Hello Folks.
It’s November and it’s been awhile since I have done a
newsletter. This was a long year with a lot of work and I hope that
next year will be just as busy.
We have started work on the next season of the IFC show and so far,
the performances from the bands we taped are pretty mind blowing:
The Mars Volta, Ryan Adams, The Blood Brothers, Peeping Tom, just
to name a few. We have not done any sit down guest interviews as yet
but I guess that starts soon enough. The first show of the new season
will air at beginning of April. I’ll get that start date to
you as soon as it’s firm.
I will be going out on another USO tour in December. The location
is still being worked out and they tell me where I’m going only
a few days before I leave for security reasons. Wherever it is I end
up will be the right place to be. It will be my 7th USO tour. I am
looking forward to it. These trips are never easy to do but always
worth it.
I have a few talking shows tentatively booked for late this year/early
next year in Dubai and Israel. I don’t expect I’ll be
seeing many of you at these shows but I thought I’d let you
know. When and if the dates firm up, I’ll post the details.
I plan on getting some interesting travel done in the next several
months so I’ll have some good stories for next year’s
talking tour.
I hope some of you have checked out the radio show I do on Indie 103.1,
Tuesday nights, 8-10 p.m. PST. You can go to www.harmonyinmyhead.com
and read all the show’s play lists and broadcast notes. I perhaps
spend too much time working on the show but it’s been a good
time so far and I think I’m getting some good music out there.
It’s cool to get my record collection off the shelf and on the
air. The show is listened to by people all over the world via the
internet (you can access it via the above referenced website).
It is the end of the year and it’s time to unleash our new stuff.
Here are the details:
NEW BOOK
A Dull Roar: The full title is A Dull Roar (What I Did On My Summer
Deracination). When my old band mates and I decided that after
not playing together since 1997, we were going to get back together
and tour in the summer of 2006, I figured there might be some good
stories to tell. So, in March I started a journal to document the
four months I allotted myself to prepare mentally and physically for
the tour and also the tour itself. During this period, I finished
the 2nd season of my show on The Independent Film Channel, worked
in the Film Wrong Turn 2, performed at the Download Festival in England
and made trips in and out of New York City for band practice and press.
As I have in the past, I overworked, underslept, blew out joints and
generally had a swell time. The tour itself had its shares of ups
and downs, which are documented in the book.
I know what some of you are thinking, and no, it’s not the Dispatches
file. For fans of my books Broken Summers and Smile You’re Traveling,
you may find this book to your liking. We printed a limited 1st edition
of 1000 copies that will differentiate itself from the rest of the
press run by having a different colored cover, a signed & numbered
title page and the coolest part (to me anyway) is the flexibound cover.
This book will not be at retail for a long time, if ever.
NEW DVD
Live In The Conversation Pit: Some of you may have seen this one on
EBay or on Amazon.com at some absurd price. That’s because a
small run of them were pressed in Australia several months ago and
found themselves on other shores. The domestic version is all done
and it’s the same as the one that came from Australia only at
a much better price. The DVD is from a multi-night run of shows in
Sydney Australia in May of 2005 while on the 25 years Of Bullshit
Tour. It came out looking and sounding good.
OLD DVD BETTER PRICE
Up For It: There’s nothing new about this DVD but there’s
some good news about it. Years ago, we did a licensing deal with another
label to release this title and we had to buy pieces from them to
sell on our site and they charged us plenty. That old deal just ran
out and we pressed up a run of them and wouldn’t dare charge
that kind of money now that we have it back here where it belongs.
It was 24 bucks but now that we’ve cut out the middle man, it’s
15 bucks. The new cover is cooler looking, but there’s nothing
new about the DVD itself.
IN THE WORKS
Fanatic! Vol. 2: As the year winds down, so too does the work on the
next installment of my labor of obsession, Fanatic! Vol. 2. Same as
the previous volume, this is the broadcast notes from my show on LA’s
own Indie 103.1 (where I have a radio show, once a week on Tuesday
nights from 8 to 10 p.m. PST called Harmony In My Head). I liked what
we did with the first volume but for Vol. 2, I wanted to add more
images so I started digging deep into my reserves for flyers, press
clippings and other stuff relating to the songs that would be great
to look at. I reached out to some fellow Fanatics and borrowed some
great Damned and Black Flag flyers and clippings and made Carol and
Dave crazy with all the scans and reductions but it will be worth
it when you see it. As soon as Dull Roar was away to the printer and
off our desks, we immediately started in on this book. It’s
almost done and should be ready at some point in 2007.
Talk Is Cheap Vol. 5: I haven’t had time yet to sit down with
Rae and go through the shows that were recorded on the 25 Years Of
Bullshit Tour but I will have some time soon and will be on the case.
When Talk 5 is done, I’ll let you know.
Rollins Band Re-Issues: We will be re-releasing some of the old catalog
in 2007. The first two up will be Hot Animal Machine and Life Time.
Nothing will be different with Hot Animal Machine but Life Time will
contain all the live tracks from the original CD release as well as
all the studio tracks from the sessions. All these tracks on one CD
will be a first. Later in the year we will put out the Hard Volume
album and the Turned On album will be remastered and indexed with
track numbers. There will probably be some other things from that
era coming out as well. We’ll keep you posted.
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New items available now at www.21361.com.