Tracking the Early Year: 12 Hours By Car

It is 750ish miles from Austin to Albuquerque, and that takes 12 hours to drive if you're doing right by the speed limit. I'm not one for stopping anywhere to stay the night, so I just do the whole thing in a day. That thought informed the chorus for this one -- some days Albuquerque feels so far it might as well be across the Atlantic. Then again it's nice to know a 2 hour plane ride will get me there, too. The rest of the song is a true instance of coming out in about 2.5 hours on a Saturday morning with much coffee and Garageband to keep track of things. I'm pretty sure none of it existed before then. I remember feeling exceptionally accomplished for it being 11 AM on a Saturday when I finished it. It was the first song we tracked for the record, and when it came time for some percussion, Dan thought quarters would have a ring to them...so somehow he compiled a handful of quarters and I stood there for the entirety of the song dropping quarters back and forth from hand to hand. A few made it to the floor, but mostly I was an adept quarter slinger. It makes me think of a ghost walking down a hallway. The banjo added a nice vibe to the whole thing. Lyrics: i am numb, i am numb two shots per feeling is my rule of thumb and i am tired, i'm so tired of being the one who sets wind to the fire it is thin, wearing thin life is a butterfly stuck on a pin i am still, i lie still behind enemy lines and i have taken my pill 'cause i don't know where you are two hours by plane means twelve by car that is the way we are twelve hours apart by car here i am, here i am spilling my soul on a string and a can can't you see, can't you see? i always thought maybe you'd be good for me but i don't know where you are two hours by plane means twelve by car that is the way we are twelve hours apart by car every day looks the same if the sun makes it up then i'll be ok 'cause every day looks the same if the sun makes it up then i'll be ok 'cause i don't know where you are two hours by plane means twelve by car that is the way we are twelve hours apart by car Words and Music by Jana Pochop © 2008 Patient Grasshopper Music (ASCAP)

Tracking The Early Year: New Mexico Boy Part II

(Part one of this non-saga lives here). "New Mexico Boy" was pretty fully formed by the time I was playing it out a lot, but it's actually gone through a few major "renovations," if you will, to get it to the version you hear on The Early Year. It's a long song. It has five verses. That's indulgent, but I like them all, so I wasn't going to chuck anything out. It got its first facelift when I was at the Life's A Song workshop with Terri Hendrix. We got some one-on-one time with Terri to go over whatever we wanted, and I played her this song. She had the same assessment about the length. At that time the chorus was: Drunk on Friday, home by 2 AM Mass on Sunday, bread and wine again You wonder who's your saint Cuz sure as hell you ain't Does confession to the Mother bring you joy New Mexico Boy? When you sing that 3 times, it makes your long song even LONGER. Terri drew some lines through the "saint/ain't" lines and said that's what needed to go. She was right. But I still LOVED that line. I went over that with Dan and he suggested those lines could be moved to the bridge, which at the time was kind of taking up redundant space: Airport's running out of planes Scared you won't wake up the same Airport's running out of planes So not only do I have this really long song but I'm REPEATING myself. Right. A little cut and paste and we ended up with what you hear now: Airport's running out of planes Scared you son't wake up the same You wonder who's your saint Cuz sure as hell you ain't And it worked, and it was all there, and the choruses were shorter, and the heavens parted and birds sang. Well, in my mind, anyway. This songwriting stuff is hard work. New Mexico Boy Lyrics superheroes, superstars live so far from where you are where crazy things fall from the sky but nothing's shown you how to fly cruise all night and sleep 'til noon tortillas, juice, and old man gloom spread butter on your daddy's bread turn off the news, go back to bed drunk on friday, home by 2 am mass on sunday, bread and wine again does confession to the mother bring you joy? new mexico boy no history you care to claim no county kickbacks in your name just a pack of dreams rolled up your sleeve to make it big you'll have to leave drunk on friday, home by 2 am mass on sunday, bread and wine again does confession to the mother bring you joy? new mexico boy airport's running out of planes you're scared you won't wake up the same you wonder who's your saint 'cause sure as hell you ain't cinderblocks like hollow hearts stacked up in piles along boulevards a fortress in your own hometown but this ain't china, walk around no this ain't china, walk around drunk on friday, home by 2 am mass on sunday, bread and wine again does confession to the mother bring you joy? new mexico boy Words and Music by Jana Pochop © 2008 Patient Grasshopper Music (ASCAP)

More Radio Waves!

My blog buddy Heather hosts a weekly radio show called Lyrical Venus featuring female singer-songwriters on KRUU in Fairfield, Iowa...and she was stellar enough to ask me to be on her show this week since The Early Year is out and about and looking to dress up and hit the town. See her nice post about the whole shebang here. She even got ALL her facts right. That's impressive. Here's a link to her radio station blog... And here's a link to LIVE STREAM the interview tomorrow (Tuesday, October 14th)...Lyrical Venus starts at 9 AM Central time...I'll be on sometime during that hour. Tune in, kids. Support the awesome radio people who get the word out about the discs that we singer-songwriters make. Thanks, Heather!!

First time on the radio...

Susan had an in-studio at KFAN in Fredericksburg before her gig in Comfort this weekend, and I was of course along to document. She is always nice and introduces me around and plugs my record...so Rozzie, the awesome DJ at KFAN, took a copy of The Early Year and while we were driving to Comfort, we heard New Mexico Boy on the radio! So you always hear those stories about hearing yourself for the first time on the radio. Usually it involves pulling over if you're driving and crying or something. I couldn't pull over because Susan was driving, and there was no crying...but we did scream a lot. Because I have a camera attached to my palm everywhere we go these days...it got caught on film. So cool to share it with some of my favorite peoples. The good life indeed.

What we need is a MONTAGE.

Back in Austin after a fun weekend merching in Comfort, TX. It was an exciting time, but that's for the next blog post. In the meantime it's nice to sleep on my own pillows. Producer Dan and I had a check-in today and we're already talking EP 2...The Early Year is out now and it's time to think about the next step. I'm excited already! We'll start tracking in early 2009. Here's a music video I edited in the car...clips and things. Yay! So much tour video, so little time.

Tracking The Early Year: Blonde on Blue

(Go to Jana's Myspace page to hear this track!) "Blonde on Blue" was the harbinger of all the songs to come for The Early Year. It came together from a bunch of pieces of things I had lying around for a while, but in a very present, descriptive way that made me think, "Huh." Sometimes you surprise yourself when you finish a song; this was one of those cases. It informed the rest of my writing for this record and continues to do so, because I appreciate the honesty and descriptiveness of the moments in the song. The vibe was brought on by a tuning I had just learned/stolen from Susan (who says she learned from Ani DiFranco...share the tuning love!) -- EBBF#BE. Try it, you might like it. It's got a fantastic sound to it. Then came the riff, then came the melody, and there we were. The whole thing is yet another fictitious story from my head, but I feel like a lot of the detail is stuff we've all actually experienced. Passenger seat, cigarette ash glow out the window, stopping for gas and coffee, all that road trip stuff. The chorus was inspired at first by the image of blonde wheat fields and blue sky -- prominent things in my vision of a road trip because so much of my life's road tripping has involved New Mexico, Texas, and Kansas. "Scorch on sun" was actually a bit of a placeholder line in my head when I first played it for Dan, who promptly identified it as his favorite...so it stayed, and now I love that image, too. Weird how things spill out and you're not quite sure they will stick until you try them on someone else. Lyrics: I am sitting on the starboard of your only way back home There is weed and rocks and turnstiles that we have to get around The rearview mirror betrays you, oh my god I hope it does me too Something in this breakdown's bound to show just how bound I am to you I could fall in love If only I could follow through The minor ways I operate, they are shifting with your hands And all I care is you come with me while this world and I take each other in Orange friction ash on air from smokes that pass the while Keep one mile under the limit, your passenger is volatile I could fall in love If only I could follow through Like ink on paper, scorch on sun You on me, blonde on blue I am an editor of tongues you say, I always skip my turn And these scratched out words I am telling you; they are making my lungs burn Oh forgive my innocence and my array of messed up starts We'll find ourselves a redemption town, we'll meet our Maker's Mark I could fall in love If only I could follow through Like ink on paper, scorch on sun You on me, blonde on blue I think I am useful I'll take good notes along the way I'll prove that 2 stops for gas and 3 for caffeine is all we need anyway I could fall in love If only I could follow through Like ink on paper, scorch on sun You on me, blonde on blue Words and Music by Jana Pochop © 2008 Patient Grasshopper Music (ASCAP) Track Info: Jana: vocals, acoustic guitar, Backpacker guitar, banjo, piano, bass Daniel Barrett: background vocals

Tracking The Early Year: Paper Rock Scissors

(Check out the player over to your left on the blog or go to Jana's Myspace page to hear this track!) "Paper Rock Scissors" went through quite a few formations before getting to its finished form. I was taken with the playfulness of the game itself, except usually when people play it there is something at stake, giving it the potential to have important consequences hidden behind the simple "1-2-3-go." My favorite part about this song is the layers it has were unintentional when I wrote it; I don't sit around thinking about how people are going to interpret things...but after talking it through with a few writer friends, it's like this tune is a disco ball. It reflects very differently on different points of view. Nifty. It's the first song I wrote in the DADDAD tuning, which is fun as all get out. I stole it from Patty Griffin. When we tracked it, I got to bust out on the snare drum and tambourine...and previously I had requested to Dan that there be hand claps somewhere on the record. Dan decided if a track was going to have them, this was going to be the one. We clapped through the whole tune twice, making for a total of 4 sets of hands clapping. ("What is the sound of 8 hands clapping?") That's also the only instance of anyone but me playing an instrument on The Early Year...it was good to have a hand clap buddy! For the guitar track we went for a smooth Duke Levine-like vibe because...Dan and I both love us some Duke Levine (he plays for Mary Chapin Carpenter a lot. A lot). Lyrics: Took an offer for a ride to Amarillo It was 23 miles by a drunken crow Be careful who you talk to when you roll down your window And you can't call home Cause I'm from great plains and greater superstition And my mother I know - she is a very good Christian Between church bell chimes and late night dimes I never really was Now paper beats rock and rock beats scissors And the note on the table cut me to slivers And I quote God in the middle of the night When I say, "Let there be light" Started asking around 'bout where the circus went I got pointed to a prophet in a Bible tent And the preacher leaned and the people cleaned Down in the river with the water and the lye So I got held up for the winter in Wichita I guess something didn't read on the radar It said "Jesus saves" on family graves But I knew they didn't always intertwine And now paper beats rock and rock beats scissors And the word on the stone broke me to splinters And I quote God in the middle of the night When I say, "Let there be light" Get down into the cellar The storm will blow over, the storm will blow over Everything's gonna get better The war will blow over, the war will blow over And now paper beats rock and rock beats scissors And the word on the stone broke me to splinters And I quote God in the middle of the night When I say, "Let there be" Paper beats rock and rock beats scissors If the book is so good why can't we deliver? I quote God in the middle of the night When I say, "Let there be light." Words and Music by Jana Pochop © 2008 Patient Grasshopper Music (ASCAP)

Tracking The Early Year: New Mexico Boy

This one makes me smile because it kind of brings a neat story full circle for me. Susan Gibson was nice enough to sing background vocals on this tune, and by now you all know she is one of my favorite singer-songwriters and has been since I was in college. We met in 2001 when she played in my Music Appreciation class. I was a freshman thinking about majoring in political science but secretly wanting to find a way to be a musician (and had been doing as such since about 5th grade). There wasn't a whole lot of example around Albuquerque of songwriters who toured and recorded on a sustainable level. Success to me meant a record deal and VH-1...which was totally out of reach. But THEN...I see this songwriter perform in my class who is making the music business work as a career without selling out to MTV, and who is writing honest and brilliant lyrics with a powerful guitar style. Um, hello? I was smitten. Suz came back to New Mexico a few times over my college career and we got to know each other a little more, and when I moved out here to Austin she offered her help countless times to this very green-behind-the-ears kid new to the scene. She didn't have to do that, but she did. Lately I've been her Merch Girl and have gotten to see parts of Texas and the USA that I probably would not have for a while otherwise...and I'm psyched to be able to do my part and work the merch table magic. When I opened for her during a couple of tours of New Mexico last year, I would always request a little harmony love on "New Mexico Boy" because she made it sound fantastic...so it was a no brainer to preserve it for posterity on The Early Year. Thanks, Suz, for everything. Shucks.

Full Circle

Well this was cool.  You can now download The Early Year complete with artwork in high quality mp3 format from DigStation.  I got the email that this happened when we were in our hotel room in Nashville, and Susan was the first person to download The Early Year.  What a sport!  She said it made sense because my geekery and nerdiness have rubbed off.  It's true, I like to share the geek love.  Also, don't tell her, but even though my geekness rubbed off on her, I think her awesome songwriting influence has rubbed off on me more.   Guess what?  You too can download The Early Year from Digstation, or order it from me directly and get a hard copy with all the kickbutt artwork.  We have options here at jpo.com.  Also, since I won't mail out the pre-orders until I'm home next week, you have a few more days to get in on the pre-order giveaway.  Jana Water stuff.  Awesome.

The Early Year and Eddie's Attic

We’re on our way to Winston-Salem, NC after a great time back in Atlanta. Susan played at Eddie’s Attic and my good friends Keith and Suzanne came to the show and then put us up in their home with fluffy beds and cute dogs and cats. Then Keith made CHEESE GRITS for breakfast and I think I might officially be a grits fan. So good! Keith and Suzanne also acted as couriers for me because I had 50 copies of The Early Year delivered to their house so I could see the thing as soon as possible. We popped open the box in the Eddie’s Attic parking lot...very cool. It turned out great. Video forthcoming, of course, haha. The other surprise of the night was a box of roses delivered to Eddie’s for ME...which confounded me as I was opening them. Shockingly, I am not known for having secret admirers, even with my charming camera presence. They were from my Merch Girl Groupies back in Texas, Teri and Sandy. They are great Susan supporters and always take good care of the Merch Girl...and when I told them we were going to Eddie’s Attic, they were very excited because Decatur is their old stomping ground and where they had their first date. (Front row table on the right of the stage!) So um...getting roses at Eddie’s Attic right after opening a box of my EP was pretty stellar. And the show was great and Martha Scanlan played too and she was great...and then the fluffy bed, and now we’re back in the car to North Carolina. Phew.

Another Teaser

Man I love these Animoto slideshows. Anyway...New Mexico Boy!

And then there was DONE.

By all accounts The Early Year is out of my hands for the next couple of weeks! The fabulous people at Oasis received the artwork from Emily, (who did just a fantastic job and you should hire her for all your graphic design needs and pay her a lot of money)...and the master is sitting somewhere in New Jersey because the post office overnighted it. Flying. Like an eagle. Into the future. Now what? Well...I suppose you could pre-order it (pre-oderitpre-orderit!!!) while I take a nap. There's a little something something in it for ya if you order early, so Czech it out. More merching this weekend...if you are in Wimberley or Marble Falls or Fredericksburg (or you want to be and really, who doesn't when there's Susan Music involved?)...come say hello! Oh, and I realized that I made an egregious error in my liner notes and neglected to thank a very important group of people that had a big role in the production of The Early Year. I'd like to write them a special note right here right now: Dear President George W. Bush and the Federal Government, Thank you very much for the tax refund check that I found in my mailbox this summer. Thanks to you and your generosity, you have allowed more singer-songwriter folk music to be released into the world, which as I recall was one of the lesser recognized tenants of your father's "Thousand Points of Light" speech in 1988. I promise to do my best to give back to the economy with The Early Year by using it to facilitate more gasoline consumption through touring, buying pretzels and Starbucks in a can from various convenience stores across the country, and by recycling all my guitar strings by making yard art and jewelry. Again, thank you very much and when you move back to Dallas/Fort Worth please come to a show. I will buy you a scone. Sincerely, Jana

So close it's thisclose.

There's a proof of the CD itself in all its greenery! I am so stoked for everything. I tied up a lot of the loose ends this week, and I think it's all almost in Oasis' hands as far as printing. The master is ready. The artwork is done. I need to fax some info, Emily will upload the artwork, and I will Fed-Ex the master to New Jersey. In about 3 weeks I'll get 1000 copies of The Early Year. Then hopefully people will take them off my hands, because I certainly don't need 1000 of them! Phew.

A Teaser!

My brother found a neato site called Animoto. Much fun with the slide shows. Here's a chorus from "Paper Rock Scissors" off the new record: (Yep, I played everything you hear on the record. Cheap labor!)

It's Done. And other random updates.

Well...we have a mastered version of The Early Year that is going to be the one that everyone gets in their mailboxes, email boxes, on their computer speakers, and on their turntables. Ok, no turntables. We're not doing a vinyl release...yet, hehheh. I am proud of it. With a capital P! And there's the cover...woot! What is holding me up right now is that I am a little slow to comprehend the embedding of ISRC codes on the tracks, still...so I did not realize I needed to register with the RIAA before this could occur. So I am registering, and then we'll get the codes, which get embedded in the master, which gets shipped to Oasis for duplication. I hope this goes fast. Today is busywork day so I can get my PO box set up (as much as taking orders from my home address via the internet is appealing, haha) and file our paperwork for Bourn Records. And send a fax to the RIAA. Who has a fax machine these days? Oh, that's right...business people. (And Kinko's! Woot!) I am still all happy from last weekend at Threadgill's. Jamming on stage with Terri and Lloyd and Glenn was pretty much a highlight of my...forever. It's neat to think about the things I've been fortunate enough to do in my two years of living here. A lot of the above paperwork and business stuff is thanks to Terri and Lloyd and their never-ending sharing of smarts and experience. From the Life's A Song workshop last October to Terri letting me harass her and pick her brain all the time throughout this past year...it's good to have people who have your back. Dan and Suz and Terri and Lloyd are all really insanely integral parts of me as an artist and of this record...I hope it does them all proud. Thanks for the chance, kids.

Learning from the Master

Postcards to hand out so people know The Early Year is on its way! Greetings from the mountains in New Mexico. I'm holed up outside of Albuquerque for a family reunion and there are good times all around, including games of speed Scrabble, green chile stew, hiking, and blue skies to the moon and back. Excellent! Thank goodness wifi extends to the outskirts of civilization, because we've been going back and forth with the very cool dude who is mastering The Early Year in Berlin, Germany. The wonders of the internet allow us to upload files and he sends them back, and nary an ocean crossed by either of us. Amazing. The past two days between fits of Scrabble and harassing my nieces and nephews, I've been cramming in a bunch of info about the mastering process. Apparently you embed ISRC (International Standard Recording Code) info into the master...which enables royalties to be tracked and tells your computer/iTunes/whatever info about what track is what. Makes sense. Lots of numbers and letters. Off to harass some more family members, haha...

EP 1 Cover: Almost There...

Ah ha! A bit of color for the cover of The Early Year!

EP 1 Cover: The Early Year

The title. The Early Year. How it came about: I was mulling over what to call this thing during the entire recording process. I put it off by calling it EP 1, and seriously considered the official title of "One of Three" because we are going to make 2 more of these in the next 2 years...but the cleverness of that title choice would not be evident until 2010 when "Three of Three" comes out. Scratch that. I thought about "Fortunate" because that's the name of one of the tracks and kind of the mantra for the whole process...I felt fortunate to be doing it. But singling out one of the five tracks didn't sit right with me, either. While discussing options with Dan, about how this was the first of many records to be made and therefore my baby EP and how I wanted to reflect that, I said, "But I don't want to call it something pretentious like "Jana Pochop: The Early Years" or something like that." Which caught Dan's ear...and suddenly dropping that plural from Years was the perfect solution. Yes, it was an early year. The getting up at 5:30 to write songs before going in to work at the county job and then spending many hours at Red Leaf after that. Each one of these songs was either born, finished, or refined in that morning writing time. I think everyone's had an early year or many...whether it was school or a job or family stuff or jogging or writing...alarms have to go off early sometimes. It just means we're all getting stuff done, which is always worth celebrating (sometimes with a nap, haha). So cheers to the early year -- I hope there's many more.

EP 1 Cover: Lyrics

Lyrics! On the cover! At first I'll admit I thought, "None of the CDs I own have lyrics on the cover." Which really, all the more reason to do it, right? It also serves as a hint to people popping the disc in for the first time...what are they supposed to be paying attention to? I worked hard on all those words all over this record, so it's nice to give them a little up front feature. Yes, I am the one that will sit with the difference between "the" and "a" for hours when I'm editing a song. An article is important. The article is important. See? I chose the words from "Blonde On Blue" because it's the tune that kind of set the tone for the rest of my writing for the year. One might call it my favored eldest child, haha.

Friday Randomization of Text

Greetings from my mechanic's waiting room, where they are cool enough to have wifi. No problems, just new belts for the car before I go to New Mexico in a week or so. No breaking down in the middle of somewhere! I think I'm dehydrated as I feel my face shriveling up while I type. That's interesting. To me, anyway. We're busy getting mastering of the EP all set up and ready to do, the artwork is coming along nicely, and I need to get some paperwork in line today. Filling out forms is ok if it's for something fun, I have decided. I am currently enthralled with Sugarland's new CD, "Love on the Inside." As I have mentioned before, they are one of my guilty Nashville pleasures, and they did a great job with this new record (please do not judge by the first single...it's summer fun but the rest goes a lot deeper). Jennifer Nettles' voice is fantastic. It's also neat that they released a version with bonus material FIRST, and will release the "normal" album in a few weeks. Usually artists release a record and then a year later you can buy the "Bonus Track" version which just makes the diehard fans buy things twice. This is the way forward, methinks. Don't mess with your fans.

EP 1 Check In

Announcement: We are done mixing. That is all!

EP 1 Cover: Some Text

Another piece of the EP cover. Yes, we did favor in putting my name on the front, haha. I decided not to go with my picture on it. The trend seems to be not to, and really...we're not in Nashville. If I wore a cowboy hat I would probably have to put that on the cover. Eek. That is not the complete title...but it does start with "The." PS: I think in my tired stupor I accidentally published a post that just gave away the whole thing, haha. So maybe if you have an RSS reader, maybe you know. Maybe. Too funny. I will make better note of "drafts" next time!

EP 1 Cover: More

So last time I showed a little piece of the cover it was just whiteness. Mean, I know...but really. It's white, what can I do? This piece is still white, but lo and behold...there's more. No, it's not symbolic of a hole in the ground or an upside down haybale. It's a wheel! This is where Emily did an excellent job of fitting in that driving theme in some of the songs...there's a vehicle on the cover. That's one of my favorite parts about this job...I have gotten to see a bunch of really cool parts of Texas and New Mexico over the past two years under the auspices of playing music...really I'm just there to be a tourist, haha. More of a draw than the views are the people and characters in each place (even ghosts!). I think nothing informs my songwriting more at this point than travel...you hear stories told from a different perspective and nothing creates a canvas in my mind like a little open road. The first draft of the cover kind of went for a car design of the one I am currently driving -- which is small and gets kickbutt gas mileage and can hold a surprising amount in its hatchback. But I asked Em to change it to the kind of vehicle I would LIKE to tour in...that goal has also informed a lot of these past 2 years of work and scheming. A little tribute to the ideas that remain in my head.

EP 1: The Cover

Folks, we're going to have some fun and reveal the cover and title of EP 1. But I'm not going to do it all at once. The way I see it, there's still a while before this little disc is in all our hands in shiny shrinkwrapped form, so I have time to drag this out. Plus, Rolling Stone does it with their covers in their blog by revealing only a little square and making people guess who it is...so why can't I? Here's the first little square of EP 1: Pretty, ain't it? No, this is not an attempt at The White Album. My very wise and thoughtful ex-boss, Karen, told me earlier this spring when I was stumped on album cover vibe that I should sit in a dark room with the tracks on headphones and try and visualize the color and texture of the songs as a whole. I tried it, and because quite a few of the tunes are about driving or were written about being on the road or some metaphorical state around that...I thought maybe I was getting "road colors" confused with what the actual RECORD colors are. When it was time to give Emily, trusted friend/killer graphic designer/voice teacher at Red Leaf, an idea of what I was envisioning, I told her about the road colors -- the sky blues and the asphalt greys and the wheat field yellows. But I also gave her a slew of CD covers from other artists that I loved, and she caught on to the Feist/Imogen Heap trend: So Emily gave me a batch of directions to choose from and sure enough, the color was white and it fits. Simple and clean, straightforward in intention and not attached to a whole lot. There's more, of course, but that's a square for another day! Oh, and the title. Well, we have a while.

Random Check In and EP 1

I started this post in the van between Davis, OK and Freyburg, TX. Then I got distracted by the shiny lights of a convenience store stop. Here is it, plus some EP 1 news tacked on. July 4th notes: Oklahoma beer is different than other beer. By law, beer sold in Oklahoma must have a 3.2% alcohol content, which is different than the usual percentage of, well...everywhere else. You CAN buy full strength beer, but it has to be at a store that sells beer and liquor only, and they can't refrigerate it. It intrigues me that someone thought about this so thoroughly. So apparently it's a big deal to have "Texas beer" in Oklahoma...stronger stuff. It doesn't seem to taste any different, but it might explain why my usual post-concert threshold was higher in Davis than usual. Ahem. They keep talking about the "mountains" around the state and I saw no mountains. I remarked that perhaps a song hook could be, "I'm as high as an Oklahoma mountain and drunk on Oklahoma beer...and I'm still completely sober." (I kid...I had a great time there). There is at least one Indian fusion music station out of the Dallas area, and today they were randomly interrupting the music to state facts about America, like how many people visit national parks in Washington state per year, and how many people immigrated through Ellis Island. I forgot both numbers. That was some wailing sitar, though. Sometimes being a traveling musician means changing your clothes at stoplights, or perhaps changing your shirt while driving. There are signs pointing the way to Hidden Lake along I-35 in OK. Doesn't that defeat the purpose of hiding the lake? July 8th Notes: The artwork for EP 1 is just about there. I'm so happy about it. Emily nailed the vibe...she sent a few options so now I have to do what I fear doing and...make a decision. Gasp. The mixing for EP 1 is also almost there! The four tracks we sent to Dallas came back AWESOME. Some little back and forth to be done but man. Phil Hill is mixing them and he is the man. Sounds like a record.

Mixology

Dan and I spent a good chunk of Tuesday mixing a tune with George, who is a most excellent dude and a really cool mixer. He took "Blonde on Blue" and brought out some neat aspects of our recording (what I like to call "hairy piano" now) while we watched and soaked in the mixing process. Mixers get the fun job of getting the picture of what the artist and producer want/aim for while giving their own touch to the project. I suspect we could give "Blonde on Blue" to 5 mixers and come up with some pretty different sounding tunes, even though it's all the exact same set of tracks I played on. Cool. "New Mexico Boy" is mixed to the point that I smile like a dork when I hear it, so I call that a good finished product. Yay for growly, sweaty guitars! That night we saw Girlyman play at the Cactus, who pretty much rocked the room and were a joy. Dan produced Girlyman Nate's solo record so it was neat to see Nate play. Go see them. Actually, they're in Albuquerque tonight, for you Albuquirks. P.S. Here's Mixer George playing bass on Letterman a couple weeks ago with Jakob Dylan. Cool.

EP 1 Check-In

Well. We've got one tune mixed and 4 more to go! What a process. One I will discuss more after we have a few more mixes under our belt and I know what I'm saying. It's a cool thing, to see a baby song grow up and sound like something that fits in with your iTunes playlist full of other artists. Neato. On that note, things I have been listening to lately: Mescalito: Ryan Bingham (I saw Ryan open for Patty Griffin and he caught my attention. For someone opening for Patty Griffin to catch my attention and not just leave me thinking, "Man, I wish Patty was playing now" is a triumph. The record is great). Trouble In Mind: Hayes Carll (Anyone who writes a song called "She Left Me for Jesus" wins. Same for "Bad Liver and a Broken Heart"). All I Intended To Be: Emmylou Harris (How cool is she? She makes great records, period, end of story). Here's "Red Dirt Girl", my one of my favorite Emmylou tunes.

EP 1 Check In / When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth

It's still coming, this little record we made. I have enlisted the services of a talented friend and graphic artist, and she was the recipient of a large and laborious email brain dump of artwork ideas. Hey, she asked for it! I am excited to see what she comes up with. Dan and I also had some options in figuring out who is going to mix. We think perhaps we have narrowed it down and that excites me. However, our new mantra is high intention / low attachment, so we'll just see what happens, eh? I have also decided to go cardboard on the packaging, recycled. It's a minor thing but if my CD doesn't contribute to the piles of plastic everywhere, that would be nice. And that's that. On an unrelated note, here's what happens when you let my niece, Erica, and I close to my nephews' plastic dinosaur collection. Carnage.

a happy little thing

Wowsers. This summer is going to be fun. Along with hopes and plans (knock on wood) that the EP will be done by August, I found out this week I'll be opening for Terri Hendrix at Threadgill's in Austin on August 16th! Mark that sucker in yo' calendar! Color me EXCITED!!! (Color me in the Albuquerque Sunport, too.)

Settling and Nicknames

All moved, love the new place. I hung stuff on the walls, which makes me feel at home. I'm not one to leave a box unpacked for weeks or months. If it doesn't need unpacking, I might not need to own it. I got one of those email survery forwards yesterday, where you state your preference for things like sun vs. rain, chocolate vs. vanilla, and beach vs. mountains...essential things like that. One of the questions was "Do you have any nicknames?" I've never had them, really. Jana Banana was about it. Since working at Red Leaf, though, I have acquired a few more. I started to list: janabanana j-po janapo po popo juxtapo pocephus dilated poples po chi minh (new as of yesterday...thanks, Geno!) I'm starting to think about album artwork and such. Weird process. I am saving photos and color schemes and other artwork I like. Something will come from somewhere and make itself obvious, no doubt. Now for some coffee to make itself obvious in my cup!

Et cetera

Yes, I realize my photos have disintegrated into "look what I can do with stock effects!" land. But it's fun. This post, like most of the things I do, was brought to you by Starbucks. Note the new old logo on the cup. I like it. Notes: - Today is my last day at the county job. Thanks, county! Clover power. - My Chile Rant seems to have sparked a lot of hometown love over on Duke City Fix. I'm glad to know I'm not alone. (Warning: for you people not from Nuevo Mexico, there's some "out-of-stater" mocking...but come on, we're not threatening). - At 6 AM Thursday morning I am pretty sure either a bomb went off or a single giant crack of thunder made enough noise to wake me up AND freak me out in one second. I'm hoping I'm not the only one who heard that. (Update: I am not -- my coworker and neighbor did, too. Phew). - I got to see Susan Gibson and Shelley King songswap Wednesday night. That made me happy. - Dan's going on tour for 3 weeks. It makes me proud that his band gets to kick butt, and sad that he won't be in Austin! Thank goodness for internets and in his case, iPhone geekery. When he gets back we hit EP 1 mixing hard and also start woodshedding guitar, voice, writing, and all that good stuff. Excited! - Apparently my "experimentation in college" (that sounds a lot worse than it is) is fine and not all that weird...because a lovely commenter named Miss Tenacity says, "College is not necessarily the time to limit oneself to experiments with chile in typically sweet foods... I'm *ahem* well past college and I STILL put chile in my oatmeal, and I've made a wicked-good batch of green chile ice cream for a dinner party." Whaaaaaat? Can I come over? Can I can I? Awesome. - I am packing to go to Winnsboro! Woohoo! I promise to take decent road trip photos.