Notes from the Road – Antioch CA. @ The Mutiny

I've decided to finally to something with all the pictures I've been taking when we play shows. So keep an eye out for new blog updates called -- Notes from the Road. Here's the first of many...

In 2008 we played a small town called Antioch in California at a bar call The Mutiny. The night Bobby learned a valuable lesson.

During the show, Davey and I noticed that Bobby was not around to watch the other bands. Later, we found out that someone bought him beers and shots at the bar on the lower level. Normally we don't drink when we play a show and here’s a good example why.

I knew we were in trouble when we played the first song -- I mean tried to play the first song. We might as well have handed the guitar to a monkey in diapers, cause Bobby could barely play. That was the longest set of my life, good thing everyone else was drunk. It’s odd that everyone whooped it up, as if they didn't notice the tragedy unfolding on stage. I guess when the music is loud and the audience wasted you can't go wrong. Then it happened, the police showed up and shut down the show. They must have heard how bad we were playing. We were told about a noise curfew after 1am. Small towns, go figure. I couldn’t have been more happier.

I have a theory about drinking and playing music. I think you need to start drinking when you start playing otherwise the booze to music ratio is totally fucked. I know if I drink and play music I'll forget lyrics, lose my finger position on the bass, and burp a lot. What a lovely image that is.

I have also noticed in our travels that often when a band calls for the audience to bring them beer, the band SUCKS. This is especially true when they call for the audience to bring them shots, and 100% guaranteed when they call for booze before they even play the first song.

At the bar someone informed me that Ed Hardy was once a respectable tattoo artist before his art was put on clothes for duchebags.

Now that’s what I call art.

The sun shined while a soft breeze rustled the trees. Like Mayberry from The Andy Griffith Show, but with punk rock music.

-Jimmy

Tony Parker - Calabrese Cthulhu Art

Here’s more monster art that we have not ended up using yet. This Calabrese Cthulhu piece was commission from Tony Parker.



Tony delivered us a black and white piece that we requested, but afterwards we wanted to add some color. We sent it to D.W. Frydendall who added a touch of red and our logo for the final rendition.

-Jimmy

Calabrese Crime Scene Winners!

Here are the winners of last month's vague art contest. In no particular order:

Rhiannon Faurie

Noah Bailey

Acey Morgue

Danny D.

Andrew Snyder

Rudey Fascist

Matt Coffin

Psychodavid
I stood alone in the hallway staring at the door to my apartment. I started to go for my keys but stopped. I knew the door wasn't locked. I slowly reached for the door knob, but quickly drew my hand back. I heard someone inside coming close to the door. Alex, my accomplice in all of this, was getting people away from the door and talking quite loudly. I assumed it was so I would hear him. He was getting people into position for my surprise. But the surprise was on them. And the surprise was great.
I took a deep breath and grabbed the door knob. I threw the door open and walked inside, cool and casual like nothing was going to happen.
"Surprise!" everyone yelled, all smiles, except for Alex.
He sat across the room from me just staring, a blank expression on his face. His hand twitched and I nodded. I reached for my back where the two Colt .45's rested, wedged into my pants. With one steady swoop I pulled the guns to the front of me. The room fell deathly silent and I opened fire. Alex stood and did the same. Each gun blast signaled another death of the yuppie squids I called "friends". I paused for a second to reload and continued into the room. The party was really starting to get interesting. People were running and trying to hide behind tables and chairs. Trying to save their pathetic lives. I turned to watch for the door and blasted away each person that ran for it. I continued walking into the room backwards until Alex and I were back to back. Sometime during the event he had also turned. We started spinning slowly, shooting in a full 360 until I could see no survivors.
Betty Bloodshed


They will all receive a set of first edition BODYBAG Trading Cards from Troy Holbrook and the full collection of Calabrese Stickers.

-Jimmy

Calabrese Comic - Sneak Peek

We are starting to ramp up the Calabrese comic that we are working on with Modern Mythology Press. I thought I'd share some pencils that Dave Baker has sent us, so you can get a taste of things to come.

-Jimmy

Calabrese Spider Skull Art

Here's more Calabrese artwork that we have not explored yet. We commissioned this from the deadly and talented Tjie Tsang ( http://cadaver.perception.net/ ) .

A sketch of things to come.


Tjie sent us some color choices, reminds me of Andy Warhol.

-Jimmy

Stage Fright - Possession Of A Mind

Ok, I'll admit it. I've had stage fright now and again, and as a matter of fact I've just overcome a recent bout. I think everyone has at least a case of the jitters once in a while. It's not that burst of adrenalin before you hit the stage, stage fright is different... it's evil. People forget that performers are alone onstage while it's the audience who are part of a crowd. If the performer loses sight of the role they play, their thoughts will creep up like a Nazi saboteur and shoot them in the head, exploding brain goo across the stage and into the mouths of the audience.

Stage fright is a mental "psych out", which can come in many forms, lately mine hit as a state of panic. While playing the song Voice of the Dead I hit a wrong note during the chorus, instead of just correcting myself (and forgetting about it) my mind raced at hurricane speeds at the error. Instead of moving forward I started to worry that I was going to screw up the next time we hit the chorus and sure enough I looked down at my fingers and fret board and didn't recognize them. I had no clue what I was doing, my mind was blank, nothing sounded right, I felt I had amnesia. For the longest time I'd keep asking myself "Why is this happening?" I'd worry: "Will I remember all the notes I'm supposed to play?" and "How will my mind keep track of all the harmonies and melodies?" This kind of thinking spiraled like blood down the shower drain, my fear of playing the wrong note gave me anxiety about going blank, which made me dread going on stage.

While pondering my dilemma I was helped by a blog post from Seth Godin, here's a section of that post...

"The first group sang a note-for-note rendition of a song by the Stones. The notes were right, but nothing else was. The singer didn't know what the song meant. And the musicians, they just stood there. No energy, no smiles, no connection. It could have been a funeral with a great soundtrack. A concert isn't about the music, is it? "


What the hell? Why did I forget this? Why am I striving for perfection when the bands I love are punk bands? Who gives a shit if Johnny Ramone ever played one wrong note? I love music for it's energy, emotion, and power, our live shows should reflect that. It's not "Guitar Hero" where every note counts, it's a mathematical equation where the show is greater than the parts.

What finally set my mind straight was a book called "Write Is A Verb". There is a chapter in the book where the author talked about when he first started giving speeches, he said " If you are nervous during a speech your focus is at the wrong place. If you are focusing on how you look or on your heartbeat you aren't paying attention to the audience".


That passage made sense. I needed to put my focus back on the audience and not on myself. The role of the audience is to be entertained and to root for the performer. It's not a battle with the audience, it's give and take. If I'm thinking then I can't focus on just playing music.

So I tested these ideas during the last few shows and they worked, I felt relaxed, confident and had a blast. Instead of struggling and fighting myself for perfection I just let go of my ego and like a young Jedi, I found the Force within me. I'm a strong believer in the power of the mind and of positive thinking - It's not always easy to practice.

-Jimmy

FANGORIA EXCLUSIVE!

Wow, I can happily be murdered now, Fangoria.com has picked up the THE GRAVES/Calabrese horror music video for an exclusive preview.

The people behind the new horror feature THE GRAVES gave Fango a whole bunch of fresh material today—including an exclusive first look at their tie-in music video for the Calabrese song “Vampires Don’t Exist,” which intercuts performance footage of the horror-rock band with lots of grisly snippets from the movie. We also got some exclusive comments from cinematographer Adam Goldfine and pics of him on the set, plus the latest character/teaser poster. Feast your eyes on it all below the cut!

Read more...

 -Jimmy

THE GRAVES TEASER POSTER #1

Here's a little teaser poster for the horror movie debut of Calabrese…I think our screen time is less than 1 minute but screen time is screen time.

http://www.thegravesmovie.com/

"Best Soundtrack" at the 2009 Backseat Film Festival

Thanks to the musical genius that is Calabrese, Blood on the Highway has won "Best Soundtrack" at the 2009 Backseat Film Festival. Ok, the other bands might have helped too.


Check out the Official Website if you don't believe me...
http://www.backseatfilmfestival.com/bff_09/bff_2009_home.html

Best Soundtrack - Blood on the Highway – Dir. Barak Epstein & Blair Rowan

http://www.bloodonthehighway.com/

-Jimmy

"The Graves" Cast & Crew Screening

The other night I went to the cast and crew screening of "The Graves." It was great to see everyone from the crew again. It was even better to watch the movie with an audience on the big screen.


"The Graves" has it's share of blood and violence but what really hooked me were the "cat and mouse" scenes set under the hot Arizona sun. The production, sound, cinematography were top notch and the acting from Clare Grant and Bill Moseley were excellent. I don't want to make this a "spoiler" so you'll need to buy a ticket and check it out for yourself.


If you have not checked out the official "The Graves" website and "The Graves" myspace, do so now! It's so cool to see Calabrese featured as part of the cast as "themselves" along side Bill Moseley and Tony Todd.


Calabrese music has been featured in indie horror movies before but this is the first time we are featured in a film, it's about time!

[Pictured Above]
Brian Pulido (Writer, Director) with the Ronald Brothers (The Producers) on stage introducing the film and giving thanks to the cast and crew.

The release date is currently set for 2010. Eternal Entertainment will also be releasing a music video for the movie featuring our song "Vampires Don't Exist". No release date set for that video but stay tuned!

-Jimmy

Zombie Beauty Pageant - Phoenix Comicon 2009

Bobby and I had a great time as judges for the 2009 Phoenix Comicon "Zombie Beauty Pageant". We were honored to be invited as "celebrity" judges. We didn't know any of the details when we arrived and I was wondering if they were going offer us the microphone to give our scores and heckle the contestants but it was a pretty low key job. We just sat back, cracked jokes, laughed, and enjoyed the show.

After picking up some coffee at the Kwiki Mart Bobby and I pulled into the parking lot of the Mesa Convention Center. I was pleased to see that 10pm on a Thursday night the parking lot was full. The event was a rather large affair with a stage, P.A., and spotlights. For some reason, I had imagined the Pageant would be held outside or in a small stuffy conference room.


The other Celebrity Judges were:

Dean Lorey - Writer: "Jason Goes To Hell", "My Boyfriend's Back" (zombie comedy), and "Arrested Development". Dean was a very funny guy. He told me about his newest book kids book, Nightmare Academy" which sounded like a Harry Potter type of story.

Nicki DeAndrea - "Phoenix NewTimes"Music Editor. I didn't get to talk to her but she did tell Dean "Calabrese is a really great band", so she's alright in my book.

Vyle - Owner of Curioser and Curiouser and Bizarre Noir. She's a very nice lady and very much a character. She just oozes personality. I have not been to her stores yet but from reading these reviews I'm heading down there to check it out.
http://www.yelp.com/biz/curiouser-and-curiouser-phoenix


Brian Pulido (Creator, Writer, Producer of comic books and films) was the Mystery Guest host this year and was right at home working the stage cracking jokes and testing the audience with his vast knowledge of Zombie trivia.



When Hell is full the dead will walk the stage.


Andrea Beasley-Brown (The Midnight Movie Mamacita) showing off the prizes.


The prizes looked pretty cool too; Todd McFarland collectables, Hellboy collectables, some gift certificates (can't remember from where), Lady Death Comics and other stuff I can't remember.


The Arizona Ghost Busters rounding up the Zombie Contestants to announce the winners.

And the winner of the 2009 Zombie Beauty Pageant is................


Heather, who immediately took a bite out of Bobby after this picture was taken.

Congrats!

-Jimmy