003 We Don't Have Money

...so we can't lose it.

That's the first line of my favorite new Minus The Bear song. Man oh man, what a show... I have to say that I'm totally jealous. In some way shape or form, I need to be on that tour! I think Gratitude could use a maraca, don't you? But seriously, it was like a class reunion.

Chris Common, Hey Mercedes' old roadie and present drummer of The City On Film, is doing front of house sound for Minus The Bear. We toured with Jonah from Gratitude when he was in New End Original. We toured with Honorary Title's merch magician, John Cheese, when he was merching for Limbeck. We're old friends with Ryan Chavez, of various productions in Houston and Panic in Detroit, and he's doing merch for MTB. Spitalfield are pals of ours from Chicago and i'm excited to give their new CD a listen. Will of Straylight Run is as dashing as ever and still the amazing drummer I marvelled over from touring with Breaking Pangaea. Slim from Gratitude is an old friend of ours from Milwaukee. By the time I saw Aaron from Honorary Title, i think we had both drank our fair share, so even though we had only met twice, we chatted it up like old bros. This is what i do. I gush. I should be on this tour.

OK, maybe i shouldn't. I have my own shows to do, you know. Tomorrow night, I hope you can make it out to Champaign. I don't care that you live in New York, Florida, California, UK, Japan. I sincerely hope that you can make it to Champaign. It will be strictly a solo acoustic affair and i'll be playing a bunch of new songs so i'm psyched. Note to self: Concoct a setlist and give it a few good practice runs. And... on Sunday, I will be playing the WLUW Record Fair at 3 pm! Both shows are with the wonderful Nathaniel Carroll, so just be there, kay?

A quick note about Will from SLR. His number is right next to my girlfriend's number on my cell phone, so i'm constantly paranoid that i'm accidentally sending him these creepy text messages like "oh baby you know i love you i can't wait to kiss you all up mwah." I actually did do that once when it was a different neighboring phone number and i realized it right after i hit the send button. So i panicked. But then I calmed down and text messaged the wrong recipient and said "he he. um. that wasn't supposed to go to you. um. but i love you too, uh, pal. rock."

Don't let anyone ever tell you that whenever I get the chance, I watch the Tony Danza show... You know, I don't like it, but if it's on, i won't change the channel... (are you buying this?)

OK, here it is! #50 - Summertime originally by The Sundays, of course. Please read yesterday's ramble for some quick backstory on its recording process! And despite all of my failed attempts to throw my voice into the mix, it just sounds better with only Lauren. I do have a really shoddy mix of the failed duet, so i may eventually post that. Maybe it will be the "secret bonus track" of a blog... But anyway, I asked Lauren if she'd be into singing on the song about 2 weeks ago and I gave her a copy of the original along with an instrumental version of my cover. When it was time to press record a few days ago, she was so prepared. I asked if she wanted me to print out the lyrics for her. She casually replied, "nah," and then proceeded to nail every line... and there are a lot of (odd) lyrics in the song. From Piscean to Liverpudlian, she knew em all... So i guess what i'm trying to say is: She is hardworking, extremely talented and... she is the singer your band is looking for. Don't you realize that?

I have completely finshed the next cover, and i only have one more guitar line to lay down on the cover after that. Talk about prepared! I am also 98% done with "Be Near" for the Post 436 Records split.

I'm going to be doing the old familiar drive from Detroit to Chicago tonight, and when you're in a car, alone, for that amount of time, you can't help but do some work. In fact, I wrote the complete lyrics to two new songs on that very same drive. Hence, I look forward to a lyrically productive drive coming up. And... I'm driving straight to the Minus The Bear show in Chicago, whereupon I will throw back some cool ones and then forget everything.

Have a great Friday everybody.