The Morning After: RESCUE Album Release Party, Ventura, 08/25/2018

It’s not really “The Morning After,” but yesterday doesn’t count because we were all dead from too much rock’n’roll.

The setlist:
A Werewolf's Been There
Lucy, Tell me a Secret
The Balcony Song
Bear-filled Woods
Getaway (Snitches get Stitches)
Grayscale
Come Back Home
Fake Pearls
Adeline
All of the Nice Things
Over and Over Again
I Get So Scared
The Laboratory
The Label On Your Sleeve
Slip Away (cover from Perfume Genius)

Personnel:
Hollis Webb - Vocals, guitar
Clint Buck - Bass, vocals
Luke Holland - vocals, guitar
Alyssa Long - vocals
Mark Henne - Drums

This past Saturday The Sleuth and I took the stage at Ventura here in San Antonio and played the new album RESCUE from top to bottom–and then some.  Though we have only played a few shows, it will be hard to match the enthusiasm, energy, and love from the massive crowd turnout we had at Ventura.  It was packed!  I spoke to many of you after the show and I was delighted that for a lot of you this was the first local show you had intentionally attended in a long time–and you had a blast!

This show is the culmination of many years and many friends helping along the way.  I'd like to give a shout-out first and foremost to Michael Carrillo at Ventura for hosting us and making us sound so good on stage. Mikey cares about this and always wants to get it right--SO THANK YOU.

One of the challenges of recording a record at home and then finding a band after the fact to perform it is capturing the emotion, energy, and clarity from a recorded platform and then transferring it to a live band performing the same song on stage.  It doesn’t sound the same–and I think that’s good.  I think we all know deep down somewhere that this is one of the joys of seeing live music: you never know what you’re going to get.

Performing the tunes with the exact same personnel as on the record (with the exception of an understandably absent Andrew McGregor) was another aspect of the show that made the release so special.  That performance may be the only time one would hear Mark Henne on drums along with the rest of the group on the record (Mark’s not dying or anything, he just lives in Austin and plays in 400 bands for a living, so when we get him it’s a special occasion).

So in the end, I was sandwiched between big groups of friends: my friends in the band playing my songs, and my friends in the audience, listening and dancing and opening up their hearts to my weird little living-room recorded music.  It’s a big, beautiful feeling I wish I could give to someone I love.

That afternoon I also stopped by the studio of KSYM 90.1, San Antonio College’s student run radio station and sat down with Hot Mustard and DJ Pyramid to talk about the release party and the record.  This was another, more embarrassing, dream of mine that I wouldn’t normally share unless I was somehow invited to do it: I love college radio.  I would follow college radio into battle.  When this civilization ends and the next group comes in after us tasked with picking up the pieces of our forgotten and broken society, I hope that the first sound they hear when they roll the dial on their field transistor radios somewhere, somehow, will be the sound of a nervous college kid saying “Okay y’all, I just ventured out into the post-apocalyptic wasteland and traded a possum pelt for a copy of Death Rides a Pale Cow on cassette–so that’s what we’ll be listening to for the next 43 rock blocs.”

College radio was an oasis for me growing up.  In Lubbock, TX we had a rock station,  pop station, several tejano and religious stations, and then one little scrappy college radio station: KTXT 88.1.  They played music I couldn’t hear anywhere else and somehow the only music that ever really excited me (right before I started playing guitar).  To be invited to speak about my dumb little record on a college radio station was sweet–even though I forgot to scream into the studio mic begging you college kids to like me.  Thank you again to Mustard, Pyramid, and KSYM for having me in!

The new record RESCUE is available now on vinyl, CD, and digital download.  You can listen to the record and purchase it from Bandcamp here:

Sing Along: All of the Nice Things

“All of the Nice Things” is the oldest song on RESCUE.  It was written in 2007 and is a companion song to “The Most Awful Things” from DANGER.  Why bring an old song back to a new record?

WHY NOT?

I try to listen to songs the way most people would listen to them (mainly focusing on the lyrics).  I believe this is one of the more “lyrically coherent” tunes I’ve written.  There are also some sweet moments in the song which lends itself a little more to the themes of redemption on RESCUE.

This tune deserves the whole lyric treatment for this post:

Beer and Queso and late-night TV
Scrabble and UNO and Monopoly
I just can't figure out what's wrong with me
It's hard to sleep at night
I'm a boxer without a fight
And the color of my shiner isn't as bright

All of the nice things aren't as nice without you

Scary movies
A comfy chair
Inappropriate clothing
An inappropriate stare

All of the nice things aren't nice without you

Penguins and puppies and small orphaned squirrels
swimming and porno and dancing with girls
I can't even get hungover anymore
Well it's hard to keep my eyes dry
I'm a cold war without a spy
and I'm a Loudon Wainwright “One Man Kind of Guy”

Listen to “All of the Nice Things” here:

Sing Along: Crossword

 "Crossword" was written some time in either 2008 or 2009.  This song is heavily influenced by MGMT's sound on "Time to Pretend."  The song originally featured an electric guitar playing what is now the distorted bass riff.  It sounded way too thin with guitar and the beat didn't have any "punch" or direction.

I decided to mess around with taking out the electric guitar, distorting the bass, adding a slight touch of stereo delay to the drum beat, and a wicked keyboard theme/solo and then caking on layers of vocals to try and achieve a fun, indie type of sound with a drum track.

The distorted bass did wonders and is something I recommend when dealing with a riff or melody that sounds thin on electric guitar.

The vocals are a little different than any other song as well.  On Danger as a whole I stepped back and tried to think about the limits of what I was doing and make it sound as good and exciting as possible within those limits.  Singing loud, singing soft, singing high and low, singing with a funny voice and then completely sober--I wanted to get a little bit of everything.  This was a tune I decided to "sing whisper" and then layer tracks to get a big, unique vocals sound.  The lyrics are a little saccharine, but the melody and instrumental themes are pretty fun (I hope) for the listener.  I had a dream of doing a video for the tune of a single take in the neighborhood and house I lived in when I was in school.  In a lot of ways this is a very representative DANGER INVITES RESCUE song.  It sounds like a song recorded joyfully by oneself in the quiet, dark comfort of an amateur home studio.

Sing Along: Brother Danger

"Brother Danger" was written in 2007 and evolved from a song about a fictional heart surgeon.  It roughly turned into a musical song poem with imagery taken from thoughts I had about my dad, my dad's dad, my friend's dad. my dad's uncle, and my maternal grandfather.  It's a song about men.  It features turns of phrase with religious and political ideas informing the characters in the narrative.  It is a serious song, but one should understand and hear the acoustic guitar rhythm part to sound like a consistent march forward and unwavering hope for redemption and meaning in a harsh world.

This is a "quiet-loud" song.  Thick keyboard noise is caked on to serve as a surreal instrumental  backdrop.  The keyboards whine as if something imminent is about to occur as the acoustic guitar repeats a terse, heavy, acoustic , choral riff.  The drums are fake drums from a keyboard mixed to sound like what drums from a Genesis or Peter Gabriel song would sound like.  The haunting chorus and reverb-laden vocals chant out a song about a traveller who is driving and runs out of gasoline in a small rural community.  A good samaritan on the road picks him up and gives him gas money.  The kind stranger turns out to be his father who is very shell-shocked and miserable from all the hardships he has faced in life.  He takes him home to meet his fun, adventurous uncle who celebrates getting to meet his nephew with playing bassoon and smoking cigars.

The traveller decides to settle down and buy a farm, but the every-day life of living in a small, rural community starts to weigh on him and his crops start going rotten.  He gets a job when he loses the farm but find that he can't work for anyone and the life he though he would have of adventure and wealth will not come true.

The traveler, having failed at farming and traditional work, turns to God and country, but nightmares haunt him still about the seeming meaninglessness of a life of struggle.  As he takes communion he hopes that Jesus will take notice of his life.

I joined the mob; I called it macaroni.
I started having some bad ol' dreams.
I went to church. I drank a thimble full of Jesus.
I hope he pours one out for me.

Brother Danger from the album "Danger" is available on Bandcamp.

Sing Along: The Label On Your Sleeve

Song: "The Label On Your Sleeve"
Album: DANGER
Tempo: 120bpm
Time: 4/4
Key: G

After I left Austin in 2006, I had a "regathering" type of moment where I hung out in my apartment in Arlington and listened to and (tried) writing and recording as much as I could.  I was working a job close by where I was making a little bit more money and after hitting up open mics in Dallas and traveling to see many of my favorite bands live, I had a good idea of where I wanted my "sound" to go and what I was capable of.

I had just heard Arcade Fire at ACL 2006 and remembered loving the kind of serious but high tension mood their droning, repetetive verse beat style.  Driving, disco "four-on-the-four" like you had a drummer stuck on the roof and told him to beat his kick and not to stop until the record is done.

This was fully fleshed out in my parents's garage on Christmas Eve of 2007.  The original title of the song was "Pennant" like the kind of university pennant you might see at a 1950's college football game.  I had the lead melody and the "theme" of the tune in my head for some time.  I could hear it like it was bells or trumpets playing-something "glorious" and heralding like a fight song at a football game.

“The Label On Your Sleeve” theme

The drums aren't real.  They are individual drum sounds from a Casio keyboard I played live into the recording to the click track.  I could never get the drums to sound quite right, but they are passable.  When I play this song live, I find myself wanting to go quite a bit faster and sing more like David Byrne.  I wanted joyous, but "high tension."

The lyrics are about getting close and physical--how sometimes the first touches are the strangest and weirdest--with another person.  It's kind of like that weird "touching" thing a teenage guy might do at the movies while he's got his arms crossed--it's that little "I want to hold your hand" motion.  I'd like to know the over-under on that weird "touching" thing those guys are doing.

This is the first of many songs I would write trying to imitate The Features.  Funny story:  I posted this on The Features Fans online community board and no one responded.  I suppose listening back it sounds a little rough, but still not bad for where I was in the process of learning to write songs and record them.

I feel the warmth inside your cashmere
I only wish I was the label on your sleeve
Maybe then I could be next to you
But instead I'll have to dream of ways to be
Close to you

So here it is in its full glory:

You can download "The Label On Your Sleeve" and other songs on Danger from Bandcamp.

Mix Challenge: A Werewolf's Been There

Two great producers were given the stems to the song "A Werewolf's Been There" from the upcoming record Rescue.  Which sounds better: A or B? Follow the Soundcloud link below to listen to WEREWOLF A vs WEREWOLF B

https://soundcloud.com/holliswebb/sets/werewolf

Adventures in Home Recording (Part II - Learn from someone great)

During my junior year in college, I lived in Glasgow, Scotland studying abroad at the University of Glasgow.  One of the first things I did after settling in to the neighborhood was finding a local music store and buying an acoustic guitar.  One of the easiest ways to find other musicians and make friends is finding a local open mic to play.  I got lucky in this respect as there were many open mic nights at nearby pubs and student unions and some of the pubs hosting them even offered a free pint for musicians who performed.

One of the open mics I played was a pub called Whistler’s Mother (named after the famous painting from James McNeill Whistler).  The host was a guy named Andrew McGregor who ran the open mic with his friend Lindsey.  They played mostly cover songs to start the open mic and created a very friendly and inviting atmosphere.  Andy’s brother Stuart tended bar and was also a talented musician with his own band.  The first night I played open mic at the Whistler’s I had the notion to let my freak flag fly a little and play some weirder, original songs.  I made some sort of impression on Andy (not necessarily a good one) and he approached me afterward and talked about music and recording.  He invited me to his home studio located in his dad’s print shop in a town about an hour away called Largs.

Hollis Webb at Whistler's Mother 2002

I met him early on a Saturday morning next to the Whistler's Mother.  I had my guitar, a tuner, and a notepad with ideas for a couple of tunes I wanted to record. He picked me up in his small red hatchback and we headed for his little seaside hometown of Largs.

What a nice, interesting fellow musician! Here he was, getting up early on a Saturday morning.  How cool was this situation I stumbled into simply by playing at an open mic?

On the way out of town, Andy turned to me and asked: "Hollis, did you know I'm a viking?"

Panic immediately set in as I thought how dumb it was to get in a car with a Scottish stranger.  "I'm about to be kidnapped, or murdered, or molested, or all three," I thought.

Andy continued: "Largs has a viking museum as it was the last point of entry when the vikings invaded Scotland.  I give tours and bang a battle axe on a shield and scare the wee kids.  My viking name is 'Ragnor'."

I started breathing again taking comfort in the fact that the worst Andy would do to me is attack me with a medieval weapon (which he later confirmed he possessed).

We drove an hour to his home town of Largs along the coast of the island--a beautiful little sea-side Scottish shire with plenty of gambling machines and places to eat fish and chips.  I expected we would record in Andy's garage at his house or maybe set up a few microphones in a living room, which is why I was so confused when we pulled up to what turned out to be a print shop.

The Print Shop, Largs Scotland, 2003

Andy’s home studio just happened to be located in his father’s print shop: a larger warehouse with printing technology ranging from large, laser printers to century-old printing machines with moveable type.  The “studio” was located in a closet.  Inside the closet was a large, custom-built computer running some version of Cubase which required a USB dongle to be inserted into the computer while running (remember the days?), a tall chair, a control surface with the model name of “Houston” (perhaps to launch a rocket, Andy frequently joked), a 88-key midi keyboard, and some cables hanging carefully from nails equidistantly plunged into the shelving unit above the keyboard.

It didn’t look like much, but I knew that great recordings had been done with less, so I was happy to throw my songs in Andy’s hands to see what kind of recording we could get.

How the sausage got made

Watching Andy work was stunning.  He was an incredible piano player, and knew how to coax all sorts of great sounds from his keyboard.  He also worked quickly and efficiently on the Houston.  It was amazing to watch him work.  When we think of recording engineers working in a studio, we get the image a guy passively moving faders up and down and twisting knobs occasionally—not so with Andy. After every track was recorded, Andy's real work began with editing, mixing, and doing the work of a producer to guide the song idea into a recording which would sound even better than what I could have dreamed.  That is one of the real challenges of a producer.  While an artist may come to the table with the component parts and ideas for a song or album, the monumental technical and artistic task largely resides with the person in charge of running the recording session.  Perhaps an artist may come into the studio with an idea of a song he wants to sound like Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” but what part of that hit and his or her song does that likeness intertwine?  Is it the killer, memorable guitar riff?  Is it the vocal sound of 90’s teenage angst?  Is it an ineffable mood aspect of the song that inspires him or her to make that comparison?  Such is the challenge and the heroics of a good, competent recording engineer and producer.  In professional settings these roles are usually separate, but for the more budget projects all these roles are relegated to the songwriter who might be recording the album on his own.

I fought a fight internally for a while for Rescue over whether I should complete each stage of the recording process with a professional: going to a professional studio and having an engineer record and mix the tunes; maybe having a figure in the local music scene with a particular and apparent talent for recording and production produce the record—guide the record into something worthy of attention.  In the end I chose to serve these roles by myself not be because I thought I could do them better but because I wanted the time to learn and do it myself.  While I will certainly be calling on professionals to help me finish the record, part of the “artistry” I hope people get from the album is a DIY aesthetic and a sense of artist growth.

I am better for doing this album and I am better for all the different people I have learned from (ahem…a one Andrew Robert McGregor).  It is special for me to do the recording part of this project by myself, but there is no way I could have done it without the experience of learning from talented professionals.

Hollis and the Mighty McGregor (2003)

If you want to record. find someone great in the studio and learn everything you can from them.  What does their workflow look like?  What special techniques do they employ on each track recording?  How thorough are they?  Do they make you do lots of takes until a line is clean and performed well?  What can you steal from them (ideas and techniques--not actual property or equipment).

You can stream Miss the Plane and Quick Relief, the two albums Andy recorded and produced for me on Spotify.

To download and stream DANGER and INVITES click here to shop and throw me some love.  RESCUE is due to be released this spring 2017!

Adventures in Home Recording (Part I - Get a recording that gets you where you need to go)

One of the unexpected joys of my musical journey came to me in the form of home recording.  What I believe makes DANGER INVITES RESCUE a great and interesting project is the fact that it was recorded on technology that is essentially available to anyone with a decent laptop computer. Like a lot of musicians in my age range, my first experience with DIY recording was making a demo on an analog 4-track machine.  My first band, Tomorrow's Yesterday, had been playing and performing for about 3 years when the rock radio station (FMX 94.5) in our sleepy west Texas town of Lubbock, TX announced an under 21 battle of the bands to occur during our city's July 4th celebration downtown.  We kicked ass and won real studio recording time (but that experience will be addressed in a future post).  FMX required all bands submit a cassette demo to enter the competition.  It's strange to think now that this was still in the time when cassette was the popular format for independent musicians to record.

We gathered in our drummer's basement--our regular Sunday afternoon rehearsal spot--and set up couch cushions, blankets, and mattresses to isolate the instrument amps, vocals, and drums.  While the consumer recording technology we used offered the ability to layer tracks, we chose to perform the songs live to get as good and tight of a sound as possible.  It sounded…about as as good as you would expect a high school band’s demo to sound from 1997.  Listening to it now is a little cringe-worthy, but it served the purpose of getting us into the Battle of the Bands.

A good demo is good as long as it gets your band or songs where they need to go.  The technology to record yourself has never been cheaper or easier to use.  All Apple Macintosh computers ship standard with the amazing Garageband application which is as easy to use as Mario Paint (80’s throwback—holla).  I have heard incredible albums recorded using this program, so you don’t need a studio full of fancy mics and ProTools to get a good recording.  There are many resources available for cheap or no cost to help you get on the road to making really great music in a home studio.

The album I am currently recording, Rescue, will likely be the last record I record using my home studio.  When the record is done I’m having a fire sale on my equipment and will likely not have the ability or space to have the studio I have now, SO…I am offering my recording and production services for a limited time in my home studio, The Bear Haus, to songwriters and bands who need to get a really great-sounding demo.  Click on the Bear Haus Recording link above and purchase blocks of 8 hours of studio time for just $100!

Thank you again for your time and support.  Go out and make some music yourself and share it.

-HW

Happy Holidays! Update on Rescue

Happy Holidays!  I wanted to take a moment to write a special message, update the website, and let you know about some exciting things for this month as well as the new year.  First, I hope you had a lovely Thanksgiving gorging yourself on turkey and watching your favorite NFL team lose while your drunk uncle made questionable assertions about Syrian refugees.  Thanksgiving means friends and family--certainly there is a reason those are both "F" words.

Second, the venerable Clint Buck and myself will be playing a special Christmas show on Friday, December 11th at J&O's Cantina here in San Antonio, TX.  We will be playing as our special Christmas band: The Reindeer Games.  Come out and hear our take on your favorite Christmas tunes and feel free to sing along!  Make a joyful noise!

Finally, in October we laid down drum tracks with the incredible Mark Henne for Rescue at my home studio The Bear Haus.  Danger Invites Rescue is a 3 album/EP home recording project I started in 2008. You can visit the Bandcamp link to pick up a CD or high quality digital download of Danger and Invites.  Rescue, the final recording in the series, is scheduled to be released next year.  This recording will be the most developed and full-sounding recording I have ever made.  I am getting a lot of help from my very talented musical friends to complete it and we will need your help and support to get it pressed to VINYL!  We will be looking at some crowdfunding options with very cool rewards, so please stay tuned and be saving your shekels to get something good from what we are cooking up.

As always, THANK YOU for supporting independent music.  Whenever Clint and I play out as Buck Webb or The Sleuth, we are always thrilled to see familiar faces come out to hear new songs and corny jokes.  So please, for your holiday shopping, consider picking up a CD, download, or sticker from me or your other favorite local band or musician.  It's a cool gift and you'll be supporting better art!  Thanks again and have a safe, fun Christmas and New Year!

-HW