Brian Bergeron

I woke up with a serious ‘case of the mondays’ today. My alarm went off at 9 but I snoozed until 10. It was practically impossible for me to get up. It is an unusual situation for me because I don’t often have Mondays. I’m usually working in at least some regard everyday but I had a pretty relaxing weekend. I went home on Tuesday and stayed until Saturday and with the exception of some light electric guitar playing and a few e-mails here and there, I didn’t do a whole heck of a lot. I got to catch up with some friends I haven’t seen enough of and I ate and drank too much. I survived, however, and I’m back now and ready to roll.

I played Faneuil Hall yesterday in 40 degree weather. I thought it was going to be a touch warmer and the entire time during my three hours playing, I kept thinking that I was going to stop. It went really well, however, so I kind of just fought through it. I wore like 5 layers and felt warm with the exception of my hands, which were frigid. All in all, however, I’m still glad that I’m able to do Faneuil Hall in some fashion and hope that I can find a way to work it through the winter (hopefully in the food court).

We’re within three weeks of our big show at The Paradise Lounge so that means I’m in hardcore promotion mode. It’s the time when I’ll bug and message my friends way too much to the point where they may get made at me…All for the hope that we get a bunch of people out. So far, it’s going all right. I made an event invitation of Facebook and invited all my friends and got 14 positive replies. I’ve also been posting bulletins on My Space and have been getting a good buzz. It’s a tough game because I feel like I have to push these shows a lot more than other people normally do and people kind of get desensitized to the number of shows that we play. We have, however, had a big year with one big show after another. I look forward to stepping away after this show and taking some time off. Not really some time off, but getting away from club shows for a while. We have a show in a bar in Lowell in February so that will be a low pressure gig that should be pretty good. I’m also toying around with the idea of having an EP release show when the new CD comes out. That might be during the February gig or I might try and put a club date together in March or April but I’m not thinking about that yet. It is a possibility, however.

So I’m recording in only four days. I’m excited/nervous but not nearly as stressed as I get about a lot of things. For the longest time, I hated recording. Now, I’m just neutral I suppose. I spent a lot of time when I first booked the studio time talking about the tracks that we will record, now that I’ve settled on a tracklist, it’s a matter of making sure the arrangements are tight:

Track list–
Cavity
You Don’t Love Me (At All) **
On My Mind (formerly known as Bobologna)
Sisters
Glory **

**= brand new song

I’m excited to see how everything comes out. If we get a good mix, I might see if the engineers from the sessions would re-mix a couple of the songs I did with Will and Dennis and then take the 7 or 8 songs to get mastered professionally. Even if it means sinking some money into it, I think we could get the 7 or 8 songs sounding great. Like fantastic. It’s great now that I know I have the teacher’s assistant position now. I can spend a little money when before I was budgeting because I didn’t know how much would be coming in.

The plan after releasing this in March or April is to begin looking for a studio and producer to release my first full length starting in the fall. I’ve done a ton of recording this year but it’s been all over the place. The EPs have served me wonderfully because I’ve gotten to work with 2 (soon to be 3) different producers in completely different recording environments and I have gotten my studio chops higher. I have been opposed to recording a full-length for so long because I don’t feel like artistically I could lay down 10 to 12 tracks and make the cohesive album that I wanted to create. I couldn’t make the artistic statement that so many people I know on a local level failed to create when they decided to record 10-12 of their best songs. I feel like I’m almost at that level and am excited at the prospect when all is said and done.

I really want to get a good producer on the project so starting early next year I will be looking to see what producers are available. I have a few in mind and contacted a couple when I recorded “The Great Escape EP” but it didn’t work I think because I didn’t have much of a resume. Now, I have a pretty good one. Needless to say, I’m really excited.

I’m meeting up with Austin in about an hour so I need to get ready for that.

BB