KPFT Radio Interview, Pt. 1

On May 14, 2010, we traveled to the studios of KPFT Radio in Houston to promote our latest single, Someone Came To Help Me, and talk about our upcoming gig at Rudyards. This is part one of our interview on the show RadioActive.

George and Chris play “Someone” for patients at The Methodist Hospital in Houston

Jeff and I debuted Someone Came To Help Me at the “Celebration of Life” event at The Methodist Hospital in Houston last year to a very enthusiastic crowd. He couldn’t make it this year, so Chris stepped in and did a stellar job.

It’s a very emotional event with transplant patients, caregivers, donor families and doctors all giving first hand accounts of how they have been affected by the transplant process. The song fit the stories perfectly and was very well-received by the more than 200 people in attendance.

This is a different type of gig for us. It’s pretty nerve-wracking to play in that environment. When you are in a club, it’s loud and you can get crazy. At this event, it’s extremely quiet, there is no stage so people are sitting right on top of you, staring and listening intently and then there’s the emotional factor that raises it to a whole another level. We were both a bit nervous when we played it the first time at the start of the event, but we slowed it down the second time at the end and it was a much better performance.

All in all, it was a great event. Anytime you can sing your songs during the work day, it’s a good day.

Jeff and George play “Someone Came To Help Me” at LifeGift event

Jeff and I were asked to play our new song Someone Came To Help Me by the folks at LifeGift of Houston. The group was celebrating it’s second annual “Donate Life Month” event. The rain held off long enough for us to do the song for transplant patients, donor families and other dignitaries who gathered at the Texas Medical Center (TMC) Commons. Tomorrow (Friday, April 16) George and Chris will do the same thing for a similar event sponsored by The Methodist Hospital Transplant Center.

The full-band track is available on iTunes, Rhapsody and other various digital download sites.

New Song Alert! “Someone Came To Help Me”

NOW AVAILABLE ON iTUNES

Well folks, we finally have some new material to share with you. “Someone Came to Help Me” is a tune that was inspired by patients, donor families and caregivers at The Methodist Hospital Transplant Center in Houston.

We played acoustically at a “Donate Life” event at the hospital in 2007 and 2008. Both years we performed “Here Comes the Sun” and “Let My Love Open the Door.” Both great songs, but the event really needed its own tune. I came up with the words and melody, Jeff added some chords and we played it at the 2009 event to a very enthusiastic crowd.

This song started it out as a demo with Jeff programming drums and playing acoustic guitar and me singing just trying to get something together for the folks at Methodist, but we decided pretty early on we should produce it as a band.

Jeff and Chris cut the basic tracks in October, which included organ, bass, acoustic guitar and Chris’ great electric guitar part that weaves throughout the song. When that was completed relatively quickly, we tried a number of different vocals sessions afterward trying to get the right sound, but it just wasn’t coming together. After some time away from it and listening to some Steve Earle for inspiration, I completed the vocals at end of January. Chris and Jeff did some further tweaking to the instrumentation on the song as well.

Mixing commenced at Chris’ Rogers Recording in early February and after a number of sessions to fix the groove and the acoustic guitar track, we all felt like something was missing. Was it a guitar part? Another vocal? Then Chris found a trippy keyboard sound that felt like a mixture of a bunch of different noises and that did the trick. Jeff played it all the way through, Chris added some excellent effects and it really turned the track in the right direction.

This was our first try at mixing our own material and Chris really knocked it out of the park. He upgraded his entire studio last year and it has really made a difference in the overall sound of the band. We are almost done with a bunch of songs we started last summer with drummer Leesa Harrington-Squyres, our former drummer and current drummer for Lez Zeppelin. We hope to have those ready to release digitally in the next few months.

The song is also available for download on Rhapsody, Zune, Napster, Lala, Limewire, Nokia and eMusic.