This Friday Andy Shaw Band at Skully's

This Friday we will be participating in this show. I have mentioned it before so here is the flyer and I will leave it at that. :)

Hoodoo, Dayton, and Whoknowswhat?

If you have not already, go to Rumba Cafe (Summit and Hudson in Columbus...duh) on a Sunday night 10p-2am and see Hoodoo Soul Band. It is your duty as a human being. They play weekly, and bring a great crowd. Normally I would not try to heavily promote a cover band but I really do not consider these guys a cover band..that's almost a bad word. These guys are like the tribute band to every funky, soulful, rockin tune there is..each song they play is a brilliant randition of whatever artist they choose. If that makes any sense...it did in my head. The lead guitar player and sometimes singer Kevin Oliver was in P. Funk at one point, for gosh darn sakes. Jeff Ciampa the bass player has worked on Grammy nominated albums (they may have won..can't remember...) he is a badass either way on bass. The harmonies are always spot on, horn section, great keys, just all encompassing good, oh and Tony McClung on drums, man that guy pisses me off he is so good, talk about pocket. Phew, I'm done gushing I think.

So ASB had a great trip to Dayton and I wanted to share this video with you, since we did not know anyone there and no one came up with us besides people playing in the band, I took it upon myself to film a little bit of our experience..while playing drums. I did the best I can, and I think at the end of the video I throw the little flip video camera to the ground cuz I had to catch the one so sorry about the ending, not the girl in the white w/black polkadots shirt dancing, I LOVED watching her she was great. I wish I woulda gotten the impromptu rapper's delight we busted into, that was awesome and people were dancing their hineys off.

In other news, I have been working on this hip hop album. This is a really fun project and I am super excited to get some local C-Bus people working on it. Been listening to a lot of Fugees and Erykah Badu and Heidi Howes just lent me her classical guitar which has already been utilized, Fugees..Wyclef...Islands..classical guita...yeah, neurons are working and synapses and firing and all good stuff. Well, atleast I understand my own blog. This Friday at Skully's is gonna be a big show, I have mentioned it forty times already so ASB, The Wet Darlings, and Jared Mahone, good times.

Dayton tonight, tomorrow who knows?

Tonight I am traveling to Dayton with ASB to play at the Trolley Stop. We have played once before there and it was a great place. Good food, beer, people, and a cool back patio. Our good friend Dave Huffman of Jakob Freely introduced us to this place so thanks Dave. He writes a great (love his advice) blog about marketing your band and what not, good stuff here.

Last night we were in Toledo at Mickey Finn's. Cool place, not a huge draw of people. We met some awesome people and even had some fans come all the way from Tiffin to see us, so thanks so much guys! We will be back to Toledo soon I am sure.

Thursday night was a crazy one for me, after rehearsing with Heidi Howes and Abby I went home and got some stuff organized, showered, and headed to meet Jared Mahone (Jan. 29th next Friday with ASB and Wet Darlings...gonna be a good show!) to grab some flyers for the upcoming gig. He is writing a song a week for his Mixtape Project, so ambitious and such a good idea, the Jan. 29th Skullys gig we are playing w/Jared is going to be his first live show supporting that project. I think he is giving out free download cards of the first couple tracks. He seemed a bit stressed and he even had his pad out writing, he was telling me how he has to be writing constantly and that the first two weeks were pretty easy but he was kinda stuck at the moment, Jared is great and I don't have anything but good words to say about him...so far..ha kidding. But yeah check him out and Andy Shaw Band at ...well you know where. So ANYWAY, I went and played with Heidi at Thirsty Ear with RJ Cowdery (who opened up) She is amazing and this local internet tv station called Fabb Vision was filming the whole concert. RJ saw me tuning up during her last song and asked me to join her on stage with the fiddle so that was awesome, she is so good and hopefully we will work together some day, like me be on a record of hers (that would be sweet). Heidi's set went really well for our first official gig as Heidi, Abby, and me..oh and Christian sat in playing guitar (really it was bass with an octave pedal) and some fiddle when I got off stage. The highlight I thought was "Listen to your Dreams" a really cool song where Abby and I do some swelly background vocals on, Heidi's voice is just sick so if you have not heard her check her out. I hopped over to The Treehouse after that gig to sit in with Slim White and the Averys, those guys sure know how to play some fun country. It is like going back in time, great harmonies, simple but awesome drums (Brady even pulled out a washboard!), amazing Tele work by Seth, and they even had Mike from Dottie and Clyde sit in on mandolin, nice work! Good times had by all..now I am off to Dayton!

I forgot

I also got together with Kerry Henderson..you may know him as one of the Floorwalkers. He plays a mean lap steel among other things. So Kerry and I got together on Wednesday to write a tune for my duets album. I had a great time writing with Kerry and we got some really solid ideas down, we're gonna finish the tune next Wednesday and then get in the studio to record soon after. Larry and I just finished vocals on our track so that is awesome, track by track it is getting done..so excited!

Lots going on

First of all I am playing TONIGHT Thursday January 21st with Heidi Howes. I will be singing, playing violin and djembe, and playing a little classical guitar, it's my first time playing classical guitar at a gig so bare with me, I love it though! The show will start with RJ Cowdery who is an AWESOME songwriter kinda in the same vain as Raina Rose. 7:30pm she will open and then Heidi Howes, backed by me and Abby Dorn (great voice, Carlos you done good!..ha).

Oh and also I am playing at the Treehouse with Slim White and the Averys, finally I am going to be able to make it to one of their gigs and play, I have once before and it was awesome. Slim and I played in Matt Monta and the Hot Coal Band and Slim ended up not being able to play drums anymore for the project and started his own band. He is an amazing songwriter, drummer, and has a great voice for country so come out and see them! I will sit in on fiddle for some tunes. Check out Slims blog about the band and their adventures here, they do this "Ranch Party Round Up" and it has been held at Thirsty Ear in the past, not sure about future..check their blog for details.

Let's see, what else? My bro Andy played last night at Dick's Den with Christian Howes. Christian asked Andy to perform for a special songwriter night he had. His sister Heidi (who I play with) did a set, Stephane Nilles, Andy, and then Stephanie again. Christian sat in and played fiddle and guitar and a backing band of a bass player and drummer also played. Pretty cool stuff, good crowd, good times. Christian does every Wednesday at Dick's playing his jazz/rock/awesome violin so check him out.

Ruby's Jam on Tuesday - Feat. G Finesse

This video is from the Tuesdy Night Jam Session at Ruby's (19th and Summit in Columbus, Ohio). Every Tuesday Evan Oberla hosts a weekly jam session with some great musicians. Usually they do a set of tunes and then they open it up for jamming. I actually sat in this night, kinda reluctantly cuz I was just there to listen and watch these guys amaze me...but I sat in..at one point I lost the beat...as a drummer..but I guess losing the one is what it's all about in jazz right? Personally, I like sticking to a good 2 and 4 groove, I am simple minded..ha..but these guys are really good at what they do..here is a clip of when G Finesse hopped on stage to spit a freestyle (I assume) verse. I am hoping to have him on my hip hop album when it starts materializing so watch out for that. I am going to chronicle that whole project on here so stay tuned. Oh also, big shout out to Mike Twice of course, jeeze how did I miss his huge drum solo in this clip? He holds it down and then flips that beat upside down here, phew...nice.

Other news in personal projects, went out to Delaware for Andy Shaw Band and had a great time playing at the Backstretch. Also played a great Thursday show at Thirsty Ear on Jan. 14th so thanks to all who came out! More ASB stuff here, as always.

Larry Cook and I just recorded vocals for our song "Lawn Clippings" from the duets album I am working on so watch for that, it is turning out great with tracks co-written by me and Megan Palmer, Joey Hebdo, Heidi Howes, Larry Cook, and so many more..can't wait to get it done!

More stuff

Last night I celebrated my friend Christina's birthday at Cafe Bella...if you have not been there yet then you are simply just stupid. Ha, but seriously it is THAT good. It is right near Hudson and High at 2593 North High Street. So after we ate we went to the Ravari Room where a bunch of bands were playing. Saturday Giant, which I sadly missed..my friend Roseanne from Wing and Tusk is in that band I saw her there and she was explaining that they were all in a Queen cover band and formed an original band so I will have to see them another time! I did catch Afortiori which is why we went to Ravari because Christina works with some of those guys at Newport. They were pretty cool, I thought the bass lines were grooving and I liked the simplicity of it. Not to downplay it, that is a good thing. I love when bands do melodies in unison where the bass and guitars are doing the same thing and the drums compliment well..good stuff. There was a band called Kuan from Dayton and then Six Gallery who just got a great deal where they are going to be touring in Europe and get their album distributed worldwide by EMI. Read more about it here. Good stuff from these guys, it can be a little heady for me (I told you I like simplicity) but they are definitely talented guys and I love that Daniel Francis became their singer. I kinda have a thing with instrumental bands...I mean really it's just that I like songs and singers and lyrics, nothing really against them I just prefer bands with singers. Anyway, Daniel's vocals are powerful and he and the band are just great performers. The thing I like about alot of these bands is that they play with raw emotion. There are tons of bands that are technically great but they just stand on stage. I am constanly trying to be a better performer and channel that raw emotion that flows through you while playing music. These guys get it.

So after Ravari we caught like 3 songs from The Wet Darlings. After going through some drummer changes and playing a ton of shows at the beginning of their existence, these guys have really found their own sound. I have not seen them in a while and am excited to finally play with them again (January 29th at Skullys with Jared Mahone and me on drums with Andy Shaw Band) shameless plug. Anyway, Jenny Lute is just an amazing powerful vocalist and with the Patterson brothers backing her up with sweet bass riffs and intricately arranged guitar parts (Bill, where do you come up with these chords?) and Aaron Bishara just solid on those drums, they have a great sound. It's a little soul its definitely rock, it's fresh, contemporary, and just good and unique. Good times..tonight I go play in Delware with Andy Shaw Band. The Backstretch bar is A long narrow bar packed with college kids from Ohio Weslyan and they have always been very welcoming of us. We have already started to build a good fanbase there so we hope to increase it every time we go. I will post a video soon of this past Tuesdays jam at Ruby Tuesday (fittingly) with Evan Oberla, he hosts this jam every week now at Ruby's moving if from Rumba, its former location.

Chillicothe..duets album

So I was unable to get together with Bree today to work on our song, but it will happen very soon. Larry Cook and I are getting the vocals tracked on Tuesday for our song "Lawn Clippings" this is one of my fav tracks so far. I am really excited to get this duet album done, I am thinking 2 more tracks need to be written and then we can record those, along with the other songs, it is all happening..slowly but surely so I hope to have a finished product very soon.

I played drums with Andy Shaw Band last night in Chillicothe. We had a great time and we even got some video out of it. My dad bought one of those flip digital video recorders, pretty sweet so I made sure to get some video and hand it off to some friends to film us while we were playing. Met a lot of great people and saw some familiar friends as well, always a joy to play in Chilli. Read more about ASB adventures here.

So I record with Larry on Tuesday and then the next project is getting my live band together, working on that right now. Oh and last but not least, I was checking out some videos today of great local bands. Super Desserts did a great Ohio Sessions ...session...so check that out. Also Relay Recording has housed some great artists including my friends the Floorwalkers, and I did not realize but Willy Mason did a video, if you have not checked him out, you are in for a treat. Ok that is it for now.

Introduction, etc..

Hey I am Chris, I play music in Columbus Ohio. This is going to kind of be a good record for me, and whomever wants to read about on goings in my life in music. I quit working a "real" job a while back and have been supporting myself by playing music and doing a little graphic design but mostly just playing music and teaching lessons. I play with Andy Shaw Band primarily. I also play with Shaw Brothers..kind of a spin off of that group but with all different songs where I play and write songs on acoustic guitar and play violin to back up my bro, also djembe and whatever is needed. I also play fiddle for Matt Monta and the Hot Coal Band and have performed with many groups in town and toured recently through Europe with Jonalee White. Columbus has a vibrant music scene and this may be the place where I talk about that, or I may start another blog about that in itself, cuz there is a lot to say.

Right now I am working on a duets album where I get together with a local music hero of my choice, and if they are up for it, we write a tune and then soon after, record it. I have written with Megan Palmer, Matt Monta, Bree Frick, Larry Cook, Mike Unger, Joey Hebdo, Joey Gardina, and Heidi Howes. So far the songs that are tracked are as follows: "Desire is a Permanent Stain" with Heidi, "As Birds Do" with Megan, "Lawn Clippings" with Larry Cook, "Squeeze the Sponge..a working title" with Joey Hebdo, and will be recording more very soon. Hopefully this project will be done by March (fingers crossed). Ideally I want about ten tracks. It has been an amazingly fun and challenging project to write, work on, and help produce with the aid of Jay Alton engineering and producing as well.

Inspired by the local music scene, my love for hip hop, groove drumming, R&B, and such I have decided to produce a rap record. Ideally I want to play drums on it, maybe some violin, guitar, mandolin, who knows right now? The local scene is bursting with energy, especially (atleast I have noticed recently) the 'live band hip hop' scene with exceptional groups like L.E.S. Crew coming up and G Finesse and the N.S. Crew to name just 2 groups, and I am really excited about collaborating with a ton of local artists for this project, but the duets album must be done first!

So next is playing with Andy Shaw Band on January 8th in Athens Ohio and January 9th in Chillicothe and then writing session with Bree Frick to finish off the week. SWEET!