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02:27 p.m.
Tuesday, July 20th, 2004; CHATTANOOGA TN – I’ve gotten used to the idea of typing while taking in a show somewhere… I’m currently at the Thirsty Thursdays open mic in Cleveland, Tennessee (“Hello, Cleveland…”), and Brad Passons and I are waiting for our slots later in the evening so we can promote his CD release party this Thursday night… most of the people here aren’t yet 21, so in a way, this sort of counts as Brad’s “all ages” show. He and I met up last Thursday in Birmingham to go play in Tuscaloosa and Atlanta, then back to Birmingham, and now on to Brad’s nest in the Nooga.
My week after Joel left pretty much consisted of getting the whole “Conduit” pre-order announcement off the ground, and I’m quite sure anyone reading this knows all about that already… Once Brad arrived, we carpooled to T-town… Tuscaloosa; yet another city I hadn’t been to since I toured through with Vertical Horizon back in ’97. Brad had booked a popular watering hole on the main strip on “Ladies-all-you-can-drink-for-five-dollars” night, and I seriously hope he’s learned from this heinous mistake. I opened for him, and although he usually says he feels intimidated going after me, on this evening, he really didn’t care… because as far as I know, nobody besides the door guy and the sound guy paid attention to a NOTE I played. Brad succeeded in getting the attention of a few wasted patrons only after his normal ruse of coming on to some dude’s girlfriend over the microphone and playing a few cover songs. All in all, I kind of felt like a was a teacher’s aide in a special education class. And I drank a few free beers. C’est lavie.
After Tuscaloosa, we headed to Atlanta for a few days, where we were absolutely pampered by some good friends of mine, Steve & Kerri. We had a blast in the ATL, and played what I feel is one of the best shows I’ve ever done there at a brand new venue: The Red Light Café. Nothing against the Ten High, where I’ve been gigging almost exclusively since 2002, but this was the first time I’ve had an Atlanta show where the sound was professional AND the atmosphere was conducive to listening to one dude singing with one instrument in his hands. It was also the best attendance I’ve had at an Atlanta show! Thumbs up to everyone who came out and made my debut there a good showing for the owner!! I’ll definitely be back! :)
(While in Atlanta, we also caught the “On The Bricks” concert in Centennial Park… the bill was Los Lonely Boys and Fuel. Los Lonely Boys came out and blazed a killer set for the better part of ninety minutes, sang tight harmonies, played their butts off, entertained the crowd, and left me totally understanding how they’ve taken over the airwaves in such a short amount of time. They also wiped the floor with the latter group, who, for lack of a more descriptive phrase, SUCKED. Note to Self: never, ever strive to sound like Fuel, even at my darkest, moodiest, and angriest.)
On Monday, Brad and I went back to Birmingham to do the Moonlight Music Café open mic. I had a show to promote and Brad wanted to play in front of the owner, so we were on a mission… and I got interviewed for a reality show, which was pretty cool. :) There’s this guy; calls himself “Johnny Colorado”, who has a camera crew following him around for a month, and he’d apparently never played in front of an audience before, but by the end of thirty days, he wants to audition for a big gig in Nashville. It could be a hoax, but they were all really nice, and it was fun. Keep an eye out this fall for “30 Days in Nashville”… I wear a cowboy hat and EVERYTHING. (…okay. No. Not really.)
More soon,
Seth
01:38 p.m.
TUESDAY, JULY 13th, 2004; BIRMINGHAM AL -- I am in bed next to Joel Ackerson… as I’ve been so many times before. Oh… wait a sec… now I’m next to Brandy, his girlfriend. Proof that in life, there’s always room for improvement! :)
…it’s not what it sounds like. They’re on the huge air mattress next to the couch (where I am) in the living room of Mandy, who’s an old friend of Joel’s, here in the B-ham, and we are settling down for some z’s after rocking the Moonlight Music Café open mic feature. What a great room that is! I haven’t been to Birmingham to play since I played here with VH, and they certainly didn’t have a songwriter venue this nice back then… I met the owner, Keith, and he was a super nice guy; it’s looking like Birmingham will be on the itinerary this fall! :]
I had a hectic day trying to get down here in time to play… I played in Indianapolis on Sunday evening (and a truck accident made me a half-hour late to THAT show coming down from Chicago), and had to juggle vehicles and have a hurried meeting with the folks at Benchmark Records this morning before I made the roughly 8 hour trip from Indy to B-ham. I waltzed in to the Café at about a quarter to nine… twelve minutes later I was doing my set. Rock and roll, baby. The bummer was that I completely missed Joel’s performance :( …but I got to do five songs, and had Joel come up and join me for “Tarot” at the end.
Yesterday’s show at CATH was interesting… I discovered upon arriving that I’d left my infamous loop pedal at the venue I’d played in CHICAGO the night before… this is the THIRD time I’ve left something there!! Uncommon Ground does something to my brain, I swear…. The first time I was there, I forgot my guitar strap. Last year I left my clip-on tuner there, and this time I left a whole damn PEDAL. What’s next; my BASS?
Grr… at any rate, it’s very lucky for me that I have some wonderful friends who live close by, and they retrieved said pedal and are overnighting it to me here in Alabama, so that I might continue to play obscene polyphonic passages for the enjoyment of others. Laura and Brian, you guys are the best! :)
As for the show in Chi-town, it was probably my best Uncommon Ground concert ever. I played the first half almost entirely off of CONDUIT, the forthcoming album, and had a very cool, quiet, respectful crowd… it should be noted, the FIRST cool, quiet, respectful crowd I think I’ve ever had there! I rewarded their attentiveness with some full on, no punches-pulled notefests later in my set, and could really feel some great energy in the room. My special guest that evening was Scottish MacMillan, a traveling guitar wizard/songwriter/loop-warrior who put down his strings for the evening to play djembe with me for “Conduit” and “Tarot”. It was out of CONTROL. He’s a madman… we’re gonna do that again at some point… A lot of the folks there were fans of the headlining acts that evening, Jeff Leibman and Brad Cole, and it was the second time I’d actually been billed with them, so it was a reunion of sorts. Everyone had such a great night; it was just a killer show from start to finish. Scottish and I also spent our non-stage time playing one of the most intense Scrabble games I’ve ever partaken in. He beat me by what should have been a lousy 13 points.
Pre-order “Conduit”! :D
-Seth
12:23 a.m.
TUESDAY, JUNE 29, 2004; SANTA MONICA, CA – I am sitting in the Santa Monica Hostel International on 2nd and S.M. Ave, laptop on hand, listening to my friend Mara sing her heart out on Dire Straits’ old tune “Romeo & Juliet”. I am reminded of the last time I was here… almost two years ago… Mara couldn’t make her gig here, and I subbed for her while I was back in LA after my first few months of the nomadic lifestyle… being here again really puts things in perspective. Looking back on all I’ve done since the last time I was here, it’s pretty daunting… for the first time, two years seems like a LONG time. Also interesting is that two years ago, LA still felt like home. I definitely feel like a visitor now.
So what’s new? I just did a week and a half tour down the west coast with Amber Rubarth and David Peters, occasionally joined by the likes of Larry Marciano, Timothy Daniel, and for two nights, San Diego’s Sweet James, who are my current favorite band; really nice guys who write great hooks, sing their asses off, and jam out like some serious Muther-Fo’s. Now I’m taking a few days in LA to catch up on some R&R, and to finalize details for the pre-release of “Conduit”, which will be announced in a matter of HOURS… I mean… it’ll be a number of hours somewhere in the high double or triple digits, but HOURS nonetheless…
I have also discovered a new corner of the internet: MYSPACE. Originally a better-working answer to Friendster, it now offers musicians their own pages to promote themselves, and I’ve posted my tourdates, some new pictures, the “Conduit” song clips, and my most recent journal entries there.
http://www.myspace.com/SethHoran will get you there if you like…
Otherwise, my world is almost entirely filled with this new record right now. The bummer is that our release date got pushed back… those checking out the Tourdates page will notice that we’ve gone from August 24th to September 7th… annoying, yes, but I’m so excited about this I don’t care anymore! It sounds better than anything I’ve ever made; it looks better than anything I’ve ever made; and if you pre-order it, you’ll get your very own Seth Horan Live Tracks (recorded on the road last year). There will be Pre-Order information everywhere you look in a very short time.
Otherwise, I am happy to report that I now need a belt to keep my 33 waist pants from falling down. In mid-April I was bustin’ out of my 36’s. Don’t worry, anti-Atkins-ites… I’m drinking plenty of water, taking my flaxseed oil, and as many recent companions on the road can attest to, I’ve even been indulging in the pancakes here and there. Rock on. :)
06:54 p.m.
SATURDAY, JUNE 12th, LAKEWOOD, CO -- This is an odd occurance for me: a PRE show journal entry. I have some time to kill before tonight’s show at the Ironworks Brew Pub, and I’ve been meaning to update for awhile now, so here we be.
I’m officially into my WEST US pre-conduit tour leg. The first show was two nights ago in Lafayette, about ten minutes outside of Boulder, and was an okay evening. I played with Fortywatt, a local band featuring J. Kim Godard; my former bandmate from back in the Miami days, when he and Ed Toth and Byron Warren and I all played in Jennifer Culture. It’s been good to hang with him and catch up for the past couple days. He’s a family man now, and I’m the roving troubadour, so we get to swap stories about how the Other Guy lives... plus I got to partake of his wife Amber’s magical cooking, got exposed to the Aqua Teen Hunger Force (!!), and got to do a little coloring with 2 yr old Gabe, who shattered all my newfound Atklins-induced self esteem when he told me, “You a big ol’ guy!” :)
After tonight’s show I’ll make my way back to Reno, where I’ll meet up with a whole slew of my west coast friends, and where I’ll start doing shows with my tour partners for the next couple weeks: Amber Rubarth and David Peters. For all the years David and I have known each other – longer than any other Superfriend, mind you -- he is the only Superfriend I have never done any touring with, so this will be fun.
…actually, come to think of it, there WAS that one show at Nazareth College last fall where David opened for Joel and I. And furthermore, that was the night David met Amber, because she was on the road with Joel and Tim(othy Daniel), and David ended up driving Amber from Rochester to the Buffalo airport! So this reconvening of forces in Reno is a summit of grand proportions. And we come around the circle again…
CONDUIT: While in Reno, I will be organizing the Live Tracks and making them ready for human consumption, which means that PRE ORDERING for the new album is just around the corner! To remind, everyone who pre-orders “Conduit” will get the Live Tracks for free! A better deal you will not find… two albums for the price of one. Am I nuts? Heck no. I just want to thank you. Y’know… for lettin’ me be mice elf. Again. ;)
-Seth
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