Inspiration comes in myriad forms.  To learn about a few of my non-musical influences, read my post on the Shaimus blog.

Today is the perfect time to think about tomorrow.

We all have plans for 2010, grand or otherwise.  I never really make resolutions because they just feel like I’m trying to convince myself to break habits I don’t feel confident breaking.  Plans usually have more structure and wonderfully loose ends, whereas resolutions are uncomfortably finite.

Now is the best time to think about later.

What are some of my goals for the year?  Inspiration; I want to be inspired by life and I want to learn from the ways people around me are living it.  Passion; I love what I do when it comes to music.  I’m also planning on loving life itself.  The ups, the downs, the in-betweens.  Mission; I hope to spend the year working hard but also having meaning behind what I do.  Meaning creates drive, and drive gets you places.  Connection; I hope to feel the transcendence I’ve felt so many times before from the interconnectedness of the people I know, the people I meet, and the people I learn about.

I also want to floss more.

Only time will tell what 2010 will bring, but I’m planning on making the best of it.  2009 was an unbelievable year for me for so many reasons.  It only makes me fascinated to wonder what the next one will have in store.

If you’re interested in a little thoughtful inspiration for the new year, take a look at this free eBook: What Matters Now

And since I didn’t post it before, I’ll close out ‘09 by posting the new Shaimus video for “Like a Fool”

I’m always proud of how talented my friends are.  Every once in a while, I like to share their music and accomplishments with everyone I can.  Today I’d like to mention a few pals that are doing good things.

Elizabeth and the Catapult

I was a big fan of their self-titled and self-released EP, but their first full-length album on the Verve label is worth listening to over and over and over.  And over again.  These are songs that are not only well-crafted, but immortalized in a pristine production that reveals more with each listen. (What a cliche thing to say.  This is why I hate writing about music.)

Visit their site here.

Zigmat

My good friend Steve Yonkin plays bass for this cool electro-pop/rock band (is that a good description?  I neither know nor care) who is up to lots of very good things these days.  Listen to them now so that you can be with the “in” crowd before they’re really popular and make you look like a bandwagoner.

Visit their site here.

Apache Stone

My college roommate and one of my best friends Hank Woods moved to New York City when I moved to LA.  I often sat around in the sun, wondering what the hell he was going to do with his life having grown up playing jazz trumpet and then suddenly shifting to rock guitar during school.  It turns out he would get picked up for a gig with Rescue Me star Mike Lombardi’s band, Apache Stone, and now he’s more of a rock star than I’ll ever dream of being.  Even more of one than he’ll ever dream of being!

Visit their site here.

OK fine.  One thing about me to finish this post off.  The Shaimus song “Tie You Down” will be appearing in the ABC Family show “Ruby and the Rockits” on September 22nd.  But I knew you’d already be watching that show anyway, so I was just gonna let it be a surprise.

This week was an interesting one in the world of Evan Brown (your favorite world, admit it). Last night, Shaimus played our last show with Dave Middleton, our other guitarist, and the band will never be the same again. No live playing for a little while as we try to find the perfect replacement. Auditions are officially open for those about to rock.

Also, for three days this week I had the pleasure of being on the set of the Sony Screen Gems film The Roommate, a thriller starring Minka Kelly (Friday Night Lights), Cam Gigandet (Twilight), and Leighton Meester (Gossip Girl). Two of our songs are going to be featured in the movie, and we got to “perform” them for the film. Phil unfortunately couldn’t make it one of the days, so Cam pretended to be the lead singer/keyboardist with the help of a little movie magic (i.e. lip syncing). Hilarious. He and I even got lines, but I expect mine will end up on the cutting room floor.

Leaving the set was sad, I felt like I was going home from summer camp. But I don’t exactly have the desire to be a movie star, so I can’t say I wanted to stay forever. Although they DID make my hair look cool and force me to wear clothes that “hip” people wear. So at least I was cool for three days of my life. I think the movie is scheduled to be released next year, so I’m looking forward to seeing how it turns out. Below is a picture of Cam, Johannes and I with director Christian Christiansen. He, like everybody else on the set, was a really nice guy. More photos from our time on the set, including glimpses of our prison cell-like trailers and my skin-tight jeans, can be seen here.

And finally this week, I accomplished the lifelong dream of appearing in an online video with Tay Zonday, AKA the “Chocolate Rain” guy! I present to you, Totally Sketch’s True Internet Story of Keyboard Cat:

A couple weeks ago, I played with Shaimus at the CD release party for our new album, The Sad Thing Is, We Like It Here. The show was great fun—sold out crowd, solid performance, giveaways, videos, and plenty of other good stuff. But above all, it was a celebration marking the culmination of well over a year of hard work.

When all is said and done, this album was about three years in the making. The earliest songs were written and honed during our 2006 summer West Coast tour, including “Turn the Other Way,” “Interview,” and embryonic versions of “Don’t Want the Story” and “While We’re Young.” “Heads or Tails” was written during a time when Phil, Johannes and I were playing acoustic shows in L.A. while Dave and Cam finished up school on the other side of the country. “Tie You Down” was a last second addition that practically didn’t even make it on the album, and recording was pushed back a couple weeks just so we could finish it; good thing, too, as that turned out to be one of the best and most popular songs on the record.

That was around late October/early November of 2007. We tracked all of Cam’s drums in our old Van Nuys rehearsal space that December; imagine his impatience having recorded almost all of his parts over a year before the album would even come out. We followed this with laying down roughly finished versions of five of the strongest tracks which would be used for our demo. Our demo was sorely in need of an update, since the band’s sound had developed so much from our first album that it didn’t accurately represent us anymore. These new songs were far more illustrative of the “Shaimus sound” as it had come to be over the past couple years—a more cohesive, collaborative band effort with more energy and focus than Paper Sun (not to say there isn’t good material on that CD).

We took a brief break from recording after that. Trying to throw high-quality recordings together at a breakneck pace while contending with often-miserable day jobs was very taxing on all of us. During this break, we made a music video for “Turn the Other Way” with Adam Kerpelman. Not only did we feel like the song was a good choice for a single, but its theme of 9 to 5 frustration resonated with all of us. Oh, and of course it gave us an awesome excuse to smash the shit out of some office equipment.

Once summer 2008 rolled around we were antsy to finish what we’d started. We finished up guitars for the remaining five songs in our new West L.A. rehearsal space, recorded real piano in some recording studios to replace the samples that were used on the demo, and got final takes of all vocals, auxiliary percussion, and other odds and ends (mostly recorded in bedroom closets). Finally, Johannes busted his ass mixing the entire thing after it was all edited properly, Phil put the final touches on the artwork, we sent it off to get mastered and replicated, and then sat back and breathed a giant, collective sigh of relief. Oh, and Phil made a music video with a Powershot camera in his underwear.

This album represents a lot of blood, sweat, tears and calluses, and I think it turned out great. It’s certainly the best thing I’ve been a part of musically, and I put so much of myself into it that I can’t help but be nothing but proud. So, get more of a sense of the process of making this record with the next video, take a listen to the samples below and consider buying it. Now is the time for us to spread the word about all our hard work, and you can help!

Available from www.shaimus.com

Also available on

Naming a song “Interview” might lead people to believe that the upcoming Shaimus album kicks off with a band interview.  Boy would that be boring.  Talk about all-time album missteps, I think most people would find us supremely lame if we actually put an interview as the first track of our CD.  Or any track, really.

But no.  Lo and behold, “Interview” is actually music.  Prove it, you say?  Fine.  Phil proves it in the video below, underwear and all.  The video is for anyone who’s ever gotten new editing software and decided to freak out their friendly neighborhood epileptic.  The underwear part is for the ladies.  Everyone wins!

I will be very happy when this album is in my hands.  Incidentally, you can pre-order the album from www.shaimus.com now and save two bucks off the normal $10 price tag that will accompany it in a couple weeks.  And while you’re waiting for it to come in the mail, autographs and all, watch this video.

Here I am in my first appearance in a real, genuine music video for “Turn the Other Way” by Shaimus. You can download the song for free currently from our website (shaimus.com). My brother Spencer also makes a brief appearance as a fellow office worker. If you’d like to send him some fan mail, I will forward it to him.

If you’ve ever worked in an office, you’ll appreciate this video. Let the catharsis begin:

While sitting in traffic one day, I realized that I am constantly reading those little license plate frames that usually say the name of the car dealer on them. What made me notice doing this were the few frames that said something different or unique; for example, I saw one that said “I love volleyball.” Confident in the fact that I was a better person for knowing that, I caught sight of a frame that had the driver’s business name and website printed on it. It soon occured to me that hundreds of people potentially read my license plate on a regular basis. What good was it to me if they knew I got my car at Springfield Hyundai?

So for the modest price of $15 I got me one of these:

Astute observers will notice that I still haven’t switched to California plates yet. I’ll get around to it. For now I am only thinking about how clever it was to turn my car into a driving advertisement for my band.