update

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

the flashlight ep is now available on iTunes.

2nd place

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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 !

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

SHOP NOW

existing and beyond

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