We have a tentative release date for The Singles - Season 4!!!! Premiering March 1, Season 4 will feature appearances by the usual suspects and includes the first recorded bits with City Council members Georgina McKee, Ben Surman and Shauna Lisse. We'll also be welcoming some new faces in Kicksville: Vusi Mhlongo (Disney's The Lion King), Perry Serpa (The Sharp Things), Andrew Fitzpatrick (the most amazing beat-boxer we've ever seen), and more. We promise it will be worth the wait, but you can satisfy your craving till then with the scratch mixes of Woof Woof - read on for the info....

In the last newsletter, we asked if anyone wanted to hear/download some scratch mixes from the The Singles - Season 4 recording sessions to see how a song develops from the initial sketch to the final mix. So....okay, okay already - inside voices, please.... Since y'all gave us such a resounding YES, here's a little peek into the inner workings of Kicksville's writing and recording process:

 

In general, as we're working on new stuff, these "scratch mixes" are put together so we can review performances, come up with further ideas, fiddle with lyrics, play with effects, and get an idea of how the final mix will eventually come together. We thought Woof Woof would be a good example for how this all works: it started as a live jam around the end bit of our song, Liberty and really illustrates how things can change (or not) over the course of a song's development.

One more thing.... These mixes are meant as an exclusive download for our loyal listeners. They're NOT ready for public consumption, so please don't upload these tracks to your Facebook page, Bit Torrent, or really anywhere else. We know they'll probably end up floating around the interwebs regardless, but we'd like to try and limit that as much as we can. So, enjoy, but please don't share publicly (for now)!

 

If you haven't alrready bookmarked resident artist Tone Deaf's blog/art page, you really should. He's in manic production mode again, so he's been posting new shite almost every day. The Anarchy 1917 artwork is friggin' awesome if we may be so bold, there are new stories about various Kicksvile characters, and someone made the mistake of giving him a camera ;-) Enjoy, but be careful....the bars are for your protection, not the inmate's.

We also mentioned in the last newsletter that we've been honored to be included in the Pedulla Basses Artist Program. Well, the new Pentabuzz has arrived, so we had to share with y'all! To Michael and Christine P., THANK YOU!!!!!

 

There really is nothing like a Pedulla fretless bass: They're beautifully crafted, they sound great, and as we've said before, they're the most incredibly expressive instruments available anywhere (they're right purty, too). We've used their basses on almost every Kicksville track released for Seasons 2 and 3, as well as the upcoming Season 4 releases (including Woof Woof). For more about the Commissioner's and the Mayor's borderline obsession with their basses, check out the interview the Commissioner did with Gearwire.com about Pedulla HERE.

 

 

In February, we'll be taping an episode of the venerable music performance TV show, Urban Theater. We'll be doing our full production in the TV studio (lights, video, you know....the whole multimedia freakout thing), and we guarantee it will be the the coolest thing they've had yet! As soon as we know the air date, we'll let y'all know, or you can check your local listings.

Well, that's it for now... We'll be back after the holiday insanity has subsided with more scratch mixes, news about upcoming shows, and more. So, till then, check out the Woof Woof scratch mixes, and don't forget to go to kicksville.bandcamp.com and get your Season 3 PDF before your neighbors get there and hog up all the good ones!