We’re Going to Philly to Hear a Song About a Missing Leg.

Well, we’re also going to Philly 
to play a concert. 

Let us explain:

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Last November, we left the Northeast Regional Folk Alliance Conference in Stamford, CT with 15 new CDs in our car. For the past 3 days, we’d been running through a Stamford hotel at ungodly hours of the late night & early morning, meeting new friends, hearing great songs, and exchanging albums with musicians with whom we fell in love.

(Yeah, folk conferences are actually NUTS, you guys).

In an effort to stay awake on our 2 hour drive home (after getting no sleep for 3 days), we decided to pop some of the albums we’d picked up into the CD player. The first one in was “Words, Words, Words” by Sam Steffen.

We never put on a second album.

The first song was so familiar, I looked at Eric and said, “Have we seen him play before?” he replied sleepily, “Well, we saw him play at 2am Saturday.” I laughed. I didn’t remember that, honestly, but I just felt like I knew Sam after hearing one song.

Maybe it’s because he sounds so much like Dylan.
Maybe it’s because he kinda writes like Dylan, too.
Long verses, each with some surprising hook right at the end.
Like the punchline to a perfectly set-up joke.

He starts complaining in the first song…

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Rooster’s in the henhouse with his feather’s all mussed 
the hay-barn is burning and the milk’s gone sour 
It’s harvesting time, but the whole crop’s a bust 
And that’s the third thunderstrike I’ve heard in the past half-hour 
Been up for three days in a drippin cold-sweat 
I called for a doctor and they sent me a vet 
I’m losing my livelihood along with a bet 
and I ain’t even had my coffee yet. 
– Sam Steffen “I Aint Even Had My Coffee Yet” [listen]

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Four more unapologetically long verses with that same punchline at the end, and I was cracking up. I was also thinking, “Damn, I wish I could write a song that good.”

Some folks just… have it, you know?

And then the second song came on.

A sweet guitar line and lilting melody sings,

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The way that an amputee misses his limb 
After the doctor has sawn it from him 
Leaving him only the scar of his skin 
With which he must try to adapt …

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“Wait, what? Where the heck is he going with this…” I wondered.

I also was completely hooked.

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… Or the way that a jury can believe what it wants
having just received all of the facts.
I miss you. Honey, I miss you — like that.
– Sam Steffen, “Like That” [listen here]

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You know when a song just shoots you right through the heart?

Sam Steffen has something so natural that all of us songwriters work hard for:

A way to say something,
So cleverly,
So eloquently,
That it just works.

When we were invited to come back to Philly to play a show at The Living Room at 35 East, we asked Sam, a Philadelphia local, if he’d do us the great honor of joining us.

and he said, Yeah! 

And so we’re so happy to be returning to Philly next weekend to play a concert with Sam Steffen. We really can’t wait to play in such an intimate listening room and we’re equally looking forward to hearing some more of Sam’s amazing songs.

It should be a really special night.

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Join us,
with Sam Steffen:

Fri. April 12th
7pm doors / 8pm music
The Living Room at 35 East
Ardmore, PA
$20 tickets: get them here

I’m Not Sorry for My Art

Musicians & artists of all mediums are constantly inundated with criticism. That’s the nature of the beast. You put your work out there for the world to judge, and sometimes you like the feedback you get… and sometimes you don’t. Sometimes it’s constructive, and other times it’s just outright mean. I can handle mean. Someone being mean about your art is someone who is being mean to themselves about — who knows what. That’s easy to brush off. I can handle constructive, too. If someone who has earned my trust has a helpful comment to help me improve in my life & in my art, I’ll take that. I appreciate that. The kind of criticism I can’t handle is an unsolicited word of advice about what kind of artist I *should* be.

It happens all the time.

“You should write happier songs.”

I smile and basically apologize. “You’re right. I’ll try.” I’m sorry for my art and what it made you feel.

But wait. Am I really sorry for that? Isn’t that exactly what I wanted when I was writing that song? Wasn’t I feeling really emotional when I wrote “Mary-Ann”, a memorial for a beautiful woman who had just passed away? Wasn’t I feeling really angry when I wrote “God Knows I’ve Tried”, or reflective when I wrote “Lullaby”?

Well, yeah. That’s always why I’ve written songs. Because I’m feeling way too much stuff to bury, and need to express it somehow. Music has been my language for the really sad, the really angry the emotional moments that need release.

And why did I get into music in the first place? Because I was listening to acoustic emo music in 2006, and it helped me cry my way through puberty. And because I heard an amazing song by Katie Herzig when my Grandad died in 2008, and it helped me grieve. Because there were break-up songs that I needed when my first boyfriend dumped me. Because music helped me move through my emotions and helped me get back on my feet. Every time something hard happened to me, I would look for a song to hold my hand through it.

And that’s what I want to do when I write music. I know that my sadness and anger and emotion will bleed into this piece of work and hold someone else’s hand through it. I know that, even though it sounds like a sad song, it will give people hope. It will make people feel less alone. Just like it made me feel less alone in the times I really needed it.

So am I really sorry? Am I really worried about making sure folks are experiencing the right amount of happy when they listen to my albums? I’m not. Because you know what I’m learning? I’m not here to make everyone happy. I’m here to make art.

Maybe it’s important that I’m writing this today on International Women’s Day. We women are taught to be quite sorry, aren’t we? I’ve been in gaslighting relationships, manipulated into thinking I had to be something perfect for someone else. I’ve been sorry for being myself, for being too much, for being too little, for being too loud, too quiet, too funny, too intense. I got broken up with once for being “too sad”. And every time I was called “too much” of something, I would try to manipulate and squish myself into being the perfect *whatever* for *whoever*. The contortion act of being the perfect *something* for *everyone* isn’t just difficult – it’s totally impossible.

And so I’m all done. I’m calling it quits.

Isn’t it the divine calling of the artist to be too much of everything we humans are? To take that “too much”ness and channel it into art. Isn’t it a blessing there are those in our midst who are brave enough to tread into the intensity of life? Was Picasso too intense? Was Van Gogh too sad? What about Frida Kahlo? Probably. (And let’s never ignore that many great artists could’ve benefitted from professional help for their mental illnesses.) However, the art they created from the intense volume at which they experienced life gave us some of history’s greatest work. Beyonce’s Lemonade is one of the best albums of this decade and, while it may have some fun upper songs & a few “downers” – it’s never apologetic. Beyonce ain’t sorry and neither shall I be.

Many of us are afraid of creating because we are afraid of who will be happy with our art. We sit down to write a song and we throw it out because it’s too sad. Or it’s too fun. Too cheesy. Too happy. Maybe too angry. Maybe too honest.

Beethoven was a pretty depressive & angry guy, and that didn’t stop him from creating. I’m sure plenty of people didn’t like the intensity of his music, but plenty of people did and nobody really remembers the haters now, do they?

The world needs your honesty, your sadness, your intense emotion. Too many of us go through our lives burying all of the feelings we have about being human, avoiding the quietness and the sadness that is a natural consequence of just living here on this earth. We all experience grief. We all experience joy. Let’s talk about it, and let’s make art about it.

My prayer for you all reading this is that you will find the freedom in your art that I’ve found lately. The unapologetic *too much*ness that is so very beautiful about you.

Bad News, Good News, Old News, New News.

Good morning fellow Americans, up to your necks in news! Beer me strength, I have already gotten lost in a few Facebook news articles today. Snopes-ing, fact-checking and comment-arguing. Why? Why do we do it to ourselves? The information overload is so overwhelming some days.

Well, today, you get to read some normal, nice, news about a pretty innocent little folk duo, who happens to be husband & wife.

We’ve had a lot of stuff happening and with all of those Facebook articles buzzing past all of our faces, we figured we’d offer you a good ole fashioned Newsletter to let you know what’s been happening in our lives.

Here’s what’s been up in TPIH-world.

As they say, it’s always best to start here.

With…

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The Bad News

Moving into 2019, we were feeling optimistic and great. Who doesn’t love January 1st, with its aroma of high-achieving Resolutions and fresh start-i-ness. *We’re gonna get off those phones!* *Let’s detox!* *I WILL journal every day!*

The second week of January came and went and, of course, many horses were fallen off of. Oh, well. We were looking forward to a quick jaunt of shows in Long Island & Connecticut. Well, without sparing you every detail, the shows were cancelled at the last second. We were mega bummed, to say the least. We spent the weekend on the couch eating vegan junk food (yuh-huh, there IS such a thing) and wallowing.

We pulled ourselves out of our self-pity by Friday and played an amazing show. (We’ll tell you about that in a second; a great show obviously doesn’t belong in “The Bad News” category.) Saturday, we went over to our friends’ house! It was totally lovely – we played BEATLES ROCK BAND, you guys! We got to their house at 7pm and there were rumors (OK, there were apocalyptic news warnings all week) that the snow would start soon. Like good New Englanders, we ignored the panic and continued our super successful Beatles tour. At midnight, we went outside to find a foot of snow where our car had once been and a grumpy fellow bulldozing said snow who told us our car had been towed. $145 later and a very dangerous 1-mile trip through the iciest streets we’d seen in a while, we were home in bed by 1:30am.

Lesson learned. Don’t underestimate a good ole Nor’easter, no matter how many you’ve survived.

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The Good News

The day before the Great Jetta Mishap of 2019, we played a truly amazing show. 50 of our dearest friends, fans & family-members came out to celebrate a great night of music here in our hometown of Worcester. It was really delightful.

At the show, we debuted our brand new music video for “Lullaby”. It was really special to share the video with our Worcester peeps, because it was filmed right down the street from where we stood that night. BirchTree Bread Company has been dear friends & colleagues for the past 4 years and they let us shoot a live video in their cafe way after hours. It was cool to be able to show the video to a room full of people who could all probably say, “Hey, I’ve been there!”

Then, we premiered the video online a few days later. The reception was amazing and it had over 2800 views on Facebook in just a couple of days. Wanna watch it? Here it is.

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The Old News

We’re calling this “Old News”, not because we love it less, but because you probably already know some of this. BUT if you’ve missed it (or just REALLY wanted to hear it again), there have been two really fun ongoing things happening lately:

• We’ve been sharing free tracks off of our Instrumental album for the past few weeks, and we will continue sharing new tracks every Friday until March. If you haven’t signed up yet – what the heck are you waiting for!?

• Another awesome piece of news: We’re going on tour very soon! We’re heading south in February (probably a good thing, since Nor’easters don’t seem to like us very much) and are psyched to be playing a lot of really fun shows. Here’s where we’ll be:

If you live in any of these areas, come out! If you have friends in any of these areas, share this info with them – we’d love to meet them. Info for shows can be found here.

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The New News

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Last but not least, our Instrumental track, River, got picked up by a really cool Spotify playlist and got… um… over 18,000 streams. In a couple days. That’s crazy-pants. We’re viral, y’all!! Here’s that playlist, called “Sweater Weather Instrumentals”.

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So, there it all is, friends! We hope this was a nice respite from your regularly scheduled programming of life.

We also sincerely hope you’re having a wonderful winter and that we see you sooner rather than later.

Lots of love,
A + E

5 Ways to Beat the Holiday Madness This Year

Okay, it’s the end of the November and we’re all already very stressed.

I can see it in your faces. You’ve already spent $800 on Amazon on #CyberMonth, sorry, Monday. The tree is too sappy. Your mother-in-law won’t stop calling. 

Everyone take a deep breath. We’re gonna get through this together.

Here are some ways you can have a healthier & less maddening holiday season this year.

1. Set Boundaries.

We’re all about boundaries here at TPIH HQ. Lately, we’ve felt like they’re the key to a happy life. They’ll definitely make this holiday season more enjoyable. Here are some examples of boundaries you can set this holiday season:

– “I can’t spend $30 on that Secret Santa gift. My budget is tight. Can we do $15?”
– “Sure, I’d love to do some holiday shopping, but I can only go for an hour and I can only spend $100.”
– “I know I’m gonna have a lot of emails go unanswered, but I’m on vacation for those 3 days, so I’m gonna set an Away Message and not look at my Inbox.”
– “You know, Mom, I’m trying to get some work done right now and really can’t talk on the phone for an hour about what Aunt Suzy said on Thanksgiving.”

Setting boundaries for yourself will ensure you get what you need during this stressful season. Sometimes you need to set money boundaries, or personal boundaries, or – my personal favorite – time boundaries. Which brings us to our favorite life-hack for good, healthy boundary-setting:

2. Schedule your life, as much you possibly can.

We schedule every waking breath in our Google Calendars. Our work as a band & our work-life balance have seriously suffered in times when we didn’t have a good scheduling practice. We’ve accidentally booked gigs during our family vacations. We’ve missed birthday parties. We’ve had to cancel shows. We’ve even forgot our wedding anniversary once! Being bad with time management isn’t only un-productive, but it messes with our personal lives & stresses us out. 

Be intentional with your calendar this holiday season. If you think that office party will last FOREVER and you really don’t want to be there all night, put 5-9pm on the calendar and be intentional about leaving at 9! If you have to get some work done before you leave for vacation, schedule a day of undisturbed, super-focused work time. If you know your house will be a total disaster after your kids open their presents, schedule yourself an hour to clean. Then you don’t have to think about it. If you’re exhausted from the holidays, schedule yourself 2 days of DOING NOTHING. Schedule time with your spouse, alone-time with the kids, even put “Breakfast By Myself” on your Google Calendar.

And then respect that time. And don’t let anyone mess with it!

3. Do something fun, for goodness’ sake.

The holidays aren’t supposed to be all stress & sorrow, you know. They can actually somewhat joyful.

There are SO MANY fun things to do this time of year. Tree lightings, special concerts (Handel’s Messiah), plays (The Nutcracker, The Grinch), classic holiday movies on Netflix, driving around looking at the lights on peoples’ houses! It’s all a little cliche, but engaging in the holiday magic is actually really fun. And it only happens once a year, so why not embrace it!

TIP: Check Groupon for sleigh rides, plays and getaways. They always have good deals on fun activities this time of year. 

4. Listen to music!

Okay, fine, we’re obviously partial to this one. We don’t feel like Googling, “Does music relieve stress?” but we’re pretty sure it’s scientifically proven. (You do the research and you let us know in the comments if we’re right).

In our own lives, music has been super helpful for relaxation. It’s also a great way to get into the holiday spirit. Throw on the Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack and you’re immediately feeling all the warm December fuzzies. Listen to this Winter Playlist we made on Spotify while you decorate your tree. Our new album, Every Seed Must Die, will really calm you down when you’re on those long drives from Grandma’s.

5. Buy less crap.

Sure, we just made a pretty shameless plug for you to go buy our music. (We’ve gotta eat, you know?) But, in all honesty, we try to keep our life as non-consumeristic as humanely possible. We find it keeps the stress at bay.

We did do a little Black Friday shopping, not gonna lie. In our defense, our mattress was 12 years old, so 20% off that “mattress in a box” from Amazon was a bit of a necessity.

Every year, though, we try to keep our gift-buying to a minimum. We’ll try to get one great gift for each important person in our life, and we try to set a reasonable budget for each gift. Honestly, Grandma’s gonna love that $25 Gift Card to Appleby’s and we all know it. A night out at her favorite spot, and the bill will be mostly covered! No reason to go crazy on jewelry for every single person you love.

Books are always great. They’re definitely better than giving your niece a loud, plastic toy that will wake up your sister at 3am and haunt everyones’ nightmares.

TIP: Instead of stuff, buy EXPERIENCES! (Again, Groupon is a great place to get ideas).

Concert tickets for your parents say, “Thanks for everything you do for me. Let’s spend some really great high-quality time together.”
A museum pass for the kiddos in your life,
A movie pass for your friend,
A trip with your spouse, promising them some uninterrupted time, will mean the world to both of you.

The stress will be over before you know it & soon it’ll be February and we’ll be trapped in 3 feet of snow, wishing we could go back to December. Try to do as well as you can to enjoy this part of your year. Reflect on all the good the year brought you, grieve any losses you experienced, and get ready to look ahead to a fresh beginning. Set good boundaries for yourself, do things that make you happy & let your heart be light this holiday season.

Tell us in the comments below how you plan to beat the holiday madness this year!

Winterize Me!: 6 Ways to Survive (& enjoy!?) This Winter

Here it comes. I’m #sorrynotsorry for the complaining you’re about to hear. 

It’s November, and we’re not digging it. We just set our clocks back an hour & are now getting minimal hours of daylight. The weather in Massachusetts is growing drastically colder. (To the point that yesterday’s 55 degrees felt like SUMMER). Seasonal depression is hitting hard and fatigue sneaks up on us a little more each day.

Classic New England, griping, amiright?

Yes, we New Englanders are famous for having terrible attitudes about the winter. All you hear in line at Dunkin’s is, “Nasty out there, huh?” From November ’til April. 

As if it’s our first year experiencing cold and dreariness. 

We pride ourselves on surviving these long winters with a heavy dose of complaining & misery. But we could learn a thing or two from our Scandanavian brothers & sisters. They’ve found a way to survive longer & darker winters than we do… AND have better attitudes about it.

Will you take the “Hygge Challenge” too? Here are some things we’re going to try & maybe you can, too.

1. Enjoy the holidays for as long as we want.

I *totally* used to be one of those people that was like, “No Christmas music until Thanksgiving and oh my gosh, I can’t believe you’re putting up your tree before December 1st.” AKA: A stinkin’ Scrooge.

But I’m noticing that, for me, the Christmas season is the most fun part of the winter. Listening to Christmas music, having a gorgeous green tree in the living room, covered in colorful ornaments & lights, cozying up to a great old movie. It’s really all so uplifting and fun. So, whatever. I’ll get my tree whenever I want & savor the holidays this year. 

2. Get outside more.

There’s a Norwegian saying that goes, “There’s no such thing as the wrong weather, there’s only the wrong clothing.” 

One of our favorite pastimes in the winter is going out for a walk in a blizzard. (Which we get a lot of here in Central Mass). We bundle up like crazy and walk the quiet dusted streets at night. It’s so romantic, and, surprisingly, once you get a good little clip going — it’s not really that cold. Especially if you’re layered. 

Most New Englanders suffer from Vitamin D deficiency, thanks to these miserable winters. But Vitamin D is still widely available in the winter. All it takes is 15 minutes outside to re-up. So, bundle up & take a quick stroll. I promise it’ll make you feel better! 

And for those of you more adventurous than me – maybe take up a winter sport! Snowboarding, skiing, snowshoeing and ice-skating are all awesome ways to keep active and enjoy the cold months.

3. Take some time off.

Anyone else get so exhausted this time of year? Whenever we’re really tired, we say to each other, “Don’t you think our ancestors probably did very little labor in the colder part of the year?” Who knows if that’s true, but there’s undoubtedly a pull on our bodies to rest more in the colder months. The week in between Christmas & New Years is usually off for a lot of kids. Maybe you can take a vacation that week and get some rest? If not, try to look for a time where you can afford a 3-day-weekend away, or a random Tuesday off work just to relax.

4. Get into a book series.

Okay, it’s probably just because we’re incredibly introverted… but come on, isn’t winter the best time to start cozying up to a great book? Take a break from the screens & engage in some enriching art. A few years ago, I read the Harry Potter series throughout the winter. The Chronicles of Narnia are great! Heck, read Twilight if it’s fun for you!

5. Get some vinyl.

Thanks to hipsters, the vinyl record is back. And yes, you’ll hear us admit (along with all those hipsters), that it really is the *best* way to listen to music. Plus, tons of record stores are coming back into business lately. If you’re in Worcester, there’s a new one downtown that you should check out. A lot of small cities have record stores popping up, and it is so much fun to search through the stacks for an old classic. Or hey, you can grab our latest album on vinyl, too!

6. Speaking of music, how about a Playlist?

We made this awesome playlist on Spotify for all of your Hygge needs. It’s our favorite chill-out music that’s perfect for a romantic night in. 

And we’re sure there are thousands of other ways to experience a “Hygge”-ful season. We’re going to try out some of these ideas, but we’d love to hear from you. What are you going to do to make it a great winter? Tell us in the comments below!

how we make it work

Hi, good morning. We just woke up from a two-day nap.

We got out of the car from 36 hours of driving, and went right to sleep. Rubbing the sleepies out of our eyes now and we wanted to fill you in on what we’ve been up to!

This weekend, we drove to Indiana to be part of an event called Escape to the Lake. This event was a conference/retreat/festival put on by our good friends at UTR Media where we were able to share music and enjoy the company of people just like us.

People who make music about life.
People who try to bring that music to whomever they can, driving around the country with their guitars packed in little cars & vans.
People who aren’t writing songs that’ll hit the Billboard charts or Top 40 anytime soon.
People who are trying to figure out how to get their songs heard, in a world where Bhad Bhabie* and the yodeling Walmart kid* are getting 15 minutes of viral fame and Coachella sets.

*don’t worry, we just figured out who they are, too.

It was great to be with those people.
People like us.
People who love what they do more than anything, and are trying to make it work.

Trying to sell albums.
Trying to find audiences.
Trying to share this thing we feel we were given to share, with people who want to hear it.
Trying to eat & pay the rent in the meantime.

It’s a tricky business, but someone’s gotta do it.

We talked about wanting to quit some days.
Okay, fine. More than half of the days.
(Just trying to be honest here!)

We talked about the dying CD industry.
The bad reviews.
The way a lot of people don’t understand what we do.
The ways we’ve been ripped off by record labels or promoters.
The list of discouragements go on and on.

And then we sat together and played songs for one another.
And we were moved to tears.

Because something happens when you hear a song.
Your heart is touched by another heart.

Someone you’ve never even met is suddenly speaking a secret language that you never knew anyone else understood until that moment. They sing a song about their divorce and your heart whispers, “Oh my gosh, I didn’t know anyone else knew what that felt like.” Or they tell a story about Africa, a place you’ve never been, and suddenly you can see the whole landscape.

Music lets us communicate in a way that is beyond all understanding.
It transmits peace, and joy, and empathy, in a way sometimes words can’t do.
What a feeling.

That feeling?
That’s why we do it.

So, we make it work.

We drive 2,000 miles,
and sleep on air mattresses,
and sell our houses,
and homeschool our kids,
and live off of Chipotle,
and sell T-shirts,
And CDs in an industry where music is free,
And crowdfund,
And send emails until 2am,
And play to empty rooms for less money than is reasonable.

Why? Because we love that feeling.
The feeling that there is so much joy in music.
That it cuts into the human experience so deeply and profoundly.
That it lets us connect.
We love it so much,
that we just can’t quit.

Know where is the best place to find that feeling?

Living rooms.

It makes sense, doesn’t it? The living room is where we connect, right? Maybe we’re in front of the TV, maybe we’re having a fight, maybe we are enjoying a meal with friends. Connecting. The heart of the home. The living room is where all of the magic happens. (Despite what MTV Cribs always said about the bedroom).

Most musicians will tell you that the best venue is the living room.

Because that’s what musicians are all about:
Living.

And that’s what people who LOVE MUSIC are all about:
Living.

House shows are popping up all over the country, and for good reason.

They allow musicians to connect with fans in the most intimate setting.
They allow music-lovers to support musicians directly, by giving them an amazing venue with active listeners.
They allow friends to invite friends into their living rooms and enjoy a little bit of real, down-to-earth, connective living together.

In a place in time where we all seem quite disconnected, this sounds like a great solution, right?

It absolutely is.

If you’ve never considered hosting a house show before, please think about whether or not this would be something you’d love to do.
If you have considered hosting a house show (or have hosted one before), thank you. On behalf of the whole music community, you are making a huge difference.

We put together a little FAQ about house shows here and we’d love for you to take a look. We would absolutely love to do some life with you & your community. To bring music and joy into your home and spend an evening really connecting. What do you think? Shoot us an email at hello@thepromiseishope.com if you have any thoughts; we’d love to hear from you.