Random pictures and some shows.

There were a couple of pictures that were posted last from my phone. One of them was of myself with Melissa(Vocals in Chance Jones) in the background as we were doing a one-off live performance of Outkast's song Bombs Over Baghdad(More about that later). The other was a picture of the beach that I took when I was out in Muskegon Wednesday which was my day off. The picture above is of the same beach on a different day. I took three pictures on my camera phone and blended them together. Figured I would post that one for fun.

Back to the show on Saturday June 26th. It was the album release for Charles The Osprey's album 'Consider.' These guys are a two person instrumental rock group that you need to look up if you haven't heard of them. You can do so at http://www.myspace.com/charlestheosprey Rock/Metal/Progressive/Instrumental/Mathy/Awesome. Very hard to describe. It's just guitar and drums and nothing else is needed. Another group that played was Ozenza. Check them out at http://www.myspace.com/ozenza . This is another great Grand Rapids based group that I can best describe as Thunder/Sludge/Smash/Groove/Rock/Metal. Noblesville also performed. Those guys were amazing. Fantastic hip hop with smooth catchy rhymes and superb lyrical content. With Chance Jones opening the night, this made for an incredibly diverse mix of music consisting mostly of bands from the Grand Rapids label Friction Records.

Everyone played their asses off and the night was fantastic all the way around. Friends were in from other states/cities, everyone was having a great time and I couldn't walk three feet without running into someone I knew. Can't beat that! For the very last song, various members of the bands that played plus a few other local musicians came together to do a collaborative effort in the form of a live performance of Bombs Over Baghdad. This was complete with marching bass drums, marching snares, drum set, keyboards, guitar, bass, shakers and backup vocals. That was one of the most fun performances I have ever had the pleasure to be a part of.





Next we had the Boiling Pot Music Festival in downtown Kalamazoo. This was the first year it was held and it was a great time. It was a little low on attendance, but I have no doubt that it will grow as it hopefully continues each year. It was a beautiful sunny day and it was organized quite well. Two stages provided ample time to set up for each band as well as a contant flow of music for the audience. We saw some really cool groups play down there and I felt that our set went quite well. The sound crew did a great job as they were both accommodating and great at making everyone sound as good as can be.

After driving back from Kalamazoo, Jessie and I went to Mulligans Pub in Eastown to catch Beast In The Field, Mean Mother and Ozenza. I had never seen Beast In The Field before and I didn't this time either as we got there too late. Crap. At least we got to see Ozenza with there always slaying song 'Black Box' closing out their set.

I didn't do much but sleep for a lot of July 4th this year and I am strangely comfortable with that. My back has been killing me and I had a long Saturday, so it felt quite alright.

Goals for this week:
1. Work on new songs at expunk practice on Wednesday.
2. Work on new songs at Heavier Than Air Flying Machines practice on Thursday and also practice old ones to prepare for the upcoming recording sessions.

Life is good.

Pedal Board Project Complete!

Well, after poking at it here and there, I finally got my guitar effects pedal board finished. The last thing to complete was cutting, drilling and screwing in the trim pieces followed by the corner brace pieces. I'll have to total up the receipts, but I'm pretty sure it was easily under $100 for all of the raw materials. Also, I must mention that my buddy Darrell Mansfield helped immensely with installing and fastening the carpet on the riser piece toward the back of the board. He is a righteous carpet installer and tore right into it helping me out a lot on that part as well as with bolting the handles in. Still have to pick up my volume pedal from the repair shop over at Eric's Audio Repair, rearrange the pedal order, rewire and I'll be all set... until I get more pedals, that is. Here's some pictures taken periodically throughout the process(I managed to upload the pictures from end to beginning. Whatever, too lazy to do it again):

Heavier Than Air Flying Machines... New Album Time?

As I have mentioned before, HTAFM have been writing songs here and there for a new album. We will be re-recording all of the previous nine tracks from the first album as well as another new nine. Last week Friday, Steve Snare from Trophy gave us a hand in recording demos of five new songs we have written. He mixed them over the weekend and everything seems to be falling into place. Sounds fantastic for basement demos, matter of fact. This Saturday is the Charles The Osprey album release show with Chance Jones and Ozenza and we plan on discussing a lot of details on the upcoming recording sessions with Kremo (Ozenza guitarist and White Lodge recording extraordinaire). HTAFM practice is this Thursday again and we'll be working on yet another newbie I imagine as well as getting a group shot taken for the Prospecto music festival's website coming up in September. We are hoping to have the album done by then. As of right now there is no title for the album.

Chance Jones had a show at Mulligans Friday night and that was really fun. There were a couple of hiccups in the set, but we had fun and I always like playing shows there. Also, my lovely lady Jessie had her sister Trish in town visiting and she got to see Chance Jones for the first time, which was great.

Also, as a sidenote to the Charles album release show this Saturday, there is going to be an unbelievably spectacular collaborative surprise at the end of the show. Those who make it all the way until the end are going to get a tasty treat well worth the wait. What can you do while you wait until then? Enjoy a kick ass night of music, that's what. Life is good.

Shows, Various Bands and General Sweetness.

Just found out that Heavier Than Air Flying Machines will be playing the Prospecto Music Festival in September! Chance Jones is playing it already and I'm excited to find out that HTAFM found our way onto one of the nights' bills. On that note, HTAFM has been writing songs(after a couple of months without practice as usual) and tonight we will be putting down demo tracks of the new ones that were not on our previous release. We still have 3 songs and a cover I believe to complete before we can think of going into the studio to record, but progress is progress. The new songs are shaping up to be pretty gnarly, so I'm stoked for that.

Expunk will have a show at Mulligans again soon which I think is July 22nd. The peninsular axe has been sounding great with everything I'm running on my board as well as the amp I'm using. I'm very happy with my current sound and look forward to adding to it's various sonic nuances. Pedalboard is kickin' ass right now too. Love the extra space to fit future pedals. Looking to get a more eclectic mix of brands and sounds. My eye is currently drawn toward this mean tremolo pedal made by the folks at Catalinbread. It's called the Semaphore and it effing rocks every youtube demo of it. (Check out the hot action right here: http://www.catalinbread.com/SemaphoreTremolo.html )

Chance Jones has a show tonight at Mulligans and that will be a load o' fun as usual there.

Go awn n' get it! Life is good.