Compiled by Jackie Lam
Our March residency with local indie darlings George Glass continues with our fourth installment of stellar live performances. This week George Glass will be joined by Radars to the Sky, The Geisha Boys (with members of George Glass), and Mama's Joy, which is a collaborative project with members of Seasons, Magick Orchids, and The Transmissions. So what if it's supposed to be raining all week? So what if there's a slight threat of acid rain and radiation looming omniously overhead? Come out to LaBrie's Lounge on the Eastside, where the booze is aplenty and super cheap, the people are friendly and the music is great. DJ J. Watson will be spinning sets all night. Doors open at 8:30 pm, and the first band goes on at 9 pm. 21 +. Per usual, here is our weekly post with free downloadable Mp3s and a bit of backstory on the making and recording of the track:
Andrew of Radars to the Sky on “Nine Months”:
This is a song called "Nine Months" from the album we finished recently, Supra / Infra (available now on iTunes, Amazon, and Bandcamp! *wink wink*).
This song has had an interesting life in our band. I wrote it (with lyrical help from Kate) a few years ago; it's about her being pregnant with our daughter, Maya, who turns 4 this summer, so it's been a while. I really loved what I heard in my head, but it wasn't in the right key for Kate to sing, and the rest of the guys in the band weren't crazy about it--it just never sounded right live. In fact, we've only played it live twice: once at the El Rey, with Andy from The Henry Clay People playing a little ukulele that kept going out of tune; and once during our Spaceland residency when we did our whole new album in order. For some reason, we just never have seemed to be able to recreate the recording.
So when we went in for a day to record the first four songs for the album (more than two years ago now), 
we spent the day on four other songs, but at the very end I cajoled Kenny into doing just one take of this song, just him playing drums and me on guitar. From just the drum track, we totally rebuilt the song. We changed the key so it was right for Kate's voice and re-recorded the guitar, then started building from there with other guitars, ukulele, keyboards, etc. Our old bass player Dave came to Dave Newton's studio and pretty much put down the bassline in one take. Rob brought his banjo, and once he recorded that part, the song really sounded like what I'd imagined in my head all along. Then we added a trumpet, French horn, sax, mandolin, and flute on this breakdown part that came right before the end of the song.
But it still didn't work. The breakdown part was a mess, and the song had no flow. So on an impulse, sitting at the computer at Dave Newton's studio stumped, I just deleted the entire breakdown section, cutting about 30 seconds from the song. And suddenly it worked. Without the interruption in the vocals, and without the distraction of my out-of-key sax and all of the other instrumentation, the song finally flowed right. You can still hear all of those extra instruments over the last 20 seconds or so of the song.
And from a song that nobody in the band wanted to record, we ended up with one of my favorite songs on the album, and one that folks reviewing it have singled out as a highlight too. I think it's the best thing Kate has ever sung--and that's saying something. In a way, it kind of serves as the heart of the album.
Free download: Radars to the Sky – "Nine Months"
Brian of The Geisha Boys on “Master Carpenter”:
"Master Carpenter" references friends, Gurdjieff, ee cummings, ideas and notes and advice to the subject
from the same subject in the future. Kind of like a Robert Zemeckis film. I like the song quite a bit, and looking forward to performing it on Tuesday.
Free download: The Geisha Boys – "Master Carpenter"
Denise of Mama’s Joy on “Heaven”:
Mama's Joy is a collaboration of members of Magick Orchids (Rhea Tepplim, Champoy Hate), Seasons (Adam Valentin, Ray Gurango, and John Seasons), and The Transmissions (Denise Duncan, Josh Solberg). It is a musical project dedicated to a few principles--improvisation and dub.
This song is called "Heaven". It was written by jamming over the period of a few weeks. We jam accompanied with a video dee jay ( not sure what to call it. Andrew Lush mixes video and effects while to what we play), so the visuals influence the character of the songs we create. We record everything, listen and discuss to decide on the song structure. I guess our biggest challenges are dubbing the drums and learning the space. To help with dubbing the drums, Champ made contact mics (thanks Radio Shack!) for the kick, snare and hi-hats. These get dubbed, along with the synth and bass, over the PA for the groove.
Making sure we can hear each other is another challenge. We improv, so we have to hear each to make it really sing. We think having everyone surround the drummer is the best way to go.
What makes this song are the hypnotic vocals. They are sampled and looped, dubbed as well and sound beautiful.
Free download: Mama’s Joy – “Heaven”
Nick of George Glass on “Markie Post”:
"Markie Post" is a new song we just began playing during this month's residency. It's a song that was written completely from scratch by the entire band. I actually think it was the first song we tried writing that way. The song is in reference to the American actress, Markie Post, who starred on the sitcom Night Court which ran from the mid-'80s and into the '90s. The content of the song came about when I was helping Pete move out of his old house. We were lugging boxes and cleaning out his garage when I found an old letter he had written to Markie Post back when he was a teenager. It was a pretty hilarious fan letter. So as a joke we started talking about how we should write a song about the letter and call it Markie Post. Just the novelty of having a song called Markie Post still makes us laugh. We're hoping that she'll come across the song at some point....maybe Pete can finally get that date he's been wanting since the '80s.
Free download: George Glass - "A Brief History of Everyone I Love"
Free download: George Glass – “Lil’ Wiz”
Related Links:
Interview: Radars to the Sky
Interview: The Geisha Boys
Interview: George Glass
