Malena and I have discovered some wonderful new fun, and due to several hours of intense work on the part of my Boss yesterday and the fact that she is computer savy herself ( I , myself , managed to crash my entire e-mail system for a day this morning ) we now have video hookup between us. And we thought just talking on the phone was fun! This is the next best thing to being together!

I know I have a lot to learn, most likely everyone in the world knows more about this than I do but i am jumping on board here. We need to expand this system to include the voice bits so we don’t have to be on the telephone ( I have only JUST yesterday learned the term ” SKYPE ” ) and apparently my IMac needs a Special camera to run with Ichat , but I sense we are going places with this. No bad thing for such a geographicaly challanged band. I want it ALL!!!!

No more ” what ARE you wearing ” ( we are so girlie ) now we can see eachother in the ever so glamourous outfits we wear around the house. Uh, Right. I think the first 20 minutes last night was spent giggling at eachother. It’s a lot of fun singing too, even tho, of course , the pictures don’t go anything like as fast as we do.

I’ll let Malena explain the bit about ” Hobbit Porn ” ( feet people, feet, it’s not THAT kind of video hookup )

Mostly I love this because I miss her. Every day. All the time. Seeing her makes it just a little bit less.

Two more days until we start recording MIRROR MIRROR. Three more days until we go on stage with Garisson Keilor.

Love and pictures,
Lorraine

Most days I know that Malena and I share a brain, or maybe a heart. We’ll write to each other at the same time, or call, only to find the other was just about to do the same , we seem to know when the other needs us. We have the same thoughts about music and the direction of the album, or about what to put on it, about how a song should go. We get happy and sad at the same times.

We each spent this morning buy hooks and hanger things for plants, so we could hang them in bedrooms and courtyards,
( not something I have ever actually done before in my life , tho I would bet she has, little garden Witchie ) When I got home from my shopping I called her to say ” WOW I’ve had this great idea , I am going to hang plant things all over my bedroom ” but before I could tell her, she said ” HEY I had this great idea and I just went out and bought plant hanger things to hang plants all over the courtyard”

This kind of stuff happens all the time. I’m glad I adore her, as it could be a little disconcerting having someone that much in your brain….

I spoke at lenth with Robin Adnan Anders , of Boiled in Lead today. He is going to be doing the drums on our cd. Gods very gift to drums the man is, never heard better. Oddly enough he and Malena seem to be sharing some thoughts on melding rock-n-roll hard driving Led Zepplin with Steeleye Span. ( no, no idea where they came up with this, but I am happy to go along ) This should rock. Robin has played on my Flash Girl cd’s and again with Folk UnderGround, and I am feeling all about drums lately, so he will be all over the thing.

Trevor Hartman, my bandmate from Folk UnderGround is going to play piano on ” Post Mortem on Our Love ” a song I recorded with the Flash Girls on our first cd. Neil wrote the words, and I wrote the music, and I have always heard it in my head on piano, and I heard Malena sing it a couple weeks ago and am firmly convinced it is going on the cd. She sings it the way I heard it when I wrote it, and then some. ( not sure what -I- am going to be playing, maybe violen ?? ) Trevor may play some accordian as well on another track. ( come on, people, it’s not that bad, stay with us here, hee-hee, ONE accordian song )

The last night of the Folk UnderGround week at the Half Time Rec was Saturday night and one of the best times I have ever had playing with that band ( yup, even including Texas, if you have been reading this blog that long ) The bar was packed, our friends all came down ( tho the BirdChick left before we could play El Paso for her ) everyone concerned had a great time. The only problem I have with playing in bars, is , sadly, the drinking people. Not all drinking people mind you, not the people who have 3 or 4 over the night or even 5 or 6 or 10 and get silly , rowdy, fun, danceing, falling over, puking, whatever makes the happy, no not them, I love playing for them and talking to them between sets…It’s the would be Romeo’s who get younger and hotter ( so they firmly believe ) with each passing drink, and become mighty suprised at the end of the night to learn that despite the fact they havee been watching me all night and digging my music all night, , I am not , in fact, going to go home with them. BIG thanks to Bedlam roadie Liz for shadowing me each time I left the stage. ( Don’t mean to whine, mind you, just feeling a bit mauled. )

Anyway, enough of that.I hope this brain sharing thought sharing thinking the same things feeling Malena and I are having keeps itself up until Saturday. Only a few more days until our first real gig. We are singing ALL the time, and hopefully our guitar player, Adam Stemple, is listening to our tapes and learning the songs ( has any musician EVER , in the history of the world since time began , EVER listened to practice tapes??? ) I’m not nervous exactly, I do this all the time, play for people, and having Malena with me is the most perfect feeling ever, I’d rather her there than almost anyone else in the world and I think it will be wonderful and people will love us but every so often I wish life had a pause button, so you could stop time and catch up for a week or two, you know, have another couple weeks to actually learn these songs your ownself…

Keep your fingers crossed and send us good thoughts of me remembering all my lyrics!

Ranting and Raving this evening,
I remain,
Lorriane

Malena’s Magick Garden

Today has been dreamy. I’ve been working on the jasmine and the lavender. The jasmine flowers go in the tea and the lavender goes in basically everything. Oh, I must tell you about our shop “availability” policy. We don’t buy our herbs from some wholesaler in china. Most of our products are make from the contents of my garden. On occation if I can’t grow or make a product, I buy it from a wonderful couple who own a farm in Michigan. Everything is organic and planted with love.

Please allow 2 weeks for shipping on all orders.

Ok ok, enough shop talk. We only have 7 more days until we perform with Garrison Keillor. I am steadily doing my Psychic Diet to enable my curvacous bod to slip into my dress. We all know after seeing 13 Nights of Fright that it takes skill for my bust to stay in the corset, right? If I gain 5 pounds, BOOM baby!

When Lorraine and I are apart, we have no problem being good with our eating habits. BUT, when we are together (being the bad influence that I am) I tend to make her eat Chocolate with me. A lot of chocolate. In fact, we could write a book titled,

A best friends guide to eating chocolate at night”

Conventions are the best. I can’t wait for the next one. The best thing about CONs is no matter how outrageously I’m dressed, there is always someone who blows me out of the water. This happens at Hollywood Special Effects parties too. But THAT is a story for another BLOG. I must get back to boiling soap and giving Mr. Gorgeous a hair cut. Oh, those lovely curly locks!

Love you all to death.

Malena TEVES

I had thought to spend today in the garden, burying soaker hoses and planting all the little guys that have been showing up from various Heirloom Seed companies, but true to form here in the Midwest in the Springtime, it is raining. At least it isn’t snow….

Actually I am not to depressed about this, as a nice day indoors relaxing before the gig tonight is right up my alley. Four nights in a bar is hard work. Tonight is the last of them, and it has been a lot of fun. I really enjoy the Irish bit with Folk Underground, we have a lot of fun and people seem to be haveing a great time as well. We have been pulling out some of the Western music we learned for Texas and it has been going over better than one would expect with the Irish music fans
( with the possible exception of the weirdest version of Ring of Fire ever attempted, hee-hee, sometimes the muse is there, and sometimes not ) . Word has it that Sharon Stiteler , Bird Chick to the Stars is coming down tonight, and so I am sure we will be doing her a version of “El Paso” ( WHY she likes this song is beyond me…) But it will take up a great deal of time, which is all to the good when one has to play unti 2:00am.

Malena has been with us via cell phone every night, hearing a different part of the show each evening and chatting with just about everyone on the breaks, all very fun. She has , she tells me, also been doing a great deal of work with her herbs and bathe salts and teas and such for our shop. I can’t wait until it is up and running, she keeps sending me samples to try ( I am making out like a bandit here ) and I have yet to find any that aren’t wonderful. This morning’s bath was one called “Sunshine in my Soul , which is think is my favourite yet, and quite reconciled me to the lack of warmth and sun outdoors.

We have been chatting with Chris Ewen from the Future Bible Heros this week about the cd. Besides doing the music for several of the songs, ( for certain a new Neil song called , for now , ” the Dark Sonnet ) he is also helping us with the cd booklet. He did booklets for the Flash Girls and Folk UnderGround, and we are SO lucky to have him back, glutton for punishment he is . He is hard at work on his own solo cd, which from what I have heard is going to be rather wonderful, I will be certain to post info on that as it comes in. He keeps threatening to come out here so that I can play on it, something I am quite looking forward to.

Malena sent him tapes this week , so he got to hear her sing for the first time. There is something very special about Malena and singing. One of our fans , who heard her for the first time at Mini Con said that ” She sang like an Angel ” ( This a big , gruff, very manly man ) Another said she had a ” F*ck All Amazing Voice ” ( this an eloquent man with a way with words ) I actually asked her to be in a band with me BEFORE I heard her sing and a good thing as I am not sure I would have had the nerve to ask someone that good , that magic , AFTER I had heard her, tho by that point she was already my best friend so I suppose I could have gotten over it..

I am very lucky to have her. We are very lucky to have eachother and all of the people who are helping us make this MIRROR MIRROR dream a reality.

We hope you will like it too.

Rock-n-reel,
Lorraine

I have always been regarded as a “stubborn optimist”…someone who sees the silver lining in the worst of adversity. HOWEVER, I met my match with Lorraine. Being around her had made me realize what a negative, faithless mortal I can be..more often than I’d like to admit.

That’s what good friends do. They help you grow and move past your limitations. I’m going to make Lorraine keep her “Best Friend/Mentor” title for Eternity. Lorraine has opened a door for my vocal creative expression to flow through and I am so thankful. Every day something miraculous happens with this project. EVERY DAY! I don’t know why we are still amazed! He hee

These songs will pull you out of your reality and enchant, bewilder and seduce you. When I started learning the songs I saw how perfectly they meshed with my hopes, dreams, and fears. For example the lines from Dark Sonnet,

“I really don’t know what I love you means, I think it means don’t leave me here alone.”

That song always brings tears of contentment to my eyes.

Wow! How often does one get an opportunity to sing songs like this? Yeah, You KNOW I’m running with it. I have two speeds..off and 200 mph.

I’m so glad you are all coming along for the ride. I hope the music gives you goosebumps too! I get them every time.

Love,

Malena

And what a fine morning this is turning out to be. First off, the pictures we took last week with Kitty ( who is actually Cat Milhos) came today, on disk and actual prints! These are the most lovely photos ever, something about the light that day out in California, and Kitty’s eye for us worked together to make the most magic photos! I am certain that Malena will put some up soon in the photo section , here on the website, but after looking at them, I can tell you they will be all over the cd booklet, and I think we have our cover shot as well.

I have been working so hard in these shoots , trying to learn how to pose and model and look like it is the most natural thing in the world, and finally, I think I may have achieved some success. Malena of course, always looks great , for besides being lovely as the night, she does know how to model and pose like the most natural thing in the world, and she has been working very hard to teach me how it is done.

Soon we will start recording. It all seems to be coming together nicely, and we go into the studio Friday the 13th of May ( nice day for it , eh? ) for the Lojo Russo portion of the sessions. If anyone know of an Uilleann or Irish Bagpiper player in the Twin Cities area who would be up for playing on a cool Gothic Folk cd, let me know. We have a song that has pipes all over it, if we can but find a player.

Another bit of news, for those of you in the Minneapolis/St Paul area, my other band , Folk UnderGround , will be playing this week at the Half Time Rec in St. Paul. We will be there Wednesday the 4th thru Saturday the 7th and would love to see anyone who comes down. Malena, sadly, cannot be there, but we’ll call her on the cell phone and say Hello and let her listen .

Magic and music, Lorraine