Twitter perk for CD Release Party

Anyone who DMs me on Twitter about the CD Release Party Sept12 will get a free copy of the CD if they attend the event.

Follow me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/CoagulatedInt

new EP artwork

people who need people need Scarborough Streisand

Last night’s impromptu set with Glen Hall and Michael Keith was excellent. It was a gritty mix of improvising, blues, noise, and drones. We battled the ultra-reflective sound of the Trane Studio, but came out on top.

We were excited enough by the set that we all agreed to continue and do more shows down the road. The band will be called Scarborough Streisand (pronounced “Scarbra”). Please befriend us on Myspace at your earliest convenience. www.myspace.com/scarboroughstreisand

gigs, uploads, CD, touring

Hello!

Today is Prehistoric Horse day in Toronto!

My friends from NYC & Oakland, Cal should be arriving sometime soon for our session at Somewhere There. Improv gigs in Toronto are always a struggle when it comes to getting an audience out; a semi-rainy Saturday afternoon might just discourage enough folks, but I hope not. At any rate, should the turnout be underwhelming, I’m making plans to record the show so that our time spent this afternoon will not go unnoticed.
We’re scheduled to start at 3pm, I’m playing a short solo set first, then David, Valerie and Lucio will perform.

$8, Somewhere There, see you there!

Following this, I will be racing home to pick up my gold Yamahas and heading down to Burlington for a soundcheck at the Boston Manor with Hot Buttered Soul. We’ll be delivering the funk and r&b hits from 9:30-12:30 tonight, I think it’s only a $5 cover, a bargain!

Tomorrow evening, cc3 is performing at the Trane Studio in Toronto on a double-bill with Paul Fitterer’s fine New & Used group. We’re going first at 8pm with one set.

In a perfect world it would be business as usual and Glen and Simeon and I would do our thing and maybe even add new tunes to the repertoire. The world is far from perfect, and so we adapt. We adapt and sometimes as a result, great stuff happens. Such is the hope for tomorrow. Simeon got an offer to do a multi-night run with a commercial band that pays well (significantly more than what a double-bill door gig at the Trane could offer). Being no stranger to the commercial band scene myself (see above, Hot Buttered Soul) I accepted Simeon’s notice that he’d be missing this gig with complete understanding.

What to do then? Find a replacement keyboardist, rush-deliver sheet music and a CD-R and then wing it at the gig? …… Doesn’t sound like much fun to me, either. Instead, you make lemonade from your lemons and plug an x-factor into the band. So, Glen and I will have the great pleasure of performing with guitarist Michael Keith. I’ve never performed with MK, but had the extreme pleasure of attending his performances in the past. He’s a great improviser and a quite deadly blues player to boot. We’re going to throw the cc3 songbook out the window, a few tunes may smack us in the face on the way out, but otherwise it’s off the parts unknown!

In other cc3 news, the new album has been sequenced, and the songs titled. Cover art and an album title are all that’s left before I release it. I’ll send it up to the digital retailers ASAP, but you’ll have to wait until Sept12 to get a CD copy at the official release party in Toronto at Tequila Bookworm.

I had originally thought about bundling a re-released DVD of my 2005 solodrumming movie with the new CD. I’ve decided against that for a variety of reasons, instead I’ve just uploaded the full movie to my MySpace video page. I used a shareware converter so it has a watermark through it, for now. When time permits I’ll do the conversion properly and have the watermark removed. I still think a lot of it stands up after 4 years, check it out!

Finally, the October tour with Glen Hall’s quartet has been confirmed. We’re going to Novosibirsk, Russia for multiple concerts and a workshop. I’m very excited! I’ve never been to Russia and to go there as a performer is quite an honour. The quartet (GH, myself, Bruce Cassidy on trumpet and EVI and Chris Gartner on bass) begins rehearsals soon and may even do a CD before we leave. Stay tuned for details! I’m excited to have Chris Gartner in the band. He’s immensely talented, but he and I have done little creative playing together. We spent some time in the cover-band trenches together maybe 10 years ago, but have had little opportunity to play since. When Glen needed a bassist for the tour, I immediately recommended CG. Long-distance travel is dubious for acoustic/upright players, and using a rented upright could be a disaster. So I felt that Glen should use an electric bassist, and in terms of e-bassers who are strong improvisers for free and avant-garde, Mr. Gartner is a treasure.

July 25 poster

CD preview track

I’ve just uploaded a track from the new CD to MySpace:

http://www.myspace.com/chriscawthray

The track is called “cc3 2009 CD preview”, and is located in the MySpace music player in the top right corner of the page.

mix report

I drove out to Trenton, ON to the Sli-Fi Chapel studio to finish the mix on the new trio record today. Brent Bodrug (Sli-Fi’s head honcho and engineer/producer extraordinaire) and I spent about two hours finishing the mix on about 25 minutes of music. Brent and I have worked together on multiple records (at least two records of my old rock band, HEARSAY, back in the early 90s), but haven’t done a project together in years. We tracked the trio live off-the-floor late in May in a quick 3 hour session, yeilding two songs and a nice collection of improvisations.

I’m really pleased with the performance of the band and the sound of the record. It turned out to be a shorter collection of music; so if we were to use vinyl terminology, it’s technically going to be an “EP”, but in truth, that’s a perfect length for an improv record. In terms of material, we didn’t do any originals this time out; the lineup of Glen Hall, Simeon Abbott and myself is relatively new, and I’m just now beginning to write material specific to this lineup. Much of our current gig setlist is tunes that I’ve previously recorded, so I didn’t want to do more studio versions of them. So, we recorded some great improvisations, and two of teh covers we’ve been doing: “Hollis Brown” by Bob Dylan and “Jesus, etc.” by Wilco. Sometime in 2010 we’ll get back in to record the new originals…

I’m going to spend the next week deciding on sequencing and titling the improvs, and maybe begin the cover art, etc. With any luck, the EP will be out at the end of the month. It’ll be released digitally (iTunes, emusic, etc.) and as a CD at gigs.

Speaking of gigs, here’s what’s coming up:

July 25 – CC solo set, opening for Prehistoric Horse @ Somewhere There, Toronto 3:00pm matinee
July 26 – Chris Cawthray Trio (w/Hall and Abbott) @ Trane Studio, Toronto 8:00pm

September 12 – Chris Cawthray Trio CD Release Gig
Tequila Bookworm, Toronto
details TBA

Much of this summer will be spent cranking out the hits in two different cover bands: Hot Buttered Soul and an un-named trio featuring myself, Mike Pelletier and (on alternating weeks) Lester McLean on vocals/sax/guitar and Mike Bongertman on vocals/guitar. That trio is doing a weekly hit at Canyon Creek in Scarborough, two sets from 7-9, no cover.

Hope to see you out there!