Appropriately Titled: Craft Beer

     For those who haven’t met me before I must confess something to you... I have an affinity for beer. Not in an alcoholic drink a case of Bud Light a day kind of way but rather enjoy a couple unique beers on a suave sailboat (okay, so maybe I don’t own a sailboat!). Craft beer has been on a steady rise for several years now. Who ever imagined that they’d wait in line for an hour just to try and get a limited release beer not to mention only ONE bottle?! Liquor stores that carry these types of beer are becoming the Toys R Us for adults with Great America caliber lines.

     So why do you care about my ramblings on craft beer? Well, maybe you don’t and I won’t force you to read any further. If you do you may find a common interest with my hobby. I collect and brew beer. Not necessarily the most “logical” hobby but nonetheless a wonderful one. I started brewing a few years ago and my first beer was a Holiday Ale, appropriately named, “The Grinch’s Christmas Ale” (This sums up my liking for Christmas). Some of my close friends received a bottle along with some homemade wine as their holiday gift. Since then I’ve gone on to brew several different kinds of beers: Oktoberfest, IPA and a Heavy Hopped Wheat to name a few with my latest being a Hefeweizen for the hot summer ahead. If you’re interested in following my brewing adventures feel free to find me on Instagram (kev_james) or Facebook.

     



Tagging Beers before they make their way into my storing cellar



The other half of my beer hobby is collecting. I’ve been asked many times why because people think beer is made to be consumed upon purchasing. This is not necessarily true. Some beers can age for quite some time. I have a few that I plan on aging for 10 years. Yes, you read that correctly. Lately I’ve found myself purchasing more beer to age than I have to drink immediately. While this is not a lucrative investment it is a delicious one that I intend to continue! Maybe you’ll be lucky enough to be invited over to my humble abode for some tastings.



     As I’m sitting pondering the thought of what color I want to paint my bedroom I receive an email titled, “Model Stranger – Craft Beer Festival.” Clearly this captured my attention. Upon reading it we received an offer to play this year’s Craft Beer Street Festival in Chicago. My immediate response was, “Hell yes!” Then I realized I have two other band members that may want to be informed first. Needless to say we took the show and are excited to be performing this coming Saturday, June 30th at 3:45 sharp followed by Empires, Civil Twilight and Shiny Toy Guns. If you dig craft beer you should really look at the lineup of Breweries and plan on attending this festival. And while you’re at it make sure to wander over to the music stage and catch us sweating profusely while pouring out our hearts and souls. Then come up, say hello and let’s drinks some delectable beers together. See you Saturday.

Recent Beers I Suggest:

Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Ale
Bell's Hopslam
Three Floyds Zombie Dust
Lagunitas Imperial Red
Central Waters Bourbon Barrel Aged Stout

-Kevin James

Recording of the Last Time

Last week we released a new track called "The Last Time". Having quite the number of new tracks to work from we decided to lead out with something from the "stranger" side.

This song was recorded over two days and is the first track where we were able to use some of the sound design we came across from experimenting with synthesizers in the studio. Since we had the opportunity of working it out live and rehearsed it well the recording went smooth. This was the first time I performed a song in the studio with "keys" as the main track.

As we are partial to mixing analog, when we were finished recording we packed up our gear and headed over to FAT Recording to work on the mix through a console.  On night one the tape machine was out of sync and was giving us a warble. We ended up bouncing it down in Pro Tools and it sounded really great until I realized the next day that we I forgot to unmute the percussion...

Vincent and I. Working it.



Night two went even better and the tape machine magically started working just fine. This time I made the mistake of leaving this really questionable effect on my vocal and when we ran the second mix I never bypassed it. I was so focused on the percussion that I forgot about the rest of the song. Needless to say the lack of sleep and the stress to the get the track done was getting the best of me.

Finally on night three I was able to get a final mix completed and over the weekend we sent the song out for mastering.

Although it we caught some snags I had a really great time working on this one.

The song was mastered by Jay Franco of Sterling Sound in New York and the artwork on this release we teamed up with local Tatoo designer and owner of the Burnt Tiger, DJ Auld. We hope you enjoy!

"The Last Time" (<--- Free Download)

Thanks for Reading!

Stephen Francis

Tight Scenes, Tears, Loud Bikes and a Small World.

Personally, I enjoy seeing how different cities we visit throughout the country compare in regards to their “Music Scene.”  Being from Chicago, I have seen that “scene” go through many different changes; some for the better and definitely some for the worst.  Whether you thoroughly enjoy it or not, Indianapolis has a “scene” on the rise and hopefully we can continue to see that “scene” flourish as we continue to visit. A couple of weeks ago we played Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, Indiana; we found it to be a joyous trip filled with surprises at every turn.

Indianapolis still proves to be one of the most tight-knit musical communities (no matter how large or small).  I feel that is in partial effect to the people of Lazy Hawk Promotions. No matter how you spin it, Will and his wife BeBe (Lazy Hawk Promotions) are in it for the music. That is something that is near non-existent in the music industry of today. Lazy Hawk, in addition to the dozens of bands that compose the live music scene of Indianapolis, has one-collaborative-agenda: go support live-original music. What more could you ask for? Granted, the grass is always greener on the other side; some people may want more all-ages-shows, some people may want only metal or punk shows… Whatever the case, the reality stands, the Indianapolis “scene” tries to put as many asses in the seats and actually listen to the live music being performed in their city. Chicago has seen better days, as we are still trying to crawl out from the sludge-of-an-era peppered with cover bands.  But there is light on the horizon. Original-live music isn’t going to disappear anytime soon, so hopefully the youthful enthusiasm of Indianapolis can infect their neighboring cities. We see a beautiful thing in Indy and hopefully it will be there the next time we roll through.  It was definitely prominent during our most recent visit for the Lazy Hawk Anniversary show. I guess it didn’t hurt that we played an in-your-face set with foot stompers the whole way through, with the exception of one tune J. We ended up doing some research and discovered the wedding song for the Lazy Hawk promoters, “Do You Realize” by The Flaming Lips. I was happy to see the shock-and-awe that came to their faces, not so much the tears to their eyes, just the utter sense of surprise, as we struck into the song. It was a magical night.

But, the magic had to stop as we were slotted in Fort Wayne the following night. The club we played was directly across the street from The Outlaws (motorcycle club) Club House… All that kept running through my head was episodes of “Gangland.”  I mean it was a rough looking spot. However, the staff at the club and the other bands on the bill couldn’t have been nicer. As the night progressed we felt at ease and played another set packed with our rockers. When I saw some of the Outlaws come in the club I was happily surprised to hear that they “enjoyed the tunes.”  Post show we grabbed a beer with a local friend at another club down the street. 

We sat at the bar nursing our beers as our eyes were glued to the TV’s above the bar. Visions of silly animals and nut-shots filled the boob tubes. We later found out that the one of the owners was behind the compilations of random awesomeness; he finds it to be a hobby… and I am fond of his hobby. I was just happy to be watching that ridiculousness while enjoying a beer when a fellow walked up to me and Stephen.

“Hey, do I know you? My friend thought you were my friends…”

“Uh, I don’t think so man,” I sputtered.

“Well, he thought that you were my friends because you are wearing hats and have tattoos.”

Turned out that we actually did have a lot of common acquaintances and he was a proprietor of the booking company for the club. We chatted for the next hour or two about our common friends, like and dislikes. I’ve said it thousands of times, however, it’s true; one of the best parts about being on the road is meeting and building relationships with people whom paths you were meant to cross. We were singled out because of my Stetson, Stephen’s bowler and our tattoos; and we ended up making a nice friend out of it.

Fairytales,

 VJ

The Explosive Nature of Life on the Road

QUINCY - May 11th

Picture this, you are in a nice-peaceful sleep enjoying dreams of fresh fruit and a magical minotaur when you are abruptly awaken by the sound of cannons. No, this is not a bad hangover-wakeup in the parking lot of Medieval Times, it was Model Stranger’s Saturday morning in Quincy, IL.

We made the voyage to play at Johnny Bang Bangs (an absolutely great club with the staff to match) a couple Fridays back. As we rolled into this pleasant place of about 40,000 residents I was delighted by the active & quaint river-town; Johnny Bang Bangs turned out to be a beautiful venue and made way for a nice evening.

Nice projector behind the stage at Johnny Bang Bangs!



Post show we shot the breeze on the riverbed with some expired Fosters (which I do not recommend) and decided to crash in the trusty van. Little did we know in a few short hours Quincy’s big half marathon/Fest would be taking place.

See our van on the right? This is the view of the club from the Mississippi.

My last memory had been finishing my beer next to the Mississippi, crawling in the van and putting on my sleep mask. The next thing I know there are cannons firing and the pitter-patter of hundreds of feet; I had to ask if we were accidentally sleeping in Bill & Ted’s phone booth after a time travel. Nope, just three guys sleeping in a hotbox-of-a-van in the middle of a half-marathon on the Mississippi River, a normal wakeup in Strangeland. We followed this wakeup call with a drive into Burlington, IA and a hearty breakfast.


BURLINGTON - May 12th
Burlington is another town that tickles my pickle. It's a great little place with old architecture and places like The Buffalo, Weird Harold’s and Mr. Motos that can consume a free soul for hours. Anywho, we continued to The Crazy Coyote; we love this place and the owner, Jason, is doing great things. For instance, this show was in correlation with a Special Olympics fundraiser (in which we also donated a percentage of our merch sales to).


As we pulled into town and made our way towards KQ92 for an interview, we dialed into station and were surprised to hear "Dreams and Bones" on air. Very exciting! The interview went quick and we headed to the venue.

The show at the Coyote was a racous one ending with a foot stompin’ and wild dancin’ crowd; much to our liking and overwhelming approval. So I’ll just say it; Burlington, we love you. It is scenes like this (and others like ndianapolis, Macomb, etc.) that plant seeds of sincerity which will hopefully spread like wildfire through the masses and revive the dying conscious of local, and more importantly, sincere music... Sometimes autographs too.

Who is Brandi?



There is a video of the show somewhere - hopefully we can get it in here shortly!

I will be honest, I love our travels and I love the people that enjoy what we are doing. I look forward to continuing the recording process and more importantly, completing a project in order to help the wildfire accelerate.

As Model Stranger carry’s our own torch I plan on enjoying the scenery along the journey… and waking to alarm clocks rather than cannons.

Sexual.
 

VJ.