announcements! new record label! new album! midwestern tour NEXT WEEK!

there is so much to say.

I am bad at blogging. I admit that I am pretty bad at blogging. I find this hilarious, since I used to be an avid live-journal-er in "my youth", but these days I pretty much put off doing the things that I "have to do" in life for as long as I can (related: I finally have health insurance!) & so it does not surprise me that I've been procrastinating intensely about all of these announcements. I will announce them in chronological order!

firstly, PAPER BOATS.

the recording process for this album was amazing. As I wrote in September, all of my friends who are great (Emily Hope Price, Joe Arnold, Guy Capecelatro III, my sister Rachel Vogelzang, & new friend Marc McElroy) came out & played, sang, and clapped along on the songs. It sounds incredible. INCREDIBLE! I'm so grateful for the guidance and help of my dear friends and collaborators, and I'm so excited for folks to hear this record. Djim Reynolds, amazing-amazingest-person, engineered & mixed the whole thing. We spent most of our days in the Electric Cave in Portsmouth NH, which is part of the old Button Factory, which is quite quaint. I spent a bunch of nights sleeping in the studio on an air mattress, waking up in the morning, grabbing a bagel, & continuing onwards. There was a lot of late-night peeing out in the bushes near the train tracks. There was also a lot of eating at the Friendly Toast, visiting Nahcotta, coffeeing at Cafe Killim, walking out by the water, visiting my Massachusetts family, song workshopping, internet-ing, and late-night-walks to the convenience store for water & sugary things. It was a little over 2 weeks all in all, & I cannot be prouder of this record.

Which brings us to the physical representation of the music, which brings us to,

secondly, SLOTHTROP.

I've been talking "the biz" with the folks at Slothtrop Music here in Madison for about a year now, ever since I moved here. Over that year they were very helpful with ideas for local venues to play, tour strategies, people that I should befriend, songs I should cover, etc. When I arrived back to the beginning of Midwestern Winter on October 1st, I sent the mixes of the new record over to my Slothtrop friends for their listening pleasure, and they got about as excited as I was over the new songs, asking if I was interested in their help with releasing the record.

And so! Thus is the story of how I "got signed".

Slothtrop has been completely awesome in this whole process. We're putting out a single in February which I'll bring on my tour with Annie Palmer (more on at the next section), and there will even be a SEVEN-INCH RECORD. I'm giddy with excitement. The songs will include four thrilling gems: a totally sweet sing-along from Paper Boats, my ridiculous Lady Gaga banjo cover, an otherwise unreleased B-side from Paper Boats, and my silly internet song. After the single release, the full record meets the world on April 13th! I can't wait. Some of the tracks (both single & full-length) are up streaming on my facebook & myspace pages. Please take a listen! There is so much sing-along-goodness! & so much banjo! The record will be available IN STORES, on iTunes or your other favorite digital distributor, and pretty much in any other form one can imagine on April 13th, 2010. I'm sure I'll be promoting it loudly when the time comes around.

Until then, I'll be on tour, which brings us to,

thirdly, FEBRUARY MIDWEST TOUR!

Next week I'll be hitting the road with megababe Annie Palmer of Ypsilanti, MI, and we will be banjo-killing & heart-breaking it UP all over the Midwest. Check out the dates below to see if we're coming to your town! All street addresses & further show details are available HERE!

thu feb 4th
Beloit, WI
CHaus, 10PM

fri feb 5th
Eau Claire, WI
The Cabin, 8PM
w/ Feathe

sat feb 6th
Milwaukee, WI
Private House Show

mon feb 8th
Dubuque, IA
BlackBloom Theater - Streaming Live!

tues feb 9th
Iowa City, IA
The Mill, 9PM

wed feb 10th
Moline, IL
Tommy's, 9PM

thu feb 11th
St. Louis, MO
The Map Room, 7PM

fri feb 12th
Urbana, IL
The Red Herring, 7PM
w/ Angie Heaton & Morgan Orion

sat feb 13th
Bloomington, IN
The Bishop, 7PM

sun feb 14th
Columbus, OH
Potluck at Mark's House, 7PM

mon feb 15th
Pittsburgh, PA
Howler's, 9PM
w/ Emily Rodgers & Lohio

tues feb 16th
Athens, OH
Bruce Manor, 8PM

wed feb 17th
Ann Arbor, MI
The Spare House, 8PM

thu feb 18th
Lansing, MI
House Show

fri feb 19th
Goshen, IN
Constant Spring
w/ Emily Rodgers & Lohio

sat feb 20th
Madison, WI
Project Lodge
w/ Emily Rodgers & Lohio

sun feb 21
Chicago, IL
Uncommon Ground - Devon
w/ Emily Rodgers


fourthly, the MADISON SONGWRITERS GUILD

Last week I took place in the Madison Songwriters Guild's monthly Song Showdown, & won "Song of the Month" with the song "Guilt"! I'll be playing that song & possibly a few more TOMORROW, FRIDAY MORNING at 8AM CST on WORT here in Madison. I'm sure I will be pounding coffee & hoping that I can play the guitar that early in the morning. You can listen from wherever you may be here on the interweb: http://www.wort-fm.org/listen.php

I also will be performing at the MSG's Songwriters in the Round on February 24th!

wed feb 24
The Brink Lounge, 630PM
Madison, WI

fifthly, ALL OVER THE INTERNET
The last few months brought some interesting internet-age. Two particularly awesome things:
You can find an interview that I did with the awesome fellas at Assault in Chicago HERE.
I also did a Lady Gaga cover after a little too much wine and the responses are stellar. HERE!


sixthly, IN CLOSING
(Edit: I wrote this on Tuesday afternoon but it's almost all still true.) It's pretty cold here. Four degrees! I'm about to go print tour posters, start sending them out to clubs, and maybe even do some press emails. Productivity, ahoy! I wore a skirt today hoping that blue skies meant a slight temperature swell, but there was no such luck and instead I'm a bit shivery, here at my favorite coffeeshop's drafty window. In exactly one month I will turn 25, I am currently in "negotiations" about a hypothetical tour in the Southwestern USofA with my inspiring friend Emily Hope Price, and there are chicken & dumplings for dinner. Life is so, so good, people! Even without Conan. This will still be a great year.

lots of love,
A.

ps: this awesome album artwork was done by ashley goldberg!

ANNOUNCEMENT: i'm making a new record, right now, in new england!

Well, I'm actually on the East Coast, which I guess means I'm making another record.

This has been in the works for some time now. "Some time," for me, usually constitutes about 2 months. When I left the New England tour in June, I said, "oh man, I SO want to make a record with all of my amazing friends who live on this, my favorite, side of the world." And so I am. Now. Presently.

It's been an awesome summer. Joe, EHP, & I had a great lil' tour in June, I promptly went from tour to Guatemala on an educational trip centered around human rights, & upon my international return was plopped down in Orange County, California for some culture shock & good old-fashioned family vacation. Families are awesome, especially when you put them near/on a beach, even when they aren't your own family. Culture shock is another thing that I have a whole other opinion about (as is consumerism), but that's a different blog. Which brings us to the short end of July, and August, and the short beginning of September. Mostly, I've been trying to enjoy HOME, this giant concept that I've been particularly unfamiliar with this year. I've been working my "day job", writing & planning this record, playing little shows here & there, and generally enjoying the life that Madison, Wisconsin has to offer. It's not a bad spot.

So this past Sunday night, after a celebratory birthday weekend (ASIDE: YOU CAN FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER HERE), I hit the road from Madison to Illinois to begin my epic pilgrimage out East. I love the East. I'll get to that.

The next morning (that would be Monday, yesterday), I woke up at 830 (to the loud knocking on the door making sure I hadn't slept through my alarm, which I had indeed turned off) and drove diligently from Illinois to Pittsburgh. This is not the best drive, as you are on 2 turnpikes (Indiana & Ohio), one of which (Indiana) has the worst toll plazas in the universe & the second of which (Ohio) has - when traveling Southbound, of course - the first two worst plazas ever followed by the BEST plazas ever, but you are always too starving to wait for Plaza No. 3 and so you end up buying a disgusting burrito because you're just too hungry. This may or may not have happened to me.

Upon my arrival to Pittsburgh I YIPPED for joy, by myself, in my car, because firstly, I was so freaking exhausted and secondly, the bridges of the city are so EPIC that I can never contain myself upon arrival. Ever. Maybe it's just the nostalgia but there are few cities that make me so giddy upon entrance, even New York (gasp). Pittsburgh's just IT, man. Rivers, bridges, goodness. I also love a lot of people who live in Pittsburgh, most of whom have moved away at this point but still remain "Pittsburgers" in my head (include mental image of burgers superimposed on bridges). However, my good friend/amazing poet Sophie is probably the Best Person Who Lives In Pittsburgh (who could only be beat out by my old guitar teacher Joe Negri, of Mr. Rogers fame, & he might have to win via longevity). We have had lives of Overlap, Sophie & I, and it's always nice to have manic evenings together when I'm in-betweeen other cities. We had a lovely evening involving matzo ball soup, baritone ukulele, gelato, video chatting, and Bridget the Cat. In fact, here is a photo of us abusing Bridget the Curmudgeon of a Cat (she moans like an old person) in front of my computer, for fun:



She really is a silly cat. And she really sounds like an old person.

The next morning (that would be Tuesday, today), I awoke at stupid o'clock to have my guitar setup by the best luthier ever, Michael Pellow, but I had not had any coffee because there was too much traffic to both stop for coffee and be on time for my appointment, so I decided to be on time (go me!), but was probably less charming for the choice. Still, my guitar is now ringing like a church bell (in a good way) & I continued onwards, driving diligently from Pittsburgh to Boston. The drive, although 2 hours longer and sometimes so unenjoyable that you want to gouge your eyes out with coffee stirrers, is quite gorgeous. You drive through mountains & mountains & rolling hillsides & mountains. Some little towns, too. And then more mountains. As magical as airplanes are, sometimes I think car travel is even more crazy. Maybe because you're putting in the effort, & usually the things you put effort into are more satisfactory. But it seems magical to me, at this moment (a bottle of wine in), that I woke up in Pittsburgh, PA & am falling asleep in my hometown of Lexington, MA. So much ground has been covered! It's like I'm on the other side of the world! There really is something Magical about travel (oh, hello, have you ever listened to my songs?) but even moreso about doing it yourself. I wish I had the stamina to bike across the country. Mike Pellow, luthier extraordinaire of earlier mention, biked from Pittsburgh to DC this summer. There was a twinge of jealousy in my heart as he twanged my guitar strings & spoke of his exploits. Cross country bike trip! Maybe sometime.

So that brings us to now, at which point I have happily arrived in Suburbia. I am sleeping in the guest room (my 12-year-old sister has been living in my old room since she turned 9) & the parental controls on the "home office" computer have blocked all images on all internet sites, proving navigation of any kind as ridiculous as figuring out a puzzle without a box top. Tomorrow morning I take my little sisters to their doctors appointments, which I am endlessly excited about (being the aloof yet awesome older, visiting sister who pulls you out of school) and then I will ramble on to New Hampshire, and the Epic September will begin.

It has been 7 years since I spent a fall in New England. Fall in New England is Magic, did you know that? It's the best, and really there's not much else that can beat it. I am so excited to watch trees turn color, and to feel like I am where I'm supposed to be during one of my favorite months. So that is Epic No. 1.

The plan (and I'm hoping to blog most of this, the rest of the Epicness) is a writer's retreat on Star Island with my good friend Guy & a bunch of other folks who I don't know as of yet, all of us writing our brains out in a beautiful setting with no outside communication. I am very excited about this, but also a bit nervous, as I have a proven history of Problems with Authority, especially when they tell me how to write. We'll see. I think it will be grand, and not bad. GRAND. Effing grand.

Following the island-solitutde, I'll be spending three weeks MAKING THIS RECORD. My lovely & talented friend Djim Reynolds, who I hold in the highest esteem & who's made some of my top-records-ever, is engineering it and is really the reason I'm over here. The ever-important Joe Arnold will be coming out to fiddle it all up, steadfastly-awesome Emily Hope Price will also be bowing herself into flames, platonic life-partner Emilyn Brodsky may or may not make an appearance (maybe if I blog about it she won't flake? Let's start a petition for her not to flake!), Airplanes-string-goddess Kate Pukinskis is working on another killer arrangement, and many, many more of my crazily-talented New England friends will be making guest appearances. Almost all of the songs are silly, sing-alongy, and pretty sugary. When this was pointed out to me recently, I decided that while true, I am excited about this group of songs; the Nesting EP needed to be as intense as it was, and this as-of-yet-unnamed album needs to be as fun as it will be. Fun & ridiculous & awesome. & so, as long as I'm not jinxing anything, it will be.

If I don't go to bed right this minute it will be literally impossible to tend to my familial duties in the morning, and that shit is the most important, as we all know.

But basically, I'm making a new record this whole month. Aren't you excited too?

update & june tour dates announced! some help needed!

it's thursday! there are a few important things to talk about on the internet! right now my fella and the bunny (he is a new addition - his famously cutest picture lives here) are both sleeping because they both pulled all-nighters for different reasons & it is very quiet & sunny & time to stop procrastinating.

where did i leave off? oh, the RPM challenge. well, it's done. (important thing 1!) you can get that recording that i babbled about forever & ever (entitled cartography) HERE for a FREE download.

2! then i went on tour with christine lyons for 2 weeks in april. the thing about making a record & not having a real, tangible record is that people don't usually go to the effort to download things, so i started making little cards to hand out, hoping that this would remind them about the aforementioned free download. i would like to have my shit together more on that for the next tour but for now sharpie works.

tour, which we entitled COMFORT TOUR 09 after the first 4 days of amazing shows & homestays, was awesome. we ate such good food, stayed with such good people, played such fun places. good, good, & fun. pittsburgh, a little south, through the midwest. also it was warm. this fact alone beat win-tour by 8000. i missed joe's fiddle & joe's fix-sore-driving-arms-bodywork, but christine & i ended up playing on one another's sets here & there, & i got back into playing solo once more, plus i added audience-bands. this was a fun experiment. it may continue into the next tour, we'll see if there's room in the car. anyway, christine & i stopped recording our shows & started making improvisational, documentary travel songs wherever we were - gas stations, roadsides, in the car, in the venues. we entitled the band timothy blackberry (thank you, dude at our last show). there is an entire youtube channel of our chronicles that you can check out HERE. we also have photos from tour up in a flickr set HERE. it was a good way to start the spring.

then i came home, then i got sick, then i attempted to get healthy & concurrently worked & booked (& am still booking) the june tour.

3! OMG! THE JUNE TOUR!

i'm going on tour with two of my favorite people, joe arnold & emily hope price. joe will be my other musical half once again on this tour. he is magic in the form of a stringed instrument. EHP was my TA during my freshman year of college. sophomore year, she convinced me to play my own songs at a daytime concert series she had curated. this was a big deal at conservatory. it was like my non-classical coming out day. i owe her alot for that. she also co-wrote & played on 2 of the songs on my first real record, some kind of parade in 2005, & makes a gorgeous appearance on the nesting EP. she is one of my favorite lady friends ever & plays a mean, mean cello. she is, also, magic in the form of a stringed instrument. we are all going to have so much fun. it will be a packed car. full of stringed instruments.

the schedule still has some holes. roanoke VA, greensboro NC, & baltimore MD/DC are the most pressing. (if you have help - house shows, contacts, nice people who will let us sleep on their couches - please drop me a line at anna (at) theanna.com). but here is the line up as of yet!

6/1: philadelphia PA - the first unitarian chapel - 8PM, details on how to buy tickets soon! w/ emilyn brodsky
6/2: charlottesville VA - twisted branch tea bazaar - 8PM, w/ the flat iron string band
6/3: roanoke VA - HELP PLEASE
6/4: greensboro NC - HELP PLEASE
6/5: norfolk VA - elliot's fairgrounds coffeehouse - 7PM, w/ folk the system
6/6: richmond VA - comfort - 8PM, w/ fuzzy baby
6/7: baltimore MD - HELP PLEASE
6/8: jersey/westchester NY - TBA
6/9: brooklyn NY - pete's candy store - 10PM
6/10: northampton MA - the elevens - 7PM, w/ brandee simone
6/11: hyannis MA - TBA
6/12: portsmouth NH - riverrun books - 8PM, w/ guy capecelatro III & annie palmer
6/13: lexington MA - private house show - 5PM

i am so excited, it's pretty ridiculous.

WE ARE PSYCHED TO SEE YOU OUT THERE!,
anna

PROCLAMATION! APRIL TOUR STARTS THIS SATURDAY!

i have a cold. a really bad cold. 3-boxes-of-tissues cold. however! i have decided to be a road warrior & not a wimp, & so i am officially announcing
a mostly-midwestern tour starting THIS WEEK with the wonderful christine lyons once again!

the schedule! (addresses & support listed on my myspace page)
SAT 4/18 - pittsburgh PA - CARNIVAL MAIN STAGE (w/ the boy band!), 3PM
SUN 4/19 - columbus OH - THE ELK HOUSE, 8PM
MON 4/20 - blacksburg VA - GILLIE'S, 7PM
TUE 4/21 - charlottesville VA - BLUE MOON DINER
WED 4/22 - greensboro NC - THE PINES
THU 4/23 - black mountain (asheville) NC - TOWN PUMP TAVERN, 830PM
FRI 4/24 - louisville KY - CARDS CAFE
SAT 4/25 - ft wayne IN - FIREFLY COFFEEHOUSE, 530PM
SUN 4/26 - bloomington IN - THE APOSTLE K, 8PM
MON 4/27 - champaign/urbana IL - HOUSE SHOW
TUE 4/28 - iowa city IA - PUBLIC SPACE ONE, 9PM
WED 4/29 - dubuque IA - SILVER DOLLAR CANTINA
THU 4/30 - eau claire WI - INFINITEA
FRI 5/1 - madison WI - BENEFIT CONCERT, TRINITY UMC, 6PM
SAT 5/2 - beloit WI - CHAUS
SUN 5/3 - chicago IL - BENEFIT CONCERT, HOLY COVENANT UMC, 6PM; TOWN HALL PUB; 9PM

this tour will feature a 2nd-edition print of the nesting EP (they're so pretty!), a few tshirts, lots of audience participation, & a new banjo.

these shows are all about you guys who come out to them; thank you so much for your continued support. i can't wait to sing with you again soon!

see you out there,
& happy spring!,
A.

a blog about songwriting, the RPM challenge, booze, & the magical state of new hampshire.

this is a blog about songwriting, the RPM challenge, booze, & the magical state of new hampshire.

i think one of the things i miss most about college is writing assignments, as much as i procrastinated on them at the time. nobody has assigned me anything real to write since may of 2007 & i haven't really blogged in forever, as i haven't felt exciting enough to. however, i've had a lot of friends asking me what the hell my status updates are about over the past week, & today a good friend of mine (who will remain nameless in case this doesn't pan out) brought up the possibility of guest-blogging for her amazing website sometime in the future. & so i started thinking about how i'd blog about this particular project. then i started doing it in my head. then i poured myself a cocktail & decided to do it in real life.

this whole thing really starts with guy capecelatro III. guy is a magical person who i met in portsmouth, new hampshire through my friend dylan when i went to record some tiger saw songs with them last year in april. guy has a recording setup in his attic that has every instrument you could ever want to play with strewn about (christine referred to it as our candy store when we were there a few weeks ago). guy lives with his magical wife pam in their magical house that is painted a billion different magical colors & is quirky & colonial (for example there are some hallways where i can't walk without making sure to duck, otherwise i bash my forehead into a wall or ceiling) & is in the magical town of portsmouth, new hampshire. it is pure magic. magic everywhere. after our first meeting, i went back to visit with guy in august for a house show with two of my best ladies, emilyn & emily hope, & this is really where the story starts.

part 1, home recording.

in college i made 2 records. we used the studio in the basement of the music school. because there were conservatory students everywhere & the studio was so fancy, it was very hard to create something that sounded simple, or unaffected. i am in no way ungrateful for that studio - i love it & the people involved with it & learned so much there. however, i was in a place, physically & artistically, where everything i made sounded really full, lush, important, & epic. the things that airplanes do was a freaking opus.

so fastforward to the tour this past august when we stayed with guy. i'd loved how the tiger saw stuff from the previous april had come out & had asked ahead of time if we could record a few of my new songs in his attic. he sweetly agreed after already hosting & playing a house show that evening, the point at which most normal people would've been exhausted & showed us where we were sleeping. we (being emilyn & me, since neither guy nor emily hope drinks) boozed ourselves up & set out to record 2 songs until the wee hours of the night, imaginary babies & judy garland (my two favorite new songs that i had been debuting, really, on said tour). & so we recorded them. i sang differently than i ever had in the school studio. i played differently (thank you gin & gingerale) than i ever had before. granted, this was also very new, different music. but i got a sound out of myself & the space & all the silly instruments that i had always admired in other musicians, really my favorite musicians, but never been able to emulate.

this, of course, took place in the month right before i made the move from chicago to madison. i moved in october, two new songs from guy's in my back pocket & a whole bunch of space to unpack my music gear in my new place - a whole laundry room, in fact. add to this the fact that the boyfriend i moved in with (sorry ladies) had a bunch of gear that i'd never had access to before (a nice recording mic, an electric guitar, a preamp, a *real* guitar amp, etc).

once somewhat settled in madison in late october, i decided that i should make a record of the songs i'd written over the year or so i'd lived in chicago, especially since most of the songs had a pretty strong, similar current running them. i was also to the point where i was sick of airplanes, & was in the process of booking my fourth tour since the record had came out & still (with the exception of a tiny live tour compilation) didn't have anything new to give to peeps on the road. the boyfriend & i also had decided that we would make a christmas record for our families & friends (he plays bass), & decided that we'd do it at the same time that i was making the new EP, since i'd already be in recording mode.

i bought a glockenspiel on ebay (i was jealous of emily hope's, & accordions were too expensive). i started putting down what i thought the songs should sound like. i recorded my mom's classical guitar while i was visiting for thanksgiving in texas & used it for the song that i'd imagined a classical guitar on. long story short, i finished the EP recordings all before leaving for christmas (& we succeeded in an amazingly fun & awesome christmas record, too). i used imaginary babies & judy garland from guy's house on the record because they were pretty much perfect (not to mention the fact that using them meant i only needed to record 4 songs, & i am a procrastinator at heart), & so i mixed them & had my good friend eric boulanger master them at the studio he works at in ojai. when i got back from christmas i had 4 days before leaving for the tour to burn the cds, print the cd sleeves & matching tshirts with my good friend & flamingo-guitar artist birdie watts, unpack two suitcases & repack another. going from california sun to madison snow didn't make the process any smoother, but it got done.

this brings us to (almost) the next part of the story.

however, i'm going to go make myself another drink. i just wrote some kind of justification, but being a semi-grown woman, i am deleting it. deleted.

alright, new drink, back to it.

i'd made this EP that i was so proud of. so proud. incredibly proud. i couldn't wait to tell everyone about it. i listened to it in my car. i immediately sent a zip file of it to all of my best lady friends. who knows if it was just the newborn-art-realized pride or if it was something more, but i couldn't wait to push it on people at the shows, which started, (as i've implied with all the christmas-talk), on january 15th.


part 2, the RPM challenge.

fastforward 3 weeks of awesome shows & adventures to february 7th when we arrived on guy's magical doorstep yet again to hang out, eat at the (magical) friendly toast, and do some more recording. as ever, guy had a million projects going and asked me to add my vocals here & there, which i always love to do when i stop in. (tangent: it's awesome to listen to a song you've never heard, come up with a line in your head, sometimes under a set of guidelines – oos on the chorus, or something with these words – & sometimes completely free to do whatever you hear. it's a totally crazy mindgame that is super rewarding, or at least that's been my general experience with adding to peoples' projects, especially in the last year or so, especially when i randomly wander in on them, such as at guy's.) we spent sunday eating at said friendly toast (which i still have dreams about now that i'm back in the midwest) & recording some of christine's new songs. & then guy asked christine & i to write some 6-word songs. & then the RPM discussion came up.

guy had kept saying, "it's february, it's february," as if it was some national month of creative craziness that we all should know about. i hadn't completely understood the RPM albums he'd given me the previous year & written it off as some project he'd done with some friends. finally as he started to explain it to the lot of us, the pieces came together - just one album in one month, it was guy, the loveable over-achiever, who was taking on five albums. most people just took on one. the full challenge is pretty simply explained here & was started by the wire, a weekly paper in portsmouth, who i knew as the people who ran one of guy's art pieces, some women. there's an awesome radio piece (where they actually play one of MY SONGS for guy's 6-word project) here at new hampshire public radio.

one of guy's (five) projects was a collaboration in which he requested the help of all of his friends to make songs with only 6 words, vaguely based on this new poetry craze of 6-word poems. i instantly said, "the internet will break your heart." so we knew we had one to put down. guy also had pages & pages of 6-word lines that he'd written printed out, & offered to let us pick through some. christine chose "i'll burn the things you left", which was pretty much in the same vein as all the songs she was writing anyway & seemed amazingly appropriate & perfect. then as joe was doing bodywork on my shoulders with his feet (which had, of course, been going on during our whole conversation about RPM) he said, "LET GO!" to which i responded, "I CAN'T!" to which he responded, "LET GO!" to which i responded, "I WILL!" which then quickly became my other 6-word song. so i had the words & just had to come up with the melodies.

fastforward two days. on sunday we'd played in portland ME & stayed the night, so monday morning found us driving back to guy's to record all day before our show with lucy wainwright roche at the red door that evening. joe was extremely hungover & took a nap on the car ride. while he slept i started coming up with tunes in my head for my little songs. i started imagining guy's attic's plethora of instruments. when we walked into the house i said, "ok, let's go upstairs!" guy & i put down my two songs, "the internet" & "LET GO!" super fast, and with guy's amazing musical help, they came out almost exactly as i'd heard them on the car ride. really? it was that easy to put down two songs? i was amazed, awed, & feeling pretty accomplished.

what really got me was the style of the two songs. "the internet" is a song with my "sweet" voice & a toy piano & violin & lots of "ooooo"s (not to be confused with ooze, although it does ooze a little too -- you can listen to it on my myspace). "LET GO!" (which is always required to have previously shown punctuation) is a song with electric guitar, bass, yelling, ME PLAYING DRUMKIT (my first time, pretty laughable), organ, and my rock voice, which i hadn't attempted to use since my high school rock band, random robot. when we played the new songs for joe (who had been napping off his hangover still while we recorded), the look on his face was priceless. "well, they certainly are different," he said. this is only hilarious, i guess, if you know joe.

i was so excited by these new sounds that i started talking about the idea of doing the challenge. this was on february 9th, we had a show & a day at home ahead of us, & i was expecting to get back to madison on february 14th, or very late on the 13th. the project was due postmarked on march 1st, but there are only 28 days in february. one of those days would be be valentine's day/my arrival home after a month away, & another would be my birthday (the 26th), which i planned (& still plan to) make a very big deal of. i wanted to do the project, but i just didn't think there would realistically be time, & i've done enough commiting-without-following-through to know that i feel like a big jerk afterwards if i don't get it done, so i was not ready to commit to something like making an entire album.

somehow in the two days of our burlington, VT show & a day at home in lexington, MA, though, i'd decided i was going to do it. in fact, i called guy while i was walking around downtown crossing because it was so gorgeous outside & i already missed the magic of new hampshire, & i thanked him for our time & said, "yeah, & i think i'm going to do the RPM challenge."

part 3, the present situation.

it doesn't seem like that was a big decision, or at least a big enough decision to warrant such a long freaking blog. it'll get there, though.

instead of stopping in cleveland like i'd planned, i drove all the way from lexington, MA to chicago, IL. it took 16 hours. there was a lot of precipitation & a lot of coffee. i even stooped to red bull at one point. i had cds & my zoom recorder (i highly recommend it to anyone!) within arm's reach on the passenger's seat. i started coming up with little tunes. i'd record them on the spot, sometimes speaking words that i couldn't hear melodies to, sometimes recording 5 different versions of the same song because i'd come up with one new line. songs weren't difficult things anymore, suddenly songs were any length, in any style, with any instrumentation. i didn't have an awesome attic like guy's but i had (& in fact am presently sitting in) my laundry room, & i had inklings of ideas, & i had this momentum that had smacked me in the face in new hampshire. not to mention the fact that, even without a project in mind, i usually write my best stuff on long car rides by myself.

so i got home & spent two days in the bliss of valentine's day, food, & on demand TV and after the weekend, on february 16th, i signed up on the RPM site & set out to record 10 new songs, or at least 35 minutes of new music, in 12 days.

the first thing i did was go out to buy a real glockenspiel since mine was terribly out of tune, which had proven to be kind of a problem on tour. while buying it i was convinced to also buy a snare drum because it was cheap if you bought it with the glock, and i had the cash on me, and i couldn't shake my amazingly fun time playing guy's drumkit in new hampshire no matter how terrible i was, so i bought the snare as well. and then i dug up the boyfriend's electric guitar.

the next thing i did was type up all of the lyrics that i had at that point, print them, & come up with chords for the songs based on what i'd recorded in the car, which i then recorded roughly on my zoom. that was the only thing i did in any kind of organized fashion. i've been reading peoples' updates & they seem very methodical, very practical, getting entire songs down and then moving onto the next. as a good majority of things in my life, i barreled into thi process & have continued, erratically, as such. on day one i put down the two songs that i'd formed to their fullest during the long drive. that night i wrote a bunch of new lyrics. on the next day i added more instruments & voices to the first two songs. then i took a day to keep writing & watch some tv & cook some pasta. then i took a day to laze about & do almost nothing. then on friday i put down two more songs. then on the weekend, which should've been the recording productivity's height, i nursed hangovers and watched movies instead of recording. then yesterday, monday, i put down four more songs in a 10-hour marathon session. which puts me at eight. today is the first day that i've gone back to those first two songs; i spent today going into each song to tweak, start initial mixes, and add more instrumentation. which is where i am now.

(break taken to take this photobooth picture of myself, literally where i am now. notice glock, snare & microphone surrounding me).



part 4, songwriting, or Song Writing.

in my freshman year of college i wrote like a madwoman, newly solo after the dismemberment of earlier-mentioned random robot, writing songs on the piano in my dorm's common room, suddenly flooding with new music, a new place, a new love interest, new friends, new life. i did my first show, had a friend record it, and then promptly burned 300 copies and sold it as my first cd. it was a really big accomplishment for me at the time, but it was everything i'd written to that point. it was a mess of thoughts. it was not well edited. a lot of songs sounded exactly the same.

i still kind of look at my first studio album that way, too. at the time, it was the most exciting thing to date, & i wanted to cram as much on there as possible, i wanted people to get as much me as they could (oy). & to a point, airplanes was pretty much the same thing, too – all the songs i'd written during the interim – but i only let two of the older ones on there, & these were orchestrated, arranged, & had a continuity to them. with airplanes, i felt like i was starting to make intricate songs, like maybe i was starting to be a songsmith like the artists i admired so much.

that brings us to the EP. i took the year's 6 songs (there were 2 or 3 stragglers that i'd never finished) & put them together and was proud (see above part of this huge blog where i talk about said pride). they took a year to formulate. the songs were complicated & intricate & interconnected & fleshed out in a way that really felt right. i had subscribed to the songwriting mantra of only putting out your best possible work for, really, the first time.

the thing about this RPM project, for me, is that it's opened up something that people have been talking about for years but i've never really tried - a song a day, or "just write it for the sake of writing it". i've grown into the mantra of lots of editing, workshopping (thank you poetry school), fixing, poking, prodding, and then, once completely satisfied, trying it out live. and then eventually putting down a "real" recording. especially after putting out my first album, i accepted the fact that putting out something for the sake of putting out something isn't worth anyone's while.

and then came this project.

i'm not saying that i've completely converted, or that i'm going to start recording every stupid thing i think of & putting it on the internet. but to fulfill the project's time limit i went into old journals, found unfinished songs, let the rock songs pass through the initial filter, let every song pass through that initial filter. and the more i let pass through, the easier i found new songs coming, and so the cycle continued and continues. i stopped trying to make songs that fit my personality or my singer/songwriter character that i've created/perpetuated/accepted/portrayed as my music has gotten more mature (that character business is totally a whole different blog all on its own). i started hearing other people, letting songs come and letting them be inspired by whoever i was listening to. "oh, this is a patty griffin folk song. oh, this is a regina spektor song from songs when i first fell in love with her live stuff. oh, this is a jason anderson singalong song. oh, this is a kimya dawson song if she & i were hanging out with the kids at that house show i just did in new brunswick." suddenly i am making a bunch of different kinds of songs i never thought i'd make. and i'm letting their recordings be messy. i'm letting them be ragged, partially because of the time limitations, but also just for the sake of being in their natural habitat. suddenly i am on brand new ground.


part 5, the present situation, part 2.

i have an entire week left. & by week i mean five days. that's a lot of time. i'm feeling remarkably confident. i think the rush of the initial songwriting blitz has worn off & i can't figure out why i'm having such a hard time with these last two songs. i spent most of today adding drums & more singing & lots of handclaps the eight already in existence. my birthday is on thursday. there is word that i might be getting a banjo from the birthday fairy. i think my subconscious is holding out on finishing song no. 9 & starting song no. 10 in hopes that i will be able to write them on a banjo. the only other issue at hand is that, since i'm on a spurt of "anything goes," most songs have been very short. i'm creeping in on 25 minutes with 8 songs and i doubt i can make each new song 5 minutes unless there's a fiery banjo solo somewhere in there.

still, most people seem to be at about 8, which doesn't seem bad for starting 16 days after everyone else. the album is so far untitled and i have no thoughts on how to make it, physically, in terms of art & such. again, i'm not worried. i will think of something.

list as of now (alphabetically, with instrumentation so far, which is not final & none of these are yet considered done):

america hugs - written on the long car ride, 3:08, voices, guitar, claps, snare, toy keyboard, tambourine, la da dum dums
guilt (killing the ghost) - written on the long car ride, 3:36, voices, guitar, melodica, claps, boom-chick, tambourine, lots of harmonies
louisa - written during tour in virginia, 4:16, voice & guitar
new england - written on the long car ride, 3:24, voices, guitar, snare, jingle bells, tambourine, glock, whoas
toy boat - written on the long car ride, 1:47, lots of voices, glock, guitar, snare, tambourine
seashore song (to winter) - written in november as a duet & then re-vamped, 2:54, voices, guitar, boom-chick, glock, shaker, toy tambourine
sing along work song - written at my desk last summer but finally finished, 2:16, guitar, voices, snare, tambourine, glock, lots of yelling with the boyfriend in the hallway
women - also written last year but now re-written & finished, 3:19, voices, guitar, organ, tambourine, snare

part 6, in conclusion.

i'm feeling pretty posi. i've been writing this blog instead of watching TV because the boyfriend is writing a paper & we have an apartment with no walls that reach the ceiling, which makes doors pretty useless (yet another blog unto itself). i will also happily let you know that i'm only 3/4ths of the way through drink number two. i feel much better now that i don't seem so boozy. however, this blog has turned out way longer than i originally intended or expected. so if you actually made it all the way through, i suggest you go & pour yourself a drink.

love,
anna
(song machine / boozehound)

lox & legs summer tour 2008!

yo friends,
greetings from humid & summery chicago. we have big news:
me & emilyn are hitting the road once more for the lox & legs summer 2008 tour-o-rama! (other possible names: no pants tour 2008! no tears tour 2008! no punching tour 2008!) we'll be driving around with our dear friends dan o'stretch (both lox and legs, on bass guitar) & emily hope price (on amazing vocal stylings & cello for a few new england shows)!

we're traveling through the midwest for a whole week & the east coast for another -- amazing amounts of driving! amazing amounts of music! give your friends collective heads-ups -- this is our first time through alot of these cities, & we're playing with & opening for some really awesome people, so we hope you can make it out to sing with us when we stop through town.
love,
anna.

LOX & LEGS SUMMER TOUR 2008
all shows with emilyn "life partner" brodsky

thu july 31st
south union arts
chicago, IL
(venue closing/tour kickoff party!!)
1352 s. union
8PM, all ages, BYOB, donations
w/ the thin man, cactus's (nashville) & elephant gun

fri aug 1st
bremen cafe
milwaukee, WI
901 e. clarke
9PM, 21+, free
local support TBA

sat aug 2nd
escape java joint
madison, WI
916 willy st.
7PM, all ages, free

sun aug 3rd
exploration iowa
campfire show
sweetland station, IA
banks of the mississippi
3PM, all ages, free
w/ marc hans, denny garcia, & jimmy berg

mon aug 4th
the blue fugue
columbia, MO
120 s. 9th st.
7PM, 18+, free
w/ open mic features

tues aug 5th
pops blue moon
st. louis, MO
5249 pattison "on the hill"
10PM, 21+, $5
w/ phoebe claggett

wed aug 6th
the cinemat
bloomington, IN
123 s. walnut
9PM, all ages, $4
w/ josh morrow

thu aug 7th
firefly coffee house
ft. wayne, IN
3523 n. anthony blvd
7PM, all ages, free
local support TBA

fri aug 8th
the lakeshore theater
chicago, IL
3175 n. broadway
10PM, $15
w/ amanda palmer & vermillion lies
buy tickets here

sat aug 9th
your inner vagabond
pittsburgh, PA
4130 butler st.
8PM, all ages, byob, $6
w/ chet vincent & the big bend

sun aug 10th
kyle cassidy's house
(west) philadelphia, PA
email anna@theanna.com to be added to the guest list
5PM, potluck/byob
w/ birdie busch

mon aug 11th
meattown, usa
new brunswick, NJ
215 hamilton st.
7PM, all ages
w/ giant explosion

tues aug 12
mansion TBA
westchester, NY
7PM, all ages
w/ anthony da costa

wed aug 13
the silent barn
brooklyn, NY
915 wyckoff ave
queens/bushwick
L to halsey, M to myrtle
7PM, all ages
w/ kate ferencz & kyp malone (of tv on the radio)

fri aug 15th
the lily pad
cambridge, MA
1353 cambridge st.
inman square
10PM, all ages, $5-10
w/ emily hope price & nicholas beaven

sat aug 16th
guy's backyard bash
portsmouth, NH
37 coffins ct.
5PM, all ages, byob
w/ guy capecelatro III & emily hope price

sun aug 17th
slainte
portland, ME
24 preble st.
9PM, free
w/ emily hope price & lady lamb the beekeeper

mon aug 18th
the monhegan church
monhegan island, ME
8PM
w/ emily hope price & local support TBA

links to all these venues & artists are up here

can't wait to see you!!
xo
anna.

08 IS FOR OUR KIND OF LADY tour.

i'm going on tour in february with some dudes (again)!
i still feel like the tour should be called the "'08 IS FOR OUR KIND OF LADY" tour, the quotation a drunken text i got from my best friend on new years eve. the full text reads: "thanks for calling before i got too drunk to call you. i love you and FYI 2008 is for our kind of lady." isn't that such a nice text? most all of my lady-friends have agreed, 08 is definitely the year of the lady. (this tour name has no political insinuations).

the tour also might be called PRESENTS & LOVE TOUR 08, because the tour contains both valentines day & my birthday, both of which i am VERY excited about. so you can decide which you like better.

i'm touring with the indubitable dylan metrano of tiger saw (myspace.com/tigersaw) and joe arnold, impeccable jazz fiddle player of summer tour fame will be accompanying my sets. we'll also have friends in certain cities hop on stage. you seriously DON'T want to miss it. plus we're driving all this way in the snow. lots of snow. if nobody shows up we will have traversed in vain.

mark your calendar & forward this to your friend that's in that town over there who would come out to see us play.

FEB 10
HOUSE SHOW
NEW BOSTON, IL
206 clay st - 6pm - w/ glowstorm & marc hans

FEB 11
THE CINEMAT
BLOOMINGTON, IN
123 s. walnut st. - 9pm - 21+ - w/ ben laatsch & nathaniel seer

FEB 12
THE BARKING SPIDER
CLEVELAND, OH
11310 juniper rd - 7pm - 21+ - w/ chris reynolds

FEB 13
THE DRAGON'S KEEP
FORT WAYNE, IN
2608 lower huntington rd - 8pm - w/ ben laatsch

FEB 14
BREMEN CAFE
MILWAUKEE, WI
901 e. clark st - 10pm - 21+ - open mic feature!

FEB 15
THE RATHSKELLAR @ MEMORIAL UNION
MADISON, WI
800 langdon st. - 5pm - all ages

FEB 16
THE FIXX
CHICAGO, IL
3053 n. sheffield - 7pm - all ages - w/ outpost

FEB 17
SKIBO CAFE, CMU
PITTSBURGH, PA
5000 forbes (university center) - 7pm - all ages - w/ boca chica

FEB 18
THE BLACK LODGE
KINGSTON, PA
22 w. bennett st - all ages - w/ election day

FEB 19
ADELINE'S APARTMENT
WASHINGTON DC
house show, email for details

FEB 20
THE FIRE
PHILADELPHIA, PA
412 w. girard ave - 9pm - 21+ - w/ boatload of madmen, the no cultures

FEB 21
CT/JERSEY
TBA

FEB 22
THE MIDDLE EAST UPSTAIRS
CAMBRIDGE, MA
472 mass ave - 8pm (i'm first!) - 18+ - w/appomattox, wye oak, sweet thieves

FEB 23
THE BLACK SPOT
HYANNIS, MA
10 ocean st - 8pm - all ages

FEB 24/25
NYC TBA

FEB 26 (BIRTHDAY SHOW!!)
THE CO-OP
SUNY PURCHASE
7pm - all ages - w/ emily hope price & emilyn brodsky


i'm so excited i can hardly wait. come! make us feel popular! expect tour blogs galore from the road. & lots of pictures. can't wait to see you out there.
!,
A.

(image by the ever-on-top-of-it jeff brown).