Day One: Saturday – featuring Deer Tick, Titus Andronicus and a host of Albany area bands went off without a hitch. A huge turnout coupled with nice weather, great beer and fantastic music made for an unforgettable day.

Day Two: Sunday – roared in with Hurricane (well, by then Tropical Storm) Irene dumping high winds and heavy rain all over the Capital District. While my B3nson pals swiftly handled the back room flooding that occurred at St. Joe’s overnight, I tried to keep in touch with all twelve of the other Undone Ensemble members – almost all of which were already preparing to make their way to the Ten Broeck triangle!

Plans had to change for the festival, since Sunday’s two headlining acts – A Hawk and a Hacksaw and The Music Tapes were coming from out of town by plane and by van, respectively. Both bands bowed out early due to the weather, so after bailing out buckets of rainwater, the B3nson crew decided to make Sunday’s RestFest “pay what you want”, shove the schedule back two hours and open the doors wide for anyone who could make it to downtown Albany. A move which Harith over at The Rev Recs blog calls “SO ALBANY” – to cobble together something out of nothing and fight for what we believe is beautiful.

As the rain and wind abated, Paul Coleman (drummer in Undone Ensemble!), Mrs. Matthew and I packed up the banjo and the drums and headed down to Albany. We noted that the “Emergency Travel Only” warning signs were appropriate in this case – this was a musical emergency that required our presence!

Arriving just in time to witness Slender Shoulders coming off stage at the end of their set was a bummer, but feelings were assuaged by the presence of their debut EP.

The next hour was a flurry of text messages and phone calls to track down the rest of the ensemble members who were not present. Thankfully everyone arrived with plenty of time to prepare and to even enjoy some music in advance of our set. Swamp Baby turned in a widely dynamic set filled with new songs and old songs that were given new life with We are Jeneric‘s Eric Krans playing drums for the entire set!

By the time We are Jeneric hit the stage, I was a bundle of nerves. Thankfully they were in the middle of performing the best set of their career, enrapturing everyone in the building while no one noticed that I was pacing in the green room!

These were tactical nerves – will we set up the stage quick enough? Will Sooze’s crack stage team be annoyed by our “first show” newbieisms? Will I drop my banjo like I dropped my mandolin at TulipFest?

via Flickr user BVCPhoto. Used with permission.

Luckily, only one of my fears came to life (I kind of forgot some of the words to the first song – “Brooklyn or Bust”) and the first and only Undone Ensemble show came off without a hitch!

Here are the songs we played:
Brooklyn or Bust
Infinitely Red (from Kentucky)
Modest Birds (from Kentucky)
Neighborhood (from A Book About the Rest)
Mustang Walk
O My Luck
Poughkeepsie (from Community Balloon)

The Matthew Carefully Undone Ensemble – ‘Poughkeepsie’ from Bryan Thomas on Vimeo.

Major thanks are in order here: to all ensemble members for their dedication and energy towards this project, to all the ensemble member’s wives, girlfriends, dogs, cats, babies, pets, and families for to SwordPaw for the availability and awesomeness of their SwordPaw HQ for our rehearsals this summer, to Frank Moscowitz for some crucial advice and cobbled together rehearsal sound fantastics, to Ben Karis-Nix and Taylor Gillis at Design it Together for some fantastic band apparel, and to everyone at RestFest/B3nson for giving us the opportunity to put this show on.

Over the next few weeks, I have a few more posts relating to the Ensemble that I want to share. Stay tuned.

This is the beginning.

The first fifteen people who purchase either a $10 bundle of Matthew Carefully CDs or a $10 clearance Penny Riddle t-shirt get a 10-song mix CD featuring unreleased music I’ve been working on or have been sitting on!

Once these are gone, they are gone.

Due to Tropical Storm Irene’s magic precluding many folks from making it to RestFest Day 2, this mixtape is now a free download!

Click here to download a 66mb zip file. Please tell a friend if you like it!

Tracklist and notes:
01. Mirrored Out* (Ceiling Life)
02. O My Luck (RestFest demo)*
03. Relocation Tactics (Spouse cover)*
04. from the Brunswick Soundtrack*
05. Call Off Your Guards (for eScape)*
06. Diamonds (Demo)
07. Prayers & Palms (live at the Arts Center)
08. Two Knees and Arms (Ceiling Life)*
09. Poughkeepsie (Live at RestFest 2010)
10. Seven Lives (Kentucky Outtake)*

* = unheard/unreleased
“Ceiling Life” songs are for a more experimental project to be released someday.
The Brunswick Soundtrack will be released by the end of 2011.
Songs I’ve written for eScape will be released as an EP by the end of 2011.
A Deluxe Kentucky iteration will be released someday.

All songs and music written and performed by Matthew Loiacono, except “Relocation Tactics” by SPOUSE/José Ayerve & co. (used without permission – sorry José!)
All songs recorded, mixed and “mastered” by Matthew Loiacono, except “Prayers & Palms” by Holland Hopson and “Poughkeepsie” by Frank Moscowitz
Assembled for RestFest 2011.
All the love.

The lovely B3nson folks were kind enough to ask me to perform again this year, at which point I began to think about putting something very special together for this year’s event.

So what does Matthew do when Matthew considers putting together some sort of musical group to play music at Restoration Festival 2011?

Matthew assembles a 12+ person ensemble.

While playing alone is all well and good, I’ve had an urge to collaborate on music with other people lately. What better way to do so than to find some folks willing and able to work on music together for a few months?

Two rules for this show –

1. No looping.

2. No electronic instruments.

For this special one-time-only performance, the Undone Ensemble will perform a song or two from each of my full-length records, some old stuff and a few newer things. It’s been a real treat to hear my ideas go from budget MIDI keyboard demos to living, breathing instrument parts.

Can’t wait for you to hear it!

Tickets are available at the Restoration Festival website. We’ll be playing around 4:30pm on Sunday, August 28th.

See you there?

The lovely folks at O+ Festival asked me to contribute a song to their new book/CD compilation since I was lucky enough to perform at last year’s inaugural festival in Kingston, N.Y. I was happy to contribute a brand new song, “Singing Upwards II“, which is exclusive to this release.

You can stream the entire compilation here, or order your own physical copy of this masterpiece by heading to that same page. The book is a gorgeous, large-format publication featuring many stories and anecdotes regarding the festival.

Matthew Carefully – Singing Upwards II by O+ Festival

“Singing Upwards II” lyrics:

Feeling you pass by me -
only your hands are wrapped above you in a circle.
I let Amy know we’re almost down,
we’re almost out,
we’re almost there
today.

Feeling you pass by me -
only part of you is singing to the heavens.
If there’s a winner now
they’re holding out
an empty sound
and wishes all delayed.

Even a pass through me is just the start of the beginning,
will the rest pull through?
We were laying down,
we went sleeping long,
spilled the dinner – shout
and this what we made.

This is our hands, this is our home, this is the place where we can lay down our heads.

BONUS:

“Singing Upwards II” is the sister of the song I wrote with Tim Koch for the Hoborchestra album I Only Eat You To Make Me Stronger. You can download the original “Singing Upwards” here.

Sometimes we need a little HOPE to put us back together…

Friends,

This morning I recorded a new album at St. Joseph’s Church in Albany, N.Y.

After two very personally eye-opening, mind-opening performances there (as a part of HEAVY), I wanted to document the music that came out of me during both occasions. The space and sound of the church allowed me to explore a more experimental side of my music that I have been longing to dive into.

Long-form improvisational loops, textures and samples for mandolin, voice and sampler were the method, while the room delivered the experience.

When the whole idea for REST FEST came to light, I had hoped I’d be able to visit the church when it wasn’t being prepped for this impending weekend.

So this morning, I reeled trusted sound-buddy Frank Moscowitz into showing up at St. Joe’s for a quick session before the B3nson folks were supposed to arrive for more cleaning and prep.

After load-in and a quick sound/level check, we were off and running. Two pieces were recorded — one from 9:15am -> 9:43am , and the other from 9:52am -> 10:07am.

The album is called St. Joseph’s Oblivion and it will be released (in limited CD form) tomorrow at Rest Fest.

If there’s some solid response, maybe I’ll make it available digitally and perhaps even a larger run of compact discs.

I’m proud of this one, and I hope you will enjoy it.

Myself included.

“Set For Weeks” is a brand new song that has a cousin in “Fit For Days” from B3nson’s LarkFest compilation from last year. It references an episode of Nip/Tuck, steals a melody blip from Dinosaur Jr. and musically nods to at least three of my older songs.

Download away, for free, and, see you this weekend at St. Joseph’s?
(I have $15 weekend passes if you need them…)

Reeling back the evidence that moved.
I’ll be under here, trapped, leaving nothing much to lose.
On these sides we’ve barely enough room.
Stealing back all presence of the proof.

Clean exact measures fairly over moons.
Wishing for the star mine emptied prayer lives up to truth.
Pour me out there’s barely enough room.
Feel contented, pleasure must pull through.

Set for weeks I am content with all the moves we made
still there’s something in the way.
And as we fill the days with obvious, engaging things
still there’s something I should say.

Daring back the trouble I’ll undo.
Steering off the widest crescent moon.
Star me out, there’s barely enough room.

This past weekend saw the opening of one of the most impressive displays of art Albany has ever seen, HEAVY.

The event lived up to its name, completely transforming St. Joseph’s (and the surrounding neighborhood, even!) into an art playground.

Pal Sébastien Barré covered all kinds of bases with this blog post and photo set from HEAVY.

Here are a few images from the weekend that don’t necessarily overlap with some of the other images I’ve seen; including a few from the Dwell/OneUnit “Fireflies and Night Skies” room (that you had to look to find…) and a few outside shots.

As far as music goes, I feel lucky to have been able to perform a sixty minute improvisation featuring looped samples, vocals and affected mandolin. There were two moments during that time where I felt terribly connected to the space, despite being completely insular and uncommunicative with beings in the room.

If you had to miss the opening weekend; well, you’re in luck! It was announced yesterday that HEAVY will once again be open starting this Friday (7/30) at 5PM (again on Saturday as well) with no less than 10 new installations/artists collaborating on more work!

I’m happy to announce that I’ll be performing a similar set of drone/improvisation on Friday along with Sean Rowe and Pete Edwards. Much more music to be added…

I’m proud to present my next album – Community Balloon which will be released on June 1st, 2010 by Collar City Records!

The album is filled with songs based on ideas and creative input from the lovely folks on my Weekly Email List. (Are you signed up?)

Last fall, I sent out a note to the list asking folks to send in their feelings, ideas, sounds, lyrics, thoughts, pictures, challenges, or whatever they’d like to hear translated into a song by myself. I needed fodder for songs, since I have offered a new song and/or video of new song to the list each week for seventy-five weeks now without fail.

The ideas that people sent me were amazing! As I worked on the songs, I realized that the arc of the music was turning into an album. Despite having enough songs written to make an entirely new full-length album of my own work, I felt compelled to finish this batch of “Community” based songs before moving on.

There are many other “Community”-like contributions to the completion of the album (like the gorgeous photography by Bennett V Campbell that adorns the cover) that will be unveiled as we inch closer to the release of the album.

Next Wednesday April 28th will see the launch of a pre-sale which will allow you the opportunity to purchase the album or the (limited-edition) “Community Bundle” in advance of the release date.

The aforementioned album and bundle will be available at the Community Balloon CD Release Show on Sunday, May 9th at Caffé Lena in Saratoga Springs. Tickets are going fast, so please click here to secure yourself a seat!