Day 11- New York City

Day 11 - New York City- Calvary church-Feb. 29

Alright, lets get to New York before I decide to put it off any longer. I'm going to attempt to be concise, but, as you've probably noticed, that's not one of my stronger qualities.
As we creeped up the east coast, I was afraid to fall asleep, worrying I'd miss the first glances of New York City. But my sleepiness trumped fear and pulled me in. I woke up to Adam yelling from the front seat "Aisha, we're here! Look! Well, if you want to." And there it was, New York, outside my window. I saw the statue of liberty back in the distance and the cluster of enormously tall buildings stretching up to the clouds. We drove through China town and through the city amongst the taxi's and parked right in front of the church that would surpass all my expectations.

The Calvary church is the most beautiful structure I've ever seen. Imagine the fancy Roman Cathedrals you might study in an art class, with vaulted ceilings, stain glass images of the Biblical cast, dark wooden pews, and a stone sculpture of Christ at the nave. My words won't do it justice. You'll have to see the pictures.

I stood around for a bit while Slow Six sound checked and wow, those guys are so good. They're comprised of drums, electric guitar, keyboards/(synth's maybe?), and two violinists, and of course you know where my attention went. Their violinists were amazing. They ran them through all sorts of effects pedals that transformed the tone, but their melodies were so cool. I felt like a star struck kid standing in amazement. Had I been invisible I probably would've jumped around in freak out mode, jaw dropped. I love watching people play who inspire me to dash away and practice for hours. They made me want to be better.
I decided they probably didn't want some girl mind gawking at them while they practiced, so I ran off somewhere. Later, the Trapdoor-

Balmorhea crew went for dinner at a sandwich shop around the corner. New York is cold! But the food was good. I was disappointed however that I didn't hear one New York accent the whole time. oh well. When we got back, we got to sound checking. The grand piano in there was so clear and gorgeous. Its tones just danced beauty into your ears and all around the room. It lingered, but in the best way possible. After spending a bunch of time trying to get a mysterious hum from Mike's guitar to dissipate, Dave saved the day and Trapdoor set up.

We opened with Shekinah. I'd missed hearing that song with piano in it and oh man, Nicole, we thought the First Baptist chapel was amazing--this was like that chapel times 10. I'll have to get the rest of the set from Adam (he's been keeping a book with all our set lists in it). But I remember Elizabeth sounding really good. Rob was tearing it up on piano, though after the show, he didn't even remember what he played. I don't know how to describe it other than this fast cascading descension of a melody, sparkling from high to low. It sounded so big. It was great. Song of Hooch and the Priest was spot on and the second half with all the singing replays in my mind. Especially when all the instruments dropped out and our voices took over. They echoed and blended so well, each of us tangling into one. It was the perfect place. That's what Trapdoor should sound like.

It was also the perfect place for Balmorhea. In Rivers Arms fashion, we started with San Solomon, the first of about seven piano songs. We had to capitalize on that grand. I don't even know the words to convey what it sounded like. That piano made every song sound all the more expressive, infinitely more delicate and all the more graceful. Winter was thunderous and dramatic, especially the second half. Lament, the piano-violin duet that usually makes me nervous, went off pretty much without a hitch. I don't think I play that song sad enough though. I'm going for tears, people. Real tears. In the middle of the set, at some point when I wasn't playing, I remember staring off, zoning out in the sound, stuck in a smile. That setting was perfect, room was perfect. I realized I was sitting in the middle of New York City, before a fairly large audience, playing music that I believe in, inside an epic cathedral with amazing musicians and I was so happy. What more could I ask for?

Afterwards, a guy came up and asked for our autographs. He was really excited about the music and so happy that he saw us. crazy. I sat at the merch booth and felt important for a while, on my post-show high. That's a fun place to be. I always feel like I've done something worthwhile. Next, Slow Six played and blew my mind. Again, jaw dropping. They turned down all the lights and had a projection of morphing lights and colors. Somehow, they became a group of moving silhouettes. It was so good! The drums sounded so big in there, and their violin lines were awesome. Again, words fail me. Go buy a cd.

We stood around afterwards, excited about all that had just happened. I watched the slow six guys from afar. One of the violinists came up to me after the Trapdoor set and said in a very suave manner, "Good playing kiddo," and talked with me for a while. I felt star-struck again when I remembered that the same guy just played and blew us all away, and he complimented me. Too nice of him.

So my efforts at being concise have failed. So I'll go faster. Afterwards we ate at Lyric's Diner a few blocks away and laughed a lot. Our waiters were funny without knowing it, and Mike's storytelling is always hilarious. He's so great at re-telling things. His voices, facial expressions and gestures are comic gold. After a late dinner, we went back to the church and stayed with Alex's friend Ben. Mike did some Chin ups on a bar. Then Dave hopped up. Then I shocked them all and did some with ease. haha. Seven years of gymnastics shows itself randomly in my life. I swear, they train you to be soldiers. After that, it was sleep time. Such a good night.

-Aisha

Hello hellooo. We're eating breakfast at Ben's apartment above the Calvary Church in New York city. The show last night was amazing. I had so much fun. And Slow Six was awesome. But I'm hungry, so I'm gonna eat some more. I'll post about yesterday the next time we get internet.

until then my friends,
-Aisha

THE SHOW - Day 10

This is another show I'm not going to want to write a lot about. Few people came, except for Dave Stout's friend Janna who brought her friends. That was nice of her. Then we had an audience who wasn't a part of the show, so we started. Trapdoor was up first. Things went pretty well, but it's so weird playing to a huge room with only 9 people scattered in it. Not to mention, it was really hard for the strings to hear themselves, and you guys know how that goes.

The Balmorhea set was the same. All I heard was the guitar amp near my ear. It was no one's fault, just what happens when you have to use a random PA for your sound that doesn't have enough inputs. I think we all felt that that set was kind of off. So, the bad news was that hardly anyone was there. But the good news, was that hardly anyone heard the off night. Ok, this is entirely too long. Human Bell played and was awesome. That warehouse was crazy cold, so we gathered by the clacking heating pipes for warmth. Aftewards, we walked all our stuff down 5 flights of stairs. The elevator decided to break. After loading up the cars, I jumped in the Trapdoor car and we stayed the night with Dave's friends who had our beds all ready for us when we walked in. So nice. We slept well, ate breakfast in the morn, and then left for New York City. I'm currently writing you from some highway, maybe in Jersey. Who knows. Anyway, New York! I'm excited!

-Aisha

More of Day 10 - Baltimore

Dave's phone with Google-map abilities is amazing. The Balmorhea car can navigate any foreign city like we own the place. We used that to find a gas station to make the gas light go away, to find a laundromat to remember what clean clothes smelt like, and to meet up with The Trapdoor car. After hanging out in the laundromat, watching the news and chatting, Dave and I met up with Rob and Mike and we shivered our way to a restaurant for dinner. I swear, everywhere we go, it just gets colder. Downtown Baltimore was deserted at 7pm. Hardly anyone was out, probably because they didn't want their faces to freeze as ours were. At least we haven't encountered any sub zero temperatures. This lady from the Northwest Territories told our class once that if you wear mascara in the cold up there, your eye lashes can literally freeze and break off.
scary.
After an hour wait, we sat down and some of us ate. The "Wimpie Burgers" (actual menu title) were a popular choice, Four little 2 oz. burgers. Think White Castle/Krystal burger size a.k.a almost non-existant. After thaat we drove down a bunch of shady looking roads and alleys, places where suspicious business deals of various sorts were probably taking place, and later landed at our destination. This creepy looking warehouse. We stood outside until these nice girls saw the cold in our faces and let us in the lobby where we would wait. and wait.
and wait.

We soon took to exploring. I found the creepiest looking stairwell I've ever seen in my life. My roommate Mon and I love to watch those Ghost Hunters shows. Its a guilty pleasure. and I don't know what I believe. I don't think there's a Biblical explanation for ghosts. But anyway, that was a total ghost hunter location stairwell. An old metal gate had

rusted to an irony faded brown. The beige wall paint had worn away in scattered spots, exposing red bricks. The stairs were stained, and a weird large blacks

mudge sat on the right wall. One florescent light flickered in rhythmic bursts over everything, and lit the way for the hint of a mysterious path.

creepy.

Dave was first to barge through some doors and find the rest of the strange open warehouse. I followed grinning and laughing in a weird "I like to be scared" kind of way. haha. (even though Alison knows I'm the biggest fake haunted house wuss of all time. But maybe I'll tell that story later). When Dave rounded a corner and Michael turned back, I decided I didn't want to be alone in there and went back too. We stood around for about 20 minutes waiting for someone to let us up until we met our guy, went up to the 5th floor to an apartment they like to call The Penthouse for some unknown reason.

It was this huge room! If I were a kid, it would've been a cartwheel, gymnastics tumbling haven for me. The guy that lived there rode by on a scooter a few times, which is totally what I would do if I lived there. This really sassy curious cat was prancing around everywhere sniffing us out. I don't feel like describing the whole room so hopefully I'll get a picture up here. But I will say there was a tire swing hanging on a 11 foot rope from the metal rafters.

-Aisha

Day 10 - Echoes Radio Recording

Day 10- Echoes

So after the Trapdoor-Balmorhea split for the evening, Balmorhea tried to find a hotel that was closer to our next early morning adventure. After driving around for a while and encountering crazy Frank who worked at some hotel that shall remain nameless, we found a hotel for the night and slept well. We woke up slowly...and early and drove a while over to the Echo's studio. We had a radio show taping there. The neighborhood was pretty cool, very old looking. We drove past lots of woodsy areas, filled with thin, tall-standing trees. It was a gorgeous day. The sun misled us into the chilling cold. Weird pockets of snow clumps rested against curbsides and walkways.

The radio show went well. The Echoes show has recorded a bunch of people, and our show will be broadcast over a hundred stations through the US. Pretty cool. Radio shows always get me flustered. We had to play through headphones in order to hear the mix and Rob's piano. I really hate playing through headphones. After hearing the natural acoustic sound of my violin without any modification, without plugging in EVER for 9 years, anything else sounds foreign.



So I'll admit, when we began, I wasn't very jazzed about it...But after the first couple of songs, I got used to hearing the mix in the headphones (which was pretty good) annnd it won me over. We played Lament, Summer, winter, the new song (which we thought we named Cabbagetown, after an area of Atlanta, but now we're thinking of re-naming it), and closed with Baleen Morning.

Then we sat around and had a little interview which went pretty well. I got to speak this time! haha, which was cool I suppose. I consider myself a pretty awkward speaker sometimes. Things usually sound about 10 times better, and make at least twice as much since in my head before my lips start moving. BUT I think this time, all went well.

He asked a lot about the names of the songs, and which came first, the title or the music. He was continually shocked that the names came after the songs. I'd say he was almost in disbelief that the guys didn't write San Solomon with San Solomon springs in mind and the title in the bag. He also asked a bit about how we, as a group of twenty-somethings ended up playing delicate instrumental music. If I'd been doing the interview, I would've explored that angle a little bit. BUT then again, it could be because I'm always more interested in the people and minds behind creative things perhaps, more than the creations themselves.

As a journalist, it was weird to be on the other side of the questions. But as we get more and more experiences with press and reviews, the more I begin to understand why musicians and artists get frustrated with the press. Someone posted our album title as "Rivers to Amrs" and said that Balmorhea was Rob's hometown. That's really wrong. They've butchered our names. People over analyze, jump to conclusions, and are annoyingly lazy with fact checking. Then, you get asked questions that you've answered repeatedly, questions that a google search could probably answer. Being on this side of things either makes me want to keep doing music writing to do it the right way or it nudges me further away from it (not that I needed help).

The studio was located in this pre-civil war neighborhood. All the houses were quaint and old looking. Supposedly the one next to us was one where George washington slept at. The place where we played used to be an infirmary for orphans. The guy that interviewed us said people that lived in the house before casually asked if he had seen the ghosts. He spoke with a comic skepticism about the existence of ghosts, but said that if any place was going to he haunted this would be the place. The setting is so perfect.

After some pictures and a lengthy goodbye, we had lunch and then were on our way to Baltimore, the land of cold wind, no internet and creepy warehouses.

Day 9

Guys I'm so sorry! Internet has been so hard to find, oddly enough. In an age where Dave, our cellist, has google maps on his freakin cell phone, no coffee shop in Baltimore had internet. ridiculous. Here are entries as I wrote them from the past few days.

Day 9 - ATM House

hey hey.

So today we just finished playing a show at the ATM house. No, it is not a place that has anything to with money, or retrieving money. But Don't ask me what it means...please.

Yeah, that house was crazy. I should've taken more pictures around there. But before I explain that, lets rewind to this morning. Alex, Adam, and I got up early and the left what I'll call the quintessential male college apartment. BUT they had extra space and were wiling to let us invade the entire downstairs of their apartment, so that was nice. Anyway, we left around 10am to get to the Philadelphia International Airport to pick up Chris Schreck, one of the, we'll say, vintage Trapdoor Band members who'll be joining us for the next few days. He plays a mean guitar. Even if you don't know him, you may recognize his face from the back of the self-titled Trapdoor Band album. Go take a look.

Anyway, we stopped at Marshal's Diner. Alex has this love for diners. This sweet old lady was our waitress. And once another elderly couple left, it was just the waitress, the cook, us, and the ladies from the View--on TV of course. We had an interesting conversation about that show, and I wondered what weight it carries with the women who watch it daily. Simulacra. That's what I think.

After a much needed breakfast, we continued to Philadelphia. We picked up Chris, dropped off our things at the ATM house and then went for a stroll through the University of Pennsylvania campus. It's kinda cool down there. All the campus buildings look like a little village. And the squirrels there are so cool! (sidenote: Everyone who knows me well knows I have a strange, unexplainable love for squirrles. I laugh all the way to class just watching them run by. IT's weird I know). Anyway, they were fat! and grey. No one cares about that except me and my mom. we tried to get into the U. Penn library, but you had to swipe a campus ID card to get it. lame. They won't even share their books. Thanks U. Penn.

On the walk back, it started snowing pretty hard. Snowflakes are fun till they land in your eyes continually. Philly gets cold! A biting cold. The kind that makes your hands hurt.

Back at the ATM house, we hung around for awhile before Balmorhea played. Adam got some cool pics and hopefully blogger will let me show you them. We opened with "Soft Rustling" and closed with the new song, newly named Cabbage Town. We forgot the melodica, buuut we're cool so it worked out anyway. Rob and Mike sang over my solo violin thing and it was golden.

Trapdoor played a pretty fun set. We threw in the favs: a stomp-filled version of Earth Mouth, Guaranteed Winter Time Blues, All is Full of Love Cover, Elizabeth. There were more. I don't remember. But people were pretty into it. This one girl who lived there kept asking for more, so we did "Ship of Death," and called it a night.

Then Balmorhea and Trapdoor said our goodbyes went our separate ways for the evening.

Noteable interesting moments of the night:

-the basement--so dusty, you could taste it
-the cat, so cute and cuddly one second, barfing under the coffee table the next
-no one from the ATM house cleaning that up
-during the show, the crowd strangely and suddenly yelling "FACT, West Philly!!! COUNTER FACT, West Philly!!"

Day 8 - Charlottesville

Wrote this about Day 8 after the show. In retrospect though I'll say that we didn't play badly, but the crowd wasn't really there to hear music. They wanted to Hukah. So whatever.

Day 8 - Tea Bazaar Show

The notion that the shows get better response as we go farther north has been proven false--well, was shaken last night. The Tea bazaar was weird. The Balmorhea set was good, it was just weird for me cause I was kind of positioned in a way that didn't really allow me to hear things through the PA that well. but whatever. hearing at shows? psh. who needs that.

ok. you know, i just decided I don't wanna copy what i wrote in the car. So I'm just going to re-remember and write things out. Trapdoor--we played half way according to the set list. Revolution Choir felt a little weird to me, maybe to all of us, and then Ship of Death turned into this improv jam that was pretty cool, but apparently not what the Tea Bazaar crowd was wanting. Again, they were there to smoke hukah. Except for a couple tables of cool people. We did do a pretty sweet cover of "Love is Simple" by the Akron/Family. But I think we all walked away feeling like it was a weird set.

oh well. The radio show Trapdoor did earlier went well, so that's cool. But I think I already wrote about that. I don't really remember. Things are beginning to blur together. I just realized that was a lame report of the show...I apologize. When you feel strange about a set, the last thing you want to do is think about it repeatedly and then break it down into bunches of details to squish into paragraphs. I have some pics, but we'll see if blogger decides to let me upload em.

I'm about to write about today so go read that now. adios

-Aisha