dear brain
please stop making me cry in my sleep. also if we could stop the dreams where i die in horrible car accidents and wake up screaming and shaking it would be awesome too.

thanks.

Whitney Houston was my first concert. I was 10 or 12? I had to choose between her and the Pointer Sisters. My brother took me. It was at an outdoor place called Pine Knob near Detroit. It was sold out. It was at the height of her rise to fame on the first album with the single "i wanna dance with somebody" still in the #1 spot. and my friends, i heard almost no pop music that night. instead I got a serious schooling about gospel music and what a voice, many voices, can do. she had many guest singers come on stage, people that if I remembered who they were my jaw (now knowing about music more) would likely hit the floor. sure she ended the night with her pop single. but the concert - it transformed my little young music brain, previously raised on hair metal, pop radio, and oldies stations - all painfully whitewashed - into a curious beast starving for music of all kinds. she had a great talent and many many human struggles. i'm sad that she is gone.

So I posted a week or two ago about needing new performance clothes. I have to say since I got a couple of the items recommended, here is the first show photo and people you sent me in the exact right direction. THANK YOU.

especial thanks to elusis for sending me over to retroscope fashions.

when we lose people, in friendships or in the greater scheme of Life, we mourn the loss of them, but also there is a mourning of ourselves. I am a different person, different facets of me are highlighted or fade out with every person in my life. Losing her, someone so significant, I feel erased. And I feel like I am fighting to not let her be erased. Just because she no longer draws breath doesn’t mean she wasn’t this amazing person. When she and her husband used to watch me, everytime I went over there - which was daily - it was like they threw me a little party. They had lost their daughter a few years before, she had cancer and passed in her early 30’s, younger than I am now in remembering the story. And they always said that I was like their new daughter come to remind them of the joy they had lost and to bring them new happiness. And so I would arrive, from the age of six weeks, premature infant with so many health problems, until the age of 11, every day, performing and singing and giving them a show. Reading stories to them. Rebelling in ways that charmed them both. They had the easy road of being the grandparent figures. They didn’t have to discipline, they just enjoyed. It seemed that no amount of living room cartwheels, impromtu musical numbers, or lightning fast chatter could annoy them, instead it was just delight. So much of how I became who I am and how I push for music and art came from those hours with them. I feel like my foundation as an artist has been erased. I barely know how to move forward knowing that she is gone as my witness to where I came from and how I grew into me. I have no moorings. Lost, adrift, and alone in an airport at 5:24am.

Hey Folks
So looking for some help. Vagabondage is doing a music video shoot in March and after realizing that I only have one good outfit for photo type things and since I've now worn it in too many things for too many bands - I have to find some new threads. The general aesthetic I'm looking for is a blending of circus noir / goth carnival / steampunk / weirdness. With my figure things that do hourglass and emphasize cleavage do well, though I'm not sure if I have the budget for a corset this time around. I've found some things on etsy but most of them are all about custom work and super spendy. If anyone has links to shops they like - please let me know. Here is a recent photo of me and a sample of the dress that is almost perfect (but not in my size) and a few other samples of the aesthetic I want. Thanks for you help in advance. xo.

plus size recs or affordable custom sites only please

     

other aesthetic references:  




and this last one is a coat I just got (but haven't received yet) that is also in the same style family

i think of doing a year end recap and just feel so tired. it was a rough. year. but as I'm seeing others around and am taking stock... I just want more for the bands. Or maybe I have no context?

Between all three bands there were four albums recorded in 2011 and three release. You could actually say five albums recorded since the second Rhubarb Whiskey album is mostly recorded and now we're in the stage of long distance adding extra parts and new things but most of it is laid down. I want the records to get out there and be heard. Not for riches but just for the sake of being heard. It's been harder it feels like to get people knowing about the music and the releases though. A lot of our getting the word out was around facebook and all of those kinds of places and since fb changed how it shows feeds and things I realize more and more how unreliable it is to assume that your people will actually see what you're posting. Unless of course you spamify yourself and post every hour about it. And that's not me. These are the reasons I wish for a record label. Seriously. Distribution and marketing. The biggest challenges.

But - there were some huge highlights. Rhubarb Whiskey playing with Geoff Berner, the big CD release party in SF with 5 Cent Coffee and Plasterkatz, getting featured in the 2011 Accordion Babes Calendar (and CD), feeling the love from Sepiachord, the good gigs and the happy reviews of the record. Really when someone call you a mashup of Bill Monroe and Sid Vicious, something is right.

And then Vagabondage, omg with how out of the park of some this year was. The four show mini-tour of the Bay Area with Carolyn Mark. Playing around with some of the best musicians in town and at some of the strangest and wonderful places (the Bordello in Oakland for example). After a year and a half releasing a mini-live album, a new full length studio album, and then doing a free political single for #Occupy. We (VB) also ended up averaging a show every 9 days. Seriously every 9 days. That's crazy. And we curated a month of shows at the Bazaar Cafe. Plus a big article in the Chronicle. Seems like we're all doing pretty ok.

The Oakland Wine Drinkers Union finished up the recording of the first album, hoping to get that out there by early spring.

I'm just hoping that as the year end lists come out, that the new albums get some notice in some of them. That a few more reviews - from friends, from blogs, on amazon, from where ever - come in and see the same things that we saw when we recorded. these song of love, friendship, and happysad memories.

Being an independent musician - as Unwoman was also recently posting about - it's hard fucking work. Sometimes pretty thankless and sometimes it's the best thing in the world.

In case you want to have a listen:
http://vagabondage1.bandcamp.com/
http://rhubarbwhiskey.bandcamp.com/

this photo was taken by Katrina James on Tuesday Dec 27, 2011 and I love it.

It's a once in a lifetime chance!

Just in time for the holidays!

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Help out a struggling artist and get some yay art just for you. 


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Sliding Scale

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Originally posted by kylecassidy at post