Smile Like You Mean It

So it's become obvious to me and perhaps you that amidst the still-newish-job, the other jobs, the school, the basement remodeling, the family, and, perhaps most significantly as it relates to this blog, the breakup of the band, that I'm not very good at focusing on the music of Champaign-Urbana...as I had hoped when I first set forth on this mildly interesting blog journey. I blame Dan Beahm in many ways, since his move to Boulder from Champaign in July abruptly ended my rock star days just months into them, just as we hit our stride with a (brief but legendary) mainstage performance at the Canopy Club. With his departure went my valid excuse for leaving my family and responsibilities a few times a month to attend and/or perform a late-night local music rock spectacle. Since then, my ties to the "scene" have become tenuous at best, and I haven't been able to devote the time I need to research the bands I want to highlight. Thus, my blog has consisted mostly of random but (hopefully) fun links to non-local goodness. I'm writing now to simply state that, for at least the next few months until my medic class ends, this blog will continue along the lines of what I've been doing recently, without the C-U focus that I'd like to hit on. I do have partially-written posts on the Andrew Bird concert that was at Krannert back in September and a couple of bands like The Beauty Shop that I'll trot out here one of these days...


BUT, in the meantime, I eagerly invite you to visit Smile Politely, a rather-new blog/website focusing on all things Champaign-Urbana that I mentioned briefly a few posts ago. The rag-tag band of all-Chambana writers includes local music guru Seth Fein, local music superstar Larry Gates, local omnipresent film critic guy Chuck Koplinski, and the former founder and publisher of alt-weekly The Octopus, Paul Young, among many other interesting blokes. They've had very interesting local music updates recently, along with food, theatre, sports, gossip, and everything else, so I invite y'all to point your browsers that'away!

www.smilepolitely.com

Just for kicks and related to nothing, I'll add here for your listening pleasure an **unfinished demo** of my favorite Dan Beahm & the Invisible Three song, as yet unreleased. There is a chance that I may receive a cease-and-desist letter from Dan for this, but he's skiing in Vail right now, so whatever. Again, this is a low-quality DEMO. When performed live, I was the dude on tambourine, who very successfully annoyed all with my overbearing ching-chinging. This is all Dan on the recording, and I invite you, as I have before, to visit his website to listen to all of his most recent album (written, produced, and recorded in a spare bedroom in a house on the corner of Washington & Elm in Champaign) for free. This song is the first of a new genre of music Dan has deemed "swank rock"... rock music with a loungey-hipster flair. Enjoy.

Dan Beahm & the Invisible Three -- "By the By" [MP3 (in a new window)]