2011 - Year in Review

I debated a lengthy review of everything that happened this past year, but decided that there was just too much that happened.

Instead, here are a few brief highlights of 2011:

• Played a ton of awesome shows, including a bunch of open mic's
• Released a website
• Graduated from Messiah College, got a job, and moved
• Played my first podcast on the NSFWShow
• Ranked #5 on amazon mp3 "easy listening" charts
• Began extensive work on the next album
• Got more amazing fans

And some things to look forward to in 2012:

• Bigger, better shows
• More looping, delays, etc.
• There are plans for more merch (i.e. t-shirts and stuff)
• Album #2
• Youtube

Details to come.

But in the meantime... check out my good friend, Caleb Hawley, bringing in the New Year!

Video of Me Opening for Caleb Hawley

Sometime last week I posted on the Caleb Hawley B-Sides concert. Check out the review here.

In the review I mention opening up for his song, Gone For Good. Well, a youtube video has surfaced with this. I'm playing my Caleb Hawley inspired song, Doppelganger.

B-Sides Review: Caleb Hawley

Now it may seem like I talk about this guy a good bit. Talk to me and you'll hear me mention bands like MR.BUNGLE and artists like Trace Bundy a lot too. I talk about these guys and build hype about these guys because they really are that good. These guys take their genre and they do things to it that are innovative and fresh. They make music that is interesting and perform shows that are intimate as well as immensely entertaining (obviously MR.BUNGLE excluded since they broke up a while ago). That's what it takes for me to hype an act.

Every time I see Caleb Hawley, it's something new. The first time I saw him, he was with a trio and what stood out was when he played Reach the Zenith with interpretive dance in the background. The next time I saw him was in a barn in the middle of nowhere, as a solo act. What struck me there was his ability to adapt to his circumstances and still be able to have fun playing a gig that, very clearly, sucked. After that, I played a gig with him in a writers in the round styled gig where all of the artists really built off of what had been played before them.

This time was yet another different arrangement - a full band. I had heard rumor of this band and had heard that it was a fun show. My thinking was that it'd be like a lot of his recorded work, which had been done with a full band. While that was somewhat the case, this was more along the lines of a single act variety show. Every song was so distinctly different from the others, yet was held together by the overriding jazz and soul infused themes and the antics of Hawley's style.

While other shows had one or two specials throughout the show, this evolution of Caleb's set was peppered with things going above and beyond the singer/songwriter repertoire.

• The first of these was the mario theme breakdown. It just ...happened. It fit, but was totally unexpected.
• A few songs later, I opened up Gone For Good with a version of my piece, Doppelganger. The transition was completely unrehearsed, yet seamless.
• At some point, I'm not entirely sure of the order, Fargo made an appearance during Who's Your Doggie? by running up onto stage to say hi.
• After that, he switched over to electric guitar. This allowed for some nice bluesy solos and some rocking out. After the show I saw a tweet from a fellow student that read something like "Caleb Hawley reminded me that guitar solos can be cool"
• A cover of Boyz II Men's I'll Make Love to You. My sister thought this was creepy, but by this time Caleb had developed his personality on stage and this parody fit perfectly. It included an a capella section where all of the members of the band could barely hold it together. Then to add to the perceived creepiness, Caleb got out the pitch shifter and dropped his voice an octave or so so that he could get a real sultry deep voice. It was hilarious.
•  To end his set, he started by singing a song about baking cookies. Apparently he wrote this funk inspired tune when he was 15. This is where he brought out some crowd participation. First, he had people cheer for their favorite type of cookie. Some cheering - nothing big. Then, he brought some kids up on stage to dance ...and taught them the cookie dance. Which obviously led to everyone in the union singing and dancing "Pour it, pour it; stir it up; stick it in your mouth and shake your butt."

And I leave you with this:

The Things You Stumble Upon

Every once in a while, while scouring the web for interesting things to read, I come across something that is awesome. Tonight, as I often do, I've been in search of the illusive press that I really don't have any of.

Everyone always asks about what press you've gotten and I'm always in that awkward situation where I have absolutely nothing. My album has been reviewed once by a friend whose arm I twisted to write the review, but aside from that, I've got nothing. With actually doing something with my music, you'd think I would've at least gotten a review from someone at school in the school paper or something, but no.

I know I've gone about the whole press thing wrong, but I've really had no help whatsoever on the matter. This is all beside the point, however.

So what did I find tonight?

Some hidden gem of press-like interest? Some new tunes that I can add to the 12-cd-high tower of cds that I've acquired in the last week and have yet to listen to? The answer to how to get the press I've blindly sought after for years?

No. No. And ...no.

However, I did find a blog post by Caleb Hawley about the gig we played a little over a year ago. Read it HERE.

For those who don't know both myself and Caleb - we're essentially the same person, give or take a few things. His blog post is about just that. This whole encounter was the inspiration for my song, Doppelganger. I think this gig was the first time I had played the song live, but at that point it didn't have a name...

A few posts ago I posted a picture from that gig. I'm new to blogging, so I have no clue if it's bad etiquette to post a picture twice, so I'll assume it is and tell you to just read the rest of my blog entries.

Seriously, though, this made my night. I didn't find that hidden piece of press that seems to be evading me, but I feel as though I can sleep soundly tonight.

And at 3am, I will do just that.

-Alex


ps - I'll try to get the rest of the MMC series up soon

Friends and Fame

Every once in a while I'll have a friend do something big and make a name for themselves. Because of the nature of music and it being in the entertainment industry, most of these "15 minutes of fame" cases are music-related. I've had a few instances where I've played gigs with bigger names, have hung out with world-renowned artists, and have gotten my name out there other fun ways.

With my friends, the earliest case of this that I can think of is when my friend, Danny, was taken up on stage with Robert Randolph and the Family Band when they came to our school. He got to jam on stage for maybe like 5 minutes and it was pretty sweet. I had actually been the one to push him (literally) to go up, so to see him having a blast up on stage was a little extra rewarding.

Matt Stevens

After that, I'd say Matt Stevens' recent success has gone above and beyond the 15 minutes. I've been following his work and keeping in contact with him since right before the release of his first album, Echo, in 2008, where his solo career started to take off. After tons of positive press from over in England, a second solo album, Ghost, and a prog-rock release with The Fierce and the Dead, he's made quite the name for himself. Now working on album 3, Stevens has established a fan base and tightly knit community that has come together as a global network. This ability to engage his fans coupled with the positive press he has received has not only helped with the numbers side of things, but has also helped to land him the supporting act to bands like The Adrian Belew Power Trio.

Caleb Hawley

However, this post isn't about Matt Stevens, and it's definitely not about Danny, either. Instead, this is about my friend and stunt double, Caleb Hawley. I first met Caleb at a B-Sides at Messiah College. He had played and I had listened while playing pool. Impressed by his awesomeness, I bought his newly released, Greatest Hits (his first release). Eventually, I guess my roommate, Ryan, who books B-Sides, was corresponding with Caleb and had given him a link to my music. We got talking, I looked up his picture and the resemblance was ...super creepy.

Height, hair, Strats, Taylors ...creepy

So anyway, I've seen Caleb a few times since then, played a show with him, and have been able to follow his progress. In recent news, he's not only released his third album, but has made it onto American Idol?! Now I'm not the biggest fan of American Idol - actually I rather dislike the show - but check out his audition:

Pretty much one of the best auditions I've seen (though I don't usually watch the show and haven't seen many auditions). It's great getting to see a friend up there and to see the sort of press that he's gotten from this. I was going to post this right after it was aired, but then thought it'd be better to post right before the Hollywood episodes. Which, I guess are now sometime in the next week or two, so that works. So, regardless of what you think of American Idol, be sure to check it out to see how he does. He's already got Steven Tyler clapping along and J-Lo telling him he's cute, so in some regards, he's won already - just not the whole competition yet.






So yeah, it's great to see friends make it and to see them do big things. Opportunities like those that Caleb and Matt have gotten come along once in a lifetime and change the course of your career. We all wish, at some point, that those things could happen to us, but to step back and think about it, that would make my life way too crazy. I like being able to do small gigs and still do this mechanical engineering stuff, while watching friends step into the limelight.