Reflection

Well, I'm back.
I've had a pretty busy summer, promoting the new album, "Wondering Where the Rush Has Gone". At the end of the summer, I felt pretty burned out and was feeling the wear of what felt like two and a half straight years of making and promoting records.
And in fact that was essentially the truth. I went in to the studio to record "In Transit" in July '07 and then released it in Nov '07. We promoted that for 8 months and then I began writing for the new record, hitting the studio on October '08, a year ago next week to be exact. We released the new CD in June and toured through the summer to promote it. And the fact is, I am proud of the hard work that was done and very proud of the albums themselves. But I have to admit that I had hoped my career would be in better shape than it is now. I've been hard at it for close to 8 years and don't feel that I've made as many advances as I wish I could have by now.
So I needed to take some time to reflect and decide what my priorities are. Which is what I've done this fall.
I've realized that I really haven't been enjoying music for some time now. That was a shocking realization. I needed to find a way to change that. I needed to start having fun playing music again. I may not have direct control over the success of my career but I do have control over doing what I enjoy.
Ironically, as soon as I came to the decision that I wanted to start enjoying music, I did start enjoying it and I've also had some great successes...
I'm off to perform an official showcase at the Ontario Council of Folk Festivals next month. It's a great opportunity for me to showcase my new songs in front of festival programmer from across Canada and the world.
I really believe the material on the new CD is ideal for the folk festival circuit, a world I've really been trying to break in to.
My hope is that next summer, I'll be playing each week at another folk festival...
Fingers crossed.

New CD out now!

The new CD is available now through iTunes! I'm super excited.

Also, the new website is now launched. It's my first ground up build of a site and I plan on tweaking it as I learn more about the whole process...

This Friday, we'll be playing a CD release concert. We had an excellent dress rehearsal but I'm hoping that the saying "bad dress, good show", doesn't apply!

In other news, I've been busy producing the Wheat Pool's new album. We just finished tracking last week and now it's off to mix.

Looking forward to getting out on the road and playing the new stuff live.

Make sure you check out the website for dates near you!

Summer is a'coming!

Summer is almost here!

That means that my CD will be out soon too and touring to follow! I'm pretty excited though at the moment, a little on the overwhelmed side.

The artwork is completed, the venues are booked and the tickets are printed...
And despite it all coming together so smoothly, I'm still convinced I've forgotten not just something, but a million things...

Here's some good news! We'll be releasing the new album on Shameless Records! They are the home of many great bands and close friends of mine including The Wheat Pool, Nick Perreault, Deon Blyan and F&M.

So look for a new website coming soon and make sure you download or pick up a copy on the new CD "Wondering Where the Rush Has Gone", on June 9th when it hits iTunes and stores across Canada! And enjoy this beautiful Spring. Maybe see you at a show!

Live on CBC

Make sure you tune in to to Canada Live on CBC Radio 2 across the nation from 8pm-10pm on March 21st to hear a broadcast of James' concert at the Yukon Arts Centre, recorded April 2nd, 2008.

I'm pretty excited to hear it myself!

Things are coming along smoothly for the CD release. We are expecting a release date of June 9th, with a release tour to follow.

Be sure to join the mailing list. If you are a member you'll have the opportunity to download a track which won't be available on the new CD.

Click here to join.

The Pharmacist..

I had no idea before today that there even was a 6 AM!

At any rate, I'm up and about to head out the door to go be in a movie! The scene is being shot at a local punk club. I'll be playing the role of the guitarist in a Goth band..?? Chris, the drummer in my band will be playing drums too.

The movie, entitled The Pharmacist is a movie being shot here in Edmonton and stars Clinton Carew. Clinton was the director for my video, Transportation and was nominated for a Western Canadian Music Award for it.

I hear we'll have our choice of either Tim Horton's OR Starbucks coffee, on set! This is the big time folks!

New Album name....

Been a little busy as of late.
Sorry for my lack of presence in the blogging department...
The band and I have been busy with photo shoots, mix approvals, touring arrangements and a the other cool things that the music biz entails...
After the original songs for the album were recorded, I wrote a few more songs that I felt were strongest I'd written in a while, so just when I though the record was done, we went back in to my studio and tracked 2 more songs.
John Whynot is now working away, mixing the record and I gotta say, so far, it sounds really awesome!
Dustin Delfs and his assistant Micheal of Laughing Dog Photography were extremely generous in donating an incredible photo shoot for the album artwork.
The photos are now off with Nick Perreault, who designed the award winning artwork of my last record, In Transitwhere he is putting together the new artwork.
Now.... The answer to the burning question.... What's the name of the record?
Drum roll....
"Wondering Where The Rush Has Gone".

My friend Jon Nordstrom just popped by. Jonny has played bass with the band for almost 8 years now. He lives in Calgary now but was up to go to an Oilers' hockey game.
He dropped off a small Christmas gift; an edited video documenting the making of our doomed record, "Rise & Fall". It was a record that was never released, due to several reasons, primarily being that my record label wasn't crazy about it, which was too bad because the band and I were very proud of it...
At any rate, Jonny edited together an hour long documentation of the process, including our 3 day drive up to the Yukon, where the recording took place.
It re-invigorated my love of that record. I've actually re-recorded a couple of the songs which will be included on my upcoming CD, due in the spring. I'll try to post a few snippets of the video on my website in the next week or so.