Able Baker Fox

Thursday a.m. We start rolling out of floor around 9 and decide to hit up some coffee at the Grind, and get to the practice space. After the days practice we’re all starting to feel like we might not embarrass ourselves at the first show tonight at the Beat Kitchen. Maybe we will though.

We started loading up the Element when we realized we had a lot of amps and merch…and not enough room for people. My skinny ass sat on a cupholder to the gig. Jeff and Ben took the bus. They took a bus. To our first show. Classic.

The LP’s showed up in all their colored vinyl glory. They really are beautiful. Big props to Dan for the investment, and big props to Ben for putting his artistic touch all over the record.

It started snowing and didn’t stop for a long time, 11 inches of it. It hurt the turnout at the show a bit, but we kind of cared less about that than the actual performance this night. The songs still aren’t being played natural, but we avoided any major song fall outs and managed to look like we knew what we were doing (didn’t we?). This is also the day that the common cold caught up with my and my voice was all but gone. Figures, right? Good thing we have Friday off to rest and practice up some more.

- Nathan

I don’t know how, or why, we do our January in Chicago. I think Florida, or Texas would be better suited for a winter vacation. But regardless of the weather, we have a good time. Jeff and I flew into Midway on Wednesday the 30th of January. My pilot said “Welcome to Chicago. Its negative 16 degree’s.” Fuck him. He was right!

After catching up with Jeff in the terminal we hopped a train into the city. Hooking up with our friend Mark we waited around for Mike and Trav to pull into town so we could get some grub at Hot Dougs. Char dogs. Bellies full, we decided it was time to meet up with Ben at the practice space.

We’ve got two shows to play this week (Thursday, and Saturday nights), and we’ve never even played and sang these songs at the same time. One year ago from now we spent 3 days writing 11 songs sans vocals, and lyrics, and then mid year 2007 we spent 3.5 days together recording the record. Its about time to figure out if we know how to do this or not.

After setting up the practice space and turning on the mics we battled our way through the set. Rough. Very rough. I was starting to think I should have practiced these songs at home on my own time. The second and third time through the progress had me in better spirits. We decide to call it a night and hit up some Mexican food at Garcia’s. Beers were had. After that back to Ben and Anne’s place for some shut eye.

- Nathan

Alright, the big week is here. To celebrate the official release of “Voices” (1/29/08) and our first shows, you can now stream the entire record here:

www.ablebakerfox.com/voices

See you in Chicago.

One of the first questions that we heard when we announced the CD release date of “Voices” was “what about the vinyl?”. Well, we’re proud to say that it’s being pressed as you read this and we’ll have a limited color (translucent yellow) at our shows on January 31 and February 2 in Chicago. Here’s the breakdown of the first pressing:

• 100 translucent yellow
• 275 black/yellow
• 275 blue/orange

Second Nature is also offering a limited edition slipmat if you pre-order the LP before January 20. Go here for more information on that.

CD’s are shipping now if you order them from here.

Thanks again to everyone for listening. We’re excited to finally get a chance to play these songs live. Hope to see you all there.