castledoor

update

2010-07-24T01:45:00.000-07:00

the bad news...

it may be obvious by now that castledoor is no longer a band.
we explored ideas to keep it together but it seems best to move on.

the good news...

download now on itunes: The Ship Recordings 2007
these songs come from the era of the "'til We Sink" EP.
produced by us and the great Aaron Espinoza, featuring 4 unreleased tracks:
1. Catching Wind of Global Warming
2. Bible Belt Blues
3. Hits Home
4. Zaika

Live At Spaceland - June 2009
Spaceland Recordings was there to capture the last night of our Spaceland residency. this will be coming out very soon.

CURRENT PROJECTS

brando is currently out on the road playing bass with our friends Rooney.
follow him on twitter for updates: @bwando

joel is playing drums for his new band Lesands:
Myspace: myspace.com/lesands
Facebook: facebook.com/lesandsmusic
Twitter: @Lesandsmusic

i (nate) seriously miss playing with joel and brando- best and most talented bros ever. hoping we can do something together again at some point.

liska & i just started a new project called Doom & Gloom.
download 2 free songs at bandcamp: doomandgloom.bandcamp.com
be the first to follow and friend us:
twitter: @dmglm
Blog: doomandgloomband.blogspot.com
Facebook: facebook.com/doomandgloomband
Myspace: myspace.com/doomandgloomband

LOVE LOVE LOVE

OUT NOW

2010-05-08T01:43:00.000-07:00

the flashlight ep is now available on iTunes.

2nd place

2010-04-29T23:10:00.001-07:00

we took 2nd place in the rock category for the songwriting competition that we told you about last month.

there were over 15,000 entries, so that's pretty cool. also, tom waits, black francis, james mercer, timbaland, robert smith & the kings of leon were all apart of the judges panel, so that's also pretty cool.

in terms of a tangible prize, we get an sm58 microphone, an m-audio keyboard, 30 packs of guitar strings and a few other random dilly dallies. so there, that's also pretty cool.

Flashlight EP details

2010-04-27T21:55:00.000-07:00

we recorded this new ep completely on our own, similar to how we did our first ep "Follow the Dove," except this time around each band member recorded their individual parts at their home studio...which in some cases just meant GarageBand. then we compiled all the tracks onto one computer and had our go-to mixer Robin Holden mix and master. we are very pleased with the results.

tracklist:

1. Burning Bridges On Purpose
2. Chance
3. Flashlight
4. Man Overboard
5. Let's Suffer Together

we wrote most of these these songs around the end of 2009. "Man Overboard" is the only exception - being one of the first songs we wrote when the band started. we recorded a new version of it that sounds warm and fits in well with the new material.

this will be a digital-only release (no physical copies will be made). the company that puts our music on iTunes didn't give us a release date - should be out in about 3 weeks though. we'll definitely keep you in the loop.

for a free download of the title track, go here: www.purevolume.com/castledoor

International Songwriting Competition

2010-03-22T21:06:00.000-07:00

The International Songwriting Competition (ISC) is the top songwriting competition in the world.

last year i heard about it and decided to submit our song "Fifth Tambourine." i almost didn't do it cause i thought it would be a waste of 30 bucks or whatever. who actually wins these things anyway? well, we do... kinda.

each year they get thousands and thousands of submissions. then they narrow it down and pull together a panel of celebrity and industry judges. the founders of the competition aren't involved in picking the winner, so each year around christmas time they do a promotion where they choose their favorite song. yep, you guessed it, they chose us! i received a sweet personal congratulatory phone call from founder Candace Avery and a check in the mail for $1,000!!!

i explained to her that the timing was almost comical. having happened within a week of losing a couple band members.

we also made it to the finalists. so this april (2010) our song will be judged by the likes of Tom Waits, Kings of Leon, Robert Smith, Black Francis & James Mercer among others. the grand prize winner takes home $25,000 in cash and $3,000 in prizes. our hopes aren't up, but omg.

however small or big this whole thing is it's encouraging, and a nice reminder that we're in the right business. the business of making songs.

the best is yet to come

2010-02-21T23:29:00.000-08:00

it feels completely insane to write that after 5 years of blood, sweat, tears, and some of the best times of our lives... the Castledoor chapter as we know it is coming to a close.

i always thought we would be the band that would survive anything.
most of us were actually feeling optimistic about things lately.
we recently finished recording some our most exciting songs with plans for a photo shoot, video shoot and press.

the slow progression of our band as a career only made us want to work harder.
regardless of the frustrations we had we always valued the fundamental joy of playing music with each other.

sadly, Gabe announced to us this week that he was ready to move on from Castledoor.

we're really bummed but we wish Gabe and Coury all the happiness in the world.

soon we hope to make the recent recordings (Flashlight EP) available on all digital music stores, including iTunes.

we're sincerely grateful to all of you who have shown your support.
from the bottom of our hearts: THANK YOU!

Joel, Brando, Liska & I plan to continue making music together.
although we're filled with all sorts of emotions, there is an overwhelming sense that the best is yet to come.

love, nate and all of castledoor

wappy walentine's day

2010-02-14T09:30:00.000-08:00

we have an unreleased song called "Zaika"
and it's featured on LA Record's Valentine's Day Mixtape.
download vol 2: click here

it's a fun listen.
but for the faithful followers of our blog...
we're offering the song apart from the mix as a free download.
the link will only be active for 1 week,
so get it while you can!

<< DOWNLOAD "ZAIKA" MP3 >>

SONG HISTORY

this song was recorded at The Ship with Aaron Espinoza.
only 3 songs were released from those sessions on our 'Til We Sink EP
we still wanna find a way to leak them out.
thanks to Ryan Baxley, we even made a music video for the song in 2007:

another note: "Zaika" is a Russian word meaning rabbit.
it is often used as a term of endearment.
Liska is Ukranian and speaks fluent Russian, so it's legit y'all.

"from the bottom the only way is UP"

tracking is done

2010-02-09T21:15:00.000-08:00

i saw the biggest rainbow i've ever seen today.
got outta my car and snapped this phone pic.

SO- feels great to announce we're officially done recording the Flashlight ep!
mixing and mastering will occur over the next couple weeks.
at the moment we're searching for a PR firm to help us with the release.
we'll try and keep you all in the loop as things progress.
eventually we'll share some details of what the recording process was like.

at this point it's looking like a May release, but hopefully sooner.

in the meantime...
trying out new material on Coop:

he seems unimpressed. that bald little jerk.

18 thousand + views

2010-02-08T12:57:00.000-08:00

yesterday one of the jonas bros, joe, tweeted that he liked our song "dumpster diving" --- crazy how much interest you can stir up on the internets when you have 282,535 followers on your twitter. i'm not sure how many views we had on our dumpster diving video before, but this morning we have 18,731. so thank you joe jonas!

in other news- we still have merchandise available at our new online store here: http://castledoor.bigcartel.com/

several tote bags are up and ready to go. limited sizes in shirts for now, but as you can see from our post below, we like wearing our t-shirts oversized and awesome.

girl crazy

2010-02-06T23:02:00.000-08:00

liska and i are obsessed with GIRLS.
we've listened to their ALBUM nonstop since it came out last september.
christopher owens delivers the songs with such heartbreaking sincerity.
it all started when i heard this song and saw this video:

sometimes a band will come at the perfect time in your life and fit your every mood.
we saw them in december at the troubadour.
then again, at the detroit bar last week.
we even bought shirts!

castleSTORE !

2010-02-06T00:01:00.000-08:00

we're in business! Buy a shirt or a tote!

SHOP NOW

existing and beyond

2010-02-04T09:56:00.000-08:00

so that was the depressing chart from cnn recently.
imagine trying to start a band in the middle of this.
i don't wanna get into a discussion about the music "business" because honestly, it makes me nauseous. people become musicians so they don't have to look at charts and talk numbers.

but you better start swimming or you'll sink like a stone, for the times...they are a changin'!

so here we are. a band full of modest nice guys and gals, being forced to kick and swim and force ourselves into peoples faces and ears. our shows are probably anything BUT modest, but that's because we are home there. the stage is the one thing we DO know. and we know it damn well. and we love it. but that god-awful word "networking" we don't know so well.

the reason our band goes through long lulls of no news isn't because we stopped rehearsing or making music, it's because we were waiting for opportunities to show up. every day checking the gmail to see if we got a big ol record deal (which is kind of an inside band joke). we get emails all the time from A&R peeps from all the majors. but you could respond to every single one of them and it wouldn't matter - at least in our experience. we even got 2 real record deal offers. one of them was swiped away from another local "silver lake" band (didn't think that could happen, but if it could happen surely it would happen to us). the other was retracted after business execs got cold feet in the biggest economic crisis of our time.

so then we wait some more. we wait for show offers, for interview inquiries, for something...ANYTHING. waiting around to die. all the while, doing our "job" of making and playing music. it's frustrating, because it causes you to question everything. thoughts like "maybe it's just not meant to be for castledoor" / then we remind ourselves the truth that we are a great band! certainly we're deserving of a chance if "so and so and so and so" get's a chance.

so we press on. some days that simply means existing. writing another song. booking another rehearsal. tweeting, haha. sometimes just existing as a band is the most bad ass thing you can do. to keep going after self-releasing 2 ep's and one full length album and not making a penny. literally we don't make any money from this band. maybe that's TMI, but fuggit. in the history of this band the only time we've personally made money is if at the end of the year we have a bit of "castledoor money" to bonus ourselves out for christmas. like here's a hundred bucks each or whatever. the rest goes back into the pot to keep fueling our existence.

sounds pathetic. and the last thing we wanna do is be a mopey band. liska told me i should blog more often and so today i woke up and decided i had some explaining to do. we normally don't inform our fans of all the little details. probably because every band is always on the verge of some really exciting thing that never comes through. but that's okay. that's life. the possibility of something great is what keeps you going. and my my my the possibilities ENDLESS!

anywayzzz--

lots to look forward to these days. our first ever real professional photo shoot is scheduled for march 1st. we are mega blessed to get the chance to work with two super talented photographers. see some examples here: http://www.williamshirakawa.com
we also have a video shoot in the works. the new music is better than ever and we're all still alive and in pretty decent health. let's do this! whatever that is.

before i go back to work (yes, i'm sitting at a desk at my day job getting paid for this!) i would like to leave you with a quote from one of my favorite people (i nearly cried when i watched him give this speech on his last late night show):

"Please, do not be cynical. I hate cynicism. For the record, it’s my least favorite quality. It doesn’t lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen. I’m telling you, amazing things will happen. I’m telling you, it’s just true." - Conan O'Brien

2010-01-23T02:27:00.000-08:00

castledoor back in the stooodio

2009-09-16T15:20:00.000-07:00

we started recording our new song.
you'll all hear it really soon! of course, we're all really excited about it.
we've been busy working on new music and talking with label peeps, good things are happening and we can not
wait to go on tour and record more new music and get it out there.

here are a few pics from yesterday.
we will try and keep this thing updated...even for our sake, to keep track of all we do :/

Invisible Children (& a new free song!)

2009-03-30T23:53:00.000-07:00

ok so here's the deal...

On April 25th, non-profit INVISIBLE CHILDREN will be staging a global event in an effort to rescue the 3,000 child soldiers in Uganda, and we are part of a coalition of bands/musicians creating awareness online to make this a huge success via Biggestlabelever.com and Causecast.org.

In support of The Rescue we are giving away a free download of our song "Hidden Treasure" on BiggestLabelEver.com

go to the site (i think you need to create a login username/password), click on Free Music and you'll find us under the alphabetical artists list, then click Get Track. a short video will play, once it's finished you will be able to download the song.

This song is one of our personal fav's and has become a live favorite for fans as well. It will be featured on our new record Shouting At Mountains out on iTunes April 21st!

p.s. in other news...
just put in an order for castledoor tote bags (gonna start makin' the merch happen like a rurl band!)

Castledoor March Tour 2009!

2009-03-27T23:07:00.000-07:00

morro bay

2009-03-11T12:08:00.000-07:00

i have an obsession with the coast of northern california.
i've only spent time there on a handful of occasions, but
each time has been rich. just simply making the drive up
the pacific coast highway, or even inland on the 101 is an
experience that makes you think hard and ache in a good
way. at the moment, the way it looks and feels to me is
how i want the music to sound. i don't always aim for
that when writing a song, cause the songs kinda choose
their own personality in a way. but anyway--

last year lisa and i went to morro bay, which is actually
south of monterey. we have a song on the new album
that's sort of an ode to both locations.
below are some photos of our time in morro bay:

bordello photos

2009-02-06T12:09:00.000-08:00

we recently played a fun show at bordello.
here are a few photos taken by jeff koga.

thank you spaceland recordings

2009-01-29T15:37:00.000-08:00

recorded live on Jan 20th, 2009 @ the Echoplex in Los Angeles

to download a free mp3 of this performance go here: www.spacelandrecordings.com/castledoor

lost video camera

2008-12-16T11:30:00.000-08:00

we lost a video camera at our show on saturday at the echoplex.
it was last seen on top of a car in the parking lot near the entrance.

if anyone has any info PLEASE contact us here or at: castledoormusic@gmail.com

there's lots of family footage on it that is very valuable only to us.

thank you

it looks like this:

men's choir

2008-11-29T13:45:00.000-08:00

members of castledoor, amnion, the monolators, and avi buffalo all recently performed alongside jack from tenlons fort at mr. t's bowl in highland park. it was a glorious evening.

photo by jeff "koganuts" koga

remember when @ the lyric hyperion theater

2008-11-21T16:35:00.000-08:00

a nice person just uploaded a video from our music video premier show
it captures the beauty, and comedy, of the moment

I'm not embedding the video because you need to watch in high quality!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWEdg9RHNZU

party vocals

2008-11-05T11:46:00.000-08:00

all this talk about history in the making.
it's wonderful.

here's a pic of liska in the booth.
i snuck it because i think it's illegal to take photos in there.
i used my finger to cover up the flash then i had to brighten the crap out of it in photoshop... still a fun shot tho i think.

last night we drank wine and recorded "party vocals" on one of our tracks...
it was the whole band, plus nikki and aaron AND mayla --- who might as well be part of the band these days. then we watched snippets of obama making his speach. aaron pointed out the serious baby similarities... i couldn't believe i had never seen this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5ALIL7T764

it's just STUFF

2008-10-27T18:43:00.001-07:00

i totaled my car just a few blocks from the studio.
lisa called the insurance company.
(thank goodness she purchased insurance a couple weeks ago)
then aaron came down and gave us words of encouragement.
we picked up a rental car and carried on with recording.

ain't nothin gonna stop us!

"i'll shake the dust right off of my feet"

2008-10-24T14:23:00.000-07:00

songs becoming an album

2008-10-21T17:16:00.000-07:00

gosh, it's starting to feel really good
we've been slaving away for the last couple months
just trying to write good songs
we may have come up with something special
something that could take us out of obscure indie band land *lol* ...*tears*
now we're faced with the challenge of recording those songs

we've struggled with this area in the past
never been fully satisfied with our recorded music

i am happy and surprised to hear myself type this.. these new recordings are VERY satisfying

we magically collided with a producer who is a perfect match for us right now

everyone in the band keeps saying how much fun this is
and it is, but there's this other weird element to it
like we're all a bunch of zombies just walking out a predestined adventure

back at it again tonight...

on this harvest moon

2008-10-14T12:36:00.000-07:00

i believe in the moon!

there was such a stiring last night.
we tracked 4 songs in about 3 hours.
o boy does it feel nice to be in good hands.

tonight we begin work on a song temporarily titled "hush"

usually i have a title for the song and then the band has a speparate title.
"hush" was adopted because we sing the word several times.
but it's not very original. which is an ironic concern, because one of the songs themes is that there's nothing new under the sun. (side note: there actually seems to be some completely original ideas and creations under the sun... ie: the spaceship)

i started brainSTORMing for a diff title.
the song mentions the moon. and today is the "harvest moon"
turns out some dude already used that title. but hey, there's nothin new under the sun... or is there.
once in a blue moon, i suppose.

after further research it looks like technically this moon is the "hunter's moon"
which is also a common song title (just search the itunes store).

anywayz

sorry for the heavy verbage and lack of visual stimuli.
hopefully we'll get some pix goin on the next post.

feel free to post song title ideas in the comments!

"the moon is empathizing how i toss and turn...

it says "hush" ..."

spring up o well

2008-10-02T17:02:00.000-07:00

we got lots of new songs in the works
honestly, i've never been more excited about castle_D music, eva
we're being very critical of ourselves, but at the same time feeling very freeeee

some temporary song titles

Hidden Treasure
Across The Border
Free! The Separation of Church and Nate
Dusty
The Bad Guy

that's all fer now
can't wait til you get to here it

(image stolen from someones flickr)

love_nayte

p.s. speaking of FREE, check out this artist: Claes Oldenburg

vinyl

2008-04-29T15:26:00.000-07:00

is the new (old) cool thing.

but seriously..
i'd love to hear the way we sound through the needle.

howabout you?

-- fingers crossed, this shit's going down.

tour 11/2007

2007-11-12T14:25:00.000-08:00

so, we're back from our 2nd WeekendTour of the season!
it was sooo crazy!
we had 2 jam packed shows!! (jk... i don't even know what that means...)
but seriously, we played 2 shows with Earlimart.

one in Fresno, one in San Francisco.
Fresno show: nice, fun...kinda weird. some guy jumped on the side
of the stage, humping the air... i think i was the only lucky one in
the band who witnessed it--

S.F-- i would have to say this was one of our funnest shows.
i can't believe austin and robby came to the show w/ their friends,
all the way from LA...

now that's cool.

we also had Rotee deliver, so we ate naan, and masala after the show...
best food ever.
i can't believe brando was all trying to eat 2 naan....
[if you every go to S.F...you have to eat here: www.roteesf.com]

so anyway.
this was probably the best weekend of my life.

w/ love,
lisa cole.

rez a dent see

2007-10-05T17:24:00.000-07:00

2007-09-06T10:33:00.000-07:00

2007-08-22T13:43:00.001-07:00

2007-08-21T21:59:00.000-07:00

So last night we did a lil acoustic session at Indie 103 with Chuck P. of Dead Air. He was a real classy guy and we had a great time.
Photos to follow.

Then we went and ate Indian food. Quite possibly the best we've (I've) ever had. Joel was mad because his meal was like $20.
Here we are after dinner thinking we are really cool. Well, just Brandon is really.

Love. Us.

yes master

2007-07-13T09:15:00.000-07:00

mastering was last weekend--
mark chalecki is the mad scientist behind mastering.

so now tomorrow (saturday July 14th, 2007) we will do our final revisions and print the master. then-- over the weekend we'll finish up the art (well, lisa will finish up the art while i check on her every 2 minutes saying "how's it goin', babe?")

so, most of castledoor got to see dr. dog play while they were in california.
they were great bearded musicians.
lisa and i waited in a "signing line" to meet them and felt like complete dweebs, and since lisa was nervous she made fun of one of the guys' sunburns.

oh- and we're playing a cd release show with Earlimart on Aug. 17th in santee monikee. should be fun.

okay, keep an eye on our myspace... we should be posting new music soon!

mixy mix at the ship hole

2007-07-01T23:04:00.000-07:00

last week of mixing...

mastering on суббота...

2007-06-25T13:43:00.001-07:00

we have our last silverlake lounge residency show this thursday, June 28, 2007.

so, come! ... thanks eli, for our pictures.

2007-05-23T11:38:00.000-07:00

we should be updating this thing...daily!

here are a few pictures. enjoy.
lc

2007-04-30T19:23:00.000-07:00

we had a fun little sunday afternoon yesterday. after church and chipotle we had a photo shoot... our good buddy phil danyew clicked the pictures for us.
what a day--

then we played a show at spaceland and brando had to wait outside the whole night until it was our turn to play (cause he's just a little baby)... haha what a dum dum... at least nate and joel got extra drink tickets.
do you think it's possible castledoor could get a newcastle endorsement?

Happiness is the ship

2007-04-15T23:41:00.000-07:00

ps. thank you monolators for writing a wonderful song,
that i used for the first part of the video.
:)

Back at it.

2007-04-12T08:41:00.000-07:00

follow the big bird.

2007-04-08T15:51:00.000-07:00

happy easter y'alls!

as reported two months ago... we began work on a brand new EP.
we are proud to announce that we've been working with Aaron Espinoza from the band Earlimart.

here are a few pics from the week we spent in the studio so far:

sorry-- we didn't get too many pictures.
we shot lots of video and haven't been able to upload it cause of stupid technical difficulties.

anyway, we're so excited about our new material (duh, a-doykie).
we're hoping to finish up by the end of april, but trying to match up our schedule with aaron is like solving a rubix cube.
we can tell you that there are 6 full band tracks (if we decide to keep them all)
and that the title will be "Shoutin' At Mountains"....