End of an Era…

Photo by Jamie Morren

Whew… The long haul is finally over & This Sinking Ship is now out there in the world.  A million plus thanks to everyone who made it out to the CD release show at This Ain’t Hollywood.  All your support means the world to us, and none of this would’ve been possible without it.  Thanks also to everyone who picked up a CD, and if you didn’t you can get one right now by ordering through subcollective.ca.  There’s some awesome photos up from the party too, thanks to our friend Jamie Morren.  Keep eyes for some video and audio from the show, we’re working on pulling that stuff together as we speak.

…that said…

It’s with a heavy heart I must impart the news that Jon the Bassist has decided to end his run with the Subs.  We are all surprised and saddened to see him go, as he has been an integral part of the band since it’s inception seven years ago.  As a forming member of the original duo, Jon is by far one of the most talented musicians I’ve ever had the pleasure to create with, and he will no doubt be difficult to replace.  Truly the end of an era.

We remaining are anxious to move forward, however, and so would like you all to please welcome Jess Stone to the Collective fold.  Jesse, formerly of the Satisfied Customers, is ready and willing to step up and will be laying down the groove with us starting at the upcoming Come Together Music Festival over the May 24 weekend.  We all look forward to seeing what the future holds despite this brief misstep, and we hope you’ll continue on the ride with us.

“After all what remains, after you?”

CD Release & MayDay Festivities

The time is near, folks.  Our album, This Sinking Ship, will be available as of Friday, April 30th!  The party is going down the same night at This Ain’t Hollywood, where we’ll be taking the stage alongside the Fat Cats.  A lot of work went into this album, it was entirely self-produced, recorded, mixed and mastered at SubCollective Studio.  The rest of this week will see us folding and gluing like there’s no tomorrow (’cause there may not be, dammit…) in preparation for the party.  We hope everyone who’s able will make it out to help us celebrate, we’re all pretty damn pumped that we’ve finally gotten to this point.

While we’re at it, leading up to Friday, you can hear us on the radio this week, doing guest spots with Lou Molinaro (INDI 101.5 fm, Wednesday at 3:30pm) & Ric Taylor (CFMU 93.3 fm Friday between 5 & 8pm).

Also, this coming Saturday is the Sky Dragon’s 4th annual MayDay Festival, where we (the original four-piece lineup) will be performing an entirely improvised instrumental set.  Not even we’re entirely sure what to expect, but it’ll be groovy as all get out, that is for sure.  Confirmed acts so far include: Nilla (Canada’s finest female MC), Rackula, Sarah Marlowe, Steve Sinnicks, Teal Booth, Dave Gould, Katie Caron, Better Homes for Meaner People, Boreal Plains, The Human Race, Blue Bottle Flyers, La Bella Union and Little Silver Tabby.  Come down for the whole day and check out the happenings along King William Street.  The festival starts at 10am and rolls on until about 11pm.  For more info you can visit Sky Dragon’s Website.

More info on This Sinking Ship’s availability will follow throughout the week.  In the meantime, you can hear the whole album on our webpage or find it on Grooveshark as well.

Dig.

CD Release Party!

Awaiting the Outcome of My Tempted Fate…

Some things to let you all in on:

We are powering through the mixing process, which seems to be coming along rather smoothly.  This has confirmed, in my mind, that “hope for the best, expect the worst” is a pretty good way to look at these sorts of things.  The pleasant surprise of things not being the worst is a great boost.  But seriously.  The tracks are sounding pretty damn good with less effort than we’d expected, and it’s going a lot quicker on account.

That said, we have confirmed the date of our release party for the album, “This Sinking Ship”!  It’s happening APRIL 30th at THIS AIN’T HOLLYWOOD, so mark your calendars and BE THERE!  We’ll be joining the Fat Cats, who’ll be rounding out the night with a giant dance party, if history is any indication.  This is going to be a stellar night, and we’ll all be in delightfully excitable moods, so you should do better than your best to make it out and celebrate with us!  ’Cause it’s about damn time, am I right?  A massive thank you goes out to Ken Inouye for putting this in motion.  We each likely owe him our first born by now.  I hope he likes babies.

We’ll be flooding the internets with more info and excitement about this over the next few weeks!  Keep eyes.

Dig.

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Recording… That is All.

Ladies & Gentlemen.  A brand new recording update is currently up for diggin’ on both subcollective.ca & on ReverbNation.  Check out “New Funk”, which has got some new guitar and keys tracks, as well as a completely revamped recording of “Sorta Like I’m Flyin’”.  We redid the whole of it, so tell us what you think!

As for the rest, we’ve got the bases basically done, with some bass & keys tracks yet to lay, which’ll be done hopefully by the end of the week.  I’ve been hammering away at vocals for the past week or so, getting an idea of how the harmonies will sound.  Most of the lead vocals & rhythm guitar tracks are complete, with a bit of polishing left to do.  By next week, we should be moving on to the Collective’s overdubbing, getting Tarek & Sam in to do their thing(s).  We need some other help as well, however, specifically a trumpet, a french horn, and a lap steel.  If you, or someone you’re aware of, plays one of these get in touch with us at subcollective.ca.  Actually, we’re going to need some art for the record too… If you make things that look interesting look us up at that same spot, we’d love to check some things out!

For anyone who’s been following since Jon & myself were playing acoustic, there’s a few tracks that’ll sound familiar.  We’ve recorded new versions of “At Night’s End”, “On the Road”, and “In Praise of Idleness”.  These songs have been kicking around for some time, “On the Road” had been (I’m pretty sure) the first song we wrote and recorded back in the Loft studio days (on N-Track, and a dusty 16ch yamaha mixer, with only one mic) and it’s now been totally revamped into something I can’t help but enjoy.

We’re taking the remainder of the year to try to finish up tracking, so you’ll have to be patient for some live Subterraneans… But stay tuned to our various channels for recording updates, videos, and more, leading up to the release of the album.

With some extra free time the past little while, I’ve also begun kicking around some ideas for the next project already, which aims to be a hip-hop compilation, of sorts.  I’ve put together a couple of rough idea tracks, which I may post at some point, somewhere, to see what you folks think.  That’s a ways off yet, but it’s now definitely in the works.

As ever… keep eyes.

J.

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Recording Update #6

FINALLY!!  It’s time for a brand new recording update.

We ‘re humming along on the base tracks now, with only three more songs to get laid down, so we’ll be moving forward onto overdubs real soon.  We’ve got some awesome guests lined up to lend us a hand for some of these, including our good friends Nate Powers (MC Undun), Tarek Ajak (Mother Tareka-Peak Soil), Sam Klass (Hood Klass Perri), and plenty more.

There’s a whole lot of new sounds, for those who’ve only heard the Busride EP, or even the Live recording from Pepper Jack Café, things are sounding remarkably different these days.  As far as the audio updates (which you can dig at subcollective.ca/recording.html or our ReverbNation Page), we’ve got brand new versions of both “New Funk” & “Sorta Like I’m Flyin’”.  It’s mostly just cleaned up guitar and keys tracks, but there’s plenty more on the way.

If you’ve not already done so, please go to subcollective.ca/contact.html and join our mailing list.  We’ve got a bit of a “Thank You” for those that do, in the form of a free download, an album preview studio jam, never before heard by human ears (besides our own).

Lastly, a massive Cheers! out to all of you that came out to the SuperCrawl after-party at Sky Dragon last week!  We had an awesome night, and we hope you dug the additional members, Sam & Tarek on guitar & sax respectively.  We got an opportunity to wander through and dig some of the crawl, and I must say how happy I was to see so many folks out supporting the event despite the weather.  It goes to show the support the people of Hamilton have for their city & arts community.  Well done!

If you have photos and the like you want to share with us, feel free to send them to us at subcollective.ca@gmail.com

Cheers!

Recording Update #5

Spent the day recording bass tracks with Jon the Bassist.  We mic’d the cab with a “Kick Ball” on one speaker and an SM57 up close on the tweeter.  They’ll definitely need compression before they sound just right, but the body is there now which is nice.  Lots more to play with and fatten up later on.

Regardless, updates to “New Funk” (which still needs a proper title) & “Sorta Like I’m Flyin’” can now be found on our Recording Updates Page, so go check ‘em out.  Things are coming along, just trying to find time between playing live to get stuff done.  We’re not too far off getting some outside help on some other instruments (Horns, Percussion, etc.), which’ll be a good time, and we’ll be sure to have a crap-load of photos and at least a video or two from those sessions.

Outside of that, head over to THESUBTERRANEANS.CA and check out our upcoming show schedule, which is constantly being updated.  We’ve got a couple cool shows lined up, August 1st we’ll be up at Plan B Organic Farm (Branchton, ON) with some good friends in a new project, and we’re lined up now for a show in Toronto at the Imperial Pub on August 22nd, with our new friends Must Stash Hat, who’re not only great dudes, but a stellar band to dig live.  If you’re out in the Toronto area, you’d better stop in.  Or else.  Something.

We’re all over the internet, so Google us…and see what pops up.

Dig.

J.

Recording Update #4

Time already for another update, as I’ve been busying myself the past few days cleaning up the guitar tracks on what we’ve got laid down so far.  I set up the amp (’67 Fender Twin Reverb) in the front hallway and mic’d it with an SM57 on each speaker, and an Apex Large Diaphragm condenser at the back, between both speakers.  The three mics together pick up the sound of the WHOLE amp, so it sounds more like it should vs. the single mic at the front.  This does, however, leave some of the other instruments sounding a bit flat, which we’ll have to take care of now.

At any rate, both of the preview tracks have been updated, and you can view them on our new Recording Page or on our ReverbNation Page.

***UPCOMING SHOWS***

Come Together Music Festival

Canada Day Party

Frontier Ghost Town, Durham(ish), ON

July 3rd & 4th, 2009

Info: cometogethermusicfest.ca

Rooftop Jam w/ Peak Soil

July 11th, 2009

10:30PM

More Details to Follow

Plan B Presents

August 1st, 2009

Plan B Organic Farm, Flamborough, ON

More Details to Follow

Lose Yer Shoes Festival 2009

August 14th-16th, 2009

Granite Ridge Campground, Kearney, ON

Info: Lose Yer Shoes Homepage

More summer show announcements are forthcoming, so keep an eye on thesubterraneans.ca, Twitter, or Facebook for all that and more good stuff.

Dig.

J.

Recording Update #3

Good day.

Last night we got a bunch of keyboard overdubs laid down, so there’s a brand new update to both of the preview tracks up on the website (or on our ReverbNation page).  Give ‘em a listen and let us know what you think!

I’ve been playing around with some guitar amp (’67 Fender Twin Reverb) micing.  The next setup I want to try out is an SM57 on each speaker at the front, with a large diaphragm condenser in between the speakers at the back.  If it works out the way I’m hoping, we should have another update ready to go before Sunday.

We’ve got recording scheduled once again for this Sunday afternoon, but Jon the Bassist is still out with his hand injury.  Likely we’ll be finishing up the keys overdubs left to do on the existing base tracks, and probably start working out some background percussion (maybe some hand drums & what-not).  At the latest, there should be another update to dig by Monday, next week.

Stay Tuned!

Dig.

J.

Notes From the Underground.

With recording coming along, starting next week we’ll be posting a song (or two) as it evolves over the recording process. Right now we’re working on Base Tracks, so when they go up next week you can hear the basic four-piece, live-off-the-floor beginnings. We’ll update the posts as they become available so you can hear the pieces coming together all the way down to the final mix. We’ll be adding some video from our recording adventures too, for a closer look into Subterranean Studios. Keep yourself up to date by checking us out at the Subterraneans Online or following us on Twitter.

We’ve also got download cards available now, for the Live Show at Pepper Jack Café. We’re asking for a suggested donation of $5, or Pay-What-You’re-Able. Proceeds will go toward the release of our studio album. At the moment, you can get them from us by coming out to our shows (and in turn supporting live music), at Sealed Art (89 Gage St S, Hamilton, ON) or by finding us on the street. We’ll update with other places as they become available.

Cheers!