We had a mighty fine time playing live in Bend, OR at River Rim Coffeehouse, a sweet little cafe on the south side of town.
Next up…waiting for a new baby! (and finishing Winteresque.) See you soon!
Join us this coming Friday, January 13th at the Green Plow Cafe in Redmond, OR. The Green Plow is quickly becoming one of our favorite venues to play music in Central Oregon, especially when paired with great bands like The Hollands!
We’ve never considered gigging at Renaissance Fairs, but since we got this sword at a white elephant exchange it seems a lot more feasible.
Here we are, finally in winter in Central Oregon…a fitting time to be finishing mixing and production on Winteresque, the new full length album from Finn Miles.
Thanks to all who have been on the journey with us the last few years; 2012 is looking up for Finn Miles!
A fine show from Dudley’s Coffee shop and bookstore! Notice in the pictures, no mic, no amps…just singing, stomping and playing. We had fun with a scavenger hunt during songs..find the author which inspired the song. A very chill time in a fantastic cafe in the heart of Bend, OR!
Join us for our next show in Redmond, OR at the Green Plow!
So, I thought we were ready to go to work on yet another album. That’s how things had worked between Branches and Telltale Heart, there hadn’t been much of a break. I had the songs…now hit it!
Kickstart Winteresque with us!
I even started a Kickstarter project in anticipation of starting the album. I was playing with a great six piece band, getting good gigs, doing radio interviews. Life was good.
It was good, but in some ways paper thin. The band was superb, but all part of other projects as well, and over a few months they mostly drifted into other backing bands. The Kickstarter didn’t really “kickstart.” It went splat. It turns out these crowd-sourcing tools work great if you have a crowd ready to give. I didn’t. Then…my brother got engaged. A happy event…but a death knell for Winteresque happening in 2010.
Fortunately I had plenty of shows lined up at coffee houses and small venues…and I could always go back to looping with the Boss RC-50 Loopstation. Still, I was ready to record…so I decided to take a step of audacity.
I would write and record an album of “new” material while waiting until we could work on Winteresque. Thus, the idea for the “Modern Saints EP” was born.
Read on to Part 3 or the Winteresque saga. (coming soon)
I originally planned on recording the Winteresque album over a year ago, but life got in the way.
After the release of the Telltale Heart EP (which was a fabulous success) I started writing a batch of new songs. When I write songs they usually come fast and furious, and before too long a theme emerges. This central thesis acts as a centrifugal force, pulling the album together, each song finding its own seat. This creates albums which are cohesive, but not caught up with all weight the concept album.
The central theme finally caught my eye in the corner of my writing journal; it was a simple Haiku I had previously written.
Autumn’s light will fail.
Long white sheets on a pale field.
Will we bloom again?
All of a sudden, the lens focused…Winteresque is a journey from autumn, through the dark of winter, and into the hope of spring. I started seeing elements of this journey in the other songs I’d write. Each song started informing the others on how they fit into the big idea; the puzzle pieces began falling into place. I wrote six songs and created acoustic demos to share with my brother, Scott Gratton who engineered and produced the previous Finn Miles EPs.
I felt like I was on track…but then something happened. (To be continued in Part 2)
As winter sets in across the high desert it’s fitting that our upcoming album “Winteresque” is in final stages of tracking and mixing. In a sense, the album, with the question “Will we bloom again?” fixed firmly in the title track, is a questions for the band Finn Miles. Will we bloom again?
After a move half-way across the country, losing a good chunk of our band in the process, we’re in the process of putting things back together. We’re just starting to get into the Central Oregon music scene with a handful of coffee house shows and open mics, relying heavily on the Boss RC-50 LoopStation to add the many layers that are trademark to the Finn Miles sound.
Will we bloom again? There will be some changes, including a complete website/social media/email list overhall, a new band, a new look, and new songs. Still, the core elements remain. Lush, beautiful soundscapes, intimate songwriting, earnest vocals…these things are in us, and cannot be separated.
If you’d like to watch the metamorphosis in action, keep an eye on www.finnmiles.com, as well as our Facebook page…we’ll be busy behind the scenes the next few months. Or join the email list…you’ll be one of the first to know about some of the exciting changes we have in store. Trust me.
Here’s a brand new little ditty, I just finished the second verse last week!
The song is based on Blaise Pascal, who was a fantastic math whiz, as well as thinker in the mid-1600s.
Another fun show at the Book and Bean in Prineville! We’ll be playing a “Black Friday” stint at the Book and Bean from 1 -3 pm on Friday, November 25th. Join us!
