September 2008

Anton and I went and checked out a gorgeous studio today. We’re shopping around studios to handle the mastering – and we thought perhaps some of the tracking – for the new album (FYI, we’re planning the CD release party for March 2009). We drove out to the mountains west of Boulder and visited with an engineer in a ‘tower’ of sorts… Anton and I both left the place saying, “someday… we’ll have homes and home studios like that!”

The plan at the moment is to return to our own RabbitSounds studio and track the entire album on our own again – and then perhaps take it to a professional studio like the one above to have it mixed and mastered. A big part of the creative process for us is the “vibe” that we’re able to create in the recording space. While the place above has an absolutely gorgeous setting in the mountains, we’re feeling like our own studio space has just as much going for it – beautiful views of the mountains AND a completely relaxed vibe where we can come and go as we please, write without a “running tab” (cost) pressuring us, and really take our time to track and re-track and write and re-write as often as we need to.

We head out on tour in a couple of weeks, and we’ll be gone for a couple of weeks… and when we return we’ve got a handful of shows booked up until November 15th, at which point we’ll “disappear” for a bit and concentrate on being in the studio each and every day, working towards a release in the very early spring.

What an amazing way to finish 2008…

So I’ve heard from many of you (via IM, email, texts, etc.) that it’s taken me way too long to add a Road Journal post about something as exciting as a debut SoundRabbit Red Rocks show. My apologies for the delay! I had to get all of my photos off the ol’ camera and figure out a few other things before getting around to this.

So… this coverage of the show here in the Road Journal will be more of the ‘backstage’ perspective… our personal experience there, with photos taken hurriedly by me with my camera at opportune moments that day.

First I’ll share the bad news… we weren’t allowed to video the show due to Union regulations with the employees at Red Rocks (it would have cost us $6,000 to get video rights), so we brought our trusty Korg MR-1 to audio record the show. I went up to the Red Rocks soundboard and met the lead engineer, who handed me a cable that ran from the soundboard… I hooked it into the Korg MR-1, checked the levels, and all appeared well. Unfortunately when we listened to the recording on our way home from Red Rocks that night, we discovered that the engineer must have given us a bad cable or channel, because the recording mix is pretty terrible. One of our biggest venue shows to-date and we don’t have any footage, audio or video! MAJOR bummer.

Okay, so on to the more positive stroll down memory lane from Sunday…. I’ll do it with photos and captions….

Beers stares down a security guard as we pull up to Red Rocks.

The trusty SoundRabbit Red Van and Red Rocks.

Van, Trailer, Rocks, Sky, Tires, Gravel

Pre-show view of the main stage and fog (it was freeeezing!)

View from the main stage looking up, before we loaded in.

SoundRabbit band & crew get our all-access “Artist” wristbands for the night.
Wristbands = go anywhere and eat LOTS of free food.

Backstage dressing room, complete with LCD tv, vibrating massage chair,
oriental rugs, and giant rock falling into the room.

SoundRabbit hangin’ backstage at Red Rocks

GQ Beers striking a pose backstage.

Map of Red Rocks backstage. Notice that they put the animal-themed bands in
one dressing room (Band of Horses and us) and the Rosewood Thieves
and Tokyo Police Club in another area together. It’s not random, folks.

Jason pre-show, tuning up.

Beers pre-show, setting up the kit.

Anton pre-show, tuning up.

Our first product endorsement, for Asics and Koss headphones.
We got free kicks for doing it, any size & style we wanted! Perks, baby.

Here’s how the setlist panned out:

Turn My Egg
View From Way Up Here*
Don
I’ll Race Ya
Obey –>
Life During Wartime

* nod to LeRoi Moore of DMB in middle bridge

The one thing that I wanted to photograph but wasn’t allowed to (and wasn’t quick enough to snap while security looked the other way) was the dining area by the dressing rooms. All the food we could eat, from sandwiches to meatballs to mexican food to desserts to salads to fruit to drinks… all day. I ate three square meals, taking opportunities to go backstage during the Avett Brothers and Tokyo Police Club sets to chow down.

As noted above, Anton gave a little ‘nod’ to the late great LeRoi Moore of Dave Matthews Band during his solo on View… he teased “Sunshine On My Shoulders” and “Somewhere Over The Rainbow,” two songs teased by LeRoi on DMB’s “Live at Red Rocks 1995” album. For those who don’t know, LeRoi passed away at the age of 46 a few weeks ago and was an old acquaintance of Jason’s back in Charlottesville. Jay had the chance to jam with LeRoi a few times and we all figured it would be nice to pay homage to him at Red Rocks, of all places.

All in all, a great experience for all of us. One of the crew members at Red Rocks told us that they (the crew) consider Red Rocks their “home,” and he welcomed us to their “family.” He said, “we’ve seen it a thousand times… you play your first show here, then you come back and play as an opener on a big night, and then you come back and we give you your own night. We can’t wait to have you guys back.” Much thanks to all of the Red Rocks crew, and to the RabbitReps and Backstage Members who made it out! It was great to see two of you in particular – Claire & Alex – dead center, smiling in front of us through the whole set! We’ll see you there next time!

Anton and I (Russ) just returned home from flyering down in Denver tonight for our upcoming shows. It’s been a super busy week getting ready for the Red Rocks show on Sunday… we got together for our normal rehearsal and spent the entire night running through the set to make sure that it fits the 30-minute time slot we’ve got. We ran it three times, and it came in at 28 minutes, 29 minutes, and 28 minutes… so we’re all set. Can’t believe that the next time we play it will be on the main stage staring up at the rocks. Woo-hoo.

This past weekend to celebrate the Red Rocks thing and to clear our collective minds and do some writing, the four of us headed up to the cabin in Wyoming (for those of you who’ve been reading SoundRabbit road journals a long time, you’ve heard of the place on many occasions). We took acoustic guitars, an acoustic bass, and some percussion items and hit the woods. Weather was absolutely gorgeous, and Anton had his fancy new camera to take some footage for y’all to enjoy:

The weekend wasn’t without adventure, either…

We had a few 4-wheelers and a boat to play with in between playing music, and we decided to take the boat out on the lake up there. Keep in mind that this lake is very big and this place is very secluded… there might be one or two other boats at most on this very large lake on a typical day. We took the boat out on Saturday evening and pulled it up onto a sandy beach, tied it to a tree, with plans to take it out on Sunday morning… then went back to the cabin and cooked some food, lit a fire, and played music all night.

The next morning, we returned to the beach to take the boat out… and the wind was howling. I’ve never seen the lake as choppy as it was… beautiful sky, but the waves and wind were pretty intense. We shoved off the shore, all four of us in the boat, and attempted to start it – with no luck. It wouldn’t even turn over… battery dead. We floated for a little while and used the one oar we had on board to make our way back to the beach. Problem is, we had to get the boat started and get it across the entire lake to be able to trailer it and pull it out at the end of our stay… so Jason and I went up and got the truck at the cabin, along with a long (15′) set of jumper cables, while Anton and Chris were tasked with somehow getting the boat close enough to the shore that we’d be able to drive the truck down to jumpstart it (without getting the truck stuck in the mud).

In what we all acknowledged (as we were doing it) was an absolute Darwin Awards moment, we got the boat pulled into the shallows of the lake shore in a muddy area covered with moose hoof prints and bear paw prints (seriously)… and pulled the truck down onto the beach as far as we could without getting it stuck… and then Jason and Chris stood in water up to their knees and hooked up the jumper cables to the truck battery, while Anton and I sat in the boat in the water holding the other end of the jumper cables… and “zap!” the boat got started… we unhooked the cables, shoved off… and the boat engine died again. We got one attempt at restarting it before the battery died… “vroooom… vrooom… sputter..sputter… dead.” Back to the drawing board, re-hooking the jumper cables and risking life and limb in the middle of nowhere in 50-degree water… all in all it took us 4 separate “unhook-start-die-rehook-jump-unhook” series before we finally got the boat started and Anton and I raced it across the lake to the dock where Jason and Chris drove around and met us to unload…

Chris and Jay getting word that the boat requires another “jump.”

…aaaand we’re off!

But not before finding ourselves (Anton and I in the boat) directly below a giant American Bald Eagle. He was perched in a tree on the shore above us… then he took off flying and we followed him in the boat, Anton snapping photos the entire time. We’ve got a whole series of pics of him, but here are a couple to give you the idea…

All in all, a fantastic weekend up at the cabin… we all came home refreshed and ready to rock it this weekend at Red Rocks. Can’t wait to see y’all there…