A Few Photos

I'm trying to get stuff off my phone/camera before I go on vacation next week, so I have room to take and store lots of new pictures, so I'm going to try to post stuff that's been accumulating here in the upcoming days. First, some pictures from last Friday.s show at The Southern.

Backstage:

Borrowed Beams of Light:

The Astronomers:

I should have some videos to post soon!

Kuchar Madness

It's been sort of quiet in Posters land lately. We've been working on the record, and getting closer to done. Lots of trumpet recording, which is basically done (I think). I took a picture of our new microphone. It's a ribbon mic and I got it mostly for trumpet, though Dave claims, paradoxically, that it sounds less good than and indistinguishable from the SM57 we normally use. Anyway, I think I'm going to keep it because it's the first mic I've found that sounds good on the Stang Ray - the amp we use live. That amp sounds magical when you're in the room with it, but until now I've never found a mic that could capture its sound on record.

Anyway, I thought I'd post an update with something non-Posters-related but still important, which is that I found a blog the other day with a bunch of George Kuchar movies posted, including the elusive Pagan Rhapsody, which I'd been dying to see for a long time. This is a real find, as George Kuchar (unlike his brother Mike) doesn't want his film (that is, non-video) work released on DVD, so some of these movies are tough to see.

I'm glad to report that Pagan Rhapsody is every bit as good as I'd hoped. What an ending!

That Was Fun

Wow! It's been a month since anything has been posted here. I have some videos of bands we've played with recently that I keep meaning to post.

Here's some pictures of last night, though.

The Ha-Rang

The Ha-Rang again

Marie from Corsair's kickass plexi head

People outside

Gull also played, and I have about thirty seconds of video of him, but I didn't take any pictures (it was too dark). Gull, The Ha-Rang, and Corsair were all really great. It was an evening of really good local bands that are all really different from one another. Something for everybody!

RIP The Taphouse. It was a good place.

09-23-2010 at the Taphouse

Here are some pictures I took the other night. For some reason there's a lot of blank space above them in this post. It's because of the weird Blogger formatting, I guess, which seems like it's going to let you edit html but then has all sorts of weird display stuff that it adds when you actually publish the post.

	Demon Beat
	Elephant Child

Recording

I haven't blagued in a while, but we've been busy recording. I took some arty photos of us making our record.

Here you can see Kris rocking the drums hard. It's all blurry because that's how fast he plays now. It can't be captured by a camera. That image is actually from last Wednesday. I think he was recording Not the Strut (or possibly the all-new version of That Thing You Don't).


Here's one of Dave playing guitar on Not the Strut. It's from today.


Renee was reading on the stairs while that was going down.

We're getting stuff done a lot faster than when we recorded our EP, but we also have a lot more songs to get through this time. About three times as many!

I'm hoping we'll have a demo of Not the Strut -- finished electric guitar, drums, and keyboard takes with scratch takes for bass, acoustic guitar, and vocals -- to post here this week. It will also be on all the various pages we maintain (assuming it actually gets done).

We also worked today on some demos for songs of mine that I haven't played with the band yet. One is an old song I used to play with Dave and Justin, and the other one is a new song that I haven't played with anybody yet.

Memorial Day Rockin' Eve-Eve-Eve

Yesterday was the Friday that led off Memorial Day weekend here in Charlottesville (and I guess throughout the rest of the country as well). We played the Tea Bazaar with Paper Fleet and Borrowed Beams of Light and a good time was had by all. All three bands were different from one another, but similar enough that people who liked one probably liked all three. I know I did!

The Posters played first, and we were a lot sloppier than usual, but it was fun and I think the general outline of each song still pretty much translated to people. I broke a bass string, which I've never done before, even just in practice!

Next up was Paper Fleet. Their singer / guitar player guy looked much like Jordan Catalano.


They should consider changing their band's name to Frozen Embryos. Or, you know, Residue. Also, they should get Rayanne to sing "I Wanna Be Sedated" with them. (Actually, no, they shouldn't.)


I'm sorry these pictures are so bad. I forgot my camera (which takes pretty terrible pictures anyway) and I was stuck with my phone. Renee took a lot of pictures with her new camera (which she claims is "almost as good as Josh's") and she'll probably post them on fbook.

The Beams were on next. Here they are tuning up.


I was pretty impressed with how many people in town know all the words to their songs. Admittedly about half their lyrics are just "ahh" or "ohh," but still, people knew all the other words too.

As you can see in the picture below, the whole band is saying "ahhhh." I think this was the beginning of "Thousand Year Powernap," the song with the bass line so infectious that Dave cannot refrain from playing it in practice whenever we're not practicing one of our actual songs.


Local photographer and video rental impresario Andy is taking a picture of the Beams here.


I went to the back of the room to get a shot of how huge the crowd was. I'm not sure if as many people were there for our set, but even if it was half of what you see here it was a pretty big crowd for us, and it was really fun to share the stage with the Beams. Adam is a pop songsmith of the highest order!


Anyway, that was a badass show. Other than breaking a string it was a totally positive experience. I still have "Kids Are Great" stuck in my head! At the moment we don't have anything lined up until mid July, so it's going to be nose-to-the-grind-stone recording for a while.

Workday/Schoolnight and Young Adult Fiction

This is going to be a photo-heavy post, so I've made the thumbnails really small. You can click on them to see them big.


Last night's show was off that hook, dude! The first act was Workday/Schoolnight, one guy and about twelve machines working together to fuck shit up. It was all of the good stuff about experimental electronic music (danceable beats, Human League-esque synth hooks, smart lyrics and really funny samples from found materials) with none of the things that can sometimes make that music unlistenable or boring (i.e. not having actual songs).


The awesome lyrics and sound samples -- many from what sounded like early-'90s self hypnosis and life coaching cassettes -- really created a bleak picture of the irredeemable distopia that is modern America, but this message of alienation and hopelessness was delivered in the form of a first class dance party act. I can't imagine a more fun way to reflect on the failings of this hellscape we all inhabit.


The Posters played in the middle slot, and after us was Young Adult Fiction, from Richmond. Seeing them play, all the Pavement comparisons started to make sense to me. There's almost more of a visual resemblance than a musical one. It's not just that they're five dudes playing Pavement instruments (including a Bob Nastanovich guy), but they actually look a little like the guys in Pavement. But in a weird way. Check it out: The Malkmus guy looks like Malkmus, but the Spiral Stairs looks like a cross between Steve West and Mark Ibold! And then the Steve West looks like Bob Nastanovich!!! The other two guys -- the bass player and the auxil-ovich/percussionist don't look like anybody in Pavement.


Here's the back of Dave as he gets down to their phat tunes.


They switch instruments for a couple of songs, and the drummer comes out and sings some songs while the singer plays drums. Switching instruments is always awesome!


Then they switched back and I took this picture from a different angle. As you can see, the people just couldn't sit still.


For the last couple of songs, Dylan (aka Charlottesville's Rhythm Bandit) played the auxil-ovitch, and the bass player took off his shirt. I'm not sure if the two things were related because I was too busy dancing. Everybody was kung fu fighting!


During the last song Dylan broke the fourth wall in a kind of situationist rejection of established decorum. I think he also may have broken this drum. Dave is trying to contain the madness, but he can't!

That was probably the most fun I've ever had at the Tea Bazaar. Word!

Cool Evening at the Garage

Awesome show at the Garage last night with Travis Kokas, Mss, and Sam Buck Rosen.


Travis was up first, playing some very pretty and bittersweet songs. Dave backed him up with excellent harmonies, Garfunkel-style.


Next up was Mss, who were always great, but are really evolving in an exciting new direction. Josh was playing a lot more lap steel, giving their usual slow-simmer noisiness an unusual hawaiian flavor. Hula girls would not have been out of place. (Nor would they have been unwelcome, and I can't stress that enough!)

The HP kicked out the jams after Mss, ripping through song after song about vaginas, to the delight of Dave and Renee's realtor, whose name I've forgotten (but that guy is a major new force in the world of rock n roll cheerleading). He also said my songs sounded like The Cure, which is by far the most flattering comparison I've received while I've been in this band.

I'm guessing that pictures of our set will turn up soon on facebook or something.


Last was headliner Sam Buck Rosen, a late addition to the bill, whose incredible songs instantly made him a welcome one. He had the weird smarminess of a vegas-era Elvis, mixed with the wide-eyed innocence of Jonathan Richman, and some kind of Buster Poindexter thing thrown in there too. He also looked like a slightly less good looking David Boreanaz.

Quiet Loudly and ex-Most Ghosts

I've got a lot going on this week, what with settling in to my new place and grading papers and whatnot, but I was excited to post these pictures of the bands we played with the other day (even though they kind of didn't come out). So this is going to be a kinda short overview, but definitely check these bands out if you can.


The first bit of news was that Most Ghosts no longer have their drummer or bass player, so rather than do some kind of Most Ghosts unplugged thing the two guitar players did two mini sets. Here's Daniel Harris, who did some effects-heavy guitar and vocals stuff. Lots of loops and layers and textural things, starting out quiet and pretty and then becoming loud and chaotic.


The other Most Ghost actually had a partner, forming an awesome electronic duo called Stereo Telescope. They had awesome danceable groves with minimalist guitar work -- kind of like a slightly updated New Order but with boy/girl vocals. Since boy/girl vocals is my favorite thing in the world I was extra excited.


Then we played, and finally the headliners -- Quiet Loudly. Really funny banter, great songs with lots of surprises. Lots of dynamic and tempo changes but with at the same time some pleasantly simple riffs. My only complaint was that there should be more singing and fewer long instrumental stretches (but you know me, I pretty much feel like all songs should have singing all the time).

Last Night's Gala

Thanks to everybody who showed up to our EP release last night! Special thanks to those who stuck it out and stayed through our set. Things were running a little behind schedule, and we really appreciate it.


We had a lot of fun. The Caninos were incredible. When I saw them last fall at The Garage I could tell they were a good band, but something about the low-key vibe of The Garage -- or maybe just the occasional SUV that drives between the audience and the band -- prevented me from realizing just how good they are. Last night I was lucky enough to hear them do "Naufragous" twice, once at sound check, and once as the second song in their set.

There something that The Caninos really get right, which a lot of bands don't, in my opinion, and that's that they let their recorded stuff be laid back and understated -- like, they let the strength of their songwriting create the momentum -- but then when it's time to play live they really rock hard, and bring as much charisma and raw power as possible. It's something I remember really liking about Dressy Bessy circa 2000 -- that their live sets sounded nothing like their records, but each offered what its medium was, respectively, best at offering. Craft on the records, and intensity live.

At the end of their set they got a bunch of people on stage to do a We Are the World style sing along.


If The Caninos played first, acting as the show's Genesis, DBB Plays Cups were surely its Exodus. Here they are playing either something from Cups or one of DBB's newer songs.


We played third (and last) much like a Leviticus whose only prohibition is against not rocking, though we did encourage several people to consume pork last night, which was not very levitical of us.

Pictures of our set, and perhaps even video, will likely emerge in the coming days.

Oh, and happy Valentines Day to all our fans. (Remember, ladies, I may not be the sexiest Poster, but I'm the only one who's still single!)

Sam