American Pancake: MAIL BAG - Keeping My Head Above Water (Barely) - Valet - The Rubs - Connecting Stars

If there is one thing that we can count on is time marching on. Somehow almost a year has gone by since I moved to Georgia (from California) and while I vowed to grow this blog I must admit it has been tough to do so. I have been working harder than ever at my day job. I have had to put in more hours in a day / week / month than I can have imagined and never seem to get caught up. The result has been less time for the blog.

Still, I want to be in grow mode and have also posted up track reviews and me babbling about other things on the Youtube channel which I truly hope you check out. I am hoping to do this on a more regular basis. I know nothing worth anything comes overnight so it will be a slow but steady process. I thought this morning I would do some brief mentions of some things that have popped up in my email recently.

There is a band out of Minneapolis, Minnesota named "Valet" who have recently got back together after a ten year absence. Apparently, they naturally kind of stopped the band thing as life happened. Some of them (or maybe all) got married, had babies (11 of them), things like that and music took a back seat. I can relate to this story and the pull that making music can have on you. A quick listen and they sound pretty good, poetic stories in their songs that makes me want to hear more. By the way, to all you bands and publicists out there who email me each and every day. That is all I am really looking for.... something that catches my ear via my heart. Hey we are all looking for that. So I will be looking, checking out these guys. Below is one song that intrigued me:

Another band that kind of caught my ear recently is out of Chicago named "The Rubs" who are in the punk /garage vein in that Ramones / Iggy Pop-ish sort of way and not only because one of the guys goes by the moniker Joey Rubbish. Liking the low fi sound and loving the attitude. I also am feeling pulled in because of the lead singer's voice. I will be posting up more about them in the future (I'm sure).

180 big degrees from "The Rubs" are a husband and wife duo from South Africa named "Connecting Stars". Not the kind of music I tend to feature. Just too sweet for my bittersweet taste I guess (inject sad self deprecating laugh) but Martin and Cheryl Engel are currently touring in an RV with their two kids spreading their songs to those who are not so jaded as I. What a wonderful thing to do. Material off their self titled 2014 release has been charting on BillBoard (no small feat). I do wish them the best of luck.





Well boys and girls it is time to head off to work. Whatever you do today, do it to the fullest as time does march on. Take care sweet people

- Robb