my dear friend Sarah has two sons, the eldest of which is now a senior at my alma mater, FSU (this has no bearing to the story, i just like to plug my school spirit whenever i get the chance!) The neighborhood Sarah and her family grew up in was very cozy and friendly. it is precisely the type of neighborhood that is a-buzz with little play ghosts, clowns, and witches scurrying around on All Hallow’s Eve vying to see who can get the biggest and most impressive collection of goodies that will no doubt be consumed by morning. Sarah’s boys, when younger, were no exception. one year, i believe the boys were around 4 and 8, the eldest had learned a new Halloween song that he was very proud of. he would go through the house singing it every chance he could…”Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat! If you don’t, i don’t care, i’ll pull down your underwear!” well, while many parents in the south might put their kid in a corner for saying such a thing, Sarah, just laughed it off, because after all, he probably learned the song from their father. meanwhile, the younger one was in the peak of his “learning by example” phase and would mimmic the older brother any chance he would get. unfortunately, he would never get the song quite right but as they say, “strong and wrong is better than nothing at all”. well, Halloween night rolls around and the boys get all dressed up in their best pirate and mummy costumes ready for a night of certain surprises. to Sarah’s dismay, the first surprise of the night would come right off the bat. the very first house they stroll up too accompanied by mom and dad, was the sweet old lady next door who always was there with a smile and a wave. sarah’s impression of her was right out of Mrs. Manners. the doorbell rang, she opened the door and saw two of the cutest little sharp-dressed characters she had seen all night. to reward them for their preparations, she opened the screen door to divvy out little hershey’s miniatures to the two boys. as soon as she opened the screen door, the youngest yelled at the top of his lungs: “PULL DOWN YOUR UNDERWEAR!!!” needless to say, sarah kept a sharper ear out for what her husband was passing down to their youngest through their eldest from that point on.

speaking of “unexpected”, we have some news!!! you don’t have to be MAD at us for taking so long between releases anymore. we are HAPPY to announce our newest recording…

HAPPY MADNESS!!!

yes, i know its seems like its been a few days short of a millennium since we started recording this thing and you guys have been very patient, but we didn’t want to put some half-ass recording out there. we whole-heartedly thank you for waiting for us to finish this project right and we hope you enjoy it. as you will see from the calendar on our page, we are having a CD release party to celebrate at M-Bar in Hollywood on election eve right before the day we get to celebrate what this voter hopes will not be full of MORE suprises! *views expressed by this poster do not reflect the view of the entire sixthwave organization* so come on out and celebrate with us!! we promise we won’t ask you to “PULL DOWN YOUR UNDERWEAR!”"

-whipple

we have two more songs in the can towards the new release, though, so not all is bad.

more good news…we are gonna be finally doing another show with the boys in m-pact! and this one will make you wanna SLAP your momma! ok, actually if you did that it would not be good cuz, the show is ON mothers day. if you slapped her on that day you would probably not live to see the next. then again, if you slapped you mother on ANY day, you may want to consider hiring protection. where do these figures of speech come from anyway?? and why are they called “figures of speech”?

hmm. things to ponder as you wait for the next blog

gig info:

sunday, may 11
w/m-pact
The Jazz Bakery
3233 Helms Blvd.
Culver City, CA 90034
4 pm
tix: tba

we are officially part of the bloggin world now!!!  i know it seems kind of late in the game, but seeing as i was like 5 years older than everybody on my tee-ball little league team, i’m sort of used to it!  lots to tell in the world of sixth wave.  where to begin?   hmmm…

well, i guess the biggest news is to tell you we are hot smack in the middle of our latest recording project!   yes.  the one you’ve all been waiting for.  this will consist of…we’ll say considerably more than ten songs, many of which you have grown to love from our live show, plus a few you may not have heard yet.  as of now there is still merely a working title, because we want to see how the project comes along before we give her a name, but we have a few in mind already!

some the did NOT make the cut are… 

The Sound of One Hand Clapping
Jacques, the Monkey
This is Not a Sales Call
Safety!!
Chapter 11
and my personal fav… Is There A Coldstone Nearby? 

we currently have 5 songs “in the can”, which to you non-recording artists out there means, recorded or tracked.  and now that Easter is past and there is a slight lull in publishing work, we are jumping back into the studio april 1 to get cracking at the next round of tunes!  and that AIN’T no april fool joke!  i know i’ve been known to come up with an april fool joke or two in the past, but trust me when i say “now ain’t the time for such childishness”… and i JUST did!  we are very excited to work with Andy Waterman and Ethan Walter over at Umbrella Media where we are doing this thang at.  these guys are gonna amaze you at what they get out of us!  we are shooting for a release date sometime in the late spring/early summer, so check back on the blog and we’ll let ya know fo shizz!

outside of the studio, we’ve done a few trips here and there, one to northern california to elin’s old stomping ground, or after being there, i should call it, elin’s former royal throne!  we had a blast hanging out with her parents and seeing old pics of her back in the day.  then we did a big concert at her old high school auditorium.  very surreal.  we also went back up to canada and met a lot of new friends and got to spend some quality time with some old ones as we were the guest artists at a vocal jazz camp up in edmonton hosted by our good friend Scott Leithead director of the immensely talented Kokopelli Choir!  unfortunately, it was -40 degrees the day we left, so you have never seen sixthwave bundle up like we bundled up that weekend!  yikes!

individually, we’ve been doing all kinds of fun stuff… 

greg j. has been snow skiing…A LOT.  elin has been spending her time working her way up the world geo-caching charts to number 3!!  cindy got a new car after her’s caught fire in the Target parking lot!   eric is busy keeping secrets from everyone!  jen’s only remaining NICE kitty just passed away leaving us with Ella Bin Laden to deal with during rehearsals!  and last but not least, i just got my gas turned on in my apartment so i’ve been cooking like a mad man, however most things are close to unedible to anyone but me.

love, peace and easy-cheese  

~the whipple