The real danger of a down economy for creative folks is one they don’t talk about on the news; boredom. The problem for folks like us at August Hour is if we get bored, things really go badly.

Good thing for us, boredom isn’t a problem right now. Between scoring the documentary and portrait photography we’ve been busy these few months.

We’re amid a re-branding effort for a cycle retailer and are about to begin the re-branding process for an industrial HVAC company here in Kansas City.

Along with that work we’re in pre-production for a promotional video for our friends at Winntech. The variety is different than this time last year, and it’s certainly better than the alternative.

This week we begin scoring the soundtrack for the upcoming PBS Documentary, “The Next American Dream.”

The Next American Dream - poster

The film is set to air nationwide in April 2009 . We’re honored to be working on this project with the great folks at Inland Sea Productions and Take 2 in Kansas City. The topic, urban planning and development, sustainability, and human scale architecture is very important to us.

Every scoring project poses new creative challenges. For this one it’s conveying the sense of humanity while thinking about the sound of America’s future development.

The most exciting part of this project is that it’s part of a program of community planning throughout the nation sponsored by several organizations. The film marks the starting point to exploring how we live in our country in the future. To be a part of the dialog that may prime a discussion of how we live in our built environment is humbling and exciting at the same time.

As more information comes available we’ll be sure to keep you updated. For now, you can click the link above to view the trailer for the film.

The recording studio has been undergoing some changes and upgrades in the recent days. We’ll post more as things take shape.

Meanwhile you can visit the recording studio and take a look around here:

guttersnipe recording co.

Around here we’re fortunate enough to call Alejandro Escovedo a friend. If you know Al, or his story, you know he’s had a rough patch — if you can call nearly dying a “rough patch.”

Recently Al performed his new song from his upcoming album with Bruce Springstein live in Houston. Yeah, it’s really cool to see Al playing with the Boss and Steven Vansandt. But what’s really stunning is seeing my friend having such a great time. Listening to the unmastered mixes of his upcoming album one thing is clear; that sense of enjoying music again is alive in Al’s music as much as Al is.

“Every once in a while let your love show
Every once in a while, honey let your love go

Nobody gets hurt”

The Young at Heart Chorus, from North Hampton, MA. When you’re a young songwriter there are certain dreams you have; performing live on the Grammies, Wembly, meeting your idols, etc.

When you get beyond 30 – hopefully – you get beyond those to bigger dreams; moving people with your music, saving a life with your words, imparting some bit of life’s lessons, or even just bringing a smile.

In the business of art we get wound up tightly in the perils of thinking that youth is a metal stronger than wisdom. Maybe what we truly should remember is that feeling is a scion more precious than ambition.

Nothing illustrates this better than the Young at Heart Chorus. Watch this video and see what I mean. Watch it all the way through; if you still have dry eyes maybe you should re-evaluate your approach to your craft, if not your life.

Friend and songwriter, Matt Wilson (a Minneapolis treasure) once wrote “the sun is coming to cold places.”

I love that phrase. It holds hope in a time of cold and desperation. It reassures. Perfectly suited to a kind man from the cold confines of the northern tier. But they can get you through a cold mid-western winter too.

In trying to bring musical and visual reference to Matt’s words I wrote “tenzing”.

In addition to the joy, hope and giving, there’s a lot of despair around the holidays. It’s the beginning of the winter solstice – an unsettling time for many. It’s also a time of great, and often self-induced, stress about the holidays. This one seems all the more desperate given all our current socio-political tumult. Oh, and let’s not forget the war; no, not the one in Iraq, but the one that’s supposedly being waged against Christmas (do we REALLY need people to invent another war around this time of year?).

The point of tenzing is not just to build a song around a guitar riff, but to bring Matt’s sense of hope to what is starting out to be a very cold and solemn winter; especially considering it’s still fall.

Anyway, without giving it all away. Just enjoy the music and images. It’s a gift, and remember the sun is coming to cold places.

We’ve just finished work on our latest Silent Short. We call it The Five Dollar Coffee Maker.

Here are a couple of links to the video:

For High-quality Quicktime Video (36meg) click here.
For a slightly lesser quality, FLASH video (18meg) click here.

To the inevitable questions:

What’s it all about?
Often in this business of creative work, people will overlook quality for expense. And by that I don’t mean they’ll take lower quality for less money. Quite the contrary; people will often settle for lower quality as long as it costs more. I used to say, “yeah, they don’t really do good work, but they have a really expensive coffee maker in the lobby.”

Well, the coffee maker doesn’t shoot in HD, it doesn’t score your film, it doesn’t design your brochure, and while a San Marco in the hands of a competent barista may spit out wonderful crema, it sure isn’t going to spit out great ideas.

We’ve always had this little coffee maker around the studio. You see them a lot in vietnamese restaurants. They make really good coffee and they only cost about five bucks. But they only work if you are patient and if you expect something different than you get with the million-dollar coffee maker.

Who did that amazing drawing?
The drawing was done by the lead actress, juj. Our chief designer and associate configuration coordinator.

Do you really use coffee for paint?
All the time. And barbecue sauce, and berries, and mushrooms, and actual paints too.

Who did the music?
I (John) wrote and performed the score. It was recorded here in the studio.

Why is it in 6/8? (IS it in 6/8?)
The music is composed and played for 6/8 because the coffee drops fall into the glass in 6/8. Some have said the song is in 3/4 or a classic waltz. It’s actually a slow 6/8. It’s not just about the beat and tempo as some might think. The time signature is also about the bar phrasing of the melody. And isn’t the point that there are no rules?

The August Hour Music Page

We’ve finally started uploading some of our music production from the past few years. Many would say it’s about time.

So far there are only a few MP3 samples, but we’ll keep uploading songs as we dig them out and get them formatted into MP3.

So far the page features music from The Silver Shore, The Daybirds and myself. It’s mostly there to give you an idea of our music production chops and to introduce you to some music you might not have heard before.

It’s always nice to revisit your first love — and music is definitely mine. Being a recording engineer/producer is a lot like being something between a midwife and a high-school guidance counselor. Midwifery is the term commonly used to describe the art of helping a woman give birth. And a high-school guidance counselor is there to help kids turn into adults. As a parent you do the best job you can at strengthening and perfecting your kids and then you release them into the world where you know others will project themselves onto them. For any real songwriter or composer songs are children and music production and engineering is all about helping the songwriter parent their babies. Because sometimes people can be unfair in their projections — or downright rude — you hope you’ve done the best job possible of preparing the songs for this state of vitality and exposure.

So yeah, it’s fulfilling work. And it can be rewarding. Sometimes I hear songs I’ve worked on and think “you know, there’s some real genius in there” and I am just thankful to have had the chance to help with them.

It all sounds good anyway.

enjoy.

Alejandro Escovedo.com Rolling Stone: Alejandro Escovedo Plays Zankel Hall

A few months ago our friend and inspiration, Alejandro, played Carnegie Hall in New York. It’s about time. How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, go through hell, and practice.

A while ago we confirmed we’ll be working on a video for Alejandro’s song Dear Head on the Wall. I’ve been beating my head against a wall ever since trying to come up with a concept for this video. It should be said, I’m not a real big fan of the performance video. It’s been done and done and done. Well, one of the most pure things I can think of is watching Al perform. So how can one not bring this purity to a video. We’ll, this song isn’t all about Al (sorry Al).

Al co-wrote this song with his wife, Kim. So there’s a lot of her in the song. This collaboration makes the challenge a little greater, but it also loosens things a bit.

Al’s input on concept was “do your thing, man.”

Uh, thanks.

Alejandro Escovedo.com » Rolling Stone: Alejandro Escovedo Plays Zankel Hall

Our friend and inspiration, Alejandro, recently played Carnegie Hall in New York. It’s about time.

Also, we just confirmed tonight that we’ll be working on a video for Alejandro’s song “Dearhead on the Wall” in the coming months.

Al co-wrote this song with his wife, Kim. So it’s an honor to collaborate on a video for such a beautiful song.

Check out the music at the link.