05/21/12

It's looking like the blog will surpass 2500 views over the next two weeks! I see that you keep coming back, so let me know why: Free stuff for FEEDBACK!

Alright, let's get into it...

I spent most of Monday and Tuesday knocking out mix work to finish up the Arch Drive Goodbye CD. I had to squeeze in some more tweaks throughout the week to finish it up, but it's done in time for our show with them and Echovox at the Knickerbocker this Saturday (INFO & RSVP). Woot!

You can check out their tunes HERE.

Wednesday night I headed downtown for the second-to-last Taste of Tippecanoe meeting of the year. The Taste is less than a month out and the crew is getting jazzed! All of the event details are on the Taste site (follow link above). Discount tickets are available at the Tippecanoe Arts Federation site and local Pay Less grocery stores.

After the meeting and loading a ton of sushi in my belly, I headed over to Lafayette Live at the theater to hang with other musician folk. Since I wasn't on the schedule and had interest from some peeps about Whistle When We Break Down, I passed around my iPod.

2 things:

• It's funny to see dudes jamming out to an iPod at a live music show.
• Be careful of sharing your art *unsolicited* with random people at bars. You may find that they're crabby, you've annoyed them, they don't like it, and that your music isn't 'Rock n Roll.' :-)

Tough crowd...

On the way home from downtown I stopped by Brady(Little Boxes)'s crib for some jamming. We got on a roll and finished up after 4am. That dude is a great player, ambassador of the local scene, and friend. What a riot!!

Luckily, I got home in enough time to grab four hours of sleep, take care of the pups, and clean up before venturing back out to play at the Purdue Farmers Market.

Here's the set:

"Before it Gets to Me"
"Pocket and Soul"
"Amputee" - Oceansize cover
"Settling"
"Guilt that Keeps on Giving"
"Dear Reason"
"Imagine" John Lennon/A Perfect Circle cover
"Faithfully" - Journey cover
Out of Our Hands

It was a good call by the University Sustainability crew to move me to a different location. I was in the middle of *what I'm guessing was* a thousand+ people passing through. It allowed me to interact/chat more with the crowd too. I hear there was a lot of pictures snapped. I'm guessing most have the caption of 'Why is this guy playing?' :-)

Really, I was hired! Sorry for being in your way!!

Later Thursday night I wrapped up ADG's This Is a Story... and chummed around with home-skillet, Justin Reagin after giving a guitar lesson.

With some help from my awesome neighbor, I loaded up PA in the van on Friday and headed downtown to share a show with Mr. Evan Ryan at Java Roaster.

Here's the set:

"Zzyzx Rd" - Stone Sour cover
"Settling"
"Dear Reason"
"Imagine" John Lennon/A Perfect Circle cover
"Before it Gets to Me"
"Pocket and Soul"
"Amputee" - Oceansize cover
"My Rx"
"No Second Chance" - Adrenaline cover
"Faithfully" - Journey cover
"Out of Our Hand"

Special thanks to my old day-job and local music buddies for stopping out for the early show! If you missed Evan's set, he killed it!! I never would've guessed I'd hear him cover Judas Priest's "Breaking the Law." It worked. It really, really worked!

After tearing down, I headed out for a night on the town; catching sets from The Shake Ups & The Enders at the Lafayette Theater, PLOT at the Knickerbocker, and Atarilogic at Black Sparrow. No one disappointed! During my adventure I enjoyed some good company and conversation with friends from Minsky Kinks, The Future Lovers, Green Room Rockers, The Mound Builders, Snorb!, & Arch Drive Goodbye. It's cool to see so many groups out actively supporting the scene.

Pat yourselves on the backs!!

Saturday I had plans to attend the Lafayette Brawlin' Dolls match, but got a little side-tracked celebrating the birthday of Brian from The Mound Builders. Karl from The Disillusioned also took part in the madness. His gift to the birthday boy was a home-brew Atari Punk Console; which sounded like a train making love to an erupting volcano through a Brian's JCM 800 and pedal-board. IT WAS MADNESS!

Apologies to the LBD crew for bailing out. I'll get there eventually! :-)

On Sunday I helped Matt from The Cocaine Wolves with some transportation and grunt work. In retrospect, I should've built a trap before meeting up with him so I could steal and hold him hostage at IND HQ for the next round of recording. That dude gets a monster guitar sound on his recordings. I must have this!!

That does it for this week's update.

Remember, you can subscribe to the blog, follow @ChrisJuneIND on Twitter, and 'like' Chris June IND on Facebook. Sharing the links is appreciated! :-)

And... don't forget to get your free copy of "Before it Gets to Me" when you purchase Whistle When We Break Down from the Bandcamp Page! That's 4 songs for $3!!!

Also, "Dear Reason" will disappear from the iTunes and Amazon.com stores in two weeks...

Thanks for stopping by! Have a great week!! I'll see you at the Knickerbocker on Saturday night!!!

Over and out

05/14/12

After a week consisting of celebrating Mother's Day, booking, promoting, performing, and mixing, I've got another update cooked up for you.

I'm glad to see you back again! Hey, have you been losing weight? :-)

Ok, ok... here we go!!

On Monday I got into mixing the new ARCHDRIVE GOODBYE EP, This is a Story. With "Autumn Reigns" approved by their crew, the plan is to dig into the other tracks and have everything wrapped up by the end of this week; setting them up to use the show with us and Echovox at the Knickerbocker on Saturday, May 26th for their CD release extravaganza. INFO & RSVP HERE

I got my 'vote' on for primary day on Tuesday. There was only one contested race on my ballot, but I helped pick the winner! For my fellow Hoosiers that haven't been a part of the process, you can register online HERE.

I've had conversations with people that believe their voice doesn't matter. If you share that thought, I'm challenging you to prove it this year. Get registered, familiar with the issues, and don't stay home on November 6th.

After completing my civic duty and before IND practice, I picked up my little brother and headed to Indy to chum around a bit. His band, Thor, has a show coming up on July 11th in town. I'm looking forward to seeing the dudes throw down again. There's a lot more talent there than their age suggests. :-)

Pancake from Gold N Tattoos in Frankfort made the trip over to the theater to hang out for Lafayette Live on Wednesday. Between great sets by ADG, Evan Ryan, and Little Boxes, we shared cocktails and war stories. Thanks to him, I learned about the launch of Evasive. It made for a good midweek riot.

Speaking of Evan, he's joining me this Friday for an unplugged show at Java Roaster downtown on Friday. INFO & RSVP HERE

After receiving a call last week from my bud Sarah (wife of Karl from The Disillusioned), I got the hook-up playing at the Purdue Farmers Market on Thursday.

Here's the set:

"Before it Gets to Me"
"My Rx"
"Imagine" - John Lennon/A Perfect Circle cover
"Settling"
"Dear Reason"
"Amputee" - Oceansize cover
"Guilt that Keeps on Giving"
"Pocket and Soul"
"Zzyzx Road" - Stone Sour cover
"No Second Chance" - Adrenaline cover
"Out of Our Hands"

Special thanks to the University Sustainability crew for having me out and sneaking me into some PRESS. I had a blast playing outside on a beautiful day! It's always a pleasure work in conjunction with local farmers and businesses!! A reporter from an Ag magazine grabbed some video during the set. I'll share it if I find it online. :-)

I'm on the schedule to return for an encore this Thursday (5/17/2012). Maybe you'll take a long lunch to come visit...  INFO & RSVP

On Friday I decided to keep a low profile in the studio and started catching up on art and adding shows to the EVENTS CALENDAR before IND practice.

Saturday I accepted an invite to visit Rhodes Amplification and jam on the new Artemis. It's a 3-Channel/High-Gain/Rack-mount/Tube 'monster' of an amp that's hand-built across the river in West Lafayette, IN. It has the personality of my Dishaster 4790, but with more power and a million extra knobs/switches and features. I'd get into the details, but I'm not sure where to start! Perhaps it's best to demo the amp yourself. If you get the opportunity, take your checkbook. It's gorgeous looks and mean tone may prove too much to pass up.

That does it for this week's update.

Remember, you can subscribe to the blog, follow @ChrisJuneIND on Twitter, and 'like' Chris June IND on Facebook. Sharing the links is appreciated! :-)

Also, get your free copy of "Before it Gets to Me" when you purchase Whistle When We Break Down from the Bandcamp Page! That's 4 songs for $3!!!

Plus, you'll be extra familiar with the material when I see you at the shows this week. You're coming, right?!? :-)

Thanks for stopping by! Have a great week!!!

Over and out

05/07/12

It's Monday and do I have a novel for you! In preparation, I started this week's update yesterday.

So, are you ready for the scoop?

Here we go!

On Wednesday we headed down to do a short set at Lafayette Live to plug Friday's show.

Here's the set:

"My Rx"
"Feed Me a Lie"
"Pocket and Soul"
"Heartkiller" - H.I.M. cover
"Out of Our Hands"

The all-around talented multi-instrumentalist, Ben Hanssens, joined us with some sax-action on "Out of Our Hands." It would be a ton of fun to get more peeps involved in jamming songs at acoustic shows (electric shows are are super calculated, making it more difficult). Shoot me a message and I'll get you some music.

After a couple months of regrouping and re-planning the event, the Artists United benefit took place on Friday night.

Mojo and Schumm got the show started off right with some twang. Initially the plan was for Mojo to be joined by the full Red & The Roosters crew, but issues came up. Many thanks to him for not canceling and soldiering on with the show! Mojo is one of my favorite guitarists in town. In addition to his great voice, the dude can play kazoo while jamming on guitar!! This is always good. :-)

Up next was Traveling, Broke, and Out of Gas. Artists United was their first of three shows of the weekend. Those dudes (and dudette) are troopers, for sure. They played Friday night without their second guitarist, but the four of them filled up the sonic space and delivered a great roots-y set. Cody & Rachael's vocals were superb! Additionally, upright bass through a full stack and a shredded bow from possessed viola jamming = awesome.

PLOT kept the show and energy rolling with their tasty blend of Hip Hop. Not only did they sound great, but they were the real-deal *visually* during their slot. Shane and Justin (aka Vision and Suspect) are top-notch, professional dudes too.

Side-note: I totally forgot that Shane and I had a college English class together... :-)

After PLOT, Minsky Kinks did their 3rd set of the night (they performed between the musical acts). Kristine, err Maella Cai Vane, runs a tight ship, and her and the other MK ladies (Roxie Vette, Roxie Despoiné, and Lady Daniella Del Toro) stole the show. They were naughty, the were tasteful, they were suggestive, they were classy, and they were... damn ENTERTAINING! The crowd was engaged and yelled their approval frequently!!

Finally, we powered up and closed down the night with some mean/raunchy rock.

Here's the set:

"My Rx"
"Feed Me a Lie"
"Pocket and Soul"
"Heartkiller" - H.I.M. cover
"Before it Gets to Me"
"A Veil Lifted"
"The Shadow I Will Leave
"Boys of Summer" - Don Henley/Atari's cover
"Out of Our Hands"

Photo by @RyanRollins

Overall, the night could be summed up by one word: FUN! Thanks to my fellow Artists United for putting on a great show, Brady Joseph for helping with sound, the Lafayette Theater crew (Ashley, Mike, and Seema) for busting it behind the scenes, and my boys Chris and Drew for being soldiers all night and helping out with the door.

So that we're all on the same page: while I received several personal 'thanks' and 'shout-outs' throughout the evening, I didn't make this event happen.

We did.

We made for a great team and the show couldn't have been pulled off without all of you!

Also, I'm super thankful for the Tippecanoe Arts Federation crew, the dudes from The Aardvark Eats, The Enders, The Mound Builders, my old pal Cody Hughes (Chemcoma), and all others in attendance for showing some scene love!! Kudos to Mr. Tim Brouk too for hooking up a sweet article to plug the event!

In the end, we raised $365 for charity. It's my hope that Artists United will continue on with new shows/lineups and keep raising money for great causes. If you're interested in keeping it rolling, get in touch with me.

I closed out the blog week at Aces rocking some unplugged tunes with my bros Marty C, James Saqui, and Kyle Bledsoe. Though Lafayette isn't that small of a town and I'm still building awareness on what I'm doing, I decided that I'd been playing a lot of the same original tunes and started a little cover-heavy.

Here's the set:

"Zzyzx Rd" - Stone Sour Cover
"Imagine" - John Lennon/A Perfect Circle cover
"When Doves Cry" * - Prince cover
"Amputee" - Oceansize cover
"Before it Gets to Me"
"Settling"
"Pocket and Soul"
"Out of Our Hands"

* Dan-O, the man at Aces Pub and a local celebrity, jumped up mid-set to play the Prince song. It was really him featuring me! :-)

The Aces crowd on Sunday nights always confuses me, but it's good confusion. There are always a ton of people there (most shut the place down at 3am) and they're really receptive to live music. James and Marty had great sets and Mr. Bledsoe downright set the stage on fire. That dude is an insane guitarist.

I'll be running the shindig down there on June 3rd and have the loud and proud IND crew there on July 21st.

There's your heads up. :-)

That does it for this week's update. I'm going to get down to business mixing the new ARCHDRIVE GOODBYE CD, booking, playing at the Purdue Farmers Market on Thursday, and promoting the next rock show (May 26th at The Knickerbocker: INFO & RSVP HERE) 

Remember, you can subscribe to the blog, follow @ChrisJuneIND on Twitter, and 'like' Chris June IND on Facebook. Sharing the links is appreciated! :-)

Also, get your free copy of "Before it Gets to Me" when you purchase Whistle When We Break Down from the Bandcamp Page! That's 4 songs for $3!!!

Thanks for stopping by! Have a great week!!!

Over and out