It's about time to do a new flier for our next few shows, but here's the last flier I made.
It's based on an old sketch I had in my sketchbook for ages, and I always loved the way it turned out. I never did anything with it til I was thinking of a flier idea, and realized that it'd be a good fit.
I inked it in Manga Studio and lettered the text in there too.
We love it so much at the Carousel Lounge, we can't stop going back!
We've got two new shows to announce, both at Carousel, in February and March.
First up, we'll be playing Wednesday, February 13, from 10pm to midnight. We'll announce our opening act soon, and if you come early, you can catch the beautiful and talented Raina Rose from 7pm to 9pm.
Bruce Chandler will be drumming with us again and we'll have some brand new songs to play as well as the old favorites, so please join us!
And in March, we'll be playing Thursday, March 13, during South By Southwest, again from 10pm to midnight. There'll be a lot of great music in town, but we'll have some special surprises for this show, so it'll be one not to miss.
In case you haven't seen us live yet and want to see what you're missing, you can see our latest live videos and demos on our Videos page, or go straight to our YouTube channel to check them all out.
UPDATE: The lovely Sofia Grey will once again join us as our opening act for Wednesday, February 13. She'll go on at about 9:30pm, so be sure to check her out!
We are now the proud owners of www.weracketeer.com!
The official World Racketeering Squad website can now be reached through either www.worldracketeeringsquad.com or www.weracketeer.com.
“In commerce, the musician makes music. In craft, the music makes the musician. The musician of craft acts on principle and moves from intention. In this way, nothing is wasted, and our playing is not accidental.
There are ten important principles for the practice of craft: (1) Act from principle; (2) Begin where you are; (3) Define your aim simply, clearly, and briefly; (4) Establish the possible, and move gradually towards the impossible; (5) Honor necessity; (6) Honor sufficiency; (7) Offer no violence; (8) Suffer cheerfully; (9) Work, but not solemnly; (10) Without commitment, all the rules change.”
continuing in the same vein ...
Thirdly, we didn't make a video of this performance. Now, it's not that not taping it made it better, but I forgot to set up my computer and didn't remember until we were in the middle of Panic. I told Isaac I had forgotten and he was okay with that. I didn't interrupt the set to do the video, something I did do for our Dec 27th performance, and suddenly our focus on getting every single performance recorded and on youtube was over.
I'm not saying we won't post video again. I'm hoping for a couple of new song demos this week, and I have footage of two nights of playing at Conan's to share, but staying in the moment and performing is so obviously more important than recording it now. That's a big change for us.
And the rest is intangible. For me, January 24th at the Carousel Lounge felt like graduating from trying really really hard to be a rock band to simply being one. We have arrived. Not in any measure of success that you're likely to read aobut anywhere, but in my heart. A year ago I couldn't imagine myself here. Now I can't imagine myself any place else.
Thanks for coming along for the trip!
~reed
Early on in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Arthur Dent sums up his life in the line, "This must be Thursday. I could never get the hang of Thursdays." As much as I admire the English everyman, I could not disagree more.
Last night, at the Carousel Lounge, WRS got Thursday up, down, and crossways. We played our best show ever. It was glorious. We walked in as men, and we walked out as men who felt really good about what they just did.
And what was so different about last night? First of all, drummer Bruce Chandler sat in with us for the first time since Halloween. Not only is Bruce a great guy to hang out with, he's a great drummer who re-learned the old and picked up the new super fast. He also paid close attention whenever I signalled him, making a good performance even smoother. I gotta say, whenever we play with Bruce, I want to have him there any time WRS is electrified.
Second, we had a really great crowd. About half were seeing us for the second or third time, so we got to experience what it's like to have a few "regulars." My coworkers at Apple Zack and Melissa showed up, which made my night, and we converted some people who came to see Sofia Grey, I met at a party last week, or who just wandered in from he neighborhood.
I'll write more later - gotta get back to work.
later,
reed
Here's us playing The Stone Roses' "Waterfall", at the Carousel Lounge on Saturday, January 5, 2008.
I’ve been a martial arts student for a couple of decades and in that time I’ve known quite a few others who were brilliant technicians and were otherwise formidable individuals, but lacked a fundamental skill set: the ability to fall safely and gracefully. This is a grave omission, because training with the belief that things will always go well and as-planned is delusional. Delusion is not a sound context for any serious endeavor; like design, for instance.
Here's an awesome video of Racquel Welch doing a groovy dance in a sexy spacegirl costume.
From BoingBoing
All right, I've been slacking on the blog front, so it's time for me to contribute.
Isaac and I are in a fairly rare position for a new band. Usually, the band members are our age and experienced musicians and performers or they're younger and inexperienced. By younger, I mean teen-aged or in their 20s. (I hope I'm not outing Isaac by revealing that we're not in our 20s) Sometimes, a band has a mix, and everyone knows of deeply experienced players who are barely out of junior high.
For World Racketeering Squad, all that is turned upside down. Isaac's an experienced musician, but he hasn't played in public since the mid-90s.
I, on the other hand, never thought of myself as a musician at all until August of 2007. (Okay yes, there was my Celtic folk band Clarsach [gaelic for harp] my senior year of high school, but that's been a long time.)
So everything about being a live band is new to us. We've watched hours of ourselves performing live (see our Youtube section!) to see how we could improve our performances above and beyond getting technically more proficient. (though we needed that too).
There are lots of disadvantages to being older. Those golden years of just hanging out all the time don't seem to happen. I spent them doing a lot of fun things, but only my friends learned to play instruments. And we don't have the youthful indestructibility that allows bands to go all night and then work all day and then do it again. I gotta sleep sometimes. :)
But I think the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. Since Isaac and I know we don't have forever to get better and make things happened, we're intensely focused on everything we're doing. We learn and adapt quickly (guile), and we're not afraid to make mistakes because we won't look cool. Not that Isaac doesn't look cool, but you know what I mean.
So there's just a little glimpse into our journey into rockdom. I hope to post little bits on it every once and a while to let you see beyond the magic curtain. Pretty pretty magic curtain.
later,
reed
