Progress, FINALLY! - Eric Checks In...

just wrapped up day 2 of pre-mixing at silver sonya. i've been working with nick anderson, who was assistant engineer to devin ocampo during the tracking phase and has been assisting chad clark with mixing as well. let me say that nick has been a huge asset to the project and his hard work and attention to detail has not gone unnoticed. we've been holed up in silver sonya's new space (a great loft in d.c. with natural light, tons of instruments and a shower!) for the last couple days and have had a fantastic time hanging out and working together. i think i just had a moment with him and he's not even around right now. gooey.

last night we knocked off early because nick had to work at the galaxy hut, a great small bar in clarendon, va. i closed the place down with him, and met his friend jay, who is a recording engineer originally from st. louis. the best bar conversation i've had in years. normally i shy away from that type of thing because bar conversations tend to veer towards football and office jobs, two things that share an unappealing ickyness and hit the red on my personal yawn-o-meter. but talking about q-tip and how guitars ruin songs made me very happy to be spending the night out and about. nick's generous bartending certainly helped as well. (i should note that a few solo rounds of pool at another nearby establishment earlier in the evening got things started off on the good foot).

tomorrow nick and i will finish prepping the last few songs for the first day of real mixing, which will begin on tuesday with chad.

i am sleepytime station. pop bottles. chat soon.

currently listening to: beck - the information
currently reading: the tender bar by j.r. moehringer
currently eating: veggie chili cheese fries from ben's, a chili joint that blasts goooood r 'n' b
currently remembering that i'm grossed out by: "what-i-did-today" blogs and people who write them

-ee

Update!!!!!!!

as Chad and Devin are holed up in the new Silver Sonya location, surely tearing out their hair [sic] at the seemingly endless number of layers and tracks, the mixes are coming together and a light is beginning to show at the end of the tunnel

we were finally able to snatch a listen to "Angry Town" yesterday and it is so exciting to hear the record begin to finally take shape - we are SOOOOO close, you can almost taste it

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since returning DC, we have been fortunate enough to share time and the stage with some great old friends, as well as some very awesome new ones - here's a little recap...

*November 7th @ The Bluebird (St. Louis, MO): we played with one of our most favorite St. Louis bands, Say Panther, and one of our most favorite Champaign bands, Headlights, who are now playing out as a quintet with Kenny and Nick of Decibully joining the ranks on guitar and bass/accordion respectively - simply awesome!!!

-as an aside, both Say Panther and Headlights have new records in the works, please save your lunch money, take your piggy bank up to Coinstar, snatch some bills from your momma's purse, or whatever you have to do to make sure that you own these records the day that they come out!

*November 16th @ Cowboy Monkey (Champaign, IL): the Cowboy Monkey is absolutely one of our favorite places to play in the country, hands down, and this looks to have been the last time we will ever get to play there - they are rumored to be changing things around and tearing out the stage come New Year's - we did get to play with some great new friends though, Des Moines', Jacob Tyler Wolfgang, Chicago's, Rachel Ries [amazing!] and Champaign favorites, Casados

after the show, Tristan took us back to Headlights' chalet, which is nestled in between two corn fields in the northern part of Champaign-Urbana, where Erin, Brett and him live and record - this was our first time staying with Headlights and we all were up uber-late drinking PBR, eating Pokey-Sticks and smoking our corn-cob pipes

good times had by all

*November 17th @ The Bluebird (St. Louis, MO): it is a rare treat to play in STL and get to share the stage with not just 1, but 2 bands that we have never played with before. this was just such an occasion! we had such a blast with St. Louis', Bo & The Locomotive, and Michigan stalwarts, Saturday Looks Good To Me

there were so many things working for us on this night, playing with SLGTM: 1) it was a Saturday, 2) it was their first time playing in St. Louis, and 3) Ryan Howard, of our other favorite MI band, Canada, plays drums!!!

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it is nice to be home to not only get a chance to relearn the songs after we dissected the crap out of them in the studio, but to also spend time with family and friends and just chill out a little

there is so much on the horizon:

*two cool shows left this year
December 8th
@ The Mad Art Gallery for the 4th installment of The Rock n Roll Craft Show
December 22nd
@ Off Broadway for A Very Merry Christmas Spectacular w/ So Many Dynamos, Light Pollution and Laite

*new record/tour this Spring

*Kiley and Steve's wedding next August!

*Stephen and former Team Up!!! counterpart Mario Martinez have been playing together again - they're performing tomorrow, Nov. 25th, as Thankful Tree @ The Lemp Arts Neighborhood Arts Center

*Ryan is gearing up for a Dock Ellis Band tour this January

*Eric H. is finishing a full-length Slow Parade album as we speak

*Mike is recording albums for both Geoff Koch and The Makeshift Gentlemen this winter

*Eric E. has most likely written about 30 new songs since we have been home and being that the Christmas season is his most prolific time of the year, expect many more songs to be in the works

etc. etc. etc.

stay tuned for more updates as the mixes begin to pour in - there is talk of us possibly getting to hear 3 more tomorrow!!!!!!!