Restart

Well, the last time I actually updated this blog was in July. Shows how good I can be with sticking with something like this. Since I last wrote, Bust A Kap released the music video for Stylin', recorded several other songs for our CD that we will hopefully release sometime in January or February, and even played a couple shows (a house show and a show at BYU's Battle of the Bands at The Wall). It's been fun, though when it comes to playing shows we seem to get diminishing returns each time.

When it comes to The Blurst of Times, that project has also expanded in terms of songs. I've added in a few more songs that I'm trying to get recorded, as well as gotten more recording and mixing done for some of the previous songs, but it can be hard when you're working full time and trying to focus on a bunch of other projects, not to mention spending time with the wife. We'll see if I'm able to buckle down and 1. get this blog a little more active again and 2. get things going with finishing the Blurst of Times cd. We'll see, it's like an eternal project.

If nothing else, here is the music video for Stylin' (albeit several months late).

7 Habits!

Well, we finished our song about the 7 Habits. BYU Independent Study then made their video for the Taiwanese school, which makes me laugh. Nothing like watching a bunch of teenage Taiwanese kids attempt to dance and lip-sync to Bust A Kap. Here's the video link, I'm personally a big fan of how my auto-tuned chorus stuff sounds in it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqgNPsFlEuc

I did some more Blurst of Times recording as well - taking care of more stuff for "A Weirdo Will Love You" and "Oh! What Glory!" I've outsourced the piano for those songs to my talented former roommate Daniel "D Money" Nash. I also had my wife Kelsey do some backup vocals for the song "Oh Lord, Where is Thy Pavillion?" which really completes the song, in my opinion. Once I get the finished piano pieces from D Money, I'll hopefully be able to finish the songs pretty quickly.

Bust A Kap CD recording is now underway as well - Trick has already recorded his bass and vocals (just in time, since he's now out of state for the month), and today I'll start recording my vocal tracks for all the other songs. It's gonna be pure hip hop. Brrrrrrrraaaaat!!!!!

A lot happens when you don't write...

So there hasn't been much writing as of late...but that's what happens when you get married, go on a honeymoon, start a new internship, and don't have internet installed in your new apartment yet. There's been a lot keeping me from writing.

Musically, Bust A Kap has had some big stuff going on as of late. On Tuesday we participated in Velour's Battle of the Bands, which was really fun. Even though most of the crowd was there to see other bands, we still managed to get a lot of people dancing and sweaty (though not as sweaty as us, since we were all in jumpsuits and onesie pajamas). We didn't win (hip hop can't win a battle of the bands, it would be apostasy!) but it was super fun. We had such a good time performing in front of a large and energetic crowd, and most exciting of all, Kaneischa (one of the powers that be at Velour) told us that they definitely want us back at some point to play other shows. Brrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaat. My favorite songs from that night were "Stylin" and "Playin Hard to Get," since they were super high-energy and we were really able to get the crowd moving.

In other Bust A Kap news, we've been working on a song for BYU Independent study about the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. A group of Taiwanese students comes to BYU to take a class about the 7 Habits, and then they make a fun video at the end of it...and we were hired to make the music for it. We're actually getting paid money to make our music, just like the artists and composers of old who were commissioned by kings and stuff. Except we're a lot less classy, obviously.

And finally, I've gotten back to working a bit on my Blurst of Times music. So I've done more editing on the songs I recorded last summer, and started work on the songs "A Weirdo Will Love You" (an old Crazy Talk song I'm revamping) and "Oh! What Glory!" Just like last year's songs, I'm planning to bring in some ringers to play some of the other parts in the songs. We'll see how it turns out/if I actually accomplish my goal of finishing all these songs and putting them out as an EP or something.

Finishing Filming! We Stylin'

This Saturday we finally were able to get around to finishing what we started back in March - finishing filming the music video for Stylin'.  Right in the middle of final exams and wedding planning, we were somehow able to get everyone together to finish our filming in downtown Provo and at The Wall (BYU).  There was plenty of dancing downtown, I shoved cake in my face (to the point where some of it went up my nose), and we scared a dog who was tied up outside of Sammy's as we went racing past as part of the sequence where we try to find the robot who is maliciously controlling us.  The scenes at The Wall were much more toned down, as we were in our nasty old suits from d.i. for our professor-esque look - professors are much calmer and more sophisticated in demeanor, after all.  I don't think my hair has ever been gelled and parted the way it was for that scene, and I hope to never do it that way again haha.  Kelsey made me look very different, to say the least.

Speaking of Kelsey, these next two weeks are going to be super crazy and super amazing!  I will be walking at graduation this week, and next week Kelsey and I will be getting married in the Gilbert Arizona Temple for time and all eternity.  As Squints would say:  "For-ev-er!"  It's going to be the best thing of my life!!!!

We also put together our first promo video for Stylin', even though it probably won't actually be finished until June because of Josh's busy schedule and the work that will go into post-production and editing.  But here it is!

From Center Stage to the Background

So the BYU Hip Hop Club Showcase turned out to be way fun, more so than we originally thought! Things didn't turn out quite as we had planned (which is fairly normal).  We had been planning on playing the song "Playin' Hard to Get," but when we arrived to do our soundcheck several members of the Hip Hop Club came up to us talking about how much their club loves "Da Mall." We still weren't really sure what to do about it even when we got on stage to perform our short set.  As soon as we finished playing "Stylin'," however, the Hip Hop Club started yelling for us to play "Da Mall."  So obviously we had to play it!  It ended up being really fun, and somehow we managed to not mess it up despite not having practiced it at all beforehand.  The Hip Hop Club's energy during the whole thing was great - especially when they all yelled "Da Mall!!!" loud enough for us to hear it onstage.  It was super legit.  We know who to go to for whenever we make a music video for that song now.

On Wednesday I had a completely different experience, moving from front and center to the background.  I've been an extra, or a "background actor," as they are more professionally called, for a few different productions with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and this Wednesday I was cast as a high schooler for an interfaith PSA about cyberbullying.  I'm pretty sure most of the other extras were actual high schoolers.  I'm 24 but look young enough, apparently.  It was pretty fun.  I should actually be visible in this one; there was one shot where I had my own cue - I said goodbye to one group of people in the hall and then walked past the group of mean bully girls while the camera panned over to their conversation.  The director actually called out my name for my cue in the scene!  So basically you could say I'm a star background actor now.   Superstardom is on the way!

Impromptu Shows and Pizza Mountain Dew Girls

So as the week draws to a close, we find Bust A Kap with another impromptu performance put onto the schedule!  This time it comes from the BYU Hip Hop Club; they want us to perform a few songs at their showcase Saturday night.  Like any good hip hop performance, some of the details are still fuzzy, but we at least know it's at the Wilk Ballroom at 9 pm.  And in true hip hop form, we held a total of 30ish minutes of practice last night to prepare for the show.  It's a busy weekend with General Conference and all, so there really aren't any other times to practice.  It's a good thing we're only playing two songs - "Stylin", which is quickly becoming our show staple, and "Playin' Hard to Get," which we haven't played in a long time and is really more pop than hip hop, but it's a catchy tune.

We also took advantage of our practice time to finish writing (at least lyrically) Patrick's ode to his girlfriend, also known as "Pizza Mountain Dew Girl."  As you can probably tell by the title, we really plumb the emotional depths of the human existence with our rap songs.  We'd written most of the words previously, and so we decided it was finally time to finish the song, which we did in under five minutes.  When you have such a profound knowledge of the human condition such as we do, it becomes easy to quickly write such heartfelt songs as "Pizza Mountain Dew Girl."  Hopefully we'll get it to the point where we can perform/record it soon!

We'll see what else the weekend brings; meanwhile here's a video from another time we played "Playin' Hard to Get" at Muse Music Café in Provo!

Project delays, and some sweet local music

Well the filming for the rest of the "Stylin" music video has been delayed a bit, as school projects start to get in the way.  We're now trying to finish filming sometime towards the end of April.  These things happen, but it definitely won't keep the video from being filmed or from being too legit to quit!

Anyhoo, there's been some good new stuff on the local music scene this past week that I've been listening to a lot.  First off, there's a new EP by We Are the Strike - the lead single "One Night of You" is super catchy disco-funk pop tune.  The rest of the EP is pretty solid too, even if it doesn't feature the band's horn section as much as I'd like.  You can check it out at www.wearethestrike.com.

Next, there's a music video from Foster the People-esque band Coral Bones' new song "Queensway." I love the synth layers going on throughout the song, and proceeds from downloads go to the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

And finally, here's a video of Tyler Glenn of Neon Trees playing the hymn "Where Can I Turn For Peace?"  Simple, quiet, but really well done.  Watch it.

Original Poem: Open Mic Night

I've been to quite a few shows where the last band of the night has had virtually no one to play for. I distinctly remember one time when I was helping my friend Chris Bernstorf with merch for his show, and by the time the last band got up to perform, the only people left in the venue were Chris, the sound guys, and myself.  It's not much fun to perform to an empty room.  It's sad when people go to a local show to hear their friend's band, but then don't stay to listen to the other bands playing.  I've discovered some of my favorite local bands by sticking around to see everyone perform.  So as a side note to that, I wrote a short free verse poem.  It's called Open Mic Night because even though the experience I mentioned was at an actual show, I feel like this type of thing is even more likely to happen at an Open Mic.

Open Mic Night

The last chord fades to silence,
Is there any applause?
No.
There isn't anyone left to listen.

We Stylin! - Filming a new music video

Well, I'm not entirely sure how this whole blog thing is going to work, but here goes...maybe I'll do an intro/overview type thing later, but not today.

This last Saturday my synth/rap band Bust A Kap began filming our new music video for our song "Stylin."  If this picture is any sample, it's going to be pretty legit.

Oh yeah.  We've actually filmed another music video before, called "Cruisin' Down Claiborne" (you can watch it here), but we wanted to do something more in-depth this time.  Which means we actually did some real planning before we started filming and have more people working on the video with us! Basically the story of the video involves Bust A Kap being changed through several different crazy styles by a malicious robot with its powerful TV remote, and our epic quest to stop this heinous attack on our hip hop stylin'.  I'm lucky enough to have a few friends in the film program, as well as a wonderful fiancé who recently graduated with a degree in Theater Makeup, which definitely makes the filming process a lot easier (and is going to give us a better quality video too)!

Of course there's still a lot of work left to do.  On Saturday we filmed the scene in which we fight against the robot in its apartment (popcorn goes flying everywhere), as well as the scenes in our David Bowie-esque outfits/makeup.  This still leaves us the scenes we need to film in downtown Provo in our hip hop and old-school professor outfits...which should hopefully be happening on the 28th.  Awww yeah!