Greetings Interns. Just a quick note to let you all know that I’m jacked to roll into Billings this weekend. It’s gonna be a good time! Upon my return to Helena, I’ll be logging onto nbc.com to watch last night’s episode of The Office. I didn’t get a chance to watch it. Don’t tell me what happens. I freaking love that show. See you in Billings!
Last week before Keehr and I left for our duet tour, I dropped 20 skins on iTunes for all the records by a band called Code Anchor. Keehr turned me onto them and I’ve been jonesing on them since.They’re based out of New York State and they’re freaking amazing. Upon checking out their webiste this morning, I noticed it’s all brand new (from last week)! I really like it. Last week on their MySpace page, they weren’t signed to any label. I checked their MySpace after seeing their new homepage this morning and the only thing different was that they were signed to a “major.” Hmmm. I wonder, does that mean we can claim them as part of the indie culture for a little longer? My guess is their music will slowly but surely break into the mainstream within a year or two. It’s bittersweet, because I’ve really been digging the fact that they (were) indie. Now that they’re not, I feel almost like I’m a bit let down.
It’s a common story. Band gets a following on it’s own, signs to a label, and the original fans feel like they’ve “sold out.” Any of you out there have stories like this? I’d like to hear about them. If you have a blog and have posted about this very thing, be sure to leave me a link to your blog here in the comments.
We made it. We’re home. What an incredible experience. We had a total blast. Thank you to everyone in Minnesota and Wisconsin who made our tour so awesome. We really missed being able to rock out with A.J. and Levi, but we look forward to returning next year with the whole crew. In the words of Cody Canada, THANK YOU GUYS FOR BEING THE COOLEST, MAN.
I wrote the song “I’m Irish” back in the fall of 2000 when I was living in Missoula. While driving to Bozo for a solo gig, I wrote the song down on a stray piece of paper in my car. Upon getting to the gig that night I had to look at that paper to remember the lyrics. Mostly I wrote it to make Josh laugh, but little did I know that the song would start a strange tradition.
When Josh and I were playing weekly acoustic duet gigs at the Rocking R Bar (in beautiful, historic downtown Bozeman) we started the tradition of the “Guinness race.” At the end of “I’m Irish” we’d have two (or more) people get up on the bar and shotgun a pint of stout. Our friend Mark Thompson only would get beat by our buddy Mark Wing (who used to drink two pints to everyone else’s one pint and still win). All these years later, it’s great to party with Thompson in Minneapolis, and it’s even funnier to see him win this race against nine other people. What chaos.
