(My trusty canine Juno guards the doorway to Pastry Park Audio Confectionery)

In the interest of getting right to the meat & potatoes, I shall endeavor (for once) to keep this short & sweet.

Our “man behind the curtain”, Mr. Michael Saint-Leon scored his second Grammy recently, for his work on Christone “Kingfish” Ingram’s latest. Here’s to Street-Lion, for another job well done. Just look at that cheese-eatin’ grin. He knows he’s the shizz.

 

 

 

When we can’t secure his knob-twiddling skills, we occasionally have to go DIY on this stuff, so Corey & I captured a bit of that on video, and you can check us out in action HERE & HERE, should you aspire to the self-engineering, home studio lifestyle.

 

 

 

Eventually though, all of this stuff lands back in his capable hands, and ends up sounding like actual professionals were in on the whole thing. Case in point, this preview, which is scheduled to self destruct at midnight on Saturday, May 7th, giving you until Mother’s Day Eve to spin to your heart’s content…or not. Whatever you decide, we’ll be calling this one “When Love Is The Drug”, and it is slated to be part of the new record we’ve been toiling over these past few weeks and months. We’re about 5 or 6 songs deep at this juncture, and you can probably count on this, and at least one or two more getting proper “single” releases ahead of the full LP’s arrival. For now, HERE’s a taste…

 

 

In other news, both Rizzo & Matt made appearances on the A-Sides Podcast since our last transmission, one to discuss the Grunge Era, and the other to…well, I don’t know….Matt’s was kinda free-form, a bit like some of that Jazz he professes admiration for. You can hear for yourself by clicking HERE or HERE.

We did a couple of shows, and got a good clip of “Lies” from Marion, IL that you can feast your eyes and ears on HERE, along with some footage and assorted pics by our buddy Rick Miller from the Libertyville, IL date that you can peruse HERE.

 

 

We’ve got a private event coming up in June, in the midst of all this recording business, and a local show on Thursday, July 7th, with Black Heart Saints(TX), and Native Sons(KY) at The Mockingbird Theater in Franklin, TN. It’s all ages, with us kicking off the night, and you can get your tickets for just $10 in advance HERE, or take your chances at the door(they’ll be $15 day of show, just FYI). This is gonna be a good one, so we hope a bunch of you Nashville folks can make it.

 

 

Finally, ladies, we regret to inform you that our bassist Matt Andersen will be stepping down from his duties as our most eligible bachelor, and tying the knot at the end of the month. We’re currently establishing a grief counseling hotline number, so please check back here for further details as they become available. We intend to do our best to help you cope, and see you through this difficult time. Stay strong. There’s someone out there for you, we just know it.

I kinda failed at the brevity thing….again.

Sorry.

 Be good to each other,
   D.

Yeah, I know, it’s been a solid month & a half since our last proper update, but in the interest of waiting until we had some newsworthy bits to discuss, we inadvertently racked up a whole mess of stuff to cover, so you might wanna pack some extra snacks and a water bottle for this trek.

 

 

 

Kenny’s 10 yr. anniversary of going from “the sub” to “the guy” behind the kit came and went last month. Matt got him a card and some chocolates that appeared to be post-Valentines Day discount offerings. Also, the package wasn’t sealed, and all the nougat-filled pieces were missing. It was weird. The card was nice though, if a tad romantic.

 

 

I taped another appearance on the A-Sides Podcast. with my buddy Andy Halleen, this time around engaging in a long-form discussion on the subject of Dokken. We go deep on wardrobe choices, cheesy videos, Don’s possible involvement in the martial arts, questionable hairstyles, and so much more. You can give that a listen HERE.

 

 

We dropped some more new merch over at our StoreFrontier page, including Hoodies and Koozies with our new “Est. 2009” seal design. You can check those out(and place your orders) HERE.

Rare slow-motion footage of us working out some of our patented choreography surfaced recently. Check THIS out, but don’t try it at home, kids. We’re trained professionals.

 

 

Speaking of kids, here’s Logan, our newest Swag Model Of The Month, sporting a now-vintage ‘Dream In Stereo’ design. Logan enjoys parasailing, gardening, MMA, and betting on college sports. He can also currently deadlift 240 lbs., and recently competed in his first triathlon. Sorry, ladies, he’s taken.

 

 

We recently hit the road for a pair of Mississippi dates, and while the shows were good, our trusty Jean-Claude Damme Van’s tailpipe fell off just as we were about to roll through Memphis, en route to Clarksdale…and again IN Memphis, then once more, the next day, as we made our way to Tupelo, and finally, later that night, somewhere in the middle of nowhere, while we limped our trusty steed home. Various implements were utilized to hastily refasten our exhaust system, but HERE, see for yourself. (Note: JCDV is purring now, and has a shiny new muffler n’ such, but I’m sorry to say our bank balance is significantly smaller than it was when we took off for the Delta.)

 

 

I played on a record recently, for some friends of ours called Ghosts Of Sunset. Their new LP ‘No Saints In The City’ is out now, on Golden Robot Records, and if you check out their current single, “The Queen Of Used To Be”, you’ll hear me taking a rare turn at lead guitar. Other guests on the album include current and former members of L.A. Guns, Little Caesar, The Verve Pipe, LSD, Enuff Z’Nuff, and more. It’s good stuff. I highly recommend you check it out, if you dig 80’s Glam Rock and/or Power Pop.

 

 

Finally, for the real news, CLICK HERE .

 

 

That’s right, we have officially started work on Album #8.

Round One of tracking focused on getting our rhythm section’s parts for 8 tunes, and now Rizzo & I will be moving on to guitars, while we continue to do some writing and haggle over what songs we wanna lay down in Round Two.

 

 

Fever Breaks, When Love Is The Drug, Sleepwalker, Way Past Sundown, Over The Moon, StrangeLuv, Gettin’ Outta Sight, and Embers are in motion, but we still need another gem or two before we can declare this deal done. We might have them already, it’s always hard to say, but since there’s no rush, we’re gonna take our time weeding through the remaining contenders, and attempting to pluck any new goodness from the ether that comes within reach.

What can I tell you about the new stuff? Well, I don’t generally tend to get too excited about these things, until I notice other folks getting amped-up over the material, but this time around, about midway through the writing and demoing process, I started to get the feeling we’d stumbled into something special with the most recent batch. It was like we truly needed to knock a little of the proverbial rust off, before we could really get down to business, and once we had, some tunes materialized that were a clear cut above. As Kenny and Matt were replacing the stand-in Bass & Drums on those tracks over the weekend, it was obvious we had an especially strong grip of hooks, and I’m now officially stoked to see what we can do with them.

You’ll be able to judge for yourself though, because I’m gonna guess that sometime in the not-so-distant future, you might see a new single/video appear…a little peek at what we’ve been up to these past few months.

In the meantime, HERE’s quick clip of Kenny laying down some drums on something we call “StrangeLuv”.

 

 

I think that hit just about everything that needed hitting, so all that’s left to mention are this pair of shows in Illinois that we have coming up. It’s been a couple of years since we’ve been able to do our thing in Libertyville, so we’re really looking forward to that one, and we’d play John Brown’s joint once a week if they’d have us, but John can only handle us in small, somewhat infrequent doses. Maybe if Matt got him an uncompromised box of chocolates…

  Be good to each other,
 D.

What’s Neil Young been up to lately? You never hear that guy’s name being thrown around anymore.

We boycotted Spotify once, and it cost us tens of listeners.

The result of our insolence? ‘Dream In Stereo’ is still absent from the service, and every single time I’ve tried to restore it, my efforts fail. Apparently the amount of damage WE did to their bottom line left them just disenchanted enough with us to maintain some sort of blockade.

Luckily, they’ve seen fit to include our subsequent releases, and in 2021, we were all finally able to chip-in on a 2-pack of Gillette Clear Gel “Power Rush” Antiperspirant/Deodorant, WITH Scent XTend Technology no less. It was a banner year for us. If you’ve noticed and appreciated that we’re a bit more fragrant these days, please know that you have Spotify to thank.

In addition to improved personal hygiene, we got a local date under our belts last month, logging what may have been our final appearance at the soon-to-be defunct Mercy Lounge. You can check out a clip from our set HERE.

The first show I ever played in Nashville, as a freshly-transplanted pup, was in that building, downstairs at the OG Cannery, with my band Seventeen Days. Our one & only live engagement before we imploded, no document remains, as trusted “roadie”(and occasional videographer) Woody Jester neglected to remove the lens cap from our camcorder at the soundboard. April 1st, 1995(?)..I think…maybe ’94. Either way, the details are fuzzy, but I do recall Benny, the deaf guy who operated the cardboard baler at the warehouse where I worked actually purchased a ticket to the show, and stood directly in front of the P.A. subs, occasionally leaning his head down to “feel” the low frequencies.  I wonder where old Benny is these days?

 

But enough reminiscing, we’ve got some shows coming up, and the possibility of a new album to discuss.

March 4th & 5th, we’re headed down to The Crossroads, like Lightnin’ Boy and Willie Brown, and then cutting over to the birthplace of The King, for back-to-back nights in two of Mississippi’s most sacred locales. Friday we’ll be at Shack Up Inn in Clarksdale, and Saturday at Blue Canoe in Tupelo.

As for this new record idea we’ve been kicking around, it’s looking like we’re about 3/4s of the way there in terms of having the tunes, so I’d say it’s a just matter of time before we start making plans to capture this stuff with our trusty Engineer/Producer Michael Saint-Leon. We even have a tentative album title. Personally, I’m feeling pretty stoked about the batch we all seem to be agreeing on..loads of hooks, big guitars, plenty of interesting little bells & whistles…my kinda jams. Hopefully you’ll concur. Stay tuned for more on that.

If you wanna get some sense of what the current lineup sounds like in the studio, HERE’s a remix of “High On Rose” from the last record, this version featuring Mr. Corey “Rizzo” Rozzoni on lead guitar. It was his birthday yesterday, by the way, so raise your glasses!

While Rizzo’s sipping cocktails somewhere, Kenny & I are gonna be working on some more new tunes over the weekend, getting another demo or two in the can, and seeing if we can’t bring the final pieces of the puzzle together for album #8.

Now, I hate to end one of these transmissions on a somber note, but the band lost a friend recently. Our buddy, and diehard Rock N’ Roll road dog Sean Pruitt unexpectedly passed last month. Sean was one of a kind, a true fan, a guy who championed the bands he was into, going out of his way to spread the gospel wherever and whenever he had a platform to do so. A longtime over-the-road trucker, we were proud to spot our logo, along with a slew of other bands he flew the flag for, displayed on the cab of his rig when we pulled up to a fest in Illinois some years back, and that’s just the tip of the proverbial iceberg in terms of what he did to promote us on his travels.

You’ll be missed, brother. RIP.

Remember, folks, be good to each other.

 Peace,

D.