The Homophones LP is now available!

The Homophones played Johnny Brenda's in Philly this past Friday, December 19th. It was a fantastic show, and I was able to capture some moments from my time in Philly pre-show and post-show. Unfortunately, no one was able to capture us during the performance, but this is all the more reason to see a Homophones show in the moment anyway...

Chez Jason avec les lumieres

Rusty paint in the backyard

Johnny Brenda's

The stage at JB's

The great Julio...

Homofeets

Ryan and Dan pre-show

Josh v3.0, Joel, Ben

Joel and Jason

At Transit, the odd guy looking at the camera really wanted to be in a photo,
he's posing in every photo I took

Handy dandy new items...

I used to own this fantastic keyboard as a child, until it was "garage-saled" by my mother when I went off to college. Many years later I was reunited with it thanks to a garage sale in the middle of nowhere, NY. Unfortunately, it's not the exact same model as the one I used to own, which had the demo song "Wake Me Up Before You Go Go" by Wham. This new one has some crappy generic demo, but I am happy nonetheless to have the infamous Pearl Drop sound back again...




Also found a lovely Jaymar toy piano at a local flea market. Now the Homophones have exactly 2 Jaymar toy pianos, and we'll have to find a way to best exploit the duo...

Whoa it's magic...

A number of years ago I was introduced to the incredible "Magic Organ" series, which was released by the Ranwood Records group back in the '70s, thanks to an impulse purchase at a garage sale in the town of West Bloomfield, NY. "The Magic Organ Goes To Hawaii" has been a staple in my car's cassette deck ever since, and its matching yellow case/cassette is a welcome change from all those boring clear tapes or gray tapes. If you've never heard "The Magic Organ Goes To Hawaii," it kind of sounds like your great old Hawaiian standards as played through a very cheesey sounding console organ, complete with the funny percussion and all.

Needless to say, I've been on the lookout for the other members of the Magic Organ series ever since, especially on vinyl, and so it was with great excitement that I happened upon this item at a local Amvets store in Buffalo, NY. I'm not big on "carousel music" (i.e. showtunes), but this is the Magic Organ, so at the very least it will be ripe with sonic entertainment.


As luck would have it, I ended up forgetting about this purchase for a good six months or so (much of this due to the lack of free time I have for listening to records during graduate school), and recently went back to my record bin to give this new addition to the Magic Organ collection a try, when low and behold I pull the record out of the jacket and what do I see inside...

A VINYL COPY OF THE MAGIC ORGAN GOES TO HAWAII!!

It truly is magic.

Why Steven Chow is the greatest

After rewatching Kung Fu Hustle again this evening for the 400th time, I am reminded of why I will always consider this one of the most entertaining cinematic gems of all time.

Catching Up

The Homophones had a recent reunion of sorts, as Jason visited Buffalo to play a gig at Mohawk Place, and work a bit more on the Gray Ghost EP. Here are a few glimpses of that experience...

Jason on the Hammond while Moog the cat listens in

Kevin, who filled in on electronic drums at the gig, showing the guts of an Oberheim DMX drum machine on loan to us for the gig

And an obligatory shot of myself and Alison with none other than NPR's Carl Kasell, who was in town last Friday night

I have recently returned from a weeklong excursion in Brooklyn, catching up with old friends and finally completing the tracklisting for the Homophones album. Only mastering is left!

The inspiration of science

The Toronto Science Museum is always a source of excitement and inspiration...

Buffalo Central Terminal

(Thanks Buffalo Rising)

Hot Leaves

To the West (again)...

Best purchase of 2008 thus far...

Genuine Electric Latin Love Machine: Persuasive Electronics by Richard Hayman
Tracklisting:
Side A
The Windmills of Your Mind
La Comparsa
The Peanut Vendor
The Look of Love
Hare Krishna

Side B
Goin' Out of My Head
Dansero
The Girl from Ipanema
Samba de Victoria
Melody #2
Spanish Eyes

Loopy

Toying with some new ideas...
(please pay no mind to the man on the screen. these were just taken for audio reference)

And now, your moment of zen...

somewhere near Cold Spring, NY, some time ago...

Back to work...

Returning to the Homophones album at "Summer Street Studios." A few songs remain in their infancy stage, easily suited for the ol' home multi-tracker setup. Some of these tunes date back to the very beginning of the band. "Grey Ghost" is first...

the assistant engineer stops in for a visit...

to the West...

there are days when Buffalo, City of Sparrows, seems to sit right at the edge of the earth, nails dragging from East to West. unmatched, in my opinion...

Recording - Friday

Friday, the last day in Paper Lab. Exhaustion is only mildly evident, and spirits are high thanks to the incredible amount of accomplishment over the past 8(?) days. Mr. Krill is like a robot, unstoppable and precise. Onward we march to the mix...





Nick kept claiming that his hair was too long,
...but rather than getting a trim, he spent most of his free time drinking a strange muddy brew out of a mason jar. The "Mud Jug" was thus born...

Here we have Nick testing out a bizzare home-made(?) synth/signal generator gizmo, which we decidedly name the "Black Dice machine." It does not make the final cut...

Recording - Thursday

Oh Thursday. You've reminded us why the world can run on things like Jolly Ranchers and unanswered radio phone-ins. Here we find the essential truths like "kid zombies rule" and "vocals take time." A special thanks goes out to Miss Ferraro's 6A class...

Recording - Wednesday

Wednesday - putting a lot of finishing touches on. Thomas from the Spinto Band stops by to give us some bass guitar love and vocal harmonies. Jason spills a shaker full of rice, prompting temporary madness...

Santa is discovered descending through the darkness in Fairless Hills, PA...