Upstanding Youth

We love you but...

2011-01-29T00:16:00.000-08:00

...we don't actually update this blogspot page anymore. What we really really want is for you to visit our official website. We are blogging directly on the main page, and there are some cool features to check out. So come hang out!

Click here to go to our official website!

Pipeline Show Pics and Memories

2009-11-04T22:37:00.000-08:00

(Click to see more photos)

We recently helped the 86 List celebrate their 10 year anniversary at Pipeline Cafe in Honolulu. It was great to get together with some bands that we have been friends with for a long time. I had a flood of memories and I thought I'd share some of them here.

When UY first started playing in 2001 we regularly played with The 86 List and Buckshot Shorty at a place on King St called Coffee Factory. The underground scene was pretty active there and I clearly remember people swinging from the ceiling, while people passing by would stare in the window.

How 'bout the Halloween show at Pink Cadillac where Steve from Buckshot was dressed as Space Ghost and had to rip off his costume due to overheating. Or the Day Killers killing it on stage. And being a little weary of the Extra Stout fans, but appreciating their Adidas. How about the Sticklers final show there at Pink Caddy as well... watch out for the boogie man...

Of course there were some great shows at Club Pauahi, with the central air dripping on everyone, and the transvestites playing pool, and Vax screaming on stage. Hell Caminos teaching everyone about Rock'n'Roll. Black Square showing the kids that Reggae can be hardcore. Our bass player at the time fell off the stage, but didn't miss a beat and our sax player had to leave in the middle of a song once.

Buckshot came out to play a show with us at the Kahuku Sugar Mill and it got shut down before the end of their set because people at the hospital were complaining of the noise.

How about the time we played a show right after Demitri got his tonsils out. Or when I had strep throat.

How about all the times we've hit our heads on that low cement pillar at Anna Banana's.

And our CD release show for A Sense of Urgency at the Loft where we felt like rock stars.

We've played bars, bowling allies, churches, schools, parks, clubs, streets, coffee shops, and we aren't going to stop.

UY loves you.

2009-07-12T23:16:00.000-07:00

Just didn't want you to forget :)
<3

Shows for the Month of May

2009-05-12T22:43:00.000-07:00

News Update

2009-05-05T23:00:00.001-07:00

Again UY must reach out from the depths of their busy lives to affirm their continued existence and passion for the life of music. We’ve been busy this year so far with the success of winning for the 4th time a Hawaii Music Award. UY has one an HMA for every recording we’ve done since our first project Trying to Stand in 2002. Also, Upstanding Youth has been nominated for a Na Hoku Hanohano Award. This is like the Grammy’s of Hawaii and we consider this nomination to be one of the biggest honors UY has received in our over 7 years of performing and recording as a band. It’s an achievement to have our genre of music acknowledged in a forum that is so widely respected in Hawaii.

One of the biggest successes UY will experience this year will be the addition of more children to the UY family. We’ll be taking a few months off from June until who knows when to get the new kiddies settled. Before that we’ll be playing multiple shows in the month of May.

May 16th UY will be playing at BYUH opening for long time friend Cubworld. We’ll be doing our first live acoustic set. We’ve never done an acoustic performance featuring the whole band before and really look forward to the opportunity to showcase some songs with new arrangements to better fit an acoustic setting. In the past Marc would take up some time playing some songs acoustic at bar gigs but we’ve never made the time to prepare an acoustic set. Also, on May 20th we’ll be at Hot Topic in the Pearlridge Mall for another acoustic set. It’ll be a kind of meet and greet and acoustic performance. We’re really looking forward to this. Hot Topic in Hawaii has really been doing a lot to promote and help local bands. Some friends of ours like Pimpbot and Busekrus have performed already and been really successful.

On top of all of this UY has been considering new ways to improve the business aspect of the band and find creative ways to promote and expose the band to a wider fan base. Keep in touch and we’ll let you know of some of the new things we have planned. One potential idea to surface is a UY sticker contest where the person who can submit a photo of a UY sticker the furthest from Hawaii will get an amazing prize. Stay posted and you’ll hear more about all that. Until the next show or next record…much love.
-UY

2009-05-05T22:36:00.001-07:00

12 different herbs and spices.

2009-04-13T21:11:00.001-07:00

We have had a lot of cool things going on and wanted to give you a report-
We had a blast at the Hawaii Music Awards a week or so ago. We got to hang out with some great friends and bands from the scene, and we performed "Sing to Me" for the audience. This was our 4th record to win an award at the HMA's so it looks like we've got a good thing going.

Lately we have been working on revamping some of our material to fit a more acoustic mold. We have a few upcoming "unplugged" shows and we are having fun finding ways to arrange our music to fit that format. One of those shows is in support of Cubworld who is returning to the island, and it is always a pleasure working with him and his crew. The other unplugged performance is slated for one of the Hot Topic stores in May. We'll provide more details on those shows when we get them. If you can't get to one of the unplugged shows I'm sure we will have some footage up on the old youtoob.

Now that MySpace is letting artists put 10 songs on their profile we thought it would be a perfect chance to feature some live and rare tracks. We are thinking of keeping a good rotation on our MySpace player so keep checking back to see what's going on there. Right now, besides some album tracks, we have live recordings of 3 Page Letter, Paint by Numbers, and This One's for You. We also put up an alternate version of 451 featuring Kui's rhymes towards the end. Fun stuff.

We just launched TheUYMerchStore.blogspot.com as a temporary place to sell our goods until we get our actual webstore more current. You may notice some good deals so check it out. Payments are secure through PayPal and we package the orders ourselves, so yeah.

Lastly! We are now on Twitter. Nuff said; are we hip enough for you yet!?

Anyway, we are very busy in our personal lives but are trying to fit in as much UY time as possible. Don't forget to keep in touch.

<3
UY

Have you missed UY?

2009-01-27T12:56:00.000-08:00

So we had a lot of fun with this blog last year. It helped us keep in touch with you while we were in the process of writing and putting out a new record. You got to see a few things and hear a few things and it felt like we really connected. Since then a lot of things have changed. There's a new sheriff in town, Obama. The economy has gone to crap and we really felt it when we went to Maui in November to promote the record. We had amazing support from radio stations there as well as the local newspaper, but the gigs were heinous. We've never had such a bad experience as we did there and a large portion of it can be attributed to the economy, as well as other business practices.
We got back from Maui and took a few months off - in order to take a breath after hustling our new record out the door and so people could finish school. It's been a sweet little break and we're now back together trying new ways to spread our music to the world while balancing our familial and financial responsibilities. We also sent our trumpet/vox member off to the mainland, Aaron Eskaran. It'll be really hard to have to same vibe on stage without him, but we wish him the best in his new place on the mainland.
As for what we're doing now, UY is trying to focus our efforts outside of Hawaii as much as possible. We feel like the economy has really tapped the music scene in Hawaii and we've decided to play at fewer bars, spend more time promoting ourselves outside of Hawaii, and take care of our music from a business perspective. There's a lot of the business side of our music that we have greatly neglected. We have decided to tackle all the hurdles necessary in order to get our publishing/licensing taken care of. Think you know someone who would like to help us take care of that? Let us know. Also, once that is taken care of we can finally answer all the people who have approached us to get our music into tv/film/radio/commercials. Once this fundamental part of UY is finally taken care of we feel like we can really start making music take us to where we want to go. It's been a huge stumbling block to us up till now.
On a side note, our CD release shows were EPIC!! We had an amazing show at the LOFT in China Town, Honolulu 18 Oct 2008. The place was packed and we had a great time with great friends. For those of you who missed it, here is Warning Call from the night. Enjoy!
-marc

Maui

2008-11-10T22:55:00.000-08:00

Click here to see more pictures from the tour.

Here's an article written in MauiTime.com
Click here to view the article

Maui bound.

2008-11-07T02:09:00.000-08:00

Maui should be sweet. We are all staying at Demitri's house tonight because we have to be at the Super Ferry loading zone by 5am. A few details- Demitri made a roast; Mythbusters; Stormchasers; Marc is sleeping on the benches we took out of the Uhaul.

Check out this CD review/article from MauiTime.com.

Help Us Out!

2008-10-26T19:10:00.000-07:00

We are in the process of getting our new CD on iTunes. It would be great if you could help us request it!
Here's what to do:
Click here to go to the iTunes feedback page
From there pick "Request an Album"
Type in-
Artist: Upstanding Youth
Album: A Sense of Urgency

Thanks for your help!!

<3 UY

The Loft, Oct 18th!

2008-10-14T02:27:00.000-07:00

The loft is located at 115 N Hotel St.
See you there.

Tonight is the Night

2008-10-11T12:02:00.000-07:00

CD Release Show Tonight!!

Coffee Talk is located @
3601 Waialae Ave.
Honolulu, HI 96816

They're here...

2008-10-09T22:50:00.000-07:00

Well folks, we have come to the end of the music production phase of this record. Now on to the promotion!

For the last week we have premeired these songs on our myspace page:
Bigger Than You or Me
Sing To Me
Flying V
Empty Pockets
Warning Call
Wailing and Gnashing

I just uploaded Detonate, Tell Me Will We, and (drum roll please...) Wailing and Gnashing the REMIX! Tim's brother Kui is an amazing artist and he took the Protools tracks and came up with something you won't want to miss. Go check it out now.

One more time, I'd like to say thanks to those that pre-ordered a copy of A Sense of Urgency, we will be sending them in the mail tomorrow morning.

Okay well I better go, The Office starts in 3 minutes :)

The Shipping News

2008-10-08T01:31:00.000-07:00

The CDs are in transit! They should be here by Thursday or Friday.
I hope everyone has been listening to the new material on our myspace page before its been rotated out. I just put up two more new tracks and four oldies.

Oh, another thing- Pre-sales for A Sense of Urgency are going great. Thank you to everyone that has gone ahead and pre-ordered their copy. If you haven't done so already make sure to do it now so you can get your copy ASAP.

Music Debut, and Album Pre-Sale

2008-10-03T23:44:00.000-07:00

Hey, I know you are enjoying perusing the internet, youtubing it on up, and seeing who else is on facebook but you might want to take a minute to check out our myspace page. We just put up two tracks from our upcoming release, A Sense of Urgency. While you are there you'll also notice a couple of older tracks that you may have forgotten about. Until the record comes out (7 days left!) we will be rotating music on our myspace player to feature new music as well as old favorites. In other words, keep checking back. Drop us a line to let us know how you like the new music!

Also, big news! A Sense of Urgency is now available for pre-order!
As you can see to your right there are two paypal buttons, one for folks in the US, and one for international orders. Of course you know paypal is safe to use, and we will ship out your order as soon as we get them next week.

So, yeah, check out out our myspace page, and have a listen!

T-Minus 8 days and counting

2008-10-03T11:14:00.000-07:00

Our CD release shows are coming up soon, and you won't want to miss either of these shows. We have killer line ups at Coffee Talk on the 11th and the Loft on the 18th. We have plans to make these shows EPIC. Of course, we will have our new CD entitled "A Sense of Urgency" for sale. We are really proud of how it turned out and can't wait to get it out there.

-UY

PS Keep checking back, because we will be debuting some of our new music on our myspace player.

CD Release Show #1

2008-09-28T22:50:00.000-07:00

We have been working...

2008-09-23T21:46:00.000-07:00

Hard.

Just letting everyone know that all the time that we have been spending in the studio is really to prepare for our CD release shows. They are going to EPIC. You all do not want to miss these events. Here are a few candid shots and clues to what you will see and hear at the shows.

We can't wait to have the product in our hands!!!

much love

-UY

p.s.- to see these shots and a lot more of us visit our flickr page www.flickr.com/photos/upstandingyouth

Upcoming shows!

2008-09-23T18:57:00.001-07:00

Here are our upcoming shows. Come out and support us!

Of course, check out our Myspace Page for all current show listings etc...

<3

Taiko Heart Beat

2008-09-16T01:02:00.000-07:00

Hanging out, and taking a break at rehearsal.

So, we have been feverishly rehearsing our new material, which has been pretty intense. At the time of recording several of the tracks had never been played as a whole band, so it is amazing to finally get to see how it will all go down in the real world.
Fun times ahead.

Coffee Talk. October 11th, 2008 More info to come

2008-09-05T00:02:00.000-07:00

CD Release Show Set List

2008-09-04T00:45:00.000-07:00

Tonight the rhythm section got together to run though all the new songs and decide on what we're going to play for our release shows. Here's what we're going to play...in this order.

warning call (ken)
detonate
headlights (extra drum)
tell me will we (ken, extra drum)
desperation w/ original intro
flying v
electric fence
sing to me
judgement (ken)
empty pockets
wailing and gnashing (ken, kui)
bigger than you or me
451 (mr. goshi, kui, uncle Kona Ahlo)

You'll also notice we've noted special things for each song like additional musicians to play for that song or extra percussion to be used. We're really getting stoked for how things are turning out and couldn't be more excited. You better be at one of the shows...or I hope Gargamel eats you.

THE FINAL COVER ART

2008-08-30T21:37:00.001-07:00

The following is taken from my flickr page www.flickr.com/photos/hynpoloboy

This is the final work. I decided to add the texture on the left and right for track listing and thank you space.

I also did this to include the full composition of the piece instead of having missing parts of the written lyrics throughout the painting.

Thanks for all the support and feedback!

The album will be sent out on Tuesday to be mastered,pressed, and printed.

We had our final listen through last night and the album sounds to us as the best work we've done so far. Be on the lookout for it!

We are going to be playing a bunch of shows over the next few months ESPECIALLY in the month of Oct as that will be the month of our release shows! Our website ( www.upstandingyouth.com ) will be going through some changes to accommodate the album so don't be afraid to drop by there every once and a while.

our blog located at upstandingyouth.blogspot.com is the most frequently updated on how things are going and all of our show info is located on our myspace page. www.myspace.com/upstandingyouth

Mahalo everyone!

-aaron

Excitement After The Fight

2008-08-30T10:51:00.000-07:00

Apologies for not having kept in better touch during the last month or so. After the band got together last night and listened to the record in it's completed form, and saw the cd art work (posted by Aaron above), I hope you can forgive us for the little hiatus that we've taken - because it seems to have paid off. Last night we had a chance to listen to the music that we've created for "A Sense of Urgency" in its entirety and it is unexplainable. I feel all excited like we've just won a fight where the odds were stacked against us. I'm struggling to find words to really and effectively express the emotions and feelings that I/we felt last night. We invited the UY family (band members and wives) to have a final listen before we send it off to be pressed on Tuesday. We were able to make final comments and corrections and hear how amazingly far this record has come. It always blows me away to hear a completed song and remember the little moment that created it before it became its completed self. This record challenges what I thought UY would ever accomplish. We started this recording process with a very intentional move towards a rock influenced ska/reggae feel and we made that goal a sweet reality. Additionally, every aspect of this recording process has been improved and magnified. We've taken the punk/ska genre in a direction that is completely our own. I feel like we've finally defined ourselves and created our sound. Enough cannot be said about the mixing and engineering skills of Demitri on this project...the "mental skills" (inside joke). I only hope that we can properly convey through our music the excitement, commitment, and sacrifice that has gone into this record.

With that in mind please, those of you who follow and support UY, keep posted for CD release shows. We have two cd release shows confirmed and one in the works. The very first show, Oct 11th, is going to be at the beloved Coffee Talk in Kaimuki. This is intended for the all ages crowd and is a fairly small venue. The second show, Oct 18th, will be at The Loft in China Town. This is a sweet venue with an underground feel, especially since you have to walk through a bakery in order to get into the venue. We hope to let guest artists participate in our set that night like a keyboard player, rapper, and pro trumpet player. We really want to make this show a great representation of how far we've come. The final show is still in the works. We really want to throw down a show at BYUH in Laie for a few reasons. Primarily, it would be a venue where we could have a great sound system, stage, and audience that we could explain song by song what this record means. It's rare to have a band release an album and then have a show where they explain to you song by song how the ideas came together, what they mean, and how they all work together. It'd be kind of like a behind the album type of show. Also, we'd have those guest artists as well to phatten up the evening as well.

So, please don't think that our online silence has meant UY has died. All it means is that we've really been focusing on making this record as amazing as possible. Hopefully soon you'll all be able to experience the mixture of excited emotions that we all felt last night as you listen to our new record, "A Sense of Urgency."

Update!

2008-08-27T01:54:00.000-07:00

So you may or may not be thinking, "what ever happened with the whole New Record out in August 2008?" Well let me tell you.

This is nothing like a last ditch effort. (from the brand new song Bigger Than You or Me)

In an effort to keep the final product up to our own standards we decided to push the release date to October. See our Myspace Page for show dates (the October dates are obviously the CD release shows). More info will be provided as it surfaces.

We were pretty ambitious thinking we could get the record out in August, and by setting that original goal I think we pushed ourselves more than we ever have. It has been fun to see everyone rally to make things happen. I don't think you will be disappointed with the final product. Demitri is in the mixing stage right now and I wouldn't be surprised if his brain explodes before the process is complete. If you know him and have his cell number shoot him a text message to cheer him up in the studio. He has been putting a lot of time and effort into the making of A Sense of Urgency and it shows.

This Friday we are doing something we have never done before, we are having a UY "family" listening party. The band, families, and other individuals that have played a role in the process will be gathering at Lowbrow Studio to hear the "nearly final" mix.

Hope to see you at a show. We are planning to make the CD release shows a bit more "epic" so you won't want to miss out (think- guest musicians, additional instrumentation, blah, BLAH, I can't give away too much...)

Love you all,
Thomas

Quick art update...

2008-08-23T23:46:00.000-07:00

I wasn't able to bring stuff of Wed so here is some of the progress I've been making...

Hope you guys like it... and don't worry this is only half of the whole front 3 panels.

Take into consideration that the final product will only be inches. Not anywhere near as large as it is here.

and remember this is not the final product!

I also added a better representation of Ech and Ad ;-P

ALBUM ART WORK

2008-08-13T02:40:00.000-07:00

The title of the new record will be called "A SENSE OF URGENCY."

The problem I was faced with was to produce art work that would portray that feeling without the end product to be considered ANGRY.

When I asked the guys what I should do I was given a different array of answers. SO not too sure of where to go I produced this drawing.

we'll see if that ends up on the album.

As far as everything else... I decided to go and do traditional drawing and painting working on paper instead of doing everything on the computer. I got some supplies and can't wait to dive into them. I prepped a sheet of nice sturdy paper and will be adding to it as soon as my design gets approved by the guys. I don't have the luxury to use as much of everything to try things out so I want to do all the preliminary stuff on the computer then apply everything done here to the paper. Should be tough but I'm more than up to the challenge.
Here are the supplies...

After doing some serious thinking on the project I really wanted to include those who really mean a lot to us this time around on the album art. I'll explain later, but I got the wives and kids in on it.

Here is what I have drawn up until this point. I have a few more things but I arranged them this way to see what everyone thought. LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK... please. I don't only want this to be Aaron's ideas and then when it's printed for everyone to be sketch on the outcome.

Things can be moved and they probably will be:-)

This is the layout we'll be working with.

much love -aaron

ps- just for fun I did a quick edit of the kind of style I would apply with the paint...

Meeting and Cover Art

2008-07-24T00:47:00.000-07:00

So as a whole band we finally got together last night. It's been a really long time since we've been together and done anything as a whole band. It's been a lot of individual time in the studio with Demitri lately. Poor D has been putting in so much time on this record. He should be paid a million dollars or at least a million hugs.

Last night we talked about a lot of things to do with the record. First we listened to everything we've got done so far and it's pretty friggen amazing to see the progress we've made in the studio. Not just that, it's awesome to see the kind of progress we've made as a band since we wrote STILL back in 2006. Writing and recording original tunes like this is so satisfying. I know other musicians who make their living playing other peoples music and they would do anything to have the chance to write and record their own music with their own band. UY is a really lucky group to be able to keep it together this long and continue to improve as a band. I can't wait for people to get this cd, put it in their ipods/cars, learn all the words, and sing along with us at a show. Nothing is more gratifying than seeing people singing along. Looking forward to that.

So, one big change is that our trumpet player Aaron will be leaving on August 16th to go back to the mainland for multiple reasons. That changes our cd release date. We're giving ourselves one more week to put final touches on it and make it as close to perfect as possible. That also means that all cd release shows that we do once the record drops will not include Aaron. That's a huge bummer. We noticed a huge difference in band chemistry once Aaron got back into the group this summer and contributed to the vibe of not only the horn section, but the band as a whole. UY is an awesome mixture of 6 unique individuals. Without any one of us it just isn't the same vibe, sound, or band.

Another really cool thing we talked about was the cover art. We've struggled to get the themes going for this. The main idea that we have is obviously a sense of urgency. But how do we convey that through an image? Well, we talked about what we feel we have a sense of urgency for. The main focus of the band right now is somewhat similar to that used by considerably nefarious organizations. We want to target the largest amount of people possible in any situation, globally, by country, by venue, or simply individual people. We want to coerce people into action,but do it through music and not violence. We want you to dance, sing, think, buy our merch and music. We don't want you to be apathetic or stationary - we want you to take action because of our music. From this idea the cover art hopefully takes a huge leap into its genesis. Can't wait to see Aaron's art skills grab this by the juevos and make it a reality.

Other than that we talked about boring stuff like cd release shows, promotion ideas, and all that stuff. We're really looking to find a publicist type person help us get the word out into as many newspapers and mediums as possible, but don't have any real leads. Could/would you help UY promote the new album? Could you get a write up in your school/local paper? Could you place our ad on your myspace or blog? There's tons of stuff that could help out. What would you like to do to help? What ideas can you think of? We'd be stoked to have your help.

UY and CUBWORLD

2008-07-18T00:04:00.000-07:00

A few months ago UY was asked to be the backup band for CUBWORLD at a show in Laie. Here's a link to some footage on youtube. It was a blast being able to learn someone else's music and not have to worry about being the singer and trying to entertain, but still be a part of the music. You can't see it from the footage but the crowd was great and the sound was awesome as well even though the recording doesn't do it justice. Check it out.

Oh...and by the way. We're hoping to have all the recording and mixing done in about three weeks! We'll be sending it off to be mastered and pressed here soon! Keep posted!

MIA

2008-07-14T23:46:00.000-07:00

Let me apologize for the lack of communication lately. There's good reason. Here's a few reasons why I personally haven't been on the blog.
1. I started a new internship/job on June 16th and it's a full time gig. Music doesn't pay the bills or buy the diapers...yet!
2. When not at work we're in the studio wrapping things up. The record has all the drums, horns, and guitar tracks done as of today!

One killer thing that has happened lately is that we were able to have a great night at Boardriders in Kailua last week. Our good friend Danny Casler from National Product came out for our last set that night. We were kind of bummed about the evening because of the weak crowd (we were competing with the BayFest that was going on that night as well). But having Danny there was awesome. For those of you reading who don't know who National Product is here's a little history. NP started playing music around the same time as our original group, Rukus, started playing back in 1998. They kept their act strictly punk and so we did a few shows together back in those days. Since then, NP has moved to California and blossomed to become an amazing band that has toured multiple countries, developed a great sound, and really made an effort to live the dream of playing music for a living. Every time they come back to Hawaii we try to hook up and play a few shows together and keep in touch as much as possible. They're awesome dudes and it's always a blast to get together.

Great compliments came from Danny that night when he heard us play our song Desperation live. That one seemed to get to him. It was great to have an intimate venue to really let loose and have fun that night. Since that night we've been able to get in touch with a good friend of NP - Darrin from Goldfinger!!! It's been awesome to be in touch with a band that you've looked up to for years. Maybe something awesome can come from these cool new connections.

A few words on "connections." It's been amazing to think of the kinds of people we've met and been able to be associated with in one way or another through music. Also kind of frustrating since things haven't just "taken off" due to these associations. Here's a little list of bands we've played with and people we've met because of Upstanding Youth.

Buck-O-Nine, Goldfinger, Reel Big Fish, The Toasters, SUM41, Papa Roach, Pepper (actually it was the father of the front man who we met), Kelly Slater, and a few others. The thing is that each time we made these associates we thought that this might be the person who could really help our band. We really hoped that these associations would help us achieve some kind of greatness that we couldn't do on our own. So far that hasn't been the case. I don't think anyone else other than UY will be the reason UY "makes it." I think if it's ever really going to happen it's going to be because we made it happen instead of someone handing it to us. Or, maybe we just haven't met the right people yet. What you think?

Last Minute Gig

2008-07-01T22:54:00.000-07:00

We just booked a last minute gig in Kailua at Boardriders. So, for all of you in Hawaii who check this blog out, we'll be playing from 10pm til 1am this Saturday July 5th. Come and shake it down with us!

Progress Update

2008-06-29T11:53:00.000-07:00

So, both the horns and the guitars are about half way done. We are making good progress, and so far everything is sounding great. Demitri has been coming up with some pretty crazy ways to get the sound we want and its definitely working.
Here's some photos from last night.
After working in the studio we played along with a bunch of bands for Black Square's CD release at 39Hotel downtown. It was fun to see some old friends (especially Ben and Janzell who surprised us!) and its always great play some of our new music.

Time for the Horns

2008-06-25T04:27:00.000-07:00

Tonight I would have to say was pretty epic. In every sense of the word.

It was the night that we were able to start recording the horns. Adam on the Tenor, Tim on the Alto, and Me(Aaron) on the Trumpet.

We really were able to communicate and get the correct articulations and phrasing down for "Sing to Me" and "Wailing and Gnashing." This proves to be quite the challenge because we don't write any of our music out on paper. Ideas are exchanged and we come up with the lines that you hear.

We have never recorded all horns at the same time so it took a little while to find what we think are the sweet spots of the room. Needless to say, when we first heard the results of our recording it literally gave us chicken skin! THIS WAS THE SOUND THAT WE HAVE BEEN SEARCHING FOR!

It's a nice raw and live sound. I think we got it this time Demitri! AURYTE! haha.

The only problem is that because the music is raw it is also revealing. We found out that it is going to be practically impossible to get 3 people to play exactly in tune with each other all the time. But we are up to the challenge. I think Demitri is a wizard at fixing things.

This is going to be a great album. I love to see the experience that we have gained really put to work boys.

Aloha readers

Drum Tracking = Complete

2008-06-24T03:17:00.001-07:00

Finished up an hour ago. Expect some fun stuff.

Upstanding Youth at Pipeline

2008-06-22T23:11:00.000-07:00

This past Thursday we opened for our good friends National Product at Pipeline Cafe in Honolulu. It was a great show and awesome times. We actually started playing as a band around the same time as National Product back around 1998 or so. Our very first real "gig" was with National Product at a venue that no longer exists at Puck's Alley near the University of Hawaii. A lot has changed since then, but we've kept in touch with the guys from NP and especially with the front man Danny Casler. Demitri is especially tight with NP since he grew up and worked with NP long before we knew Demitri. It was great to be able to see NP as they've developed and really taken control of their musical future.

As a little treat here is a clip from the show. It's a clip of Desperation and also an introduction of our new UY hand signal. See if you catch the symbolism of the signal. The metal sign with shaka - groove with a crunch - however you look at it it symbolizes our mixture of sounds nicely as well as the letter U and Y. Hope you love it.

Drum Tracking Updated

2008-06-22T22:41:00.000-07:00

We are done tracking the drums on 8 of the 11 songs for the record. So far the process has been pretty smooth. On Friday we did four songs and then we did four more on Saturday. Tomorrow we'll do the last three, and work on tracking some other percussion stuff.

Anyway, here are some notable moments and random facts:
*Nailing the full band section of "Tell Me Will We" with no metronome
*Completing "Headlights" in 40 minutes
*Getting totally fried on "Flying V" two days in a row
*Using the new drum tuning system Demitri got in LA- it saved us a ton of set up time and the drums sound amazing
*I bought a used ping ride and then thought it wouldn't end up being useful but it actually sounds good!

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So here is the track listing for the record, in no particular order:

Sing to Me
Judgment
Wailing and Gnashing
Tell Me Will We
Headlights
Flying V
Detonate
Bigger Than You or Me
Electric Fence
Empty Pockets
Warning Call

Most of these songs have never been heard outside of the studio so we are excited for people to hear the finished product.

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UY hanging out before the NP show @ Pipeline Cafe

in the studio

2008-06-20T22:09:00.000-07:00

Hey Guys! we have officially started the recording. Tom and I are tracking the drums as i am typing this. Tom is killing the drums and we are having a lot of fun. I won a whopper at burger king (thanks Indiana Jones!) Someone will get some pics on here of what we are up to and what it is like being in the studio with UY. I'd like to take some video and put it up so I'll try setup a camera or something. Hope you are all being awesome, and if you can come down to Kainoa's tonight we play at 10pm.
See you soon!

Let the tracking begin!

2008-06-16T21:56:00.000-07:00

If you have been following this blog you've heard about the preproduction and demoing we have been doing to get geared up for the real thing. Well we are going to begin the drum tracking on Thursday. I'm pretty excited because I have thought a lot about the drum sound and how I want to approach the process. Don't worry, we'll keep you in the loop.

Writing Done

2008-06-11T22:59:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to let those who are following the process know that today we've actually finished writing every part of the record. We've never done this much preproduction for a record before. Demitri said we now have the "treasure map" that'll lead us to a gold record since we've laid everything out with such detail. It's a trip to see how each time we go through the recording process, this is UY's 4th project, we improve drastically from what we did last time. The actual recording process should run much smoother this time since we put a huge effort into demo-ing out each song in detail before we actually begin recording. So, break out the festive beverages and make a toast to us - we did! Things should be on track for the August 25th release of "A Sense of Urgency."

Sing To Me

2008-06-11T13:55:00.000-07:00

After UY recorded our last album Still we wrote a song called Sing To Me. It's really gotten some great attention since we've played it live for quite some time now. We can only imagine the kind of results it'll have once it's fully recorded. Someone said that it's already topping the charts in Japan from a demo version that was leaked - who knows? So the other day while we were in the studio I put together a video of the song for everyone. A little background on the lyrics of the song: At one point my wife and I were kind of homeless. I had just started working on my masters degree and working as a substitute teacher, my wife was pregnant and working, and we were homeless. One night after my wife had tried to pick up a second job working at a surf shop in Haleiwa she came home and cried her eyes out to me because everything was just piling up way too much for us. Back in those days of homelessness I would sing her to sleep at night playing an acoustic and eventually wrote 'Sing To Me.' It seems like the most difficult moments have brought out some of the best musical ideas. So, here's a personal version of 'Sing To Me' for you that'll be on our upcoming album, A Sense of Urgency. ps We won't take this one down after 24 hours. We'll leave it here so you can keep coming back and get your sneak peak of the upcoming album.

Demos and Writing...

2008-06-11T11:25:00.000-07:00

We are really close to being done writing the record, and we have almost every thing all demo'd out. I start tracking the drums next week.
Here are a few pictures taken at the studio.

BUY OUR MUSIC!

2008-06-06T11:54:00.001-07:00

We've added some details on the right hand column of the blog that need to be pointed out. We've really tried to make our music ubiquitous (that means found everywhere!) especially on the internet. Here is a quick list of the most common places that you can purchase our music. Take a special note of our SNOCAP store because when the new record is finally done it will be available first from our SNOCAP store before it's in a hardcopy form. You can also support UY by copying the SNOCAP store and pasting it to your myspace page or blog so that it becomes even more ubiquitous and UY begins to overtake the internet and our music takes over the world. That's our ultimate goal at least for this week. We're fickle like that. If you post our SNOCAP store on your page let us know so we can take a look at it. You might win a treat.

WHERE YOU CAN BUY OUR MUSIC:
1. At the bottom of this page!
2. On our website
3. On our Myspace page
4. On iTunes
5. On CdBaby

Nothing To Say But Thanks!

2008-06-05T00:13:00.000-07:00

Much love to all the people who took a few minutes out of their day to check out our new song and video. We're thankful for so many good friends and fans. More to come!

Warning Call Set to Tour Footage

2008-06-03T09:57:00.001-07:00

For all the fans that we met last summer while on tour, here is a list of places that will be seen in the video we'll be posting tomorrow. Again, the video is a montage of footage we took last summer while on tour and it will be set to the music of "Warning Call" which will be on our upcoming album that is slated to come out in August. Here is a list of locations and venues that are used in the video.

Hollywood, California

Albuquerque, New Mexico - Hyper Music Festival

Farmington, New Mexico - The Rock Radio Station, The Totah Theater

Moab, Utah

Provo, Utah - The Velour

Wednesday June 4th for ONE DAY ONLY we'll post "Warning Call" on youtube, this blog, and our myspace page.

It's On - Warning Call

2008-06-02T11:06:00.000-07:00

So as a band we've decided we'll let those of you who are paying attention preview a song off our upcoming album. The song is called "Warning Call." The lyrics touch on a bunch of different ideas ranging from unity amongst musicians, music listeners, and how music is a means of uniting people in ways that culture, language, violence, and religion can't. Music has an amazing way of bridging political/cultural divides. That's the glory of a musical revolution since it can unite people where other methods have failed. That's hopefully one of the results of our music - people of different or even conflicting backgrounds can appreciate the same music and realize that there are things that we all have in common. Far too often our differences are highlighted in order to define ourselves when what we really need to do is point out our similarities in order to diffuse conflict. I'm on a political ramble and this wasn't my intention - but there you go.

We're tossing around some video sample ideas to put the music to. So far we've gathered footage from our Summer 2007 tour and started piecing some of that together. So the idea is to present footage from that tour set to the song "Warning Call" so everyone can get a sample of what our new record is starting to sound like.

Be advised, this is just a demo version of "Warning Call." With that in mind, here are the details. The video will be presented WEDNESDAY JUNE 4TH FOR ONE DAY ONLY. It will be available on youtube, our blog, and our myspace. After that we're going to remove the video and music. So if you want to get a peek at the new song and the video we're working on you better mark your calendar. Much love and hope those who are reading this enjoy what we're working on. It's your job to spread the word now.

New Songs Exposed, You Like?

2008-05-29T19:02:00.001-07:00

So we were talking about possibly posting the demo version of a few of our songs on here and possibly on our myspace. We're pretty secretive about our music while it's in the works and only show it to a few people to get opinions and reactions because we don't want to ruin the surprise when it is actually completed. Would anyone like to hear the demo version of our new stuff or would you rather just wait to hear the refined completed version when we're totally done? If we did post anything it would be on our myspace and blog for one day only and we'd make an announcement prior to posting it. Leave comments and suggestions please.

And if you haven't heard, we're toying with the idea of naming the album "A Sense of Urgency." There's a lot of different levels that this title works on and Demitri was the first to suggest it.

Highlights

2008-05-28T10:10:00.000-07:00

This past weekend was pretty eventful. So much so that Tim got an insane case of strep throat and had to go to Queens hospital to get things sorted out. I tried talking to the guy over the phone while he was in the waiting room and you couldn't understand him the poor guy was so messed up. Luckily he got taken care of and he's doing better. That's what happens I guess when you play 5 shows in three days. U.Y. only played three, but Tim also plays in another indie rock band called Linus and they had a few shows too.

To get into the details of this weekend I wanna start with a story about the Cubworld show at BYUH this past friday night. The show went down better than we could have expected. By the first song we had people up front dancing their shoes off and people were really enjoying themselves. I was kind of nervous about the crowd because a large portion of it was older faculty aged professors and community folks. I asked Jake/Cubworld if we should shorten our set because I didn't want to destroy the old folks, but he wanted our full set so we agreed.

Come to find out, a certain student activities coordinator/director from BYUH seems to have an issue with the Youth of Upstanding-ness. It seems that in his opinion U.Y. is too loud and not a type of music that he likes. So he cornered the M.C. for the night and asked her to announce to the audience that they should feel free to use the bathroom during out 5 song set! I couldn't believe that someone would actually try to do something like that. I've had similar situations with this same director in the past and I know he doesn't like our music because he's told me so to my face, but to ask the audience to go to the pisser during our set?! I was just blown away by the lack of respect, social tact, or general manners that this situation seemed to expose. Luckily, Cubworld got to the M.C. before she made her announcements and made sure she didn't make the directors rude suggestions.

Other than that the night went off amazingly. U.Y. backed Cubworld for 4 songs and they all went down awesome and the audience seemed to love it. As soon as the show was over we packed up super quick and flew down to Haleiwa to play at Kainoas. It was a big shift in energy since we had this huge crowd that was really into our music and then we play to an almost empty bar for 3 hours. Although there was a midget getting down with an older Filipino woman during a few of our songs. They were cutting a rug like no other for a few songs and that actually made the night worth it to see this really short dude getting all freaky with this older Filipino woman. Most people in the bar were cracking up.

The next day we had to play 4 hours at Kemoo Pub in Wahiawa across from Schofield barracks. To take up time I played a solo set and our ever faithful friend Cory got some footage of that night. We should be getting a well recorded dvd of the Cubworld show since they had cameras all over that stage. Once we get that footage we'll post a bunch of it. For now here are some clips from the Kemoo pub show. The first one is of two new songs "Wailing and Gnashing" and "Warning Call" which'll be on our upcomming record. The second one is of "Sing To Me" which is gathering a lot of popularity since we've been playing it for awhile. It'll also be on the upcomming record slated for August 25th. Much love.
-marc

Heavy Hitting Weekend and Summer

2008-05-21T12:54:00.000-07:00

This weekend is going to be pretty amazing. We haven't been this busy in a long time and I'm really looking forward to playing a bunch of shows. We had a long meeting last night plotting out the rest of the recording for the record and how we're going to try and get things done. Before I get to those details I just wanna make sure you noticed the shows this weekend. We're playing two shows on Friday night and another on Saturday. The Friday night gig with Cubworld should be awesome with a great venue and tons of great musicians. Upstanding Youth will also be the backing band for Cubworld that night - so we're really putting some miles down that night. Check out a show this weekend cause it'll be hotness.

Some important dates we can start sharing. We've put down two very important goals for the new record. We want to have the physical cd in our hands by the week of August 25th. We hope to have all the mixing and mastering done no latter than August 11th. So hopefully people will be able to purchase our album starting around August 11th from our snocap stores then itunes and then the physical cd will be available once we get it back from being pressed.

To be honest it's a huge project at this point. We've plotted out when everything needs to be written, when each instrument needs to record - each part has been plotted out in order to streamline this and keep everyone up to date on what needs to be done and it's a TON of work.

We're going to try a few new things when it comes to recording this record also. A few new tricks that Demitri has learned as well as simple techniques to improve the overall quality of the record.

One of the big things that I'm really pushing is to have all three horns record simultaneously. We've never done that in the past, but the quality of performance they get when they play together is leaps and bounds better than when they track it individually. Obviously there'll be overdubbing here and there, but I'm really excited to see how the horns go down. There will be a bunch of other little things here and there that we're trying to do, but those are secret and you'll have to just go on not knowing and we'll smile because we'll think we've accomplished something awesome when in reality most people won't even notice. If they don't, that'll be a huge success. Much love.

I can't stop watching the bill o'reilly clip...DO IT LIVE!!!

2008-05-21T12:42:00.000-07:00

Hey Everyone! this is Demitri just wanting to fill you in on the UY gossip. We all got together the other night and discussed the future of things to come. As you may or may not know we have an album in the works, everything is mapped out and we are ready for a crazy 14 weeks of writing and recording. we will probably be doing some podcasts and put some vids up from the studio. also keep your eyes and ears open for demos of some new songs. I personally would like feedback from you guys once we get the demos up and see what you all think. We are also in the works for a title to the record so if anyone has any thoughts of what connects you to our music feel free to put it in print. I'm hoping for some inspiration from you guys cause we do it for you! Thanks gals and guys! See you soon.

28 Years Later

2008-05-18T00:43:00.000-07:00

Yep, he got older today. So, we let him win at croquet. Turns out he is a graceful winner. Go Marc!

Photo Shoot Highlights

2008-05-15T10:45:00.001-07:00

Our drummer Tom has really gotten into photography and did some great edits of our photo shoot from tuesday night. Here are some highlights. These along with other photos can be seen on our flickr page at:
www.flickr.com/photos/upstandingyouth

How many old school nintendo items can you see?

Old Forum

2008-05-14T17:34:00.000-07:00

http://www.upstandingyouth.com/talk/viewforum.php?f=1

I just found this link and had to post it. It's an old forum that we used to have on our official website. We closed it down because it got invaded by bots and we couldn't control it. The site still exists but we don't use it. There are awesome topis like "this band is queerbag"by Naloboyz where some kids were pissed that we were hired to play their high school party or "Guinea pig blog" about when I got paid to let people test drugs on me for 10 days. Silly memories. It's like I found some old buried treasure.

Shananigins and Preperation

2008-05-14T16:03:00.000-07:00

So in preperation for the new album we had a photo shoot of the band. We called up our good friend Marina Miller who most of the band went to high school with at Kahuku High. She's really gotten good over the last few years and we love working with her. She's done a lot of our photo shoots in the past and she knows what we're all about. This shoot went pretty well. Here's a sample of the shananigins we got into.

We found a couch on the side of the road and then turned a front yard into a front room. Demitri some how was able to jump stright up and get some serious air! Hopefully we can use these photos to overhaul all our myspace, blog, website, etc in preperation for the new record. We had another meeting last night to discuss timeframes and when and how we plan on finishing the record and we're shooting to have all the songs recorded by mid-late July. We have so much to do in order to get things done!

A big part of our time, at least for the rhythm section, is now being focused on helping our friend Jake Kongaika aka Cubworld. He's coming to town to do a show and asked us to fill in as his back up band and also to have UY open the show. We're stoked to help out and be a part of his show. Jake has had some real success as being one of the first people to make it on the famous website sellaband.com where he got people to invest $50,000 in him in order for him to do a record. Since then he's been traveling a bit to do shows in Europe in support of his record. It's amazing the new opportunities that the internet has provided for music.

Aside from all the preperations for the record I'm just super stoked to have UY in "go" mode. We've lined up a ton of shows already for this summer and are working on a few trips to Maui. Hopefully our Maui trip satisfies this blogs major fan from Makawao! Much love to the Makawao support that we've noticed on our daily blog map. We've been stagnant for a few months now and to finally feel some serious fuel being set to the fire of UY makes me stoked to get working on things. Many things are falling into place to make this happen. Aaron is back from the mainland, most of us are done with school for the summer, no one is going to the mainland for the summer, my wife is going to visit her family for three weeks for her brothers graduation so I'll have tons of time to work in the studio...somehow the planets are aligning for UY so we can put this record together right. Instead of slapping it all together really quick we'll be able to put some serious time into making a great piece of art instead of just a product. Can't wait to show it to you.

-marc

Videos

2008-05-13T00:54:00.000-07:00

A slew of UY related videos found on YouTube.

An outhouse built for two.

2008-05-09T22:46:00.000-07:00

Marc has been putting some serious peer pressure on members of this band to add to the UY blog so I thought I'd try my hand at it. First off, if you are reading this I would like to congratulate you for finding your way here (not to mention staying long enough to read these ramblings).

I am looking forward to seeing this album come together. We have been having fun writing new music and demoing out the songs. This time around the process seems to be really collaborative. You should expect something different, but not so different you won't recognize it as being UY. Aaron said he already has some design ideas for the cover art. I'm stoked to see what he comes up with.

Speaking of music... I recently watched a documentary on the Flaming Lips called "Fearless Freaks" which really inspired me. I hope to live my life with at least half the passion of Wayne Coyne. He may be eccentric and sometimes silly, but I don't think you can doubt his genius. Another amazing film is "I am Trying to Break Your Heart" which is a documentary about the making of Wilco's epic record Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. I would highly recommend this film as well as the album. After seeing the movie I purchased the album which was on constant rotation in my car and at home for about a month. I'm still not sick of it, and the reason is that 1) the songs are good to begin with and 2) the production is layered in such a way as to be rewarding each time you listen to it. After digesting YHF we have been listening to A Ghost is Born which is sort of the "follow up" record to Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Both albums are amazing.

Lastly, the picture at the top of the post makes me laugh. You know the person who designed the outhouse was thinking something along the lines of "I know, we'll save time by having people use the bathroom in twos!" Sometimes the best result doesn't come from streamlining the process, but don't take my word for it (insert Reading Rainbow sound here).
:)

Reunion and Goal Setting

2008-05-09T10:32:00.000-07:00

Last night was the first time all six of UY's band members were together in about a year. Aaron (trumpet and backing vox) has been in Provo working on his masters degree in Art for the past year. We've really not been the same without him and have tried our best to keep playing shows with him gone, but it just hasn't been the same. Practice last night made that very clear. The additional horn and vocal harmony just adds so much to our live sound. Without it we're just like any other normal group. Each person is necessary and vital to create the vibe that always makes UY the great band that it is. Each person brings their own energy that they give off and each person plays off the bands energy differently. It was awesome to see the horns have some new life pumped into them last night. We haven't had a practice like this in over a year.

We were able to finally discuss some important issues last night like, are we going to go on another mainland tour, are we going to be able to finish this record we're working on, and if we don't do these things then what are we going to do. For me personally, the fact that I had a really important job interview this week helped me make a lot of decisions. Hopefully I'm going to be able to stay in Hawaii for awhile with a great job and keep playing music. I have one more semester to go and I'll finish my masters degree from UH in political science and this new job will keep me and my growing family alive. So that means for the first time in about 3 years Upstanding Youth will be in Hawaii for a whole summer! Usually someone is gone to the mainland (usually me trying to make a dollar and getting screwed trying to do so) and UY can't play shows. Our goals are now to finish a new record before August and try to play shows as often as possible whether they're paid or not. We've limited ourselves to paid gigs only trying to pay for a new record and tour this summer, but that has only hurt us in a few ways. We need to play more shows and inject ourselves into the scene again since we kind of feel like we've become detached. I suggested we shoot for shows every weekend, but that was ambitious - I know. We also decided that touring the mainland isn't going to be possible for a number of reasons. Instead, we're going to try and hit the outter islands like Maui and the Big Island as many times as we can during the summer.

So that was the big first time practice/meeting for the summer. Things should start picking up for UY and have some great results. With everyone on the island and a new record just waiting to be done I'm super excited to see what kind of things we throw down and are able to present to the world. We have some amazing songs already written and recorded and we're just waiting to show them to our fans. I can't wait to see what we come up with in the next few months.

Self Baptism

2008-05-08T13:43:00.000-07:00

It's time to shove Upstanding Youth out into the world - again. I think as a band we've had over 100,001 ideas on how we can get more exposure or bring our music to more people. This is idea number 100,001. The goal of this blog is to provide a space where the band can be real and let you see into our real lives. Lives that have real dreams, hopes, frustrations, success, and failures. So often with band websites and promotional tools we have to make ourselves look bigger, badder, more hardcore (or less depending on who you're talking to), or just like something that is a little bit of an exaggeration in order to get attention. There are hundreds of bands out there and it is virtually impossible to be heard above the bad ones and even harder to be stand out from the good ones. Blogs are like reading someones journal or a letter they wrote to an intimate friend and can be a new way of connecting to our existing network of friends and fans and hopefully gain more. Hopefully we can write things about ourselves that people would find interesting but more likely they'll be mundane boring things sprinkled with interesting moments. More importantly this can be another tool to unify a group of people who share a love for music. The band as a whole can provide stories around this little blog-like-campfire so everyone can listen, laugh, cry, and smile about all the things that make the band that I have dedicated most of my life to so great.
-marc