February 19, 2008
Gong Lake is released. CD and heavy clear vinyl.


November 1, 2007
The vinyl test pressings have been approved. We'd like to extend a giant thank you to our friend John Hastie in Chicago for doing the grunt work for us while we were on tour.

October 28, 2007
The first "single" from Gong Lake is out. Along with the help of our friends Tyler H. Derryberry and James A. Weinberg the art looks amazing. We hand spraypainted the jackets and screenprinted over the paint.



October 1, 2007
Way back in August we went to our friend Scott's Old Colony studio in South Boston and mastered and sequenced the record. Sometime at the end of September (last week to be exact) Dan finished the artwork and it was approved by all. Today, the first of October, the LP and CD masters were sent off to the manufacturer. Now we wait. More:

Title: Gong Lake
Tracklist:
Silver Pool
Grey Shallows
Paris Green
Purple Sleep
Yellow River
Copper Green
Blue Glass
Black Tide
Red Sea
Ebbing
Release date: Tuesday, February 19, 2008

A limited edition CD single/EP for one of the aforementioned songs, plus some other audio oddities will be available in November.

August 9, 2007
We met at Mark's house to listen to the finished mixes on Mark's tricked-out stereo. Everything sounds great. We have to make minor changes to 3 of the songs, otherwise all that's left to be done is mastering and finishing up the artwork. Time to celebrate, time to nap.

July 31, 2007
Preliminary mixing is now complete. M, J and K worked well into the morning once again and during this time Jason fell asleep in the middle of a conversation with Kevin. Yup. Now we will spend a few days away from listening to the songs and revisit them in a week or so. Hopefully we'll gain perspective and little will need to be changed.

July 30, 2007
All 4 of us again sat in the hot basement studio, slowly stewing in our sweaty clothes. We mixed 2 more songs, which now puts us at a total of 6 completed.

July 29, 2007
Jason, Mark and Kevin got together and mixed 3 more songs...Dan caught up on sleep.

July 28, 2007
Photos of the mixing and recording occurances that took place almost 25 hours ago.


July 27, 2007
We met at Jason's, had breakfast and discussed the general direction we felt the mixing should go in. We shared our concerns and our rudimentary mixing ideas. We got to the Berwick and it was brutally hot. A damp basement in Roxbury, MA is a great place to spent a sweltering summer day doing vocals and trying your hardest to concentrate. We had 1 fan that Jason brought from his house which had the air-circulating power of a moth trying to escape the room. Maybe there was no fan at all and we just, every once in a while, felt a sneezy breeze pass by us. This was a productive installment and we finished the rest of the vocal recording...it took most of the day. Mark stood on a box to do his vocals as the microphone was set to Jason's height. Kevin set up a condenser mic in the adjacent room. Cavernous and concrete, the natural reverb was pretty great. After we had a dinner break we started mixing the first track...it took almost 5 hours. Jason had to go home, Dan fell asleep on the couch while Mark and Kevin worked diligently. Dan awoke to our first finished track...this was small milestone that felt like a small miracle.

July 25, 2007
We went to Kevin's house to work on some edits and to start mixing. It was hot. Dan fell asleep on Kevin's bedroom floor. Band life is exciting and you shouldn't let anyone talk you out of it.

July 23, 2007
Now comes the painful and tediuos chore of making the artwork. We've spent the entire day going back and forth with ideas on album title, track listing and cover art. Painful is a fitting word. Dan spent 43 minutes on the phone with Table of the Elements/Radium C.E.O. Jeff Hunt discussing art specs. There have been no official reports if any progress was made. Later in the day Mark and Dan met Kevin at his studio in Roxbury, MA to do some additional recording. Dan strapped on the dust mask and did some vocal bits...finishing the vocals parts to Grey Shallows. Sweet, another thing done.

July 20, 2007
We've been listening back to the rough mixes and making notes. Mark has been holed-up in the Magnetisn Crafts Kisok editing and mixing together ideas and making suggestions. We're now mapping out the album...making blueprints, sketches, revisions, crumbled up pieces of trash, maybe even actual gold...we are in the maluble phase. This is where you can fuck everything up really easily.

July 16, 2007
The initial recording hurdle has been cleared, which means we're done with all of the initial instrument and most of the vocal tracking. The jams are so laid down. Comitted to long strips of magnetic tape. Now we move onto mixing which can be more difficult and always much more arduous.

We can't say enough good shit about Machines with Magnets, the incredible people who run it, Ursala the sweetest guard dog ever encountered and the fine, colorful citizens of Pawtucket, RI some of us had the pleasure of running into on the street. Holy $%&# is a phrase that immeadiatly comes to mind. Here is a brief day by day replay:

Day 1, Monday July 9th: We picked up Kevin, left Boston and arrived in Pawtucket, RI around noon. We loaded our stuff in while Kevin and Keith talked about microphones and traded bits of technical studio jargon. We set up quickly and spent the entire day placing mics and getting sounds...it took over 10 hours to do just that. There was a show in the adjacent gallery begining at 10:00 PM, we played a song to test levels as the first band played just a few feet away. We dont think they heard us, we were not intending to be rude. We were really happy with the inital sound of everything. Deciding to save out ears we opted to go to bed and rest. Our friend Tom was gracious enough to let us stay the week at his place not too far away in Providence. We went to Tom's where he, being the gracous host, fed us a hearty delicious meal in the backyard before we found floor space to sleep. It was stifling.

Day 2, Tuesday July 10th: Everyone woke up early. The heat and bright light of day made it impossible to sleep. We had breakfast with Tom and left. This was a really productive day, we worked almost 15 hours and managed to get 5 songs down. By the time we left we were all spun out...back to Tom's for a few more hours of heat-aggrivated sleep. It was 3:30 am when Kevin gave Dan a lecturing about the frustrations that arise during recording. We stayed up and discussed the next days plans a bit. Mark slept on a very thin mat in the TV room, Dan slept on 3 cleverly positioned couch cushions in the hallway next to the bathroom. Kevin and Jason flanked each side of the dining room table on very thin sleeping mats placed on the wooden floor.

Day 3, Wednesday July 11th: Today we arrived a bit earlier and ate breakfast at the studio. Kevin had a bunch of patching and set up to do so we started around 1:00 PM. This might have been the most frustrating day overall. We spent almost 6 hours getting one song they way we wanted it. We'd play it, fuck it up, listen to it back, make small changes and try it again. It was really difficult. None of us were happy so we tried different ways of recording it but it just wasn't working out like we hoped it would. We got to a point where we hit a wall, it just wasn't going to happen. So to humor ourselves in our delerious state we sad fuck it and tried it one more and actually got it. Maybe it was because we let our guard down, who the hell knows, but it worked nonetheless. We thought this day would be easier since we did 5 songs the day before but these songs proved to be the hardest. We worked for over 15 hours. 3 more songs down. Back to sleep on the floor.

Day 4, Thursday July 12th: The early part of the day we worked on fixing problems left over from the previous day, the later part of the day we kept open for experimentation. We did some improv stuff with Kevin and later on our friend Ken brought his homemade synth and we laid some gold to tape. After we filled almost 2 reels of tape with improvisation stuff, we started work on vocals. This turned out to be a brutally long day. We worked until sometime after 5:00 AM, as we left MwM it had already been light out for a bit. It's so disorienting to spend almost an etire day in a room with no windows, listening to the same things over and over to leave as birds are chirping and everyone else is going to work. We worked almost 18.5 hours and by the time we reached our beloved floor spaces to sleep it was complete blaring daylight.

Day 5, Friday July 13th: We slept for 4 or so hours then went and worked on vocals all day. We worked until 6:00 PM, then drove home to Boston to play a show. We'll admit it was not our best, maybe our worst in some time, but it was fun in that sleep deprived way. Sort of like "Really? That was fun? Awesome...I guess it was then, wasn't it!" We left the van loaded and slept in our own beds...



THANK YOU: Machines with Magnets, Kevin Micka, Keith Souza, Seth Manchester, Tom Roach, Ken Linehan, Farhad Ebrahimi, Pawtucket, RI, Ursala the raddest dog in Rhode Island, Lauren Holt, Vikki Warner, and our van.

July 8, 2007
We had our last rehearsal last night. Almost 7 months to the day that we first started writing stuff for this record. We met with Kevin to discuss microphone strategies, then played everything one last time before packing the van. Today we'll set up, get sounds and maybe do some tracking...we'll see. We're driving to Pawtucket very shortly. It's raining but warm. Very exciting.

June 29, 2007
Today Dan was stopped by the police for taking pictures of Boston Harbor because of his Obvious threat to "Homeland Security". We drove to Chelsea, MA to gather a pile of photos to use for album artwork. At some point some guy in an oil truck started yelling at Dan. Partially Dazed and partially in disbelief Dan looked up to see 2 police cars coming down the street. One had their lights flashing but only one stayed and the officer got out of his car and inspected the photos. A bunch of artsy, blurry photos (most of them Polaroids) of rocks, weeds, the ocean, a rusty bike...obviously we were gathering these to use for future unspeakable acts. They actually said, not once but twice, it was an "obvious threat to homeland security" because we had photos of the bridge. In the end the cop didn't confiscate or make us delete any photos but if something terrible happens soon Dan is expecting the doorbell to ring shortly thereafter. Seriously a fucked up place we live in.

June 6, 2007
We've spent the past few days locked away in the practice space and it's been quite beneficial. Today we went to Mark's house (The Magnetism Crafts Kiosk and Bakery) and recorded all of our vocal parts over the recordings we did a week ago. Here is evidence:




June 4, 2007
We were supposed to start recording today. As things often don't go according to plan, we got a call from Machines with Magnets yesterday informing us that due to an air conditioning unit problem, we will have to postpone recording until July. Today is Jason's birthday, so we're making the best of it, having a BBQ and drinking cheap wine instead of being held captive in a studio.

May 31, 2007
Today we recorded the new songs ourselves in the rehearsal space. Mark dragged all his gear in, placed the mics and we got rough versions of all 8 songs. It will be a good reference point. We can spend the next few days listening and individually coming over the fine hairs. Maybe a clipping, maybe a shave or maybe nothing at all. We have 2 more rehearsals left before heading to lovely Pawtucket, RI to deliver the young, handsome new compositions to archival materials.

May 21, 2007
It's been almost a month since we've written anything here but we've been busy. We are two weeks away from recording and going in with 8, possibly 9 new songs. We have fine tuned all the songs we have been speaking of in previous posts as well as written 2 new ones. We've somehow amassed 6 reels of 2" tape and we don't plan on sleeping much.


April 25, 2007
Photos from April 22, 2007 taken in lovely New Haven, CT where we were happy to share a bill with our friends Usaisamonster and David Daniell. 5 of 7 new songs and much to our suprise we played them fairly well...that is considering we've only played some of the new songs only a handful of times. It was great to play out again, we realized how much we've missed it over the past few months. Hearing the new songs in a different space gave us a look into what needs work and what gets to stay. Aside from some edits, extensions and other minor changes the first wave of writing is nearing completion. Now on to the next...

Photos by Jared Katz and Lindsay Metivier

April 17, 2007
Sadly we were forced to cancel our weekend tour due to vehicular hinderances. Our precious van's electrical system failed. Sad. Though we were disappointed to not be playing out and seeing friends this afforded us the opportunity to lock ourselves and in our rehearsal room and fine tune our current songs. The work was very much needed. We also wrote another new song called "Paris Green". It rules. We send our apologies to anyone that was going to attend any of those shows. We'll be back very soon.


April 13, 2007


April 9, 2007
We embark on a mini tour this upcoming weekend where we will try out the 5 new songs we've finished. Untitled #1 is now called "Emerald Sea" and untitled #2 has a working title of "Grey Harbor Shallows".

April 4, 2007
We now have 5 songs in varying degress on finishedness, In order from most to least they are:
1. Yellow River
2. Untitled #1 (See chart below)
3. Untitled #2 (See video Below)
4. Black Tide
5. Untitled #3 (See way below)



April 1, 2007
This is a song we came up with a few weeks back...we really liked some elements of it, but something overall just wasn't there. We cut out some dead-weight parts, kept what we liked and restructured the whole thing. We are again proud parents. This one is really guitar heavy with electronic poke-outs all over the place. It cuts Mark's hands and hurts Dan's arms. Jason has cut his caffeine intake in half. This is no April Fool's joke.


March 30, 2007
Machines with Magnets



March 29, 2007
Enjoy this map, it is of the first finished song. No guitars are played.


March 27, 2007


March 26, 2007
Finally, we have some real news. While we really enjoy talking about the weather and taking silly photographs, we figured if you're actually looking at this page you might want to know what's up to in regard to the record we're working on. Overall, we're generating some new sounds and trying to incorporate some new elements into our music. We have 3 songs close to being finished, the structures are pretty much set and now we're just working on transitions and cleaning up certain parts. "Yellow River", the first one we wrote, sounds the closest to actually being finished. A second as of yet untitled song needs a bit of work but has us all really excited. It's full of electronic sounds coming out of 3 different amplifiers, bass kalimba and tons of drums, percussion and clicking. no vocals yet. We're working on a third tentitively called "Black Tide". It is a bit more subdued and dark. The 4th song, an improv we did at 2 shows a few months ago will still probably make it onto the record in some form, however we have not worked on it all that much since.

Aside from that we have a bunch of ideas and parts that may/may not turn into "songs". We're currently setting up to record stuff in our practice space so maybe we'll have some audio bits up soon.

Lastly, we have decided on a studio in Pawtucket, Rhode Island that seems to be pretty sweet. The record will be recorded by our good friend Kevin Micka who recorded Patterns and the Improv LP amongst much other stuff. We will record in the first week of June, starting on Jason's birthday. That's all for now, more weather updates forthcoming.

March 25, 2007
Here are some of the new instruments we are working with. The second picture down on the left is what happens to an instrument after 117 shows in a relatively short time. The guy in the red sweater is Joel, if you see him around say "hey".


We Ran into our friend Casey on our way to practice and later realized the first flowers of spring had bloomed outside our practice room. How Nice.


March 23, 2007
Sorry we've been such strangers but we've been really busy as of late. Marathon practices are having good results. New instruments and gear are generating alien sounds. The coming of spring is making us happy. We're still lighting the fireplace in our rehearsal room, but we're also spending more time getting mud on our shoes since it's now warm enough to stand out in the yard as the snow melts.

March 1 , 2007


February 28 , 2007
Mark is on vacation. Jason and Dan have been busy writing a new song. The 4th potential contender for the new record...we'll see what kind of magic the vacationee will lay over it upon his return. It's been pretty warm and the ice is melting, but it's still winter and there is still snow on the ground.

February 20, 2007
Today we've begun writing yet another new song for the record. This one is pretty spazzy. Here is a map of a tentitive structure. A visual aid so you can see what it might sound like. This also serves as a look into our sophisticated song writing methodology.


February 12, 2007


January 31, 2007
We took a week off from writing to play some shows with the amazing Rhys Chatham. On January 29th, 2007 we played at Great Scott in Allston, MA. The show was recorded and we ended our set with an improv piece that will probably end up on the next record in some form. Many people had very nice things to say about it, so we put it up for stream on our MySpace page. It's called "Improvisation Live...", give it a listen.

January 12, 2007





January 10, 2007
This was the first time we got together to work on new material and the first time we played together since returning home from 4 months on tour. We're all reconfiguring our set-ups and experimenting with new tunings and effects. Jason has constructed a few new instruments such as an electric gas pipe xylophone, a new multi-control oscillator and a spring harp. Mark is working on a new synthesizer which will improve upon his masterpiece light switch synth box.

We started to write a new song which at this point Dan is playing the electric gas pipe xylophone and drums, Jason is playing amplified springs and singing and Mark is playing drums, percussion and foot controlled oscillator. Thus far it's kind of strange. Tentative song title: Yellow River.

We also now have a fireplace in our rehearsal space, so expect plenty of sexy.