It has been said that Twitter is the death of many websites and blogs. I update that thing all the time, but so not this much better-equipped website (yet, do I need a “fail manatee”?). Adding posts longer than 160 characters is hard!

Today, Nick Delffs came over and we recorded the final two overdubs for the next Shaky Hands album (tentatively titled—last I heard anyway—Realms Out Of Reach). It involved vocoder, possibly the last thing anyone would expect to hear in a Shaky Hands song, yet it works perfectly (it IS in the background, not part of some Daft Punkian dance break). And apart from Rafter adding those two overdubs down in San Diego, all the mixing is done too. Now we just gotta release the thing!

I should also mention that I’m going to be playing bass in The Shaky Hands exclusively now that Mayhaw has left. There will be a couple other new people added to the fold as well, but Nick will still be playing drums! That has really worked out well, so there is no reason to change that.

The past month myself, Mayhaw and Ky have been tracking a set of 14 songs for the Alex Arrowsmith & His Pugs album (tentatively titled Real Nights). Like always, I’m engineering/producing/mixing/bluhbluh everything myself but this time with My Pugs in our comfy practice space at Ky’s house in SE Pertland. It is a major departure from all my previous albums, because everything is based around a real band tracking live with no click tracks and no tomfoolery. No ballyhoo. Of course there will be added production, but it all revolves around the basic three-piece takes and it sounds RAD. That should be coming out earlyish 2011. After that, I’ll probably do another Modernity Leave-style album recorded on my four-track. And then another Pugs album. And then the ten-year anniversary reissue of A Bunch Of Songs in November 2012 (with new art by Joe Keatinge!).

We have no Pugs shows coming up at the moment. We wanted to have as few distractions for recording as we could, since we can only get together once or twice a week and if we were playing shows, those would have to be devoted to practicing for a show instead of recording. Also, Mayhaw wants to take a bit of a break from live shows (kind of going back to him leaving the Shakies). But hopefully Ky and I can threaten him inappropriately or something to get him to play some more shows once the album is done.

Also, I play with my friend Nate Birkholz in an on-again-off-again band called Redcoat Turncoat. We recorded an album a year ago (I freaking got to play a real Wurlitzer electric piano) and it just came out last week! We played a release show at Slabtown and it ruled. Lots and lots of funs. Listen and buy!

Hark! PDR cometh from upon yon hillside! Today I sent off the final artwork and mastered songs to be printed and duped. Finally, after two years from conception to contractions, Public Domain Rainbow is finally and officially DONE. I don’t know when the exact release date will be, but it should be up on CD Baby/iTunes/etc. by the end of the month or early March. The arbitrary release date will be whenever I get the hard copies of the album shoved into my warm living hands.

I have songs from PDR in the player at the top of the page! Take a listen to minute to the songs!

Also! The full band debut of Alex Arrowsmith AND HIS PUGS (myself on guitar/vox, Mayhaw Hoons on bass and Ky Fifer on drums/vox) will be on February 17 at the Hawthorne Theatre. It’s at 8 pm, $4 at the door, 21+. Come out and witness apocryphal history! Also, we have a show at the Ash St. Saloon on March 28. Me and m’pugs must school the world.

I should also mention that I left Tiger House last week. So did Ky. However, Bill and Carl are picking up the pieces of that nuclear blast quite well, and from what I hear, they already have a replacement bassist and are auditioning 6 drummers next week! Awesome eh! I’ll also still be recording future Tiger House CDs and demos and whatnot. So you should still go see their shows. It is important.

Happy hot damn New Year, chieves! I have some exciting news to announce: 1) The full live band debut of Alex Arrowsmith And His Pugs (my pugs being Ky Fifer on drums and Mayhaw Hoons on bass) will be at the Hawthorne Theatre on February 17! It’s a 21+ show, $4 at the door. I hope to see y’all there for this momentous occasion. It will be commemorated at Fort Clatsop for years to come.

And 2) Public Domain Rainbow is coming out NEXT FREAKING MONTH! OR SO! Finally eh?! More to come soon!

The first review of Modernity Leave is in, and believe it or not, it’s a positive one! Looks like I sent it to the right people, because they seemed to get it, and not everyone would. It’s a review site called Babysue, who also gave Applewine a nice review waaaaay back in 2006. So thanks to Babysue for that little Modernity Leave writeup. Go read it!

Public Domain Rainbow update: I have actually been actively working on the album a lot in the past week. In the past few months, I’ve just been tweaking here and there because I’m afraid of finishing it (I might be coming down with Chinese Democracyitis), but I’ve been recording a lot of vocals (both myself and Alyssa), patching up parts that have been bugging me. The album feels very close to finished, and I think it’s because I finally feel like this batch of songs feels complete with the addition of “All You Need Is Love” as the closing song. I didn’t have a good closing song before, but now it feels like I’m finally getting some hotels on my monopolies. So I may end up finishing it pretty soon here. That doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll be releasing it soon, but at least it would be out of my system!

Download Modernity Leave in its entirety.

I wanted to take a photo of Tessa buried in Modernity Leaves to announce its release, but she wouldn’t let me tonight. Now there’s just a bunch of cat hair all over my CDs. So I’ll just have to use words:

MODERNITY LEAVE IS OUT!!!

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

And by out I mean let me know if you want it and I’ll send/give you one. It’s free at the moment. I’ll probably add it to CD Baby/iTunes pretty soon, but for now you have to get it from the source.

It’s official, my furry crustaceans: Modernity Leave is coming out NEXT MONTH! In just the past couple of weeks, I finished up the recording of a record total 40 songs on my shabby old Fostex XR-7 four-track contraption. Then just two days ago I mixed and mastered it in a day. Today I designed the cover. I love this album. It’s totally different from anything I’ve done so far. Not that it’s all crazy and innovative or anything. It’s just unpolished and rough as a rasp, which is something I’ve been wanting to do for a while. And I figured, to make it worth your while, I’d fill up an entire CD. While I recorded 40 songs, not all of them will fit, so there’s “only” going to be 36 songs. I’ll have the final running order up here soon!

PREPARE.

Also, don’t forget about my show on Sept. 3 at the Ash St.! Shove it into your temporal lobe!