TOUR VIDEOS/NEWS/NEW BLOG

at http://charlenekaye.tumblr.com/. i'll soon be abandoning this guy. but here's my latest post anyway.

OHMYGOD YOU GUYS!! TOUR VIDEOS ARE HEREEEEE
Let me say first, that it was truly a challenge to condense the hour and a half of footage we had into these four 7ish minute long videos. The camera went from being a leering 5th eye, to a welcome spectator, to a newfound friend and then ultimately the chummiest of chums, eventually following us not only at sound checks but at breakfast, in bed, and up our nostrils.

The tour as a whole was awesome and unforgettable. For all of us, this was our virgin tour, which is why everything you're about to see is probably infinitely more amusing to us than to anyone else. So please, watch and enjoy at your leisure, if you have a lot of time on your hands and feel like spending some quality time with the nutcases in my band. They're all good (well, I think so anyway) but I've included little synopses anyway for the short-attention-spanned like me.

Episode 1: We head out to our first gig in Muncie, IN and practice in the back room of Village Green Records. We played with folk troubador Eric Alexander and another Muncie band called Bonesetters who I didn't manage to catch on tape. Thanks to the host with the most, Travis, for putting us up and letting us sleep on his couch in the record store and taking us out for some good, old fashioned, heart-attack food - deathly syrupy sweet waffles, 5-egg omelets and the like.

Episode 2: Pittsburgh!! We play in an old warehouse-turned-practice space called Ed's with the band Sleep Experiments. Dave plays one of Emily's violin riffs on his bass during our sound check, prompting Emily to retort, "Don't steal my thunder, bitch!" This then turns into a full-fledged, white-girl 'tude dance ("NO! UH-UH!!!"). At 1:57 I've lost all grasp of what she's saying, and then she just starts screaming because, why not? Later, we get back to the house and Emily gets her Marlon Brando on.


Episode 3: Our DC breakfast concludes with a full band a capella rendition of "Menomena," or the muppet song. We each take a verse - Jared definitely took the cake on that one, and Dave makes a convincing gorilla in his. No gig footage, but what ensues is the rap explosion in the car that's based on Clone, Jared's alter ego, morphing into a 10-foot-tall warlord and fighting 9-foot-tall giants in the main square. Emily and I take it upon ourselves to sing the hook of the song, now called "The Day that Clone Died." The next day in the car, Emily and I explore the joys of iFart on my phone. Business as usual.

Episode 4: GRATUITOUS NEW YORK CITY MONTAGE!!! We play at the Living Room, then head out to the bar for some drinks and some shakeyface. We recap the tour by interviewing each other in dark glasses and asking each other such questions as, "Emily, what is your favorite face that you have made on this tour?" and "Dave, which note is better - D or E, and why?" This one is my personal favorite.



And now for some exciting news - I have picked a coast!! I will be moving to Brooklyn, New York in September, along with Cesspool, the Dirty Birds, their girlfriends, some high school friends, their girlfriends, and everyone else in the world that I've had some random connection with that happens to be moving there/living there. I'm so excited because i'm already planning on stalking Bret and Jemaine, Michel Gondry and Kaki King.

More news - two of the aforementioned bands, Cesspool and The Dirty Birds, are both recording right now and their new albums are going to be AHHHHSOME. The Dirty Birds album ("How the Cause Became the Cure") comes out on August 7 and seriously you guys, I've been in there for a few sessions and the stuff they've done so far will melt your heart and make you want to dance and sing and jump around and go for long scenic drives and kiss babies. And speaking of kissing, I was in the studio with Cesspool yesterday recording some kissy sounds and mmm mmms.

Last bit of news - MY LAST SHOW IN ANN ARBOR will be opening for the Dirty Birds at their CD release show on August 7. So mark your calendars, (time and location TBA), I hope to see your smiling faces one last time before I head out into the big bad world forever and ever.

LOOOOOOOVE AND twinkies

Charlene

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follow me on twitter!!! http://twitter.com/charlenekaye

BELIEVE! EP! FREE!

Hey guys!

I have recorded a small EP of sorts- 5 songs with just me solo on piano (3 new originals and 2 covers). And the best part is, it's freeeeeeee, available for download at the bottom of this post.

here's what the physical copies i gave out at last night's show looked like-



And speaking of last night, thanks to everyone that came out to the Pig for our superwomen show!! Our Fleetwood Mac collaborative 3-part harmony explosive extravaganza was a definite success and was captured on video by the one and only Mark Arnold (of Paper Frame Productions!) so when that becomes available, I'll promptly put it up on here. Other highlights include an acoustic/male choir-supported "Strike a Chord," and my attempts to breakdance during Laurel's set for which I was rewarded with a big fat shiner on my knee.

Okay enough babbling, here's the CD already. Click on the CD cover art below to get to the website to download it. Did I mention it's free?




Special thanks to Chris Conover, who recorded, mixed, and mastered it!

track listing:

1) The Doormat Song
2) Pilgrims
3) Hemisphere
4) The Maker Makes (Rufus Wainwright)
5) Ex-Girlfriend (No Doubt)

tell a friend!

love,

charlene

YYY

Yeah yeah yeahs acoustic additions on the deluxe versions of "It's Blitz!" is bliss. Karen O, i don't care if you're a nut, you can sing like a mother@#$&*^@.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs with acoustic guitars, a grand piano, and STRINGS?!?? It's the most beautiful thing I've ever heard.



oh, and I could never figure out what the album cover was for the longest time - it's someone cracking an egg with their hand. I thought it was some sort of lightbulb or glass being broken. But it's an egg!

I just got back from New York and any doubts I had about living there before have now been extinguished after this visit. I loved everything about it. I'm gonna be a part of it, NEW YORK, NEW YORK!!!

hmmm.

i had 3 nail clippers at one point. now i have none. I know there's a swirling vortex in my room that extra socks, guitar picks, pens, and the like fall into...where is it??

on a completely unrelated note, nothing pushes my buttons like this sound....



ahhh....i will own a Wurlitzer someday. A real one, and not just an electric keyboard that has a Wurlitzer simulator. Oh, but I have no moneys!! sad sad sad.

oh hello.

oh hello. is anyone out there?

so i guess i'm gonna get back on this thing again, if not for any reason other than being inspired by Liann's hilarious and insightful musings on life that she details in her blog.

today i bought



to accompany



I dropped mad dollars on the amp...I'm so poor!!! but to be fair, the guitar I got was mine for only $100, and I really needed an amp that lasted for more than a year without breaking or cutting out, so I'm super...amped? about my new one. The guitar was Miguel's, that had been sitting in his basement for 2 years that he wanted to get rid of before he moved (Stick to drums, buddy...) The white pick guard is courtesy of yours truly with a little spray paint. Then I replaced the musty strings with new ones and put the strap on....voila!

In other news...I bought a blender for $10 at the Salvation Army and have since been making delicious fruit smoothies every day on my back deck. It's getting really hot outside and I couldn't be more ecstatic about it.

For the most part, I've been much too lazy to actively discover any new music this year. I'm still hung up on the old stuff I've been listening to since freshman year of college--right now, I've been really into Rufus Wainwright's first album (again). Listen to "Damned Ladies" - so good.

what else? I don't know.

Elephants.

God, what a song. Rachael Yamagata kills me. She KILLS me!!!!

SKIN AND BONES

watch the music video my brilliant sister, thom and mark arnold directed.



WATCH IT!!!

Paper Bag

I was staring at the sky, just looking for a star
To pray on, or wish on, or something like that
I was having a sweet fix of a daydream of a boy
Whose reality I knew, was hopeless to be had
But then the dove of hope began its downward slope
And I believed for a moment that my chances
Were approaching to be grabbed
But as it came down near, so did a weary tear
i thought it was a bird, but it was just a paper bag
hunger hurts, and I want him so bad, oh it kills
Cuz I know Im a mess he dont wanna clean up
I got to fold cuz these hands are too shaky to hold
hunger hurts, but starving works
when it costs too much to love

Ahhh. i JUST discovered When the Pawn... by Fiona Apple. Always ahead of the game.

it's done.

October 10, 2008!!!!

listen to some tunes HERE.

Today I'm grabbing monday by the balls and throwing its ass all the way to next weekend.

ohgawd.

22?!?!?

great. what birthday do i have to look forward to now? social security at 65?

renting a car at 25?

gimme something to work with.

now that my purse has been stolen

and I have magically still managed to maintain my iPhone throughout all this, here is what I lost~

-the keys to my house
-my driver's license
-my student ID card
-my credit cards
-my key identificators which were so sweet because they were different colored guitars!!
-approximately $17.00 in cash
-my DARTH VADER WATER BOTTLE (gentle sobs).

Never mind the license or credit cards. I don't have to drive in michigan and i can always renew those. But I've had a long relationship with that water bottle. It was my little friend, a piece of me. Likewise, a little piece of me withered up and died inside yesterday at the loss of my purse and all its contents.

this post is for bryanna

bryanna complains that I never update my blog anymore so here's one for her. the fall is gloriously busy and exhilarating. classes have started and i'm taking 3 english classes (including a creative writing class) and a world war II class, which I love already. bryanna is going to come visit me for a football game on some weekend this fall and I'm stoked. My new house is amazing. The album will be released October 10 at the Yellow barn with Frontier Ruckus and i could die of antici.....pation. (new tracks up HERE.)there's no internet in my room. the amount of junk in our living room that we have yet to organize is astounding. my birthday is on friday and we're having a derelicte-themed bash to break in our new place in celebration. i watched Woody Allen's Sleeper tonight and I loved it. my iPhone is not disappointing me at all. I could use a little more banana bread in my life right now.

John Coltrane

"My goal is to live the truly religious life and express it in my music. If you live it, when you play there's no problem because the music is just part of the whole thing. To be a musician is really something. It goes very, very deep. My music is the spiritual expression of what I am - my faith, my knowledge, my being . . . When you begin to see the possibilities of music, you desire to do something really good for people, to help humanity free itself from its hangups. I think music can make the world better and, if I'm qualified, I want to do it. I'd like to point out to people the divine in a musical language that transcends words. I want to speak to their souls."

John Coltrane

Perpetuum Mobile

Wurlitzerlust.

It will be mine.



Oh yes. It will be mine.

Don't expect a care package from me any time soon.

If I could make a list of my favorite things to do, going to the post office would rank at the absolute bottom of that list. It's a place I've come to thoroughly despise. From the moment you walk in, the smell hits you like a brick wall - something between the spectrum of smelly feet and mothballs, among various junk that's probably been sitting there for years - some discounted office supplies, stale mini-paks of M&Ms, the greatest hits of Willie Nelson. Some awful elevator-type music is always noodling overhead, usually Kenny G or something along the lines of smooth jazz.

Apart from the depressing ambiance, what really gets me is the people that work there. Everyone behind the counter seems bitterly aware that they have the worst job in the world and nobody has any qualms about showing it with the "kill me now!" attitude they plainly exude. You are forced to wait in a line longer than the Nile and inhale that nauseating fish-mothball air for what feels like a year, to interact with people who hate their lives and consider dying from licking too many envelopes a legitimate cause of death. It's hot and stuffy and the people in line clearly think along the same lines as you do, loosening their collars and wondering how fast they can do this before bolting for the exit. Once I asked one of the workers if I could borrow her pen to address my envelope, and she gave me a toneless, "there are pens in Office Depot next door." She wouldn't let me use her pen!! She might as well have just shrieked, "I have a letter opener and I'm not afraid to use it!"

Finally, the ridiculous cost of shipping these days is the cherry on top of my unpleasant post office excursions. Any time I try to mail something it always ends up costing me like a billion dollars. Which is why I say, I am avoiding that place like the plague. Or you better thank me with arms open for mailing you the birthday card that cost me $8.00 to send you. (I'm not naming any names...Spencer.)

Oh and while we're at it, another thing that really annoys me is people who take the elevator (or, "the lift") to the 2nd floor. But that's another post.

joie de vivre

Joie de vivre (from the French joie, "joy"; de, "of"; vivre, "to live, living"; "the joy of living") is a term sometimes imported into English to express a cheerful enjoyment of life; an exultation of spirit. Joie de vivre, as one scholar has written,

"...can be a joy of conversation, joy of eating, joy of anything one might do… And joie de vivre may be seen as a joy of everything, a comprehensive joy, a philosophy of life, a Weltanschauung. Robert's Dictionnaire says joie is sentiment exaltant ressenti par toute la conscience, that is, involves one's whole being."[1]

In English common usage, the phrase is sometimes corrupted to joie de vie. This would translate to "joy of life" or "zest for life," rather than the more affirmative "joy of living."

WHO is rolf harris?!?

I'm in the throes of writing a press release on this guy Rolf Harris who's coming to the Opera House for his first show in 10 years. I'd never heard of him before, but apparently he's HUGE in Australia and even bigger in the UK. I'm talking headliner at Glastonbury, people dubbing him "the king of music," sold-out stadium crowds in the 70's and 80's. My coworkers say that he's a big deal because he's made a career doing these things called "novelty songs" - goofy songs that everybody eats up like hotcakes because they're just so ridiculous and out there to be taken seriously - such as his cover of "Stairway to Heaven" (below). His claim to fame is the instrument he's dubbed the "wobble board" - while shaking off a painted canvas to dry one day, he discovered the interesting sound the cardboard made as it flopped back and forth. hence, the wobbleboard was born. It's so scathingly brilliant. Seriously, if stuff like this excites you as much as it excites me, get off your arse and watch this right now.