We spent this last weekend shooting a music video for our song “Small Frame”. I ended up, through a series of lucky events, getting a permit for this beautifully creepy place off route 66. (Roy’s Motel and Cafe).
It’s an abandoned motel from the 70s that still has all the old furniture set up, it even had an old piano in the lobby.
The video is in editing now, the goal is to release it by Halloween.
We had so much fun doing this, and can’t wait to share it with you all.
Bye for now. 🙂
Raymond being a boss
Marissa tracking vocals
Marissa & Neil
The one and only Scout
After we got back from tour we were hit with a wave of inspiration and went back into the studio with our favorite producer to record 7 new songs.
We don’t know when we’re going to release any of these yet – since we just released “All we left behind”, but but the new material will be mixed into our live sets. (We may release a couple singles all the sudden)… These songs are definitely recognizable as Highland Kites songs but they have a bit of a different spin to them. I’m excited for our friends and fans to hear them.
On that note, we are back to doing tons of live shows. We’ll be doing local shows and mini tours our the Pacific NW. We’ll be posting all our show updates here on and on all our social media. Our next show is on the 26th of Sept at Trip in Santa Monica. You can confirm here.
Bye for now. 🙂
Well, we just got back from our 7 day tour of Washington and to summarize it all – it was freaking incredible.
The music scene is Washington is very supportive, we can’t wait to go back. I’ll be sharing more details about this tour but wanted to first share a story about our first show we did upon arriving.
I had called and booked a show at a little place in Olympia. I was told that the band we were playing with was a local band with a good draw and that we would be either opening or headlining, depending on what we worked out with the band.
Well, we got there and the folk act we were playing with were not local, but were also from out of town and just like us, did not have a big draw.
They were great and super fun, and we all decided to make something out this crazy situation. So, while some of the band members were setting up Nigel (our guitar player) and I went out onto the streets of Olympia, walking up and down the street telling people about a free show happening at the venue. We had people running away from us and looking at us like were were a bunch of lunatics, BUT, as we were playing our set 5-6 people we had talked to out on the street came in and watched the show.
While this may seem like a pointless story, the moral here is that you can honestly make something out of any “crappy” situation that gets thrown at you. We sort of just took it on as a challenge, did everything we could to make it successful and played the show as if there were 1,000 people in the audience.
At the end of the night we made new friends, new fans and actually had a ton of fun.
Side story: I was walking our of the venue around 11 pm to get a cup of tea at the place next door and a very intoxicated, practically naked man started running after a guy driving a beautiful classic car screaming “how dare you take my car, put that back in the garage right now!”. It was a good laugh to end our crazy day.
So, that was Washington, show # 1.
Yesterday we put on an intimate little show at Artisyn Studio in Tujunga, and it was beautiful. I can’t even express how much I love to perform. It’s like every time I play my songs live they come back to life again and I can feel everything I felt the moment they were written. And even though all those emotions aren’t happy ones, it makes me feel so completely alive.
We’re going to be putting on a series of intimate house type shows soon. These really are my favorite shows to play. There’s something about the cozy atmosphere and they d.i.y. setup that makes it so personal and real.
I’ll be posting dates and things as we set these up.
Our show at Artisyn Studio
Show at Artisyn Studio
Show at Artisyn Studio
If you are craving some beautiful and heartfelt indie music stop what you are doing and listen to AKW. I don’t know about you but I feel like some music has gotten to be too produced – too perfect – and has lost the much needed emotion and vulnerability a good song has to have in order to really pull at your heartstrings. AKW keeps the perfect blend of beautiful production, while still holding onto every bit of integrity and raw emotion in their songwriting and delivery. Every song from this band is heartfelt, real and beautiful. They just released an EP – “To be Alive”. So, take my word for it and go check them out.
I got to track all the piano on this album on this beautiful vintage Boudoir. It sounds INCREDIBLE.
We are in production on our new album at Red Rockets Glare studio with producer Raymond Richards. The release date will be announced soon and we are so excited!
You can see Neil here killing it on the drums laying down some of the final tracks.