Stormcellar Band Home Page

Watching the news come out of the US and seeing the world wobble a little on its axis.

Life during war time. Informational wartime.

SC11 has an official name now: Rogue State.

O tempora, oh mores, right?

(sigh)

Meanwhile in the stormcellar, construction continues.

Musicians of the Inner West

Woot. two more sessions for SC11 this week.

Slowly, slow, bit by bit.

We've had some wonderful support from our local musical colleagues. There's some heavy duty talent out there.

Choirs?

Looks like we're going to have a go at recording some Choir action next week. Unexpected and appreciated. Hoorah!

More details on that shortly.

Rebuild and Re process.

One of the tracks has failed to thrive. Yikes. First in a while. After trying many things for 'the Fix Is In' it hasn't met with approval. Now we're back to the rebuild, replace, redo stage. 

This may change timing now as we figure out the way forward.

Fiddling while Rome Burns

Gotta say, we make an effort to keep our focus on the useful positive stuff, everyone needs a time out.

That said, we truly live in interesting times and we're acutely aware of it.

We hope you, dear reader, fellow cellar dweller, are well, stay well.

Don't take no wooden nickels.

Keep your eyes on the horizon and make sure your personal stormcellar, that wonderful, unassailable place of calm in your mind, is well stocked with good sounds and the hinges oiled.

This is definitely NOT Kansas anymore, in toto.

The first lie is that you have no power.

One person makes a difference.

Ask the king, the tyrant, the despot

Telling you that you have no power.

The first way to win is to convince you of it.

It takes the responsibility of action from you

makes of your bad faith

enabler

fellow traveller

and lays the pathway to your own oppression.

It's hard to stand against the tide.

Hard to accept the answerless questions

knowing that they'll be asked only.

It takes the brighter skies of our minds

the stronger roots into the earth

the whole and perfect belief

that because there is life,

life wishes to be. Can be.

Who picks up each foot, one after another?

Who makes the journey of a thousand miles?

Who pays attention to the ten thousand things?

Who stays their hand in anger

offers it in kindness

chooses the harder path

because an unerring rightness directs them

stronger than a current

a true north from within

of understanding

of respectful awe

that knowledge demands.

It is your hand.

Your foot.

Your voice.

The first.

One amongst many,

each equally powerful

because they have chosen to be.

Eventually, one leaf falls

one drop of rain

one feather of snow,

from such gentle things

come the weight of what is real,

what cannot be resisted.

This is a truth of power.

It is not taken.

It is surrendered.

Hold fast, a moment longer.

Hold fast, the binding moments go

Hold fast until the tempest has abated.

Rosie rang me the night before. 'Are we really doing this?'

Hell yeah. 6am on Saturday, toe-curlingly-cold and we're up, driving off to Bowral to play at the Markets.

Despite managing a small moment of Agoraphobia as yours truly left the house, it was a decent drive under blue skies.

Ahh...memories of time spent on Merrygang street and Bong Bong Street.

As I parked the car I looked up to the clear blue through the gumtrees. Gumtree. Anyway. Pretty.

Brother Bill has gone to a tremendous effort to get this project organised. We are fortunate indeed.

All I had to do was setup my stuff and grab coffee.

How cold was it?

Rosie took this brilliant picture when his Pick snapped in half. yeah that's pretty cold.

Doing the Weather Permitting tour has prompted us to play some back catalogue songs, some, such as company of a friend, we haven't played live on stage in...5...6...years?

Half Man Cow, Rest My Bones, all the Carl's Chair album stuff, plus the gentler items from other albums that don't get a run at the Night Gigs.

There was a wonderful confluence of perfect weather, cold cold cold, yet sunny.

The smells from the stall holders making amazing food, coffee, yummy baked products, spicy Indian/Turkish (?) stuff OMG wafting across the schoolyard.

It was a particularly pleasant day and we had quite the crowd.

To my great surprise, several of the stall holders came over to say thankyou, as we finished up for the day.

Between sun, skies and music, there had been a good turn out and a lot of people stuck around the market, leading to a brisk trade for stall holders.

Rosie got a discount on Hot Sauce (oh he's happy now), a few Stallholders bought CD's by way of thanks and...we got free empanada's.

The Empanada's of Victory. Nothing says love like Spanish Snacks! Thank you Ola Lola!

As I continue to read the news, looking at the world spinning off its axis, I am reminded how fortunate we are to be here, down in Oz.

If you aren't getting out to your local markets, you are missing some stonkingly great artisan foods, gifts, produce and good vibes. And if you happen to be out there, and it's Weather Permitting, you may find your friends in the stormcellar out enjoying it too.

Some days are more intensive than others. Today was one of those days. 

I've been working on lyrics for Bill's song. I liked the song sans-lyrics, but what do I know.

Ok. No problems.

Got there.

Forgot to print.

Wrote'em out as quickly as I could.

Benefit of "finishing" them an hour before we started. Note: 'finishing' is almost always an optimistic concept.

This has been a solid 18 months between the two albums. I think. Ok close enough. Pretty much from our return from the last US tour when we launched into 5D, into Pirouette, leading to Pirouette (Electric Version) showing the way to SC11.

While that was happening, 5D went into Beyond 5D, becoming SC10, Safe Harbour.

As we get to the last tracking, we're finishing the thought that has run through the whole project.

Kind of felt like we crested the hill. 

This has not been without its perils. Not every idea works.

Still, today's work saw two of the last tracks start to come together, to make sense.

Marcus joined us again on strings, linking SC10/11 sonically. Nice touch.

Also, Marcus made sense out of two important sections. Nice. 

As these items started to come together, Mr Wizard remembered the core thought from almost 18 months ago, Rough Lush.There ya go.

There are still plenty of things to fix; the plumbing, the bunker, installation of the centrifuge and the vending machine and still I can't help but think that today we reached some sort of milestone.

With further luck, another few sessions in the coming two weeks, a little mixing and then...voila!