Fun summer

Just cleaning off my camera and realized that hey! We had one hell of a summer! The Folk Fest Songwriting competition, Sled Island, Calgary Folk Fest, the Mountainview Festival, the Bownesians picnic, our CD release at the Palomino, playing live on CJSW, the Tour de Bowness bike race, a couple of pool parties and then a bunch of bar gigs, just to keep us off the streets. It may have taken us a month to recover but we did it up right!
Here are a few snaps for posterity.

Bownesians at Sled Island 2009

Well, we're pretty damn excited about being selected to play Sled Island this year. Doug's kitchen was rocking on Monday night as we practiced our special S.I. set (gotta keep up with the other bands on the bill, don't you know - Jon Rae Fletcher and Australia's the Re-mains are all playing after us at Verns that night! Yeah! I know!!!) The show is Friday night at Verns (8th Avenue, right next to the Uptown). Come check it out!

The Calgary Folk Festival Songwriting Competition 2009 - Best Song of Alberta

The competition was stiffer than the a Ronnette's beehive, but Doug Waite of the Bownesians, for the second year in a row, took the title of "Best Song of Alberta". Yeehaw!!

Winning the contest again means money to finish our CD and the opportunity to play at the fabulous Calgary Folk Festival once again (Leah is going to consume only throat lossenges for two straight weeks before the festival, as to avoid another embarrassing voice-losing incident like last year).

Here we are, fresh from "Bowness Garbage Day" where we played on the back of a trailor being pulled by a tractor, on the Ship and Anchor stage performing Doug's winning song "Alan Saved the Radio Station."

more photos from the night the girls took over the Palomino!

Happy, the Garter Girls and, of course, the fabulous Bownesians at the Palomino. Photos courtesy of Clayton Hansen.

more at audities...

late February...bownesian's percussionist Mike had to lay his tambourine trax... the session started well but soon devolved into mayhem as the pins in mike's (actually, Leah's!!!) tambourine began to, one by one, fly from the instrument... followed shortly by the little metal discs... like shrapnel throughout the studio... David burying his head in his hands, saying, 'glad u guys brought quality gear out...' as the tiny deadly dics flew mere inches from the $10K mic.

Friday the 13th at the Palomino...

...was anything but bad luck. Sherry-Lee and her handsome fellers, plus the Garter Girls burlesque troupe helped ensure that. Notice the enthusiastic facial expressions of the band members.

Some more photos from the recording. The whole thing happened 

over about 4 days - 4 

very long but incredible days (10 am to 2 am kind of days),so we were all a little frazzled by the end.  

The Bownesians went on tour on Saturday night. We left Bowness to take it on the road all the way to Centre Street, namely, the Studio Cafe.

Opening for the Appleman Collective, we were the crowd warmers and the Studio seemed like the perfect place to come in from the cold on a bloody cold night (-30 freakin' degrees!)

The Appleman's crowd were ready for some rhumba-ing once the Collective started, and I caoptured this video of the Appleman's gal and a friend dancing with wild abandon. As evidenced by the footage, a good time was had by all.

Oy vey, the next morning we were up with the birds heading over to the Bowness Community Centre's Community Association celebration. We mainlined coffee and made it through - and no clowns were injured either. This was a milestone.

Rosemary's doin the mambo...

Tiki Bar Mayhem...

So one coldcoldcold, snowy December night, an artist named Robert Turriff invited the Bownesians to play in the midst of his magical art installation at ACAD - a make-shift but incredibly authentic looking tiki lounge! The weather outside might have been nothing short of frightful, but with a video loop of a beach scene playing outside the fake window, and a crowd that was eager to believe that they were drinking mai tais in a tropical paradise (instead of inside the Alberta College of Art with the windchill at a record -50 outside) the atmosphere was pretty damn balmy...

Photos by Kenneth Locke

Get some tequila for your voice

...that was the advice given to bownesian vocalist Leah by her pal Sam Masterton. "And get the good stuff, too", Sam cautioned. This seemed to work well last weekend when Leah was tracking her vocals in the Audities studio. We listened closely to the 'before tequila' and 'after tequila' tracks, and really, there was no comparison. Of course, the 'after tequila' listening was, well, AFTER tequila so there may have been some bias...

Recording Good Times

The Bownesians had the amazing opportunity to record at the fantastic Audities Studio this weekend. Owner, engineer and audio-phile extra-ordinaire, David Kean, is producing our 6 song EP and we really appreciated his expertise. With six of us in the band, it's no easy feat organizing our complicated little arrangements, let alone corralling us all and keeping us on track ("like herding cats," David was heard to say)!

Anyway, we're not finished yet, but what an amazing experience so far.