Nate Lampa- stage manager, backline tech, fixer of stuff, healthman, lb 4 lb the best stage tech in the US of A.  Scott Cannon- tour manager, front of house mixer, solver of schedules, celebrity lookalike.  Steve Chant- tour manager, front of house mixer, ping pong hustler, language expert.  Dan Schultz- lighting fancifier, bachelor, hair grower, party compass.  Darien Koop- production manager, lighting dancer, biggest biker calves on tour, enforcer.  Nate Dreger- monitor engineer, drumset repairman, responsible, blonde.  Ronnie Lee Booth III- merch, stage manager, mr. manners, lover of all things sugary.  Eric Brown- merch, human snuggie, proud father, photographer.  Kevin Kookogey- manager, boss man, author, family man.  Jordan Mattison- hunk, all things hunk related.  Brian Morris- lighting tech, wearer of beards, ghost bgv singer, cannot tell a lie.

Honestly though, all of these guys should have an “etc.” by their descriptions because they all do above and beyond their normal job description.  We are supremely blessed with such talented and hardworking folk that believe in what we do.  Thanks so much fellas.  We love you.

-TG

whilst other lips did quiver

bequeathed me friends from bars and farms

some cyclists, a hipster

moustache, my man, you hid my fear

my blemishes, my wrinkles

you frowned for me when I was down

and gave my smile a twinkle

moustache, alas, you faced a foe

a chasm seldom covered

an equal and opposing force

the scorn of my dear lover

moustache I loved, I set you free

no longer saving flavor

but one day you’ll return to me

to give my nose a neighbor

to give my nose a neighbor

-TG

I suppose in any structure or ecosystem there has to be a bottom rung.  That is inevitable, unfortunately.  It may not be their fault at times.  But one group always has to fill that role.  Parasites, as much as we may loathe their existence, don’t know any better.  It’s all they can comprehend to benefit at the expense of others.  You, spammer, do know better.  It’s unlikely that this will ever be seen by who I address, but on the tiny chance that one or two did, I’d say it was worth writing.

I don’t generate a ton of traffic, but of all the comments that I’ve sorted through, 93% of them were spam.  So kudos to your technology.  I’ve tried installing anti-you safeguards, but you’re always one step ahead.  I hope that someday, you reap what you’ve sown.  Although, I’m not sure what that would look like.  If you spam a spammer, does that mean their inbox would be jammed full of legitimate, coherent, and emotionally inspiring communiques?  And they’d have to read through at least the first paragraph of every single one to decide whether or not they actually know the person…

Anyway, thanks for all that.  It takes quite a lot for most people to get under my skin even a tiny bit.  But then again, for a parasite- I guess it’s rather easy, huh?

-TG

Spotify session we did in Portland- was a good ‘ol time. Our Juno-60 has had a rough tour, and really needs some repairs soon.  Somehow it held up for this whole take, which is rare.

JHS pedals promo vid- these guys have treated me extremely well over the past year.  Outstanding customer service, overnighting pedals to me when I break them, and letting us sample all the newest analog goodies.

And this is a Paste mag bit they had me write up about pedalboards.  Just a little more gear talk, for those of you that are into that.

So until my next post, here’s my current favorite ? pic of our kitty Charlie:

So I’ve been in a local band for years now, and we finally released our first full length album this year.  I just put it online this week, so for those of you that enjoy seeking out new bands and tunes, check it out:

www.cornbeltchorus.bandcamp.com

If I have to pick a favorite track, I’d pick ‘go home,’ followed by ‘wishing well.’  But I’m really proud of the whole album.  The band is comprised of some of the best talent in Springfield, MO and I’ve always been proud to play alongside them all these years.  I’ll put a pic of the liner notes so you know of whom I speak.

Cheer up yer ears!  -TG

Hi friends.  We’re halfway through our Odd Soul 2012 tour and are taking a much needed week off to re-calibrate our machines and our muscles.  For the more animated ones (Darren, Paul, Darien “Disco Ball” Koop) it may require more than just a week, but that’s all we’re alloted this time.

The production rehearsals were really exciting pre-tour.  For many of us involved, it was our first time seeing any 3d video mapping, let alone so close-up and on such a big structure.  The technology is simply mesmerizing.  Most aspects of this tour have been well documented, so I’d be hard pressed to tell you about anything you couldn’t find on your own, but just in case- there’s a great behind the scenes video here that gives credit where it’s due.

As for the actual shows and touring, they’ve been exhilarating to say the least.  The crowds, night after night, have brought such an infectious energy to the venues, that it starts to feel like we can do no wrong.  A great example happened just in our most recent show in Minneapolis at First Ave, where only the third song into the set and around the second verse (of Blood Pressure) we lost power to the majority of the amplification, but more importantly to Paul’s mic.  So, still having our personal amps on, and of course the drums, we just kept playing through the song anyway and the crowd cranked up their collective vocal chords and sung the rest of the song for us- probably as loud as I’ve heard a crowd that size get for just impromptu singing.

Other mishaps inevitably have happened, like: the rhodes collapsing shortly after Paul stood on it, Darren stabbing himself in the eye with a broken drumstick (yes, accidentally), knobs of pedals breaking right off in my fingers, calling B3 repairmen every four days, and the temporary failure of just about every piece of gear at least once, and of each facet of the drums- at least three times.  Actually I was recently thinking to myself that it often feels like we’re professional troubleshooters first, and musicians second.  That being said, we’d be seriously screwed without our invaluable crew, who I’ve mentioned before.  Because even if we can diagnose the issue, they are usually the ones with the know-how and tools to actually fix said problem.  They are forever watching over us: (proof)…

Yes that’s right, that is Mr. Nate Lampa looming in the kick drum reflection.

Overall, I think most, if not all of us are having some of our favorite tour experiences to date this past month.  Of course it’s many different areas that can lead to this satisfaction, but ultimately it always comes down to the music.  This latest grouping of songs, which includes every track from Odd Soul, is consistently just really fun to play.

That’s about all I feel like recapping at the moment, but I’ll leave you with some of my favorite photos from the tour, which include much confetti, phantom drumsticks, honey i shrunk the Meany, and lots of jumping.  I just found most of these online, so thanks to all the great photographers out there.  And if you want even more behind the scenes pics, feel free to follow me on instagram under the name ‘grandepic’.

thanks for reading

-Gman

I recently finished a kids album called The LMNOPs, and you should ALL buy several copies for you and your loved ones.  Even if it won’t arrive in time for Christmas, you can buy the digital copy, and just promise the kids that the physical copy is coming in the mail.  Check out the whole album here: http://thelmnops.bandcamp.com/

OR at the very least, you can check out our first music video on vimeo or youtube:

The Alphabet Song by The LMNOPs

I had a really great time making the tunes with Zach, lead singer of Cornbelt Chorus, which is a local band I’ve been in for years.  He writes and sings most of the material, and I arrange and play most of the music on it.  My awesome artistic wife Laura made all the visuals for the artwork.  We have more songs on the way, so if you dig it, you can expect more in the future.  Also a big thanks to Brandon Goodwin for making the video for us- he’s done several MM vids among tons of other awesome videos.

Merry Christmas from The LMNOPs!

Both Jimmy Kimmel and Jay Leno were very pleasant hosts to us, as were all the staffers.  I can’t really pick a favorite experience though, because on Kimmel you get the huge outdoor stage, with a real live standing crowd, and then on Leno we all got our pictures with Miss Piggy!  So, I guess we’ll call it a draw.

-Tag

Other positives?  I learned how valuable our awesome crew is.  Totally saving us from danger, harm, embarrassment and any other pitfalls lurking at shows.  Seriously, they really are amazing at what they do and we couldn’t function the same without them.  The seductive hammond from the 1940s really tried hard to kill Paul, and me as well, numerous times through strong electric currents which feel like lightning bolts and leave you painfully confused and bewildered.  Between Nate taping up all metal on the organ, and specialists in several towns working on it, we eventually minimized the danger.

And I had ample time to learn the basics of my first iphone this tour, which will hopefully allow me to be able to blog a little more often.  In the meantime for those of you that are hooked on Instagram, feel free to follow me (grandepic) since many of my posts are often band related.  But I’ll still put a few pics here for kicks.  My favorite detail is from the Rolling Stone Japan shoot, where the writers didn’t even attempt my last name.  Or maybe in that country I’m just known simply as “Todd.”

So I thought I’d upload another Gman track for folks to soak up.  This is probably my favorite instrumental I’ve made to date and definitely my favorite one to play live.  There’s actually a pretty decent live video of this one from a show back round about ’06 or so.  You can find it if you can figure out how to navigate myspace since the 4 years since you logged in last.

It’s entertaining when I think about the crazy stuff I attempt to add into tracks all the time.  I remember adding to the intro a voicemail that a friend left me and all I could hear was just crazy strong wind gusts happening.  So listen for that.  Not as easy to hear as something like in my track ‘passe’ where I inserted a nextel two-way walkie talkie sound byte as the whole intro.  Anyone remember that feature?

Enjoy!

-Todd