Even Handed Odds

April showers bring May flowers

Posted: April 26, 2012 by Crommunist in general, music

And what do Mayflowers bring? PILGRIMS!

All right, enough kidding around. You’re probably wondering what we’ve been up to. Here’s the rundown.

We finished up in the studio, recording two tracks to submit to the Peak Performance Project - ‘Gravity’ and ‘Space’. They both sound amazing, and we can’t wait for you to hear them. We’ll figure out what the best way to get them to you is.

We’re going to be heading back into the studio to record two more tunes – ‘Jimmy’ and ‘Destiny’ soon, and we plan to just keep rolling out songs as we can. Of course, we’re limited by time and $$$ so it may be a little while until you can see them. However, we have started recording our rehearsals, so we might put a couple of those up for you diehards to listen to while we get the official versions cleaned up and ready.

Speaking of which, we have new videos that were taken at The PRE-aster Show, so you can check those out on our Video page whenever you like. We’re also going to be releasing ‘fun’ videos of us hanging out, playing cover tunes, monkeying around, just generally being us. You might want to subscribe to our Youtube channel so you can see them when they go up.

The guys (minus Sean, sadly) will be playing next Saturday at Burnaby’s famous Mountain Shadow Pub (at the foot of SFU campus). It will be our first time playing there, so we’re pretty pumped to get a chance to play for a new crowd. Of course we are still doing our regular Friday night at the Coppertank on Broadway if you don’t feel up to the trek.

After that though, EHO’s going to be on a bit of a hiatus as people are travelling. We’ll be back in early June, and then again on break until July. In the meantime, stay tuned to our Facebook page, where you’ll get notifications about unofficial stuff that the individual members are doing – open mics, checking out other local bands, Youtube videos, pictures, the whole shebang.

Hope you’re enjoying the spring weather! See you around, EHO fans!

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter!

April: big things happening

Posted: March 30, 2012 by Crommunist in recording, show announcement

Hey CROWN fans, lots has been going on over the past month. Let us update you.

Working in the studio

We were at Clark Drive Studios with our newest member, Sean ‘drumma’ Morton, laying down the drum tracks for Gravity and Space in anticipation of entering the Peak Performance Project. We’ll be back in this weekend putting down the acoustic guitars and vocals before our producer, the talented and skilled Rick Wellin, turns our meager racket into beautiful, radio-ready music. We’re going to keep the ball rolling beyond these two tracks, but will be taking our time rolling out new tracks.

The PRE-aster Show

If you’re in the Vancouver area next Wednesday night, you’ve got to come check out our debut as a 5-piece. We’ve been working hard for the past 3 months to get our original tunes stage-ready, and we’re really excited to get a chance to share the results with you. After playing these songs dozens of times before, it’s still wild to hear how different they sound with a back-beat.

Farewell to ‘CROWN’

After nearly two years performing as CROWN, we’re excited to announce that we’re changing our name to reflect our new sound and energy. Say goodbye to CROWN, say hello to Even Handed Odds. We’re going to be making adjustments to this page and trying to migrate people over to the new Facebook page over the next few months as we re-brand ourselves as Vancouver’s newest independent music voice. We’re looking forward to bringing you this new sound, under a new name. Pro Tip: it’s not “The Even Handed Odds”, so when we get big, all of you can feel very smug and hipster-ish correcting the newbies

I guess we’ll have to start these posts with “Hey EHO fans” or something…

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter!

Show announcement: The PRE-aster show

Posted: March 6, 2012 by Crommunist in show announcement

Hey CROWN fans.

You’ve been patient. You’ve been teased, titillated, tempted and taunted, but you’ve managed to survive without rioting over a question that we have been asking ourselves:

When the hell are we going to hear new CROWN music?

So it is with no small amount of satisfaction that we announce the PRE-aster show at the Backstage Lounge on Wednesday, April 4th. This will be a show quite unlike other shows we’ve had before, because for the first time ever we will be performing as a five-piece with our new drummer, Sean! You think you’ve heard CROWN before, maybe you’ve seen every single show we’ve ever played and own multiple copies of our EP.

You ain’t never heard CROWN like this before.

Over the past couple of months we’ve been working hard re-writing a number of our songs, and on April 4th you’ll get to experience the fruits of our labour. We’ll be starting at 10, but you’ll want to get there early if you want a seat.

See you on the 4th!

This event has a Facebook page!

Starting to record this weekend

Posted: March 5, 2012 by Crommunist in recording

Hello CROWN fans,

So March is upon us, which means that CROWN is back in the recording studio at Clark Drive Studios. Unlike last year, where we were trying to rush out an EP under the gun (4 tracks in 5 days – oof), we are going to be taking our time to get this thing right. Our first goal is to record two songs (Gravity and Space) to submit to the Peak Performance Project, but the eventual goal is to have enough tracks for a full album that we can make available to you. We don’t have a timetable on that yet, but of course we will keep updating you as this project moves forward.

The thing about this return to the studio that is particularly exciting is that we will be adding the drumming talents of Mr. Sean Morton to the mix. We’ve been working with him steadily since the beginning of the year, and his virtuoso style fits well with our own. These recordings are going to be a long and painstaking process, so we hope you will bear with us as we work through them. We’ll be releasing pictures, videos, and some rough cuts over the process, so definitely stay tuned for all the latest updates.

By the way, if any of you use Twitter, make sure you’re following us for all the latest updates and tweets from the band.

Get excited folks, lots of very new and exciting stuff just around the corner!

Two shows this weekend

Posted: February 20, 2012 by Crommunist in show announcement

Raise your hand if you’re ready for it to warm up and get sunny already!

Okay, now put down your hand. This website can’t see you, and you probably look ridiculous trying to high-five your monitor.

We’ve got the perfect antidote for the winter blahs – live music! This is going to be a big weekend for us, as we head to The Copper Tank (Broadway & Balaclava) for another Friday night blowout. Last week’s show was an absolute barn-burner – thanks to the fans for showing up and supporting us big time. We’re looking forward to a long and happy relationship with the Tank – they love having you all there, and we love the large open venue.

Saturday we are going to be making our triumphant third appearance at Darby’s. Unlike our Friday show, we’re going to focus our Saturday show on our original material, in preparation for our… oh shoot I almost spilled the beans. In preparation for nothing. Nothing at all. Certainly not anything in early April.

So if cover tunes are more your speed, then see us on Friday. If you’re a fan of original CROWN tunes, then Saturday’s for you. If you’re a CROWN super-fan, then we’ll see you on both nights!

February: recording, shows, and new music

Posted: February 13, 2012 by Crommunist in Uncategorized

What’s up, CROWN fans? Is everyone excited for Valentine’s Day? You know what’s really romantic? A ~~gift certificate to the mall~~ CROWN CD! No? Maybe?

Anyway, here’s an update for you. We’re slowly closing in on confirmed booking dates for our first recording. We’re hoping to have two songs recorded (“Gravity” and “Space”) in time for the Peak Performance Project submission deadline. We’re also mulling over different ways of releasing content – as an album, as a series of downloadable songs, as the soundtrack to a softcore adult film – which will be the subject of a number of fun debates over the next little while. If you’ve got ideas of your own on what way we should be releasing content, please leave them in the comments!

We’re getting well settled into our jam space, and picked up some spankin’ new equipment that we can use at gigs. It’s also given us some ideas: outdoor gigs in places like Granville Island, Sunset Beach, maybe other places around the city. Here’s what we need from you - anyone who knows anything about busking licenses and municipal regulations (Ian has a pipe dream about having a live show atop Grouse Mountain), please make yourself known! We need your help.

With our shifting ideas of how to release our music comes a longer timeline for recording, which means we can also shift our focus to booking some live gigs. This is particularly exciting for us (and hopefully for you too), because we will be able to start playing as a 5-piece. We can’t get over how different the songs sound with the addition of a skilled drummer – we think even long-time fans will be pleasantly surprised. We’ve got our eyes on a few places to play, but we want to hear from you: are there any venues you’d like to see CROWN play at?

If you’ve been to the Copper Tank on the past couple of Fridays, you’ve seen that we’ve added a couple of new cover tunes to our set. There’s more of this to come in the very near future, as we begin to update our set lists. We really appreciate your continued support at the live shows – your presence gives us extra clout to play in more places. None of this is possible without YOU, so give yourselves a big pat on the back.

That’s it for now folks! Don’t forget we’re playing this Friday at the Copper Tank, and are playing a double bill of shows next Friday and Saturday at the Tank and Darby’s respectively. Hope to see you all there!

Announcement: recording starts in March

Posted: January 26, 2012 by Crommunist in music, recording

We are very proud and excited to announce that we will begin recording our first full-length album starting in March at Clark Drive Studios. We are finalizing dates, but expect updates as we go through the process.

Unlike our EP (which we recorded frantically over the course of two weekends), we are planning on taking our time to get all the pieces right. This means tracking and re-tracking line by line, going over every bar until it is perfect. Just talking about it is exhausting, but it’s a price we are willing and eager to pay.

Speaking of ‘paying the price’, thanks to the support of our amazing fans, we are planning on financing the whole project based on our income from gigs. While this may elicit a “yeah, so?” from many of you, it’s very rare that a band with no label support and no contract can afford something as expensive as a record’s worth of studio time without going into debt. Suffice it to say, we would not have this amazing opportunity if it weren’t for those of you who show up regularly and bring your friends to rock with us.

We’re working hard to keep you coming back for more, CROWN fans. We’ve been putting in time at the studio to prepare new material, both originals and covers. We’ll start rolling them out over the next couple of weeks, so you definitely don’t want to miss it. Ian generally doesn’t like spoilers, but I’m sure he won’t mind if we drop a couple of names on you. Anyone who’s a fan of Tom Petty, Michael Jackson, Kings of Leon, Matt Good Band and/or The Trews should start getting very excited.

Come see us at the Coppertank tomorrow (Friday!)

New dates, new shows, new material

Posted: January 24, 2012 by Crommunist in general, show announcement

Hey CROWN fans,

Thanks to your overwhelming support at our first gig two weeks ago, the Coppertank has invited us back for all four Fridays in February. The staff at the Coppertank was a bit… swamped, dealing with your enthusiasm, but otherwise they loved having you there. We’ve also heard from many of you that the Tank is a better venue to watch us in, so we’re glad to accept the offer to play there more often. We’re also happy to accept an invitation from Darby’s to play there next month.

We’re in the studio working hard on adding some new material to our live show. If you have any ideas or suggestions on covers you think we should try, let us know in the comments or on our Facebook page.

Just a reminder: we’re at the Coppertank again this Friday night! Great drink specials and yummy food. Come check it out!

Follow us on Twitter!

Kicking off the rust, blowing off the dust

Posted: January 11, 2012 by Crommunist in general

What’s up, CROWN fans?

We had our first practice since mid-December last night in preparation for our weekend of shows. It was a particularly exciting practice for us – it was our very first night in our new jam space at Clark Drive Studios. We share the space with our buddies and fellow Vancouver musicians Secret Revolution (but shhhh! you didn’t hear that from us). It was a great night for us, but an eye-opening experience. Getting a break from the routine of practices and shows is nice, but it definitely takes its toll on playing ability. That’s okay though, we’re going to be back at our fighting weight come Friday’s show at the Copper Tank.

We’ve got fans throwing out requests for the setlist on Friday. Is there any song you particularly want to hear?

Don’t forget, we’re on Twitter!

Jumping back in the saddle

Posted: January 9, 2012 by Crommunist in general

Hey CROWN fans. This is our first week back after a nice long vacation. Stuart spent some time in Portland, Darin spent the last few weeks in Argentina, Ian flew back to Toronto, and Paul spent time with his family at their cabin on Saltspring. All in all, a pretty relaxing time. But now we’re back to business as usual.

Tomorrow we’re moving into our new practice space at Clark Drive studios. We’d been using the tracking room for the month of November, but a vacancy has opened up and we’re moving into a legit space of our own. We’ll have pictures for you to check out soon. We’re back to our usual schedule of Tuesday and Thursday practices, and are going to spend this week’s sessions kicking off the rust and getting ready for this weekend’s shows.

Ian was at the Coppertank on Friday, just to feel the vibe, and was pleasantly shocked to see it so full of people. This means that if you want good seats this weekend, you’d better show up early. Coppertank – it’s a thing. We couldn’t be more excited for the opportunity to play in a new venue. If you can’t make it on Friday, don’t worry – we’ll be at Darby’s the next night. If you still can’t make it, we’ve got other Coppertank shows lined up for the next two Fridays (the 20th and the 27th) so you’ll have a chance to see us in the new place soon. Who knows? We may get invited back to play there on a regular basis!

This past Saturday, Stu played a show with his old band Ready.Set.Die. at Vancouver’s Media Club. He told the rest of us: “We have to play the Media Club. This has to happen. We would go down so well here.” We’re right on board with the idea, and are going to push hard to get our own show on our own night of our own music. No news yet on when that’s going to be, but when it happens you’re going to find out about it here.

For those of you who don’t know, CROWN is on Twitter as well, so be sure to follow us if you’re not already.

See you Friday night!