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Projects...

Happy Holidays to all those celebrating over the next few months. To those not celebrating, happy regular days to you!

Kelly and I have been enjoying our time at home since we've been back. Although it's relaxing, work has definitely not stopped! I have my hands in a variety of different projects at the moment, all of which I'm excited to finish soon. Mainly, I'm excited because once I finish these projects I can start work on a brand new album. 2009 has been a jam packed year, but one thing I really miss is working on music. I didn't write too much this year, so I plan to spend a lot of 2010 writing, recording, and releasing as much new music as I can. Touring might not be too high of a priority next year, but there will definitely be some shows, no worries there. Being on the road the last four years I feel has disconnected me with developing my craft as a songwriter. It's hard to even want to write when you are always on the go, I've simply been too exhausted. So hopefully over the holidays I can slowly get back in the groove of writing (and eventually turn my story into a book/movie called "How Brad Got His Groove Back"). Anyway, here's some projects I'll be working on over the Winter Break...

Mid-December we will be shooting the video for the next single from "Life As A Song" which will be "Break." I'm excited to do this video because it will be completely different than the last video we did. I think you'll be surprised. It will probably debut online in late January/ early February.

Kelly and I will be heading up to New York with the band on January 1st for a performance on the CBS Early Show January 2nd. This will be our second time on the show, returning to promote "Life As A Song." Hopefully a live national TV appearance will mean a great start to a new year!

Back in September the band and I recorded a live show at Sweetwater Sound Theater in Ft. Wayne Indiana. I will be taking selections from the show and releasing a live digital E.P. once I get the songs mixed how I want them. I will also be putting up video online from the show so in case you missed it you can check it out. There already is a video of "Do It Again" up on the official Five Times August YouTube Channel. Check it out!

Lastly, I've had a lot of interest in the first Five Times August album "Say" from a lot of new fans. It hasn't been available for a long time, but because of the new interest I decided to re-issue the album early next year in "deluxe" format. I plan to re-record all the songs from the album with voice and acoustic guitar (much like the "Acoustic Sessions" album) and release the new versions along with the old original home recordings from way back in 2001, with a bonus audio commentary track about the album. Right now plans are to release it digitally, but for those that want the actually CD I will be making a special limited edition 2 disc set to add to your FTA collection.

So that's a few of the projects I have going on right now. I just wanted to send out my holiday wishes and keep you up to date on everything that's going on. If I don't talk to you before the New Year, have a good one!

- Brad

Thoughts on Michael Jackson

Like so many other people, yesterday I saw the new Michael Jackson movie "This Is It." It was a great inside look to what would have been an amazing show. Sadly it will never be seen the way Michael intended. It got me thinking a little bit about my childhood, growing up with Michael's music. Many people don't know this, but before I picked up a guitar I was dancing like Michael Jackson in my room at 10 years old. He was my first musical idol and inspired me to be an entertainer. For years I fell out of touch with that love for his music. I'm sure a lot of us did. Several months before he died I had started getting back into not only Michael's music, but the whole Jackson 5/ Jacksons catalogue. Sure enough, once he passed away, the entire world rekindled that love for his music again, and now here we all are going Michael crazy.

One thing that makes me sad is that the media in this country (in particular) tore him down, inside and out, yet, now they praise him. It seems like a very fraudulent appreciation. For me, I never fell into the hype of all the controversy surrounding his personal life. Though we can all agree there were many eccentricities about Michael, I don't think a person with that much love and respect for the world behind his music would do a lot of what he was accused of. If you watch a lot of his older interviews you can tell he was a shy and lonely person. Yet, it seemed no matter how hard people took punches at him he tried to keep his message of love above it. He's the only celebrity I can really think of that made those messages about the world and could back it up with their actions. Still, the media destroyed him. It's sad to me that someone with so much talent, that gave us so many great memories, and tried so hard to spread such a positive message was annihilated by the same public and media that once adored him.

In all honesty, when I first heard of Michael's death I wasn't immediately sad about it. My first thought was "Well, I didn't really know the guy." And it's true, none of us did, we only have the memories of his music pertaining to our own lives. Though that made us think we knew him, we never did. My second thought was "people die every day." There are so many people out there that lived there life doing so many good things but never get praised for it simply because they didn't have a hit song or movie to go along with their good deeds. Yes, it's absolutely sad that Michael Jackson died, but many great, talented, good natured, genius people die every day. However, because they were a teacher, or a firefighter, or a janitor, nobody pays much attention to it.

The way we absorb and praise celebrity here astounds me. I have a theory about this generation's obsession with "immediate satisfaction" and it kind of falls in line here. Though I'm guilty of seeing the movie, it's unsettling to me that there are so many Michael Jackson projects being made not even 6 months after his death. There seems to be a theme of "let's see how much money we can make off this dead guy." Which, I know sounds harsh, but someone somewhere has that mindset. Record companies are cashing in, releasing unnecessary remix compilations (I've counted almost 20 released since his death). Bootleg shirts are EVERYWHERE, surely you've seen them... "King of Pop 1958 - 2009" with a badly printed picture of Michael on it. To me, mourning the loss of one of my idols was almost tainted because I was distracted by the thought of "Gees, now everybody loves him again, probably because everyone is making money off him now that he's gone."

But, then I think back. The first CD I ever owned was Michael Jackson's Dangerous. I wrote Epic Records when I was 9 years old asking if they would send me the album because I didn't have enough money to buy it myself. A few months down the road I had forgotten about it, by that time I bought the cassette tape, but sure enough a MJJ Productions envelope showed up in my mailbox with the CD inside. I still have that same CD, and though it's been played to death and all scratched up now, it reminds me of dancing in my room with one white glove and homemade sparkle jacket, pretending to be one of the greatest entertainers in the world.

So with that, thank you Michael for setting a great example for me. For inspiring me to become an entertainer, and to be a good, decent person AS an entertainer. Also, let's not forget our own loved ones who have passed away as they were most likely just as important, if not more important to our childhood as Michael was.

That's all for now.

Oh, to be home again...

Kelly and I finally made it back home last night after a two month long tour. It feels so nice to be back and to have our own bed again! Ironically, we actually fell asleep on the couch our first night back while watching a movie! Regardless, there was something about using my own soap and towels in the shower that makes me feel cleaner than I have in six weeks! I've had hotels-a-plenty the last four years of my life, though we have a few shows here and there over the next couple months, I plan to absorb home life as much as I can. Thank you to all of you who came out to the shows and supported the tour, bought the merchandise, brought friends and made new fans out of them. We had a great time meetings and playing for you!

"Life As A Song" will be released digitally on iTunes tomorrow, or supposedly. One of the problems as an independent artist is that everything is tentative until it actually happens. I work with smaller companies to get my music released, and though the official release date is October 13th, sometimes digital stores like iTunes and Rhapsody do not post smaller releases until a few days after the major's. It makes things difficult when trying to promote the release of an album, a lot doesn't go as planned. But either way, it SHOULD be up by the end of the week.

I've had a lot of time over the last months of touring to think about the direction of Five Times August and the future of my music career. Road worn and exhausted, over the winter holiday season I plan to stay at home as much as possible and work on new material, and have even thought about a few side projects separate from FTA I'd like to experiment with. I'm excited to see what happens. I do have almost an entire album's worth of material for another FTA release, but since "Life" hasn't even come out yet I plan to take my time on the next album. I am hoping while I am home I can get a music video done for my favorite song on the album, "Break." The video for "Better With You" came out great and I had a wonderful experience making it, so I'm intrigued to see if we can accomplish something even better!

Anyway, I wanted to drop a line and finally get this blog started with a real entry! Since I am actually home now I think I'll have more time to update you guys on what's happening. I also plan to write a few blog articles on the music industry and how I run things as an independent artist, so stay tuned for that.

Hope you are well.

From home,

Brad

Introduction

Welcome to the new Five Times August blog, "Life as a Blog." I'll be adding entries here surrounding the release of the new album "Life as a Song," which will be in stores October 13th. Here you can find my thoughts from the road, thoughts on the music industry, reviews of my favorite music and much more. I hope to use this blog as another way to connect with you, so feel free to comment and leave your own thoughts in response to my entries. 

My apologies for the bland and basic layout, it will be much prettier by the next entry!

I look forward to hearing from you, check back soon!

- Brad w/ Five Times August