Lisa: Tell me about the publishing deal that motivated you to move from Michigan to Nashville. How were you discovered?

Ford: A graduate school colleague had heard some of my music and put me in touch with a publisher she knew in Nashville, Jerry Smith. I was on my way to Nashville for another project anyway, so I gave him a call and we decided to meet up. I had my guitar and played him some songs in his living room. He asked me right then if I wanted to work together. Then we went out for sushi. I was living in Michigan at the time, so I made the move down here 8 months after our meeting. I was writing a lot, but It wasn't until I met my friend Reid Scelza that things really started to take shape.

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February 2007, (para)Normal, IL:

Phonograph spend an overnight with bassist John Davis's friend, Scott Callan, a local music engineer. Callan and his wife reside in the back half of a haunted house on temporary watch. (Today is October 28th. Go ahead and accuse me of festivity.) The front half of the property is now a museum with "all the furnishings typical of your 20-something recording engineer... 600 year old Persian rugs, religious texts over 1000 years old... you know, that sort of thing," John says. The museum-residence was the childhood home of Adlai Stevenson, who ran for President against Eisenhower in 1952 and again in '56. (If I fail to provide you with a ghost story, acknowledge this creepy fact about America that acutely haunts us today: Stevenson lost by a landslide in both elections. He was popularly ridiculed for being too intelligent). The museum houses artifacts including furniture rumored to have been used by Abraham Lincoln. Upon entering the mansion, visitors are greeted by an early 20th-century Hiawatha Victrola. Herein lies the title of Phonograph's currently released EP: Hiawatha Talking Machine.

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In December of 2004, Brooke moved to Ontario and got married in 2005. "My life in love and music really began then." It's a comment like this, paired with the music she makes, that gives an audience the impression that Brooke Miller lives a life less earthbound. She's adrift in music, in ancestral channels. "Don and I have a wonderful musical relationship," Brooke says. "It was pretty much that way right off the bat." Together with producer Peter Lubin they create You Can See Everything in an old converted church in Ontario, rented for eleven days from friends. They set the rooms up for different instrumentations. The organ was placed in the living room with thirty foot ceilings, bass in the kitchen, drums in the basement, guitar and vocals in one of the bedrooms. The album was engineered in another bedroom in front of a twenty-five foot stained glass window. The title track, You Can See Everything , Brooke wrote for her husband. "I had tied up most of the loose ends of the songs and was almost ready to start pre-production for recording," Brooke says. "However, when Don and I got together and we discovered we simply needed to be together, I found myself wanting to bring the record full circle somehow... That's when 'You Can See Everything' pretty much wrote itself."

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In March 2007 Mark Charles Heidinger released his first Vandaveer album,

, on the Indie label Gypsy Eyes Records. When I ask him how this collaboration came about, here is what he tells me. "I first noticed Gypsy Eyes sending suggestive signals my way from across a dark and dingy basement bar a few years back. I eventually built up the nerve to glance back, first with a wink, then with a stare. Really, once you get locked into a staring contest with those Gypsy Eyes, you have no choice but to, um, collaborate." Notice that a pair of gypsy eyes stare out of his head (just look at them!) as he articulates his response in a manner both elusive and oddly existential. I'm at large in a posthumously penned Vonnegut novel, free to chat and chuckle with a highly intelligent and hilarious Pied Piper, who also, it seems, is a really nice guy.

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Hello Tokyo, the power pop group from Brooklyn, NY, emerged in 2004 and has thus far conquered a spectrum of accomplishments so inclusive they are one rock n' roll ambition short of throwing live puppies into the audience. The band consists of Kat on vocals, John on guitar, Sam on drums and Blake on bass.

The Interview:

Lisa: I hear you've just returned from a studio recording in Hollywood. What were you working on?

Kat: We were working on a previously released song. Producer Greg Richling, aka our hero, showed a lot of interest in the band and in June 2007 flew out to New York City to re-work a song that's been very very good to us. With regards to which song, that's all I can say right now. The vibe was great and there was some serious chemistry. After a few months we flew out to Hollywood, recorded it and presto! We have a new killer version of a killer song that we're hoping will continue to be very very good to us!

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Brother Henry, a four-piece musical entourage from Nashville, Tennessee, carries a heavy torch: three brothers and a frere non de mere. The depth of a rare vocal gene pool is supported by cello, guitar, mandolin, and a crack Hofnerian rhythm section. All four members of the ensemble have toured and recorded with various well-known musicians, contributing to artists such as Ben Folds, Tim McGraw, Indigo Girls, Cowboy Junkies, Guster, Sixpence None the Richer, Steve Earle and REM. The Brothers released their first cd,

, in 2004, following up their tour with a live album, "Live At The Basement,", recorded in Nashville. In 2005 they released with two tracks featuring guest keyboardist Chuck Leavell (Rolling Stones, Allman Brothers). Their third release, Love Survives, only expands their popularity and support in Nashville, Atlanta, Charlotte, Louisville, Winston Salem, Asheville... all over the Southeast.

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I'm at Inman Perk, a coffee house in Atlanta, Georgia, opening an email from Mia Riddle. My feet are fastened to the good earth somewhere within five miles of this locale at 8 p.m. on Friday night, despite my impulse to tell a different story.

Mia Riddle's tale thus far begins and ends in Brooklyn. The yarns of her first solo tour are spun from a friend's leaky hatchback, a chariot escorting her through some of the U.K.'s less-traveled nooks and far reaches, where she plays with hardcore and metal bands. Like all legends-in-the-making, she faces imminent bloodshed. "There's no way I'm getting up there," she tells punknews.co.uk. "I'm going to be knifed." She's delivered upon a less violent fate: audience and admiration. Two solo EP's are self-released, "Ship of Dreams" and "Tender," before the band comes together to release Mia Riddle and Her Band's first full-length album,

, which inspires copious accolades. "If it's a brief trip to bliss you're looking for," says The Owl Mag, "Tigers is likely as good as it gets." It gets better. Mia Riddle and Her Band just got back from their second U.K. tour and also hit Paris this time around. After a couple New York shows on the books this Fall, they head into the studio. Their latest EP, , is about to become a full-length album.

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[Editor's note: Sunday Service is back and this week LisaRae interviews Garry Ventura of The Snow. Read it all after the break.]

LisaRae: Are you based out of Los Angeles? Is this where the band began? Where are you guys from?

Garry: The Snow is based in L.A. We came together in the Spring of 2006 while writing songs in various rehearsal and jam rooms. Once I met Aaron, I realized I had met someone important that had something to say and the means to do it in a real and artistic way. The Snow came together slowly as drums, guitar and vocals working out parts and sounds and lyrics for a couple of songs. Billy came in, made them really solid and Jason brought in the intensity and more texture. We took those to Stagg St. studios and recorded them live overdubbing vocals and effects at Regime studios. "Trading Post" and "October" were done. It was then we realized we needed to start a band around this and continue writing and playing together. But it was too late... we already were a band and The Snow was born in those first two songs.

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Let me tell you what's happening on Sundays at Amie Street. I am a music lover. I am also a compulsive writer who, when derailed from my current fiction project, needs to feed the monster. So... I inquired with the Editors about creating a weekly biography blog introducing the site's musicians, announcing their shows, album-releases and tours for the upcoming week and acknowledging what self-created artists are saying and doing with and for their music. I'll feature one band or musician each week and make announcements for as many as possible.

What I aspire to do: lucid, honest, grassroots promotion of independent music.

Tristan Waterkeyn found time in his current two-week tour of South Africa to chat with me a bit so I could introduce him to his Amie Street listeners. I encourage you to visit his music here on Amie Street. He's offered to send a link to all of his tracks for free to any Amie Street member who writes 3 RECs for his available songs. Write him the RECs, he'll send you the link!

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