We’re wrapping up this run of wintry concerts with a house show in Philadelphia this evening and a concert at SUNY Purchase with Nat Baldwin, Woodspider, and Whale Whale Whale. Everyone has been amazingly welcoming and generous everywhere we’ve gone, feeding us, sheltering us, wrapping us with snakes and buying our records.

At Nashville's GemsOnVHS with Natalie Prass and Many Others

Ben Gives Mogwai the Gift of Flight

We love dogs. Kristin really loves dogs. If you are a dog and you’re interested in joining the band, and perhaps even doubling as a roadie, please contact us with the phrase “Inquiry About Tour Dog Position” in the subject line. We are especially interested in dogs with experience in live sound. Thank you.

It is unseasonably warm here in Philadelphia, and I hope that this bodes well for our upcoming shows in New York, Massachusetts, Maryland, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. We’ll have Bridget with us for the first handful of shows, which means awesome times and some new arrangements.

Here are some little ditties that Ben and I put together on iPhone GarageBand on our tour last fall. That’s Alec Spiegelman singing background vocals on “My Song”.

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Keep an eye on our Twitter account for updates to our tour and other exciting goings-on.

See you soon,
Dave (and Cuddle Magic)

As the flat expanses of western Indiana rush by through the our van’s broad windows, Alec, Ben, and Dave are working away on band business with the help of Poop, our trusty wireless cellular data router. There is beautiful weather today in the midwest, crisply cool and slightly cloudy. What follows is a somewhat scattershot, thematically organized series of recollections and reflections on the past several weeks.

It has been wonderful to be playing our music just about every night, and sometimes in the afternoons, too. We’ve driven our van and trailer to some pretty remote locations, such as Upper Jay, NY and Thomas, WV. The Recovery Lounge in Upper Jay is just about the coziest and best-upholstered venue I can recall visiting, and the accommodations are second to none. The same goes for The Purple Fiddle, except that what they lack in upholstery is more than made up by their remarkable tomato soup.

So many people have bent over backwards to make us comfortable along our journey. Dave from Frederick, MD’s Café NOLA graciously allowed us to crash at his place with his adorable kitten. Bloomington treated us very well: Dan the Abandoned brought a bunch of friends and some pretty great songs, and then Rick Dietz put us up very comfortably and walked us through a tasting of remarkable homemade meads.

The Bohemian Coffee Shop in Baltimore has an awesome little piano and just enough room to squeeze us into the corner by the window. We liked it at the Bohemian so much that we’re coming back for another early show in November.

Uplifting Words from the Krystal in Knoxville

Pengy Sunbathes on the Roof Deck at Preservation Pub

We had an awesome time in Knoxville, playing at both the Relix Variety Theatre and the Preservation Pub, as well as on the air at WDVX. Thank you Jenny, Michael, and Seth for putting us up! Above is photographic evidence of our time in Tennessee.

There’s so much more to tell, but it’ll have to wait until the next post. Also, The Deckers are awesome.

We’re on our way to Upper Jay, NY. Vermont is really, really beautiful right now. It’s hard to imagine that this tranquil place was being ravaged by flood waters just weeks ago.

Pawtuckaway State Park was host to the Pawtuckaway Music Festival yesterday, and we were lucky enough to be able to join in the festivities with an afternoon set of music. We arrived just in time for Alec to join our friend Audrey Ryan on a couple of tunes and were able to stay for most of the afternoon and evening, enjoying some tasty chili, delicious baked goods, and sets from Gramafoma, Minor Revolution, The Jonee Earthquake Band, and Fire Tower.

We capped the evening off by achieving what we believe may be a historic moment in the history of Pawtuckaway State Park: we fit nine people on the boulder behind the picnic shelter. Yes, that’s right. We did it. Props to Trevor for his bold vision and his brother Jeremy and Katrina Pratt for topping off the whole shebang. Here is photographic evidence of our achievement:

Alec’s Aunt Amy and Uncle Jim put us up for the evening and treated us to some tea and freshly picked Vermont apples. Thanks Aunt Amy and Uncle Jim!

We’re on our way back from Upper Jay, NY after a beautiful day of ferry riding and foliage in the Adirondacks. The audience at Recovery Lodge was really incredible this evening, and Scott and Byron have created a wonderful, intimate performance space. We hope to come back to Upper Jay very soon indeed.

See you in Philadelphia on Tuesday.

We have just recently started a fundraising campaign for our upcoming album, Info Nympho, complete with a sweet video by Cole and Ben. We’ve already invested thousands of dollars and hours so far in producing, refining, and recording this material, and we want it to be perfect. We’re conducting the campaign through Kickstarter, a handy web service that makes a cinch to donate to a project and receive specific rewards in return. There’s a catch, though: if we don’t reach our goal by September 1st, we don’t receive any of the funds! So drop by our project page and donate. We’re especially excited about some of the larger rewards, like the signed lawn penguin, but even a donation of one dollar will help a whole bunch.

By the way, this Kickstarter campaign is the only way that you pre-order the new album. For a very reasonable price, you can help us reach our goals and reserve your very own copy of Info Nympho as a vinyl album, signed CD, or digital download. Thank you!

Quite a lot has happened since our last blog post, much of which has been covered either in our Twitter feed or in one of our newsletters. If you haven’t signed up for our newsletter, take a moment to do so now: go back to our home page, scroll to the bottom of the page, type your email address in the white text fields and press Join. You’ll then receive an email, and when you follow the link in that email, you’ll have signed up for our newsletter. We don’t send them out too often and we won’t be too hurt if you ever decide to unsubscribe.

Some highlights from the last several months, lifted from our newsletters:

In late March (actually before our last blog post, but never discussed here), we collaborated with Ran Blake for a sold-out show at Cambridge’s Lily Pad. This performance included a spell-binding solo piano set by Mr. Blake, followed by a set of our music and a couple of collaborative performances. One of the pieces on which we collaborated was an unrecorded piece by Mr. Blake arranged by Cuddle Magic with lyrics by our long-time collaborator Tim Davis.

We were all very sad to hear of the death of our friend Donald Miller in March, whose art graces the cover and reverse back of our first album, and we’d like to take a moment again to remember his kindness and generosity. Thank you for everything, Mr. Duck Beer.

In late May, we debuted “a set of music written for the combined ensemble of ourselves and [toy piano virtuoso] Phyllis Chen“, including pieces by our own Ben Davis, Kristin Slipp, and Alec Spiegelman, as well as a compositions by Phyllis Chen and Wes Matthews. We played the music to packed rooms in Brooklyn (Barbés), Cambridge (Lily Pad), and Saratoga Springs (Caffé Lena), and it was a pleasure and an honor to work with Phyllis Chen. There’s a video of Wes’s piece from our Lily Pad performance, thanks to Alex Chaloff. We’re hoping to record some of this material in the near future.

We played a couple of really great shows in July, visiting Maine for the first time at The Oak and The Ax (with The Deadly Gentlemen, Greg Jamie, and Patter Cubs, all of whom were a blast), and swinging by Club Passim (with The Capitalist Youth), our old stomping grounds, for a reliably warm and welcoming audience.

Finally, we just got back from playing a set at The Wassaic Project‘s Summer Festival. We were up there earlier this summer, and we just can’t emphasize enough what an amazing undertaking it is and how awesome the people are who make it possible. Alas, inclement weather nixed our camping plans, but we’ve already pencilled in next year, either as performers or friendly experiencers. We were able to peep Ghost/Light and Acrylics, and they were sick. Great sound, great suroundings, great people!

That brings us up to date. We’re playing a late show at Rockwood Music Hall this coming Thursday, and a rare, drummerless performance at the Lily Pad on Friday with Cleek Schrey and Steph Coleman. We’re also planning a tour in October and November, and we’ll have more details on that in the upcoming weeks.

Don’t forget to tell your friends about the Kickstarter campaign, too! Just send them the link to our Kickstarter project page – that’s kickstarter.com/projects/cuddlemagic/cuddle-magic-to-release-info-nympho-an-analog-reco - and they’ll be able to take it from there.

Kelly, Rob, and Aviv of Sleepover Shows were kind enough to document us playing some new songs while we were on tour last October with the full band. We’re not normally accustomed to performing on the street, but Somerville is pretty familiar turf for us – their place is just down the street from an old stomping ground of ours and only a couple of minutes away from where Dave, Christopher, and Bridget used to live.

All of these songs will all be appearing on our new record, which we’re working hard to get into your hands sometime this summer. In the meantime, enjoy Kristin’s weird dream and our Brautigan and Pancake sandwich, both of which appear below.

Special CD Day with Denji Poops

We thought we’d share this old photo of Ben Davis, our singer/songwriter/bassist/guitarist/ukuleleist, from back when we had just received copies of our first album in the mail at the Gartland Street house in Jamaica Plain where a few of us used to live. Alas, we’re sold out of it now, but we’re going to be selling it as a download from the FYO Records website soon enough (in your choice of mp3 or lossless audio), and you can get it from iTunes in the meantime. We’re also thinking about printing some more copies, but more on that later.

We have two New York City concerts coming up in February. We’re playing at the Knitting Factory in Williamsburg on the 10th with Nat Baldwin, of Dirty Projectors and an awesome songwriter and performer in his own right, and In One Wind, a band that’s new to us but pretty much kills it if the video and audio that we’ve gleaned from around the web is any indication. We’re also playing at Temple Beth Emeth in Ditmas Park on the 27th as part of Mike Winograd and Richie Barshay’s ‘Ditmas Acoustic Series’. The series has been putting on top-notch, intimate shows in this space for a while now, and we feel privileged to have been asked to play. It will be quite different than our Knitting Factory performance, to say the least – an opportunity for us to play a quiet, unplugged set for New Yorkers and revel in the acoustics of this beautiful synagogue. Annie Lynch will also be playing some of her stunning songs in the sanctuary that evening.

Also, speaking of past blasts, we’ve sent out very few emails to those on our mailing list. In fact, we’ve sent out one. However, we’re getting ready to send out another, so if you haven’t joined our mailing list at one of our shows or through this website…well, you get the idea.

Oops. I’m not sure that we’re ready, Luddites that we are, but we’ve gone ahead and done it – we’ve started our very own blog. Please bear with us as we get the hang of this thing and try our best to keep things up to date and keep you, our friends and supporters, abreast of Cuddle Magic goings-on.

That said, we have some exciting events coming up soon! We’re playing three consecutive shows in the northeast next weekend in Harrisburg, Philadelphia, and Brooklyn. The first two performances are at places at which we’ve played before, fantastic venues that have treated us marvelously in the past: Stage on Herr in Harrisburg and Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens. Below are some great pictures of our past performances at these venues.

Cuddle Magic at Stage on Herr, October 2010

Cuddle Magic Gardens at The Magic Gardens, September 2010

The picture of the band on stage that you see above and to the left is from our performance at Stage on Herr as part of our tour last October, and it was a blast. We got to play two sets (long ones, too) and were treated like royalty. Oh, and the sound was good. What more could you want? This time around we’ll be joined by The Joint Ventures, a band and songwriting collective featuring Zach Bailey, Seth Dubin, Kevin Strawser, and Scott Frenchek, all regulars in the central Pennsylvania music scene.

The photo on the right is from our Cuddle Magic Gardens performance this past September as part of the Philadelphia Fringe Festival. It was a very special event, complete with a sound installation by FYO Records‘ own Josh Carrigan, projections by Matt Hoffman, lights by Roswell King, and sound by Jim Calvarese and our own Christopher McDonald. Everyone had a great time and we’re excited to be coming back to the Magic Gardens. This time we’ll be playing in their basement (thanks a lot, cold weather – jeez), but it’ll be a happening to remember. Color is Luxury, that radical Philadelphia duo of Charles Cohen and hair_loss, will be blowing minds up front, followed by frequent Cuddle Magic collaborator and toy pianist par excellence Phyllis Chen, who will also join us on a couple numbers. The Magic Garden’s basement isn’t the biggest spot in the city, some come early and stay late! Oh, and BYOB.

The last of the three shows will be at Brooklyn’s Café Orwell, which is a new spot for us. Well, actually, we’ve all been there for coffee, but now we’re playing music there! It’s in Ben’s neighborhood, so we figured that it was about time we dropped by for some music making. It’ll be an intimate show with very little amplification, which makes us very happy.

Finally, it has come to our attention lately that we haven’t been stellar about crediting the people that make us look good, or at least try their best – photographers. They’ve all very generously donated their time and energy and creativity to capturing our live performances, and without them we’d only have Dave’s crappy phone recordings to prove that we’ve actually done what we’ve done, so…thank you. Thank you very, very much. Besides the photographs you see above by Ollie Hammick (Stage on Herr) and Stacey McDonald (Cuddle Magic Gardens), Alexandra Breznay and Adriane Ohanesian have taken some beautiful photographs for us. We’re sorry if there’s someone we’ve neglected to mention here, but if so, we’ll rectify that in post number two.

We’ll be adding to this weblog somewhat regularly, so stay tuned.