so i did a show last week w/ ready fire aim... it was very intense and we seemed to entertain the crowd very well... we use a lot of electronic devices that take both patience and faith to keep fully operational - between guitar effects cutting out, the computer malfunctions and drum triggers that are intense and necessary to maintain our cutting edge sound, it keeps our hands full.
since the loss of a keyboard player it has been my job to offer the 'weird noise' element to the band live which leaves me mostly on my knees twiddling with knobs to make the perfect concoction... last weeks show was very intense for this reason.
so the show starts, i've got phasers and flangers and vibrato effects going on with no actual note... just this hum building into an intense shriek of noise and almost abrasive sounds that leads up to the burst that starts the first song of the set, 'wannabe your' - and this, is what leads me to my point of a rather short blog entry.
as the sounds spin around, dizzying at times, sage plays this simple line that sets the tone for what is to come on a violin. usually we hope this takes about a minute and a half or two minutes, but we had the electronics malfunction so it took about 5 minutes instead. the suspense was maginficent! there was nothing really happening, just swells of noise perplexing an intrigued audience. at long last, it all came together... an explosion of tone and sound that would frighten most... and at last, we had our release.
check out what we're all about @ www.rfasociety.com
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Friday, July 17, 2009
my boys and the transition to living in manhattan
i moved to manhattan on a whim. i mean, seriously, 36 hours before hitting the road for the big apple i had turned to my boy whiggels and said, "dude, i think i'm gonna move to new york". At this moment we're in a tour bus on the way back to Nashville for something of a hiatus after a 5 month tour. He looked back at me and said, "i'm renting a car to go back to philly, you want me to get a bigger one and just roll up with me"? - of course i said yes.
so here go whiggels and i 15 hours of great tunes, great laughter and both teeming with excitement, but both of us for different reasons. Whiggels hadn't seen his wife in a few months, and i'd been itching to get back to new york for a few years. So we roll into philly, my sister is swinging by on her way back from chicago and so she stops and picks me up and runs me to princeton. I hang there for a few days then catch a train to new york to crash with another old boy of mine, dan.
So i wind up on a couch in brooklyn, he sells brooklyn to me like a used car salesman and as i look for my own spot i find myself looking exclusively in brooklyn. after a month of searching i finally wind up in williamsburg and then go off on the job hunt to try and support myself living in new york.
To put this in perspective, it was the very beginning of october that i moved to the city, it was the beginning of november i found my spot, and it was at the beginning of december i was afraid i'd have to leave because the job market had dried up. I had lined up this gig with a few of my friends in the city for dec. 4 and was getting ready to load up the truck with junk (another boy of mine, not the term for my gear) when my phone rang and to tell me i'd gotten a job and i start on saturday.
I didn't have to leave new york, but after working tirelessly at this joint for a few months the sensationalism of brooklyn had really worn off and i found myself pining, once again to live in manhattan proper... just with a little more sincerity as to which part of the city.
So after searching and searching i wind up in the east village, a nice spacious apartment with large windows and a wick of a lease remaining, i was settled. Then I thought about things, and talked with my boy billy and my boy jason and we decided to get a spot even closer to the action than where we are living now*.
So one day in the office Billy jumps up to go look at this spot thats a duplex, 3 bedroom 2 bath with a huge outdoor space just off of 4th street and convinces us that it is a winner, jason and i head over at about 6 to look at it, we say we'll take it... we start the paper work and i run out coz' i realize i'm late for a dinner and drinks tour of williamsburg.
So today i write you. in linen pants and a very light shirt to tell you that in ten months i have gone from tour bus to couch to hipsterville to manhattan to two apartments in manhattan for the month of august. is this excessive that if i'm on 14th st i'll only have to walk 3 blocks and also if i'm on houston st. i'll only have to walk to blocks? i suppose so, but i suppose its just a preparation of things to come.
check out my band at rehearsal
http://www.myspace.com/readyfireaimnyc
*we all live on eleventh street in the same building but in different apartments - 10 blocks away from said action.
so here go whiggels and i 15 hours of great tunes, great laughter and both teeming with excitement, but both of us for different reasons. Whiggels hadn't seen his wife in a few months, and i'd been itching to get back to new york for a few years. So we roll into philly, my sister is swinging by on her way back from chicago and so she stops and picks me up and runs me to princeton. I hang there for a few days then catch a train to new york to crash with another old boy of mine, dan.
So i wind up on a couch in brooklyn, he sells brooklyn to me like a used car salesman and as i look for my own spot i find myself looking exclusively in brooklyn. after a month of searching i finally wind up in williamsburg and then go off on the job hunt to try and support myself living in new york.
To put this in perspective, it was the very beginning of october that i moved to the city, it was the beginning of november i found my spot, and it was at the beginning of december i was afraid i'd have to leave because the job market had dried up. I had lined up this gig with a few of my friends in the city for dec. 4 and was getting ready to load up the truck with junk (another boy of mine, not the term for my gear) when my phone rang and to tell me i'd gotten a job and i start on saturday.
I didn't have to leave new york, but after working tirelessly at this joint for a few months the sensationalism of brooklyn had really worn off and i found myself pining, once again to live in manhattan proper... just with a little more sincerity as to which part of the city.
So after searching and searching i wind up in the east village, a nice spacious apartment with large windows and a wick of a lease remaining, i was settled. Then I thought about things, and talked with my boy billy and my boy jason and we decided to get a spot even closer to the action than where we are living now*.
So one day in the office Billy jumps up to go look at this spot thats a duplex, 3 bedroom 2 bath with a huge outdoor space just off of 4th street and convinces us that it is a winner, jason and i head over at about 6 to look at it, we say we'll take it... we start the paper work and i run out coz' i realize i'm late for a dinner and drinks tour of williamsburg.
So today i write you. in linen pants and a very light shirt to tell you that in ten months i have gone from tour bus to couch to hipsterville to manhattan to two apartments in manhattan for the month of august. is this excessive that if i'm on 14th st i'll only have to walk 3 blocks and also if i'm on houston st. i'll only have to walk to blocks? i suppose so, but i suppose its just a preparation of things to come.
check out my band at rehearsal
http://www.myspace.com/readyfireaimnyc
*we all live on eleventh street in the same building but in different apartments - 10 blocks away from said action.
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