Setting up in chandler for the dvd recording.

Setting up in chandler arizona for the dvd recording!

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Check out the new Christmas Gift Pack!!

*Humor intended*

Baby jesus plays a flying v!

Nativity photo shoot!

Rainy time in southern ca. On the way to simi valley.

Dave and travis are bringin the noise but not the funk! But they sound tasty and salty!

Late night taco run after sound check. Yum. -tj

The venue in temecula had a very christmasy set that brought a new level of christmas cheer! -tj

Thanks for the lights tamara! -tj

Loading the trailer after a day of practice.

Lunch at apple computer with our friend karl. Neato. -tj

This looks like a good bunch of people if you ask me! San jose btw. -tj

Deutschland war erstaunlich!

Wir aller Wunsch, den wir viel länger geblieben sein könnten, aber wir mussten für den Weihnachtsausflug nach Hause kommen. Danke zu allen unglaublich netten Leuten, die mit uns und uns gelassen sprachen, willkommen sich zu. Wir würden lieben, nach Deutschland wieder zu kommen eines Tages! Wir geben fotos und Video unserer Reise bald bekannt.

-T.J.

gute Nacht aus Deutschland

We made it to Germany after one of the craziest days ever! Now it's bed time.

-T.J.

On the plane! Smile!

Boarding the plane... Next stop... Munich.

Pushing our livelihood through lax. -tj

If you missed the broadcast...

Watch it below! We had a fun time, and as you saw (or will see), it was very casual, homespun, and personal... just like we planned.

-T.J.

Broadcast Tonight 6pm pst

Watch it right here, or at our ustream page!

We're gonna play some Christmas tunes, hang out at Eric's studio, and have a good time. Hope to see you tonight!
Live Broadcast by Ustream.TV

-T.J.

CD's and Holiday Packs are in!

We got the first shipment of Christmas EP's and they look beautiful! You can order them right now at the store.

Also, we have some FOF holiday packs that offer some cool merchandise at a discount! Check them out here.

We're super excited about how the Christmas EP came out, and we hope that you and your friends dig it!

-T.J.

I need to go drive around for no reason now. - eric

Guitars for the Christmas EP

I thought it would be fun to do a nerdy update regarding the guitar recording process for the Christmas EP. Here we go...




Guitar-wise, we used Eric's Tele, and strat for parts that needed that single coil bite and twang. The Ric was used for thicker humbucker stuff. The Taylor solidbody is cool because it fits somewhere in between a single coil and a humbucker on the tone scale. It has the girth and thickness of a humbucker, but more bite. Both Eric and I used this guitar quite a bit on the EP.

The Matchless and AC30 were used heavily, as well as some cool mini little amps... a cute little Gretsch and an adorable Gibson (missing the bs on the badge, making it a 'Gi on.'). We had tons of fun messing with different amp/effects/cab combos, often running multiple amps simultaneously (especially when coming out seperate outputs of a stereo delay like the 'echo park.')




When it comes to mics, Eric told me (his exact words...) "An SM57 1/4" off the center of the speaker cone at a 30 degree angle. Use a protractor, a laser level, and a plumb line to make sure that it is exact. We will not move the mic EVER."

He did actually say something like that, but it was very sarcastic and we both got a good laugh. For some reason, people tend to read books about engineering that tell you stuff like this, and they follow it blindly. If music is about hearing, then it seems like using our ears is a better option when it comes to mics, placement and getting tones in general. All that to say, Eric would usually be in the control room, and have me move mics around until it sounded right for that particular guitar part. Most of the cabs were mic'd up with some combination of an SM57, Royer ribbon, or Sure KSM (large diaphragm). It's easy to talk about gear all day, but no matter what gear you have or use, ears and the way you play are WAY more important.

Being that this was my first time in the studio with Eric, I learned to be way more picky about moving mics around until it sounds right! No excuses... laziness is not tolerated!

Also notable is the Sean Cimino patented "jacked up" pick trick. We used it for edgy and edge-esque tones. It is pretty basic... just destroy a nice smooth pick edge with something sharp, and scrape it across the strings. It was often the extra push a tone needed to cut through in a mix. Thanks Sean.


This video also has some info about effects and amps:

Future of Forestry Christmas Part 4 from future of forestry on Vimeo.

Sorry if that was boring. If you made it this far, congratulations, and my deepest apologies for taking up your time.

-T.J.

Download the Christmas EP!!

After many many many hours and weeks and months of work, the Advent Christmas EP is ready to escape from the studio and hit your ears! We're excited about it, and you should go buy it for $4.95 right now over at futureofforestry.com/store.

The CDs will ship on November 24th. You should download it now, and then buy copies for all your friends in a few weeks!

Hope you like it!

-T.J. / FoF

Live interview and Acoustic set Wednesday!

Tune in this Wednesday at 6 pm Pacific to the internet show called 'Crossrock TV on the spot.' Eric and I (T.J.) will be bringing a bunch of instruments and doing some acoustic versions of some Christmas tunes, an interview and possibly a bonus song...

You can watch it live at CRTV's Ustream page, our myspace, or at FOFTV.

Also, if you live in San Diego, you can come to the live taping! It is free, and it would be sweet to see you. Here's the address: 10752 Coastwood Road • San Diego, CA 92127 . It is at a coffee shop called Cana Cafe, and I believe it is attached to a Church. You might want to get there about 15 minutes early (5:45) just to be safe. Hope to see you there, or on the internet.

Future of Forestry Christmas Video 1

The Christmas EP will be available VERY soon! We are stoked for you to hear it. Here's a glimpse into some of the guitar and bass recording...

T.J.

Future of Forestry Christmas (part 1) from future of forestry on Vimeo.

New Splash page is up!

After being outdated for far too long, the old futureofforestry.com is gone and in a digital trash compactor somewhere in cyberspace! Our good friend Jordan Halvorsen (a VERY gifted web designer) designed a new splash page for us while the new full site is in development. Check it out and stare at the background for a while... it will put you in a trance as it subtly shifts in color!

-T.J.

Sound check in north park.

Random Islands of Kindness

Recently, after a worship gig at South Hills Church in Corona, we were eating some hamburgers at Islands, and basically having a good old time talking about whistling, Santa Barbara, and Mona Lisa. When it came time for the bill, our waitress brought it up and said that someone who was at the church saw us come in and paid for our meal. That person didn't leave their name, myspace address, or even a demo for Eric to listen to! How cool is that?

Generosity and humble anonymity are an amazing combination, and we were blessed by it. So, whoever you are... thank you so much for paying for our meal and teaching me about the power of selfless acts of love with no expectation of anything in return.

-T.J.

Power!

A young spider's uncle once said, "with great power comes great responsibility." To a recording engineer, we could turn that around and say "with great electricity comes great guitar tones." I'm sure Eric will touch on this later, but it's been power issue Tuesday today. First, it was an annoying buzz. A power conditioner/regulator fixed this, but now fuses are being blown and music is not being converted into 1's and 0's thus hindering the progress of the album. I miss the good old days, when you didn't even need electricity to make a CD (he said sarcastically!).

-T.J.

Daniel Lanois/Alison Krauss/and musical inspiration

We were on a plane a few weeks ago, and got to talking about Daniel Lanois' killer pedal steel playing and tone. Then, we started discussing Jerry Douglas and his amazing dobro skills (A.K.'s dobro player). I had heard Alison Krauss before, but never really LISTENED to it, if you know what I mean. I bought three of A.K.'s cds last week, and they are really awesome on a musical and production level.

Maybe I've been playing too much mandolin, and I need to head out into the backwoods with my cousin ol' Ricky Jimmy Daniels for a few months and wallow in crazy bluegrass until I can get this out of my system.

At the end of the day, listening to such high level stuff is really inspiring. I can't listen to really inspiring stuff before bed anymore, because I get too worked up to sleep... I end up going to my studio and working into the wee hours of the morning! I love music that does this to me, because it is the far less macho equivalent of a pre-game pep talk for a sports team.

Picture a coach getting the team all worked up...

"You gotta fight, FIGHT hard and never give up!!! When the going gets tough, ducks fly together!!! No Man is an island!!!..."

What if the coach then said, "Now head on home, put on your PJ's, and get some sleep."

That's totally what it's like for me to listen to really inspiring music before bed. The trick is finding music that is good, but not so good that it will turn me into an insomniac. I save the really really good stuff for when I am emotionally and physically prepared to deal with the hours of creativity that stem from listening to it.

I'd love to continue this insane blog post, but I'm getting tired and am feeling the urge to listen to some fairly okay music and catch some zzz's.

T.J.

Live Broadcast! Tune in on Wednesday.

This Wednesday (9-3-2008) at 6pm (pdt), we'll be broadcasting live video of a drum tracking session (a certain Christmas song about a certain drummer boy). There will be big drums, little drums, guirros, popcorn snares, oh my!

Here's where you can watch it: http://foftv.blogspot.com/

If you want to comment and interact while you watch, watch it here: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/future-of-forestry-tv

Hope to see you Wednesday at 6pm!

T.J.

For those of you who don't live in Indiana:

The Indiana Update

Ahhh Indiana... what can I say? We had such an awesome time there! From the time we landed to the time we took off to head home, we were well taken care of. Brent, Matt, Britney, and everyone at Northside New Albany were incredibly hospitable and friendly. It is people like the aforementioned that make or break a trip like this, and they Made it with a capital M. I'm regretting using the word aforementioned, but you get the point... On to the pictures:

Welcome to Indianapolis!



Here's the venue while we were setting up.



This is Spence enjoying a second floor tom.



Here's the vibes/theremin/saw/keys/glockenspiel station. Notice Sean looming in the distance layin' down some sweet riffs.



We stayed in downtown Louisville, and we had fun walking around finding food, coffee, record stores, etc...


-T.J.

Hanging with our indiana friends kyle jordan, matt, and brent in louisville.

We're hanging in louisville tonight and possibly catching the closing ceremony of the olympics.

Here's the venue. Should be a fun might!

On our flight to indianapolis. TJ found the secret to total relaxation since they now charge you to rent a pillow.

West Coast Festival Tour Pics

We've been back from the tour for a few weeks, and a photo update is past due! Here we go. Join us, would you?
The open road. Ahhh. With gas prices the way they are, the open road somehow lost some of its magic. Once we have hover vans and hover trailers, the magic will return, trust me.


We had an amazing time at the Columbia River Gorge. After a long stressful but awesome day of playing at Creation West, this was just what the doctor ordered. There is nothing like a beautiful view to recharge and put things in perspective!


Who is that scary looking shadowy, silhouetted figure on the horizon?


Here we are jamming on some sweet guitars at the Taylor house. If you look closely, you can see Uncle Mikey's legs. He's a totally tubular, rad guy and his coolness plus the kindness and hospitality of Grandma and Grandpa Taylor were a huge blessing.


We stopped at a gas station in the Cascades. We didn't need gas, we just wanted to spend $100... jk. Anyway, the sky was doing some amazing things color wise, so we had some photographic fun while the pump whirred away.


"Hello Eric, how are you?" "I'm fine, but the sky behind me is feeling a little blue."


"Hello T.J., how are you?" "I'm fine, but I'm practicing the flying jump kicks grand master Eric showed me in an attempt to get a good myspace pic."


This is Ben in the luxurious backstage area at the Gorge changing strings.



Eric surveys the war torn land backstage at Spirit West Coast. Moments from when this picture was taken, the entire FOF crew launched into a blurry speed frenzy of getting things on stage and plugged in. Ahh my blood pressure is rising just thinking about it. (just kidding mom, I'm fine)


Eric looks out over the gorge. Did I mention that we loved it there?



All in all, we had an absolutely splendid time on tour. We met lots of wonderfully nice people, played lots of music, and made lots of memories.

-T.J.