Preparing for Battle

I sat down last night, alone in my little workspace, preparing for what was to be about 4 hours worth of recording, arranging, and focusing on material the guys and I have been writing off and on in the gaps of life for about 5 months now. I had an overwhelming amount of stuff that needed to be organized, recorded, and arranged for the coming of Summer, whence Andy will be back in town, and the floodgates will officially be opened, and we’ll be immersed in writing, rehearsing, and performing, and I had know idea of how I was going to do it. The thought crossed my mind to just put it off – but no. I was determined, and I knew I needed to get it done before summer (which is only a couple of weeks away for Andy) was upon us, and I knew I wouldn’t have too many more opportunities before then. So I buckled down, prepared myself for battle, and spent the next four hours racking my brain, hooked up to a computer, taking notes, and putting all of my ideas into an organized, recorded format, totalling about 14 new songs for us to work on this summer! It felt great to get it done, but without relishing it too long, I quickly found my bed and passed out.

NOW, with all of this cool new stuff we’ve been writing, again totalling about 14 new song ideas so far, we’ve also got some other huge plans for this summer, besides just finishing an entire album’s worth of songs! The first of these big plans is of couse gonna be to PLAY MORE SHOWS. We started off the year as we hoped by playing about a show per month, but it’s now been a while (due to having a complete lack of time in April), and we’re all ITCHING to get back on stage. So, our promise to you is that we WILL be playing absolutely as much as we possibly can this summer, especially starting late June through August! Our goal is to play once a week during that time, and use that to really generate some much needed momentum for our next album, and the next stage for our little band.

The next big thing we’re planning for besides writing songs, and playing shows, is to get better in touch with our true fanbase. Let me explain: Basically, I think we’re doing (and have done since starting this journey about a year ago) a pretty decent job of reaching out and communicating with our friends and fans via Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, and the like of social networking, but there is no doubt that we could, can, and need to step it up, and do a better job at actually reaching people in a meaningful way. This blog, for example, I think is doing a great job of keeping those interested informed of everything we’re doing and what we’re thinking, and what we like, don’t like, smell like, etc, etc, etc, but the key phrase there is “those interested.” Those interested enough to find out about this blog and actually read it, are already doing their part, and we can’t thank you enough, those of you who actually are! WE, however, need to do a better job of connecting to people, and I think the best way for us to do this is by employing our mailing list, for our true friends and fans to sign up, and stay in the know. SO, after that long digression, the point here is that besides everything else this summer, our number 1 goal is to grow our fanbase and our mailing list, and use it to really keep in touch with our fans! This is something we’re committed to, and we’re really looking forward to doing that this summer.

AND, finally, what we also really hope to do this summer, is break through. We want to play a lot of shows, yes. And we want to write a lot of songs, yes. And we want to strengthen our fanbase, yes. But what we also want to do, is break through! And by that I mean, we want to make an impact, and start getting recognized (just START getting recognized, that’s all) outside of our garage and local community for who we really are – an independent, progressive metal trio! We work SO hard (as emphasized in my opening paragraph), and sometimes the business side of things can be a little discouraging, but it’s all worth it when we get on stage, and do what we love. And we want to share what we love with everyone else, and that’s why we hope this summer we can break through. Wont you help us make this goal a reality? You can in a big way by telling your friends – seriously! I mean, I know you don’t think you have any friends, but trust me you do, and they want to know what you think is cool! If everybody signs up for our mailing list (lifestage.fanbridge.com) and shares us with their friends, we WILL have a breakthrough summer, and that’s a promise.

All this being said, look out for Life Stage this summer! We’re seriously preparing for battle this year, and we want you to be a part of it! Take the 5 seconds to click the “Share” button on our Facebook page, and help us in our fight. We really appreciate our supporters, and we can’t wait to see every single one of you out and about this summer. BTW – don’t be afraid to leave us a message, comment, or just say “hi”, we’d love to hear from you! Let us know what’s going on in your world.

Until Nextime,

Ross
Life Stage