R.E.M. Blog and Journals

Thanks to everybody who commented on my last blog post! I really appreciate you sharing your playlists with everyone and introducing us to some great new music!

As I was responding to your comments, something hit me. You guys have shown us an incredible ammount of support over the last few years. You've called your local DJs to request our music. You've come to our shows and purchased our CDs. And your votes have caused us to win more contests and get onto more playlists than I could count. Each of you has helped make what we do possible.

Last week was really cool because we had twenty people contribute to our post! But, our anlaytics show that hundreds of people read it. Why is that? I'm not sure. But I feel that it is - at least in some part - due to the fact that so often the creation and delivery of art is a one way street. I want to change that; so I'd like to invite you to take a moment to do three things:

1. Visit atris.wordpress.com (This will be more fun if everyone goes to the same page.)
2. Scroll down to the comment box and introduce yourself. Write a few words about anything you'd like. How did you first hear our music? What city are you from? What are your favorite movies? Pretend we just met at a coffee shop. If you'd like share your blog address, Twitter ID or someplace where we and other people can learn more about you that would be great too!
3. Check the box that says Notify me of follow-up comments via email.

Please don't do this for us, do this for yourself and for everyone. It takes a certain amount of bravery to put yourself out there; but it's worth it. We love to get to know people with similar interests, ideas, and opinions. And it's really cool when group discussions are started. If you have something in common with someone who posts, let him or her know! It makes me feel great to see people responding to my comments, and I love to chime back in to share my thoughts.

Looking forward to meeting you!

-Mason

Hey everyone,

What bands are you listening to? I thought it would be fun for us to get to know each other's musical tastes. If you have a moment and an MP3 player, follow these three steps and drop me a comment with what you get!

1. Turn on your MP3 Player.

2. Navigate to SHUFFLE songs mode.

3. Write down the artist and song title of the 1st 10 songs that come up.

Here's what I got. If you'd like to listen to/purchase any of these tunes just click their title to be directed to the iTunes music store.

David Bowie - Thursday's Child

Bill Evans - Peri's Scope

Tegan and Sara - Hop a Plane

Jimmy Eat World - Your House

Sufjan Stevens - Let's Hear That String Part Again, Beacause I don't Think They Heard It All the Way Out In Bushnell

Coldplay - Amsterdam

Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton - Reading In Bed

Belle & Sebastian - Get Me Away From Here, I'm Dying

Keane - Atlantic

Michael Stipe - In the Sun

Thanks to Pat Donahue, from 107.7 WACC's Notes from the Underground for this idea!

Hey everyone,

Noteflight provides an online suite of tools that artists can use to collaborate on musical scores. Think Google docs, but cooler (I know, we're biased). Check out this glimpse of the new song. I wrote it on the internet. How cool is that? Speaking of coolness, our friend Angie made us a fansite! If you click here you'll be directed to a'tris Nation where you'll find some of the many awesome banners and glitter graphics she's created for us over the years. If you like them, she's made it easy for you to embed them on your site to share them with your friends. Thanks Angie!

Please let Angie know how awesome she is in the below comment box!

Would you like for Reza's music video for "Dark Lotus" to be on TV? If so, will you do two things for us?

1. First, will you watch the video at theindieshow.com?
2. Second, will you take a moment to register and vote for us by following the directions in the below clip?

If you could spare a couple of minutes to do this we'd really appreciate it. Voting is open through 5 April 2010 so you can vote for our music and videos as frequently and as often as you'd like :)

Hope this finds you feeling healthy,

-Mason

P.S. I just saw that we're in the Top 10 Alternative Rock artists on Ourstage again this month. Thanks guys!

So it's been decided, my other project is on emotions.
This is quite ammusing because based on how I dress, when I tell people they assume it's all gonna be doom and gloom!
Lol, I'm doing a page on each emotion, but I'm trying to concentrate on the nice ones, just to prove I can be a shiney happy person withought having to dress like a 1960's golf caddy.

Last time I blogged I asked you guys if you'd like to help us get another tune of ours back on Fame Games by voting for your favorite song. Thanks for responding in a big way! "Black Bird's Song" is now going to be receiving some major exposure as, thanks to you, it will be appearing on Monday's Q show! I'm so glad to see that you like "Black Bird Song"; it's a personal favorite of mine.

For those of you who aren't on Twitter, the guys and I have been tweeting about some really great news this week and I wanted to share some of that with you here. Currently "Automatic Doors" is #1 on Ourstage's Alternative Channel for the second week in a row! There are all kinds of cool prizes to be had for monthly winners so thanks for helping us hold steady at the top :) Two more weeks to go, w00t!

In other cool news, a'tris is currently Globally ranked #71 on ReverbNation's Alternative chart. Just to give you some perspective, over 250,000 bands use ReverbNation to promote their work so we feel really good about that :)

Thanks again for your support!

-Mason

A couple of days ago I blogged about Susan Peter's comments on our lyrics. In response the guys and I received some messages asking if we'd made them available and, if so, where they could be found. The short response could have simply been "no," but - because we try to be a little less curt in our replies, I
thought a more thoughtful answer might be in order:

No.

There is a reason behind this though :) When I sat down with my writing partner, Mike Kreher, years ago and first started talking about what we wanted to do with a'tris we immediately agreed that an emphasis should be placed on the lyrical content as we both felt that much of the landscape of popular music at that time was dominated by acts whose works were seemingly calculated to touch upon every conceivable cliché in order to solicit a response which would lead to quick record sales... In other words, boy bands. And that needed to be fixed.

The two main acts we sited as influences as we began thinking about how to create music that we believed would be accessible but more relevant were Radiohead and R.E.M. We were both big fans of those acts and each of us believed that they embodied what we were looking to do both sonically and lyrically. Radiohead's song forms and structures were different and their harmony could at times be complex, but everything they did had a clear focus and purpose and, for that reason, it just worked. Many of these same ideas were embodied in Michael Stipe's lyrics as well. A lot of his stuff was pretty esoteric and often I would spend hours when I was growing up listening to his records and wondering what he was saying. At some point though, I stopped focusing on what his meaning could have been and started thinking about what the meaning had become. Mike expressed that he felt the same way and suggested that we avoid publishing lyrics in the future.

I could see where Mike was coming from because I had a difficult time understanding Michael Stype's words and could never get what Thom Yorke was saying. (Anyone else find they have that problem, too?) But that was cool because I made up my own words to fill in the gaps.

On a side note - I always wondered if those guys, along with many of the other artists whose works I respected, slurred their words intentionally to make their performances sound cooler or to throw me off or something. Now that I've been accused of making similarly incomprehensible sounds though I believe that this has less to do with intent and more to do with the often spasmodic nature of self-expression.

To try to articulate each word would rob the work of one of its most indelible traits. At the same time, releasing the lyrics would similarly rob listeners of the ability to apply the music we would create to their lives in much the same way that we had both done with R.E.M. and Radiohead's material. But I was (and still am) ridiculously perfectionistic and so I wanted to share them because I would be spending a lot of time creating them. I don't mean to sound self-aggrandizing here but that's honestly how I felt. And would releasing the lyrics really take away from our future listeners' experiences? We were split; but that was okay because, aside from a couple of tunes I'd already written, ("Black Bird's Song" and "Compassion"), we really didn't have any other material.

After a few more chats and many weeks of writing Mike and I finished up the songs, put what was to be the first incarnation of a'tris together, and brought Chuck Sokol on board to engineer appeal. It was in 2004, as we began to plan how to release that album that Chuck settled our debate about the lyrics by siding with Mike. A future publishing deal cemented it and that's the story. As of this time, for the above reasons, no lyrics have been officially released.

Thankfully it looks like I'm not the only one who would like the lyrics to be made available. I just noticed that someone posted lyrics to "Automatic Doors" on SongMeanings.net. And it appears that they made up some of their own words to fill the gaps like I used to :) Whoever you are I support you! If anyone wants to build us our very own Greenplastic.com, while I can't supply you with our lyrics, I'll gladly send you my blessings and gratitude.

-Mason

P.S. Care to hear more about our early years? Tune in to paradizeradio.com this Saturday, 29 August at 4PM EDT and feel free to ask me some questions in the chat room!

Today did not get off to a good start. In an effort to add some new content to a'tris HQ I accidently modified a couple of key files and the whole site came toppling down like a game of Jenga. That's about the only funny analogy I have for that one though because I broke our website... :/

And the refresh button didn't fix it. Nope. But I clicked it a couple of times anyway because it felt better to blame my browser than recognize my carelessness. Venting my frustration on my primary mouse button didn't really get me anywhere though so I finally put on my thinking cap and started to work out what I needed to do.

Long story short (a little over two hours long, to be exact) I was able to get everything up and running again thanks in large part to an application called iWeb Valet developed by Ziggysoft. Maura and the gang at Ziggysoft are fantastic and those 19.00 EUR were well spent. I hope you'll visit atrishq.com now. After all of that I am through with web development; that is one big bag of hurt. I get extremely perfectionistic about things and I'd much rather focus my energy on writing lyrics than on creating, breaking, and rebuilding websites.

Back to lyrics - the guys and I received some fantastic comments from Susan Peters about a couple of our tunes. It's really cool to see such a response to our approach. I've included Susan's words below. What are your thoughts? Do you share her interpretations or do you have some of your own? Leave us some comments and let us know what you think!

Aug 23 2009 7:32 AM:

HAILS FROM COVINGTON, TN.
Thank you for requesting to be added to myspace friend's list. I hope that our friendship will continue to grow. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your world of music. Also, I want to thank you for your patience in my getting back to you. I have been having some Internet Explorer software problems, and like children can be, does not want to respond. So everything gets erased and I have to wait and start all over again. Should you guys get a banner, plz let me know so that I may post it on my profile to help spread the word about your music and for future friends and people who come to visit my site. DARK LOTUS-This song, to me, is about a young human-form who is being primed for a particular task. He no longer has to fear leaving home on this journey set before him. He is no longer attached to his mother's apron strings. He is told to leave. Do not be afraid of what he must do. He has reached maturity. Old enough to be able to flourish and replenish the Earth on his own. The information has been put onto tapes that he was given. Possibly instructions on what the task he has to accomplish. He has grown into manhood. Similar to a Noah's Ark possibly. The music and your vocals are amazing. The different octaves that you are capable of reaching are just phenomenal. The music is sooo visionary along with the lyrics. I can see in my mind what you are singing, but it is really hard to put into the proper wording that I have described. It is as if this young man has a gift. That possibly by touching something, he is able to provide life, rebirth to what has remained dead in the Earth. Great job. I love the song and the lyrics. Continued.

Aug 23 2009 7:33 AM:

AUTOMATIC DOORS-I am just sooo stoked on this music that you guys are providing me. This song has started by the light that is sooo bright it is blinding people. Life is short. A conversation has begun about how everyone is doing. Some people do not feel that great. Do they imagine what might be after life? People are afraid of possibly wanting to travel farther away than their front doors. Not wanting to take a chance and take that step that will put them in a place of insecurity. A place unknown to their small minds. The insight that you have on the world is astounding. Money is the root of all evil. We are pieces on the governments chessboard and they play us where they want us. They tell us only what we want to hear not what is actually happening. We are just letters on a piece of paper. Love the song. Great job. LIGHT AND SHADOWS-This guy is reading from some sort of a transcript that he does not particular believe to people who are listening, but then after reading this passage, he comments to the people and tries to say that he did not mean what he said. So here he is trying to concede and explain what he said that was out of context. He is of political stature. The workforce is at a standstill. He is clouding his speech. Trying to whitewash it. Telling the people stating that he is not responsible for the problems at hand. Curfews are set. Marshall Law has come into play. Houses being ransacked. To me, the light and shadows are the half-truths and lies they conceive as truths. Continued.
Susan Baker Peters

Aug 23 2009 7:33 AM

THIS MORTAL ENGINE-I love the intro to this song. An accident has happened. He had a dream about the two of them on the beach. He awoke from his dream and believed that she was there. He was able to trace every line ofwhat she looked like in his mind. She faded in and out of his mind. He believes in his mind's eye that this is how life ends. Reality has set in. He is remembering the ambulance sirens. He is remembering the conversation the two of them had before the accident. She told him that this is how healing begins. It starts with remembering. Putting things in perspective. She came to him in a vision and spoke to him, telling him this. Love the story. I hope that this was not an actual event in your life. How sad I feel for you to have lost a loved one so soon in your lifetime. This song brought tears to my eyes. You put such feeling into your songs. I loved it. CACTUS BRIDE-Bridal invites are being sent out by the groom. He is wanting people to arrive bearing very expensive gifts. He is requesting that people arrive in casual attire. The party is in the streets, kind of like a block party which is out of character for a party before the wedding. He is getting bored and his patience is being tested. This is all a fascade. The plastic and artificial rules and regs of getting married. These so-called formalities of a party before the wedding. I have enjoyed every single piece that you have written, played, sung. The whole band was such a joy to listen to. Will continue to keep in touch with you..Kisses, Susan

I saw this article on Cult of Mac today and thought you might enjoy it. It appears that police in Notts have taken some creative measures to help you protect your iPods. Follow the link below to Cult of Mac to learn more about how to keep your a'tris albums safe :)

Do you leave coveted goods like iPods in plain sight around the house and forget to lock doors? Well, if you live in Nottingham, England you just might find a police officer dressed up as “Burglar Bill” entering your residence to teach you a lesson. The charade is being staged to teach locals to wise up after [...]

Via Cult of Mac

P.S. I composed this in two seconds with Blogo blogging editor! If you'd like to grab a free copy you have a couple of days left to throw your hat in. See the details in my previous blog at atris.wordpress.com. Thanks to Blogo you can expect far more posts from me now. I just paired it up with a free news reader called Net News Wire and it makes sharing interesting articles so much easier! If you haven't subscribed to our RSS Feed please do so. I'll be updating this far more regularly now. Woot!

Hey everyone,

It's been a while. Hope things are going well for you! I just received a fantastic e-mail today from my writing partner, Michael Kreher. Our friends at ReberbNation have selected the video we shot to thank Microsoft for making "Dark Lotus" available on their Windows Myspace page to be featured on many of their web properties! This is an awesome exposure opportunity for us so we are very grateful to both companies for helping us move forward. I'll keep you posted when our video hits the sites!

On another cool note, tonight at 9PM CST I will be sitting down to talk with Joey from Wildgoo Radio. Wildgoo has over 125,000 listeners so I'm really hoping that everyone of them buys our records :) Be sure to tune in to show your support at Wildgoo.com

So, as I believe I mentioned in my last post, lately my life has been consumed by creating an Open Mic for Charlottesville's musical community. I'm really excited to say that the first even last Thursday went over extremely well. We had 11 artists come out to share their music and were graced with a featured performance by Brian Patrick! If you live around the Charlottesville area I hope that you'll come out to join us tomorrow night. Obviously, many of you live outside of Virginia, and many more outside of the United States - for that matter - so I am working to give you a little window into our fun by digging into wireless internet streaming solutions. I hope to be able to share some progress with you on that end soon so that you can check out some of the fantastic local talent here and maybe catch an unreleased a'tris song or two. :)

Hope this finds you feeling healthy! -Mason

P.S. I received the below message from a friend of ours named Owen on Twitter. His charity, Rage Arts, gives children the opportunity to work alongside professionals to create film, theater, and music productions. My bandmates and I firmly believe that the arts are an integral part of a well-rounded eduction and encourage you to support these types of initiatives.

@ragearts: could u sprd the wrd where ever u can people can sup our charity by ent raffle 2 win a new fiat 500 4 £2 www.everyclick.com/fiat

If you'd like some help with getting a positive message out please shoot us a direct message on Twitter @a'tris!