Gavra Lynn's Downtown Peoria Gallery

 I attended an art and music showcase at Gavra Lynn’s gallery down on Jefferson across from the Civic Center (the storefront that says "Art Show"). The gallery is a great spot to see work by local artists and hear some local musicians; from time to time Gavra has even hosted some local filmmaker’s events.

The gallery is quite large and there are paintings and sculptures all over the place. To keep the gallery running, Gavra hosts benefit events and invites musicians to play and even show their own art work. The admission fee is usually not required but is encouraged as a donation. While the crowd size varied throughout the night there were usually about fifteen people wandering about and eventually settling to hear the next music set. Overall, Gavra had invited ten bands to play over the course of seven hours and the genres involved varied from folk and progressive rock to experimental.

If you weren’t listening to music you were either chatting about the artists or grabbing a beer or some wine from the mini-kitchen. The evening was great but I only watched a handful of bands, I did not plan on attending for all seven hours. I was there to play a quick set with my band and then hang out for a bit to chat with friends. I haven’t really been to this kind of event in the past, but I have seen galleries and concerts. One series of paintings by Anthony Couri has caught my eye every time I have visited Gavra’s gallery.

Anthony has created some interesting works using merlot and cigarette ashes as his media. The red splashes of wine almost look like accidental spills and the black ash marks contrast with the white paper (or canvas) he uses. The pieces almost seem as if the fallout from a late night party has found its way on to an open sketch book sitting on a coffee table. Most of the shapes seem random and organic so it’s quite pleasing to the eye, any tension may be derived from the overall appearance of a spill or a mess needing to be cleaned up. Anthony was present at the event to play some music as well.

Unfortunately I only caught the tail end of Anthony’s music set. His band Gypsy Gypsy Gypsy is labeled “Psychedelic, Trance, Visual” and I could certainly tell this was an appropriate assignment. Anthony sat surrounded by percussion instruments ranging from a small hand drum to a rather small gong cymbal. It was a very trippy mix of shimmering chimes and gong howls all sitting nicely with an electric bass guitar drone. If you’re expecting some catchy hooks or pop lyrics, look elsewhere, this music was truly psychedelic with no discernible structure. It was a nice display of the genre and it would have been very enjoyable to anyone who is into that sort of thing.

Gavra and her gallery are a breath of fresh air for Peoria, and the community she has created is unique. It’s about time downtown Peoria has a nightlife other than a bar. I would suggest a visit to anyone who hasn’t been down there yet.

One Year Ago Today in Burbank

"We didn't call him Eno, we called him Brian" said Jerden. I had just asked THE Dave Jerden what it was like working with Brian Eno. Dave was rough around the edges, quick phrased, and he had a harsh voice, so he didn't waste it on words. "They ripped off an African soul musician on that album, completely ripped him off", Dave balked about Talking Heads' fourth studio album "Remain In Light". Apparently Dave was wary to admit how groundbreaking David Byrne and Brian Eno's creation really was. I could have disagreed, but obviously Dave knew way more about it than I did. I actually didn't like the album the first time I heard it, but it grew on me, and before I knew it, it was my favorite Talking Heads album. There I was sitting in Burbank and right before my eyes was the man who engineered and mixed that very album. He was tall, grey haired, and the whole time I was there he was wearing his black leather jacket and often sitting out under the gazebo with a cigarette. I remember him saying that "things are different now", which I suppose he couldn't be more right. I can't really give the guy any justice in a blog post, the man has worked with more influential artists than I have fingers and toes. Either way, here was a man that had a direct influence on my musical teens and twenties. At this point I couldn't even imagine the headache of mixing "Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On)", I'd only wish to have the caffeine and the patience to deal with that much content.

Lori and I saw little of Dave while we were in Burbank, but when he was there he made quick decisions and was gone in a flash. Our final day in the studio was made up of mostly vocals and that was the day Dave sat down and worked with Bryan to comp out several of my vocal tracks. It's a brave new world when someone like Dave is talking out the lyrics you wrote and saying which parts of which take should go in the final mix. I remember many times during our few days in California looking at Lori with that "Holy Crappuccino, I can't believe this is happening" look.

When it came to the nitty gritty Bryan Carlstrom was the workhorse. Bryan was either sitting at the studio's gorgeous giant analog console, tapping on his iPhone, clicking at Pro Tools, adjusting a mic here and there, or puffing at a cigar out under the gazebo(actually Bryan's right-hand man John Nuss was the one making mic adjustments and fixing cord issues most of the time). Bryan seemed the more personable man between him and Dave. Bryan waxed philosophical about his days at Capitol Records, when reverb was made with speakers in empty concrete bunkers in a basement on Hollywood & Vine. These had in turn become the smoking dens for many an artist once digital reverb came along. I also remember a mention of the maintenance elevator that went to a secret floor where the booze was kept. The illustrious red light on the top of the Capitol Records building that flashed ever so steadily in the California midnights was actually Morse code for something or other (a certain vulgar phrase about a particular studio manager comes to mind).

Bryan, who was from the Midwest, just happened to be the pioneer of Pro Tools. He singlehandedly had a stress attack, an epiphany, and then re-routed a few wires to make the first hit album using Pro Tools, turning it into an industry standard. He has worked with just about any hit '90s act you can think of, and, to me, seemed full of steam to keep working for another ten decades, if it was at all possible.

The one wish I have now, a full year later, is that I could have heard what Lori and I created in the midst of such genius. Unfortunately, Konami created a sub-par game, and had an even more sub-par development department. The game had already flopped by the time we hit the tarmac at LAX. Our song never saw the light of day. I still feel, however, that this was my greatest musical achievement, I came, I saw, I conquered. Here's to the future!

For more information on this event please see the following posts:

Day 1 - Chasing The Sun

Day 2 - Into The Studio

Day 3 - The Work (The Fun)

Blue Civilian Stock Footage Compilations Featuring The Music of The Aposematics

I take stock footage that I've shot and put it to music by The Aposematics (a Peoria based band). Check it out! These were all shot with my Sony DCR-DVD403 Handycam.

Find more of The Aposematics at theaposematics.com

The Aposematics in Rolling Stone today!

The Peoria based group The Aposematics are on page 24-25 of the current issue of Rolling Stone (pink Lady Gaga issue) in the Konami Rock Revolution ad.

Into The Studio (Day 2)

Photo By Lori Brooks

We were awakened by our alarm clock and then by our hostesses phone call. Not completely awake and surprisingly not jet-lagged (this came upon us the few days right after we flew back to Chicago), we dressed up and headed down for our free breakfast. The spread was wonderful, fresh fruits, an omelet bar, croissants, muffins, eggs, potatoes, bacon, and sausage (the breakfast bar became a daily occurrence, so I’ll only mention it once.) With so much free food, it was difficult to gauge our intake, so as not to become sluggish when the work comes.



Photo By Lori Brooks

(Just a side note on the realization of how much money is in this part of the country. I’ve only seen a handful of Lamborghinis at car shows, and in big city areas. This one was no slouch. It looks to be a Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder, price tag of about $220K.)


Photo By Lori Brooks


The work never really came for us this first day in the studio. We arrived at about 9AM (nothing quite like trying to make rock ‘n’ roll at 9AM on a Wednesday) and were greeted promptly by Bryan, Annette, Jon, and Seth. I exported all of my tracks from “The Bridge Is Out” on Lori’s laptop, and threw them out on the studio server. Bryan imported everything into ProTools and began tweaking and mixing everything. This went on for a couple of hours while Lori and I explored the studio and snapped pictures. There was some discussion of drums, and thankfully all I had was one stereo track of drums, so it required that they bring in a real drummer. (Konami needed separated stems and midi notes embedded in the tracks for their developers to get the song ready for the game.) Bryan clued us in on the fact that the “greatest drummer in the world” just happened to be in the area from a break on tour, but the discussion stopped at that point.









They released us for lunch and suggested downtown Burbank’s Gordon Biersch as the place to go. They were right. At the time I was not aware that Gordon Biersch was a chain (Lori and I were hoping to eat at places in California that you couldn’t find anywhere else, or anywhere in Illinois for that matter) but their menu was different, their beer was delicious, and it just had that overall California feel to it, so it was truly worth it. Everyone on the wait staff was pleasantly attractive, very nice, and had very unique facial characteristics, almost as if you could tell they were all aspiring actors or actresses ready to hand out headshots at a moment’s notice.





Downtown Burbank was gorgeous, weird shops, all kinds of interesting restaurants, palm trees, expensive cars (without any rust), and the Cartoon Network building within walking distance.

After lunch we checked in with the studio and we were given the rest of the day off. It was time to see the sights, from a car (everyone knows that California and cars mix very well). Since we were in Burbank we decided to hit the studios first. We drove by all of them, and stopped at Warner Bros. for some photo ops. From there we hit Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and finally Rodeo Drive. Lots to see, Southern California is a very beautiful place. Lori and I snapped almost 1300 pictures while we were out there; we tend to be very shutter happy while traveling.

After many hours in the car, and the ever present piling up of work we decided we better see the ocean now while we still have the chance. We couldn’t be that close to the Pacific without getting a glimpse. Apparently no one else in Southern California had the same idea. The wind howled off the water and threw sand at us at breakneck speed. If it were anyone else, it would have been a horrible day at the beach. But we were still on cloud nine, getting to do all of this on someone else’s dime. It need not be said, but I’m sure this day would have only been better had we been cruising around in a fire apple red convertible the size of medium seafaring vessel.











About 6:30 we headed back to the studio to check in and Seth was attempting to lay down drums for our track, it was not going well, and I could tell Bryan was frustrated. He talked about having another 6 hours of work that night before we could come in and start recording. We were released again.

We were beat, but we headed back to the hotel, changed clothes, and since we knew the next two days would be treacherously long, we decided that, yes, we wanted to see more. We headed to the Hard Rock Café at Universal’s Citywalk. 100 or so pictures and an eight dollar cheeseburger later, we were headed back to the hotel for bed. Then I got the call from Bryan. “Hey, Gregg Bissonette has done me a personal favor, he came up to the studio and we were done in an hour”. This was the afformentioned “greatest drummer in the world” and he was now on our track (this is Ringo’s drummer man, he’s jammed with a Beatle, that’s just messed up man, far out). We could have only been happier if we could have met him personally, alas, this was not the case.








We sank into our bed and slept hard.

Going to Los Angeles

Lori and I (The Aposematics) have won a trip to Los Angeles (among other things). We're leaving for Chicago tomorrow April 14th, 2009 to catch a plane, and will be back in Peoria Saturday April 18th, 2009.

This trip includes recording with Dave Jerden and Bryan Carlstrom at their studio in Burbank, plus a Rolling Stone photo shoot. The photo shoot (I'm told) will take place in the studio and possibly another TBD location.

The firm in charge of this will be keeping us busy during the day, but will take us out on the town for dinner every night.

We're nervous, but excited for the opportunity. We've never been to the west coast. It's been quite the chore for us to pack and get everything lined up on our end.

We will be updating our Twitter accounts, and Facebook pages hopefully with pictures and details if anyone is interested on updates. (Go to http://www.theaposematics.com/links.htm for the urls to our various networking pages)

The long, treacherous path of learning to play and record music on my own has finally paid off. This was completely unexpected, if this is the only compensation I ever get for doing something I love, it will have been well worth it.

Sayonara!

John