Finishing Touches

We're as ready as we're gonna get for the show this Thursday (at El Rio, 9:00 pm for reals). We've practiced and practiced and honed our seven little songs. They're shaping up, for sure. I took the liberty of screenprinting some patches then sewing them on to Gina's new homemade cymbal case and stick bag. The stick bag is designed to hook on to the snare drum stand to simulate the bass drum with decal that we don't actually have. I am a complete and total dork.



Little apartment, big ambition: When you live in an smaller apartment, you have to use all of the space you have. This often means building up. I'll be building up my tea towel inventory in a serious way this month because The Heated is sharing a booth with ciuccio at the Renegade Fair next month. To accommodate the number of towels I'm printing, I've strung up hooks for clotheslines. Yesterday was the first time I felt like a professional screenprinter with my press and my clotheslines.

Blatant, uncomfortable hints.

Thoughts. I have them. And I have nothing else to blog about but these little snippets. Consider:

1) The new Neko Case album, Middle Cyclone is so good that I am both impressed and bitterly jealous. Were it so that writing about random happenings outside my immediate frame of reference was what I do... but no. I keep it personal. I've lived a life, people. But her lyrics make the songs what they are and what they are is brilliant. I don't mean to talk shit but I didn't really get Fox Confessor. Or else, I got it and it was just a little too dark. Middle Cyclone is more relationship based and I'm pretty sure one song is about secret, gay love (Vengeance Is Sleeping... anyone care to discuss that with me? Totally, right?) so you know I'm into that.

2) School is going really well, both the furniture making class and the web development (HTML and XHTML) class. The ironing board I'm constructing has legs. Right now would be a good time for me to buy more materials but quite frankly, it's not gonna happen. School may be why I never have enough time to write but it's good to get learned.

3) There is so much going on with The Heated but you will not hear about it here first. My mailing list will hear about it first. That is a blatant, uncomfortable hint. Deal with it. I have been playing a ton lately and there are new songs that of course, are utterly brilliant and display my inner-beauty in a way that makes me glow from within, literally. No, not literally.

I almost forgot

Look, things are crazy around here right now. So, this actually happened two weeks ago but I'm just getting around to posting now. The Heated tea towels are being sold by their first physical store. It's a bakery in Canada! Dartmouth, Nova Scotia to be precise. Tara of Two If By Sea Bake Shop actually taught herself to bake, not unlike how I taught myself to screen print. We're goddamn kindred spirits. She did get our description slightly off as Jenny does not play an instrument in The Heated but since my goal was to get a collective going on under the name of The Heated, and she pretty much contributes to everything but the actual music, including roadie duties so...

Look what the Storque brought!

Remember a while back when I published the best shots from my photo shoot? Well, they were for an article that came out today on Etsy under their Storque section. After all that worrying about making my face look so so pretty, they chose a picture that features my mid-section... which is still pretty hot so I'm trying not to take it personally. Heh. Thanks to both Etsy and Esty seller flyingrhymes who put this whole shebang together. I feel all official and stuff. Validated. Love me.

Newsworthy

The Bay Bridged also included my show for their Weekend Picks. Sweet. I've been trying to tell all my friends and associates that this is going to be a good one. Now that it's been recommended by not one but two San Francisco music blogs, I feel so validated. 

On that note, I got an email earlier in the week from Radford Bishop, who actually came and stayed at my shitty, one-bedroom apartment in South San Francisco (The Industrial City... we all pay our dues) while he was on tour years ago. This was while I was still in The Pre-Teens and we played a few shows together. Anyway, he managed to track me down through that new bio I put up for The Pre-Teens on last.fm (I knew that was a good idea). I don't mean to toot my own horn, but here's what Radford had to say about my old band:

The PreTeens have actually been a huge influence for me!  You guys were pheonomenal. I play those 2 cd's for everyone I know just about (I still listen to songs from both albums on a weekly basis, if you can believe that) and encourage them to buy the cd's online. 

So toot toot, motherfuckers (too much?). Now, that is a fan. Look, sometimes I need a little ego boost. Ok, all the time. I'm only human. Radford's band is good, yes? I can hear a little Pre-Teens in there. I want to listen to more but my wife has had the stomach flu for the past few days so I've had to sit around and watch her sleep. Priorities!

Tell me we aren't all the same!

I mean, it's eerie.

Creative Block

I need to come up with a new tea towel design as suddenly, the merchandise division of The Heated has become profitable! It's no doubt due to the efforts of my merchandise manager (a.k.a. wifey) who takes care of my Etsy shop. Plus, I hear there's this holiday coming up that involves buying gifts for people... oh, and Jesus. Anyway, the towels are selling and I feel I must introduce a fresh design. If you'd care to weigh in on the matter, vote. The quiz is to your right (on my blogger page for those who are reading this elsewhere) and will be up for a week. Granted, by the time you vote, I draw, then burn the screen, then print the towels, Christmas might be over. But the satisfaction of making new things never expires so I say, let the design contest continue. I call it a contest because I'll give you a chance to win a new design once it's done. Stay tuned, suckas.

Last FM

I put The Pre-Teens albums up on Last.FM yesterday cuz why not? For those of you who are not aware, I used to play bass and write songs with them and sing... and over-sing (damn it, I did, ok?). I don't think my old band mates would mind and we have more plays than The Heated, I'll tell you that. I tried to lure listeners over promising them that The Heated is very similar to The Pre-Teens but Last.FM never does what I want it to do and so, there is no cross-promotion. I'm not ashamed to cross promote and we had good songs. Some are not but overall, we were pretty solid.

(I just went on a twenty minute journey into LastFm when I had only intended to pop over quickly and grab the hyper-link to The Pre-Teens and then found that we are also known as simply Pre-Teens. That's even more people that need to hear that I exist.)

I just realized that Last.FM never actually uploaded the tracks I spent an hour putting up yesterday. Please someone tell me what it wrong with them? Why are they so evil?
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11/25/08 Update: ok, now most of the songs are up. I guess they just had to process and I'm impatient.

This might sound familiar

Did my brilliant press release make it to the masses? Hell to the yeah. Many thanks to The Deli Mag for their remarkably sound decision to post it on their home page.

Press Release

For Immediate Release:

Cristina Espinosa placed an ad for a drummer for her previously solo-project The Heated on a whim. The ad read as follows:

Low-key drummer sought. Must be ridiculously good looking.

There were actually two replies but when the first respondent realized there was no money involved, only Gee Fortycoats remained as a contender. The Heated’s self-titled, debut EP was released this past April and already included far more instruments than Espinosa could hope to include in a live performance as a solo artist. So when it became clear that this new drummer also plays guitar, mandolin, various percussion instruments and banjo, Fortycoats was asked to stay on. Thus it is with great pleasure that The Heated announces this new line-up will debut on September 16th at El Rio. The show begins at 8:00 pm and admittance is free.

Concentrated concentration

My shoulders are still messed up and though the pain has gone from a pinched nerve feeling to merely the sorest, sore muscles I've ever had. My physical therapist has been pushing my back ribs into place and marveling at just how tight my muscles are. She also warned me to fix my posture, which I've been doing. It kills.

As a result, I've been staying away from the cursed computer which gave me the shoulder problems in the first place. At first it was difficult but luckily school started up around the same time so I've had less time to be checking my email/myspace/facebook/news obsessively. Truly, I've realized that I'm getting far more done as a result. It's forced me to really focus and get what I need done on the computer then step away. I've gotten my homework done, put together radio promo packages, written a press release (about the surprise I'm announcing this week) and contacted some clubs about shows (success at the Red Vic). That's all in the last three days. It's good. I think I need to continue on accordingly. Less internet, more working.

Show review: Blondie's on Monday... again

So how was the show on Monday? First off, let me tell you I was tired. I'd been working on a little headache all day. One of those headaches that isn't so much painful as persistent and seven hours later, you're tired of the space behind your temple gently throbbing. I ate breakfast. I drank water. I ate lunch and still... I took ibuprofen and worked it out.

By the time the show came around, I was ready to go but when I got onstage, I second guessed the set list and started with Hot Bastard! instead of my originally planned number. Sometimes it's hard to stand up there and realize that most people didn't show up to see you and you need to win them over within the first ten minutes or else. Did I win them over? Well, maybe. It's hard to tell. It wasn't packed but at the same time I sold more merch and albums than ever before. So, it's a tough call but I like selling things so overall I'm going to call it a success. I meant to have someone take pictures. Next time.

There are a few people who come to damn near every show and it helps me tremendously to know that if all else fails, if everyone is too tired or comes down with a case of the Mondays I can count on this core group to come out and drink enough to make the bartender want me back. You know who you are. You know I love ya.

Despite the sparse population of this show, I felt good up there. I dug deep into the Cristina catalog, debuting a song that I wrote when I was 20 (its public debut though my living room has heard it for years) up to the song I wrote a few weeks ago. I even pulled out what was undoubtedly the hit of the show: my hastily cobbled together Billy Idol cover of Dancin' With Myself. Please note that I did not cover the part where Billy let's everyone know how he's all wet and he sweats and he sweats and sweats, sweats, sweats, sweats, sweats. Gross.

Speaking of sweating, I've been working my marketing muscles on the upcoming El Rio show. Literally, I took an exercise walk there tonight to drop off fliers for the August 5th show. Check it out below. I'm into skeletons lately.

Doesn't photograph well

Pasted below is a new weapon in my marketing arsenal: press photos. The magnificent paintings behind me (I've been calling them Good and Squirrel vs. Blue Jay) are by an artist named Grant Olsen, who I believe lives in Boise. I tried to stalk Grant in order to find some type of website for him but all I found was an article in which he said he would use some grant money he was awarded for his art to visit the dentist so clearly, he's a man after my own heart.

It's taken forever to get a press photo that I actually like because I don't photograph well. I'm way hotter in real life or at least, that's what my wife tells me and by "tells me" I mean she nods her head when I say it. Seriously though, put me in front of a camera and I'm all gums, double chins and acne scars. Apparently the key is not smiling. I'm ugly when I smile is the lesson I've learned. Anyway, now I've got to print these suckers up and get them in an envelope. The press must know about The Heated.

Even when I was 17

I made this little number up to give to members of my street team ("Little Helpers"). By street team, I mean my friends... they could be a team. It covers three months worth of shows cuz I like to plan ahead.