who will give us love?

almost a month ago, tate from the lionelle and spooky moon was hit while riding his scooter home from practice. short story, he's going to be out of commission for a while. in the midst of this bad situation, many of his friends in salt lake's artist community are doing what they can to help.

on thursday, november 13th, blackhounds, mury, the hotness, all time ending and sam from ask for the future are playing kilby court. it's $6 at the door and all the money goes to help tate once he gets back on his feet (he shattered his pelvis so it could be a while). kilby's donating the venue, the bands are all playing for free and we're handling promotion. please pass the info on and help rally support for tate. let's sell out kilby and have fun helping someone we all love.

Travel Travel Travel

Chad, Tate (the lionelle), and i all loaded up in a rental car and drove to California on Sunday night. We realized that northern California has such beautiful weather this time of year, and has made us not want to come back to the 12 feet of snow in Salt Lake. In our wonderful road trip we got to stay and hang out with Brighten, while they were in the studio recording their upcoming ep. We had the pleasure to see them lay down some vocal and guitar tracks. be excited for this, i know we are.

hello, from last night's show - jan. 18 at solid ground.

swans of never.

ole bravo.

the lionelle.

listener

tim and eric awesome, listener awesomer?

check this out...



catch listener with his band on friday, january 18th at the cafe. get online tickets here. olé bravo, the lionelle and swans of never are also on the bill.

what's in a name?

i first was introduced to the listener legend a few years ago. i've often wondered what happens to hip hop artists after they stop making hip hop (i assumed that they finished college and became babies-daddies). in the case of dan smith, aka listener, he just started making a different kind of music, one he calls "talk music." i know, sounds impressive right?

it's been a several year process now and i think he's finally on the verge of pulling something off. his new cd "return to struggleville" comes out january 14th and will finally deliver in cd form, his brand of music. one way or the other, he manages to tour relentlessly with a full band (which includes his wife kristen) and make a living playing talk music.

talk music (as best as i can describe it), is a mix of shouting, screaming and singing while always remaining in its basest form, beat poetry. it's similar to mewithoutYou and modest mouse vocally, but mixes in beats and a lot of human rhythm (including, but not limited to: clapping, banging on a washing machine and ratchets).

now that i've caught you all up, pay attention: listener will be playing the cafe on friday, january 18th with the lionelle, olé bravo and swans of never. tickets are officially $7, but if you track down someone from the cafe or from one of the local bands, they'll sell you a ticket for $5. listener has played the cafe twice and both times, it ends up being one of our highlights. now he's graced our fair city with a weekend date and hopefully it will pay off for him and everyone that goes to the show...buy tickets! seriously, buy tickets online at: www.24tix.com.

oh! the review

i hung out with tate from the lionelle today. if tate were a mommy, the lionelle would be his baby. to call him the lead singer is like coloring a picture with only two crayons. calling him lead singer also assumes that much of what he does as front-man is singing, which is a highly discussed point of contention.

in the few lionelle shows i've been to, i've noticed that a portion of the crowd simply cannot handle that tate chooses to warble and shout when it's plainly obvious that he can sing normally. the difference here is that tate isn't aiming to sound like mae (or what mae tries to sound like after an afternoon with the auto-tuner). he could if he wanted. he just doesn't want to. if i'm not mistaken, isn't that rock and roll? knowing you're different and not caring?

at any rate, if tate was the mommy and the lionelle was his baby, oh! the company that we keep would be the babies' shiny new toy that isn't just shiny and new, but is actually a really great toy like one of those learning toys from germany that helps kids learn.

oh! isn't a local cd. the lionelle just happen to live here and record here. oh! sounds like it was made by people that make music for a living. it has rich textures, multiple layers, guest musicians, guest vocals and lots of fun in between. if it were a soup, it would be equal parts appleseed cast and mewithoutYou with a bit of bright eyes (bear in mind that i hate comparisons like this).

so here it is. they're throwing a FREE cd release party this saturday at slowtrain (i can't wait until they know we exist!). they'll have oh! available for $10 and the lionelle are playing with calico, tolchock trio and paul jacobsen. it's free and you should go. i can't.