Hello there campers.  We have birthed another collection of songs from Mr. James.  Behold the Beware! EP.  Here’s a review of the EP out of the UK…

“Beware! is an all too quickly over taste of front porch Americana-folk at it’s most beautiful. I swiftly got past the relatively easy listening of the EP to the lyrical and melodic crux and became immersed in some other worldly conspiracy plot. By the end of “Tie One” (Track 4) I just wanted to go and play it again in a dark room with a bottle of something ill-advised…” – 4.5 stars – Andy Ward – Born Music (UK)

The EP is available through all the digital outlets – iTunes and the like.  For those in the United States who would prefer to venture out to your local indie record store, please make the journey.  Here is a list of stores where the EP is available:

ARIZONA
Zia Enterprises – Phoenix, AZ
ALABAMA
Oz Music – Tuscaloosa, AL
CALIFORNIA
Fingerprints – Long Beach, CA
Amoeba Music – Hollywood, CA
Lou’s Records – Encinitas, CA
Salzer’s Records – Ventura, CA
Dimple Records – Sacramento, CA
COLORADO
Twist & Shout – Denver, CO
FLORIDA
Park Ave CD’s – Orlando, FL
GEORGIA
Criminal Records – Atlanta, GA
IDAHO
Record Exchange – Boise, ID
INDIANA
Indy CD and Vinyl – Indianapolis, IN
MARYLAND
Sound Garden – Baltimore, MD
NEBRASKA
Homer’s – Omaha, NE
NEW YORK
Looney Tunes – West Babylon, NY
OREGON
Music Millennium – Portland, OR
TENNESSEE
Grimey’s – Nashville, TN
Disc Exchange – Knoxville, TN
TEXAS
Waterloo – Austin, TX
Disc Go Round – Corpus Christi, TX
UTAH
Graywhale – Taylorsville, UT
VERMONT
Pure Pop Records – Burlington, VT
WASHINGTON
Silver Platters – Seattle, WA
Easy Street Records – Seattle, WA
Sonic Boom Records – Seattle, WA
WISCONSIN
Exclusive Appleton – Appleton, WI

Today you can listen to the premiere of Joshua’s new EP Beware! on WNYC’s “Soundcheck” a week ahead of release.  You can stream the 4 song EP in it’s entirety, as well as hear and read an interview with Joshua and host Gretta Cohn discussing life, and the meaning behind the songs on the new release.  HEAR / STREAM it at WNYC now.

The Beware! EP will release this coming May 7th, and is currently available for pre-order through I-Tunes as well as direct through Joshua’s website – http://www.joshuajames.tv.

Pre-Order the Beware! EP out on May 7th and get an instant download of the song “Beware” upon purchase. Watch Joshua and Evan performing the song “Beware” and “Ghost in the Town” live on Carson Daly tonight!!!

Right about the time we wrapped the recording of music for our third album, it became apparent that there was more than one body of work forming. An EP’s worth of music – 4 songs – were selected to comprise an EP that complemented and continued the story of the recent full length album “From The Top of Willamette Mountain”. All of this music was recorded in the same period with Mr. Richard Swift manning the role as Producer. This “sister” companion to the latest album, “From The Top of Willamette Mountain”, was deemed “Beware!” after the title track of the EP – “Beware!”.

Tune into Carson Daly tonight, April 11th/12th on NBC, to catch me and Evan peforming “Beware!” and “Ghost in the Town” live from the Troubadour in Los Angeles, CA.

The track listing of the Beware! EP is as follows:
1. Beware!
2. Cheyenne, Wyoming
3. We Saw The Light
4. Tie One

 

A few weeks ago, Joshua and Evan were asked to perform in Los Angeles at the Troubadour for a night of music curated by Carson Daly.  The focus was on songwriters, and the goal was a night of music with more “stripped down” performances showcasing their songs.  In case you missed the television airing, here are two songs you can check out via Hulu by clicking the links below.

Joshua James – “Queen of the City” – Live from the Troubadour
Joshua James – “Mystic” – Live from the Troubadour

Tune into Carson Daly / NBC this evening for a performance from Joshua James.  DVR, TiVo, tape it, watch it, now.

Oliver Fred. Some Kids Get ALL The GOOD Genes.

One month passed by like a summer breeze. I have only the typical “business” of life to blame for it. Waves of progression/digression come and go like the days of the week. Inundated with eggplants and irrigation ditches I have found a sense of peace in the garden this year. Every morning I find myself with hands in the dirt, pawing my fingertips into the organisms of those to come and those that rest.  It has been a bit harder to make sure all “DUCKS” are in their proper rows this year in regards to the garden. There have been many things that require attention apart from growing food. One of which lies soundly next to me as I type this phrase.  It seems as if every day passes quicker than the next. By the time the feedings and the groomings, the cleaning and the scrubbing, the singing/typing/this(ing) and that(ing) is all over the moon has already begun to shown her face and its time for bed. But the morning DOES come and it DOES lift my spirit once again. I have decided, for the first time since we began gardening, to give a proper irrigation system a fair chance. I researched until exhaustion the proper way to irrigate our little farm without spending too much money and using too many resources. I decided on a “drip tape” irrigation system. It was somewhat easy to assemble and utilize. It only really requires drip tape, their proper adaptors to connect to poly tubing and a long piece of 1/2” poly tubing. I ran the poly tubing down the long way of our garden and stretched drip tape down each row of crop. It has only been two days but I am ecstatic about how it is working. I suppose time will be the judge if it was worth the amount of energy and money to set up such a system. SUERTE!

Garlic Geeks

Seed Settin’. Hands o’ Danger.

DRIP Irrigation. Part One.

DRIP Irrigation. Part Two.

The garden has caused us to be very BUSY, BUT……I like being busy. I can’t stand idleness and nothing to do, and so it’s perfect soil for thriving and getting on with the next. Through the business of living and the preoccupation of “ALL” of the things that I “HAVE” to get done I have found some time to get away from the MTN and indulge in other activities that don’t have to do with milking/gardening or tending to things that require me to exist.

A couple weeks back I found myself driving up American Fork Canyon in a recent vehicle that my lady and I made. It’s a 1989 Ford F-150. It was time to get to the hills, away from the city. I had lured Dottie (our Nubian Goat) into the back of the pickup, grabbed by bag of rope, harnesses, shoes and carrots and headed in. I hadn’t been climbing outdoors all year and it was NECESSARY that removed myself from the busyness of mundane. I sang to a George Jones tape all the way up to a place called Beer Can Alley, it’s a newer (Though not ALL that new) area to climb in and was JUST what I needed. I met a buddy of mine up there and it was a full morning of “BELLIES FULL’o FEAR” as I like to put it. As we descended back down the canyon I was happy to know that such a place existed, and that existed in my proverbial backyard. It is GOOD to feel alive. To be alive/breathe.

Ford F-150. Goat In The Back. George Jones on the RADIO. American Fork Canyon. PERFECT.

Dottie.

American Fork ROCK Climbing.

Buckley and I. Canyon Cookin.

The day following the ascent up the mountain of American Fork I ventured into the land of the dead. Things that once were alive, but no longer did. THE KITCHEN. There was a celebration at a familiar place and cookies were in order. I was determined to find the best Oatmeal Raisin Cookie recipe that I could find. And though they were wonderfully EPIC, they might NOT be the greatest of the greats. BUT, give em a whirl. SHA LA LA.

XOOKIES

 VEGAN Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 10 minutes

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup margarine (make sure it’s vegan margarine!)
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 cup soy milk
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp cloves
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
• 1 cup raisins
• 3 cups rolled or quick cooking oatmeal
•  

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Beat together the sugar, brown sugar, vegan margarine and vanilla until smooth and fluffy. Add the soy milk and mix until combined.

Add the flour, baking soda, salt and spices, and stir until well mixed. Add the remaining ingredients. Batter will be very thick.

Drop by 3 inch balls onto cookie sheet and flatten slightly. Bake 12-15 minutes, or until done. Cookies will still be slightly soft and chewy. Yum! Enjoy your vegan oatmeal raisin cookies!

The wildness of life never ceases to amaze me. It shouldn’t. It couldn’t. Be alive or DIE!

Joshua Fred (Shaky Hands Inc.)

It’s been over two weeks since I arrived back into the great valley of Utah. There was much to do upon getting here. The milking of the goats, changing beddings of the chicks, tilling the garden, starting seedlings, etc, etc, et cetera. As with all of our homesteading there have been many trials and errors. This past year we had a mighty one, one for the bookie. It was our second season with our honeybees, they had been doing so well the first season and the second season was proving to be the same. WE had been keeping them at the end of the garden lane, which sits, directly behind our neighbor’s high vinyl fence. It was probably July and we received a frantic message on facebook from our neighbor. There was no phone call, no knock on the door, just a message. The online correspondence seemed intense and urgent; they wanted the bees removed from behind their fence. I called after reading the message and asked if I could stop by to explain the docility of honeybees and their INSANELY important roll in our existence.  It wasn’t until the following day that I stopped by. It was a quick conversation that ended with my neighbor asking us to move the hives in a very timely fashion. I tried explaining that bees are very subject to getting lost and or swarming if the hives are moved more than 3 feet every 2 days. This didn’t seem to concern her, and so we, per request of neighbors, moved the hives a good 30 feet away across the fence line into the back field of a different surrounding neighbor.

(as a side note, our neighbors are wonderful, kind and very respectful people. I believe it probably had to have been a startling fact, to stumble upon two hives of honeybees behind their fence. And so, as a disclaimer, it SHALL BE KNOWN).

Well…it all went quickly down from there. The bees, for some reason, began getting very aggressive, there seemed to be chaos/confusion/destruction and I had not been tending to them as frequently as I should’ve been. Weeks came and went. It was in August that the blackness of our beloved beehives began. I opened up one hive only to see that there were NO BEES inside. Every last one of the living bees had left the hive. There were half constructed honeycomb and dead bee bodies on the base floor, but nothing moving. I was crushed. I knew that I had to open up the other hive but was nervous to. What might’ve happened? Why did they leave? Was it the moving of the hives? Had there been pesticide sprayed nearby? I slowly opened up the second hive. DEATH. DEATH. DEATH. All over. Bees half hidden inside honeycomb, DEAD. Bees all over the baseboard and inside the hive, DEAD. Just like the previous hive, there was nothing living inside. I couldn’t believe this was happening. What had I done wrong? Where were the happy buzzing bees that I remember from the previous visits? They were nowhere to be seen. It was a hard season here on the MTN for beekeeping. Too much death. Sadness and Despair. I was determined that the following year I would set the hives up in the safest of locations, away from unwanting neighbors and possible pesticide sprayings.

So, when I returned home from this last tour I had already ordered two boxes of honeybees (Italians) while out on the road. Three days after Ollie arrived we were contacted by the Intermountain Farmers Association, which is where we purchased our bees. They were here. The two boxes of beautiful buzzing bees had arrived at the store and we were scheduled to pick them up Saturday morning. And so the following day we headed in and grabbed the two boxes of bees. I had, the previous afternoon, prepared their future homes just behind our chicken coop where they would be properly cared for and looked after. When we got back to the MTN with the two boxes I was excited and nervous to put them in the hives. The first (and only) time that I had ever installed bees into a hive I was wearing full bee protection, but in the book that I had been reading since my arrival home (The Beekeepers Handbook) said that when you receive your bees they are in their most docile state due to the fact that they have no hive or home to defend. No honey reserves to hold onto. And so for this go around I had decided to do it sans bee suit. My lady thought I was crazy but said that she would document it with our iflip and snap some FOTOS during the installation (For posterities sake).

A Beekeepers Dream of Heaven

The installation was quick and required very little skill. I sprayed the boxes down with sugar water to keep the bees happy and fat on sugar.  I then opened the boxes and removed the queen.

Boxes

The Queen of the Night

Then I poured the bees right over the hive and capped the queen box with a sugar cube, which allows the honeybees to eat away the sugar to release their beloved queen. The whole process was beautiful and really got me excited to spend more time with those lovely ladies this year and the years to follow.

Now, I suppose I should say SOMETHING about this extended play (EP) disc that we have coming out May 7^th. I AM excited about it (maybe not as excited about is as I am about these RADICAL bees) and am proud of the songs that swift, Evan and I recorded during the “From The Top Of Willamette Mountain” sessions. The four songs found on the newest BEWARE! EP is four songs that we decided to leave off the full length to release all on their own. And ON THEIR OWN they are being released. It is available through all the regular online retailers (Amazon, itunes, etc) but is also available in physical form through my website www.joshuajames.tv and there is a BEWARE! T-shirt that I designed modeled after a construction paper collage I made for the MTN, if you like T-shirt sorta things.

BEWARE!

And so there it goes.

The bees and the BEWARE! The sun and the son.

Here is to the changing weather. Here is to our dying bodies.

Here is to the bees and the babies.

AHOY, AMIGOS.

AHOY.

Joshua-Fred.