The last year really flew by. A couple trips to Europe promoting the latest Cross Record LP, Wabi-Sabi. We played tons of shows with Indie monsters Shearwater, and it was a humbling and educational experience. Check out the fantastic tour diary by Emily Cross. 

Molly Burch's LP, Please Be Mine, just came on on Captured Tracks. She's been blowin' up down here, and I'm very proud of our work on this album. We recorded it in just 3 days, with most of the vocals being live takes with the band. That never happens! Here's more info about Molly and what she's doing...

Julia Lucille is building some buzz for the release of her new album, Chthonic. Check out the beautiful first track, "Eternally". The record comes out in April on Austin label Keeled Scales. 

Coming soon: Another record with Secret Colours. A bunch of mixing projects. A super secret Sub Pop collab.. Dogs. Cats. Motorcycles. It's hard to keep this thing up! 
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To quote Aaron Lewis, it's been a while... Sorry for the lack of digital presence. The real world has been taking up a lot of our time and 2015 has just flown by. We had an amazing Chill Phases 2 during SXSW. Here is a fantastic photo essay by our friends at Portalsmusic. 

We are very excited for the release of Julia Lucille's new record, Chthonic. Emily and Dan co-produced it. Dan just finished mixing and it was mastered by Carl Saff. This LP is going to make some dark waves. Hints of Elliott Smith and Mazzy Star. It comes out soon on our favorite Austin label, Punctum Records. 

Drumroll please....... the new Cross Record is done!!! This was the first LP that Dan and Emily made together in the new studio. With a little help from our good crazy engineer friend Theo Karon and some marimba from Swans' Thor Harris, we created one eerie little baby. Look for it early next year on Bada Bing! records. 

Dandysounds continues to work with some great clients from Chicago, including a new record from Maks The Fox, currently in mixing stages. Chinatown Security made the trek down from the Windy City to do a quick and dirty psych punk record. Look for that early next year. Also on deck from Chi-town is a new Terriers record. 

All that and a bunch of cats, dogs, no more chickens :(, motorcycles, wrecked cars, and a now semi-functioning tape machine.

With Love,
Dan and Emily

Check out Dan D's interview with Dan Snaith of Caribou in the current issue of Tape Op Magazine (#105). Subscribe for free at tapeop.com. 

Also, here are  links to Dan's other Tape Op interviews:
Dave Longstreth of the Dirty Projectors
Ben Greenberg (formerly) of the Men

We are racing to the finish this year and we've had a lot of cool projects along the way. We were happy to welcome Rock n' Roll Hall-of-Famer John Sebastian, singer and principle songwriter of The Lovin' Spoonful, to record a track he co-wrote with Greta Morgan of Springtime Carnivore.

In the crazy world of attempting to make a living making music, there are moments that require a more, shall we say, tailored form of creativity. 

Things are moving fast on the ranch. The Texas heat is creeping in and we are bracing ourselves.  The last couple months have been busy with projects, part-time jobs, shows, and kittens. 

Here's a little summary of the music that's been happening here:
-Jess Williamson's "Snake Song" was featured on Pitchfork. Take a listen here. We hope to have her back in the fall to record another track. 
-RFShannon started what will become their 2nd full-length LP. Should be a spacey fun album to make. 
-Schwein! recorded a batch of catchy and at times goofy 70's punk. Really enjoying mixing it. Talking Heads and Ramones binges in the control room. 
-Real Live Tigers cut some backing tracks for an album. They'll be back in July to finish up. 
-Dwight Smith did a few stripped-down acoustic numbers. His guitar playing and melodic sense are solid and unique. 
-Currently mixing tunes for Mike Chorvat and Dan Wade. They each came here from Chicago to record some hooky power pop rocksteady bebop. 
-Emily and I have been slowly chipping away at a new Cross Record Record. More soon on that...

Cole Bee Wilson came over some days ago to track vocals for an epic historically based project he's working on. I won't say any more. 

SXSW has come to an end. We had a crazy week of people crashing and practicing for showcases and capped it off with an amazing party that felt like the first year of a music festival. 

While I was busy working my day job, Dan was working with the very talented Jess Williamson last week.  I've been enjoying hearing him mix her new jam while doing various things throughout the house. .Happy to be meeting such genuinely sweet and gifted people here in Austin! 
-E

This is an MCI JH-110C 1/4" 2-track tape machine. I first came into contact with one while getting the self-titled Any Kind record mastered at Saff Mastering in Chicago. I loved the sound of running the whole mix through tape and back into computer. It really opened everything up and glued the sounds together. Unfortunately, their machine can no longer record and is only used for playback. 

It just so happens that there was one in Austin on craigslist, and my new friend Marshall at Shadow Hills helped me check it out. He warned me that it would take time and work, but that everything was intact and if I wanted to put in the hours I could hopefully restore it to working order. I'm currently doing my homework and getting a game plan together... 

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