Forest City Lovers

It’s nice to be home. Thank you to all the lovely people I met along the way, and for being such beautiful attentive audiences. It was such a treat to play stripped down versions of FCL songs and to try out a few new ones. I did some video sessions whilst in Halifax, but I will post those later.

Instead, here is the Blogotheque Take Away show that Claire and I did. I’m a huge fan of the work that these guys do, they seem to capture great musical moments with a lot of my favourite bands. We were honoured to be included. We filmed it in our friend Dave’s backyard in Austin, Texas while he was out. I hope he didn’t mind…

Forest City Lovers | A Take Away Show | Presented By La Blogotheque, NxNE, SxSW and ASTW

We did a session with the Kiyanna Project while we were in Austin. They were very lovely people and were able to coax a story out of me about what went into “If I Were A Tree”.  It’s rare that I tell the stories behind my songs; I really like people to apply their own meaning to my words and use them in their own moments.  But if you were curious, listen on dear grasshopper…

Forest City Lovers – If I Were a Tree – Kiyanna Project from Kiyanna Project on Vimeo.

Hey South Western ONTARIO. Last night you delivered in a big way in London. Feel like topping that, Sarnia? Well we’re coming to Ups and Downs tonight so we’ll seeeeeeeeeeeee you there!

Also – how awesome is this video from the summer when we had you beautiful dancing bodies all up in our grills?!

HOUSTON!

We’re playing a free all ages show at Cactus Records in Houston, TX  on Saturday March 19 (TOMORROW). We’ll be playing for about half an hour and there will be refreshments provided to cool you down.

Address: 2110 Portsmouth Houston, TX 77098

Please come out and say hello and tell all your friends! xo

Just to note – here are our remaining USA dates and please note that, due to construction on the building, New Orleans is cancelled.  It’s our first time to many of these cities, so please RSVP and share with your friends!

March 17 – SXSW official showcase @ Habana’s, 9pm (FB invite)
March 20 – Houston @ Houston House of Creeps (invite)
March 21 – Fort Worth @ the WhereHouse (invite)
March 23 – Athens, GA @ Flicker Cafe (invite)
March 24 – Columbus, OH @ Treehouse  (invite)
March 25 – Youngstown, OH @ TBA

Dear Friends,

please keep an eye out for us in a town near you. Or maybe we can rendevous at SXSW under the Texan sun?

See y’all soon!

xo kb

I suggest that you listen to this song while you read this gigantic image-heavy blog post and marvel at the amazing string arrangement and the stunning use of pizzicato.

From this ordinary desk placed beneath an old single pane window (that looks out towards the tops of naked trees and green-and-brown crumbling rooves), I can see the sky is grey and lonesome. There are but two more days left in our year of twenty ten. Often it feels like the year has gone by so fast, but when I stop and reflect on everything that has gone on, there are years of memories dispersed throughout this twenty ten. Here is a sampling of some fun times in our year:

We started off the year in the studio, finishing up Carriage. Here we are making our producer Chris’s head spin with our demands.

Right after we wrapped up mixing the record we all headed down to Texas.

From USA to UK, spent some time reppin’ Canada in England while Carriage got mastered.

Spent the summer touring across Canada and US with lots of good pals (Evening Hymns being one of them). This is about the time that Claire joined our fantastic team to contribute even more beautiful strings to the mix.

We’re not on tour in this photo but just having a summer meeting with our label guru, Stuart. It looks like maybe we were waiting for our delicious food to arrive at this moment judging from our fake smiles. We love the Beaver!

Speaking of food, we heart Tubby Dog and hit it up every time we’re in Calgary. Just think how great we all felt, jiggling along in the van for hours on end, after eating this massive gastro mess? Worth it!

This year we learned how to play Crazy Knucks. We’ll show you sometime…

We released  CARRIAGE in July! This is the only photo I took from the night. I remember I had to run up to the balcony and snap it right before we went on.

“There is nothing more fun to do in Chicago than drink American beer and wear 3D glasses.” Truth.

But posing like this comes in a close second…

Lots happened in between all these photos, but I’m sure you don’t want to spend your whole lunch break looking at photos of our smirking mugs. Here we are at our favourite ‘Dep in New Brunswick posing with a giant pumpkin to begin our mission to take a group photo with every pumpkin we saw, wherever we went.

Towards the end of the year we wrapped up a super fun tour with these guys here and then headed back to our fair city. Our hometown show to cap off the year was a lot (tonnes and tonnes) of fun. We just can’t wait to get back into it next year.

You’ve probably noticed that most of the photos I posted here are of us doing things other than play our instruments. That was done with careful thought, you see, because although the shows are of utmost importance to our career, the friendships/family/fans/adventures in between seem to stay with us most of all. We are forever grateful for your fantastic support, smiles and affections. There are so many places to go and so many people to see., I hope we get there together.  On the note of together – sadly, our dear friend Neil is going through an  illness that needs some good vibes sent his way. Please go to bruce-peninsula.com to hear it from the horses’s mouth.  We hope you’ll send your warm wishes his way and consider donating to Princess Margaret Hospital here:  http://www.pmhf.ca/

As the year comes to a close, and everyone begins to look wistfully behind  them to collect their thoughts, I leave you with this sentiment:

“Life is short, art long, opportunity fleeting, experience treacherous, and judgment difficult.” - Hypocrites.

Thank you and xo Kat

Whilst in Montreal this past October, we had the pleasure of taping this clip with some of the folks from CFRU. Our pyrotechnics had the day off, so we left it in the hands of inexperienced radio hosts. This may or may not have been a brilliant idea.

If I Were A Tree – Forest City Lovers from The Thrill Is Back on Vimeo.

About a month later we were in New York. Whilst there we got our van towed and played some awesome shows, among other things. We also took a romantic stroll with a couple of people from The Wild Honey Pie, and ended up serenading them in front of the water.

Constellation – Forest City Lovers (TWHP Session) from The Wild Honey Pie on Vimeo.

xoxo to the maximus,
KB

This past weekend was a lot of fun. We returned from our Pumpkin Patrol tour and played  a big homecoming show in Toronto. It was mega fun, and thank you to our awesome friends Allie Hughes, Hooded Fang and Golden Ghost for joining us on the bill. A few places reviewed the show and have some photos, you can see them here and here.

We’re getting ready to head to Rochester tomorrow to play the best bar with an upside down kitchen on the ceiling, the Bugjar with our friends Viking Moses. We’re heading down to NYC after that to celebrate with the Wild Honey Pie for their 1 year anniversary at the Living Room on Thursday and our first ever show in Brooklyn, with Golden Ghost, at Union Hall on Friday. Saturday brings us to SUNY Binghamton! We’re excited to visit our friends in the tiny town of Endicott and explore the mountains of upstate New York.

We’d love to know if you’re coming! Please RSVP to the Facebook invitations below:

Rochester @ the Bugjar (All Ages!)  VIEW INVITATION BUY TICKETS
Manhattan @ Living Room (Wild Honey Pie 1 yr anniversay, no minors)   BUY TICKETS
Brooklyn @ Union Hall (no minors)  VIEW INVITATION BUY TICKETS
Binghamton @ SUNY (All ages! Free!) VIEW INVITATION

Thanks for making this autumn a blast! xo
-kb