Hey all! It’s been an incredibly exciting weekend: sound engineer Kris Umezawa’s baby was born Friday, and Gene’s second son was born LAST NIGHT. (He’s already on a jazz schedule, arriving late and starting up at 1 AM.)
Both Kris and Gene will be at tonight’s sold-out Birdland show, perhaps a little sleep-deprived but probably rather euphoric. Please feel free to bring cigars for them…and also to join us after the show at ZANZIBAR.
(Gene and Kris will most likely scoot back to their respective hospitals, but Brendan and Val will be delighted to have a celebratory drink with you!)
Zanzibar
645 9th Ave at 45th St
212.957.9197
We’ll probably get there around 9:15ish - the show ends at 8:30, and then we’ll be signing CDs and packing up gear. See you tonight…
Val and Bren will be driving to Northwest New Jersey to play some songs from Sleeping Beauty Wakes tonight, in support of our upcoming show at Birdland in New York City. Never mind that the radio station is 65 miles away from the club–through the magic of web radio, you can tune in and hear our songs and witty banter from the comfort of your very own internet.
Check out Homegrown Radio, and tune in tonight at 7 pm Eastern time.
All spring long, the pace of life had been ramping up. Brendan and I had begun flying out to Los Angeles at least once a month, working on songs for three separate TINKER BELL movies; Gene and Suzanne had begun preparing and cocooning in earnest, as baby boy #2 pressed forward (and down) toward his planned May arrival; the three of us in the band were honing our concert version of SLEEPING BEAUTY WAKES, getting ready to perform it on both coasts; now that we had the new album in hand, we were also preparing for a workshop of the theatrical version of SLEEPING BEAUTY WAKES, at the McCarter Theatre in Princeton, New Jersey, to include a bunch of actors and probably a lot of writing; and Brendan and I were getting more and more stressed out about preschool options for our son Mose, having spent many hundreds of dollars and hours since last fall applying everywhere and getting in nowhere. We were on what seemed like every waiting list in Brooklyn. Read More »
Rob Bond, the leader of our Petal Pusher Program, has Gone. To. Town.
He has ransacked his collection of old GrooveLily live videos, TV appearances, and now he’s even filmed and edited our recent Sleeping Beauty Wakes concert at McCarter. And he’s posted all of it here:
Rob Bond’s collection of GrooveLily videos at Vimeo.
It’s official. Rob is on fire. We cannot afford him. He gets the awesome award for 2009.
We are delighted to announce that our brand-new album, SLEEPING BEAUTY WAKES, is available as of today, March 31. Official street date is April 21, but you can get it right now, without even putting on your shoes.
For a physical copy of the CD, with beautiful 24-page booklet designed by Jeff Hardy and including all the lyrics, order directly from PS Classics.
For digital download (complete with spiffy 12-page digital booklet), go to iTunes. (iTunes is the ONLY place to get the digital booklet.)
We also invite you to check out these feature articles about the album:
- the folks at Direct Current have us on their front page. We love this excellent site dedicated to “smart, grown-up music.”
- the lovely people at Playbill are keeping us in the news as well.
- New Jersey journalist William Westhoven blogs about us in the Daily Record.
Come join us to celebrate and get your copy of SLEEPING BEAUTY WAKES in person, if you’re anywhere near Portsmouth (April 4), Princeton (April 7) or Palo Alto (April 10)! NYC CD release party will be at Birdland on May 18.
March 28, 2009 – 11:15 am
No glitches, no problems - they’re beautiful! We’ll load some boxes into the van in about an hour and start making our way toward Phoenixville, PA, where we’ll be playing a benefit concert tonight at the gorgeous Colonial Theatre, including approximately 8 songs from the CD. If you’re in the area, come join us and be the first to get your copy of SLEEPING BEAUTY WAKES.
with love and shrinkwrap,
GrooveLily
Sleeping Beauty Wakes album cover
Val will be calling in to “The Lowdown” on WDVR Radio at 6:05 PM Eastern time today - Monday, March 23 - to talk with Victoria Ann Davis about our upcoming SLEEPING BEAUTY WAKES concert in Princeton, NJ. Victoria will also spin some sneak preview tracks from the SLEEPING BEAUTY WAKES CD. Listen at 89.7 or 91.9 FM in New Jersey, or online here.
We’ve also been told that Beth & Jules will feature tracks from SBW on their “Free For All” show this week on HomeGrown Radio NJ, Tuesday between 9 AM and 12 noon.
CDs have arrived at PS Classics headquarters in Bronxville! We’re doublechecking to make sure there are no glitches, and then planning to bring them to all our upcoming gigs. Official street date is April 21 - but come to a show and get your copy early.
In addition, the album will be available on iTunes a week from tomorrow (Tuesday, March 31) - and hard copies will be available very soon from PS Classics. Updates imminently.
One of my favorite things about the interwebs is the way that things keep changing and getting (mostly) better when you’re not looking.
Case in point: by following a few links today, I discovered a world of GrooveLily pages out there, most of which I had never even heard of. If you have a moment, stop by, check out some of these new internet hothouse flowers and smell the lilies:
- The whole world of iLike.com, and the iLike GrooveLily page
- Mog, which seems like a fascinating music-oriented world unto itself, and our GrooveLily Mog page, with a coupla choice reviews by somebody named Nimby
- Our presence on the awesome internet radio phenomenon Pandora, complete with relatively up-to-date songs, and woefully out-of-date allmusic.com guide bio of us…
- a baby, very beginning of a presence for us on imeem–anybody wanna step in and help out?
- A cursory search on Facebook today turned up our own Facebook page (which I built and have sadly neglected for months), but also
If anyone finds anything GrooveLily-related out there that they’re particularly excited about, drop me a line at brendan (at) (the name of the band I play in) dot com.
February 23, 2009 – 10:02 am
Due to your requests, and our dwindling physical supply of these shirts (our most popular design to date), we’ve just added a “Screwed-Up People Make Great Art” shirt collection at our CafePress store. Enjoy! There are short-sleeve, long-sleeve, scoop-neck, V-neck, maternity and plus sizes available.
Men's Long Sleeve
We’ve seen some wonderful personalized designs on these shirts (fringes, ripped sleeves, midriff modifications, you name it)…so we hope that you’ll feel free to make your own great art, screwed-up or not, with your shirt, as the inspiration strikes you.
Also, if you’d like to see any other CafePress items with this logo (or any of our logos), just let us know - we’ll be happy to oblige.
February 3, 2009 – 10:00 am
Folk Music. Drums. Can they coexist? This question plagued us (or at least me) for several years during our foray into the folk music scene. That period in the band’s history had many triumphs and many dips into deep despair. But, it also was the source of one of my proudest accomplishments, which I am reminded of today.
Read More »