We are playing Mercury Lounge tonight!

With our buds Robbers on High Street.

They were great, we played w them a year ago it was awesome. Come out.

brilliant

Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis from Between Two Ferns

I wanna go surfing!

I stopped by Annex to see the Drums 2nite. They great!

Jonathan is a superb performer and their hooks are breathtaking. I can't wait to play with them in 2 weeks.

Tom

The Galaxy

Watch the end where you can see the spine of the Milky Way. Far out...

Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas Star Party from William Castleman on Vimeo.

Pianos!

We had a lovely show with XYZ Affair on Monday which officially concluded our Spring Tour. We are all exhausted and taking a couple days off before our show this Friday at Newsonic in Bushwick.

XYZ's are superb and really talented. They have some new-ish songs up on their myspace that are dope. We played with them last year at Music Hall of Williamsburg, the night of the torrential downpour of '08.

Monday was the first show of their residency and the last show of our tour. The crowd was really great and, for a NYC crowd, enthusiastic (middle america is just so damn friendly, you forget about NYC...) But it was seriously a blast.

Our set from this show will be broadcast on Jezz Harkin's Breakthru Radio in early June so check back for details. Our pal Helge, who mixed 2 tracks on Lay That Cable, is giving the show a once-over as we speak.

We are really stoked to have some unique and wonderful NYC shows coming up. As mentioned, this friday, May 15th is at Newsonic, which is by all acounts an INSANE party. Then May 28th we're opening for our indie heroes the 1990's at Mercury Lounge. June 13th we're playing the Exit 44 fest at Wonderland with Tigercity, whom we played with at Bowery last year and really dig. We're planning our summer tour in late July/early August, so we should be back in a lot of the places we hit this time around again. We cant' wait!

Tom

Back home!

We made it back in one piece to Brooklyn last night for a super sweaty set at Retox/Glass House in Bushwick. We were exhausted but had a blast. Disasteradio, a one-piece synth rock freakout session from New Zealand played as well. Fun stuff.

The last few days of the tour were pretty amazing despite being incredibly drained (can you tell how tired we are in this photo?) from so much driving and shitty rest stop food. It's unbelievable that you cannot buy anything fresh off the interstate in this country. I won't rant about it except to say that shitty food makes you feel shitty and it's no wonder this country is so unhealthy.

That aside, the shows were amazing and we met and crashed with some of the most wonderful and friendly people on the planet. Cincinnati was a highlight. We played a short set at WOXY radio, which was such a thrill as we all listen to those guys all the damn time anyway. They are great hosts and super people who love what they do so much. One wishes that there were more people like them, fighting the good fight and doing incredible work out of sheer passion for music and radio. DOWNLOAD THE WHOLE SET AND INTERVIEW HERE.

After the set we killed time for a couple hours, bought some cables at a typically douchey Guitar Center and then went to the Northside Tavern and played an awesome gig with Koala Fires. The turnout was awesome, people danced and shouted. We partied serious.

Here is a review from that show:
The Action Painters got people dancing last night at the Northside Tavern, which is always a good thing for an indie band! The band feels somewhere between The Strokes and The Killers, before both got too commercialized. The Action Painters have the refreshing qualities those bands had when they first started out. They began their set with an unreleased Beatlesesque “How Could It Be So Wrong” and yes I think I even spotted a Harmonica which showed some range. The majority of the evening however they kept the kids dancing to songs like “Sooner or Later” and “456”. The Brooklyn band played a mix of songs from their 2007 album Chubby Dancer, brand new EP Lay That Cable, and some unreleased tracks. They ended with the crowd pleaser from the new EP “Money Changes Everything.” I believe that there will be nothing but good things to come for this band!

We have a ton of NYC shows in the near future, starting with Pianos tomorrow night with the XYZ Affair as they kick off their residency, which is sponsored by OhMyRockness. Sweeeet.

Springfield Il

Land of Lincoln and home to egg brothels.