Between Songs

The Ironwood

2010-01-05T11:08:00.001-08:00

We had a nice show at the Ironwood last night :) It made for a warm start to the trip. Thank you to our friends that came out. You guys made the evening. And thank you to the Ironwood! The staff were wonderful, and the sound was great. Hopefully we'll have the opportunity to play there again. However, if so it will be at a new location. After years of building a solid reputation, the Ironwood is ready to move to a bigger facility with a rumored seating capacity of 250 (as opposed to the current capacity of 150). Given the name the Ironwood has built for itself, this can only mean new possibilities in drawing larger acts among the indie music scene. It's a strong private investment in the arts community for the city of Calgary, and something that I'm sure lots of people including myself are rather excited about. If you live in Calgary or happen to visit, I recommend stopping by the new location, which should be open within about a month. We'll be off to Lethbridge in the next couple days and then hopefully joining up with our friend Jessica who is currently fighting a cold. All our best to you Jess!

Happy New Year Everyone. We're looking forward to the days ahead.

With gratitude,

Tim

Gingerbread Houses

2009-12-16T02:11:00.000-08:00

Hello internet. You black void that I have now turned into my write room. It really is a nice program this 'Write Room'. I enjoy writing without the distractions. However, it's also dangerous. Distractions, and the reality of where we are living are guidelines to our behavior. I have a white dotted line that runs on either side of my car when I am in motion. This stops me from hurting people. There are people that share our cafeterias, gyms, and restaurants. These people stop us all from yelling strangely like animals, muttering oddly, and eating rudely. And then there are icons on my desktop and on facebook that remind me not to write inappropriately. But the Write Room takes those distractions away. As though the world lay behind a curtain. Talking about it though, analyzing it - well I suppose that sort of ruins the mystery. It reminds me that this Internet was made for you and me. Otherwise, I'd just keep all these words taped up in a black void and just say, "Merry Christmas Void." Cousin Void. The void you talk to a few times a year. I need a better relationship with my void then that.

There are boxes mounting my walls, and lonely desolate cans of soup that lay idly in the cupboard. The cold billows through a still air in my living room, and the lamps are serving a utility rather than a comfort. I am moving. We are moving. We are packing our things and saying goodbye to things for quite a while. We are playing guitars and singing. We are writing. We are driving a lot. Let me repeat: we are driving A LOT. I will enter the realms of Vancouver three times by automobile in the next month. This will be made possible by a key replacement that I intend to conduct tomorrow. A very cold Edmonton was responsible for my trunk freezing shut this evening. And a frozen trunk was responsible for me accidently bending the key in the lock. I alone though am responsible for intentionally bending the key back into its original shape so that I might leave the shopping centre this Christmas season and drive myself back home. And so, I am alone responsible for the crack in the steel of my key. This is not a tragedy. These are small potatoes in the grand scheme of things. But the key to a car, that small piece of metal, certainly does hold the fate to the plans of one's holiday season. As such, I'm going to insert my cracked key into my ignition tomorrow, and drive somewhere in the hope that I don't arrive with one half of my key in my hand, and the other half of my key in the ignition of the car. And then, I will copy the key. I will copy the key so that I can proceed in driving to Vancouver. So that I can visit family and friends this holiday season. I will copy the key so that I can still look forward to playing lots of songs to people this upcoming January, and drive me and my wife to an airplane that will fly us somewhere rainy and new this upcoming February.

In cleaning a pantry I've discovered foods that I forgot about. This same experience can on occasion manifest itself in relation to the fridge or the dresser. All three storage compartments typically prompt a different reaction from me though. I will almost never consider a second greeting with a long-forgotten friend that makes a re-appearance in the refrigerator. Conversely, to find long-forgotten friends in the dresser is usually a delight, particularly in the seasonal sense. There is nothing better than a wave of warm weather coupled with the finding of a favorite pair of shorts & flip-flops. The pantry on the other hand offers a re-acquaintance with long-forgotten friends that are questionable at best. Does dry pasta go bad? You'd think not, but it might have a funny smell. How about hard candy? Yeah, that's a strange case too. For those items that can be given to the food bank this time of year in the middle of moving - canned goods - I say, spectacular. I never feel good about throwing certain things out. But other things beg the question, "Would giving this away be a charitable act, or just make me a bad person?" At some level, such a question becomes a question of science before any moral law.

My friend Jesse and I built a gingerbread house this holiday season. It was by no means a modest attempt. We spent probably close to 40 minutes staring down the bulk candy aisle. We spent our time planning to melt down hard candy for the formation of windows. We planned complex roofing structures. And we wrestled with the decision of whether or not to attempt the replication of existing structures, or build something more inspired by our own creativity. But, as our present gingerbread house would present itself, we should have spent more time considering recipes for good quality gingerbread, and cemented icing before any other lofty idea. What began as an attempt to build a multi-layered structure resulted in us finishing with a four-sided home, and undecorated to boot. There is a reason why older people typically build gingerbread houses, or at least act as the ringleaders in its construction. It is the same reason that you can buy gingerbread house kits: it's Really hard to make gingerbread homes. That's why we don't live in them. 90% of them would probably fall apart. Only witches that eat children are successful enough to be long-term homeowners in the gingerbread market.

An aside: I went looking to read Hansel & Gretel online, but the first story I came across was riddled with references to televisions and chinese food. . I'm curious how fairytales might look ten years from now when we read about the Three Bears and their meal of Muslix.

Goodnight Internet. I will write to you again soon.

First Encounter with a Labradoodle

2009-11-02T06:06:00.000-08:00

Spaceships, Trains & Pants

2009-10-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

I had a chance to visit Victoria this week while we were away for the trip... It feels really good to breathe there. There are leaves big enough to wear as hats. One morning I took a walk to campus. There was a thick fog covering the park as I walked through, and I was met by a baby deer with antlers. The fog - an exaggeration? No. That actually happened. Wizards? No. But it would have been cool. In retrospect, I think animals with antlers are likely something I would normally avoid. However, this one caught me by surprise. For all baby deer with antlers reading this post, I give you a warm invitation to visit me anytime you like. Bonus points if you catch me off guard.

Another thing I like about Victoria: everyone says, 'Thank you', when getting off the bus. I realize the possibility that this may be customary for lots and lots of people. However, I've sat on many buses where people do not say thank you upon their departure. To see people saying thank you stop after stop in Victoria... did it get old? Nope. If only the subway and light-rail-transit systems gave us the ability to thank the train operators. There is often a door in the way prohibiting our gratitude. In fact, I usually don't know what the train operator even looks like. I never seem 'em. While using the new train system in Vancouver recently, I was made aware of the fact that there wasn't a train operator driving the car at all - driving the car that I was moving in. After being made aware of this fact, my first thought was: this kind of set up seems like a bad idea all around. Like the bad sci-fi movie where thousands of people jump at the chance to trust the computers because the computers can do what humans can't. And then NASA launches the first spaceship ever to be boarded by the common public, and without a pilot to boot because hey, we can mount cameras in the side of the spaceships head - far superior to any man's peripheral vision. And then after the spaceship crashes and lots of people perish, Ed Harris smacks himself in the head for not having hired Admiral Ackbar who's peripheral vision is well complimented by an acute awareness for traps and mishaps. But then my second thought was: hey there's a fully certified professional sitting somewhere in an office nearby watching a dozen monitors for intruders of the rail. And he's got laser beams firing in all directions just in case damsels and other children fall on the tracks in distress. Not bad lasers. But the good ones that alert you when something is interfering. And that's when I got off the train.

I got off the train to beautiful soaking wet Vancouver. Sarcasm? No. I really do like Vancouver. And I really do like the rain soaking wet. I like it as much as I like rambling in a blog that I need to visit more frequently - particularly early in the morning. But Vancouver provided me with an insight: for those who tend to buy their pants ever-too long, you're probably going to be pant-less sooner than the next individual that happens to be more picky in his or her sizing. I'm referring to the classic pant on heel drag: when the back of the pant leg creeps up underneath the heel of your shoe and then gets tattered and tattered until it blows right through the hem and into an array of torn denim that goes, "Hey, I've had these pants a little bit too long". I do not know for sure whether or not this is more problematic in damp weather. I am neither a scientist, nor a pant doctor. However, all I can think of is that moment when upon taking off your shoes in a friend's house, you go to walk across the carpet and the wet cuff of your pants that once lay under your shoe moves forward to a position under the heel of your sock. And now, not only are you well on your way to having a blown out array of denim, but you are now a person with wet socks. And, you are likely tracking mud through your friend's house. My mom always told me not to track mud through the house of a friend. That's not true. But you shouldn't.

Kelowna has been very nice. We played to a new restaurant known as 'The Greenroom'. On our second night in Kelowna we played at the Minstrel. Thank you to all those who came out to support our music on the recent 'Sarah Cole CD Release' mini-tour. It was a really nice opportunity to meet some new people and see some good friends too. As of now I am looking forward to coming back home. Thank your transit operator, and if possible, choose to wear pants that fit properly. Abruptly, and sincerely, t.

Giant Pumpkin Questions

2009-10-09T10:28:00.000-07:00

I have all kinds of questions upon seeing this photo:

1. How much does a pumpkin like this cost?

2. How does one safely pick up a pumpkin of this size WITHOUT the severe risk of: (a) killing someone; (b) puncturing the pumpkin; or (c) killing the pumpkin?

3. Is it big enough I could hide in it and surprise children?

4. Or is it ONLY big enough that a child could hide in it and surprise me?

5. If I rolled this pumpkin down the hill in Okotoks (a.k.a.) Centre Ave., what kind of cars would be in real trouble?

6. Can one insure a pumpkin of this size?

7. How many seeds will it provide?

8. How many pies?!

9. What does the hollowed out inside of the pumpkin sound like?

10. How big a knife would one need to carve the pumpkin?

If you have any trouble seeing the pumpkin visit the link below. #28.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/10/autumn_scenes.html

Giant Pumpkin

2009-10-09T10:16:00.001-07:00

Big Rock Candy Mountain

2009-09-19T14:24:00.001-07:00

The Collegium

2009-09-19T11:11:00.001-07:00

Played a show last night to a very nice bunch of people at the
Collegium in Kelowna. The Collegium is a student space designed by
Trinity Baptist Church. It includes a lounge area, a kitchen area and
laundry services as well. But it's different than the average student
space. On an evening such as last night, a team of volunteers organize
food for everyone, appetizers and virgin cocktails. And students are
shuttled over from the nearby UBCO campus. I was taken back by not
only how much amazing organization took place, but by the positive
energy that surrounded the room. It was encouraging to see such a
great student program take place. And we met some great people. Thank
you to all who came out last night to listen to some music and have
some snacks. After a long drive from Calgary, nothing made me more
happy than the opportunity to play some music for you. And thank you
to Steve for sharing the stage with Sarah and myself. Off to Vancouver
now to play at Lugz Coffee House with Gillian Hobbs. Gonna see some
friends and enjoy a little bit of humidity while we can.

Wishing anyone who reads this a fantastic day!

Tim

2009-09-17T18:31:00.001-07:00

On the road to two shows in BC. Think I'm going to go looking for a
pot of gold. I wish I could have captured the whole rainbow...

2009-07-16T20:45:00.000-07:00

Sarah Cole Studio Day

2009-07-16T20:41:00.001-07:00

Seasonal writing disorder

2009-07-16T20:39:00.001-07:00

On my way to Calgary right now. I've been doing lots of recording with
Sarah this week, and Matt and Keith. Right now the weather has picked
up. Everything feels a little bit fresh - a little bit new. If there
was anything stale left to dry my ambitions this past winter I'd say
it has shaken itself. I'm excited to record, and I'm excited to write.
It feels like a few new doors have opened - new ways to be creative.
Sarah Cole - check out her album when it's all finished in a few
months. We're all pretty excited on our end!

I'll post some more pics this week.

Tim

2009-07-16T20:30:00.000-07:00

Summer Skies

2009-07-16T20:27:00.001-07:00

2009-06-20T20:30:00.001-07:00

2009-03-12T16:27:00.000-07:00

Report Card

2009-03-10T07:29:00.000-07:00

Dear Weather,

I'm sorry, but I'm writing to inform you that you have failed SPRING 100. When re-taking the course next year you might consider allowing more time for preparation and thought progression. -30 to a +2 jump in 3 days really has us all confused how you got there. SO... if you could please stop being so ridiculous. Like, really.

Regards,

Tim

Microphones from Star Wars

2009-03-09T01:35:00.000-07:00

Language is a wonderful thing. Admittedly, I don't fluently speak more than one of them. But I did take some French and I did take some Spanish. And after taking both of those subjects I discovered that they were essentially like the trial version software on my brain's hard drive. If I wanted the full expanded version I'd have to buy a plane ticket somewhere and force myself to really learn the ins and outs of the application. This evening though, I had the pleasure of jamming with some individuals who were quite fluent in other languages.

And when I say this, I mean these people were jamming, SINGING in other languages. Straight up, I think this is rad. The remarkably challenging thing about vocal jamming (unless you're scatting) is that not only do you have to project an improvised melody on the spot - but perhaps even lyrics as well?! Well, that's like rapping - except combined with a melody. Let's just appreciate that for a moment. Okay, now do all of that in a second language. WELL... I heard people doing this tonight in English, French and Spanish.

But now, with that introduction, let us throw away reason, skill, and the point of translation. I didn't understand the majority of words that were sung this evening, but I was enjoying every beautiful moment of it. Imagine, a small theatre - perhaps the smallest theatre you've ever been in - 40 people max... but auditorium style, as though an interview panel were there to review your first monologue ever.

The light was dimmed until all I could see were but silhouettes. Some were playing music across from me while others sat in the seats surrounding - joining at times, and watching at others. We were without smoke but the room was fragrant enough and warm enough as to strike an agreeable measure of sterility. I do not like feeling dirty, but on occasion does it not seem that the cleanliness of a room might disagree with the liberty of chaos? It is difficult for the 5 year-old, let alone the 25 year-old, to create chocolate chip cookie dough portraits on the wall of the apartment when there work is constantly being wiped away and sanitized by the mother, or the roommate. A great piece of wisdom I've heard claims, "Play every wrong note like it was the right note - like you meant it." Or at least something to that effect... Well, what if we made every stain like it was the right stain - like we meant it. Yes, it would probably look a little bit odd, but boy would we all be a heck of a lot more self-confident - and infrequent in our purchasing of garments for that matter.

But back to the theatre. The microphone that was being sung into... look above.

At this point you might say, "Oh! Tim, no need to explain. I understand. Like a wrestling ring. I get it. Yeah, that's awesome!" But, I really need to explain more. A man plugged my violin into an amp and without any pedals managed to make it sound very nice. Straight across from me stood another stranger whom I had never met. He looped a bass solo, beat boxed overtop of a groove that he had piped through the system on his computer and then proceeded to play music to me on another violin. The evening was looking up!

Behind us played the video images of hands transforming sand into horses and then men, and then storms. But this chorus of strangers - we were the soundtrack. There was little conversation, but much said. And when I had contributed what seemed appropriate, I turned off the amplifier that was graciously provided, unplugged my violin, and left the room to the sound of flutes, congas, guitars and techno. I returned to a wintery Edmonton, but with all the more reason to appreciate this community all that much more.

To these new friends,

Merci, Gracias, Thank you.

Egg Rooms

2009-02-28T13:03:00.000-08:00

Matt drew this picture when we were in the studio. I have always kept it. I think it's nice that there are two of them. Every egg deserves a friend. But I believe there is only one watching television, and they certainly own a double bed. So my question is, where did the other one go to?

Welcome to the Journal of Tim Smith

2009-02-26T23:02:00.000-08:00

www.betweensongs.blogspot.com

Welcome to a virtual page where I will be posting thoughts, and colorings, and photographs, and maybe even videos of moving people on occasion. It's gonna be a vacation for my brain, and fingers crossed, your brain too. But I suppose that'll depend on where all these ramblings lead.

I've maintained a blog before. I've felt fond of a blog before... I've felt responsible for a blog. And like many people, I've watched a blog die in an angry fit of apathy. It's a disheartening place to visit. But luckily we’re not there now! Now is entirely the opposite. Now, is about birthing a small digital scrapbook and finding a new home for it. (A task that could require a new set of crayons).

Why now? Well, I talked it over with myself and decided it was time. I'm going to be going out on the road with my friends on a trek to Vancouver. A tour of sorts. And what better way to remember a road trip than with some crayons, a camera, a pen, and a mobile telephone. Random? Oh yeah. But a bucket of fun with 5 bucket holders for everyone.

We're gonna drive. We're gonna sing.. We're gonna meet new people. And I'm gonna write to tell you all about it. And then after we’re back, I'm gonna write to even tell you about the days that were about 4.5 times less exciting. Because let's face it, those days come around sometimes, but they’re worth making better when we can. I wish you all a glorious afternoon.

Stay tuned, Subscribe, Wash, Rinse, Fold, Repeat.

yours truly,

mr. tim smith