Recording Prep Play by Play (rehearsal slide show)

Band practice happens twice a week. For me, this happens an hour away from where I live. Still, I look forward to it every time. I put together this lovely little slide show so that you can enjoy a night of practicing and good-time-having with us.










To start out this particular night, Foday will show off his lack of inhibitions by performing (with Matt's accompaniment) the worst rendition of "I Can Only Imagine" that I've ever heard.








Dolly surfing is a skill I've developed over many arduous practice setups. Yes, I am a trained professional.




























We do knuckle down and do work eventually. I can't wait to show you all the new stuff we've been working on.













The process of putting together and preparing these new songs has really brought our rehearsal times to life. There is a new energy that we are all just dying to share with you. Stay tuned...

Recording Prep Play by Play (pen to paper)

The band and I are diving head first into a brand new song. We are all putting this monster together at once. I've found this to be a very organic concept for writing.
I'm not walking into the practice room with a fully finished song, someone will do something on their respective instrument and change the whole feel of that particular section.

I give most of my attention to the lyrics. Every word and phrase gets second guessed. We're very excited to write this song, but this is a process that requires a big investment of time.This is the first draft of the song. It just kind of has its own schedule...




-andy

Recording Prep Play by Play (I'm not all there)

We don't start recording until January. However, I've been in recording mode for about 4 weeks now. Every shower, every meal, every car ride alone is it's own session. Different melodic sections and tones will be mixed, moved, and adjusted as I wander through Walmart.
I'm getting lost more and more frequently. Not necessarily in a physical sense, more in an "oops, I forgot I was doing something mundane" sort of way. Staring blankly at my sock drawer for 5 minutes doesn't mean I can't seem to find the right pair. I'm just aloof and that's okay with me.
In these days, I'm pretty much functioning and interacting at about 60% of my essence. The rest of me is at the studio...where the other part wants to be.
So if you happen to bump into me and I'm not all there, now you know why.
...can't wait to get this album to you.

-andy

Recording Prep Play By Play (Tentative Track Listing)

Our flight from Chicago to STL got delayed for a couple of hours last night so Matt (the master of focus and on-taskness) suggested that we use that time to start talking about the track listing of the new album. Of course, everything that was decided last night is subject to change since we're not recording until January, but I just wanted to drop everybody a line on what we're looking at here.

Probable Album Title: Barefoot
Possible Track List:
1. New untitled full-band song (you've never heard it, eeeee!)
2. The Poet and the Painter
3. Drop Your Nets
4. New Acoustic Song that I haven't finished writing
5. For the Ones Who Are Willing To Take Off Their Shoes
6. The Sound of Your Song
7. Acoustic Song that doesn't have a title yet
8. Bread and Wine (the 4th one with banjo and stuff)

So as you can see, we've got a lot of work ahead of us and I've got a lot of writing to do, which is what I should be doing now. I promised myself I would set this time aside to write but instead, I'm talking to you. Why are you so distracting? Leave me alone. j/k, I like you.

andy

The Most Exhausting Cycle

I've given up some things
For just a time, of course
The trampled trails
And vintage vails
All in the hopes that I'd prevail
To kill sin from the source

I felt like such a saint
For suff'rings deep and wide
If gifts to give
Were relative
I'd have a fragrant life to live
Instead, I stunk with pride

I found to my dismay
There's always more to lose
What man lets go
His heart will stow
The sin with even more to grow
His good will sinks him ever low
But wait, there is good news...(mark 10:26-27)

band update

I'm not going to lie, the band was on the rocks for a month or two.
Foday wasn't sure whether or not he wanted to continue. As stressful as it was, I slept like a baby through this time, nothing really on my mind to think about.
Now that things are on the up and up again, it takes forever to get to sleep. Too many ideas.
It's like a nervous energy that I absolutely love.
As long as the band continues to produce, I'll continue to not sleep and that is a sacrifice I am willing to make.
-andy

The Poet and the Painter

Dear Poet,
Write Your words
Upon my heart
Like canvass
Noun and verb
This sacred art
My hands, I think
Could be Your ink

Dear Painter,
Paint my mind
One solid hue
Like poems
Each brush stroke
A hint of You
My pride must hush
To be Your brush

And Your poetry
Is Your grace in me...
My death, Your potpourri

Bread and Wine #4 – lauda spirituale

Oh, Bread and Wine
Lend me Your heart
If You‘ll allow
I will take part
In this communion
Then sings my soul
I‘m whole
Oh, Bread and Wine
Covered in skin
Stand on the grave
Birth me again
Where there was dirt
There is a tree
And I‘m free

As sure as the curtain was torn
I am not forlorn,
I am not forlorn
As sure as the curtain was torn
I am not forlorn

Oh, Bread and Wine
Light on my feet
Show me the way
And I‘ll walk that street
But my eyes are poor
So be my light
Tonight

As sure as the curtain was torn
I am not forlorn,
I am not forlorn
As sure as the curtain was torn
I am not forlorn

Oh, Bread and Wine
Warmth on my face
Take me to You
To that great place
I can‘t wait to go there
But ‘till that day
I‘ll stay
And I‘ll obey

Oh Sunrise, fill my soul
Give me communion
Now I‘m whole

Bread and Wine #2--Soul

Oh soul, I
See dead men
Walking dead
But Bread brings truth

Your city has
Old buildings
Painted white
Where Wine wakes youth

The curtain has been torn
So won‘t you lift your head?
There are babies being born
So go raise the dead
Sell it all to have the
Wine and Bread

Oh soul, don‘t
Be weary
This can‘t be
A teary time

So run to your
City, its
Begging for
More Bread and Wine

The curtain has been torn
So won’t you lift your head?
There are babies being born
So go raise the dead
YOU ARE FULL, NOW SHARE WHAT YOU’VE BEEN FED

Bread and Wine #1--Sunrise

Oh, Sunrise
Light pours in
Singing a song to the eyes
Bright and free
Melodies
Are swirling songs in the skies

Red clouds burst
Long night ends
We see the long awaited sign
With lilies
Like trumpets
Declaring Bread and Wine

And I am waking
To light, to death‘s demise
The ground is shaking
I’m found with no compromise

Open hands
Speak volumes
The Bread says, ”Thy will be done”
On palm leaves
Like post cards
Written in wine from the Sun

And I am waking
To light, to death‘s demise
The ground is shaking
I’m found with no compromise

We’ll be fine
You‘re on time
We see the sign
Bread and Wine

just a few more weeks...

mewithoutYou, one of my favorite bands, is coming out with a new album on may 19th. as if Brother Sister, their most recent release wasn't progressive enough, this new album titled it's all crazy! it's all false! it's all a dream! it's alright is produced by Daniel Smith, one of the most interesting people in music today. get ready, because this is going to be a sweet album. i can already taste it.

andy

a lingering thought from Easter

i’ve been thinking about this one thing since Easter.
Can’t seem to stop thinking about it.
it’s a very Easter-ish thing.
it’s a good thing though.

so I’m not too worried about it getting to be a problem.
Actually, I’m hoping it will stay stuck
and be something permanent to think about.


you see, the Trinity is something that no one really knows much about.
here are some things that i hang on to in order to better understand the Trinity:
a) the love within the Trinity is the purest love that exists, possibly even the reason why the Trinity decided to create… so that this unbelievable unity could shared, enjoyed, worshipped by others
b) the fellowship within the Trinity is closer than any two people and a little more separate than different qualities inside the same person… somewhere in between.
c) the existence of the Trinity simply is. The Trinity is outside of time and throughout all of eternity the Trinity has experienced this perfect and complete fellowship.


until…(this is where it gets really crazy)


part of the Trinity came to earth (time).
part of the Trinity took on a humanities worth of things that the Trinity has never been associated with—sin.
then the Trinity for some period of time was separated, different than before, missing a part.
Why would an all powerful being give up the most perfect thing that exists for any amount of time?
surely not for mankind!


Oh, the love that was required to do such an illogical thing.
God is good. this fact is now even more solidified in my mind.
the only time that the Trinity was ever separated was on my account.



--andy

Bound For Home For the First Time

I‘ve broken my feet
too many times
And wrapped them up with
too many rhymes
So wisp me away and make these legs un-lame
I've stood on my head
and I've run out the door
I've spun through tornadoes
And fell through the floor
But moths just can‘t seem to resist an open flame
If I read, or write, or grow wings and take flight;
The burden from birth on my back is still so much stronger
This won't last much longer

I'm not looking right or left
I'm not acting foolish
I'm not placing bets
I‘m looking up ‘cause that's where I'm headed
As soon as I get these shoes unleaded
From all those unlit unforevers
They‘re weighing me down
They‘re soiling my feathers
I can start to feel the breeze of new weather coming down
That‘s where I‘ll be found
I'm bound for home
for the first time
Right now is just the worst time

this is what we do.

just a glimpse of andy rhea and his band's grueling practice schedule:

1:00 get stuff moved onto stage and set up

1:20 "your mother" jokes

1:30 go over new stuff

3:00 lay on futons and dream. talk about music.

3:25 tickle fight

3:35 go over previously performed stuff

4:30 jam. make stuff up.

5:00 go to Jack in the Box and eat tacos with kenneth stanger

6:30 head home.

(schedule is tentative. "your mother" jokes may start up to 5 minutes into setup.)

How "The Shack" Helped Me

I try to maintain a limber mind whenever someone tries to express the unexpressable. For instance, with anything spiritual (especially anything concerning God) words aren't really going to do justice to the situation. You just can't blame a human for that. None of us are smart enough. It’s very important to understand this when reading anything written by a human concerning spirituality. That material is going to be subjective, personal, and might not fit in perfectly with your own views and emotions.

So…

Just so you know…

That’s how I try to read this kind of stuff.

The Shack is fiction. And this isn’t a review so I’m not going to spoil the ending for you or anything like that, but reading this book did raise a line of thought that lead me to a dogmatic conclusion concerning God.

William P. Young was very creative in animating the Trinity into this novel. While doing so, liberties were taken on the personality of God. I love to wonder about God, about how he thinks, feels, smells, etc. There’s plenty to wonder about and even though the Bible reveals bits and pieces of God, it really just encourages my question asking habits. Despite all the wondering and questions, I try really hard not to accept assumptions and hypotheses of God as fact because somebody once told me in junior high just what you make of “you and me” when you assume…

:)

In The Shack, I don’t really see evidence of this type of fear and respect.

So you should read this book and be affirmed that no human can enclose the personality of God into a fictional story. The Shack was essentially written to try to get people to think of God outside of their religious box, but this story is itself a box that tries to contain the personality of God.

My dogmatic conclusion is this: God is what God is and no human can or should conclude any of those “is’s” outside of scripture.

--andy

http://theshackbook.com/

Pressed into Molds

Today, I was thinking about the imagery that scripture paints of our relationship to God as being clay to a potter. It caused me to ponder the ramifications of this analogy and so my random thoughts are as follows.

I often times feel in my life that I am being squeezed into a mold of what everyone else thinks. The molds of what to do, what to say, who to associate with, how to spend my time, etc. are a few of the many molds I find myself not only squeezed into, but also somehow strangely attracted to. However, as I ponder this idea of potter and clay it leads me to a few realizations. I don’t know a lot about pottery, but I do understand enough to recognize that pottery produced by a mold carries a less significant value than pottery produced by a master potter. The pottery that is massed produced is just a reproduction of a mold. There are no unique features that one pot possesses over that of another produced in the same mold. The pottery made by a master potter, however, is a unique product of his skilled hand. It’s beautiful and set apart as a work of art. The molded pottery is mass produced and sold to the general public for a general price and a general use.

Molded pottery is easy to make and very cost efficient. In the same way it’s easy to auto pilot through life and live the status quo. But there is something in me, as well as the rest of humanity, that says there is something more—and there is much more. It’s the process of no longer being confirmed to the pattern of the molds, and allowing the potter to shape, in which us earthen vessels find life.

-Matt Assel-

2 new frontiers

we've got some big plans on the horizon. new frontiers for this summer. first of all, recording a band album; which will start next month. secondly, a decent sized tour which right now will extend as far as Baltimore, MD and back. several stops along the way (bathroom breaks, leg stretch breaks, shows, etc.) so you'll want to keep an eye out for where we're playing if you're in that area. things are tentative at the moment but we'll keep you closely updated on the nitty-gritty of what, when, and where.

--and His band

some love for winchester, IL

I’m pretty sure I could play at tiny little venues with the good fans for the rest of my life. If you were at the show last night, thanks for making my week.

--andy

The Final Breath (a waltz)

This is the end of me
my final breath
new life to be

The new life stills my lungs
it's ecstasy
it's old to younge

I'm hearing voices of
unspoken tounges
that speak in love

The dancing will begin
we'll dance above
forgiven sin

This is the start for me
with servant grin
new life to be

Cloudless Day

This, being the first "official blog" of the website should be about important things, the things that weigh heaviest on my mind. you know, stresses and stuff...and yet the only thing i have to talk about right now is how content i am in a certain area.
females are great. wonderful to have around. but right now i'm in a season of my life where i have:
a) no girlfriend
b) no prospects
c) no motivation to engage in the awkwardness of starting a relationship
So basically, this area of my life is pretty non-existent right now and you know what? it's pretty nice. i'm enjoying it big time. The stress, the worry, the self-consciousness...all gone for now at least. It's like a cloudless spring day.
--andy