Not much to report on right now - many projects are on the back burner, including a few that I haven't yet mentioned here. One thing that I keep forgetting to come back to is the radio show. That's on hold until next month when, with any luck at all, we'll tape a bunch of 'em. As to when they'll be online, I'm not sure yet; I'll get back to you.
In the meantime here are some great bands to check out:
Suzy and Los Quattro were brought to my attention by the right honorable Lindsay Hutton of Scotland's N.B.T. I am a sucker for female fronted rock combos and if you are too this one will get your toes tappin'.
From Milwaukee comes the Chinese Telephones, a fine act in the tradition of the best of the East Bay groups of the late 80s like Crimpshrine. There are still a lot of bands out there that try to copy the feel and the vibe and they still almost always get it wrong; the CTs get it right and add a little Midwest wintry angst to the mix, some by way of Husker Du but mostly straight from a good old fashioned heart-on-the-sleeve ingenuousness common to people from places that are generally frozen for around half the year.
Finally there's Project 27, a band with a more West coast slick-punk style, which surprisingly doesn't make my head ache. Must be because they're smart enough to keep the songs short; that they can write circles around most bands of that ilk doesn't hurt either.
First things first - the re-release of the first, self-titled Riverdales album. This one has as many bonus songs as tracks on the original album, bringing it up to 24. I would've loved to re-mix this one but we looked in the Asian Man cupboard and the cupboard was bare.
One question one or two of you may have is "Why the new cover?" Simple - for reasons that now elude me I apparently gave copyright ownership of the cover pics to the photographer. That was fine while the record was on Lookout but I was a bit shaky on the legality of the whole thing with the re-release. I had no idea how to contact the pic-snapper so we went with a photo that had been shot by some German guy and his light-in-the-loafers assistant in Munich when we were on the Green Day tour. I'd never seen the pic up close as my only copy was on a slide but suffice it to say that it turns out you can catch homosexuality after all, at least temporarily. Seriously, that pic was gayer than a Navy rimjob, friends. It had to go. Enter Simon the resourceful Scot who, with a deadline of less than 24 hours, searched through his blushing bride's personal effects and dug up the photo that now adorns the cover of the reissue. It's kind of stupid but let's face it, kind of stupid is preferable to totally queer. I mean, I'm sure all of you would've found it hilarious, but I've got to try to walk around in my community without getting foreign objects hurled at my head by angry villagers so you'll have to find another source of amusement I'm afraid.
The live stuff is okay I think, though it was the first show of the tour; we actually got to be a pretty darn good live band by the 40th show or so (and of course no recordings of these phantom good performances exist which is either a stroke of terribly bad luck or terrifically good luck depending on whether or not you think I’m a liar. And if you do think I’m a liar I’d be happy to step outside with you and settle it right now. Yeah, that’s what I thought, tough guy…). The previously unreleased stuff is hit and miss. Vapid's tune is great but mine went unreleased for 11 years for good reason I think. Anyway, the album's out on Asian Man officially on Tuesday. I'm too lazy to link, just go to their site (asianmanrecords.com. For the love of God, don't go to asianman.com unless you want to get an eyeful of exactly what you ought to expect from a site called asianman.com). As for me, it's hard to express an opinion on the record as a whole as I haven't actually yet seen the re-issue. Three cheers to Mike Park for getting copies out early to the fans but come on big fella, send a little sugar to the guys who harvested the cane why don't ya.
Speaking of the Riverdales, we're about a month away from sealing the deal on the unfinished tracks for Phase 3. I think there are five but we seem to be missing one and frankly I've got my hands full here at Weasel Acres (f.k.a. Weasel Manor; since we've moved to the country from the city and I've become a gentleman farmer it’s really no longer a Manor) so who knows if it’ll ever be tracked down. Adam Alive (from It's Alive Records - again, too lazy to link, ask Google to do it for you) is finishing up the new cover for that one. The art was good on most of that record thanks to the talented and generous Massimo Zannoni from Italy's infamous Manges but frankly that uninspired cover was a result of everyone involved being bereft of ideas. I'd like to think it's because we shot our creative load on the actual songs but let's face it, I was probably too occupied with roto hockey and fondue parties by that point to be screwing around with such hoo-ha. That snafu is being rectified by Mr. Alive as we speak, so let's all keep our fingers crossed and hope that something else doesn't go wrong. I still don't have a release date for that one but I'm hoping for Feb. or March 2007.
On the solo record front I'm still in a holding pattern. Some well-meaning souls in the comment section have expressed concern and even dismay that my recent forays into the world of proper vocal technique may render my whiny, nasally, head-clogged-up-with-snot voice a little too smooth for their liking. Rest assured that I haven't turned into Pavarotti yet. I'm just learning how to sing without hurting myself - my vocal coach is under strict orders not to tamper with the amateurish and grating timbre of your songbird's sweet yelping. We all know these tattered chords, rough around the edges as they may be, have been known to lay a few golden eggs, and I'm not quite ready to quit squeezing the karats out of the old pipes yet so put down the petitions and torches if you will.
I'm mainly waiting on demos from Mike K. who, being a little bit busy with selling a zillion records and playing in front of massive crowds of dudes who want to be him and chicks who want to do him, doesn't have all the time in the world to sort through and make sense of the audio scribblings of an ancient punk rocker. Still, he'll be burning the midnight oil on the next break and I expect to see results soon-ish.
Last thing is, it seems that offering up used and about-to-be-discarded pieces of my clothing has somewhat of a positive effect on sales via giveaway contests. God only knows why (in fact, if St. Peter does indeed let me cross the pearly threshold my first question to the Almighty will be, "Why would anyone want a ratty, holey, smelly pair of my old sneakers? And please tell me I'm not going to be rooming with him."). Still, mine is not to question why, mine is but to doff my skivvies, hand them over to Interpunk.com and pray that it helps to create a few sales. In this case I am considering surrendering the leather jacket that I've been wearing since 1992 or 3, though said surrender is not without its terms: namely an amount sufficient to replace the made-in-Pakistan, bought for 80 bucks at an Army-Navy surplus jacket with a nice new Schott Perfecto. If somebody ponies up the cash the jacket will be up for grabs, otherwise I'll sew up the pockets yet again and keep running around in it for another 14 years looking like Rip Van Ramone; I don't give a damn either way.