CDs and listening and stuff

Right, well amongst other things, last night i picked up the CDs.
That's about where the good news stops.
The bad news involves having a disagreement with my car about where we were going and coming to a decision that upside down in the ditch was the answer.
That and finding out there's a problem with the CDs.
It's fair to say that i've had better days*.

But, i'll be sorting out the cds in time for the launch. So, date for your diary.
Friday 19th November.
Upstairs in 1331 (Grape Lane in York)
Free entry
We'll be playing, Dr Jones' other band will be playing and we'll be joined by the excellent Dan Webster as well.
CDs (in all their corrected glory) will be available for ten of your english pounds.

For those of you who've pre-ordered and aren't based in York, i'll be getting yours in the post to you once they're sorted and i'll sent you bank details.

In between now and then i will be putting the various tracks up in various places (myspace and bandcamp) so that you can have a listen prior to parting with your hard earned. 

Watch out for a flyer nearer the time (i.e. when i've had time to do it**) that will help persuade you that this really is the best thing to do on friday night.
Stay well
Drew

*As, to be fair, has the car.And, unlike the car, i don't have a scratch on me.
** Today i have mostly been speaking to insurance companies and their associates.

Getting there...

yeesh, how long can this take? So, i think i've finished the artwork, i'm just waiting on a couple of answers on some technical queries from the folks at HDC in Bradford, and then, finally, we'll be looking at a week or so for production.
Which brings me to Launch Night!
Well, it would if i'd sorted it out yet.
And here's where you can help, there's a poll in the right frame of this site, because i'm trying to get a booking when as many of you as possible are available, so please click away and let me know which dates are good for you.
Thank you.

On an un-related note, i found this the other day:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=400100311992&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT
Now i don't mind that one of my cds is on e-bay, i don't even mind that it means one of YOU thought it wasn't worth keeping and sold it on.
But really, £3.99 second hand? It's only a penny more brand new! That my friends, is what you call and unacceptable mark up. And in these difficult economic times too, i dunno...

I’d just like to start off by asking, “where the bloody hell did the year go?”
I’d like to follow that up by asking, “What the fuck happened to summer?”
But moving on from that…
I have finally got the gigs page up to date, well, up to date-ish. There are a number of dates that are distinctly lacking in details, but pop ‘em in your diaries anyway – if only so you have a handy excuse the next time you’re asked to out with your “mates” from work…
Still waiting to hear what’s happening with the CD print problem – in the meantime we have sample checked a number of boxes and fished out a bunch of ones that we think are ok and I will have them available at the upcoming gigs.
And returning to the gigs topic, if you can’t make any others, make it to the Junction on the 11th, we’re headlining and it should be a cracking night.
Stay well

Music updates and a couple of other things

'ow do (as they say down in naaaarfick),
couple of updates for you, firstly, gig next week in the Chemic Tavern in Leeds. It's an open-mic type affair with a proper set from the headline act - that's us - and has a pretty good reputation as a night out. It's next thursday (31st) so pretty much everyone should have been paid and it's free to get in; if that isn't a recipe for a night on the beers then i don't know what is. Well, actually, going across to Belfast at the weekend for a stag do is probably an even better recipe. ;¬)
But i digress...
The Chemic is in Wodehouse and you can find all kinds of details about it here: http://www.myspace.com/chemictavern

Secondly, CD news. The CDs have arrived, but... (you knew there was going to be a "but" otherwise i would have spammed you to death by now)
... we've had some issues with the print quality. We've sent some samples back to the production place and they're investigating. At the moment we do have CDs for sale (quite a few of them are fine) but we're not yet in a position to go heavy on the advertising because we can't guarantee the quality.
But they are available, come see me after a gig (or pretty much anytime really, i'll probably have some with me) and for just four of your english pounds i will sell you one of my 5 Track EPs.
Printing aside, i'm really happy with them.

Lastly i just thought i'd stick a couple of links up showing a couple of things have brought me up and down over the last fortnight.
This really depressed me, what are we coming to?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7513416.stm
This really cheered me up!
Where the hell is Matt?

That's about it for now, if you can make it i'll see you in Leeds, and hopefully we'll have some good news on the CDs soon.
thanks again for all your support
Stay well
Drew

P.S. i had a little off when mountain biking on sunday - the picture is a bit disappointing because it did sting quite a bit at the time!

Well, here we are in the second half of the year. I think it might be time for me to review some of the predictions i so foolishly made at the beginning of the year. Here they are with some updates:
The turmoil in the record industry will escalate at a frightening pace resulting in:
The end of DRM
The creation of some kind of musical collective distribution mechanism
The demise of one of the big 4 record companies.
A slew of litigation and pathetic prosecutions from the big 4 record companies.
Gig prices will go up.
Well, i'm doing reasonably well so far on this one - we'll keep an eye on it through the next 6 months and the critical build up to the christmas sales.

Outside the music business
I would expect similar changes to start to permeate into all areas of commerce
We appear to be getting this a bit but not as fast as i was expecting (ever the optimist me).

Arsenal will win the football premiership
Hmm, wasn't exactly on the nail with this one...

Glouscester will win the rugby premiership
Well, i made a good stab at this one, they won more games in the actual league than anyone else, it was just the bloody play-offs that did for them. I'm claiming a degree of accuracy on this!

No-one will actually read this blog all the way through
Surprisingly i was wrong on this too

The best selling record of 2008 will be Drew Stephenson's first EP (hell it's my dream alright!)
Well now, this would have been helped on its way if we'd got our arses in gear and actually got the damn CDs available before July. But they should be hear any... day... now...

So that was the half year, mostly wrong but with occasional flashes of brilliance.

For what it's worth, Nadal to win this afternoon and Valverde to win the Tour De France.

Oh yes, and at the moment i'm listening to FDR and they're bloody good. Check 'em out here:

http://www.myspace.com/fdrtheband