California: Felsen Love You Long Time

California is a big lovely state.  I have a lot of Cal pride.  One thing that's a joy about living in such a big state is that there's always something new to see and when you're in a touring band, you get plenty of opportunity, as we did this past weekend traveling for two shows in So Cal: Friday in Hollywood and Saturday in Long Beach. We took a different route down south this time.  Departing from Art's house in Pacifica and heading down to meet up with I-5 near Los Banos.  We were hungry and found a one man Taco Truck.  I highly recommend him.  Not quite the artist as that genius in SLC near Burt's Tiki Bar, but El Brother is real good. I think he was parked on highway 152 somewhere near Gilroy. Reason #147 for my love affair with California:  abundant high quality Mexican food.

A little further down the road, we came across Casa de Fruta near Hollister.  It's a giant fruit stand with perhaps the largest selection of dried fruit I've ever seen.  Reason #423 for loving California:  the produce.  This is the type of intense nerdliness that is Felsen: while other bands are talking drugs and porn, we're get excited about dried fruit.  Really excited. The people at Casa de Fruta knew they were onto something and have therefore expanded their roadside biz to include Casa de Burrito, Casa de Coffee, and Casa de Cho Cho for the kids.  Kinda kitschy, but kinda charming.  I didn't wanna leave.  Ever. But Hollywood was calling. Specifically, The M Bar for Friday night's show.  Back to the 1-5 for all the usual--cowschwitz and then over the grapevine and heading into all that lovely 101 traffic in LA. Hollywood on a Friday night.  Big time.  Big time headache.  Reason # 496 I don't like LA: Valet parking everywhere.  That turns it into a pay to play situation for me and that aint cool.  Free parking is my blood sport and my divine birth right.  We branched off for dinner upon arrival:  Me and Dara for vegan food at Doomies  and Art and Shane off in search of meat on a bun. Yummy vegan food kinda made up for my issues with the valet man. Still I had a chip on my shoulder.  Note to self:  don't walk out on stage at a gig in Hollywood and greet your audience of 13 with "Good evening Scientologists!"  It's probably not funny to them.  Friday's gig was kinda lack luster by Felsen standards. Not promoted at all by the other local band.  They were good though.  

We persevered thorough our set.  attempted shenanigans including me sitting on the lap of one of the actors from 30 Rock.  (Seriously that really happened.)  It was probably the low point of his recent life. If you're gonna make omelettes, you're gonna break some eggs.  And by broken eggs I mean, some unwilling, unsuspecting audience member who gets sat on while I'm playing the guitar.  I did manage to corral about 10 people on stage for the final number.  We haven't done that gimmick in a while.  It's always fun and makes the band and audience feel connected.  We sold the CDs, said a few nice words to the kindly people there and watched the band after us.  They were good. Gear packed, we needed a late night waffle and found the IHOP in Hollywood, then headed to our lovely hostess's home in Santa Monica for some much needed sleep.  Well...about 4.5 hours of sleep. We awoke to the joy-filled sounds of a 6 year old and a 3 year old.  I didn't mind though as I can't sleep past 7 no matter how late I go to bed.  The little girl loaned me her bedroom for the night.  Very pink.  Very quiet and I slept like a baby floating on a magical cloud.  A pink fluffy cloud.  Our hostess Kim was so nice to us and fed us a really wonderful breakfast.  LA has great bagels.  We lingered around her house, told war stories (she's a musician as well) and then headed out to the Sportsmen's Lodge in Studio City for a swim in the pool.  Man that was Heavenly.  Perfect weather.  I hung out with my old friend and touring compadre from way back, Duff Ferguson and his daughter, sister and bro-in-law. Later we headed over to Long Beach and Dara and I found more vegan food (the hippy salad please) and then eventually arrived at the Prospector for the night's gig.  

Saturday's gig more than made up for Friday's kinda lame experience.  This one renewed my enthusiasm for Rock and Roll.  Great crowd.  Our Long Beach street team provided a strong contingent of friendlies and the newbies were open and willing to give us a shot.  We threw down mightily in the true Felsen spirit. Great crowd interaction.  They were mainly a rowdy bunch, but we were able to debut a new real quiet tune that's kind of a stark contrast to the rest of the high volume, high energy vibe we were channelling.  The tune is called "Poor In A Wealthy City". Amongst other things, it's about my years living in Chicago and feeling so, so out of place with the great disparity of wealth on display in that city.  Out of place is my native environment..it's what I do best. But hey, who doesn't feel out-of-place sometimes?  It's starts with just me, strumming and singing. Shane, in his infinite vast wisdom, reminded me to play even quieter as I was starting the tune. The quieter I got, the more the room simmered down. You coulda heard a pin drop on a ball of cotton in the forest. Shivers.  I love those moments.  "Tonight I'm poor in a wealthy city/prosperity towers high above me/inhaling the exhaust wearing duct-taped shoes/ imagine Muddy Waters singing the blues."  That felt really good to sing those lyrics.  The rest of the set was more rocking.  Tokyo Electric, Lorazepam, Better Thoughts, Don't Turn your back on Me Today and Gunfighting at Dawn with a Smoke on the Water teaser.  A girl came up to me and said Felsen reminded her of Weird Al Yankovic. I'll accept that.  

It looks like were praying to Shiva, but were just doing some soul claps on "All You Gotta Do is Smile".

 I look mad in this one.  Maybe I was.  It's not you...it's me.  Lorazepam.  I think.

After us were our musical hosts and brothers from the road, State To State.  I love these guys.  Trust me, it feels really, really good when you're the out-of-town band to have a local band on your side, rooting for you, helping you out, loaning you gear, setting you up a gig, PROMOTING IT, and to hang out with too.  On top of that, these guys are the real deal musically speaking.  Los Angeleans, please, please patronize their shows.  You will not be disappointed. They have a very cool Raidoheadesque vibe to their music and their singer, Shay is one of the very best singers I've heard.  It makes me envious. It makes me want to practice more.  Beautiful songs too.

We were all pretty tired post gig and had to make it a somewhat early night.  So no late night post show shenanigans this time. I did however manage to trade a few CDs and a t shirt for a cool new used jacket. We drove to our host Todd's home in Echo Park.  We climbed this immensely tall stair case to the front door.  We were all laden down with gear and belongings.  Each of us were completely winded, tired, and spontaneously started laughing at some point.  That Staircase was no joke. We got up early, headed back down the stairs,

passed this car,

found a diner,

and got on the I-5 where I found yet another cool red neck hat at a truck stop along the way.

This was our first road trip since the arctic quest to Portland, OR in early December. God willing, this will be the first of much travel over the next year to promote our most recent album, I Don't Know How To Talk Anymore.  We're currently incubating another larger national tour for later this summer and fantasizing about getting on a plane for the east coast.  Does anybody have some extra air miles? The good drummer's waiting at SFO.

Meanwhile, we're gonna hibernate for a while.  Hope to see you April 22nd at our next Bay Area Show. Should be a fun one.

Where is my mind tough gal? Huh?

Felsen played this past weekend in Sacramento at the Fox and Goose Pub.  This was our 4th time there in the past 4.5 years.  It's a great little spot and they've recently sunk a bunch of money into improvements, including an upgrade to the sound system.  We've always have a great time in Sacto and each time vow to return again and soon.  The gig was put together by my pal Gabe Nelson.  Payback perhaps for us putting his fabulous new band Bellygunner on a show at the 50 Mason in SF this past Thanksgiving weekend. I've known Gabe for about 7 years now, in fact he plays bass on our Felsen Loves You EP. With Bellygunner, Gabe really gets to show his vast talents as he fronts the band, plays guitar (damn he's really good) writes the tunes and sings the lead parts.  On top of this he's very smooth and easy and relaxed and charming out in front of a band. It makes me really happy to see him up there doing his thing and sharing all these great, catchy tunes with an audience. So...we were thrilled to do this show with Bellygunner and happy to return again to the F&G.

I drove up early in the afternoon to do a live radio show at Twirl Radio in Sacramento.  Twirl is hosted by Mike Lidskin who has been a huge supporter of Felsen over the past few years.  His show is devoted to local homegrown Indie music and he's given tons of musicians airtime over his 15 years in the biz.  Twirl has been an internet only radio show, but will soon be a regular old fashioned Sacramento terrestrial radio program that you can listen to in the car or in the kitchen making dinner. Mike is very excited about this, mainly I think because he'll get to introduce more people to the music that he loves.  This here folks, is a rock and roll true believer.  Twirl honored Felsen with 2013 album of the year and Saturday I got to go on air, play a few tunes and talk it up and of course pimp our upcoming gigs.  I played a few from the new album and sang an oldie "Like Water Fit For Babies".

The original plan for the radio show was for me and Dara to drive up early and do the show Felsen duo style, but she's been sick.  Possibly pneumonia with a side of Laryngitis--that's an awful combo for a singer. Poor thing really wanted to do both shows.  I was getting status updates the days leading up to the show, each one grimmer than the last.  Saturday morning I told her to stay home, get some rest and not to worry about the gigs.  I drove up by myself, leaving straight from my Saturday job--teaching drum lessons at Music Time Academy in Livermore, CA.  (BTW: There is no greater joy than teaching 10 y.o.'s to play ACDC and Beatles on the drums!)   I did the radio show and then got a text from Dara saying she was on Amtrack heading for Sacto--she's gonna do the gig by hook and crook (as they say in India). Is that dedication to the art form or is that just plain crazy?? You decide.  Her voice sounded beat up when she arrived.  But come show time, miraculously she sang great, worked the crowd and danced like a dervish. That's Tuff.

The show at the Fox and Goose was a fun one.  The night started with The Seshen who were incredible.  This was my first time hearing them and they killed it.  Big band, lots of percussion, samples, etc...great vocals and really tight rhythm section.  A+ kids.  A+.   They had an R&B dance vibe.  Very fun stuff that got the room really grooving.  Up next was Bellygunner, the lone local Sacramento band, who brought out a great crowd and kept the energy flowing with their songs and full on charm attack.  Felsen did our thing.  Going on last and being an out-of-town band was a little tough as the room thinned out a bit before we got a chance to start, but we held a goodly number of people and put on a pretty high energy show.  I climbed on tables and chairs, sat in peoples laps, interrupted conversations, got up in grills, my usual brand of irritainment.  I used Gabe's amp and have officially learned this lesson for the 47th and final time--use my own amp.  It always throws me for a loop no matter how nice the other guy's amp was (and it was a beauty). I have such a narrow little guitar path I can travel, anything unfamiliar rattles my cage and knocks me off guard.  Couldn't get my bearings. My mojo was limping a bit.  We rallied though and gave it our all. Triumph of the will.

The musical high point for me was our closing number, a cover of the Pixies classic tune, Where is My Mind.  I've always loved this tune.  I was on tour a few weeks ago, playing drums with Dara's project and we had some time to kill post gig and we all stayed up late watching Fight Club. I feel asleep. Where is my mind plays in the final scene of the movie (go back and watch it) and it woke me up. A great song does that to me.  I have a few songs that have woken me up and I have a really strong relationship or association with those tunes.  Your mind is clear and extra receptive in those times and a great song can cut right into your core and leave a permanent mark.  What a creepy, sad and scary scene in the movie that is.  Buildings are being blown up and are collapsing. The movie was pre 9-11. Wow.  Prophetic? Somehow that song really hit me and I had to learn it and play it with Felsen.  Gabe joined us on guitar.  Ooh and that creepy Kim Deal backing vocal sung by our very own backing vocalist tough gal.  Something came unhinged in me when I was singing that.  Where is my mind? Your problems--are they real or is it all in your head.  Get out of your own way.  You're either busy living or your busy dying.  That was a beautiful, powerful moment for me. Thank you rock and roll Gods for somehow sparing me yet another day and allowing that one to happen.  Trust me, I needed it.

Next Felsen show:  Wed Feb 26 at the Night Light in Oakland.  

Greetings From the Ghost of Heavy Metal Rock and Roll...

Hi.  

How are you?

press play and then come back and read me.  

Did you know this song was a letter to you from me, the ghost of heavy metal rock and roll. Kinda corny right?  Well that's how I feel about myself. Sometimes I feel like an apparition, a ghost in your head...  it's getting lonely here at rock and roll inc. as there's not many of us left. Most have fled, or died or moved to the suburbs, retired from the biz, so to speak. God knows, I couldn't blame them.  A more turbulent, screwed up line of work you'll be hard pressed to find. This isn't for the faint of heart. You gotta want it.  Most days, I still do.  

Anyhoo...I was thinking about you the other day, remembering olden times from centuries come and gone and I wanted to reach out and see how you're getting along now and low and behold, out fell this song. It's just for the two of us, but then again maybe there's some universality to it also.  I wanted to say come back to rock and roll old friends, we're here for you.  Do you remember rock and roll--c'mon man.  We were the best of friends!  Do you remember being a teenager and feeling so much despair and then getting an embrace from your favorite Clash song, or the Replacements or U2 or Violent Femmes or the Smiths and feeling somehow renewed--ok just enough to not give up all hope and fall into the very heart of the heart of darkness.  We here at rock and roll inc haven't abandoned you, nor will we ever! so yeah, that's the universal part.  And then there's the very personal, the me+you part is as such written "I'm here to show you love, like when we were younger, you swept me under, we were the best of friends." So, that dear old friend is for you.  You can have that. You're welcome.  You can stow that one away putting it in the box in your closet and please from time to time do unearth it when you are an old, old woman and show it to your great grandchildren.  "I had a friend once, a long, long time ago..."  and finally, there's a line about our departed mothers "Do you realize with your mothers prayers tonight, you're still alive. Know i'll be here til the end of time."  a huh.  Nodding head with vigor and some sentimentality indeed.  That's your prayer at bedtime, your daily affirmation dear old friend.

singing off for now.  

your friend til the end,

Felsen.

ps.  hey i've got a gig you should come by.  it'll be fun.  like old times. 

Rickshaw Stop Thank You's etc...

Felsen played a really great show this past weekend in SF at the Rickshaw Stop.  For you out-of-towners, you bridge and tunnel people outside of the bay area, the Rickshaw is one of SF's finest venues and it was a real honor for us to be there, and that honor was only deepened by the fact that we were truly blessed to be sharing a bill with two great local bands.  We Became Owls is a folky band led by the very talented Andrew Blair.  I suspect they're gonna be huge real soon.  And any chance we get to share an evening with Brad Brooks is indeed a real pleasure. Pure class.  Like Bryan Ferry, Brian Wilson and Brian Jones all rolled up and surrounded with a great band, including a string trio.  Classy! Brad's an institution. (Full disclosure, I'm also Brad's drummer so I'm a bit biased.) 

The show was our CD release party to celebrate our newest CD, I Don't Know How to Talk Anymore.  We worked really hard to promote the show and all the bands worked together.  Note to bands who want to get in front of an audience: gotta work together with the other bands on the bill. Can't do it all alone.  Divide and conquer.  We also got a ton of help from the promoter of the event, Bill Hansell of Appleberry Jam.  Bill worked really, really hard to book the gig.  For whatever reason, this was a hard gig to book.  I wanted a weekend.  I wanted a big club in SF and I knew I wanted to have some control over who else was gonna be on the bill so that we could present a great evening of music.  Tall order. And all you talent buyers weren't lining up for dear old Felsen?  Apparently not. Bill went back and forth on dates with about 8 different venues, until finally the Rickshaw relented.  Bless them.  We didn't want to disappoint them and felt the urgency of properly promoting the show.  You also put your ass on the line when you book a gig.  If no one shows up, word gets 'round among the club bookers and you're likely to not get booked at XYZ venue again.   (Do you bookers all get together and gossip about local bands at your secret monthly Masonic Lodge meetings?) We dug deep and put on a major PR assault calling in lots of favors and hitting it hard. Full scale charm attack. Forgive us.  We're gonna leave you alone for a while.  Promise.  For the many friends and fans who came out to the gig, we thank you.  We also apologize for clogging up your email inbox and your social network feeds with our shameless self-promotion.  Taking a break for a bit now.  mmmkay.

Felsen went on last.  Does that mean we headlined?  Or did we just draw the shortest straw and get duped with cleanup?  Glass half full or half empty?  I'll go with headliner.  That means added pressure as people will often split after their friend's band plays.  We had a pretty solid throng of people there though thankfully.  It felt really good to walk on that stage.  We've been using some real cool entrance music for the past few months, the theme music to the old spaghetti western Sixty Seconds To What by the great Italian Film composer Ennio Morricone.  OK, I stole that idea from The Clash Live in Japan. It sets a mood, and somehow helps me focus.  It's epic and majestic and totally over-the-top.  This was big time for little old Felsen.  Big stage, smoke machines billowing out the fog, Ennio Morricone blasting through one of the best sound systems in the city as we file out after the evening's MC, DJ Shuugah's lovely introduction AND we utilized the Rickshaw's in house video projector and screen and projected one of the most beautiful films EVER, Koyannisqatsi.  Ever seen it?  Amazing.  Kinda hard to describe.  There's no dialog.  All visual with a sound track by Philip Glass.  The film consists primarily of slow motion and time-lapse footage of cities and many natural landscapes across the United States. Koyannisqatsi is a Hopi word meaning "a life out of balance."  A perfect mesh with the bigger themes of our album, which is all about alienation in an era of technology, social media, advertising, gluttonous consumption....A life out of balance indeed.  A bunch of people asked me if we edited the film to coincide with the music. Oh hell no. I'm way too lazy and technologically challenged to pull off something like that. Somehow the music would just periodically synch up with the film. Kismet.

To make the show a little extra special, we had six musicians on stage.  We had the usual 4 of us boys plus our pal Adam Rossi on keyboards.  Dylan and Adam have been playing together in local hit makers Luce for the past 10 years or so. Lots of chemistry between the two of them.  We've added a new Felsen too.  For the past few months I've been working with singer/songwriter Dara Ackerman.  I play drums in Dara's band. She's singing with Felsen now.  She's a great backing vocalist and really adds a lot visually to the band--a veritable non stop dervish of dancing.  

There were many musical highlights of the show.  All You Gotta Do is Smile felt really good and powerful.  To me that's a really, really sad song.  Listen to the lyrics sometime. I had to earn the right to sing that one.  Tokyo Electric was really, really fun and just keeps on getting better and more fun and gets the crowd worked up and dancing.  We hit really hard with the title track, I Don't Know How to Talk Anymore.  The band felt particularly synched up.  And I got to play Brad's beautiful guitar.

The set list was really well paced thankyouverymuch.  We work hard on stuff like that.  The devil is in the details.  A good set list makes a big difference.  I always want the energy and intensity to keep escalating. We've really hit our stride now with Better Thoughts.  As is the case now with that one, we pretty much get the whole room full of people (however many there are at our gigs) singing along on the extended outro "Better thoughts will keep you happy and alive".  We're you there?  That felt good didn't it?  The band sounded absolutely wonderful on this one.  Really powerful and kinda other world-y at moments.  I told the audience it was an opportunity to work through their issues. Group therapy session. Seriously, who doesn't need it?  (I need every minute I can get.)  Singing through their issues. I got issues on my issues.  We've now segued the end of that one into our long-time closing number, an oldie, Don't Turn Your Back On Me Today. It's a pretty rock solid one-two punch.  I'm old school showbiz--I like segues. One beautiful moment was at the end when Dylan and Dara joined me at my mic and we sang the outro.  Kids, that right there's rock and roll.  

I was starting to feel bad for the audience's ear drums; we ended the night with a few more mellow tunes.   Gimme Shelter for the Devil was really beautiful.  And then we jumped down into the audience and we sang an oldie, Take Me Back all acoustic-y.  Dylan played the banjo.  We sang and shook tambourines.  We busked for free.  I asked the audience to simmer down and listen up and they obliged. Coulda heard a junkie drop his needle. People just kinda magically start to sing along on that one.  That was really powerful.  And then they asked for an encore and we ended the night with another oldie, a tune the 6 of us never all played together: Like Water Fit For Babies from our Felsen Loves You EP. It's a song about being a new parent and wondering how you're gonna hold it all together.  You got worries.  You got anxiety. You're sleep deprived.  

Thanks a bunch Bill Hansell, DJ Shuggah, Brad Brooks and band, Andrew Blair and We Became Owls and the good people at the Rickshaw.  Thanks fans and friends who came out and sang and danced with us. What a night!  OK.  I will shut my mouth for a few weeks now.

NEXT FELSEN SHOW:  WED JAN 29 AT BOTTOM OF THE HILL.  

video from the show

Uncle Francis is Gunfighting at Dawn

I took a drive today with Uncle Francis. He's a longtime Oakland resident and a retired therapist. Back in the day, he was hired by various bay area schools to work with at risk kids. One of his mentors worked with drug addicts back in the '60's and conducted the therapy sessions sitting on a park bench--the drug addicts natural habitat. That put them at ease and communication started to happen. In his wisdom, Francis decided to put a killer stereo system in his car so that he and the hard to reach at risk kids could cruise around and listen to Tupac and Biggie Small. Somehow this worked. Released from school for an hour, ride around in a rad Lexus with a killer LOUD ASS stereo and go to McDonalds. Sounds like fun to me (except the McDonalds part). The kids started to communicate with him and the parents and teachers began to see a positive change in their kids.

Francis is a hardcore music fan. We bonded over music about a million years ago when we first met. So today we drove roundtrip from Oakland to San Rafael with the sole purpose of listening to Felsen's new album, I Don't Know How To Talk Anymore. It was a real treat to listen to the album on such a great stereo. I LOVE BASS and that stereo has got some serious low end! For a 72 year old guy, Francis likes to listen to music at a very high volume (bless him). God so do I and I think he likes to listen to music louder than me. And he really listens. I'm so totally narcissistic about Felsen's music, that if you ever suffer the unfortunate great displeasure of having to listen to any of that stuff with me, I will need your UNDIVIDED ATTENTION. Turn that cell phone off. Clear your schedule. Your world now revolves around ME, at least for the next unsuspecting 40 minutes of your life. Francis obliged me with great attention and focus. Verdict: good album to listen to in the car. I wouldn't argue with that.

I haven't listened all the way through in a while. I've had a few months away from it. We play the songs on stage and we rehearse, but that's different. The album is it's own animal. It was nice to come back to it with fresh ears. And it made me reflect on making the album and writing those songs and some of the personal price you gotta pay to make art. I'm not talking about the major hassle it is to get something completed, funded, etc...or the personal havoc it may wreck upon you and your family or personal life being so obsessed with something that vehemently consumes your time, mental energy and money. No I'm not thinking about that, but rather the life you gotta pour into it to make it real. Kinda hard to describe. You gotta earn that stuff and it doesn't come cheaply. You have to go live a little bit, experience some of life's joy and sadness, love and loss, life and death and while you're at it, go smell a new born baby's head; this all somehow mysteriously morphs into songs. And it's still no less mysterious a process to me all these years later. Maybe it's a mystery now more than ever. The more you know, the less you know.

Uncle Francis really liked Gunfighting at Dawn. He said it kinda reminded him of Leonard Cohen. I'll take that. I'm real proud of that tune. It's about Katrina and the great flood and all those people stranded on the bridge (shame on us). It must have felt like judgement day for them. Police officers from nearby Gretna, LA blockaded the bridge, preventing thousands from fleeing NOLA. "Meanwhile I'm stranded on this bridge now three days. Across the overpass a well-armed militia's waiting for me." "If you got a weapon to use dear Jesus, use it on your enemies." (That's right. You read that one correctly.)  Although their crimes against the gulf didn't come for another few years after Katrina, I name check British Petroleum too, just for good measure. Uncle Francis really liked all Dylan's guitar playing on this one. I think Dylan was mad when he was playing the guitar that day. At least it sounds that way to me.  Gunfighting is an easy one for me to get worked up over.  It feels real good to sing on stage and get a whole room of people singing along.

Need to work it out?  Feeling a need for some group catharsis and drinking a few beers on a Friday night?  Please join us Friday January 3, 2014 at the Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco. Francis, you in?  This is how Felsen conducts OUR therapy sessions thankyouverymuch.

Gong Hits anyone?

A few years ago I got a lovely Han Chi gong as a Christmas present from my family.  I love this thing and I always wanted one.  At the time, I was putting together a band to play a bunch of Led Zeppelin tunes for a benefit concert with my dear friend Jo Ann “Mama” Pacho.  What self-respecting drummer playing Zep tunes would perform sans gong?  I used the gong on stage with that band and I have since used it on stage with a few other bands, but have also used it many times on different recording sessions.  It’s on two Felsen albums--Breaking Up With Loneliness and I Don’t Know How to Talk Anymore.  

Ear buds in now please.  And while you're at it, turn the lights down low.  You can hear Han Chi especially in the intro and also the very last sound at the end of Gimme Shelter for the Devil from our new album.  This is how i like to use the gong.  Kind of shimmering quietly and slowly not really bugging anyone.  No big clang "dinner is served!".  Subtle, spacey, spooky perhaps.  Polite, charming, decent, lovely.  Ambiance I say!

Recording the gong was a beautiful moment for me and Felsen bassist alumni Cristian Hernandez. Cris was kind enough to masterfully record and mix the entire album (at no cost to us, thankyouverymuchdearfriend) this past spring at his old house in San Lorenzo, CA. Recording in his house was a real pleasure, a dream come true really as we weren’t constantly staring at the clock wondering how much time and money we were spending and therefore could allow ourselves the luxury of experimenting and fooling around with interesting sounds, mic choices and instrumentation. When you’re on a tight budget at a bigger studio, you often end up taking the Henry Ford assembly line approach to recording and the creativity can get really squashed.  With the freedom of experimentation, I played Han Chi real lightly throughout the entire song.  It kinda ebbs and flows, beautifully shimmering in the background, like ocean waves breaking around you.

Work on the album began last Christmas with me sending out demos to Cris, Art and Dylan. No real songs were written at that point. Some of the songs were just little embryos, some more song like, but none were really "done" per se. The first time we all played Gimme Shelter for the Devil was at the Felsen hurt locker (rehearsal space) in West Oakland in January.  As we did with all of the new tunes I wrote for the album, we huddled together with just acoustic guitars and a snare drum with brushes.  Everyone played real quiet.  We knew we had something really special.  It's quiet, like non violence.  America: lay down your arms, surrender to the void, relax and float downstream.   We kept at it and by May 31 we had a recorded and mixed album of 12 new Felsen songs. We had copies in hand around July 1. We pulled that one out of thin air!

We’ll be playing Gimme Shelter for the Devil on stage at our CD release party on January 3, 2014 at the Rickshaw Stop in SF. Please join us and sing along at the end of Gimme Shelter for the Devil. It's easy. You'll know what to do.

December 2013 Portland Shows

Sunday early afternoon driving through snowy Oregon winterland, listening to Rogue Wave and heading up into the mountains now for our return trip to Oakland after a few days on the road.  These were Felsen's last dates of a very busy and productive 2013. We played 2 shows in Portland this weekend.  

The original forecast of 0% chance of precipitation for Friday kept getting more and more grim as the week went by.  We decided to leave Thursday night for Friday's show.  Somewhere on the drive the 20 degree cold really hit me for the first time at a rest stop on our way to spending the night in Redding.  I couldn't stop shaking. Being a long-time Bay Area person, I've lost my ability to deal with cold weather temperature despite my lake-effect snowy Indiana upbringing.  A troupe of pansies we've been called by a cold weather tough gal.  Unusual cold all the locals said. Driving conditions on Friday in the mountains were pretty bleak.  What should have taken 6 hours took 10.  We lost about three hours in a 20 mile stretch of snowy mountain pass clogged with jack knifed trucks and cars being pulled back onto the interstate and trucks stoping to put on chains.  

We got to the Ash Street Saloon for our 9pm set at 8.30.  Good times.  Needless to say we were pretty frazzled from the drive and also just tired.  Typical Griffin, I barely sleep under the best of circumstances, getting ready for a few days on the road meant a few nights of minimal sleep. When we got to the gig on Friday I was tired, stressed out and hungry.  I hadn't eaten well in a few days either.  Despite all that, we had a great sound check and were pumped to play.  The sound system, stage and lights were totally pro.  I'm essentially a drummer who plays some guitar and can sing a little bit.  I got into this Felsen front guy thing by default, without making any plans.  It just kinda happened and has slowly engulfed my lifetime of playing drums. The gear aspect of playing guitar is still a bit of a mystery to me. Hell, half of my gear is borrowed.  what can I say? I have a sugar daddy.  Amazing how everything works during the sound check and then you come back 20 minutes later to do your set and voila, you got equipment issues that shut down your show.  All you gotta do is smile.  Remain calm.  Pull it together kid.  I cobbled together my rig and muddled through the remainders of the set. My rig crapped 2x during the show.  We decided to finish with one of the quieter tunes on our new album, Gimme Shelter for the Devil, perfect as my sugar daddy's amp mysteriously wasn't putting out much volume.  Despite that, playing that song quietly was a beautiful moment that made us all feel somewhat vindicated for an otherwise clumsy show.  Friday we had our gal pal numero uno Dara Ackerman onstage with us singing backing vocals.  She killed it. The felsen gender barrier has been officially been broken!  

I play drums in Dara's band.  She's returning the favor.  win win.  This weekend was actually a whole crew of east bay musical misfits on the road bringing it to the good people of Portland (you're welcome!)  Saturday's show was a house concert or at least that was the original plan.  The party givers decided to move it to a venue that was rented out for the show, Bamboo Grove Salon.  Really neat place.  Dara pretty much organized the whole thing.  Also joining in on the fun was our pal, Scarth Locke --I'm also his drummer. Dara sings with Scarth and vice versa.  My dear friend and beloved bay area bassist Pete Canton came up to do double duty playing with Scarth and Dara.  (Pete played bass on Felsen's Accidental Drowning album). It was nice to be with friends and bring this crew of people i work with together with Felsen.  Scarth and then Dara each put in real nice sets.  The small crowd gathered in the room listened attentively.  Felsen eased into our set.  Rock and Roll's Not Dead, All you Gotta Do is Smile.  The energy and enthusiasm were starting to ramp up. people were starting to dance during Tokyo Electric, which was sounding really great and groovy at both shows this weekend, thankyouverymuch. The show was real easy from there on out.  I gave a special shout out to my niece, a recent portland arrival, who at about 3 AM on only her 3rd day in town, managed to successfully evacuate her entire apartment building which was soon to be engulfed in smoke and flames.  May she never have to pay for another beer as long as she lives in Portland!  We focused mainly on the new songs:  Gunfighting, Lorazepam and absolutely crushed it with Better Thoughts.  We had a posse of goofy solid gold dancers by the side of the stage.   The extended outro "Better Thoughts will keep you happy and alive" became a mantra that the whole room got into.  that's powerful juju to ward off evil spirits and keep out the bitter cold.  We finished the night off with Gimme Shelter For the Devil.  Which for me, might have been the musical high point of the whole road trip.  It was really deep and spiritual and cathartic to sing that song. I'm still not exactly sure what it's about.  fear of death...fear of life..growing old...trying to just keep your shit together...loving your enemies.  I guess all of those things.  Who isn't going through something complex and crazy right now?  needless to say it felt really good to sing that one.  I had Scarth up on stage too singing the outro.  The whole room sang along.  thank you portland.  what a fun really beautiful freezing cold weekend to warm up the collective heart of this troupe of pansies.