Category Archives: GTG Activity

Last night Hattie and I went to Magdalena’s Tea House for their weekly open stage night. Magdalena’s once was the closest thing I had to a home in Lansing. In August 2005 I started going to Michigan State and was sharing a shitty little dorm room with a guy whom I had nothing in common with. I tried going out to a couple of the college parties that I’d heard so much hype about, but these parties were just overflowing with macho party animal dickheads and scantily clad bitchy bimbos and I either ducked out right away or stayed around until some dudebro tried to pick a fight with me (which didn’t take very long). I had some friends in town, but I really wanted to meet people that had real ideas about the world and a desire to take part in the creative. Hattie and I knew about Magdalena’s Tea House, The Plurals had played there before even, so one Wednesday in September 2005 we decided to check out their open stage night. We didn’t play the first time, but we met Chris Dorman, who hosted the open stage night, and someone who, although I rarely see him anymore, I consider to be one of the best people I know. We went back the next week, played a couple songs (totally acoustic because they had to turn the PA off at 11 PM or else the guy who lived upstairs would start stomping) and a nice girl named Maia introduced herself to us. With those two introductions I went on to meet nearly everyone in Lansing that I count as a good friend. Scott Bell, of Bermuda Mohawk Productions and Cartridge Family fame, and Adam Aymor, that guy who plays guitar in Cheap Girls, were friends of Maia’s and they were usually hanging around, and a few months later when I experienced the Cartridge Family for the first time I started piecing together who was actively involved in the Lansing music scene. In the meantime, Chris Dorman formed a band called A Story Told that The Plurals played a lot of shows with, and he was actively going around town meeting people and inviting them to the open stage night. One of these kids was a little longhaired 17 year old named Jeremy Rizik, who covered “sugar we’re going down” by Fall Out Boy the first time he played at Magdalena’s. He says now that it was satire; I still think he was sincere. The list goes on: Autumn, Jo Taylor, Jacki, Steve Leaf, Hot Rod, Jim, Brett McDowell, Indigo, Lennon, and Magdalen Fossum, Chris Linsell, the late Phil Wintermute (a truly wonderful man whom I feel privaleged to have known) and so many more. I met so many amazing people and was so inspired to be a part of something so creative and transcendent; my week began to revolved around these open stage nights. It was my weekly escape from the college life that I was beginning to despise (and indeed, it was just the beginning of that whole bit) and I know a lot of people were first familiar with the name “The Plurals” due to my and Hattie’s hit-and-miss attempts to play acoustic songs. It didn’t matter though, it was fun and it was an amazing thing to be a part of.

When or why things changed I’ve never been sure. At the end of the 05-06 school year people went away for the summer, and some people were in high school and moved away from the area. It carried on for a decent little while, maybe even another year, but the faces were changing at the shows and the people themselves were changing. Chris Dorman reached a point where he couldn’t volunteer his services to run the open stage night every week, and that certainly dealt a blow to the scene. Hattie and I – along with Nich, Frankie, and Stefan – had moved into the GTG House by this point, so we were now starting to kick up our own thing and we were less focused on being part of the Tea House scene. The Tea House itself underwent many changes, and it got to a point where I had no idea what days of the week they were open or when their hours were or how often they had shows. The Plurals, The Break-Ups, The Knights Without, and Head and Toe all made the Tea House a regular venue through the middle of 2007, but eventually it just drifted out of our radar. Part of it was that we were tired of having to turn down or play acoustic when we wanted to try bigger and more open things. Mostly we just weren’t in contact with anyone that was part of the scene anymore.

A few weeks ago, on May 16, Luke Schmidt put on a show at the Tea House that The Break-Ups and CrookedSound played. It was the first time I’d played there in nearly two years. It was a great show, and the following week practically all of us played there for the first Damn Yankees Part Deuce show. That show was the first time I’d seen the owner, Miko, in nearly a year and she told me that it was great we all got to come back and play since they were closing at the end of the month. Wow. Magdalena’s closing. A place that at one time was such an important part of my life would soon be gone. It will always be important to me for holding me together for that eighteenth year of my life. Some people dive into drugs or alcohol or become obsessed with money… I played a lot of music and made a lot of friends. Those fucking hippies, corrupting our youth!

So Hattie and I went last night because we knew it would be the last one. It was completely different from the venue of my coming-of-age story, but as we sat up there and I closed my eyes and sang “Exercise in Humility” on that stage and hoped that I didn’t suck playing acoustic, it felt like four years had barely gone by. The four years that had passed were evident in other ways – little Magdalen Fossum, who can’t be older than 8 years old, sang a set on the ukulele and sang beautiful harmonies with her mom. Amazing. I was hoping to get some of the old gang back together, but Jo Taylor was the only one that made it out. She sang her song “The Answer,” which Hattie and I heard for the first time in that room some four years ago. We hung out for awhile, Jo had to leave early because she was working early in the morning. That didn’t used to be a problem. This whole month has been very strange to me. I’ve been working in Ionia and living at my parents’ house half the time, Drinking Mercury and My Apology have performed live, I’ve played two shows at Magdalena’s, and I will probably be seeing some old friends I haven’t seen in years this weekend. Getting older. It doesn’t make me sad, but it’s certainly strange.

tommyplural

So I’m here at Scavenger Hunt checking in some new inventory, and a friend pops in with some dude-bro in shin-length plaid shorts and a fake-vintage Red Stripe shirt. I’m always happy to see the friend I prefer not to name right now since he’s a person that likes to go to shows and be part of the scene. As usual, we chatted about upcoming shows including Jason Alarm’s CD release this Friday and the TCF/Plurals/Johnny Unicorn show at B414 this Tuesday. Dude-bro was curious. “Who’s playing where?” he asked. I told him “Jason Alarm, Cheap Girls and The Plurals at the Sun Theater this Friday.” He seemed to present a sense of acknowledgment about these bands, though I don’t recognize him from any shows. “Oh cool, I don’t like The Plurals, though,” he said. I wasn’t really offended by the dude-bro, and for a moment, thought he might have been kidding around, but he was not. His friend gave him a nervous look, but said nothing. I was kind of grinning. He looked at us and eventually picked up on the fact that he said something wrong. “What? I don’t” he said again. “Oh, that’s cool, whatever” I said non-nonchalantly and they continued to pace around the store. After he paced around the store a bit more with his BlackBerry not buying anything for a awhile, and with him in such close proximity, couldn’t stop myself from asking “So what don’t you like about The Plurals?” Winking at the friend in the know, I knew I was putting him on the spot, but I was too curious to hear his reaction. “Oh, um… they’re just not my bag, you know…” he said. “Anything specifically?” I asked. “They’re just not my bag, ya know… I don’t know. Sorry… I saw them at the Scene place and they had to restart their songs a bunch of times… I don’t know. Sorry. They’re just not my thang.” CRINGE. He couldn’t remember any specifics about the show, or about The Plurals. I don’t even know if he figured out that I was the drummer of The Plurals, though I’m sure some one informed him once they left. My response was pretty much “Oh, okay man, that’s cool. I just wish you knew what you didn’t like about them.” The whole thing didn’t really bother me as much as it entertained me. Would some one please tell me what he means by “bag” though?

Whatever. Come to the Sun Theater Friday!!

-Hattie Plural

GTG023, Jason Alarm “Engage” is coming this Friday, May 29th! We’re having a show at the Sun Theater in Grand Ledge, and The Plurals and Cheap Girls will also be playing. We’re really excited about this CD and we hope everyone digs it. Admission to the show is $8 and that includes a copy of the CD.

In other news, a supergroup has been formed. The GTG supergroup is known as Damn Yankees Part Deuce, and we played our first show at Magdalena’s Tea House last Thursday. It included 9 person renditions of Plurals and Knights Without songs, a My Apology reunion, new songs, and only one absolute trainwreck. Very nice! Anyone who’s ever been in a GTG band at any point is automatically a member, so who knows will be there next time? We certainly don’t!

The Plurals played a show in Bay City Friday night with Feel Good Violence and the Sinners. The venue wasn’t that great (why do sound guys like to put microphones on every instrument and then bump the kick drum to the top of the mix and put effects randomly on everything… do they think it sounds good, or are they just bored?) but we had a lot of fun. It was just what I needed, to let loose playing these songs that I love so much and transcend the world around me. Not that things are shitty or anything, but the feeling of being inside those songs is always better than being anywhere else. I’m really excited to do the same again this Friday for the Jason Alarm show. Sometimes, it seems like every show is my first show. Well, first shows usually kind of suck, but… fourth show or something.

Our good friends in the bands Guest Stars and Frank and Earnest are playing a free show together at Basement 414 this Thursday. Check it out!

Is there anywhere else I should tell you to be? Why don’t you tell me!

For too long have we hung our heads in shame. For too long have admitted defeat. For too long have the size our manhood considered, “inadequate.”

I DECLARE A REMATCH!!!

In the next week I will call the members of BMP (Bermuda Mohawk Productions), and issue an official rematch to last year’s softball game. Unless disputed, we will hold this rematch on the date of August 30th @ 3 P.M. followed by Crunchy’s for Pizza and Beer (GTG vs. BMP 2.0).

Don’t take this lightly my friends. I expect to see you all out on that field.

Paschal Circus- We need you there this year.

Tommy- Hit those cages, let’s try and hit one this time.

Hattie- Aim for horky’s face.

Nick- Stay on the bench, please.

Timmy- We need you at the game! You’re our secret weapon. Invite Zach too.

Peter- Your dog is our official mascot this year. Beef her up. Teach her to attack on command.

Randi- I need you inside their heads!

Eric- Close down the shop. Bring the little ones. I want the infant on short stop. no exceptions.

Jason Alarm- Don’t think for a second you’re going to be on BMP’s team. We can bribe you.

Loren- Show us the the benefits of that rich latin heritage, for once.

James- You’re our man in the streets, use that charm and get the girls down to the field.

Can someone invite those Kevin and Mike too?

LET’s DO THIS!

(GTG vs. BMP 2.0) Race for the cup. Sponsored by Powerade.

-J. Quentin

Hey Guys,
How is Everyone? I thought I’d check in and let you all know what’s going on.

I just got back from the 2nd from last NYC recording trip, and it went really well. Tracks are sounding solid. I’m now booking into August/September/October with tons of response from great midwestern people.  I’ve got 38 shows confirmed, with about 10 or so pending. I’ve collected a solid list serve of 100 or so folk music magazines and blogs with their websites, getting ready for a big mailing. All in all, I’m feeling pretty good.

What’s up with everyone? Any upcoming shows, recordings, etc.? I’m curious to know. Has this song swap died? Where my homies at?

-J. Quentin

….so I’ll post.  Word around the street is that there’s a clamour for Nich updates, and the last two times I tried to post, I gave up after running into brief technical difficulties.  Oh well.  I just got outta work.  We (crookedsound, the Plurals with our main man Mr. Merkster) are playing a show tonight at Magdelena’s Teahouse.

More updates soon!

-Nich

Well as one could surmise from Hattie’s post below, the beloved flower shoppe van named Carrie-Ann is now out of commision, which also puts myself without transportation. My bicycle unfortunately is in the back fo the van right now, which we left in Portland. Timmy gave us a ride to Lansing on Tuesday but his car couldn’t fit a  bike in it, so I am quite simply sans a vehicle at the moment. The great James Spreitzer has been gracious enough to allow us to use the Thunderchild when necessary, and getting around Lansing without a car isn’t a big deal, but as my only employment at the moment is working in my dad’s green house in Ionia, I need to figure some other stuff out. My parents are picking me up tonight and taking me to Ionia, which has left me some time to sit at Nich’s computer and do computer stuff. Like write, right here, right now!

The Plurals played a funny show last night. It was a last minute set at Small Planet to help out our friends in the band Waveburner, and there was about 12 people in the building, including the staff, the bands, and the 3-4 people that came to watch. Straight From the Fridge and Acidic Death were ther other bands, and watching such fresh young faces rocking out in a big empty room brought back fond memories of The Plurals circa 2004. We had a good time. Andy from Calliope came out to watch us and he and I had a blast watching Straight From the Fridge and filling each other in on Plurals and Calliope happenings. It’s amazing to me to have one of my favorite bands of all time be a local band whose current and former members have helped us out so much along the way – come on out on July 24 at Mac’s Bar when they take the stage again. You can bet I’ll be there, no matter what else I have to do that day (which seems to be a Break-Ups show in Hastings… I’ll find a way).

The Plurals just recorded 5 songs at Broadside Productions in Kalamazoo. They sound sweet. We kicked them out, Husker Du style, live instruments and overdubbed vocals, nothing else. The songs are “Bean,” “Plastic,” “Gaia,” “The Sun,” and “New Age,” which, if the song titles aren’t familiar, are songs that we’ve been featuring heavily in our set for the last few months. We’ll put these out as an EP or something. I’m really happy about how they sound and it’s giving me some good ideas on how we’ll execute our next full-length.

Cheap Girls are touring the UK right now. I’m really excited for them and can’t wait to hear about it when they get back.

The Break-Ups are chipping away at a “GTG Session” which we’ll be releasing as a split with the late Head and Toe featuring the last things they recorded. Head and Toe’s half consists of some of my favorite Head and Toe songs that they were playing live in the last month or so before they split. The Break-Ups half features five songs from the out-of-print album “Blush Noisette,” re-recorded, rearranged, and much much better. I think this will be a really cool release, and hopefully The Break-Ups will be putting out an EP of newer stuff by the late summer. There was a really fun house show at GTG House on Tuesday night that The Break-Ups headlined where some of the new songs were featured. The other bands that played that night were really good too… Tavo Carbon and Smallpox + The New Vaccine, both from New York, New York were the featured acts of the night, and Irwin Vega and Ahmad Naboulsi rounded out the local side. Ryan from Irwin Vega brought some sweet sound equipment and lights and stuff so the vibe was great in the room all night. I dig playing shows with those guys… they really want t strengthen the scene around here, and I commend them for their work they’re doing in East Lansing. Lord knows I tried to get something going in East Lansing, but nothing happened. AndyCalliope told me last night that the great underground scene East Lansing had in the late 80s and early 90s was the result of DIY kids from Flint re-locating to East Lansing and renting houses specifically to throw shows for the DIY touring bands of the era – including L7 and Flaming Lips. Andy said it was amazing and that it can never happen again… but I’d love to prove him wrong. The GTG House shows have been a great experience, and The Plurals always hit up some cool house shows out on tour. It’s all about bringing it together.

Summertime gives me hope that we can do all these things. Let’s get ready.

Upcoming shows –

Saturday May 16: The Break-Ups, CrookedSound (first show in over a year!), Luke Schmidt, and Jared Sims at Magdelena’s Tea House… 8 PM and a guaranteed good time.                                                    Sunday May 17: MK Ultra Culkin CD Release w/ Really Cinematic at Small Planet                                      Thursday May 22: Drinking Mercury, Frank and Earnest, and Jessi Spreitzer at Magdelana”s Tea House

Well my parents are here to pick me up. Time for a weekend of flower baskets and confusing coworkers.

tommyplural

What a weekend! Two-thirds of the Plurals (me and Tommy) were hard at work this Mother’s Day weekend selling plants at McCord’s Farm Market. Mother’s Day is pretty easy for us, since most people are buying hanging baskets with the “she’s going to kill it anyway” attitude. After a haze of two nine-hour shifts that blur together in my head, I booked it to Mac’s for an early show to play guitar with Really Cinematic and drums with Frank & Earnest. Flying down the highway in my shaky flower-shop van at 80mph, I wondered how much longer we’d last. For whatever reason, Carrie-Ann seemed to run better for me at that speed. Mysteries. I was barely still running myself. Tommy intentionally avoided booking any shows during the month of May, and I thank him for that. But I’m still a sucker, and I ALWAYS want to play shows. So there I was at Mac’s. After working in the sun all day, I could barely see a thing in the dark, dingy bar. I had just missed another great set by Johnny Unicorn, and the touring acts were about to start setting up. James and I filled up on some greasy Fish ‘n Chips down the street and headed back in time to catch Busman’s Holiday. I could barely keep any thought straight after an un-nessicarily dramatic few days at work (why do middle-aged women have such a hard time listening to someone that’s “old enough to be their daughter”? Grrrrrr).

The show was running behind as usual, so Really Cinematic played five songs; same old stuff… (we need to write more songs… fuck, we need to practice!) Then,  I jumped back to the drums while Frank and Earnest set up in a mad rush. My worst fears came true with this show. Practice goes over well; the songs are still a little shaky but if I listen to and watch my band mates I’m fine. Anything I screw up I just compensate for with some stupid-awesome drum-fill. But my hands weren’t working with me since my head was barely working itself. On top of that, the other musicians couldn’t very-well communicate with me when they were focused on trying to hear themselves. Back behind everything… I couldn’t hear shit.  I think we were a little spoiled by Seth’s sound-board capabilities—when he was our sound guy, we could actually hear each other and rock out. But unfortunately for us, whoever was running sound Sunday night was new. Very new. Of course everyone said it was an alright show, but that didn’t take away my disappointmet with myself. I know I could have done much better. So we sulked some, and then some more. Sulk, sulk, sulk.

It wasn’t even ten o’clock when we found ourselves back at the GTG house. Johnny was getting the flu, Loren had to get back to Lake-O for a funeral, James and Jessi were fighting, and I had to work at 8:00 a.m. Loren and I managed to stay considerably positive somehow on our ride back to Lake-O in the rickety old caravan. After I had reached Ionia and put my $3.40 in my gas tank, I got a text from Loren that he left his stuff in my van! Hahaha… oh Loren. So after crashing out and returning to work again, I buzzed over to Lake-O on the express way to deliver Loren’s things. On the way back while shaking up to speed on Jordan Lake Road, Carrie-Ann experianced this horrible lurching… and though I had just been going 70mph on my way over, I could no longer reach half that speed! I stopped and added some fluids, but it didn’t help much. It was soon to be over for poor Carrie-Ann, our beloved flower shoppe van.

Allow me to share some history about Carrie-Ann. She came after Amanda, our previous band-van; this enormous, blue ’86 Dodge van, so the Caravan was quite a change. I purchased the caravan from Rick Anothony for only $500 after driving it all over and around Lansing for a year delivering flowers. There was about 260,000 miles on it, lots of rust, but it was a very well-maintained vehical. I left the flower-shop name on it as long as I could, but during my last days at the shoppe, Rick snuck out there and removed his business name and left the roses on it. The Plurals took it to the east coast and back. It got me anywhere and everywhere. She never stalled on us once. Gradually, she began to deteriorate. The back hatch broke, so we had to hold the door open while loading equipment. Then, the side-door (which we always had problems with) decided it wouldn’t open anymore. And more recently when I went to open the driver-side door, it about fell off, leaving the passenger-side door the only practical access. Then came the shaking, and… it was all downhill from there.

I’ve decided that any work on the van will cost more than it’s worth to have it fixed, so I’ll just sell it for parts. Talk to me if you’re interested! Tommy and I made it back to my parents’ house in Portland and were able to borrow a car to get to practice with “Firebrand of the Revolution” since we’re playing with Crooked Sound and the Break-Ups at Magdalena’s Tea House this Saturday. We stayed the night in Portland. Things were fianlly starting to wind down. Something was on the T.V. that showed the date (May 11th) and I thought “holy shit!” and turned to Tommy and said “Happy Anniversary!!” We both laughed really hard about the fact that we totally forgot it was our six-year anniversary. We celebrated with a bottle of honey mead my brother made. It was delicious.

Timmy was nice enough to pick us up and give me a ride to the Scav today. We’re still figuring out what to do about not having a car. It’s all good for now—we have bikes! Plus, Pickle and the Thunderchild are there for us when it comes to shows, at least until Tommy gets his brother’s car in the summer. Tonight we’re having another GTG house show with The Break-Ups, Irwin Vega, Ahmad Naboulsi, Tavo Carbone, and Smallpox and the New Vaccine. Should be pretty alright. I’m making spagetti for the touring bands and whoever else is around (including YOU if you come by around seven o’ clock). Then tomorrow, we’re supposedly playing the Small Planet with Waveburner and Straight From the Fridge. Wonder how that will go…

Can’t wait for GTG Fest!! We’ve been plotting away… it’s gonna be good. Good times all day and night with camping and all. Fuck yeah. Hope to see some people tonight, tomorrow and this weekend! Going to see a mo-ped soon, so if I don’t see you, count on me running you down on my new wheels!!

-Hattie Plural

Haha… In the GTG House at this moment, Frank and Earnest (cool new punk band that Hattie is currently drumming for) are downstairs playing “Higher” by Creed. Just figured I’d throw that out there.

Amazingly, they busted into this right when I clicked on an article on the Rolling Stone website about Creed’s reunion tour. Creepy.

I’ve got a real post in me somewhere, but I just had to let this be known.

tommyplural

I was driving to work the other day and my CD player was acting up as usual (Thats what happens when you punch it and then another time you spill coffee on it). So I was surfing through radio stations. I was on Pratt Lake Road, which gives me shit for signal sometimes. Anyways, I went through my usual line up of radio presets. 97.9, 96.1, 106.1, 107.3, 101.3, 96.9, and 98.7. I am in the Lowell area, so its almost right in the middle of getting Lansing and Grand Rapids radio stations. I noticed as I was speeding now old Pratt Lake that there was absolutely nothing on the radio. Nothing. 97.9, WGRD, which used to be my favorite radio station a few years ago has turned into a station that likes to play a lot of Hinder, Nickelback and Staind, along with Black Album Heavy Metallica, Guns N Roses and ACDC. This used to be the station I’d go to when I wanted my 90s alt rock fix. Anyways, with that being said, there was nothing on the radio. So I started to surf, none of the oldies stations were playing songs, they were all on commercial. The usual rock stations were playing crap. I didn’t want to sit in silence, because when I’m driving I just cant. So I started to scan and I ended up on some lame Soft Rock station playing “My Heart Will Go On” by Celine Dion. By basic second nature I turned the station and kept scanning, passing all my presets who were still playing shit songs or were on commercial until I found myself back at that Soft Rock Station. Finally once it was back there I just stopped. I conceded to this soft rock station that would play in grocery stores and department stores. It took me about two minutes to realize that I was sitting in my car listening to Celine Dion by choice. Note, Celine Dion scares me and I’d rather shoot my brains out than listen to her, but on that day, in that situation, I found myself listening to Celine Dion rather than modern rock music of today.

Is it me? Or maybe has the music of today surpassed me. I like to think I have a wide variety of music tastes which range from Arcade Fire to Jewel to KISS to Slipknot to The Beatles. My CD book has a wide variety. How hard would it be to find something on the radio that would fit my tastes? I don’t like the modern sound of todays music, I don’t like modern metal, I don’t like modern rock. I despise Nickelback, I despise Saliva, I despise Staind, I despise Hinder. All these bands are major mainstays on radio stations. Could it be that popular music today has finally surpassed me? Have I become one of those people stuck in a time where they thought music was “cool”? What is “cool” these days anyways?

Obviously someone thinks Staind and Hinder are cool. 

I remember when I was in high school, sophomore year to be exact, I was watching VH1 (back when they actually played videos). Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” came on the TV. I’ve heard the song before but this time it was different. The opening drums to the overdriven guitars gave me that musical “holy shit” moments that you can remember for the rest of your life. It was at that moment my eyes opened to Nirvana. Soon there after I was listening to Bleach, where I fell in love with “Floyd The Barber” and “Love Buzz”. Then moved onto Nevermind where “Breed” and “Territorial Pissings” became not only my favorite Nirvana songs but favorite songs of all time. Then I listened to In Utero, where within the opening riffs of “Scentless Apprentice” I became a full on Nirvana fan. At that time, I was a hardcore Nu-Metal fan. Limp Bizkit, Staind (Pre-14 Shades of Grey), Korn, Slipknot, System of a Down, Hed PE, Kittie, etc… etc… I was immersed within this genre. But I remember that moment it all changed. Sitting there watching Nirvana play in this video. I was hypnotized. I went from System of a Downs “Toxicity” to “Unplugged In New York”. I started listening to the Beatles like there was no tomorrow. I never really looked back. 

What bands do I listen to that are modern radio mainstays? Foo Fighters. Weezer. 

Thats about it. 

Modern bands that I listen too today include Arcade Fire, Straylight Run, The Decemberists. Neutral Milk Hotel. The Flaming Lips. Dandy Warhols. 

I only really listen to older Flaming Lips.

What albums have I discovered lately that have given me any sort of emotional reaction? Walk Among Us by The Misfits, Damaged By Black Flag, All of Calliopes albums, and all the music that I find throughout local music spectrums. Besides local bands, these albums were all from another time. 

Sometimes I think maybe I am lame. Maybe the music of today is “cool” and I no longer am. Maybe I dont get it anymore. 

On another subject, I was thinking about all my musical projects as of late. The Break-Ups, Drinking Mercury and Abbey Divine are all projects that I am currently involved in. 

I was thinking about the songs we’ve creating as units within these bands. How sometimes to be a part of a song can be so mesmerizing. Sometimes a song can make anything better. I started thinking I’ve given a lot for my bands, as much as I could give. I always made myself available to my bands, as much as I could be. If I had to cancel or if I couldn’t make it, I had to have a pretty damn good reason and I was going to make sure everyone within that band knew exactly why I couldn’t be there. Sometimes when you give so much, it can sometimes hurt when you don’t get anything back. 

I tried to give every project everything I had. When I was in the Knights Without, The Break-Ups were kind of pushed to the side so the KWO could get its record out there and promote and get noticed. Which was fine with me, everyone within the Break-Ups were involved in some way with the Knights Without. Hattie was the drummer, Tommy recorded the album, and Frankie was the sometimes vocalist. So it wasn’t like I was neglecting the Break-Ups. Working with Josh Hanger and Loren Pudvay was a great time for me. They were both talented musicians and I think it made me a better musician. And becoming a better musician only could help out my other projects. I like to think that as much as a downer the ending of The Knights Without were, it was an overall success in my mind. A lot of people found themselves and a lot of people grew. You get back what you put into it. And I feel I got a lot back out of that. 

It’s almost disheartening when you dont get anything back. Sometimes people can have passion on there face when you are in front of them but when an important time comes nothing happens. Passion is something I feed off of. Every time Tommy and I talk about future endeavors of the GTG, I get excited. I want it. I want it to happen. I want it to happen right now. GTG Situations at Hand Vol. 2, want it now. GTG Sessions for every single GTG Member, want it now. Acousticade? Give it to me. Maybe some people see it differently than I do. Maybe when I am playing a song and I feel those moments of passion, certain others aren’t feeling what I am. Maybe they are, they just forget the moment they walk out the door. When you are act practice and you all hit that certain stride where nothing can do wrong and you look around the room to see everyone immersed into the song. I think of those moments weeks, months after. How the fuck can you not forget the feeling of that? Not only to be totally lifted within a song, but to share such intimacy within a song with someone else. Being in a band is like a family for me. My song writing is a little door within myself that I don’t show a lot of people. To be able to express myself with these individuals without actually having a conversation is a moving experience. I live for those moments. Don’t tell me to my face that this is something that is “going to happen”. Fuck that. When the time comes around to make it happen, others are absent. I would never got give a band my all. I would give it everything I had. Don’t make plans to practice with me only to cancel them at last second with no real explanation. Don’t give me the “I’ve just got too much going on” rant. It’s not that hard to plan out your day. I do it week by week, and when it comes to my bands I make sure they get first pick at my free time. Dont plan shit with me for months only to cancel on the day of. And especially dont make plans to do something and just not call or ever give an explanation. I’ll just find something else to do.