Round The Decay Of That Colossal Wreck

A Guest From The West, Performing Music Without Being Asked, and a Charming Story From the Annals of C&W

The other day I was seated on our virtual veranda (The Aqmatsi Virtuanda from Dorn Furnishings in San Arbetos) and there were some bees and I was reading a book of showbiz tales and I came across a story about how one cold, cold night in east West Texas a man wandered into a watering hole when his tour bus broke down because he was thirsty and hoped for a jukebox. Upon the stage that night was a young girl strumming a 1956 Falcohoner "steel" string box and out of her mouth came the prettiest sounds you ever heard not from a bird. It was open mic night at the Los L'Argonnes in Pente, TX and though they didn't know it then, this chance meeting would lead to decades of beautiful music made by these two lost souls and millions of records sold. The girl on the stage? Prenty Fulliweather. The guy whose tour bus broke down? Gus Bernzt.

Anecdotes like this enrich the millienial narrative of our musical culture, but they also remind us that some nights it's worthwhile to wander into an open mic. Which is what some members of National Eye did the other night because Douglas Kirby's in town and we needed something fun to do.

First Gretchen played some songs (in a dazzling sneak preview of her own group YELLOW HUMPHREY's debut performance this Friday at Blinkin' Lincoln), assisted by Steve Quaranta from Paper Masques:

Followed by Doug who sang some beautiful songs including his own "Milky Mile" and his radical re-imagining of basement tune "Lo & Behold" and he also wore this hat:

And then (I) Rick (me) sang some songs dressed like Dr. Who!

As you can see (if you're a slyboots-observant-type) these moments happened at the famous Philadelphia place The Fire. Open mics are fascinating for a million reasons and I always learn a lot when I go to them. The music, of course, ranges from the bad to terrible to good to mental hospital, but I've never walked away without some new piece of information to put in the great book o' life.

Incidentally, all these photos were taken by main man R. Connell who didn't sign up to play any music. Neither did Will Baggott (who was there) but that's because his banjo fell out of an airplane. But worry not: it should hit the ground in time for Friday's show! (Will plays banjo and bass in Yellow Humphrey.

More soon news. I mean, soon new mores. More news soon more news. Including a review of how Doug's week in Philadelphia went and if he managed to record anything for the upcoming new album!!!

Gianmarco

In-progress portrait of Gianmarco.

National Eye Is Not The Only Band On Earth To Have Its Very Own Blog

Well, now there's some competition out there in the world of blogging about your band because I only just this morning found out from my third cousin (never removed!) Shai of the Capitol Years that he has started blogging and already there is a whole magical heap of totally great recordings and pictures posted on it.

Here are the words where if you click them you'll be taken to the Capitol Years blog.

Of course anybody reading this blog surely already knows about The Capitol Years. We've played 40 million shows with them and members of their band have been contributing to our albums since 2008 (which is a long, long time if you think of 2008 as more like 2006 which might be more accurate and time is unfixable anyway) and we even went on that tour where they were us and we were them.

And maybe Shai will post audio from that tour, who knows. Or maybe we will on this blog. Because it's history and history isn't going to repeat itself, you have to do the repeating for it if repeating is what you want.

Already up on the blog is a recording of a live performance where members of NE joined TCY (for the first time, I guess!) to play songs from TCY's country & western album Pussyfootin'. Check it out, but leave any comments you might have on this page not that one because I want to win the blog war. BAD.

More NEws on the way!

Quarterly Report: On the Horizon Are a Number of Things and Not a One of Them is in the Least Bit Bad

The weather here on the eastern coast of the United States has been teasing us lately with spring-like bursts of warmth and light but let's not get ahead of ourselves: we'll spend a few more months shivering and may even get another blanket of snow or two before it's time to really take down the storm windows and dust off the patio furniture.

Similarly, I don't want to feel too close to the finish line with National Eye's work on our (provisionally but confidently titled) next collection of music Ramparts. But I'm sufficiently pleased with the progress made so far to mention it here. I'd say the thing is halfway to being three quarters done but by that I don't mean it's three eighths because it's way more than that and math doesn't mean anything in music unless you've been brainwashed by Donald Duck in Mathmagicland which, while totally entertaining, is an unreliable teacher (at best).

The heavy-lifting (writing the songs, convincing drummers to come over and learn them, buying new curtains) has been accomplished. Future Favorites will include: "Eat the Birds;" "Man with an Aim;" "Millun Years Or More;" "Drag the Lake;" "Sticky Murderer;" "Hum Along;" "All-Black Bloom;" "One Sad Volunteer" (I think); "Down the Volcano" (maybe); "Long Ago A Go-Go" (still need to get that one up on its feet); "Mama Shipwreck"; "Introducing Dr. War"; and maybe a few others with equally promising titles.

And I offer up those promising titles now for reasons obscure even to me. But there they are, for all to see. I suppose a fun game could be to try and guess which ones will be supergood and which ones will totally stink. Then again, you would lose that game because they're all gonna be totally good.

Meanwhile, looking backward instead of forward, previous album TFS didn't get any BAD reviews and even reared its hairy head on some Greatest Albums of the Whole Heaping Year lists, though not the big famous ones like F. Scott Fitzgerald's or L. Ron Hubbard's or H. Jon Benjamin's. But we appreciate that some people are listening and hope it continues to bring joy and prosperity to the world.

And looking forward again: keep an eye out for some outtake-y type songs from National Eye on an upcoming compilation from the Coalition of Independent Music Stores and Park the Van, alongside similarly rare tracks from the Spintos, Dr. Dog and the Capitol Years. We dug deep in the vault and it wasn't empty like Al Capone's at all in fact it was full of great songs.

I will mention that on this blog when it appears. In the meantime, please fill the comments with lavish praise.

Best of luck!

Struggle

A Hearty And Fulsome Thank You, Plus A Dose of Optimism For The Upcoming Year

First of all, I want to thank everyone who joined us last evening for a stupendously enjoyable performance at Johnny Brenda's. Everything went pretty well music-wise (there was a hilarious and dangerous free-jazz passage caused by a faultily fired neuron somewhere, but fans of the cosmic-comic found it added a breath of new life into a wrinkled old pony of a song) (still, others thought the musicians forgot what they were supposed to be doing for a hot and panicky thirty seconds or so, but that's the thrill of live theater) and I can't say enough about the friendliness and musical power we found in our co-entertainers The Love Language and The Rosebuds. Both troops hail from North Carolina, a place seemingly incapable of spawning jerks, half-jerks, or anybody not lovable and full of music.

While I'm waxing grateful, might as well say thanks to Sean of Daytrotter who graciously welcomed us (and others) into Miner St. Studio in the wee small hours of Thursday to perform a few songs for his fascinating and important website. He's doing a truly valuable service, capturing all of the music he does -- he should get some kind of medal (or cake). And it was our good luck that he came to Philadelphia for some extracurricular documenting. Our eternal brother Nick Krill was there performing yeoman's work as sound engineer (along with a verynice gent named John). More thanks than I've got at my disposal are due to them all. Keep an eye out on the DT site: hopefully it ends up sounding ok...

And that ellipsis seems like a nice way to move into the future. The blogging was slow and intermittent during the holiday-nonsense season, but I'm making a solemn oath to you and the breeze that we'll get back to it in earnest. The trick, of course, is finding interesting NE-related things to show and tell about. Should they get scarce, we'll make 'em up.

And 2009, fingers crossed tight, should also be the first annum where NE puts out some kind of album within a single 12 month period. We will be striving to move faster than the earth does round the sun. Work is moving rapdily, and excitedly, and I look forward to doumenting a few moments of the recording process here on the blog. I feel reasonably confident the album will carry the title "Ramparts" (as hinted at in Jeff's post below) and will be known down the ages as the NE "rock" album. Or maybe just the one that will bum people out least at parties.

So, stay with us. And have a wonderful year. I have this crazy feeling it will be a really really good one.

Will Records In The New Year

I stopped by Philadelphia to say hello to 2009 for a few hours and did some drawings of Will. He's the one on the left. (Click for a larger version).

THIS SATURDAY FOR REAL AT THE FIRE ALL AGES WITH THE ARMCHAIRS AND TOY SOLDIERS ALL AGES ALL EXPENSES PAID

So yeah, that show is happening and it'll be a load of fun. The lineup will be:

Will: on bass
Gretchen: on violin
Rick: on guitar
Kyle: on drums
Paul Rodgers: vocals

Which will be interesting and vastly entertaining. Speaking of vastly, I just came across this fabulous old interview with Rick, Will and Doug from the banner year of 2006:

THIS IS THE LINK TO THE INTERVIEW SO CLICK IT

I really loved this couple and their podcast. I also love Doug and Will. And goodness knows I love promoting things that are three years old. So there you have it, a little blast from the past.

TFS Sketchbook

I drew this page while waiting for Rick to get out of work - we spent the next five days or so drawing and brainstorming art ideas for the album, getting sick, drinking with Will at his house, walking around with Gretchen, shadow-boxing Harpo, watching the Concert for Bangladesh, etc... until it was time for me to get back on the train to Virginia.

The Illustrious Career Of Nick Krill, Famous Musician and Mix Master of Our Album

PHOTO : Mr. Flom and Mr. Krill sing for pizza and beverages, State College, PA 2008, taken by G. Lohse

If you don't know, how it works in music is: you make an album in your house (hopefully you have some instruments and some songs and a tape deck with "REC" function) and then you get them to sound as good as possible and then you send it to Sony. But wait! What if it still sounds like junk after all that hard work? Well, what you do then is you get Nick Krill to take your album and work real hard on it for a while and then it will sound Just Terrific.

And if you're anything like me, then Nick Krill used to live upstairs from where you made your album. He doesn't live there anymore (we've turned his room into an aquarium), but when he did it was pretty great because he was able to mix the entirety of The Farthest Shore and I didn't have to go anywhere except up some stairs in order to tell him to turn up my guitar. And he really did do an amazing job; if you ever heard the original mixes that I did of these songs you would run out of the dance club screaming your head off.

So I asked Mr. Krill to talk about some of the projects he has worked on over the course of his career in Music. Of course, Nick is known the world over (and over) for being in The Spinto Band, but here we'll focus on his yeoman work as recordist, engineer, and mixer.

..

Thus below are the words of NK, discussing (in chronological order) his Adventures in Sound:

The Rude Staircase "Sookie Jump" - engineer
i helped engineer this album way back in college. i met the singer, lynn, through mutual friends and ended up helping with almost all of the overdubs and some of the basic tracking...all in a combination of studios ranging from college stairwells to the wonderful inner ear recording. it was a pretty great experience for a youngster because the band would give me instructions like, "i want this vocal to sound like a half inch tall person is singing it inside your ear canal."

Walker Lundee "40 Love" - co-producer, engineer
these guys are a really fun pop outfit that invited me to share an amazing warehouse space in philadelphia. the recording space also had a skate ramp in it, and between takes i learned how to ride a half-pipe....although i never made it more that about halfway up the dog-gone ramp.

The Teeth "You're My Lover Now" - mixing
rest in peace teeth. it was an honor to work with these fellas. all of this was mixed in the drummer jonas' spare bedroom. when i was done mixing we packed up the whole mini mobile studio into his roommates thirty year old VW beetle and drove it back to my house.

And the Moneynotes "new cornucopia" - mixing
one of scranton PA's finest. this was a lot of fun to mix because while the skeletons of the songs and nice old time rock n' roll tunes or odd sailor type chants and gypsy music, the songs had a great deal of odd ball sounds going every which way. it was also interesting, and sometimes challenging to mix as the style of recordings varied
from song to song. some were live on a four track, some were built up with overdubs, some were the whole band pounding away as a full group.

The Minor White "Old Theatrics" - producer, engineer, mixer
another great scranton group. these fellas are an amazing stew of the beatles, wilco, and television. seeing as the aesthetic of all these groups have all been an influence on my recording ears at one time or another it was really fun to make some recordings influenced by all three.

National Eye - "The Farthest Sewer" - mixing
hey rick, remember when you emailed this to me asking if i wanted to rent a room in your house: "You'd probably end up producing our next album just because you'd be there." dreams do come true. i was able to hear a lot of these songs while they were recorded and rehearsed as they seeped up through the floor boards and heating ducts. when i finally heard the full versions blare over my loudspeakers i was on cloud nine. kind of crazy....the music was played in the basement, recorded on the first floor, and mixed on the third floor.....good effort house.

And good efforts, all, to you, Nick. Have a happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

..

P.S. I only had to edit one thing in Nick's portion of this post: he called our album "The Fartest Shore." I have to admit, this is a problem with the title I never anticipated, but I expect this won't be the last time that happens.

The Free Farthest Shore Streaming Album Player Is Here

And stream, stream, stream it does, like a mountain stream. Or like a mountain lion, if you prefer.

In other words, if you haven't found it within you to purchase the album by National Eye called The Farthest Shore -- if you're still uncertain that it will be the dynamondo-est listening experience you'll have this whole year (whale songs excepted), then you can dip your toes into it with this lovely thing which plays the whole album and shows you some neat pictures and looks deep down into your blouse -- all for the price of nothing!

CLICK ON THESE WORDS TO GO TO THE NATIONAL EYE FARTHEST SHORE STREAMING ALBUM PLAYER.

Thanks and compliments are owed to Corey Watson for the layout and techwork. Cash and favors are owed to Jeff Love for the artwork.

Oh also: I'm excited to get back to blogging. I threw out my shoulder and my pencil last furlough and haven't had a chance to talk about a great many things. Needles to say, NE is firing on all (four thousand seven hundred fifty twelve) cylinders, recording and laughing, and much news is to come. See you then.

First Lope

Here's the letter Rick included with the first version of the rough album he mailed to me.

Call Off The Revolution! Everything's Cool! Plus: Another Demo of a TFS Song from the NE Lab's Rubbish Bin

In the final days leading up to this presidential election that just happened, I received word from a reliable source that not only were the bad guys going to win, they were going to loot and pillage and spray shaving cream all over our stuff in a last-ditch power-grab, coup d'etat bonzo doo-da deal so ferociously ruthless that it would have taken nothing less than a Superman-style reverse-planet-spin to undo.



What I'm talking about is not merely an old man assuming the presidency, but a steely-eyed repudiation of liberty itself by forces hitherto unimagined in this nation. So I did what any sane person would do, I took to the mountains. Not to escape, mind you, but to regroup and fortify and launch the effort to reclaim freedom. And also to hike:

Well, you can imagine my relief when I stopped in the General Store at the foot of Mt. Foom (for supplies: eggs, milk, "fruit leather," paper towels) and saw a newspaper that said "GOOD PREVAILS" and so we excitedly packed our stuff and headed on back to the city.

Which is why posting has been light. Needless to say we're all thrilled to have found ourselves in this new age of hope and palpable relief, even if running around the woods with dogs and waterfalls is pretty nice. But it's time to ENGAGE, and the only place to do that is back at NEHQ in Philadelphia. Which is where this demo of Eva the Atom-Smasher was recorded way, way back.

Many of you know this song in the key of D (as it is on the album) but this one's in E flat. For you non-music scholars, that means I had a capo on the guitar for no discernible reason other than to make it slightly more difficult to play on most instruments.

Enjoy, and don't forget these fun demos for Several Beaches and Effortless Plane from past excursions into the Land of Lazy Low Fidelity.

(Rugged Mountain Man Picture credit: Gretchen Lohse)

Tom Cruise Inspired By National Eye Song

This movie was inspired by the song "Abwehr" from National Eye's album "Roomful of Lions".

Invisible Blue

Pure Film

A lovely piece by Jeff Love.

Coming soon on the blog: an in-depth article on TFS technicians Nick Krill and Burleigh Seaver, lots more demos and recordings, pictures of my speedboat, a centipede race in Athens, Greece, and much much more!

Richard's Music Criticism Corner

As you all know, every Thursday our friend Richard checks in with his roundup of the latest music releases in the pop, rock, country, r&b, swing, oldies, latin, quaker, and country categories (and also jazz), giving readers his thoughts on new music and how it makes him feel and what it says about our times today in the world. It just goes to show: National Eye isn't just about making music, we are about listening to it and saying things about it. And so, here are this week's picks!

NO STRESS EXPRESS by Halfpint

This album has the perfect name because not only will you not be stressed when you listen to it but you'll get there super-fast with no stops because the music is Just That Good. Some of the instruments played on it are drums, keyboards, and singing. I don't know how to describe the music because it's all in French, but buy it anyway and enjoy! Rating: 10 smiles

TODD by Rattlin' Razors

This new album by Newport, VA's favorite sons Rattling Razors is called Todd and I think you know why: all the songs are about famed comedian Todd Lazenby. If what your ears like is fast beats and honking horns and clever lyrics, then this is the album for you. On side one there is one long song called "TODD" and side 2 is totally blank until you get to 28:31 and there's a bunch of people laughing. Joke's on you! Rating: 4 punches

WITH AN EXTRA BIT OF LUCK by My Fair Lady

Finally, here it is: the album you've been waiting for from Boston quintet My Fair Lady. No one does it quite like them and here they do it and do it and do it until your head hurts from trying to keep track of how great it all is. The best song is probably "Need More Of You In My Life" because it has the best lyrics but that would be selling short other great songs like "XYZ (The Zipper Song)" and "Let's Go Screw (in a Light Bulb!)" That last song sounds dirty and you'll think it is until you realize they're talking about light bulbs. Rating: 90

THE LIVING MUSIC by Michael Jones

Attention irony fans: this record by producer-turned-singer-turned-actor-turned-tugboat captain-turned-singer Michael Jones features NO PIANO, despite the piano you can see quite well with your own eyes right there on the cover. But this album could be called "Living Room" just as easily as "Living Music" because your living room is the perfect place to put it on and LISTEN. Rating: hhhh

TALES OF TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS by Yes

This reissue of Yes's classic rock opera comes with an 18"X42" poster (featuring all the members + Kate Jackson), a booklet with liner notes by Pat Nixon and Charles Schulz, and all the songs sequenced in alphabetical order. New re-mastering has the bass sounding crisper than ever and we can all agree it will be nice to finally have something to listen to in the car. Rating: 14/32

Don't Wait for the Box Set!!: Part Two In Our Unearthing of Crummier-Sounding Versions of Songs From The Farthest Shore (Doot-Doot-Doo Edition)

Now that the album has been available for a full week, it makes (marginally) more sense to throw some more crummy demo versions at you. That way, you can sit down and carefully notice all the interesting musical things that can happen between Conception and Reality (i.e. demo version vs. final album track). It's a mystical journey every time, I assure you.

We've already offered up the demo for Effortless Plane, which was pretty darn different from the album version -- a fact not lost on our readers. Here's what some of you had to say:

"This is a much slower version of this song than the one on the album. Is there something wrong with my VCR?"
Linda Winston, Des Plaines, IL

"where r the drums?!?"
Edmund Softel, Battersea, London

"I have to agree with bombdroppa99: mit Sicherheit eine (längst bekannte und zugängliche) Bereicherung für ihre Studien, als Projekt ohne echte Angabe von Gründen oder Nutzen und als bloße Quelle für sinnlose Verlinkungen: eine."
Andy Conroy, Nebo, KY

"Hey Caruso, ever heard of singing lessons? Just kidding! Call me."
Admiral Cornelis Cruys, Taganrog

Good points, all. But let's move on already!

Our next primordial offering is the song Several Beaches, presented here without the benefit of Gianmarco's drums, Will's bass, Josh Newman's guitar, Doug's backups, Charlie Hall's electric piano, or decent lead vocals. Nevertheless, fans of accidental tube distortion and mid-song coughing will not be disappointed!

In other words: COMPLETISTS ONLY!

[Also included above: another great page from Jeff Love's Farthest Shore. This one looks beach-related so it feels appropriate.]

Animagic

A trailer of sorts I threw together for the album.