovers. The School for the Dead show that was planned for today on Main Street in Northampton, MA has been canceled due to wicked cold temperatures and crafty evil winds.
Sorry, about that. A still and thirty degree day is one thing. A six degree windchill is another story altogether, and the name of that story is "The Day That School For The Dead's Show Got Canceled."
For those keeping track, the three holidayish themed songs that we were planning on visiting were Father Christmas (by the Kinks), Winter Wonderland, and a fast instrumental version of that Sleigh Ride song.
Oh well, maybe next year.
Enjoy the blizzard, pals.
Sorry, about that. A still and thirty degree day is one thing. A six degree windchill is another story altogether, and the name of that story is "The Day That School For The Dead's Show Got Canceled."
For those keeping track, the three holidayish themed songs that we were planning on visiting were Father Christmas (by the Kinks), Winter Wonderland, and a fast instrumental version of that Sleigh Ride song.
Oh well, maybe next year.
Enjoy the blizzard, pals.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
School for the Dead Live on Main Street Northampton 12-19-2009
What have I gotten us into this time? School for the Dead is playing a concert outside in the middle of December? In New England?!? Simply ludicrous!Was 2009 the year of the non-venue concert? It may have been. In various line-ups, I played in a library, in a rainy field, in a rainy and cold high school courtyard, a bowling alley, a book store, a town pavilion, an elementary school cafeteria, someone's living room, a hotel lobby, an apple orchard, an artist studio, and now on a sidewalk in the snow. Well, yeah, I also played in coffee houses and rock venues. But here seemed to be an inordinate amount of strange venues. I hope the trend continues. As Jason said, just after our library show, "Non-venues are the way to go."
I think this one though, might take the cake. Does anyone know what it feels like to play a guitar when it is below freezing? You can't wear gloves and your fingers are pressing down on thin cold metal wires. For an hour. Well, we hope to have some overhead heaters set up, so hopefully, that'll help.
We'll be out there on Main Street in Northampton, MA from 5:00 to 6:00 on this Saturday (December 19). Just in front of the First Church (pictured here - though it'll be dark)
We'll be entertaining you while you shop, or wait for your restaurant reservations, or just stroll through the festive little town center. We'll even throw in a few holiday tunes for you.
Can you guess which ones? Which ones would you want us to do?
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
SNTB as VU at the VOO - Friday December 18.
On Friday night (December 18), Sitting Next To Brian is playing in a Velvet Underground Tribute Show at the Rendezvous in Turner's Falls, MA. There will be twelve bands playing the songs of VU. We'll be doing three songs and the band will be comprised of Brian, Thane Thomsen, Trace Meek, and me. The show is totally free. It's set free. Come on out, Sweet Jane.
What songs do you think we will do?
No cheating to those of you who already saw the list on Facebook.
Which songs would you do? Why?
Monday, December 14, 2009
Two Shows, Two Photos, One Movie.
We had two very different shows last week. On Wednesday, the Rub Wrongways Caravan of Stars played a quiet almost-unplugged concert in a small old wooden room in a library. On Friday, School for the Dead (with Lesa Bezo) played a two song full on loud rock set at a large full rock and roll venue.
On Wednesday, it snowed in the morning. The streets were empty. I was in a hat and gloves and snow blowing in the morning. By afternoon it was raining and sleeting and raining. There were giant slushy puddles everywhere. There was even lightning. We decided to put on the library show anyway and we pulled up in the almost empty parking lot and loaded in through the rain.
Inside, it was warm and welcoming and we set up our stuff in the historic room...and lo and behold...people started filing in. By the time we were starting, we had to put out extra chairs. There were even people sitting on the floors.
(photo by Max's telephone)
We put on a quiet and friendly show in which we did our best to utilize the sounds of the room. For example on certain songs, different members would scatter out into the room around the audience and play from there. We sometimes sang with microphones and sometimes without. The acoustic guitar and banjo were never plugged in.
We played for an hour and then shared hot chocolate and peppermint tea with the crowd and we thanked everyone profusely for coming out on that dark and stormy evening.
Here's a video that Dan Richardson filmed, of this evening's version of the Fawns song "Friends":
On Friday evening, Lesa, Brian, Ken, and I all piled into one car and made the drive down to New Haven, CT. We were playing as part of the CD release concert for Ciao, My Shining Star - the songs of Mark Mulcahy. On the ride down, when there was a break in traffic, we listened to the newly mastered and previously unheard new Sitting Next To Brian EP, "The Wrong Tree". It sounded really great coming out of the car speakers on the dark highway.
We magically found a parking spot right in front of Toad's Place and loaded in. Immediately, I was surrounded by old friends. I feel like I spent my first half hour there just shaking hands.
Toad's Place is a big classic rock club. The bands that performed treated it as such. There was a lot of great guitar rock going on and the stage had great lights. I sat in the back and just happily took it all in.
When School for the Dead took stage, I felt completely at home and we belted our way through our two songs (each band had a ten minute set scheduled). We played Omnivore and I Just Shot Myself In The Foot Again (our Mulcahy cover). The audience seemed to dig it and judging by their faces (Brian, Ken, Max, and Lesa) so did the band. The only casualty was Max's bleeding finger which he quickly wrapped in tape.
Want to hear something strange. School for the Dead immediately followed a performance by Jounce. This is the band of Pete from Pete and Pete and joining them on guitar this night was the other Pete and joining them on vocals was Mark. We were in a sublime slot.
After us was Winterpills and then Brian, Ken, and I took the stage again to join Rick Murnane and Chris Collingwood for their set. We played Cookie Jar (Mulcahy) and Fire in the Canyon (Fountains of Wayne/Gay Potatoes) with Philip Price. I played bass which was fun. My finger did not bleed.
The night continued after our set and I enjoyed it thoroughly from the back looking over the room at Elvis Perkins and the Butterflies of Love and Chris Harford to name a few.
Here we are doing "Omnivore":
(photo by Brian Akey)
On Wednesday, it snowed in the morning. The streets were empty. I was in a hat and gloves and snow blowing in the morning. By afternoon it was raining and sleeting and raining. There were giant slushy puddles everywhere. There was even lightning. We decided to put on the library show anyway and we pulled up in the almost empty parking lot and loaded in through the rain.
Inside, it was warm and welcoming and we set up our stuff in the historic room...and lo and behold...people started filing in. By the time we were starting, we had to put out extra chairs. There were even people sitting on the floors.
(photo by Max's telephone)
We put on a quiet and friendly show in which we did our best to utilize the sounds of the room. For example on certain songs, different members would scatter out into the room around the audience and play from there. We sometimes sang with microphones and sometimes without. The acoustic guitar and banjo were never plugged in.
We played for an hour and then shared hot chocolate and peppermint tea with the crowd and we thanked everyone profusely for coming out on that dark and stormy evening.
Here's a video that Dan Richardson filmed, of this evening's version of the Fawns song "Friends":
On Friday evening, Lesa, Brian, Ken, and I all piled into one car and made the drive down to New Haven, CT. We were playing as part of the CD release concert for Ciao, My Shining Star - the songs of Mark Mulcahy. On the ride down, when there was a break in traffic, we listened to the newly mastered and previously unheard new Sitting Next To Brian EP, "The Wrong Tree". It sounded really great coming out of the car speakers on the dark highway.
We magically found a parking spot right in front of Toad's Place and loaded in. Immediately, I was surrounded by old friends. I feel like I spent my first half hour there just shaking hands.
Toad's Place is a big classic rock club. The bands that performed treated it as such. There was a lot of great guitar rock going on and the stage had great lights. I sat in the back and just happily took it all in.
When School for the Dead took stage, I felt completely at home and we belted our way through our two songs (each band had a ten minute set scheduled). We played Omnivore and I Just Shot Myself In The Foot Again (our Mulcahy cover). The audience seemed to dig it and judging by their faces (Brian, Ken, Max, and Lesa) so did the band. The only casualty was Max's bleeding finger which he quickly wrapped in tape.
Want to hear something strange. School for the Dead immediately followed a performance by Jounce. This is the band of Pete from Pete and Pete and joining them on guitar this night was the other Pete and joining them on vocals was Mark. We were in a sublime slot.
After us was Winterpills and then Brian, Ken, and I took the stage again to join Rick Murnane and Chris Collingwood for their set. We played Cookie Jar (Mulcahy) and Fire in the Canyon (Fountains of Wayne/Gay Potatoes) with Philip Price. I played bass which was fun. My finger did not bleed.
The night continued after our set and I enjoyed it thoroughly from the back looking over the room at Elvis Perkins and the Butterflies of Love and Chris Harford to name a few.
Here we are doing "Omnivore":
(photo by Brian Akey)
Christmas Song Title Wordplay
You may or not have received the emails from co-workers, friends, family, etc. where there are these lists of Christmas song titles where the words have been changed so that the diction is more elevated. "Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow" will then be "Allow Crystalline Formations to Descend in Triplicate" or you'd have "Rudolph, Quadriped with the Vermillion Proboscis."
So, you knew I'd have to have a go at this. I thought I'd bang out a half-a-dozen of these just to have fun with it; instead, I spent so many minutes crafting just one that I had to stop myself before an hour elapsed without realizing it. Here it is (hope it's worth it):
I Ask Whether It Is Metaphysically Possible That Sentient Beings Other Than The “Self” (I, The Ego, Atman, Etc.) Might Be Experiencing A Similar Auditory Perception To The One The “Self” (I, Ego, Atman, Etc.) Is Currently Receiving And Processing In The Cerebral Cortex.
So, you knew I'd have to have a go at this. I thought I'd bang out a half-a-dozen of these just to have fun with it; instead, I spent so many minutes crafting just one that I had to stop myself before an hour elapsed without realizing it. Here it is (hope it's worth it):
I Ask Whether It Is Metaphysically Possible That Sentient Beings Other Than The “Self” (I, The Ego, Atman, Etc.) Might Be Experiencing A Similar Auditory Perception To The One The “Self” (I, Ego, Atman, Etc.) Is Currently Receiving And Processing In The Cerebral Cortex.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Wednesday, December 09, 2009
Snow Shmow, The Show Must Go On.
This is pretty much the scene as it'll be tonight at The Calvin Coolidge Museum in Forbes Library, Northampton. We'll probably be dressed a little nicer and looking a bit happier. Our cheeks will be rosy from the snowy outdoors. You'll be cozy and warm in the wooden room surrounded by artifacts and banners and paintings and display cases.
Jason, is currently working on getting a hot chocolate and peppermint tea thing going on for after the show. No promises.
The show starts at 7:00 and is totally free for any all who would like to attend. We'll be playing a myriad of instruments and songs from School for the Dead, The Fawns, Bourgeois Heroes, Sitting Next To Brian, and The Salvation Alley String Band.
I think it'll be a nice memorable night for all of us to gather in this strange room after the crazy first snowstorm of the year. I hope you can make it.
Here are the "venue" details: Forbes Library
Tuesday, December 08, 2009
About The Weather
Anxiously keeping an eye on the weather. What does it mean for tomorrow night's Sssshhhh Show at Forbe's Library? What does it mean?!?!?!
If the show does go on, you can rest assured, the upstairs of the old library will be the coolest place to be during a snow storm. You can also count on us playing "Snow Day" by the Fawns.
If the show does go on, you can rest assured, the upstairs of the old library will be the coolest place to be during a snow storm. You can also count on us playing "Snow Day" by the Fawns.
Monday, December 07, 2009
Your Two Cents Worth
Our music is all over the internet. We're on the obvious places like iTunes, Emusic, Amazon, and Rhapsody and we're on the less obvious places like Lala, Last.fm, Jango, Thesixtyone etc. We're on play lists here and there, we're on internet radio stations, you can download MP3s attached to articles or reviews, you can find us on all the illegal downloading sites. If you search around you can get our download our music for free. You can certainly stream it for free all over the place (including this very site).
We get downloading and streaming reports from the legal musical vendor websites. On some of the smaller ones, the reporting might be something like $.02 on occasion. When I see that two cents, it makes me happy. You'd think it might be the opposite, and certainly, it'd make me even happier if it was two thousand bucks. But even that two cents perks me up a little because it means that someone out there somewhere listened to one of my songs.
Ok, it doesn't necessarily mean that. They might not have been listening at all, the speakers may have been turned off, the website could have just been streaming in the background. Any number of a gazillion things could have happened. But, to me, it offers the likelihood that someone listened to one of my songs. That makes me happy.
That makes my day, actually. You know, before the internet, the only people who could hear one of my songs either had one of our albums in hand or they were at one of our concerts. But nowadays, it's very easy for someone, even on a different continent, to listen to our music.
Every time someone listens to a song of ours and angel eats some cake. Thanks for listening.
We get downloading and streaming reports from the legal musical vendor websites. On some of the smaller ones, the reporting might be something like $.02 on occasion. When I see that two cents, it makes me happy. You'd think it might be the opposite, and certainly, it'd make me even happier if it was two thousand bucks. But even that two cents perks me up a little because it means that someone out there somewhere listened to one of my songs.
Ok, it doesn't necessarily mean that. They might not have been listening at all, the speakers may have been turned off, the website could have just been streaming in the background. Any number of a gazillion things could have happened. But, to me, it offers the likelihood that someone listened to one of my songs. That makes me happy.
That makes my day, actually. You know, before the internet, the only people who could hear one of my songs either had one of our albums in hand or they were at one of our concerts. But nowadays, it's very easy for someone, even on a different continent, to listen to our music.
Every time someone listens to a song of ours and angel eats some cake. Thanks for listening.
Thursday, December 03, 2009
Happy Synchronicity or I Give My iPhone Too Much Credit
The weather outside is crazy today. It felt like I was on vacation somewhere tropical as I walked to town this morning. I had my headphones on (I just got another nice pair after a horrible week of ear-buds) and I was listening to the old iWhat on shuffle. As I walked in the strangely mild air with the confused winter sun beating down on me, I started to notice some weird coincidences in the songs being played. A suspiciously odd amount seemed to have the word "happy" in them.
Had someone actually invented the iPod App that I mentioned a while back? You know, the one where the ipod interacts with the online weather feeds and caters the play-list to match the weather. Could this be possible? Was it just a coincidence? Had my iPhone reached a point of singularity? Was it taking on life?
When I had a moment to sit down and go back over the songs that had played, my heart started to skip a beat. Happy this, happy that. Then my logical brain parts burst the colorful balloons that my fun-time brain parts had been flying. Duh. The thing wasn't on shuffle. For some reason it was just playing alphabetically and was in the middle of the H's.
Anyway, here's what I heard. It was fun while the dream lasted.
Had someone actually invented the iPod App that I mentioned a while back? You know, the one where the ipod interacts with the online weather feeds and caters the play-list to match the weather. Could this be possible? Was it just a coincidence? Had my iPhone reached a point of singularity? Was it taking on life?
When I had a moment to sit down and go back over the songs that had played, my heart started to skip a beat. Happy this, happy that. Then my logical brain parts burst the colorful balloons that my fun-time brain parts had been flying. Duh. The thing wasn't on shuffle. For some reason it was just playing alphabetically and was in the middle of the H's.
Anyway, here's what I heard. It was fun while the dream lasted.
- The Beatles - Happiness is a Warm Gun
- The Aloha Steamtrain - Happiness Waits
- Mazzy Star - Happy
- Mark Mulcahy - Happy Birthday Yesterday
- Joe Jackson - Happy Ending
- The Figments - Happy Ever After
- The Who - Happy Jack
- Replacements - Happy Town
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
SShhhhhh... Preparing For The Rub Wrongways Caravan Library Show
We had an interesting practice last night. The Rub Wrongways Caravan was in the studio preparing for our Sssshhhhhh Show at Forbes Library next Wednesday. We added six songs to the Caravan catalog including a brand new School for the Dead song.
This concert is going to be an adventure for us. The room is wooden and historic and we have to be very quiet because, well, because it's in a library. It's in a library and the library will be open. People in other rooms will be reading and doing whatever it is that people do in libraries. Sucking on cough drops? Browsing the stacks? Eying each other suspiciously?
We will not be entirely acoustic and we will have a tiny PA set up but the volume will be way way down. Last night we played around with arrangements of these songs to see how they felt at low volumes. Here are some of the instruments that we plan on playing at the show:
This concert is going to be an adventure for us. The room is wooden and historic and we have to be very quiet because, well, because it's in a library. It's in a library and the library will be open. People in other rooms will be reading and doing whatever it is that people do in libraries. Sucking on cough drops? Browsing the stacks? Eying each other suspiciously?
We will not be entirely acoustic and we will have a tiny PA set up but the volume will be way way down. Last night we played around with arrangements of these songs to see how they felt at low volumes. Here are some of the instruments that we plan on playing at the show:
- Acoustic guitar
- Ukulele
- Electric guitar
- Pedal steel guitar
- Wurlitzer Electric Piano
- Pared down drum set
- Banjo
- Glackenspiel
- Electric bass
- Harmonica
- Melodica
- Various percussion instruments
We'll be playing songs by School for the Dead, The Fawns, Sitting Next To Brian, Bourgeois Heroes, and the Salvation Alley String Band. The show is set on shuffle. You never know which band you will get, who will sing, who will play what.
I hope you can make it. It's totally FREE and it's from 7:00 to 8:00, so it's nice and early on a weekday. It's all-ages. It's going to be a strange event and I think we'll need your help to make it a magical evening.
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