Just a little reminder that We Accidense are playing a very special indoor/outdoor show at Experimental Sound Studio (5925 N. Ravenswood) this Saturday at 4:00pm. And before that, we are being featured on the glorious WNUR (89.3 FM, Evanston/Chicago). The following is from the desk of Dan Burke…

Incorporating: “Patchworks” feature focusing on groundbreaking, old and new synthesizer music and primarily modular synth music made by members of the Muffwiggler forum from 4-5PM.

We thought we’d give y’all a taste of what we’re bringing to Europe in September a little early: Yeah: Saturday, August 31, in the afternoon, we are doing our first show at ESS as part of their summer series (graciously and intelligently curated by one Adam Vida). Implodes, a band I’ve not yet heard but look forward to hearing, will also be playing that day.

And, yeah: Evelyn Davis (specializing in piano innards), Dante Kester (our newest and tallest bass player), Charles Dudley Bayne, III, Jeff Libersher and Thymme Jones will be the lineup you will hear.

You will, here?

Or I suppose you could skip that show and just see us at one of these spots:

Friday, Sept. 13: Gerardmer, France. Le Grattoir

Saturday, Sept. 14: Basel, Switzerland. Hirscheneck

Sunday, Sept, 15: Leuven, Belgium. L’Escalier

Monday, Sept. 16: Brussels, Belgium. Magasin 4

Tuesday, Sept. 17: Paris, France. L’Espace B

Wednesday, Sept. 18: Clermont-Ferrand, France. Raymond Bar

Thursday, Sept. 19: Probably Milano! Confirmation soon!

Friday, Sept. 20: Montpellier, France. The Black Sheep

Saturday, Sept. 21: Carmaux, France. Rock In Opposition Festival

We get to play before our heroes, Univers Zero! And Faust will be there, too. ¡Yowza!

Our good, good, obnoxiously talented friends, Carla Kihlstedt and Matthias Bossi, were in town last week. The first thing they did upon arrival was play an amazing show at Schuba’s: It was intimate and highly engaging, with some of the most amusing caffeine-induced between-song banter I’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing. The second thing they did (which I unfortunately could not attend) was play a house show in Evanston. The third thing… Oh, the third thing they did…

Well, they invaded our CHEER-ACCIDENT recording/rehearsal space (“the basement”) to document the very first TRUE collaboration between them and us. (Now don’t get me wrong, these two camps have put in a lot of time together, both in the form of recording– Carla sings on “Sun Dies” from Fear Draws Misfortune and plays violin on “Blue Cheadle” from that same album, and their former band, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, and CHEER-ACCIDENT have engaged in so much onstage cross-pollination that I’ve sometimes forgotten where one band ended and the other began. But this…)

THIS was the first bona fide collaboration, in that we were all equally involved in the inception of a song. The way we went about “writing” this song was rather treacherous: Carla, Matthias, and “road friend,” Abby, came over to join the JeffThymmeDanteEvelyn version of the band (in other words 4/5 of Euro-Accident) to freely improvise for an hour. The next step in the writing process entailed sifting through the (frightening/joyous/magical) id vomit to “find the song.” Well, we found a few chunks that did the trick, Carla sang some words that Scott Rutledge had written many years ago (which happened to be lying in plain sight on a table upstairs, still songless after all these years), violas/violins/trumpets were overdubbed and we were good to go.

And so what does this collaboration have to do with “musicians earning a living?” Well, this song (entitled “Before The Sun”) is to be the August 2013 installment of Carla and Matthias’ subscription page. Jointly, they go under the moniker “Rabbit Rabbit Radio.” I’ve been a subscriber since day one, and it’s been an amazing ride: They’ve pledged to record a NEW song every month, while giving members of the site access to the process of the recording (via video documentation), top ten lists and other dork-ass brain fun (DABF). You can enlist in this extraordinary world for as little as two dollars a month. They have generated enough interest during their one and a half years of existence to have come darned close to earning a living (there’s that phrase again) through this site alone.

And guess what? CHEER-ACCIDENT is about to follow suit. That’s right, we are going to (per their suggestion) completely rip off their idea: As of September 1, 2013, you will be able to enable yourselves (for $2, $4, $6, or $10) access to a brand new song, rare live footage, conversations with Phrogclock, and a “wild card” scenario which will vary from month to month. (And, of course, the “free” part of CHEER-ACCIDENT.com, including the part you’re reading right now, will remain free.)

So. Given that we find ourselves a mere 24 hours away from Rabbit Rabbit Radio’s first CHEER-ACCIDENT invasion/inclusion, I suppose I should throw you their link. It looks like this: http://rabbitrabbitradio.com/

Fortuitous, eh? And completely (honest!) unplanned. Tune in soon for details on how you may participate in enabling your favorite CHEER-ACCIDENT to earn a living.

We are playing our first show in two years (almost to the day) at Mayne Stage in Rogers Park. 1328 W. Morse. Doors open at 6:30. Show is at 8:00. Gnuman will be starting the night. They are a Gary Numan cover band. We come the closest we’ve ever come to being a Gary Numan cover band on the “B” side of our new single which will be available at the show. (We’ve never come that close to being a Gary Numan cover band, though.)

(But really, that “B” side isn’t as far off as you might imagine.) Well, enough about Gary Numan. Let’s talk about you. What do YOU think about Gary Numan?

Don’t forget to remind me to tell you that it’s an all ages show.

Oh, and that we’ll be playing for 90 minutes, covering pretty much every year we’ve been around. But who’s counting?

I think the keyboard player for Gnuman is a dentist. But he also used to be in the band Men Without Hats.  
(I don’t believe those two things are mutually exclusive.)

Our new bass player is good. His name is Dante Kester. These people, who are also playing that night under the CHEER-ACCIDENT moniker, could also be considered good: Carmen Armillas, Charles Dudley Bayne III, Mike Hagedorn, Andrea Faught, Jeff Libersher, Cory Bengsten, Sacha Mullin, and Thymme Jones.

I hope you can be considered good. And there. On June 22. Saturday.

Okay. Time to run out of time!