AMY ANNELLE: news

I'm about to perigrinate up the plains to play some shows,

across the valleys of the Candadian and the Cimarron,

to the Rocky Mountains and then some.

I hope to see some of you who dwell out that way and your neighbors too. 

 

Friday July 9 

MATTER BOOKSTORE

144 N. College Avenue

Fort Collins, CO

with Origami Hands

http://www.wolverinefarmpublishing.org/matter-bookstore/about-matter-bookstore.html

 

Saturday July 10 

TITWRENCH FESTIVAL

a three-day all-ages, DIY festival of music & visual art

GLOB

3551 Brighton Blvd.

Denver, CO

http://titwrench.com/day-two.php

 

Sunday July 11

Buckhorn Bar

114 E. Ivinson

Laramie, Wyoming

with Birgit Burke, Mike Safran & friends

(307) 742-3554

 

Monday July 12

KRFC Live at Lunch

noon Mountain Time

Ft. Collins, CO

listen live http://krfcfm.org/

 

 

I'll have copies of the new album"The Cimarron Banks" and other music too.

 

You might find me on the street at the Woody Guthrie Free Folk Festival in Okemah, Oklahoma July 14--18.  You might find me any old place between here and there.

 

Fare Forward, Voyagers!

Amy Annelle

 

P.S.  There's a page up for "The Cimarron Banks", come say hidy:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Amy-Annelle-The-Cimarron-Banks/373241298603

Oh, how the storms come up o'er the High Plains.  

On a moody muggy afternoon, a lonely gravid cloud 

means possibilities.

It casts its shadow & starts to stir up the air around it.  

Before your very eyes, it's gathered a roiling mass of allies,

charged particles, all with a notion to rumble and lash.  

There is a lively energy exchange with the paralell plane.  

The thunder comes, bolts of lightning are hurled,

a banshee wind drives a curtain of rain.  

To be caught in the open in such a storm is to laugh as you run for your life,

is to know how it feels to be alive.

This is not unlike how a tour happens.  

A festival, an offer of hospitality, a house concert or happening

is the cloud that starts a reaction in the air around it.  

This is happening already; a tour is in the air!  

So I thought I would put the word out that, if you've written me in the past

about a show in your neck of the woods,

now is a good time to remind me.

Yes please to drop a line if you'd like to see about booking a show,

or want to suggest a friendly listening spot, happening

or show putter-onner near you.

 Commotion & reaction, thank you & bless you.

~~~~~~~~~~

The official release of "The Cimarron Banks" approaches June 1st!*

It can be got via good old fashioned mail order, or from me at a show.  

To order with cash or check, please send $12 + $3 ship & handle = $15

(international orders please include $5 shipping & handling)

and do send an email to let me know it's on the way!

 

AMY ANNELLE/HIGH PLAINS SIGH

1101 JEWELL STREET

AUSTIN TEXAS 78704 USA

highplainssigh@gmail.com

 

Or you may use paypal by clicking the 'order now' button at www.highplainssigh.com

There's another curious happening on the High Plains:

at the very top of mesas, that much closer to the clouds

tiny butterflies fly around and do their thing,

despite the stiff winds and long odds.

perhaps it's the view that stretches forever,

perhaps it's the lack of affect from concrete & plow.

It's a wonder they survive, or find each other at all;

but clearly they do.  

 

With love from the hinterlands,

Amy Annelle

Hello friends,

 

 I am very happy to announce the new album:

 

THE CIMARRON BANKS

A High Plains Emanation.

by Amy Annelle

"The Cimarron Banks reveals Amy Annelle as

a High Plains angel, serenading sagebrush

and shadows, while harmonizing with the wind. 

Her songs are sparse and transcendent. 

But far from being cloud-bound, Amy exalts the soil—

what grows from it, walks on it, and is built upon it. 

She also marks the trail of remnants:  that which is

wilted, forsaken and ghostly"

–Irwin Chusid, WFMU radio

cover painting by Valerie Fowler

TRACK LISTING:

The Cimarron Banks ~ The Hellhound's Address ~ Wounded Man ~ Harden Your Blades ~ Carrion Dream ~ Wake Up, Little Dark Eyes ~ Paleface Blues ~ Forever In-Between ~ Miss It More Than You Know How ~ Ode To A Lone Bird ~ The Nightjar's Blues ~ Streaking With The Lightning

SEALED CD IN TRIPLE-GATEFOLD SLEEVE

Official Release Date June 1, 2010

~Pre-orders will be filled Immediately~

$12 each + $3 shipping & handling

normal bulk shipping rates will be estimated for multiple or International copies.

 

AVAILABLE FROM HIGH PLAINS SIGH MAIL ORDER ONLY!

YOU MAY ORDER YOUR COPY

via paypal button:

http://www.highplainssigh.com

or good old fashioned mail order with check or cash:

Amy Annelle/High Plains Sigh

1101 Jewell Street

Austin, Tex 78704 USA

listen to music samples & read more about the album here:

http://www.highplainssigh.com/bio.html

early airplay on WFMU, KXT, Asheville Free Media

To request a review or airplay copy please write 

highplainssigh@gmail.com

 

THANK YOU, ALL OF YOU,

FOR YOUR SUPPORT THROUGH THE YEARS!

"The Cimarron Banks" written & played by Amy Annelle; produced & recorded by Craig Ross. Additional recording by Brian Beattie. Mastered by Joe Gastwirt. Paintings and illustrations by Valerie Fowler. Special guest musicians Ian McLagan, Paul Brainard, Craig Ross, Josh Housh, Molly Fischer, Will Landin, Tom Cornelison.

 

 

~~~~~~~~~~

"THE CIMARRON BANKS" is on Facebook, but it's shy and not really sure what it's supposed to do there.  Please come visit and give it a cup of tea or something:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Amy-Annelle-The-Cimarron-Banks/373241298603?v=info

Amy Annelle SXSW 2010 Austin Texas USA

Music Showcase--Friday, March 19 7:30 p.m. at Stephen F.'s Bar at Intercontinental Hotel, 701 Congress Ave.

Sweet Relief Acoustic Stage/SXSW Interactive--Monday March 13 4 p.m. at the Beacon Lounge in the Austin Convention Center, 500 E. Cesar Chavez St.

Free Show--Sunday 2.21 7:30 PM at Flipnotics South, 1601 Barton Springs Road

OKEMAH, OKFUSKEE COUNTY, OKLAHOMA USA I met woody guthrie's sweet baby sister mary jo guthrie  at the Okemah Shamrock gas station.  she god blessed me and said she loved me and all musicians and sat with me a minute and gave me a little card with woody's photo and her address and a red heart and on the back was a version of the Optimist Creed. "my father raised all us kids on this," she told me, and that she passes it on to folks she meets. now i believe the Optimist Creed was written in 1912 and i don't know much of it's history or politics. this is personal. please don't overthink it. take ms. mary jo's words to heart and follow the straight line they make to a certain place: the guthrie family kids getting raised up in hard times, in a house on a hill in okemah.  (some of the story: "Bound For Glory" by Woody Guthrie)

here's what it says on the back of the card ms. guthrie gave to me:

TO BE so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.

TO TALK health, happiness and prosperity to every person you meet.

TO MAKE all your friends feel there is something special in them.

TO LOOK at the sunny side of everything.

TO THINK, work, and expect only the best.

TO BE just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.

TO FORGET the mistakes of the past and look to the future.

TO WEAR a cheerful countenance always and give every living creature you meet a smile.

TO GIVE so much time to self improvement that you have no time to criticize others.

TO BE too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

Ahoj friends,

And welcome, those of you new to the High Plains Drifter Newsletter. It was really something, this last tour of America's oft-overlooked Great Plains (and some mountains too). Summoning songs with you in abandoned churches, art spaces, backyards and the odd dive bar. Thank you for being capacitors, and making it happen.

when i got back to texas though, i got whipped up in the whirlwind. and oh, i got tired. maybe you too would like to be let off the hook, to forget for a moment about the ephemeral billions being slung around Washington and Wall Street, indeed the world. the unfathomable debt in which we are, in a way, drowning. money, it seems, has grown tired of all the fuss, the discrepancies. money is flown off to some theoretical nest no economist can reach and it ain't coming down. encouraging in its absence the development of other currencies: self-sufficiency, creativity, friendship, thrift.

this is not to belittle the troubles of any given individual. indeed, we got big problems. but this is not all there is to it. there are happenings in other orbits. it's a warm morning here, and the mexican woodpeckers and grackles are up in the oaks babbling their cryptic liquid songs. selfish, it could be said, or self-preservative to focus elsewhere, but do try.

i would like to tell you what the great plains did to me. plains of earth, not air. i could tell you all kinds of stories, about the fishermen in thailand who, upon pulling up the day's catch in their big nets, pick out the stingrays and throw them like frisbees about the ship deck; or i could tell you about the geezer hobos i met under the Highway 969 bridge, who have been there since 1978 with one guitar and one styrofoam cooler, exploring their endless repertroire of obscure country songs. but these are of another plane. so, i will stick to the earth.

* * * * * * * * * * *

it was a hell of a drift, this one.
from the Balcones Escarpment to the Livingston Range,
by way of Sand Hills, open range and Bad Lands;
rivers Red, Arkansas, Milk, Missouri;
through the main upthrust of the Rocky Mountains
and her many drifting island offspring.

Threading it all together are plains so vast as to wipe off the map the heavy-handed boundaries of states, the dotted lines of latitude and longitude. Skies so wide as to reduce to a whisper those wildcat oil towns, handsome brick-laid cowtowns, fur trading outposts and county seats. sightlines so long as to dismiss the last hundred and fifty-odd years of white settlement that led up to the settled American Great Plains of today, the Greatly Unsettled America of today. The fear-mongers' voices do not carry far on a prairie wind, and if they do, it's because you're listening for them.

But then the traveler tops a rise and falls into region of endless corporate croplands. a stillness descends. the spirit of the land dies. it's the same sort of feeling you get when you see your first open pit mine or old growth clear cut: it has to come from somewhere, my dear. many plains farmers today are laying their bets on biofuels. this is the source of one kind of "green energy", oceans of it stretching endlessly (though when ripe, the strange sorghum heads are more of a pinkish-purple).

and then a town grid rises from the flat monoculture palatte and you temporarily inhabit it, and start to meet more kids at shows and folks gas stations of Indian descent. you enter and leave whole other nations: Omaha, Cheyenne, Lakota. or hear, from a highway worker in the Nebraska panhandle, of an isolated all-white town called Whiteclay (pop. 14), located just a few hundred feet from the Pine Ridge Oglala Sioux reservation, where 4 million cans of beer are sold each year*.

history is alive, the people and the land are breathing, at times singing their death song. and simple distinctions between past and present can't be made; suffering and injustice, sacrifice and windfall all wrapped up in the person next to you at the cafe or listening to you sing. No, it wasn't so long ago, and the book is not closed. The Great Plains are a Great Paradox, and my love for them, conflicted as it is, grows deeper still.

a version of the vision:
FURTHER DENATURED
http://www.highplainssigh.com/photos-group-47.html
* * * * * * * * * * *

On the plains today you might still see for yourself how our history's writ in blood in many a meadow and creek bed and sacred, holy place. America has managed to hide the bones of ten million massacred buffalo. and the truth too, shrouded in shame and apathy, when it comes to the wrath loosed upon the Plains Indians, the war we waged on their ground. "Threats, deception and murder"...i don't mean to preach, but if you aren't sure what happened on the plains in the 19th century, you might ought to start asking, reading, finding out.

"redman vs. bluecoat in the Wild West, a few battles ensue and America completes her mainfest destiny, under the auspice of the christian god": this was the lie we were fed as schoolkids, a story that might have stretched from p. 402 halfway down p. 404 in your grade school textbook of US history. this rendition of historical fiction affords much romance to the prairie sod buster, the Sooners racing for their Oklahoma land claims, wily scouts and lone rangers who made the plains "safe" for white expansion. this fiction casts the Indian character as carved of wood, some mysterious wildman who pops out of the bushes in his full feather bonnet, a half-wit with a hatchet and a peace pipe, a willing, doe-eyed squaw played by a white lady with braided hair dyed black.

Of course, the nation had much to gain by dehumanizing the Plains Indian--America coveted the land they lived on and the untold riches therein--and dehumanizing is an essential component of genocide. in the century and a half since, tens of millions of settlers, tens of billions of dollars of resource exploitation and agriculture do make a lot of historical noise, threatening to drown out anything that doesn't substantiate it.

Quiet, quiet. what remains is the impact of deeper harmonics, the legacy of an american "victory": reservations carved like gristle out of the plains, accounts of the miserly rations doled out by agencies in the midst of blizzard or drought; the empty treaties, the forced marches, the massacres. and most of all, the descendants of those who survived. No, it wasn't so long ago, and the book is not closed!


* * * * * * * * * * *

Please drop a line if you are so inclined.

Fare Forward, Voyagers!
Amy Annelle

* * * * * * * * * * *

*more on Whiteclay: http://www.commongroundcommonsense.org/forums/lofiversion/index.php/t30469.html

Ahoj, Friends!

I write with word that a tour of the High Plains and Rockies draws
nigh for some friends and I.

Me and Ralph White will be playing solo sets through North Texas and
Oklahoma into Kansas, where we will be joined by dear friend and high
order songmaker Michael Hurley. We continue as a threesome, treading
a faint path 'cross the sea of grass and lightning wrath and cradle of
nomadic horse culture, with a final transect of the Rockies (from
whence the horse cultures descended).

My new album is not quite finished, but I'll be peddling a new very
limited edition tour compilation called "SOME FROM THE STREAM". This
is a drift through my recorded output, from the gloaming of the
twentieth century through the day before yesterday, including several
unreleased tracks.

If you find yourself an inconvenient distance from the high plains,
you may mailorder a copy here:

http://highplainssigh.com/products.html
Also will have a collage notebook series exploring the hypnaogogic
state, based on paintings of exotic deer from the 1920s. see for
yourself:

http://highplainssigh.com/photos.html
We'll see you out there, friends, in your imagination, or physical
manifestation.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
HIGH PLAINS & PEAKS US TOUR

* with Ralph White || www.ralphewhite.com ** with Michael Hurley || www.snockonews.net
FRIDAY, AUGUST 8TH, 2008
DALLAS, TX
*Lee Harvey's
Theater Fire's CD Release Show

SATURDAY, AUGUST 9TH, 2008
DENTON, TX
*Dan's Silver Leaf

MONDAY, AUGUST 11TH, 2008
OKLAHOMA CITY, OK
*Sauced

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 13TH, 2008
TULSA, OK
*Sound Pony

THURSDAY, AUGUST 14TH, 2008
WICHITA, KS
*The Artichoke

FRIDAY, AUGUST 15TH, 2008
KANSAS CITY, MO
**The Brick

SATURDAY, AUGUST 16TH, 2008
LAWRENCE, KS
The Replay Lounge
~~Precious Blood, Michael Hurley~~

SUNDAY, AUGUST 17TH, 2008
LAWRENCE, KS
**Love Garden Sounds

MONDAY, AUGUST 18TH, 2008
OMAHA, NE
**P.S. Collective


TUESDAY, AUGUST 19TH, 2008
VERMILLION, SD
**Washington Street Art Center

FRIDAY, AUGUST 22ND, 2008
FORT COLLINS, CO
KRFC FM
1--3 PM
~~Precious Blood & Michael Hurley play live & disc jockey~~

SATURDAY, AUGUST 23RD, 2008
CENTENNIAL, WY
Beartree Tavern
Arthur Magazine Presents:
the 9th Annual UPLAND BREAKDOWN - 2 PM
~~PRECIOUS BLOOD plays Carducci & Lightbourne's atavistic music
festival with Michael Hurley, The Stop & Listen Boys, Al Rivers &
friends~~

SUNDAY, AUGUST 24TH, 2008
DENVER, CO
**Sliding Door Gallery

MONDAY, AUGUST 25TH, 2008
DENVER, CO
**Lion's Lair

TUESDAY, AUGUST 26TH, 2008
LOUISVILLE, CO
**Waterloo Ice House

THURSDAY, AUGUST 28TH, 2008
SALT LAKE CITY, UT
**House Concert

SATURDAY, AUGUST 30TH, 2008
WEST GLACIER, MT
**Lake Five Resort
Outdoor Concert on the Belton Stage
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Fare Forward, Voyagers!
Amy Annelle

Summer's come now, soft and green

perigrinate, we, to new orleans

to pay homage to jellyroll, bix and magee

breathe of the pineywoods and lowland cajun prairie

tread lightly past water moc and allagata'

and put on harmony with katydid and ciccada



we hope to see you in NEW ORLEANS, friends, and friends thereof:

++++++++++++++
AMY ANNELLE, RALPH WHITE, LADY BABY MISS
Saturday, June 28 10 PM
Dragon's Den
435 Esplanade Ave.
New Orleans, LA
++++++++++++++
there's talk of a Precious Blood hootenanny Sunday somewhere.

Fare Forward, Voyagers!
Amy Annelle

ahoj friends,

the moon has made its final ptolemic aspect and is now Void of
Course. slow down, it says, and use your intuition. the moon has
nothing to fear of earthquakes, snakes or fakes.

amy annelle will be playing tonight in austin, texia:

FRIDAY MAY 2 (Void of Course moon)
Hello Lovers CD release party
with Amy Annelle, Silky and Fiction
Emo's
603 Red River
Austin, Texia

doors at 8, show at 10.

fare forward, voyagers!

body residents of the chthonic state*:

it's roundabout time to get things in order for a summer tour.

if you have written before about having a show in America (for now)
or would like to put one on, please drop a line:
booking@highplainssigh.com

surely some conventional bookings will come into play too. but we're
most curious about the good people and things waiting behind your door
when you open it. be it a house concert, art space, party in the
woods or meadow or what have you.

Amy Annelle will be playing all new songs, songs that are nearly done
being commited to the recorded format [------>now perhaps you are
thinking about being commited elsewhere, like the octagonal Insane
Asylum on Roosevelt Island in 1839]

Ralph White too will be playing songs from his forthcoming solo
album.
myspace.com/ralphewhite

And they will probably do a few shows as the duo Precious Blood,
which is another thing altogether: "Precious Blood is steeped in folk
music's strange past"~~Adam Schragin, Austinist
myspace.com/preciousbloodmusic

***********************
2008 Summer Tour of the Chthonic States
Amy Annelle solo, Ralph White solo
(and some shows as Precious Blood)

Fare Forward, Voyagers!
and thank ye!
xxamy annelle.

***********************
*chthonic...typically refers to the interior of the soil, rather than
the living surface of the land, or the land as territory. It evokes at
once abundance and the grave.

The term 'chthonic' can be used to describe the spirit of nature
within, the unconscious earthly impulses of the Self, one's material
depths, but not necessarily with negative connotations. In the
positive sense, it appears as a 'spirit of nature', creatively
animating Man, things, and the world.

(from the Greek khthonios, of the earth, from the earth; pertaining
to the Earth)

a bee buzzing around town had a look around says it might come down to
this: a pack of mules falling from a ledge into the abyss. two
separate storms speaking lightning together over the high plains. a
refractory pattern and an overtone. a whole lot of feedback and then,
static.

I will be singing in Jandek's band for his SXSW performance Saturday
March 15.
Jandek show info here:
http://2008.sxsw.com/music/showcases/band/69298.html

a house concert:
Amy Annelle w/ Hello Lovers, Aaron Blount
Friday March 14
11 PM
104 Chicon St. (@ Cesar Chavez)
Austin, TX


A new duo of Ralph White & Amy Annelle:
PRECIOUS BLOOD. digging deep in the traditional music game bag for
the ones with the lean muscles and the beautiful hide.

PRECIOUS BLOOD
Friday March 14
3 PM
FXFY'all
1306 E. 6th Street
Austin, TX
free all day party on the east side. From downtown, walk 4 blocks
east of the freeway.

Precious Blood has a new myspace music page:
myspace.com/preciousbloodmusic

fare forward, voyagers!

these things are happening.
the I's have nothing to do with it.


Friday March 7
10 p.m.
AMY ANNELLE with AARON BLOUNT, HELLO LOVERS
The Mohawk
912 Red River St.
Austin, TX
www.mohawkaustin.com
Saturday March 8
9 p.m.
AMY ANNELLE with RALPH WHITE, CHRISTINA CARTER (Scorces,
Charlambides)
house concert at Shawn McMillen's
1011 E. 14th St. (Navasota)
Austin, TX
ralphewhite@myspace.com
www.wholly-other.com

fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past
into different lives, or into any future;
you are not the same people who left that station
or who will arrive at any terminus,
while the narrowing rails slide together behind you;
and on the deck of the drumming liner
watching the furrow that widens behind you
you shall not think 'the past is finished'
or 'the future is before us'.
at nightfall, in the rigging and the aerial,
is a voice descanting (though not to the ear,
the murmuring shell of time, and not in any language)
'fare forward, you who think that you are voyaging;
you are not those who saw the harbor
receding, or those who will disembark.
~T.S. Eliot

TONIGHT
TUES FEB 19
9:00 PM
LARKSPUR, AMY ANNELLE, RALPH WHITE

at an abandoned (for now) hobo camp on the east bank of Bouldin
Creek
South Austin, Texas USA

Access the trailhead at the back of Elk's Lodge Lot, where it comes
to the edge of the dropoff to Bouldin Creek. Go South (Left) just a
little ways. the nigh-on-full moon will surely get you there.

The Elks Lodge is at 700 Dawson, just up the hill (South) from Barton
Springs Road. This is near Lamar and Barton Springs Road.
l

Weather is going to be good. There will be a campfire.


Fourth in a series brought to you by The Austin Secret Show People
myspace.com/theaustinsecretshow

Fare Forward, Voyagers!

2008 is happening. did you see the space lattice the night it turned,
smoke curling around your head, your breath a slow and steady stream
of white?

not long before dawn i rose in the hay field with the cedar waxwing
flock. we were scratching the dirt for seeds, tossing fermented
bushberries into the air and swallowing them whole, wheezing tenderly
to each other through bandit masked beaks. there was plenty to eat,
oh there was plenty to eat.

next, i was a human walking a meadow with no paths or fencelines. i
found an old horseshoe in the dust and hung it on my wrist. my
pockets bulged with fine specimens of igneous incidents, of earthly
metamorphosis.

i picked up speed and let the wind lift me. south, to drift cross a
mountain range i'd seen in a dream. i drank from the creek upstream
from where my hides were softening. and the light, the light got
gold. a portentious start. take heart.

have a look at two new photo zines: "Fever Dream Winter Tour" and
"Twenty Square Feet of Shady Lane"
here: www.highplainssigh.com/photos.html
fare forward, voyagers!
xxamy annellexx

To the creatures of Austin, Texas and its environs:

official word of a house concert with the great Michael Hurley &
friends;
ALL THE ELEMENTS CONVERGE!

MICHAEL HURLEY
ANS Kaleidoscopic
AMY ANNELLE (the places)
RALPH WHITE

Friday Dec 14
!8 PM sharp!
1011 E 14th St.
Austin, Texas
$8 suggested donation

*BYO ossuary, juniper berry or statuesque acquaintence*

map here:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=1011+E+14th+St,+Austin,+TX+78702,+USA&sa=X&oi=map&ct=title
to eavesdrop on doings of these particular muses:
www.gnomonsong.com www.myspace.com/mearabai www.highplainssigh.com www.ralphewhite.com

Fare Foreward, Voyagers!
xxamy annellexx

> Ahoj Friends,
> > A new musical fever dream strain has been cultivated up on the high
> plains. in the shadow of the mother mesa, raptors riding the
> updrafts. over there's the faint intersection of a raiding trail and
> a wagon trail.
> > this fever won't kill or maim. take the strain, and see.
> > under its influence you may better:
> navigate the changing season and make out the new sliver moon over
> brittle cornfield stubble;
> follow the ley lines of city lights symmetrically strung across those
> poor dark skies [skies stripped of secrets];
> calculate velocity flow of black city rivers as they go [unnoticed by
> most] under all those bascule bridges. impromptu picnics from pails
> in the shade of the anchorage, during construction. bridge spans
> borne of pragmatic immigrant thinking.
> > [why is it always dark in the city?
> 'cause nighttime is time for the show]
> > AMY ANNELLE (The PLACES),
> RALPH WHITE
> MIDWEST TOUR
> * * ** * ** * * * ** *
> TUES 11/6 AUSTIN, TX
> BOULDIN CREEK CAFE 8 pm
> 1601 S. First St.
> > WED 11/7 DENTON, TX
> DAN'S SILVER LEAF
> 103 Industrial
> > FRI 11/9 CHICAGO, IL
> RONNY'S CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS 9 pm
> 2101 N. California
> > SAT 11/10 CHICAGO, IL
> MARTYR'S 7 pm
> 3855 N. Lincoln Ave.
> > SUN 11/11 URBANA, IL
> THE IRON POST 8 pm
> 1201 S. Race St.
> > MON 11/12 MILWAUKEE, WI
> NEIGHBORS 8 pm
> 800 E. Clarke @ Fratney
> > WED 11/14 JACKSON, MI
> NOMAD
> > THURS 11/15 DETROIT, MI
> TRUMBULLPLEX
> 4210 Trumbull
> > FRI 11/16 CLEVELAND, OH
> BELA DUBBY
> 13321 Michigan
> with Theodore Vril
> > SAT 11/17 CLEVELAND, OH
> MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART
> with Theodore Vril, Matt Valentine & Erika Elder, Neptune
> > SUN 11/18 ATHENS, OH
> CASA CANTINA
> 6 W. State Street
> * * ** * ** * * * ** *
> Hope to see you, Midwest Voyagers.
> > Fare Forward!
> xxamy annellexx

Ahoj Friends, from the post-apocolyptic jungle of Central Texas.

This is so: sixty days of rain early in the growing season has got
all the green things expanding to extraordinary proportions. The
okra's twelve feet tall. The pecan trees are hanging heavy, gravid
with tasty nuts, succumbing to gravity.

And, when speaking of climatic irregularities, one can't help but
address the attendant Butterfly Explosion. They're here in such great
number and variety--yellow orange white, neon green velvet black and
powdery blue--tiny and vulerable, drinking from a mud puddle, or
enormous and slow, fluttering with such bravado, it almost warrants
stopping in the garden to shoot the shit with them.

Lest we dismiss the Lepidoteran* bretheren as another
precipitation-induced anomality, we ought to consult the elders for
some insight. The Blackfeet people say the butterflies bring you a
dream. The Irish think they're human souls waiting to pass through
purgatory. The Maya thought them dead warriors in disguise. What is
going on, winged harbingers? Perhaps this: the River Styx is
overflowing its banks, and so souls flow freely, to and fro. Could
you dig being a butterfly? after you die. Flying around, high on
flower nectar you sucked up with your curly tongue, seeing ultraviolet
secrets with your compound eyes?

* * * * * *

Well the High Plains and Peaks Western US Tour was an epic ramble
through the unconventional venues, river canyons, mountain passes and
cottonwood plateaus of America's Left Half. Rolling with master
musicians and beloved friends Michael Hurley and Ralph White, pulling
notes from instruments on friendly stages or by campfirefight,
sleeping under the stars, hearing the earth twitch and groan below its
thin skin. Nobody got sick, abducted by aliens (though they were
observed by the full moon above the Snake River Valley, two days prior
to our crossing of it) or left for dead at a Greyhound Station,
freedom tickets flowed at a sustainable velocity from doorman to
gastank, and you: people, I tell you! You are great. Kisses and
cosmic gratuities go out to all of you who set up the shows and those
who came and joined in; and those who took us into house, shack, bus
or driveway, shared gifts from the garden, home cookin' and
conversation...THANK YOU!

Michael Hurley's brand new long player "The Ancestral Swamp" is out
now. When you get in then seatsprings creak their greeting. The
dashboard's big enough to hold everything and there's windows in
places you usually can't see through. This birdsong carries clear
above the din of the creek, so you'd best get your vinyl while you
can, kids. Tweet!

http://www.midheaven.com/artists/hurley.michael.html
I have posted a photo zine of our tour here:
http://highplainssigh.com/photos.html
a Sleepography here:
http://highplainssigh.com/news.html
Howard Wyman in Crawdaddy:
"They played with every bit of gumption as they would by the fire or
in front of a crowd of thousands"
Read the rest of his review of the rest of our San Francisco show
here:
http://crawdaddy.wolfgangsvault.com/Article.aspx?id=3056
* * * * * *

Thanks to the miraculous union of a hand-held cassette player and a
USB cable, I was able to post an MP3 of the April '07 live performance
by The Places Fractal Folk Trio (Amy Annelle, Joshua Housh, and George
D'Anunzio) on Michael Leahy's KDVS "Cool As Folk" program. The
fidelity of which you may find intriguing:

http://highplainssigh.com/music.html
And finally, an update on Ralph's dog Stella, the Rattlesnake Bit
Catahoula Dog. It's been a week now and she's definitely out of the
woods! Thank you for your well-wishing!

Fare Forward, Voyagers!
xxamy annellexx

*Lepidotera: scientific order of butterflies, moths, and skippers

DAY 1 Copper Breaks area overlooking pond,Texas Panhandle
DAY 2 a rock cove near Black Mesa and Rabbitear Mountain, Oklahoma Panhandle
DAY 3 clapboard bunkhouse near Ridgetop Nature Trail, Oklahoma Panhandle
DAY 4 fake-lake campground outside Greeley, CO
DAY 5 loft with pine paneling and red shag carpet over Joe Carducci's kitchen, Centennial, WY
DAY 6 back bedroom of double-wide next to venue, lots of brown things and deer paraphanalia. LaPorte, CO
DAY 7 Carducci's again
DAY 8, 9 downstairs guest bedroom at edge of white carpet field, Fitzpatrick house, Lakewood, CO
DAY 10 under the stars in a Cottonwood Flat, Green River's banks, Western WY. Woke to psychedelic pelicans fishing in the river. For real.
DAY 11 couch in back room, Clayton's Mormon brick house, Salt Lake City, UT
DAY 12 in the midst of a coyote dance party, Snake River Valley, Oregon/Idaho border
DAY 13 pallet on the floor, a hat full of plums from the trees outside, Seattle, WA
DAY 14 between the circus tent and the scrapwood shack at Andy Piper's freak compound, Bellingham WA
DAY 15 Next to Big Bertha the tube radio on Snock's couch, Astoria, OR
DAY 16 next to Dave Reisch's 1947 bus home, Freak Mountain, Tualatin Mountains, OR
DAY 17 bank of a Coast Range River next to onery drunk family, Oregon
DAY 18 on the street in front of friendly house, Davis, CA
DAY 19, DAY 20 below the wainscotting and asymmetrical oval ceiling in Jen and Quinn's apartment, San Francisco
DAY 21 Josh & Yuri's rock and roll laundry room, Oakland, CA
DAY 22 Parham's guest room amidst the moving boxes, Los Gatos, CA
DAY 23 Tinder-dry oak copse at Cerro Alto, above Morro Bay, Central CA. seriously hassled by blue jays.
DAY 24 Cottonwood and willow flat in Los Padres National forest near Ventucopa,CA (two weeks after it burned). They grow persimmons, carrots, and asian pears in that valley!
DAY 25 Drove all night across the desert
DAY 26 Sandy cedar and juniper flats in Kaibob National Forest near the Lowline train tracks. North of Ash Fork, AZ (Flagstone quarrying town)
DAY 27 Flat spot on a dirt road next to the Hat Rock, above the San Juan River Canyon, edge of Navajo Nation
DAY 28, 29 edge of Dark Canyon Primitive Area, Manti-La Sal National Forest (near Bears Ears Mountain), Southeast Utah.
DAY 30 Scott's house above Durango, CO
DAY 31 the only motel room sleep, edge of Llano Estecado, Lubbock TX
DAY 32 End of a lonesome county road near O.H. Ivee Reservoir. Oilfields/Rattlesnake/Restless Spirit Habitat. Hill Country, Runnels County, TX

Ahoj friends, old and new!

there are many of you!

this trip has been different.

From the moment we left Austin, the sky has been swarming with storm
clouds, raptors and glorious sunsets. Our first gift was a surprise
gig in perhaps the deepest valley of America, in the shadow of the
Black Mesa where New Mexico, Colorado, Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas
quietly ponder each other. At the senior citizen's potluck dinner we
played for the folks, including the 95 year old valley matriarch.
Cowboys and girls waltzed along with our unamplified instruments as
the funnel clouds and the double rainbow give way to a most contented
dark. That night we slept in a clapboard bunkhouse (discretely left
unlocked), but an obstacle for the game trails of bobcats, coyotes and
mule deer. Everybody around there works hard to get by.

The Upland Breakdown brought us into America's Mongolian high
steppes. Velvety golden green mountainsides, old friends, puffy
clouds and getitin' gone music. 1920s rock and roll, odes to the muse
and post-cajun psychedelia. Souled American drops it down to C, and
every sound vibration's like it's taken mescaline. Deepest song
telling and a van that holds everything (rolling now we are, with the
master!)

Then Denver show at the gallery was a door buster! And the next
night: a surprise house concert in the old style. I am surprised and
honored to be playing music for (along with folks in their teens
twenties thirties etc) folks in their sixties, seventies, eighties and
beyond. It's not every night you get to shoot the shit with someone
who ran their airplane into a tree over New Guinea in WWII. No sir.


We've just begun, now we hope to see you next...shows added in SF and
Bellingham, WA.

Thanks to all so far for the good times and hospitality, and

Fare Forward, Voyagers!
xxthe placesxx

THE PLACES HIGH PLAINS AND PEAKS WESTERN TOUR

Most of the dates are with the legendary vanner and master song
teller MICHAEL HURLEY www.myspace.com/kornbred07

All dates with proto-folk enigma and river brother RALPH WHITE
myspace.com/ralphewhite
* * * * * * * * *

AUG 31 BURT'S TIKI LOUNGE Salt Lake City, UT
Michael Hurley, The Places, Ralph White, Pink Nasty

SEPT 2 LAST CHANCE BARN DANCE Trout Lake, WA
Michael Hurley, The Places, Ralph White with Bingo Dream Band, Freak
Mountain Ramblers, & lots more freaks and dreamers

SEPT 3 TRACTOR TAVERN Ballard (Seattle), WA
Michael Hurley, The Places, Ralph White

SEPT 4 GREEN FROG Bellingham, WA
Michael Hurley, The Places, Ralph White, Lone Bird

SEPT 5 FORT GEORGE TAVERN Astoria, OR
Michael Hurley, The Places, Ralph White

SEPT 6 LAUREL THIRST Portland, OR
Michael Hurley, The Places, Ralph White

SEPT 8 DELTA OF VENUS Davis, CA
The Places, Ralph White, Garrett Pierce

SEPT 9 HOUSE CONCERT San Francisco, CA
The Places, Ralph White, Garrett Pierce
(999 Steiner at 9 PM)

SEPT 11 HOTEL UTAH San Francisco, CA
The Places, Ralph White, Dave Mihaly's Shimmering Thieves

SEPT 12 RHYTHM Nevada City, CA
The Places, Ralph White, Tractor Operator

...and shows in the works for Los Angeles, Durango, CO and Marfa,
TX...

Fare Forward, Voyagers!
xxamy annellexx

-----------------------------------

a cosmic high-five from the Austin Chronicle:
http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Music/?subject=oid%3A526642
"A folksinger in the truest sense, Annelle and her high, lonesome,
pretty voice seem to be from no particular time--more like many of
them at once. Resembling someone who might've been hopping trains with
Woody Guthrie, she transmits ages of American troubadour traditions in
her performances. But if one of her roles is as a medium, it's hardly
a passive feat; the songs come from and go in all directions."--Mike
Wolf, Music Editor, TimeOut New York

"What longtime Austinite and former Bad Liver Ralph White puts on
albums and onstage is so mind-boggling and vast, it forces those of us
in the description business down a treacherous path" (Darcie Stevens,
Austin Chronicle)

iridium's good for electrical contacts and exterminating dinosaurs.
it cannot be attacked by acids, but can be attacked by molten salts.
it's named after the latin word for 'rainbow'. rare in the earth's
core, o lowly non-radioactive, non-noble gas, it is common in
meteorites. what i'm trying to say is: don't rule anything out. the
lowly rarity could be the end of thee, flung down from the heavens in
vast quantities, blotting out your sun.

CALCULATIONS FROM THE SPACE LATTICE: this serves to alert the Jandek
fans in the house that Places fiddler and soloist extrordinaire Ralph
White will be joining Jandek's backing band for one concert:

SATURDAY JULY 21
RALPH WHITE accompanying JANDEK
(the rest of the band being Susan Alcorn, Will Johnson and Ryan
Williams)
ROSE MARINE THEATER
FORT WORTH, TEXAS

which will be filmed for a future documentary, and the whole story is
told here:

http://www.austin360.com/music/content/music/stories/xl/2007/06/0628xlmusic.html
Ralph White's here:
www.myspace.com/ralphewhite
if you don't know Jandek, or dislike silvery white transitional
metals, please disregard this message.

Fare Forward, Voyagers!

xxamy annellexx
THE PLACES

Ahoj, friends!

An airplane has taken the rubes and our instruments to New York City!
Back to the land of the mosquecycle and sycamore and 3-legged dog,
humans displaying infinite variations of aggression, compassion,
transcention.

On the airplane we learnt from the tiny TV screens how hippos do kill
but don't eat human flesh. and if you do, don't eat the brain,
because you can catch a disease that makes you wobbly and eventually,
die.

Dig: there is an article about the Places today in Billboard
Magazine:

"Annelle makes music borne up from
the land. Keen, empathetic observers, they seem to move, like ghosts,
through walls and locked doors and into the homes and lives of men and
women they'll never be, yet whose stories are somehow always in part
their own -- and our own."

READ THE WHOLE BILLBOARD ARTICLE HERE:
"http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/hear_now/index.jsp
AND this most luminous TOP LIVE SHOWS PREVIEW from TimeOut NY:

"A folksinger in the truest sense, Annelle and her high, lonesome,
pretty voice seem to be from no particular time--more like many of
them at once. Resembling someone who might've been hopping trains with
Woody Guthrie, she transmits ages of American troubadour traditions in
her performances. But if one of her roles is as a medium, it's hardly
a passive feat; the songs come from and go in all directions."--Mike
Wolf, Music Editor

http://www.timeout.com/newyork/article/9050/the-places
COME OUT, NEW YORK CITYZENS!

Thursday 7/12
SOUND FIX RECORDS
free in-store performance
9:30 RALPH WHITE
10:30 THE PLACES
110 Bedford Ave.
(718) 388-8090
www.soundfixrecords.com
FRIDAY 7/13
JOE'S PUB
ADVANCE TICKETS/SHOW PREVIEW HERE:
http://www.joespub.com/caltool/index.cfm?fuseaction=detail&performanceID=3166 9 PM RAPLH WHITE
9:4 PM THE PLACES
425 Lafayette
New York, NY
(212) 539-8770

SATURDAY 7/14
HOUSE CONCERT & BONFIRE/HOUSE FIRE & BONCERT
Germantown, NY (2 hrs north of NYC)
new friends, email for details.

Write if you are in NYC and might like to have a good old-fashioned
house concert on Monday.

Fare Forward, Voyagers!

xxamy annellexx
THE PLACES

we've gassed up the captain and will be morosely combusting the
petrified remains of dearly departed precambrian creatures* all the
way to LA...

that's LOUISIANA, friends

combustion engines are no longer viable.
perhaps that van's best left behind in the bayou.
as a frame for to hang thickening wisteria vines and leatherflower.
a nest for the black-masked racer and canebrake rattlesnake.
and we'll walk one foot at a time through the devilwoods and
ironwoods and pineywoods.
from texas to louisiana.
from louisiana to texas.
where to find the refrains and remains of blind mamie forehand,
dennis mcgee, sadie coeurville, king solomon hill and little hat
jones.

annelle, ralph the third, and arrow the whip-tailed butterfly hound
are coming to New Orleans, and we can't wait to see you

THE PLACES
RALPH WHITE
LADYBABYMISS (MISS O. from A PARTICULARLY VICIOUS RUMOR)
DENISE BONUS
June 17

10 PM
The Dragon's Den
435 Esplanade Ave
New Orleans, LA 70116
504 945 7744


p.s. ralph just got on the myspace, why not go over and say hello and
make friends
myspace.com/ralphewhite

FARE FORWARD, VOYAGERS!
xxamy annellexx

crucible (def. 3): a place, time, or situation characterized by the
confluence of powerful forces.

*Geologists report that sediments in Oman provide evidence of an
extinction 542 million years ago, the "Precambrian Gap") possibly
brought on when the deep sea disgorged noxious waters, which set the
stage for the proliferation of wild and wonderful life forms that
followed. (it's nothing personal. think of the wild and wonderful
life forms that may follow the next disgorging of noxious waters)

it was a cold and starry dark, a month or so back at brenda's shack,
which is unlike any other home base ever created. brenda is an
extrordinary creature who's gone to great lengths to create a suitable
habitat. a pad with the appropriate paramaters, paleattes and
textures. there's furs and claws, adornments from a dozen decades and
a dozen foreign lands. it's a mongolian yurt in an urban yard, there's
lamb and millet and lentils from a propane stove and small glasses of
red wine and kombucha tea. the books that line the walls all have red
spines. a gentlemen who knows what's best might follow a sign
suggesting a climb to the top of the loft.

the inestimable jolie holland was there that night. the evening was
whiled away in gentle celebration. jolie and i got to trading songs.
and jana and brenda and chris drury were listening, and chris is a
filmmaker, so his camera saw things, and secretly captured these
twilit pixels:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=lrA2I7NLnXE
it's a video of an unreleased song of mine called "Everyone Has
Spoken". that's jolie's guitar and her lovely visage in the
background, and brenda's belongings abstrusely illuminating
everything.

-----------------


TimeOut New York's Mike Wolf wrote about our Manhattan Island show:

http://highplainssigh.com/press.html
some photos from that Continental Tour With No Middle are up:

http://highplainssigh.com/photos.html
and my apologies to those of you in the middle who wrote me
saying..."hey! what's this no middle shit???!" we'll play extra good
for you when we do come through this summer, and bring you a brown bag
of sweetcorn from a farmer's market.

in the meantime. we've seen the leaf cathedral opening outside.
while i was gone, green came to be the dominant shade. there's water
flowing in the creeks and everything looks alive. and it's all a lie.
my man is leaving. i'm tired of weeping, i'm tired of moaning. i'll
be here watching for his ghost in the hallway, and recording its
reaction when i call it by name.

Forward, As Ever, Dear Voyagers,
xxamy annellexx

Come on out, New York Cityzens!

The Places Forests and Caves Trio featuring Ralph E. White (with Danny Barnes and Mark Rubin, a core member of the Bad Livers) plays fiddle and hellhound banjo; Jude Webre (Places class of 2001 alum) in the upright bass arena; with Amy Annelle and her '33 Gibson L-00 (which recently won a cage match with Delta Airlines):

Thursday 3.29
THE PLACES
with CASTANETS
Show Venue has moved to ***PALACE TAVERN***which, conveniently, is around the corner from the original venue (the lutheran church) 206 Nassau @ Russell| Greenpoint, Brooklyn
G-Nassau or L-Graham | 8pm | all ages | $7 | 718-383-9848 www.toddpnyc.com
Friday 3.30 THE PLACES (8:30) with RALPH E. WHITE (7:30) GOOGIE'S LOUNGE upstairs at the Living Room this is an intimate listening room and there is no cover. i think they have a 1 drink minimum. if you don't drink that is cool we will buy you a ginger ale! yes those are separeate 1 hour sets by the places and ralph white. don't miss ralph or you'll be real sorry.
please come early and settle in, settle in.
154 Ludlow || between stanton & rivington
http://www.livingroomny.com/googies.html
The Village Voice recommends us:
http://www.villagevoice.com/nycguide/ev107685,6.html
...Ralph White is also playing a 7:30 solo set at the Rodeo Bar (375 3rd Ave on the Big Island of Manhattan) on Sunday 4.1--i might sit in on a song or two--no foolin'!

Ahoj, Friends, I say as I gaze at the remains of the late Cenozoic
Tualitin Mountains. known locally as "the Portland West Hills", or
"where the rich people live". obliquely crossing the anticline.
intersecting several concealed faults inferred at the surface. We've
Followed the Fault Lines as far as reality would allow, then passed
the threshold, and no temblor has transpired. geological time will
tell.

The Follow the Fault Lines Spring 2007 West Coast Tour reverberates
nonetheless. Joshua Housh and George D'Anunzio (the Places West Coast
Strings and Skins Band rhythm section) are angels with muscles and
moustaches. feral and hysterical and fearless. you will hear more
from us.

In the meantime i will be posting two very different live recordings
(the Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco, and an unamplified stomp & shout
set and interview on Michael Leahy's KDVS "Cool As Folk" show) right
here:

http://highplainssigh.com/music.html
But all in all: great shows with great bands! Eternal hangs with
dear friends we don't get to see near enough, and new ones too. Thank
you very kindly to all who put us up/put up with us!

From the natural habitats of desert rats and baby rattlesnakes to
that of the hordes of hipsters with hangovers riding around on
bicycles, in no time flat. eternal pacific ocean, graduations of
floral and faunal zones and transmissions from the enigmatic Ladybug
Poet. Midnight Jams with local teenagers and an ominous visit from a
Methamphetamine-fueled, demon-mask wearing neighbor at the break of
dawn. A chance interaction with a Brazilian Cupid amidst the
shattered innerds of a massacred accordion at a san franciscan
intersection. Pictographic evidence will be up soon at:

http://highplainssigh.com/photos.html
A special cosmic high-five to Eric and his wife, who came all the way
from Phoenix to see the Portland show.

hell it's already time to board a redeye plane to cross the continent
and bring some more music out the ether on the other side:

The Places Forests and Caves Pressure Drop Trio featuring Ralph E.
White (he of the Bad Livers, back in The Day) plays fiddle and
hellhound banjo; Jude Webre (Places class of 2001 alum) in the upright
bass arena; with Amy Annelle and her '33 Gibson L-00 (which recently
won a cage match with Delta Airlines):

Thursday 3.29
THE PLACES
with CASTANETS, SHAPES & SIZES
Lutheran Church of the Messiah
129 Russell St @ Nassau | Greenpoint, Brooklyn
G-Nassau or L-Graham | 8pm | all ages | $tba | no phone
www.toddpnyc.com
----->>JUST ADDED<<-----Friday 3.30 THE PLACES (8:30)
with the inestimable RALPH E. WHITE (7:30)
GOOGIE'S LOUNGE upstairs at the Living Room
this is an intimate listening room and there is no cover. i think
they have a 1 drink minimum. if you don't drink that is cool we will
buy you a ginger ale! yes those are separeate 1 hour sets by the
places and ralph e. white. don't miss ralph or you'll be real sorry.
please come early and settle in, settle in.
154 Ludlow || between stanton & rivington
http://www.livingroomny.com/googies.html
The Village Voice recommends us:
http://www.villagevoice.com/nycguide/ev107685,6.html
...Ralph White is also playing a 7:30 solo set at the Rodeo Bar (375
3rd Ave on the Big Island of Manhattan) on Sunday 4.1--i might sit in
on a song or two--no foolin'!

Come on out, New York Cityzens!

and Fare Forward, Voyagers Everywhere!
xxamy annellexx
mail-order 'SONGS FOR CREEPS'
brand new original album by the Places
http://highplainssigh.com/products.html Critic's Choice/Best Ten Albums of 2006, Billboard Magazine


"...wonderfully weird, macabre songs about fading love, murderous
intentions, seers and midnight explorations" ~~Peter Linblad, Goldmine
Magazine

"...consistently eschews the tried-and-true...a prog-pastoralist
vortex of charm"~~Rod Smith, Timeout NY

"Conventionally this record might be folk, psychadelic,
avant-pop--more or less undefinable--but most of all it's got a grip
on the sprawling, strange, optimistic, terrifying feel of open-road
America."~~David Snyder, IndieFolkForever
---------------------

"well, there's intelligence, and there's wisdom...that's why in D&D,
they're two different scores"~~Paul Brainard