BRGA'd

Leviathan still hasn't had a rehearsal since we were given the news that our drummer is still with us, which I find to be pretty lame that we haven't met in light of present circumstance. The members have gotten quite busy (myself included) with their lives... Luckily the Shar band has stepped up the rehearsal game so we've been rehearsing during this Leviathan void, so that's kind of cool, at least I'm pre-occupied.

B.R.G.A. (Brian Roberts Guitar Academy), has had a steady drop out rate since I claimed I was nearing maximum capacity, tragic prophecy haha. This is inverse to how much time I've put into BRGA since my last entry. As a growth/investment measure, I've registered the domain www.BrianRobertsGuitarAcademy.com which, takes you straight to my host website; www.TyrannyStudios.com/lessons.html clever right? No more tranny studio jokes yay. In addition to that I went on a graphic design tear and came up with logo ideas. Bumper stickers, logos, business cards, banners, picks, etc. See below.

Even Brian Roberts the Garden Isle Guitarslinger wasn't safe from the graphic design tear!

So, as you can see, without a rock band for my to exude some creative energy, I've allotted it to other things. I have even begun scoring a guitar showcase track for the new BRGA promo video. An updated version complete with it's own original soundtrack as composed by me! I'm going to use Guthrie Govan's "who plays it best" track as a guideline, and replace the generic improv I did over a Joe Satriani style backing track, and hopefully showcase multiple styles to attract a bigger pool of potential students. I've finalized the first 25 seconds of it so far.

The guitar pilgrim quest is ever-going. I've since had a few auditions, and I think I landed a spot with the local rock group Ignite the Red. I've known some of the guys in the band for at least 7 years and I got an official gig with them at the end of the month. I'm pretty excited about it, and I'm hoping it can help pacify some of my Leviathan frustrations.

Attendance for the N3 Podcast is at an all-time-low, so I'm tapering back its frequency yet again; every first Sunday as opposed to every other Sunday.

With one eyebrow raised, I also signed myself up for a surf lesson app/website called www.gosurflife.com and had a call with the entrepenuer based out of Canada. I'm hoping to operate on the fringe hours of the surf school I currently work at to pick up some extra, low-stress cash. Supposedly this will launch in June or July or something. We'll see how it goes. Coincidently, I've taken the first step in acquiring my "blue card" from the boating department of the DLNR Honolulu to legitimize my surf-teaching. Supposedly there's like a 7 month waiting list or something.

Using my friend's Amazon Prime account I purchased a bit of stuff for the music and the house and everything arrived a couple days ago. Yay! I spent probably 2 hours among other things trying to install some stupid surf racks in the backyard. Very frustrating. But, I'm pumped none the less. I haven't bought anything for myself in quite some time, so it was about time! Plus, I'm sharing my space with another now and they need some room, so I'm freeing up some space with these little upgrades.

Flew back home at the beginning of this month for my niece's first birthday party. It was cute and quaint. Perfect for my liking, and yet another quick Kauai zap.

Over this past weekend I had a friend from Seattle whom I hadn't seen in probably at least 4 years fly into Oahu, and I met up with them on Monday, and although it was brief and extremely low-key, it was quite nice to reconnect even in the quaintest and uneventful of ways. I'm not sure our plans will afford another meeting but that's fine. I'm happy I got to see them!

The truck is fine, but already having some issues (damn you Chris! Just kidding). I think the reverse lights have gone out and one of the turn signal lights is burnt out. Minor inconveniences, but it's nice to be able to go through the mountains again and have that freedom.

That's all for now. Spend more time doing and less time talking. Peace out!

Crossroads

So I just bought a truck. The days of the Nissan Maxima are now almost over. I had that car for over four years! This car, much like my laptop, has far exceeded my expectations! So the new truck, is very exciting.

The most current incarnation of Leviathan Hawaii had it's last gig. It's been a couple weeks since I had anything to do with my rock group since then. Much to my disbelief, it's been kind of nice actually... which for me is shocking. Two days ago we were expecting to lose our drummer, so I suppose the thought of having to reform was a little daunting, but to everyone's surprise, that has since been postponed for another 5 months or so, so I'm hoping we'll be "getting the band back together," so to speak.

I've been encouraged to dive further into the world of pedals at the wishes of the Shar band. So I'm going to be lugging around my pedalboard now for that group.

I went to Kauai on two different occasions since the last entry. Once for a gig, another for a reunion with my two maternal cousins. The sequence of events and travel has been pretty chaotic, in a good way.

Other than that, B.R.G.A. (Brian Roberts Guitar Academy) is nearing maximum capacity! It all started with a dream haha.

Come to find out I have a port-side herniated disc in my lowest vertebrae, and so I am now taking physical therapy for that. Wanna get back to 100% some day.

That's all for now.

Little Pineapple in the Big Apple

As promised, here is my monthly blog entry! I am 6 days back from my whirlwind of an East Coast trip. I have a newfound respect for those who come to Hawaii for vacation from the East Coast. It was a grueling 11 hour flight from JFK to Honolulu. I was gone for 9 days and went all over the place. Here's a map.

I flew into JFK international in New York, then flew to Charlotte, North Carolina, then flew to Atlanta, Georgia where I was then picked up and driven to Auburn, Alabama. Stayed there the night, the following afternoon (day 2), we drove to St. Simon's in Georgia and stayed the night there. That afternoon (day 3) we drove to Jacksonville Florida, then drove to St. Augustine and stayed there the night. The next morning (day 4) we drove to Charleston South Carolina where we got into a car wreck. We spent the night there, and the next day (day 5) got another car and drove to Virginia Beach. Stayed there the night, then drove to Richmond the next day (day 6). We stayed in Richmond that night then went to wine country the next day (day 7) followed by a train ride to New York where we arrived very early (1am on day 8). The last 2 and half days were spent in NYC just wandering.

It was craziness, it was grueling, lot's of road time but I got to see a lot of stuff! Not much has happened since my last entry being that the last few months have been focused on pulling all resources to this east coast trip. Other than that I got some quiet time with myself as I readjust to PST.

I went to the doctors two days ago to check out my back. I messed it up a couple months back doing deadlifts, and being that my back hasn't fully recovered I figure I'd hit up the professionals. They gave me a muscle relaxer prescription, which I took a dose last night and that was a nice experience. Definitely gives you cotton mouth like everyone says it does.

Leviathan Hawaii 2.0 has it's final gig this Friday, March 11th, and I am frantically trying to burn CD's for this show, of course, my CD burner has decided to bust, but I can't blame it. This laptop I've been running has been operating since 2011! Far exceeding my expectations for a computer/cell phone. I have a default 2 year life expectancy for these kinds of products... which usually means I have a bankroll aside for replacements but I've squandered all of that gambling haha (problem much?), or going on trips.

That's all for now!

It's Been Far Too Long...

It's been far too long since my last post. As always. Since October, a lot has happened. Realistically, I will try do these monthly. Think of it like a Brian magazine subscription. Anyway...

The Annual Ty Gurney Surf School Halloween costume contest was a huge success. I dressed as Thor, which I carried on into performances and appearances as a musician.

Leviathan had a gig in late October for some shitty touring band. The show was on a Tuesday, and we were asked to open for the group, to which I am very gracious for the opportunity. However, it was a complete and utter blunder! Tickets were priced at $25 apiece, and my group sold 7 tickets. And by sold, I mean that my band bought the tickets and gave them away to our friends interested in watching us. Of three opening bands, we sold the second largest amount of tickets... When the headliners performed, I counted 25 people in the audience. Considering we "sold" 7 tickets, and each band had +1's, in addition to the tickets they supposedly sold, the turnout was bleak to say the least. I think everyone affiliated was a little embarrassed by the whole ordeal. Win some lose some I guess. We weren't without our own batch of imperfections either...

In November Leviathan had a gig where we featured our new singer, so that was pretty exciting! I also had a stage nightmare for my rock band: I broke a string minutes into the set. I had to step out for about a song and a half while I man-handled my string back into my guitar.

I also went to Maui for the first time as a birthday gift. It was fantastic. From what people had told me about it, I was expecting Maui to be far more developed and possibly even unpleasant, being described as a "intermediary between Kaua'i and O'ahu." I was pleasantly surprised and confused as to why I had been told that my whole life. Seeing the sunrise at Haleakala was incredible. I felt like I was in outer space, you can see the earth curve from up there. The road to Hana was beautiful, but grueling. I also went scuba diving for the first time as well. Maybe I'll get dive certified some time in the future?

By some miracle I passed Japanese 201 with a strong B, even though I began to fall behind and didn't feel like I owned the material as well as I had in previous installments of the class. As a result, I have taken a semester break from school, and I may even take the same class again to reinforce my weak understanding. I don't want to go on if I'm already a bit lost, it's just going to compound my problems.

The holidays came and took a shit on my life as they always do. No gigs, no rehearsals, very minimal guitar lessons, but a fuck ton of service industry work. Thankfully, it's no longer food service anymore; it's Waikiki surf lessons. Except I did make a cameo appearance at the Grand Manoa Ballroom to help them out for one shift. I worked 25 of 27 days in a row at the surf school. Meaning, out of 27 days, I had two days off. That, like every year, is my "Christmas." I'm thankful however, because school and Vegas kind of bankrupted me, so I liked the additional income, however, because my other streams of income dried up relatively during that time, I didn't really make all that much more additional money... sad. I also had a pretty big blow out with some strung-out 21 year old co-worker kid. That was super annoying to deal with. But, I wound up getting a raise in light of the whole situation so hey!

Been podcasting here and there with the N3 Podcast crew. So that's still going. It's basically the only way I can dupe my friends into hanging out with me now that we're all adults and they have real jobs and stuff.

B.R.G.A. (Brian Roberts Guitar Academy) has been doing well. I even got some love from one of my newer students. It's nice to get shouts outs every now and then ya know? I got to work on cranking out more tutorial videos. I got plans for guitar pic logos and stickers and stuff. Stay tuned for that...

In other news, the Shar band has been it! There has been some huge accomplishments (in my opinion) achieved in the past few months. It's been decided to play more originals (yes!), we've been rehearsing regularly (yes!), we got booked to play at the NFL Pro Bowl tailgate party (awesome!) and we even got booked to open for UB40 on Kauai (hell yeah!). In addition to all this Shar's got this new song "Should Have Known" she just released and it's getting some attention on the airwaves. So that's great. I also had one of my most drunken performances ever the day after the UB40 concert at Rob's. I got slobbed. It was embarrassing. I'm surprised I'm not fired.

Leviathan had yet another gig a few days ago, that was rad, and we got some sweet pictures! I also unveiled another "Hawaiian Punk Rock" song that I've been working on for the past month during our mini winter hiatus; Ehukai's Molokai Slide. I should have a decent recording of that done within a month or so. We do have a video of that performance, but it's not coming up on the searches so... if ya want, you'll have to go to this link for the video of our performance February 12th.

I also drilled a bunch of holes in my wall to try and find studs to mount a surfboard. I'm very proud of myself (not), so I'm including that in the update.

And for future plans, Leviathan is slated for a show in March. This'll probably be our last one for a while so please be sure to come if you are in the Honolulu area! We're losing our drummer to legal punishments so we'll be stymied for a little bit. I also go this crazy 9 day east coast trip that's about to go down in a week, so I'm looking forward to all that. Vegas revenge is still slated for July.