the Endless

Facebook username

2009-06-29T10:37:00.000-07:00

Well, friends, we finally did manage to get a personalized username on Facebook (the rules were different for Fan Pages than they were for personal usernames and only just became available today). Unfortunately, due to Facebook's labyrinthine rules, we weren't able to get our preferred choice, which would be /theendless, so we had to settle for /theendlessband. So if you are looking for us on Facebook, we are at www.facebook.com/theendlessband. Similar to this website address (we have been trying for 10 years, by the way, to get www.theendless.com, which is just lying fallow). Come over and be-fan us!

Podcast Tonight: Let the Healing Begin

2009-06-15T14:48:00.000-07:00

Our music is going to be featured tonight on Isgoodradio.com's Dr. Groovy ("the marriage of music and medicine") at 7pm Pacific Time. As the email let us know:

"...with the theme for June being "mental health" and a focus on anxiety and ways of combating it...your music will be a part of the mental healing."

So listen in tonight, Monday at 7pm PST for Dr. Groovy and the Endless. Think you'll miss it? The podcast will be available later at www.drgroovy.podomatic.com. A big thank you to the very cool IsGoodMusic for featuring us!

Can You Be The Hunter?

2009-06-01T14:15:00.000-07:00

For the most part, the shoot went well. I had two characters. The wolf:
And the lamb:Let me just tell you, my friends, I am cozying up here to a character which I saw fully in my mind's eye and genuinely made me cry. I was that attached to it. I kept thinking, "why is this kind of deep and honest connection so hard to conjure when I'm acting, but here I am cozying up to a lumpy piece of cloth and am completely full and in the moment?" I think the answer might be because this is my art and my story. Very interesting.

We had a light blow out about 20 seconds into the first take which you can witness in all its glory here:
Silliness. My sister Victoria is a makeup artist so she came to make me perty, which was nice. I think we have a couple of pics of her working on me behind the scenes which I will post.

A big and hearty thank you to Maron Studio for the use of their green screen (and the very fun shoot for their movie the day before). We are now sending off the footage to Mathias in Sweden who will hopefully be able to use some of it (*crossing fingers*). We'll let you know how it went!

The Heart Of You Is What Is True

2009-05-29T10:40:00.000-07:00

This Sunday we are going to shoot a video for our song "Hunt For The Heart" with Mathias Erixon (aka Oddity). We found him via Radar Music Videos and are really excited about working with him. He has an impressive background in videos, just see his previous work at www.oddity.se. His ideas for the song are really exciting, and we loved that we can work long-distance together (he is in Sweden, we are in Los Angeles). We will be doing a green screen shoot on Sunday and then he'll be working on the collage/animation aspect of the video on his end. Very, very exciting.

I've been haunting our local shops for just the right costumes for the video. There are two characters/aspects to portray and I think they are starting to come into focus. A lot of greys, lavenders, and whites. Maybe some feathers, we'll see.

I also have a shoot for a role in The Diamonds of Metro Valley, so it's going to be a full weekend. More pics to come on Sunday!

This just in: our song "Was I Not Your Muse" has been selected as a featured song on Women Of Substance radio. Go listen and check them out on their MySpace page. Nice!

"Writers and artists aren't machines."

2009-05-13T10:54:00.001-07:00

There is a really excellent blog today from Neil Gaiman, who goes into some detail about the time and energy it takes to create.

You don't choose what will work. You simply do the best you can each time. And you try to do what you can to increase the likelihood that good art will be created.

And sometimes, and it's as true of authors as it is of readers, you have a life. People in your world get sick or die. You fall in love, or out of love. You move house. Your aunt comes to stay. You agreed to give a talk half-way around the world five years ago, and suddenly you realise that that talk is due now. Your last book comes out and the critics vociferously hated it and now you simply don't feel like writing another. Your cat learns to levitate and the matter must be properly documented and investigated. There are deer in the apple orchard. A thunderstorm fries your hard disk and fries the backup drive as well...

And life is a good thing for a writer. It's where we get our raw material, for a start. We quite like to stop and watch it.

This is so true, and lately I have been acutely aware of how much life has been putting us on a bit of an unwanted hiatus. It happens. I used to fight it in the past but in the last few years I have realized how futile that fight is. I think that's why Somniloquy was a lot less stressful of a record to make, because we didn't fight against life, we worked when life let us.

Reading this blog led to a conversation this morning with my friend Matt, a fellow writer, who offered the following observation:

mattnuez13 (10:51:35 AM): u know what else is beautiful: I was thinking about u and D and ur albums, esp. the new one...
mattnuez13 (10:52:07 AM): and I realized, more consciously perhaps than I have before, how much of an actor you both are, as a band, in creating your albums
mattnuez13 (10:52:28 AM): and that has so much to do with how scenic and storytelling-landscape-esque your productions are
mattnuez13 (10:52:43 AM): you guys find an idea, and then follow it down the rabbit hole
mattnuez13 (10:52:53 AM): and immerse yourself in it and research and ponder

He's right, and it's something I've never considered before, that because I come to this music process as a life-long classically trained actor, I can't help but put a million miles of thought and research and backstory and almost Meisner-level preparation into the songs. Funny thing to not realize after all this time, but it makes perfect sense that one discipline informs the other. Thank you, Matt!

This all being said, we are working on a lot of projects right now that we are looking forward to sharing with you all as soon as the Flying Spaghetti Monster allows.

Choosing A Video Director

2009-05-05T15:52:00.001-07:00

We recently learned about a great website called Radar Music Videos which helps match bands with video directors. So we have submitted a call for treatments for our song "Hunt For The Heart" and have gotten some absolutely awesome pitches! We are mulling over our choices and are really impressed and excited with the quality of directors that are working with the site. If you are a band in search of a video, check out Radar!

More on who we chose and the process of making the video as this all unfurls!

Gearing Up

2009-04-15T11:14:00.000-07:00

We went on a journey to the outer edges of Los Angeles-land last night to get our hands on a keyboard that we can use for live shows. It was so far, I think we might have actually gone over the rainbow. But it was worth it, as we now have a new 62-key family member who is not even remotely as heavy as our 88-key weighted keyboard who simply hates leaving the house. Some instruments just aren't as comfortable playing live as in the studio.

The gears are cranking up ever so slowly for playing out. You are probably wondering why this is taking so long. A little back story: this last year we've made the transition from PC to Mac, and have been working hard to get all of our stuff backed up from Cubase into some kind of semblance of order for Logic. We are in the beginning stages of learning how to use Mainstage, which is Logic's live counterpart. This means having to essentially unravel every bit of what all of our songs were made of and re-assembling them piece by piece. Then we have to figure out what can be played on instruments live, what can be created live in loops, and what needs to be stripped away.

We are also on the search for live band mates. This will be an interesting process of discovery. As soon as the Endless Live Machine gets itself whirring, then we can play and play and play as much as possible. It's just the getting there that is proving to be the challenge. This is what you get for writing electronic music (and having a day job).

We are also in the pre-writing stages for the next album, which means lots and lots of intake. It means museums, travel, nature, films, painting, playing, and just generally consuming life in the hopes that it will bring inspiration over the next year. With that in mind, we had a little trip to the ocean this weekend and met these guys:

They do help.

Exclusive "Lee Miller" Acoustic Download and New Reviews

2009-03-25T14:10:00.000-07:00

There is a mockingbird losing its mind outside our window. It must be Spring.

Last month we recorded an acoustic version of our 2004 song "Lee Miller" for inclusion in our Electrical Language interview with Gabor Kovacs. People have been asking how to get ahold of that track, and we are happy to announce that we are making it available here for a short time (this will not be available in our download store and is a special gift to you, our sweet fans). Right click here to download Lee Miller (Acoustic).

We've got some new and enchanting reviews of Somniloquy to share with you today! The wonderful goth webzine Morbid Outlook says "These tracks are dream-laced, echo-ridden, and haunting," and UK-based rock review site Leicester Bangs calls our music "as Gothic and as funereal as The Cure’s Faith-era output." David did a little jig when he read that. We are sensing a Goth trend here, which we will gladly accept.

Still getting ready for live shows. It's taking a lot of computery work. We've been less bloggy and more tweety lately. I'm sure you understand. Please join us there if you can.

Podcasts, Reviews, Demands

2009-03-02T15:38:00.000-08:00

Is it Spring where you are? There are little popcorn bursts of flowers on the plum trees here in Los Angeles. We just wanted to update you on a few things going on in Endlessland in the last week or so.

To reiterate our last post, Somniloquy was given a lovely review by the awesome Amy Lotsberg at Collected Sounds. To quote, "I've always loved this band, but this is an exceptional release." Read the whole review here.

If you haven't had a chance, we invite you to check out our conversation with Gabor Kovacs on the Electrical Language podcast. Since then, we've been played on three great podcasts: AMPed (the official podcast of the Association of Music Podcasting) played our new acoustic version of Lee Miller, the Dark Compass podcast played Shock Of It All, and the always wonderful Story Circle Network played Lit From Within.

We are starting to gear up to play live. It requires a lot of whoozits and whatsamablabber as we figure it all out. If you are interested in having us play in your city, please go over to Eventful.com and demand us in your area.

New Album Review - Collected Sounds

2009-02-24T11:41:00.000-08:00

There is a new review of our album up at the always awesome Collected Sounds website. Please go check it out. To quote:

The melodies are entrancing and the different layers of music floating above and under the main layer combine to make something very pleasing to my ears. It’s as if every little ‘tik-a-tik’ was intensely labored over so that it would be in the perfect place at the perfect volume and I’d say mission accomplished.
I’ve always loved this band, but this is an exceptional release.

Many, many thanks to the wonderful Amy Lotsberg for this.

Electrical Language Podcast Featuring the Endless

2009-02-15T13:25:00.001-08:00

Hello from London! We want to take a quick break from sleeping on the tube to let you know we are featured in a podcast that just came out today. A little background: last weekend we had the pleasure of speaking over Skype with Gabor Kovacs of the fabulous Electrical Language podcast. Gabor has been a strong champion of our music and he has been kind enough to devote his entire program to discussing our work this week.

To listen in, just click here, and please subscribe to this excellent podcast. We discuss our history as a band, the new album Somniloquy, the Sandman, our download store, and much more.

Many, many thanks to Gabor for this. We hope you enjoy it.

What's That Stuff Coming Out Of Your Mouths In The Album Artwork?

2009-02-09T11:07:00.000-08:00

If you haven't watched our "Making Of Somniloquy" series, you might be wondering what the long white cloth is that's coming out of our mouths in the album artwork. It's ectoplasm, brought to prominence by Victorian-era mediums during Spiritualist seances. They often used a mixture of cheesecloth coated with grease or paint which they would then hide in various orifices in the body. When they were communing with spirits, the ectoplasm would then "materialize" out of their mouths, ears, and other body parts to prove that they were in fact communicating with the spirit world. We were inspired by a photography exhibit we saw at the Met in New York called The Perfect Medium: Photography and the Occult, which featured hundreds of beautiful photographs chronicling these phenomena. As artwork it was visually striking and deeply chilling as well, and I think a lot of the sonic concepts of the album of grew around that inspiration. We wanted to make an album that sounded like those photographs.If you just do a Google image search for "ectoplasm", you can see a lot of what we're referring to.

Where'd You Get That Fancy Jewelry?

2009-02-05T11:22:00.000-08:00

I wanted to share a little about the great jewelry that I used for this photo shoot. A long whiles back I was perusing the great website Fabulist when I came across the gorgeous handmade jewelry at Ach Ach Liebling. I had just finished writing the lyrics for Hunt For The Heart when I came across this necklace:

It's called Call of the Wild and features a wolf and a hunter's knife, both themes that figure prominently in that song.

Earrings in this shot (you can see them better on the actual album cover) are called Bury the Hatchet and feature a shovel on one side and a hatchet in the other. Again, these felt so right for the story of this album: finding finality, peace, and closure. Good stuff. Go check out Ach Ach Liebling. There are so many fantastic and interesting items there that are unique and probably tell a piece of your story, too.

The Making of Somniloquy Episode 4 - Behind the Scenes at the Album Photo Shoot

2009-01-26T15:03:00.000-08:00

Please click through and select "watch in HD" where possible, as the low quality version looks a bit strange.

This is a video from our photo shoot at the Pasadena Museum of History. The photographer is Lauren Noble. Guest appearances by Tifanie McQueen, Paul Plunkett, Michael Holmes, Mary McIlwain, and Aaron Arendt. This was a really fun shoot. The song is "Rosabelle: Answer - Tell," the last track on the album. Enjoy!

Amazing review from Wears The Trousers

2009-01-19T12:01:00.001-08:00

I love the UK-based magazine Wears the Trousers and have been reading it since it first debuted. Today is an extra nice day because they have given Somniloquy a very nice review. To quote:

The art and concepts of Somniloquy explore may be steeped in 19th century nostalgia, but the subject matter is universal and transcendent of time, drawing on themes of love and the relationship between heart and self. Amid the somewhat eerie settings, there is a pleasing warmth and modernity; each song is crafted with care and thought, composed with subtle layers and looping refrains. Tackling the majority of vocal duties, Adriana has a versatile voice, capable of both sailing, breathy cooing and darker ethereal melodies. There are clear dream-pop conventions at work here, melting into the folktronica canvas of their work; this is ambient chillout music, but with content.

Read the full review here.

Somniloquy Is Here!

2009-01-13T09:55:00.000-08:00

somniloquy som·nil·o·quy (sŏm-nĭl'ə-kwē) or som·nil·o·quism (-kwĭz'əm) n.
The act or habit of talking in one's sleep.

The big day is here! Our new album, Somniloquy, is now available for purchase. It has taken over three years to get to this day, so we are extremely excited to finally get to share this music with you. To purchase the physical CD on CDBaby, just click on this link:

You can also find the album at Amazon. For high quality MP3s with embedded artwork and lyrics with self-determined pricing, please visit our music store. In the Merchandise section of our store we have also put up t-shirts for sale:

...along with a great new Collector's Pack that includes signed CDs and posters from Somniloquy and the Republic of Heaven.

We've also posted a new episode in our Making of Somniloquy series, discussing the song "Rosabelle: Answer-Tell."

If you've already heard the album, would you please take a second to post a short review on our CDBaby and Amazon pages? We would really appreciate it.

Stay tuned to our Twitter feed today for short hints and factoids about the new album.

Phew! That's a lot! What a day. Thank you to all of you for helping make this happen, and for those of you who anonymously recorded your dreams for us: you are so very beautiful. Thank you.

Last Day Before The Big Day

2009-01-12T15:12:00.000-08:00

Well, this is it. Today is the last day to order our lovely pre-order package. It has been such a pleasure to make and send these packages to you, and we really hope you enjoy them. A HUGE thank you to those of you who supported us with the pre-order. Most importantly, your support means we get to continue to make music, and that's what is so special about all of this. The dialogue back and forth with you is what makes this all worth while. You are the artistic patrons of our time, and should be proud of that. Thank you for being our De Medicis.

Tomorrow, if we are lucky and all the stars align, CDBaby will list Somniloquy for sale. Amazon will definitely list it, and it will be available here as a download purchase in our music store. iTunes will probably take a while longer, but honestly, wouldn't you rather get the songs here with a higher sample rate with embedded artwork and lyrics? We would think so. If anyone has technical questions about downloading from our store, please don't be afraid to ask.

We will see you tomorrow. Have a good night!

Last Week to Order Our Pre-Sale Package

2009-01-05T17:38:00.000-08:00

Happy 2009! We hope you have had wonderful holidays. Thank you to everyone who responded to the release of our 2008 Holiday Single. It was really fun. If you didn't get a chance to download it, you can find it here.

We want to thank everyone that has pre-ordered our new album, Somniloquy. The first batch of orders was mailed today. This is a reminder that this great package is available for one more week and includes immediate download of the album, along with a physical CD (signed), t-shirt, and poster for $35 including shipping. If you want to take advantage of this unique offer, please visit us at our music store in the next week.

We are still aiming for a January 13th CD release date, providing CDBaby is able to accommodate us. If there is any delay, we will certainly let everyone know. Thank you again for your support!

the 2008 Holiday Single is here

2008-12-18T10:28:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone!

Every year, we release a holiday single for you, our fans, to thank you for your support. The songs we chose this year are from the wonderful Mr. Fred Rogers and his magical television show. Mr. Rogers has been a great inspiration to us and we decided it would be fun to cover a couple of his songs in our own Endless-y style. The two songs we chose are "It's Such A Good Feeling," and "Tree, Tree, Tree." We hope you like them, and we send you our warmest wishes of love and joy.

To download the 2008 Holiday Single, click here.

New Shirts and Holiday Single News

2008-12-08T14:33:00.000-08:00

Our new shirts just came in! We are very excited. They are sooooo soft and nuzzly comfy.Right now the exclusive way to order them is with the Somniloquy pre-order pack. For those of you who have ordered so far, we thank you SO MUCH and hope you are enjoying the new songs!

We've been toiling at the 2008 Holiday Single for a few weeks now. For those of you new here, for the last six years we have been putting out a couple of songs during the holidays for our fans. It started with standard Christmas songs but has now veered into really whatever catches our fancy. If you are on our mailing list, you will receive the holiday single. If you are not on the list, please join it by clicking on the link at the bottom of the page! Free songs! Often silly! Good for digestion! If you follow us on Twitter, we will continue to send out hints about what songs we're covering this year.

Somniloquy Pre-Sale Begins Today

2008-12-02T09:49:00.000-08:00

We are proud and excited to open our new music download store today! Download re-mastered MP3s from our previous albums or pre-order Somniloquy, our new album, and receive the following:

Immediate MP3 download of the album

On January 13th by mail:

Signed CD
11 x 17 Somniloquy poster that looks like this:
Beautiful Women's or Men's Alternative Apparel "Lit From Within" T-shirt - Lovingly and sustainably made with eco-friendly inks on organic cotton with this image:

This special package is only $35 including shipping and is only for this limited time.

After January 13th, you will be able to purchase our physical CD on CDBaby or in digital form from the download store.

An important element of this new store is the "self-determined pricing" options that are offered. Please take a moment to look around the store, pioneered by indie artist Issa, and get to know the new system. You have the option to pay market price for a song, choose your own price, download as a gift from the artist, or "creative currency." If you have any questions or need help with the new system, please let us know.

We hope you love the new album!

Inspiration: Synecdoche, New York

2008-11-18T12:08:00.000-08:00

I've tried writing and re-writing my thoughts on Charlie Kaufman's new film, Synecdoche, New York, and I'm failing miserably. It's probably because it is not possible to make linear sense out of something that is beyond linear sense. It's a beautiful film, exploring the deepest questions of the nature of being an artist, and further and what it means to be human. A synecdoche, as described by Wikipedia, is a term denoting a part of something is used to refer to the whole thing. A simple example would be referring to your car as your "wheels."

In Synecdoche, New York, director Caden Cotard creates a synecdoche of his entire life as a theatre piece, trying to relate life by being scrupulously honest in re-telling it onstage. In this excellent interview, Kaufman relates that film or a work of art itself is in fact a synecdoche. We are trying to relate the macro through the relating of the micro.

This deep search into understanding one's purpose and ability to connect and love hit me at a very deep level, and this was one of those rare and precious film-going experiences where I was so moved that I feel it altered my perception of life on a fundamental level. Those rare moments where you are pulled out of mundanity and see life from a higher, more objective perspective. It is inevitable that we must die, and the living of this life is what is so important, and I am reminded again of how precious and perfect every moment is.

I am so grateful to any work of art that forces that kind of deep introspection. I hope Kaufman continues to direct his own work and bring us these amazing, strange stories. I'll be watching.

Sweet Information!

2008-11-14T09:38:00.000-08:00

We had the pleasure of seeing the wonderful and hilarious John Hodgman perform with Jonathan Coulton last night at the Echoplex. If you don't know Hodgman's work as an author, seek out his books immediately! He is incredibly intelligent, and amazingly funny. To me, he is a modern day Mark Twain. He was there to promote his new book, More Information Than You Require, and it picks up where The Areas Of My Expertise leaves off. If you like smart people making smart references to completely made up facts, these books are for you. I've decided it's my goal in life to get John Hodgman and Paul F. Tompkins in a room together just to watch them blab about dandyism or snuff boxes or crow migration habits or whatever it is such men as these might discuss. Somebody make this happen for me!

THANK THE MAKER

2008-11-12T22:29:00.000-08:00

After a week and a half of mind-breaking combing through files to figure out why the new, as yet unrevealed web store broke all of a sudden, the problem is finally, thank HEAVENS, fixed. David actually threw himself on the ground and wept.

...yeah, we've been a little stressed. But now, JOY! And back to our regularly scheduled preparations for launch.

Stupid Breaky Things

2008-11-11T10:41:00.000-08:00

We were very close to being very close to presenting the music store to you all, but last week had a breakdown that is from what we can tell not our fault but on the server side and is causing all kinds of havoc. The rest of the site is finally coming together, however, and you can now have a look around the new digs and tell us what you think. The music store problem is being tackled by David, who is extremely smart and patient, but it would try anyone's sanity, how much he's had to wrestle with this thing.

We've been making a concerted effort lately to get to theatre as much as possible. There are a lot of opportunities to do so in Los Angeles for very low prices, which is one great advantage of living here. We got to see Spring Awakening at the Ahmanson, The School Of Night at the newly refurbished Mark Taper Forum, and a screening of the 1925 Phantom of the Opera at the Walt Disney Concert Hall on Halloween. It was our first time at the WDCH and it was fantastic to hear that organ playing with such force and precision in that space. The sound really is incomparable and I really look forward to hearing a full symphony there.

We're getting ready to order our t-shirts through a company called LifeWork. We picked them because of their green practices. From their site:

Today, we run an entirely green operation using only eco-friendly stuff. Our tee's are fair trade certified organic cotton, printed with water-based or certified phthalate-free plastisol (try saying that quickly) inks, biodegradable cleaners, etcetera.

Sounds good to us. We want to be able to bring you a product we all can know was made in a manner friendly to the environment and in keeping with fair labor practices, and these people have got the goods. Not to mention the fact that the shirts we chose are EXTREMELY COOL and good-looking and not your typical boring shirt. I think you will like them a lot.