cryin' over peter wolf.

The only thing that pains me more than seeing one of my favorite bands put on a poor performance is having to write a poor review on it—especially when it’s factors out of the musicians’ control. Ever since seeing Peter Wolf Crier blow me away as my personal top performance at South By Southwest 2010, I have been all about any and everything these two Mid-Western dudes have been about. Their debut album, Inter-Be, was one of my most played this year—both intimate yet powerful with their folky drum and guitar acoustic collaboration. “Crutch & Cane,” “For Now,” and “Untitled 101” are my jams, period. So when I was randomly selected as a winner on Lincoln Hall’s Facebook page for their gig last week, I was beyond stoked. I didn’t even realize these dudes were in town, since they were the opening act for Dawes and Vetiver, it wasn’t publicized very much. I quickly became giddy with excitement, even recruiting a girlfriend to whom I oohed and ahhed relentlessly to about how powerful Peter Pisano’s falsetto melodic vocals and drummer Brian Moen’s eerily animalistic mad drumming skills were.


Seriously--I was like their biggest fan. And well, to be fair, I still kinda am. When my gal pal and I secured our spot up front and center of the stage, I was sure we were in for a special treat. Up until, some bro dude to my direct right shouted at a semi-glassy eyed Pisano, “Yo Peter! Whatchya’ drinkin’ man?” To which Pisano politely forced a smile and quietly and forcibly replied, “Maker’s. It’s a whiskey; I’m feeling a bit under the weather.” “Dude, I know what Maker’s is! Right on!” Oh no, I thought. Peter’s sick. How the hell is he gonna cry for us tonight? I cursed the bro man to my right for wasting the limited and valuable vocal chords of my beloved crooner.

Around 9:00 pm on the dot, Pisano and Moen got down to it. And at first, it was promising. They opened up their 30-minute set with my personal fave, the album opener “Crutch and Cane” and then transitioned into the addicting, two minute tapper “Untitled 101.” But then Pisano’s voice began to dry up. And looking back on my videos, the sound itself was less than satisfactory. I’m not sure if it was something that was up with Lincoln Hall’s acoustics, the fact that the main room was emptier than what I’m accustomed to (since I’m not usually there early enough for the openers), or if it was the fact that I was so close to the speakers on stage – but as you can see in the video, the sound was distorted and not the clear, crispy goodness I’m so spoiled on with this venue.

Pisano’s typical honey dripping serenade was a forced, throaty series of croaks and my heart instantly sunk. I can barely drag my own butt out of bed with a sore throat to work in a mere cubicle; I can’t even begin to imagine how much it has to suck when you make your money with your voice and it’s shot. To top it off, Pisano’s parents were in the crowd. Poor guy seemed to be having a rough night.

On the upside, Moen was his usual full forced self, banging on his drums for dear life, and Pisano, although ill, still managed to tear up his guitar seemingly unaffected. But unfortunately, any fan of Peter Wolf Crier can attest that Pisano’s vocal range and prowess is what makes the group stand apart from their competitors, and even Peter Wolf Crier can’t wail with a sore throat. For anyone who has seen PWC prior to the LH show, you know what I’m saying that it would be a crime to pass up the chance to check ‘em live; but for those of you who’s first encounter was this past Thursday, I beg of you, pick up their record and give them another go. They’re one of the only bands this past year to give me goose bumps, just more so with the crying vs. the croaking.

i almost cried for peter wolf crier tonite.

out of sadness. and out of laughter. this isn't my official review (which will follow later), but my 'man-i'm-so-exhausted-i-can't-believe-i'm-still-awake' genuine first rambly impression).

first off, i love peter wolf crier. inter-be is a fantastic album. 'untitled 101' and 'crutch & cane' are two of my favorite indie jams of 2010. truth. but doods, i knew from before the set even started by the glassy look in poor leadman peter whatever his last name's eyes, that dude was sick. bro in crowd shouts ' yo peter whattchya drinkin??' like they're best pals and homeboy sadly smiles, 'makers. it's whiskey' 'OH BOY I KNOW WHAT MAKERS IS," bro shouts back. "i'm under the weather," peter force smiles.

awwwwww. anyway. yeah, poor dude had a sore throat. and as badass as he and his drummer were banging their shit instrumentation wise, his voice sounded like a croaking frog. like, in 'crutch and cane' instead of smoothly cooing in his sexy falsetto honey way, 'babeeee zan-zo-barrrr,' he throatily croaked, 'babreeee zshan-zsho-bhar,' and i thought, 'dayumn. i cant even crawl into a cubicle feeling like that. i can't even begin to imagine the frustration if my voice was my carurrr.' and to top it off, his parents were in the crowd. awwwwws all 'round.

so that sucked. the show didn't quite suck, but at the same time yeah it kinda did. but then megan points out the sexy drummer dude's hair (future man i want to date for sure. gotta google stalk that bitch's name. full package : sexy glasses. sexy tattoos. sexy little boy haircut.) the three little cowlick tendrils are fucking blowing in some mysterious windy breeze i can't even see where it's coming from. this is in the midst of 'down down' which is a pretty slow and quiet song. so us geeky dorks (sober, mind you even), attempting to gulp our urping stifled laughter just made it that much worse as we dreamily stared at the blowing hairs.

yes. we are dumb. whatever. that made the show to me, to be honest. at one point i turned to megan and said, 'that man needs to be my boyfriend. now.' and then he started making possessed like facial expressions, banging on his drumkit, appearing to lip sync the words 'bow wow bang bam' or something of the sort. hairs blowing in the wind.

i'm laughing out loud now. i think it's time my sleep deprived ass got some shut eye.

walking with THEE.

i see that clinic is playing lincoln hall this thursday. if my week wasn't already super jam packed with randomicities (thurs being craft night), i'd totes check em out. not super familiar with their catalogue, but i def have a special place reserved for 2001's single and vid 'walking with thee.' as you can see above, these brits got mannequins that bone. super sweet boots. twister. bad hair. and erect nipples. takes me back to my first college radio show, with me and tessa blaring this on our monitor, screaming in an awkward british nasaly accent,  'NOOOH!' to which abeolicious would bust in and blurt on air. good, innocent, dorky times. if i could get abe and tessa down to chicago in a day's notice, we would totally rock out at the clinic show. instead, i will just watch this video on repeat. friends. why they gotta get married and have families and live so far away and shit.

sidenote: i totes want a mannequin now.

the vaselines slather up tha' sexin' at lincoln hall

I may not have known shit about The Vaselines other than what Nirvana taught me up until a few weeks ago—but I got one helluva semi-private lesson at Chicago’s Lincoln Hall this past Thursday night. The Scottish duo Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee came off as a blink-and-miss-it blip in the mid-to-late 80’s alternative rock scene, forming in ’86 and releasing their debut record Dum-Dum in ’89—only to break up shortly after its release. If the garagey lo-fi outfit hadn’t found a fan in a certain Seattle grunge ringleader, it’s hard to say if The Vaselines would have the reputation they have for themselves today. Thanks to Mr. Cobain, (who even named his daughter after Ms. McKee), several of us are more familiar with the work of The Vaselines than we may even realize after covering tracks such as “Molly’s Lips,” “Son of a Gun,” and “Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam” on Insecticide and MTV Unplugged, respectively.


Twenty some odd years later, for whatever reason, Kelly and McKee decided to give their simple, two-bit guitar cult status another go with a reunion tour in ’09 and a sophomore LP release, Sex With an X on Sub-Pop Records this year. Their performance last year at the Metro had stirred up a lot of hype, and after hearing several friends and critics’ raves, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to check them out personally at the always incredible Lincoln Hall.

Unfortunately, opening act Dum Dum Girls had to cancel the most recent lag of their tour for undisclosed reasons; while McKee still made light of the situation, claiming it was Kelly and the trio of male back-up musicians’ overtly sexual come-ons that frightened them away. I can’t remember another show that came remotely close to cracking me up as consistently as McKee and Kelly’s humorous, sexual charged stage banter. Poor Kelly served as the butt of McKee’s constant cracking; from his lack of groupies, (“Just put a paper bag on Eugene’s head, ladies—any takers?”); his fashion sense, (“What is up with your t-shirt?” McKee jabbed, “It’s my comfort shirt, c’mon,” Kelly pleaded); to his desperate, (yet somehow endearing), come-ons to female members of the crowd (“Who smells so good? Is it you, pink scarf girl?” to which McKee retorted, “How can you smell that far? Are your senses heightened because you lost all your hair? Or is it your bad teething?”). McKee also made stabs at herself, coming across like an adorable, yet sadly, sex-starved rock heroine; joking about ‘relieving’ the male band members and nightly gangbangs—only to turn around and assure the crowd they were more of the ‘tea and scrabble sort.’ The comedic routine nearly exceeded the performance itself—but not quite.

The sound in Lincoln Hall was crisp and clear, as always. Red and gold hues illuminated the stage with blue strobes flickering the background. The crowd, whilst sparse and maybe 40-50% at capacity, made up for the lack of bodies with their enthusiasm. Those in attendance weren’t your typical arms crossed hipster dudes, but hardcore, vinyl collecting, fist pumping, older white men without rhythm--who you knew that if they didn’t now, had worked in a record store at some point in their life. Dancing, swaying, and lots of applause echoed the crowd’s enthusiasm for the stellar showmanship that took hold of Lincoln Hall. If you haven’t had a chance to catch The Vaselines live yet, or visit their classic release Dum-Dum, do yourself some much needed research and check ‘em out now. Better later than never.

Set List:
1. Oliver Twisted
2. Monster Pussy
3. I Hate the 80’s
4. The Day I was a Horse
5. Sex With an X
6. Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam
7. The Devil Inside Me
8. Molly’s Lips
9. Slushy
10. Poison Pen
11. Bitch
12. Such a Fool
13. No Hope
14. Rory Rides Me Raw
15. Ruined
16. Son of a Gun
17. Let’s Get Ugly
18. Mouth to Mouth
19. Dying for It
20. (Enc 1) Sex Sux
21. (Enc 2) You Think You’re A Man
22. (Enc 3) Dum-Dum

the vaselines rule.

i caught the cult 80's alterna-blink-and-miss-em legends the vaselines at lincoln hall the other night.ima write a review too. i'll post 'er up yonder when i get around to it. let's just say it was a pretty stellar show, but you can see for yourself with some vids i captured here.

the stars were alligned.

My review review of what went down last night at Lincoln Hall is below. I didn't wanna oversnob it and gush on how awesome the live renditions of all the Five Ghost tracks were, but oh my goodness all mighty, were they on fire. They played pretty much the new album in its entirety. And I, personally, LOVED it. When Amy Millan softly cooed "Changes - I've Never been good with change, I hate it when it all stays the same; caught between the gold and the gate, my heart beats again;" I nearly died. Or cried. Or something.

The fucking six man orchestration of nostalgic synth work and throwback keys, electro rhythms and her girly vocals just siezed my broken little heart. And when they played "Your Ex-Lover is Dead," I really did die. At least on the inside. Probably my favorite Stars song ever written, the gentle mass crowd sing along ("You were what I wanted, I gave what I gave. I'm not sorry I met you, I'm not sorry it's over, I'm not sorry there's nothing to say"), broken hearted anthem shook me up. The melodies were so mesmerizing. The lyrics definitely hit a little too close to home. But despite my handful of brews or so into the night, I kept my poker face and just swayed against the brick pillar on the balcony, quietly singing along, tapping my little toes.

But it wasn't all pity cluster fuck broken hearted songs, I was definitely skip dancing my little heart out 89% of the set, scribbling my notes like a fiend. Quite possibly the best show I've checked since Beach House, it was a memorable evening. Too bad the damned Hawks stole the thunder, leaving me with the repetitious "da da da, da da da da da da da da da duhhhhs" instead of my pussy dreamy indie pop jams. Oh well, win some, lose some.

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I feel incredibly privileged to be amongst the few media folk lucky enough to have gotten a sneak peek at Stars’ forthcoming fifth studio album The Five Ghosts. This 11-track collection is the group’s most cohesive and flawless release to date, even trumping out my personal fave, ‘04’s Set Yourself on Fire. Departing from their long time label, Arts & Crafts, Stars funded their album independently and self-released the record on their new label, Soft Revolution. As a result, you can tell the group really took the time to fine tune their weaknesses, and The Five Ghosts is much more synth driven than past efforts, also focusing more on the vocal harmonic chemistry between Torquil Campbell and Amy Millan. The album doesn’t drop until June 22nd, and so far the sextet has been fortunate to avoid any digital leaks. So I can only imagine what it must have been like to witness the musical majesty which unfolded last night at Chicago’s Lincoln Hall as the other 95% of the crowd.

I strolled in a few minutes late just in time to catch the bittersweet poppy gem “I Died So I Could Haunt You.” My favorite track on the new record, I instantly knew this show was going to be a great one. The sound quality was a bit on the quiet side, but was crisp and clearer than ever. The collision of soft percussion, slinky synth work and jittery keys led Millan’s whispery honey dripping vocals into what she introduced as “track four,” (also known as the first single, “Fixed”). Violet and gold hues splashed the stage, and the sold-out crowd politely swayed and bopped accordingly to the next 45 minutes or so of the majority of The Five Ghosts.

Thanking the audience for allowing them to present their new material, Campbell tossed a handful of rose stems and petals into the crowd. Millan assured the full house they would soon return with the second half of the show, with more familiar material, which surely didn’t disappoint. The overall vibes and quality of the performance was much tighter and memorable than their last Chicago date at the Vic a few years back. Highlights included numbers from their full catalogue, including Heart’s “Elevator Love Letter,” Bedroom’s “Take Me to the Riot,” Set Yourself on Fire’s “Your Ex-Lover is Dead,” “Ageless Beauty” and a mass crowd sing-along to “One More Night (Your Ex-Lover is Dead).”

Then, as if the eloquent encore finale “Calendar Girl” wasn’t mind blowing enough to call it a night, Lincoln Hall proceeded to drop their flat screen to the crowd with just enough time to watch the Blackhawks score their overtime Stanley Cup winning goal. It was a good night to be in the city. You might say that for Chicago, the stars were aligned.

STAR talk : ain't no thang

oh man. i first fell in love with stars in 2005, when i first discovered "set yourself on fire" back at wrst fm in my days of music directorhood. instant infatuation, for realz. tracks like "your ex-lover is dead" and "one more night" got me hooked. beautiful and simple indie dream pop melodies. love it. never did i think that five years later i'd be living in chicago, interviewing them for a music site. but i did. on friday i chatted up torquil campbell for chicago innerview and i gotta say he won me over with his polite charm and nerdy humor. i was kinda pissed off at 08's "in our bedroom after the war" with all of campbell's wanna-be morrisey antics, but after speaking with him for 20-odd minutes and love love loving the newest release "the five ghosts," i'm won back. can't wait to check this outfit out at lincoln hall on june 9th. shit will be real. my condensed cleaned up version will appear on the site next month, but we had such a solid convo i felt inclined to post it somewhere for all the other stars fans out there.

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There’s not much to say about Canadian indie dream weavers Stars that hasn’t already been said. The Five Ghosts, Stars’ fifth studio release, may be the group’s very best collection to date—full of synth pop energy, the stories of love and death are gripping and majestic. Singer Torquil Campbell talks to Chicago Innerview about the band’s new label, the recording process and his belief in the afterlife. (Stars plays a sold-out show at Lincoln Hall on June 9th.)

Arts and Crafts was your home label since 2003’s “Heart.” Your upcoming release is being distributed via Vagrant Records, but is being put out on your own label, Soft Revolution. What inspired the start of your own label and the departure from Arts and Crafts?


Just you know the contract had come up and we’ve been doing what we do for ten years and it was literally just a chance to try something new, to set up a new paradigm a new system and we had an amazing time being with Arts and Crafts and we’re still going to put records out with them through other bands and stuff but it just was a time to do something else so we took that chance. I think in this era of music and this era of the music industry its implicit upon you to take as much control as you can of what you’re doing because you’re trying to get a piece of an ever decreasing pie and the more you can increase the directness of the relationship of you and the listener, the better off you are. I think that was the main thrust of what we were doing was just to take control a little bit more of what we were doing and open up the pathway between us and the people who buy our records more directly.

Do you think you’ll be signing other acts to your label?

That’s something we haven’t even talked about. I mean, that would require this record make a lot of money and that remain to be seen so you know, if we have a huge success on our hands, maybe we’ll go and find a bunch of people, but both those things seem highly unlikely, so. . . (laughs).

Would you mind describing the recording process of the Five Ghosts?

We did it in three sessions which had two halves to them, so there was a writing and recording half in each session. So we would write for three weeks and record for three weeks and we did that three or four times. We didn’t demo, everything that we recorded, we wrote and left sort of unfinished until we got into the studio and let the songs be finished and have its recording only be once. I think a lot of bands struggle against demoitis, you write it and record the demo and it’s got an energy and a freshness and a feeling to it and then you try and go back to the studio and recreate that and that I think has been a frustration for us in the past so we wanted to make sure that the recording that’s on the record is the one where that particular kind of magic happened. So we didn’t do demos and we left the process of finishing up the song to the studio and to our producer Tom Mc Crawl, and that was great I think we all benefitted from that a lot.

It seems like everyone gets their two cents in reviews these days, but very rarely do the artists themselves get the opportunity to sell their works directly—as your own critic, how would you describe the new record:? In comparison to past albums?

Oh god, I don’t know – how would you describe how you looked when you were twelve in opposed to fifiteen – it’s a reflection of all of us. I’m certainly more proud of this record and more sure that this record is a great piece of work than anything else we’ve ever done. Because we didn’t let any other circumstance be, we just didn’t stop until we all felt that way. I think in the past it’s been harder for us to be honest with ourselves and to face the parts of our music that we weren’t happy with and I think this time we gave ourselves time and we gave ourselves the circumstances to really tackle those weaknesses so they’re not there anymore, so I would say this record is the sound of the band who really knows what they’re doing now and aren’t going to settle for anything less the best they can do.

The Five Ghosts is more synth backed compared to past efforts. Was there any conscious decision towards this change?

Yeah there was, I mean the thing is that I think there’s synthesizers a lot on all our records, maybe they’re more veiled and doubled with organic instruments on other records and this time we kind of let them be and let them speak for themselves a little louder. We were very much conscious of wanting to, we’ve always been a synthesizer band and we’ve started out making synthesizer records and I think we wanted to rediscover that part of our sound and Chris had bought a lot of great metala keyboards during the time we were making In Our Bedroom and we just wanted to explore that part of stuff that we’ve always had in our lives but had things diminished by covering it up with a lot of other instrumentation.

There’s a hint of death with The Five Ghosts, both with the title namesake and such tracks as “I Died so I Could Haunt You,” “Dead Hearts,” and “The Last Song Ever Written.” Is there a story behind the album title or was it just picked at random?

It was a hard year for us, we lost people and we gained people and we experienced I think, losing people we love on a level we never experienced before and so ghosts were everywhere. And death and beginnings and endings were in our face, it was sort of inevitable that it would become a part of what the record was. I think that ghosts are sinister until you lose someone and then they become something you really hope exists and something that you, you want to feel them all around you because you suddenly realize that heaven is a great invention because it sort of speaks to the hardest thing about life which is the sense that one loses people one loves and they just go they don’t exist anymore, they’re not anywhere and that’s a terrifying thought when you lose someone you love. The idea of someone being a ghost becomes a way of communicating with them or a way of believing in their existence still and a way of them still having presence. So that was all stuff that was very much rattling around inside our heads while we were making this record.

Your albums always showcase original art, where do you come up with the concepts?

Well Bedroom was a painting by my brother Tom Campbell, who’s a great painter. This cover was designed by Jacob Lorenz who works at the Cardboard Box Project which is a wonderful company in Montreal that Chris (Selingman)’s brother runs. They do artwork and merch and design for us and Arcade Fire and for a number of other bands and they’re just an amazing sort of platform for people’s idea s and there’s a lot of creative people within that art house that help out to make those images work. Those photographs are 19th century spirit photographs – people used to, when their loved ones would die, they would be sent to have a photograph taken and the photographer would superimpose a photograph of their loved one over top as a sort of fake ghost photo that you would put up in your living room or your hallway, or whatever. That comes from that idea of sort of Victorian ghost photographs.



What is your favorite track on the record?

That’s a tough one, (repeats question to self), I dunno, it changes day to day, I think Love Fix, that’s a great pop song and I tend to love the ones I’m not singing on. I love Changes, you know then I can just be listening and enjoy them, whenever I hear my own voice I’m staring at a mirror, so. . .

What’s the last show you attended as a fan?

I went to see Phoenix, who I love.

What’s currently on your iPod? Any new artists we should be listening to?

Always, lots I think. There’s always tons of great music happening. I love the new Shout Out Louds record, I love that Washed Out record, I think that’s lovely. I think The Drums are a great band. I love so much stuff, whenever I’m asked to come up with stuff, my mind freezes but the new Gorillaz record is fantastic. I think he’s always someone you scramble to keep up with as far as his ability to write hooks and his pop know-how, you know? But I love that Shout Out Louds record, that’s certainly making a lot of time on my playlist I listen to that record a lot and that new Kings of Convenience record. I love a lot of stuff from Sweden and Norway and the Nordic countries, I think they share a lot in common with what Stars do I guess.

What’s the last great book you read?

I just read Farewell my Lovely by Raymond Chandler. It was an incredible book, extraordinary book – I try to narrow down my books so that I don’t read anything but great books because there’s so many books that it’s hard to waste time something you’re not certain is going to be amazing. So Raymond Chandler is a sure thing, all you have to do is buy a book by Raymond Chandler and you’re guaranteed a masterpiece.

If you could spend a night covering any other artists’ material, who would it be? Who would you want to cover your material?

That’s a tough one, I’d love to be in a Smiths cover band sometime, just because I know it so well or a Pre Five Sprout cover band but that would be tough to find other musicians who’d be able to play pre five sprout cover songs. Who to cover us, maybe Perro del Mar and Tom Waits? I’d like to hear them do a bunch of duets. They’ve got plenty of their own shit to do though, so not sure they’ll get around to it. (Maybe they’ll read this interview and give you a call), Maybe maybe, they’ll be inspired.

What’s your favorite part about being on the road?

Playing the shows, playing the shows to be honest is the only good part of being on the road at this point in my life. I have a baby daughter and a beautiful wife and there’s not much to compel me to hang out in hotel rooms and busses except the shows which are amazing and which are inevitably the highlight of the day so just being able to play the music for people who enjoy it and realize that we’ve gotten to the point where we can do that all over the world is a very privileged thing. You feel very lucky and grateful for that.

With the recent May release of BSS’s “Forgiveness Rock Record” and Stars’ June release of “The Five Ghosts” only a month apart, you must have all been pretty busy. Were you all equally involved in the latest BSS contribution or not so much this time around? Any chances of both groups coinciding any tour appearances?

Not much, Evan I think did a little bit of work on it, Amy did a little bit of work on it but mostly that was a record that those guys made as a five piece which are MacIntyre, so there was much less involvement from the sort of auxiliary members of Broken then there has been in the past. I think they felt they needed to focus their energy and their sound and we were making our record simultaneously so there was very little time as well to spend on it but I know Evan jumped on some tunes and I know Amy did some too.

How long have you known the other members of the band?

I’ve known Chris since I was 8 years old, so thirty years. I’ve known Evan since I was twelve, I’ve known Amy since I was 18, so a long ass time – Pat since I was 25?

What’s your relationship with Amy like – when it comes to songwriting is it a one-man show or is it a collaborative effort?

We help finish each other’s stuff, like I write for Amy a lot. So the conversation, the voice is always in our mind. The lyrics tend to be either a me or Amy kind of thing but there are some songs that we finish together or songs that Amy will write something and I’ll come up with something to add or vice versa. That happens quite a lot. The initial impulse of the song is generally one person and the basic, totality of the song tends to be one person but it can be finished or augmented or helped out by the other person and as I say, it’s always the conversation of the music is always in our minds you know and balancing those two vocal qualities and finding a way to, umm, I think that’s sort of more my job in the band, is writing songs for the two of us. It tends to be if a song that both of us are singing, I’ve written it. I mean, I’ve written the words, the music is always collaborative and always starts with Chris and Evan and Pat.

How would you say the internet has affected your music? With things like MySpace, blogs and digital piracy – would you say that your career has been positively or negatively affected?

Well you never know, because you can’t go back and replay it without it. I’d have to say positively in all total, because a band like ours, without the internet, we’re not getting to Singapore or Taiwan or Japan or Australia or any of those places that we have gotten to. If the internet didn’t exist, we might sell a couple of hundred records over in those places and never be able to afford to get there and never be able to build an audience there so it’s an incredible tool in the sense that it allows you to reach out all over the world to people. I think we’re also a band, however, that’s probably our records have probably been stolen 4 or 5 times often more than they’ve been bought, so in that sense I guess we’ve suffered – but without that technology would those people who are stealing the records even know we exist? Probably not, so, it’s a trade off. But ultimately I think it’s been an amazing thing for our band and the technology of MySpace – speaking of MySpace, although I know it’s not popular anymore, for a band as a platform, it’s an unbelievable simple and effective way of putting your music up and allowing people to hear to it. MySpace has died off recently, but we’ve had all of seven million hits, that’s a helluva lot of people who’ve been exposed to our music through that particular website.