Yes, it’s true. My favorite band of all time except for The Who (hey, I’m a child of My Generation, what can I say?) is alive and well and ambitious as hell. It’s not enough for them to rule Seattle, they want the whole world.
And why not? Who deserves it more than, erm, well…my little girl?
That’s right, Amber Shine, the female-fronter talked about in the image above, is indeed my daughter. No, I’m not mentioning this to explain why she rocks because that’s something her own beautiful self is about. I’m mentioning it so everyone will understand that when I say she rocks it’s because I know. Because her mother and I have heard every word and note of every song she and Yevtushenko have written/played/recorded.
And not only have I rocked out to the band’s work, I’ve watched and heard it grow, the band’s sound becoming emotionally deeper, its anthems (yes! they’ve got the rock anthem thing down!) more compelling, lyrics more meaningful.
And, hey, as a dad whose paid for a helluva lot of vocal lessons in the past, I’ve got to admit that I’m more than just a little pleased that in the course of all this growth my little girl-woman has been availing herself more and more of her 4-octave range. (Okay, I might be a little off there. Maybe it’s “only” 3. But it sounds like 4 to me.)
But I digress. My purpose here is to give y’all a shout out about Yevtushenko’s Kickstarter campaign. Their EP, Yevtushenko: Do has already become a smash, cementing their position as the acknowledged #1 indie rock band in Seattle, making their Kickstarter goal the raising of enough moolah (I love talking like Bruce Campbell) for them to record their own full-length album of all-new material.
Unlike some other recent Kickstarter campaigns begun by relatives of people in showbiz (like, say, this one where, as Ken Levine puts it, the “daughters of povertry stricken playwright David Mamet…need $32,000 to make a video of their [one] original song),” this campaign is for an eminently reasonable – oh, hell, it’s a damn bargain – amount of money: $1700.
What’ll the dough-re-mi be used for? Here’s how the collectively speaking Yevtushenko (the band) put it on their Kickstarter page:
Yevtushenko is an unsigned, d.i.y. indie rock band based in Seattle and our process is pretty simple: We open our eyes, tune our ears, look at ourselves and the world around us and then we rock.
Recording is pricey, production & promotions are costly and touring is the most expensive awesome that has ever hit a bank account. But with a little savvy and whole lot of rice’n beans we’ve figured out how to lower our overhead and yield the best of all products – ROCK’N’ROLL!
We were recently quoted $700.00 per day for professional studio time. For a full-length album we’re looking at a minimum of 5 days. That’s $3,500.00! (And that’s before all the hidden consumable costs kick-in like: drumsticks, new drum heads, guitar strings, picks, batteries, food, fuel, etc.) And of course there’s the issue of control. If we record in a professional studio, with in-house engineers, will our album sound the way we want it too? How much of us will sound like them?
We had an idea. WE’LL RECORD OURSELVES! For our first two EP’s we recorded, mixed and produced ourselves. We acoustically treated private residences, loaded-in our recording equipment and went to work. This is a longer, more involved recording process that requires the band to focus and challenges us acoustically, sonically and creatively. Instead of 5 days costing $3500, we budget $1700 for a month. We trade in-house engineers for our own passion and perfectionism. We trade the name and reputation of an associated professional studio for the unique warmth and love of a private residence (which absolutely translates into the recordings). We’ve done it twice now, once in Seattle and once in Los Angeles. And with your help we’ll do it again!
Love,
YEVTUSHENKO
And speaking of doing things professionally but inexpensively, here’s Yevtushenko’s Kickstarter video, which they put together for just a shade over $1.99, or to put it another way, for over $34,700 less than the video mentioned above – and Yevtushenko’s has 3 times as many songs as that intended video’s 1. It’s also visually very, very cool:
As I write this, Yevtushenko has $1,041 of their $1700 goal with 11 days left to go. That means that everyone reading this has the opportunity of a lifetime: To be in on the beginning of, yeah, here we go again, my favorite band.
Now that I’ve gotcha all pumped up, why not hie thyselves over to Yevtushenko’s Kickstarter page and show how, you know, cool ye be?
Oh, wait, three things before I forget:
- Yevtushenko is returning to L.A.’s Roxy (yes, that Roxy) July 6th and will be playing the main room. And if you’re there, not only are you guaranteed to hear some of the best rock ever, but if you say hello Amber will, at the very least, smile back. Plus, she and the guys will give you that autograph you secretly crave.
- Yes, the Brodys have contributed to Yevtushenko’s recording fund. We didn’t fund it all because Amber and her bandmates, Bazz and Jeremiah, are probably the most independent sons of bitches we’ve ever known. This project, like the music they play, is their dream and no one else’s, and being the ones who make it fly financially as well as creatively is what they’re all about.
- No, Amber is not munchman. I swear. She just talks like him.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Yevtushenko reached its goal 12 hours after this post was published. Way to go, gang!
