Not much time to tell you all about how I’m having another great hair day! Thank god for humidity! Am I right or am I right guys?!?!??!??!
Anyway, you’ll have to come see for yourself tonight when I take the stage with none other than Jeff Litman at Arlene’s Grocery (8pm) … and then power over to Throgs Neck to a place called Rockwood Music Hall wherein super quintet Mother Feather will be impolitely melting faces at 11pm.
Oh and speaking of me and how good you think I look since I stopped adding sugar to my coffee … imagine how happy you’ll be to see me on stage next month with Mother Feather doing an acoustic set at this cool new cafe on the Bowery called: Bowery Ballroom.
Tell me the name of the guy not on the right and I’ll put you on the guest list for Casey Shea’s free show at Rockwood Music Hall tomorrow night! We go on at 11. And… if it’s anything like the last gig I played there, MTV will be doing some unauthorized filming of the show and disguising it as the memory of someone more famous. Watch out Viacom … the authorities at SAG are very, very ________.
Since you asked, here is what I am/was eating for breakfast:
And here is who will be eating you for dinner on July 9th:
You should get your tickets here: http://boweryballroom.com/event/6568 … before everyone else gets theirs and the website says Sold Out and then you have to go Bowery Ballroom anyway and say “isn’t there two more tickets left?” And they say “lemme see.” And then after about 2 and a half seconds they say “yeah there are two tickets left. You want both? That’ll be $30.00.” No please. No thank you. You just hand over the money and know you could’ve saved $4.00 if you had listened to me. But you never listen do you? No. That’s half you problem isn’t it? That and the company you keep. Oh yeah? That mouth of yours will get you in trouble one of these days.
In other news, there’s probably gonna be other cool announcement type announcements about the Mother Feather at Bowery Ballroom show coming up soon. So, keep holding your breath. You’ll be breathing again before you know it.
In related news, the Casey Shea band has two gigs this week. But neither of them are listed on his website. That’s on account of him having the greatest record label in the history of labels that reblog cool video clips of Louis CK in all the spare time they have not posting the gigs that THE CASEY SHEA BAND HAS THIS WEEEEEEEK!!!!!! Luckily for you you have me to tell you where to be to see this great band sing all of Casey’s great songs and one of my decent songs too. What’s that? Of yeah, he even put my song on his upcoming album. What’s that? Yeah, he’s got a new album. It’s done. I mean, the last I heard, it was done and my song was still on it. Pretty cool huh? Yeah, me too. I’ll totally tell you when it’s available so you can buy it and I’ll have a few more pennies to go towards that cottage in Misquamicut, RI. In the meantime, you’ll just have to come to the shows we’re playing this week. Actually, I’m not sure you can go to the first show. So, just ome to the second one. It’s at this place called Rockwood Music Hall. It’s kinda the same kinda place as Cafe Vivaldi, except the sound men are better looking in that there are actually sound men working at Rockwood Music Hall. And no I did not unintentionally not say Sound Person. I know what the appropriate term is but there are actually not any females working sound at Rockwood Music Hall. You’ll have to ask them if that is intentional yourself. The sound men do however have great haircuts. Especially the one who looks like Justin Bieber. Anyway, The Casey Shea Band is playing at Rockwood this Saturday at 11pm. Shocking I know.
Mwah!
M
P.S. In other recording news, the great Andy Fitzpatrick will be releasing his new single this coming Monday, June 13th.
P.P.S. I’ll tell you more about that and how I recorded my bass for the B side tomorrow.
Either I’m getting better looking, or people really seem to like my new Mother Feather T-Shirt! Get yours on August 12th, when we play Rockwood Muzak Hall Of The Lower East Village Manahattana …
M
P.S. If you purchase said T-Shirt at the show, you’ll be entitled to a free download of our new E.P.
P.P.S. That right … The E.P. is done and it sounds better than yours!
P.P.P.S. I’ll be doing something called “lighting” for The Dig tonight at The Rock Shop! Come down … They’re also better than your band.
This morning I woke up to the following digital representation of a sideways email …
Come tell me how jealous you are tonight when I’ll be at The Living Room playing a double header with Shanna Zell at 9pm and Kris Gruen at 10pm.
And, just in case all the bands fortunate enough to be performing at the Brooklyn Indie Fest haven’t been promoting their pretty little band butts off, later this week you’ll have the chance to go to Little Field in Brooklyn for the aforementioned Brooklyn Indie Fest. Once you’re there you’ll be invited to pay anywhere from $23 to $55 to see a bunch of bands that usually play at Rockwood Music Hall for FREE. Now, if that doesn’t sound like business acumen, I don’t know what does.
Mwah!
M
P.S. Speaking of business acumen …
P.P.S. By special invitation Mr. Andy Fitzpatrick will once again grace the stage of the aforementioned Rockwood Music Hall this Sunday at 10pm.
P.P.P.S. There’s a pretty good chance you’ll see me playing double bass at that show.
Who knew that Duff McKagan was not only one of rock’s most unsung heroes, but also … a literary genius!?!?!!??!!!???
I’m gonna play along to It’s So Easy to make sure I’m warmed up for Terri’s Birthday down at Jeff Litman’s show … Rockwood, 7pm.
Oh, and tomorrow night, the Andy Fitzpatrick show starts at 10pm. Not 9pm. And we’re playing a new song of his wherein he uses a lot of something called “figured bass.” That show is also at Rockwood Music Hall. Go figure.
When asked why his bass had only two strings Douglas Hart, bassist for The Jesus And Mary Chain, explained: “… that’s the two I use, I mean what’s the fucking point spending money on another two? Two is enough.”
Always seeking a musical challenge, you can see me attempt to play an entire Mother Feather set on ONE STRING tomorrow night at Rockwood Music Hall! We go on at rock and roll o’clock.
In related news, last night I had the pleasure of performing at a birthday party for the great Bob Gruen. You may remember him from such memorable photos as this one called “Matt Basile performing with Kris Gruen at Bowery Electric”:
He’s also taken some lesser known photos as well. Like this one of an unknown British folk singer from the 70’s.
Anyway, it was really fun to play at R Bar. Nothing says “I’m a classy joint” like a stage with a pair of stripper poles. Gosh, I’m so glad the Bowery hasn’t lost it’s edge.
Mwah!
M
P.S. Tomorrow night is the last show of the Dred Scott residency at Rockwood Music Hall.
First was this piece reminding me that I have to many friends on facebook and that people pretty much always form their beliefs about how the world works based on something called “anecdotal evidence” instead of doing what in successful business circles is known as “running the numbers”. In case you don’t have however long the following embedded audio file is to listen to what I learned, ”anecdotal evidence” is basically akin to the thing this part this sentence links to and “running the numbers” is the thing you do when you want to find a way to, oh I don’t know, have a successful baseball team.
Then I came across this tidbit of a human interest story about a woman named Charlie Morgan. That’s right, a woman named Charlie! And guess what else!?!??! This woman named Charlie’s spouse is named Karen. Karen is not a man. Because you’re so smart I know you see where I’m going with this story about the soldier who returned home from something called “war” to find out that she and her spouse would not have the same health care benefits as a certain other groups of veterans who were not married to people with the same set of chromosomes. This of course serves to inform my continuing assumption that pretty much everything I ever learned in school is a lie. Except for the part where they told me that anecdotal evidence is unreliable. Or so I hear.
In unrelated news, you can also go to iTunes and write a review of the EP that the rest of this sentence links to. You probably won’t get an autographed copy of said EP, but you will endear yourself to me for at least the next week or so.
Mwah!
M
P.S. Tonight you can tell me how you like my new hair cut when I’ll be playing with Will James at a place called Rockwood Music Hall.
I finally paused Noel Gallagher’s infinitely repeating new album long enough to watch the second most awesome video ever:
In related news, if you’ve been wondering how to financially profit off of other people’s silly protest efforts, then look no further than our good friend Jay-Z, and our guardian angels over at Muzak Television, by clicking on this part of this sentence.
And since December 15th is so far away, you’ll be happy to know that you’ll also have an opportunity to compliment me on my age defying hair follicles when Mother Feather takes the stage at Rockwood Music Hall this Friday, November 18th. We’ll take the stage at around midnight. And since you’ll be saving so much money by not having to buy a ticket to the show I’m sure you’ll do you part to support all the things you claim to support by purchasing a CD or a T-shirt. I say I’m sure because I know you’re a good person. See? You wouldn’t want me to think you were a not good person would you? Good. See you Friday!
Unfortunately Casey Shea will be singing and playing something called Harmonica. Wow. Well, at least you won’t need to waste your hard earned money on sleeping pills during his “solo.”
Wow. In case you’re one of those pinko-commie-lazy-pants liberals who think socialized medicine is the answer to your pathetic little life problems, let me take a minute to tell you how great it is to be one of the hard working Americans who enjoys the true benefits of privatized healthcare! You see, after four days of not being able to decide if I would rather A. Jump off the BK Bridge or B. Amputate my intestines, I decided to get off my _____ and finally sit down to get some kind of a check up examination thing to find out what’s going on in my stomach. Should be simple enough since, as I said, I am one of the people who earns my keep and pays my health insurance premium and this is gonna be great because I’m sure I’ll get seen right away by the for profit Doctor who is there to serve me because that’s what I am going to be directly paying him for. Oh man, the free market is so awesome! So now I just got off the phone with a lovely young woman we’ll call “Jessica” who upon answering the phone exclaimed in the well worn joviality becoming of all career receptionists, “Hello! Doctor’s office, this is Jessica speaking, how may I help you today?” So I says to the woman we’re calling “Jessica”, Hi “Jessica”, my name is Matt and I have to get a doctor because I have insurance now and because I have a stomach pain and I need a check up examination thing and … what’s that? Oh, my date of birth is Februaty 12, 19 … seventy … something or other. My last name is spelled B as in boy - A - S - I - L - E. I always say B as in boy because sometimes people think I am saying P as in periwinkle which is of course why I earn so much money doing voice overs. I also gave Jessica my health insurance card number and phone number so she could call me back. Then, just like that, we were all ready to make my appointment. “Jessica” said, “Let’s see here Mr. Basile (which is what I get called since being born in 19 seventy something or other became so long ago) it looks like the next available appointment is on January 9th. Is 5pm okay for you?” I said “Hmmmmm, well, lemme look” and then I opened up my iCal while I thought about how many more days I was gonna have to decide if I would rather A. Jump off the BK Bridge or B. Amputate my intestines and upon seeing that there was nothing on my schedule that day I continued “yeah, I mean, okay if that’s the closest date you have, I mean I guess that’s just cuz of the holidays and stuff huh, well okay yeah, I mean that sounds great, I’ll look forward to seeing Dr. Sloan at five on January 9th.” Anyway, I’m sorry to bore you with this. I just wanted to point out how great it is not to have to wait multiple weeks to see a doctor when you really work hard and embrace being so awesome at profiteering.
Speaking of awesome. One can assume that Christopher Hitchens is no longer being awesome. Unless of course he was totally wrong. I guess I’ll probably never know. Or will I? Damn! Life is confusing sometimes. Anyway, I watched the very poorly produced video below this morning and couldn’t help but wonder what the young woman who introduces Mr. Hitchens thinks whenever she watches herself introduce Mr. Hitchens which I can only assume she does from time to time …
In unrelated news, I read the article that this part of this sentence links too last night. I won’t say “you should too” because that would assume that I know things you do not or that I feel in some manner superior to you, which in fact I do but it would be considered impolite to say so, thus I will fein humility and offer some sheepish platitudinal such as “Hey everyone, here’s something I read and maybe you’ll think it’s interesting too, but if you don’t hey that’s cool because I don’t wanna offend anyone out of fear that you might not donate to my next Kickstarter Campaign.”
And speaking of shameless self promotion, tonight I’ll be playing with Mother Feather. We go on past your bed time, so I guess you’ll miss out. But hey, you never liked getting your face melted anyway. In case you were wondering though, there are some very sensitive and thoughtful singer songwriters playing before us, so maybe you’ll come down to Rockwood anyway and have a nice hot mug of Chamomile Tea with a dash of Buckwheat honey in it. Mmmmm, doesn’t that sound great on a nice cool December evening?
Okay. I’m gonna go now. And yes, I am in a really bad mood.
Today is pretty cool. Having reached the goal of killing and or enabling over 100,000 Iraqi deaths in the last decade-ish, the US is withdrawing the last of it’s troops today. Behind, we will leave a lot of friends.
In other news about today, you may be interested to know that I am not only wearing a cool new tie because it makes me look, er, cool, but also because it’s part of the requested attire for one of my gigs today. One of my gigs today? Oh yeah, I have three. That’s my version of a humble brag. Just, you know, nonchalantly mentioning that I am so sought after that I have three professional bookings in one day. Oh, and did I mention that said three professional bookings are for something called the “Double Bass.” That of course means I have two bass that I have to play simultaneously. The same part. Doubled. More bass. Mucho Bella Basso!
Anyway, the first and third of my gigs today are with the formidable Kris Gruen. He’s the kind of guy you wish would run for president, or at least city council. He probably will someday. For now I get to listen to him sing while I stand next to him mostly just playing the root note of whatever chord he happens to be playing at any given moment of whatever song we happen to be performing. It’s pretty fun, especially since he’s such a good singer. We play at The Richardson at 4pm. That’s in Brooklyn. Then we play at 2A at 8pm. That’s in the East Village.
In the middle of those two gigs, I’ll be playing my first gig with Mr. Jon DeRosa. He has more tattoos than me and a very racy set of playing cards mounted to his living room wall. Last week we recorded some songs for his next album. The very good drummer Mike Pride was there too, playing the drums. We’ll be playing, minus Mike, at The Richardson at 5pm. That’s still in Brooklyn in case you forgot.
In more news about today, my stomach still feels like crap, I’m still in a bad mood and yes it has started to interfere with my general happiness as it relates to other living things. Fortunately there are only three and a half weeks until my privatized medicine doctors appointment.
