Love. Whether it's religious or secularist, capitalist or communist, optimist or nihilist, it's the time of year where everyone needs to "chill" and appreciate those we love and those who love us.
Sorry Dads, but Mommies just may have an edge when it comes to superhero attributes. It's just Dads have the better PR department while Moms' accomplishments are much more inglorious.
Fortunately, we have a day to give Mom her due and sing her praises...which we in The Hipwaders are more than happy to do: Always Mom - The Hipwaders
Although our new CD isn't supposed to be officially released until April 7th, I though it was time to let everyone have a listen. Here's every track in glorious lo-fi. Buy the CD for true hi-fidelity and the neat album cover by Brian Clarke:
Now if you want some of the back story on this here album, here you go.
With the current way music is distributed and listened to, we've realized albums seem to be on the way out. Prior to 1965 and The Beatles "Rubber Soul" album from which no singles were released, pop/rock albums were - for the most part - a collection of hits with some filler added to pad out a release. Now, with easily accessible downloads and portable mp3 players, it seems like single songs are what interest people the most. It's pre-1965 all over again. We'd hate to put out a full length release and have difficulty selling it as, in reality, we've actually sold very few albums. Our downloads have slowly increased over time and we felt the best option is to release mini-albums. With a mini-album, we can record more frequently and at less expense.
We've actually been able to record 95% of our next release, a Christmas album, with the money we've saved.
Anyway, we hope you enjoy the "Goodie Bag", who's title came about when my family went and saw "Space Chimps" last fall (Chimpanzees in space? Come on, it's comedy gold.). During one of the scenes a character inquires about "goodie bags" and that set me off thinking how it'd be a great title for a song, album title and even a band name.
To record the album, we set off for The Hangar up in nearby Sacramento. Run by John Baccigaluppi, The Hangar is a funky warehouse that is home to Tape Op magazine - the best magazine on recording ever! The Hangar is a comfortable recording environment where a skateboard ramp is situated in almost every room.
Our engineer, Bryce Gonzales, had us record live (Nick Baca - drums, Tito - guitar, DJ Kinville - bass) which wasn't as hard as I expected as we had been performing most of the songs live for the past year. Unfortunately, Bryce had to leave the sessions when the opportunity to record freak-folk cult hero, Devendra Banhart arose.
After a hiatus of a couple of months we able to get another engineer,Robert Cheek, to come in and record the vocals and a few overdubs. As Robert had actually recorded the Deftones' cool version of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy"in the same studio, we felt we were in capable hands.
We quickly recorded the overdubs and mixed the album and then headed own the hall to MonsterLab Audio for mastering by the golden-eared, Eric Broyhill and his insanely friendly dog, Gypsy.
We not only enjoyed the laid-back recording vibe in Sacramento, but the local restaurants are really good and sometimes you're lucky and come across some cool photo ops:
THE SONGS:
1. BIRTHDAY RUCKUS. This song came about when we tried recording our samba-esque version of "Happy Birthday" in our garage rehearsal space as a birthday greeting for Evalyn Harper. She's the daughter of Oklahoma childrens' music performer Monty Harper - whose guide to kid-friendly radio shows is indispensible - and his wife, Lisa Harper. Lisa has a terrific podcast, Kid Music Planet, and was asking for children's music performers to just record a quick little message to wish Evalyn a happy 7th birthday. Anyway, our attempt at recording a greeting failed and when the other guys left I drank some coffee and sat down with my guitar and quickly came up with this ditty. When I sent it to Lisa I even told her I was gonna re-record it with my band as I really liked it. So, Evalyn, thanks for the inspiration!
2. FIELD TRIP. Probably our most popular live song. As a father with two young sons in elementary school, I've been on my fair share of field trips. Some lame, some pretty cool. With the budget crunch schools have been experiencing, I thought about what kind of field trips schools could have if they had Pentagon-sized budgets.
I'm a huge fan of songwriter, Scott Miller, of Game Theory/Loud Family. I had to give him some props by alluding to the first song I ever heard by him when his band was operating out of nearby Davis, CA. It's in the second verse where I mention his song, "Nine Lives to Rigel Five".
3. ALWAYS MOM. My mother passed away when I was young and never got to know her as an adult. Therefore, in my eyes, she will always be young, beautiful and saintly. My own wife is a terrific mother who tireless attention to our children is amazing. With both of them as an inspiration along with all the mothers who make the trek to our shows with kids in tow, I knew I had to write of songs for mothers everywhere.
4. PRELUDE TO A THING. A palate cleanser from all the upbeatness!
5. THINGS YOU WANT. Brian Boyd is a friend I've had since high school. He's smart, funny, and very creative and is the most interesting person I know to converse with. We had agreed to record some demos of song ideas he had floating around and said he'd send me some stuff. What he sent was a full 90 minute cassette (?!) of song (in varying stages of completion), jokes, vocal impersonations, and what-not. I picked out about a dozen songs I really liked. One partial song that really caught my ear was, "Things You Want". It was an upbeat romp with a terrific melody and a cool verse and chorus to which I added a bridge and another verse. I was hoping to record it in the style of NRBQ and even tried to do my best Terry Adams clavinet imitation. It doesn't sound anything like NRBQ.
6. MY NEW CAMERA. I remember when I got to use cameras as a kid and how much I enjoyed taking pictures. With their compositionally-challenged skills, kids can take some awesome pictures of headless parents and siblings with missing limbs. I thought I'd try and capture some of the joy I feel with taking pictures and especially had fun with the Free Design-type vocals.
7. WHAT'S THAT NOISE? Inspired by the Don Knott's movie, "The Ghost and Mr. Chicken", I decided to create a Halloween song about someone spending the night in a haunted mansion. Using music from a song I'd previously attempted to record a couple times before without success, we were finally able to come up with an arrangement that worked. Like, "Things You Want" it has the close harmony singing I love doing with Nick.
8. GOODIE BAG. The title track that was inspired by the Space Chimps movie. I'm not sure when the tradition of handing out goodie bags at birthday parties came about, but I know I didn't get diddley squat when I attended birthdays as a kid.
We were fortunate enough to have our super-talented friend, Gunnar Madsen, add some vocals to our recording. When I wrote the song I was having so much fun playing and singing it I felt like I should scat. I quickly realized scatting should be left up to professionals. Having remembered that Gunnar Madsen was the singing voice of Sammy Davis Jr., in a Rat Pack biopic on HBO I contacted him and he agreed to sing. Trekking on down to his place in Berkeley, I was privileged to watch him lay down numerous vocal tracks. Each pass was different and hilarious and I wished we didn't have to stop and choose just one. It would have been great to have videotaped the session and strung all the bits together. Coulda got Gunnar placed on a psychiatric hold:
So that's it. A goodie bag collection of audio trinkets we hope you'll have fun passing time with. And, although it won't officially be out until April 7th, if you've made it this far you can find downloads and/or purchase the cd now at these places:
The Hipwaders' drummer Nick Baca is an art teacher at a local High School and has seen many creative students come through his classes. One of those students, Anna Wagner, is a terrific artist, photographer and now music video artist. Here's here visual version of our song "Cat in a Bathysphere" from our last album, "Educated Kid".
After having become enamored with drawings of her own cat, "Rat Cat", and having seen her stop-animation line drawings of said cat tip-toeing through the tulips, we asked Anna to see what she could do with Rat Cat manning the controls of a bathysphere (actually a bathyscaphe which is actually much more navigational but didn't sound so good singing).
After extensive drawing and watercoloring, Rat Cat is ready for his/her (I really don't know!) closeup:
Well, from our angle. We're getting ready to back into the studio - here forward to be known as "Santa's Audio Workshop". It's actually The Hangar in Sacramento. Santa's Little Helper will be Robert "Flossy" Cheek, who'll be recording us and creating the proper festive audio mood.
We've got 9 original tracks that will celebrate the Christmas season. Yeah, we're not getting into that politically correct argument about "Merry Christmas" vs. "Happy Holiday" and try and please everyone with Hannukah/Kwanzaa/Baby Jesus songs. This will be purely secular. I like everything about "the holidays". Sure, I like the Hannukah stuff - the principles of Kwanzaa can't be beat - and the Christian holiday tunes are top-notch. But boy-oh-boy do I like me my Santa Claus and the commercialism, too. I like the tinsel & lights and garish plastic decorations and the giant inflatable penquins and the crowds in the mall. I like seeing the rude frantic shoppers trying to finish up their Christmas shopping. Why? I'm not really sure. Probably because it reminds me of my childhood. It's like a circus that comes once a year and I'm that innocent kid who's fascinated by all the hoopla and magic. It's the time of year when you get in touch with the family and friends you've lost touch with throughout the year and remember why your friends are your friends and your family...well...is your family.
So, come this Friday, I'm going to try and cram all those feelings into my head/heart/fingers and hands and create an audio recording that represents those feelings. Wish us luck..and a Merry Christmas.
As we wait the many, many months until "The Holidays";-) , here's a video from a telethon we performed at for on our local cable access station here in Vacaville. It's a great little town that has a wonderful downtown yearly tree-lighting ceremony and a very cool neighborhood called "Candy Cane Lane" where every house is exquisitely decorated.
"The Hipwaders have a clean yet hard driving sounds that’s very garage rock — if the garage was clean and organized and had piles of toys stacked in colorful bins. (They) all have a great rapport both with one another and their audiences, and humor is omnipresent."
While I can’t argue with that description - and I actually agree with it - I approached the shows with trepidation. As I roamed the school grounds prior to our first show I noted a recital was taking place in a nearby classroom. Young students where performing classical works on violin and piano with professionalism way beyond their years. While I never “studied” music as I should have, I did take piano lessons as a kid. I learned just enough to read music v e r y s l o w l y. At fifteen I learned guitar out of a book and began writing songs. I no longer needed to read music to enjoy playing and my instrumental skills have progressed at a snails pace as I view musical instruments as merely tools to write songs.
Therefore, my musical inferiority complex reared it’s head and I felt strange about performing in a place where “musicians” studied and guest performers where technically proficient way beyond me. I though of other times where I felt I was “outed”. There’s a Bay Area promoter who likes to joke(?) with me every time he books a show with us by saying he “knows” that we’re just punk rockers disguised as children’s music performers.
I have to blame Lenny Kaye for all of this as he was the compiler of the original “Nuggets” 2LP set back in 1972 that brought attention to 1960's American garage pop/punk rock. I had the privilege of meeting Lenny when we shared the Kidzapalooza stage at Lollapalooza 2007. Lenny’s the longtime guitarist for punk/poetess icon, Patti Smith. I told him how influential Nuggets was to me and that it had ruined my ability to appreciate commercial music. He said, “Your welcome.”
So, back to our shows at the Community School of Music and Arts. It didn’t help we started our sets off with our most popular song, “Educated Kid”. Ironically, it’s our simplest song consisting of just 3 chords ( A, D & G, if you must know). I don’t think any more than 3 people in attendance had even heard the song but the crowd quickly caught the groove and clapped along. I relaxed and both shows rocked. The kids and parents were into it and any feelings of inadequacy never materialized.
I sent an email thanking the staff for having us and I was sent an email back that they received from a concert goer. It was a note from a grandmother who had brought two young grandchildren who “loved the show” and she was “amazed two children could sit in their chairs for so long.”
The best part of the note was at the end when she writes that she was planning to have the children start taking music lessons at the school, “but now they love to take rock music”.
Ha! Now I know how Lenny Kaye feels. A small part of me thinks it’s wrong to have corrupted a couple of innocent children. But mostly I feel like: #*%& YEAH!!!
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