Soaked in Manchester

We have settled in, soaked some of it in and are readying ourselves for more. Currently being a rather large geek and spending my precious back stage time on the internet in Manchester. To my left is a beautiful and most likely ancient church. I am quickly reminded of how young the United States is compared to most of the world. Ryan is finally in a place where many of his favorite bands grew up and Matt is taking very nicely to his "prawn cocktail crisps"(translation: ketchup flavored potato chips). We are slowly but surely being integrated into this proper society.

Being that this is a tour put on by a major publication, we are all also getting our first lick of being interviewed. I think the majority of us still get a little giddy at the fact that people outside of Southern California are interested in us. Certain questions for new bands have to be asked. i.e. How did you get you started? Tell us about the album? etc. In the gut of us all we take what we create very close to heart and I can't say how many times we've been at our wits end trying to get a melody just right or yelling into each others faces fighting over a lead line or bridge. Yet with the monotony and repetitiveness it was interesting to see how lackadaisical we would get as the day progressed. Earnestness and tension are best and often served in our small rehearsal studio in Los Angeles....so we'll have some fun while away.

Off to Dublin and more. I have to say I am looking forward to a right pint of Guinness. Officially labeled "Picture Perfect Dublin Tourist".

Andy
Local Natives

pictured below is literally the scene I came upon when we opened our suitcase filled entirely of our "van made" cd's in London. I thought it was very fitting visually to the above blurp.

Close Quarters

Everyone keep close, very, very close. We are currently so far from home(just landed in the UK) and in many ways even farther from the ones we love. Yet I watch as all of us scramble and fumble to make sure that we stay close w/those we are physically farthest from. As a band we keep close to try and keep it honest, to openly communicate and to annoy the living hell out of each other. We pack ourselves into a blue tin box known as our "tour van" and find ourselves focused on sitting up straight and keeping equal elbow room. We cram and spoon each other onto one bedroom hard wood floors, crashing with old friends or running into new ones. We push our bodies into seats 34A-E and fight to fall asleep in airplane chairs that seem more fitting for a five year old leprechaun than a full grown human. I see each of our material belongings condense and deflate into a single carry-on and a computer bag. Ambian, laptop, cellphone, alcohol, hard drive and headphones are my new materialistic best friends. Without these I am a quivering, crying child.

We are all very new to this "closeness". Learning as we trip, bruise, pass out and stub our toes along the way...and it makes me smile. We should be so lucky that we are in such close quarters.

Andy
Local Natives

Dreams

I'm slightly shaky because of the caffeine. I'm slightly hungover because of the Anchor Steam. I'm slightly foggy on all the details of these past five Mondays spent playing at Spaceland.

For some reason I think most of us were under the impression August was going to be a little lazy. Looking forward to the thought of finding random movies to watch on Netflix and getting around to exploring the corner bars of Atwater Village. I got as far as Naked Lunch and the bear special at Hugo's...which isn't that far. August shaped up to be a very busy but all around productive 31 days. We have added some music to the final album. We have finalized all the artwork/packaging. Its mixed, its mastered, its stirred, its salted, its sweetened, its splattered.

Five Mondays in the month of August meant a quintuplet of free shows for our residency at the glitter curtain known as Spaceland. So very pleased with how this residency turned out. Humbled that so many great local LA bands decided to join us and thankful for all the people who got involved, whether it be a laptop DJ in the corner or just a fellow blog friend. I am a failure in the realm of photos or videos from this past months shenanigans, but I'm sure I'll be reminded of all them over the next few weeks(as I stare into a destroyed kitchen deconstructed at 3am last night).

Every single one of us appreciate the fact that so many new friends came out each Monday. We are still dipping our toes into the deep end of L.A. and it was overwhelming to get such a welcoming response to what we put way too much time and effort into.

I'm gonna take a nap.

Andy
Local Natives

p.s. Every month Spaceland does a little piece of art d'residency on the display board right inside the doorway. This was the one we got....Note the bent frames on the glasses and the PBR in hand.