Crib Notes

It was Woody’s birthday yesterday and the Balkans celebrated it on stage at the Littlefield performance and art space in Brooklyn. It was not the best music of the tour, but it tops my list as the most fun. You can definitely see a change in their comfort level with their stage presence and with the audience. I lost count of the number of times Frankie told the audience that it was Woody’s birthday. Most of their set was spent tuning and having fun. Stanley ran off stage after almost every song, and at one point during a song — Woody took over and played the high hat with the neck of his bass. At one point Frankie received a text message and started to read it out loud to the audience, but Stanly called Frankie from the drums and they had a conversation on stage. Frankie unsuccessfully attempted to hold his phone to the mic.

Despite their merrymaking, when they committed themselves to a song they played it wholeheartedly and it sounded great. A month ago aside from the fact that Woody is my brother, I would have seen the Balkans because I enjoy their music and they’re good musicians. After last night and the show in Richmond, I will go see the Balkans for all the above reasons and because they put on a fun show.

We’re in the home stretch now, leaving New York for Ohio. And the Balkan posse has grown to eight (the four boys and now four girls)! Check out the the Balkans’ Myspace for more.

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We headed out of New York for a “short” two hour drive to Philadelphia for a gig at the Danger Danger Gallery.  Massive rain storms, again, and just plain congestion turned our 90 mile trip into a five hour drive each way. We will not have happy memories of the New Jersey Turnpike. Despite the traffic and the warnings that the venue was in a very bad neighborhood, it was overall the best gig yet.

The neighborhood was sketchy, but I found shelter in the Dock Street Brewery with some local friends while the Balkans missed out and ate vegan wraps next door. People actually turned-out for the gig. The Balkans put on a strong show and were dripping with sweat by the end. Stanley did his customary dramatic finish where he abruptly stands up and throws away his drumsticks. The basement had flooded out because of the earlier rain, but the bands were still able to play. The main room hosted three rock bands and the other room had two electronic acts, which seemed to get more of the crowd’s approval. Maybe the Balkans will make it back to the city of brotherly love someday…

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Wednesday morning we packed up and headed north of the Mason-Dixon Line.  And can you spell disaster, because I’m pretty sure Woody Shortridge can’t.  That’s what the past few days have been: a fun disaster.

We were supposed to go to New York via Hoboken, NJ for an interview and in-studio performance with Planet Verge.  As we approached New Jersey we were hit with torrential rains.  Luckily we had allotted extra travel time, but we weren’t prepared for tornadoes.  Yes, there were tornado warnings in the New York area.  Thus the Planet Verge gig was rescheduled for Thursday evening, but the studio was unavailable so the Planet Verge hosts were going to do the recording guerrilla-style.  We were unexpectedly thrown into downtown Manhattan at 6 p.m. with buckets of rain.  We made it slowly, but safely to Brooklyn to park the cars for FREE.

True, we had a lot of fun exploring the city. The Balkans took the time to check out Chinatown for some cheap stuff.  However, once again New Jersey got the best of us.  We picked the “worst time” to drive from Brooklyn through Manhattan to Hoboken: 5:30 p.m. The studio was less than 8 miles away but it took us almost 2 hours to make it. Amazingly we arrived in Hoboken on time, early actually, but one of the girls at Planet Verge was late.  We went to check out the performance space, the parking lot of the studio, but there was no outlet.   While the Planet Verge host searched for an alternative spot the parking lot proved a playground for the two bands, special thanks to some Styrofoam scraps (some of which Brett hit me over the head with).  And Stanley Vergilis proved to be the best at jumping for a hole in the wall.

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The Balkans aren’t driving a fancy bus, they won’t be staying in hotels or even eating at mid-priced chain restaurants during their nine-stop tour of the east coast this summer.  But they do have complete ownership of the whole tour.  They’ve booked the shows themselves, made T-shirts, pressed records and crammed equipment into a soccer-mom-mobile plus a turtle top.  They spent months convincing concerned parents that they weren’t going to die, and after a full-band and parent meeting last Saturday they were reluctantly given the go for takeoff.  Yes, this is a tour with plan and potential.  It is also a tour with four recent high school graduate boys and a hand full of girls in tow.

The tour started sometime Saturday afternoon while I was in the shower. I emerged to find the car packed full with little room for my own bag.  We arrived in Athens to find people slightly confused as to who the Balkans were. Flagpole, Athens’ local alt-weekly, listed the band as an “Atlanta duo” while Jake, a listing’s paper, had a photo of all four members of the band, but they were labeled the “Blakans.”

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Atlanta’s the Balkans are raising the bar on DIY cred. They make their own records — practically from scratch.

Balkans bassist/guitarist Woody Shortridge makes the mold by pouring liquid silicone over a record placed at the bottom of the box. Then, the record is made by pouring a liquid resin into the mold. The kind he uses dries in 15 minutes. He adds urethane dyes to create colorful swirling patterns. The whole process takes less than an hour to complete.

Balkans bassist/guitarist Woody Shortridge learned about copying records this way from Adam Bruneau who originally posted about it on his blog. Together they perfected their technique and Cave Paint Records was born.

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