We had a little time off with some big trips, managing to collect Covid as a souvenir. So after cancelling the gigs we have this week, I'm happy to at least I'm out of bed and sitting up at the computer now to update you on "Henry's Hideaway". Both the CD and LP are now in our hands and also downloadable from our website and all the streaming platforms, but you probably already know that. It's also going out to lots of radio stations in the next week or two and we are extremely grateful to Dennis McNally for helping us reach the people we need to reach.
But wait, you can hear a preview of our quartet playing it live at Bird and Beckett Books and Records in SF on Saturday July 13 at 7:30 p.m. Heck, maybe we'll make it a quintet to perfectly match the instrumentation on the record. For now, Henry and I will be joined by Alex Baum on bass and Ken Owen on drums. I keep telling people it's a departure from our usual Ameri-Kinda fare, because we have let a teeny bit of jazz tell us what to do, but it could also be considered just a stop along the way in our relentless search for perfection (OK, Henry's), a refinement of a couple of songs we've previously recorded (mine), and/or a revelation of yet another face in our Sybillian personality...definitely something new, anyway!
Expect a jazzy supper club, 1950's kind of sound and ambience. Being us, the music and lyrics themselves still wander around whatever was obsessing us when we wrote the song, and continued to obsess us or we wouldn't have spent so much time and money producing the thing. Why lie?
There is one song we didn't write and it's a real highlight: is Maurice Tani's "Take Me With You When You Go Too Far" which I think every female singer I know wants to make her own, and frankly, I believe Pam Brandon already has. When I first heard her sing it I just knew I had to um, "borrow" it. For a little while. Or forever. Or maybe we can share. Maurice said it's OK.
Another is Henry's crooning "Almost Hear Your Voice". It's heartbreaking. It's not about me, because I would never break his heart that way, so a pox on her and any other hers that did. It's pretty gorgeous though.
This is way too long. Come to Bird & Beckett! July 13, 7:30 p.m. Covid will NOT be in the house.