Gets the Girl

NYC Debut, Radio Play, Fan Love

2009-10-12T12:51:00.000-07:00

Finally, a new post. It's been a while, so that means lots of news:

Gets the Girl has been playing shows at a breakneck (for us) speed, performing four times in the last month or so despite the onset of school. We made our NYC debut with an August 22nd show at The Local 269, followed by a September 8th show at the prestigious Sullivan Hall. Then we had our biggest concert to date: solo billing at Keys to the City, a great bar and night club on the New Haven Green that brought in a whopping 400 people. Photos from that show are up on our myspace and feature multiple shots of me dancing like an idiot, so check 'em out. It was a totally ridiculous night, capped by free champagne for the band and our crew and leading to our first radio play on the new 104.1 FM. Sick.

All these gigs had the happy consequence of adding two excellent musicians to the band's roster for good. I'm happy to say that Niraj Patel, drummer, Yale '11, and Dan Bailen, bassist, NYU '12, are officially IN THE BAND. More complete bios on those two to come, but for now, let it suffice to say that they are both ultra-talented musicians who add energy and virtuosity to our live show.

Rounding out the shows, last week Allen and I played an acoustic show at a penthouse apartment in downtown Boston, on the 34th floor of the Ritz Carlton. We played an hour-long set for fifty or so of Boston's most powerful, well-connected people, who were a wonderful audience and bought loads of CDs. It was an amazing opportunity, and spoke well for the accessibility of our sound (most of them were over 40 years old).

We're on a bit of a gigging hiatus for now, as Allen's basketball and my compositional studies preclude any real traveling, but we're planning on releasing a number of videos in the coming months, so stay posted.

All signs seem to point to the fact that the band is nearing the Tipping Point, that critical mass all unsigned bands hope to achieve where their music reaches enough people that it takes on a life of its own, and goes viral. (For an example of someone who is doing this RIGHT NOW at Yale, see Sam Tsui and Kurt Schneider's video here.) Our stuff is definitely spreading... I've been receiving three or four bits of fan mail a week. Consider this message from a fan at McGill:

"at the risk of sounding like a rabid fangirl, i just wanted to tell you how amazing gtg is. so, so, so amazing. i'm only saying this to you because i can't believe that you guys aren't monumentally famous yet, and when you become monumentally famous i'll never be able to tell you. your music is just brilliant. i've been playing the piano for twelve years, so i say that not just as a head-bopping girl, but as a head-bopping, legit-music-appreciating girl. the sophistication of your style and your classical training is really apparent."

-M

Wow. We sent her a T shirt.

We were also recently featured on a running blog and iTunes playlist run by John Anderson in Philadelphia, PA, called Bold Pace Music. I've heard our stuff is good for studying or hooking up, but this is a first. Thanks John for the love, and good luck with your endorphins.

Finally, big props to our manager Avi Gandhi, who is setting up all kinds of great opportunities for the band, ordering t-shirts, getting gigs, talking to blogs, etc.

Other things on my mind: Sufjan Stevens's orchestral piece "The BQE," the return (after a 30 year hiatus) of Bladderball to Yale's campus, Rasheed Wallace.

In the Brooklyn Way,

Ellis

P.S. visit us at our Wordpress account from now on, please!

http://getsthegirl.wordpress.com

Guitar Heroes

2009-07-12T23:11:00.000-07:00

Hullo,
Interviewed 3 amazing guitarist/composers yesterday at Princeton U- Steve Mackey, Mark Dancigers, and Andrew McKenna Lee. Topic of conversation: electric guitar's role in classical music. Is the individualistic nature of the guitar (think Jimi Hendrix's national anthem) antithetical to the subtler paradigm of chamber music, where all the instruments are similarly loud (or quiet), and contribute to the piece with more or less equal importance? What is it about our culture that led popular and rock musicians to have such a different way of thinking about instrumentation; one or two voices taking the lead role (guitar, vocals) and the rest (bass, drums, rhythm guitar, keyboard-usually) just supporting cast? And why do audiences feel somehow let down when a guitarist DOESN'T take this role? Why is music where the guitar is quiet really weird? Cool shit... you should check out what they had to say when the podcast comes out this week on the New Amsterdam website.

All this talk of lead guitars got me thinking about whether we need an electric lead in the Gets the Girl live show. We worked with an amazing guitarist on Just Pretend, Tyler Roberge... it definitely adds a level of virtuosity and musicianship that is otherwise lacking in our stuff. But I wonder if virtuosity is really what the band is about. It remains to be seen. Check out "So Well," "Half a Heart," and "Talk Me Down" at our myspace to check out what I'm referring to. What do you think?

Photoshoot soon. Ideas for iconic/dramatic/interesting places in NYC or wardrobe suggestions are much appreciated.

<3

Infernal Machines, Fair Weather Feelings

2009-07-08T15:41:00.000-07:00

Hey-

Just got back from working at the New Amsterdam office. The highlight of the day was interviewing Darcy James Argue, a contemporary big-band man who won "Emerging Composer of the Year" at the National Jazz Awards this year. He is whip smart, makes really honest, compelling music, and has an excellent blog which, coincidentally, was nominated for "Blog of the Year" at that very same awards ceremony. He calls his music "steampunk," which is usually a term used for fictional literature, but in his case refers to the fact that he is taking something old (the big band) and using it to make something futuristic (his weird, heavily indie-influenced, highly-produced album Infernal Machines). In our interview, we talked about the juxtaposition of old/new, the relationship between notated and improvised material in his work, and the isolated mentality that many jazz composers have in regards to the rest of the music world. The podcast will be up soon... in the meantime, you can stream his music from his page on the NewAm website.

In other news, I just finished a piece for string trio and bass yesterday which will be played by the 5th House Ensemble at Yale in the fall. It's going to be great, though a little difficulty I encountered when I ran it past my cellist roommate is the coordination of playing and stomping (there's a percussive aspect that runs through the work). I'm thinking about having the cellist or bassist actually play a kick drum during the live performance... might be fun.

In GtG news, Allen is currently writing a duet for male and female voice. We have a few prospective girl singers-- more on this later. We're going to record it later this summer and release it on iTunes along with new versions of "Slow Song" and "Lullabye." For now, here's some lyrics from our last duet, "Where We Land":

"So beautiful with your face and your eyes tossed aside

The ready-yets and the get-sets are safely inside

I'll admit to pretending you wouldn't ask to stay

But silly games, as you can tell, take both of us to play.

The fair weather feelings were bound to end

So take your time in feeling like more than just a friend

So stand your ground, dig into the sand

And let it get quiet where we land"

You can download the song with the rest of our Where We Land album for FREE here. And you can get our newest album Just Pretend here, also free. If you like it, please share it-- click the button below:

ELL

A Television Landscape

2009-07-06T11:44:00.000-07:00

Hey all,

I'm currently sitting in Studio B at Clinton Recording Studios in Hell's Kitchen. We're listening to rough edits of tracks from William Brittelle's new album Television Landscape, which will be released on New Amsterdam Records this Winter. It sounds like it's going to be an amazing album, and what's especially cool is that I've been able to see the whole process, from printing the scores, to hiring the musicians, to recording, to editing. I've been pretty involved with it for a while, doing pre-production editing in Logic, working as a techie at the live show, lending an extra ear in editing, buying food for the players, etc. I've even been involved in the promotional planning, researching how other Indie albums succeeded, the best websites to promote it to, etc. It's encouraging that both Bill and the producer, Lawson, seem to go through a similar process that Allen and I do. They start with pre-recorded vocals that Bill sang at home, then craft a sound environment around it, finding players who fit the parts, re-writing little things, running out for Milano cookies, etc. Though they have things a lot more set beforehand than we do... Bill had mock-up Logic files complete with software instruments playing all the parts before they even hired the musicians, whereas Allen and I often write our shit in the studio. One of the benefits of playing most of the instruments ourselves, I guess.

Lyrically, Bill is all over the place. His last album, Mohair Time Warp, was super spastic and just generally ridiculous. This one is much more focused and (I think) enjoyable. I don't want to disclose too much, but here's a snippet of lyrics from the title track, which we're listening to right now:

"beneath each moment, there's a television landscape"

The album is essentially an homage to 80s rock, but seen through the lens of a trained classical composer. Bill used to sing lead vocals for a post-punk NYC rock band until he blew his voice out. Now as one of the co-presidents of New Amsterdam, he's trying to synthesize the super-separate worlds of Classical Music and Everything Else. To give you an idea of the score of TVL, he quotes Prince, the Beach Boys, and Ravel as major influences.

It's interesting to see how Bill has negotiated the weird divide between the notated tradition of Classical music versus the improvised tradition of Rock in this album. He has scores for every song, but they're not very specific, especially in the drum writing, which is sparse and simple. In order to make the whole thing work, he had to get versatile performers who could: a.) read music really well, b.) be open to improvising off a score, c.) blend all of these things together in a sophisticated but accessible way. So like, the drummer read the music but added his own fills, etc. So far, so good-- the level of musicianship on this album is pretty unbelievable.

Oh, Sting popped his head in the other day to say hi to Lawson, but I missed him! I had been working on a new piece for string quartet and was a running a few minutes late. Oh, the sacrifices I make for my art.

Gotta get back to work... more soon.

Ell

New York is a busy, noisy, ridiculous place...

2009-07-02T20:23:00.000-07:00

... and I've been enjoying every minute of it, for the most part. The only real problem I've adjusting to the city is the subway. I mean, it's not difficult to navigate, especially in Prospect Heights and lower Manhattan, which is generally where I spend my time. But it's so LOUD. I've almost given up using my iPod for subway trips, because the squeals, rattles, etc. are enough to drown out most anything that's not, like, at a constant and high volume level all the time. Pretty much, anything that's not Hip Hop or Pop. Which is shitty because I've actually been listening to a lot of somewhat subtler, dynamic-heavy stuff recently, like Nadia Sirota's new album for solo viola (yes, someone actually made an album for solo viola), first things first. It was recorded on New Amsterdam Records, the record label I've been working for. I got to do a podcast to promote its release, which was sick because I got to hang out/get drunk with Nadia, Judd Greenstein, and Nico Muhly, three of my musical idols. Nico especially is doing big things. He just got the grant to write the next Metropolitan Opera. And he's like, 28. Fuck. Plus he runs a sweet blog. Funny thing, the three of them know each other really well from a while back, so the interview was super fun and easy to do. You can hear it here, if you go to the top right corner of the page and click "podcasts." (There's also a note talking about it on the front page.)

Anyway, things are going well in Gets the Girl-ville. Met with Allen the other day to talk over some GtG plans for the Summer. Looks like we're doing two short 3-4 day tours in August (the 14-17 and the 21-24). Then we played some basketball at the NYU gym. Funny, I kept getting smoked by this short, muscular black dude, which was frustrating the hell out of me until I found out he played point guard at Stanford. I felt a lot less bad after that.

Oh, and I played "So Well" for the dudes at NewAm today and they liked a lot. Sweet! Approval from one of New York's hottest/trendiest/most intellectual labels is definitely a good thing. Right now we're trying to decide if "So Well" should be our single off the new album or not... I think we're actually leaning toward "Half a Heart." I'll leave you with lyrics:

Half a Heart

She doesn't wear her glasses much

Likes to keep the world an arm's length away

Says she can focus when she wants to

Doesn't bother to keep in touch

Gets caught up in the day-by-day

Says she can unwind if she has to

She's got half a heart to give

I got half a mind to say

"hold on a little longer, I think we're better off that way"

She keeps me catching up when I thought I was ahead

Got an arrow through my heart

But she was shooting for my head.

She's alright with crazy,

says its just how she gets by

Says she can fake it when she wants to

She fades out like a movie

I hang on but she just slips away

Makes it sound like she has to

Chorus

Luv

Excuse me, miss, have we been acquainted yet?

2009-06-26T22:23:00.000-07:00

Hello all,

I'm Ellis of Gets the Girl. I arrange and produce the music, play the keyboards, and occasionally write songs. The other man in our little duo is Allen, who sings, plays guitar, and contributes much of the lyrics. We've started this blog to document our journey as we strive for relevancy in today's fractured but exciting music world.

I'm a rising junior at Yale, and Allen is a sophomore at NYU, where he plays point guard on the basketball team and acoustic guitar at dorm parties. For my part, I study music composition, and when I'm not playing with the band, I'm writing string quartets or whatever for like, classical ensembles. I run a group at Yale called sic inc-- Students' Indie-Classical Interdisciplinary Collective. Essentially, it's a group of performers whose goal is to present genre-less instrumental music in an interesting and accessible way.

Anyway, the two of us form the core of Gets the Girl, although we have a whole team surrounding us. There's Niraj, our drummer (also a junior at Yale), and Avi, our manager. We also work periodically with a cellist at Yale, a guitarist at Berklee, and a percussionist at Westfield State in MA, and are currently in the process of finding a new bassist. I actually just finished talking with Avi about the possibility of a late-summer tour. We think we'll be doing an 8-10 day trip of major cities on the East Coast, though the details are all pretty fuzzy at this point. Things should clear up soon, as Allen is coming to join me in my Brooklyn home on Monday, and we'll start working it out then. So stay tuned!

I'll leave you with this video we made last summer for one of our pieces, Slow Song. It took like, 40 hours of Photoshopping to come up with this stop-motion/live-motion mix. Lyrics are posted below:

are we too old to remember the days when we were all so separated

and it took the courage of a lion to venture out across the gym floor

say something sweet, get you to come on out with me and find your hips with my hands

so we could sway, oh so uncomfortably, and be so pleased with ourselves?

oh won't you come on reminisce to a slow song with me?

questions rise, questions fall on listener's ear

if you're my better half, what am i without you here?

i pass a note to see if you would be my lady

complete with boxes checking no, yes, or maybe

i miss the times when it was simply you and i-- been such a long time

chorus

Hope you like it! You can hear our stuff at www.myspace.com/getsthegirl , on iTunes, or at this FREE DOWNLOAD LINK, where you can get our entire catalogue of music. If you like it, please click the share button below-- we would love your support! We also have a facebook group and fanpage.

Cheers,

Ellis