“How I Came To Cry These Tears Of Cool” has been picked up by Burnside Distribution so there are even more ways to purchase this majestic piece of work. We also began recording at Haywire Studios in Portland recently. We laid down 16 tracks in 6 hours tentatively called…..oh I better not say. Of course those 16 tracks will be revisited I am sure. I also recorded eight more solo for a total of, oh you do the math, I’m an english guy.

Hopefully I can crank out a few more this week if I can get a little peace and quiet around this joint. It has been a fantastic summer so far, full of automobile malfunctions, quick repair, small towns, big characters, lots of yucks, lots of good times.

Thanks to the 12 tribes for letting me on the bus and giving me that cookie. It was pretty incredible.

Thanks to the drunk hairdresser at Whistlin’ Jacks, I will try to learn some Ricky Martin for the next time around.

Thanks to Gig Harbor, Tacoma, Jazzbones and the Farmers Market in the rain with the wonderful 80 year old that stood and watched in the pouring rain. Confidential to SK, stay off that junk can’t you see you’re breaking your mothers heart.

Thanks to Aaron and the Twisp River Pub. Stop by in the Methow Valley. It is beautiful and the beer is amongst the best I’ve had and I am an alcoh, er….connoisseur.
Thanks to the Pirates of Ilwaco, the great people of the Astoria and the outlying regions. You know who you are. (Except for that one waitress, what the hell did I do to you? I never met you before in my life, you’re kind of jerk. You’re a jercules and that means you are harnessing the power of ten thousand jerks).

And always thanks to Corvallis, Seattle, Portland, and Yakima you are the golden triangle with and extra stop of my existence.

And of course thanks to Lonesome Dewey, “Hell, Might As Well” Denell, Dr. Hess and his Evil Keys….and the mighty Kwab for filling in at Folklife…..and everyone else!

Look at the calendar, come to a show

It has been a long time since I updated this I know, but those on the mailing list know that I have been playing a lot of shows and bouncing around too much to sit in front of this soul sucking box for too long.

With the help of Billy “Lonesome Dewey” Miller on upright bass and “What the Hell” Denell Fahy on accordian we have formed a collective rock and roll operation called the Modern Conveniences.  We have been playing in around Portland for a couple months now.  I consistently continue doing solo shows and have been writing more new material than I can sometimes keep up with. 

I hope to start recording again to document the new material before it loses its freshness depending on my economical viability in the current market place that is my empty pockets. 

I was recently added to Northwest Folklife.  I am playing on May 28th at 11:00 AM on the Fountain Lawn with the Sangster Brothers and Kwab Copeland.  Also look for the Modern Conveniences at the Fremont Fair wedged (ha ha!) somewhere near the nude bicycle riders.

You probably noticed the new videos on the home page.  If not go back and watch Lonesome Dewey and I as we open for John Doe in Seattle.  I should have a myspace video up shortly too.

Also I got a nice review on All Music from John D. Luerssen the author of a recent biography of the band Weezer that has received much acclaim! Thanks John!

Check the schedule, come to a show and say hello.  HELLO!

An interview with Spring, who will play with his band The Post Modern
Conveniences in Bend on Wednesday (see “If You Go”), clocks in at right
around a laugh a minute. He’s a funny guy, even when he’s taking a
break from painting a house to make a few extra bucks.
“Let me get down from this ladder real quick,” he says after he answers
the phone. “I’ve got to be careful. I don’t have health insurance.”
Spring lived in Seattle for 10 years before moving to Portland about a
year ago. He grew up in Flagstaff, Ariz., where he started playing
music in high school. Ask him how he started playing guitar and he deflects
the question with typical self-deprecation.
“I’m not a guitar player. I’m a guitar owner.”
But one spin through the songs at myspace.com/colinspring reveals that
Spring is just being modest. His songs are an infectious blend of 1960s
folk and 1970s pop, with a heavy dose of his wit and wordsmithery.
Spring came to the Northwest in 1994 because he “couldn’t think of any
other place to move.” He became a small fish in a big pond after
spending a few years being a medium-size fish in the smaller pond of
Flagstaff.
“I was pretty bad, which was all right because there wasn’t a lot going
on,” he said. “There didn’t seem like there were high standards, so you
could be pretty bad and still get gigs.”
Gigging in Seattle wasn’t easy, but Spring did get better as a player
and a writer, he said. He cut three albums for a friend’s record label,
Home Recorded Culture, before self-releasing “How I Came To Cry These
Tears Of Cool” earlier this year.
The album has a bevy of guest musicians on it, including Seattle
luminaries such as Screaming Trees drummer Mark Pickerel, Young Fresh Fellows
bassist Jim Sangster, and Carla Torgerson, vocalist and guitarist in
The Walkabouts. The album got a 3-1/2 star rating from the excellent
music magazine Paste, and The Oregonian said “Tears Of Cool” has “the kind
of tunes that make other songwriters look as if they’ve acquired the
language by mistake.”
The songs on the album have a warm, vintage sheen, which hangs over
Spring’s clever, sometimes political lyrics. It’s a record that sounds
like it was made three decades too late - not surprising given the
songwriter’s influences.
“I like that 1970s Southern California kind of Jackson Browne-y thing,”
he said. “I like Warren Zevon, that kind of stuff. John Prine. I like
that folk rock kind of thing.”
Since moving to Portland, Spring has been focusing on music full time;
he calls it “self-unemployment.” He’s working on his fifth album now,
and is trying to bring more of his jovial personality into the songs, he
said.
“I’ve always kind of been a funny guy, but … I go to these folk
festivals and there’s a really great singer and there’s a really great
guitar player, better than I’ll ever be in my life,” he said. “My strength
is my lyrics and my wit, so I’ve kind of figured out a way to instill a
lot more humor in the songs I’ve been doing.”
Spring said he enjoys looking out at a crowd that is laughing (in a
good way) at one of his lyrics. At the same time, he’s wary of becoming a
novelty act. One of his newest songs, “Good Looking Man,” has quickly
turned into a staple of his live act, and now people are yelling for it
throughout his set.
That makes him a little nervous. But not too nervous to make a joke
about it.
“That’s what everybody wants to hear. I’m kind of seeing what it’s like
to be (1980s one-hit wonder) Kajagoogoo. It obscures all the other
songs,” he said. “I love John Prine because he’s able to do the funny thing
and the melancholy thing. He’s able to transfer back and forth pretty
seamlessly, and I think that’s the eventual goal. I like being able to
do both.”
Spring says he’d like to talk to me all day, because it means he would
get to put off painting the house that looms over him. He says he’s
“kind of lazy,” but he also seems to be a guy who is content with his
place in life and in the world of music.
“I feel like I’m at a good level to be at. I scrape by, but it’s pretty
adventurous. I’m always in a different situation,” he said. “If you’re
in a mid-level band you play mid-level clubs across the country to the
same type of crowd. I’ll play a farmer’s market, a coffee house. Dive
bars. I play as much as I can and wherever. I like the whole adventure
of it.”

By Ben Salmon

By Kim Nowacki
Yakima Herald-Republic

This weekend’s Yakima Folklife Festival marks the one-year anniversary
of singer/songwriter Colin Spring ’s relationship with Yakima. He’s
been back several times since last year’s festival, has several sets
scheduled for this weekend, and will be back again next month for two
concerts.

Wild-haired and wickedly funny, Spring writes modern folk-rock music
that’s gritty, real and romantic, but also bright and humorous at times.
It’s poetic urban storytelling reminiscent of Dylan, Springsteen and
Steve Forbert.

“I always wanted to play punk-rock in the ’70s stylings,” says Spring
who cites John Prine, Warren Zevon, Jackson Browne, Social Distortion
and Suicidal Tendencies among his influences. “It’s always been my goal.”

His first album came out in 1998, the second during his “tortured
years” — “it’s kind of tough for me to listen to that album,” he says.

On the third, “Cancion de Pollo,” and his latest album, “How I Came to
Cry These Tears of Cool” — which features the drumming talents of
Ellensburg-bred Mark Pickerel plus a number of top-notch musicians —
Spring tells four-minute epics, elaborate stories you have to hear again
and again to truly understand the complexity of his songwriting.

“Sometimes when you say folk, people think you sing about chocolate and
cats,” he says with a smirk.

For Spring’s songs, he draws from fact and fiction, from his own life
and the stories of others heard four times removed.

He explains all this on the back cover of “Tears of Cool,” where he
lays bare his own turbulent past — as unbelievable as it is in parts.

He writes in tiny type of suburban hipster parents, broken homes,
Federales with machine guns, odd jobs, odder living arrangements, love and
loss, the results of circumstance and rolling with the punches.

When Spring, who now calls Portland home, makes his way back to town,
he’ll be accompanied by his band, the Post Modern Conveniences. Members
include Billy “Lonesome Dewey” Miller on upright bass and drums and
“What the Hell” Denell Fahy on accordion.

With titles like “Joe McCarthy Is Sweeping Off His Grave, you might expect to find lyrics of a political nature on Colin Spring’s latest release. And though you would not be wrong you may bve surprised by the depth of feeling and the range of emotion that are also present, chugging along aton a rolling Wurlitzer oregan and and solid blues rock beat.

“What is all this free speech for when we can’t use it anymore/It’s the red scare with a veil across its face…they’re still blacklisting all the tongues that misbehave”, sings Spring in his husky, born to rock voice-not quite Dylan, not quite Springsteen, just absolutely real. “Does She Still” takes a quick trip throught past loves; “Lover, There’s A Light On” has the feel of an Italian ballad with plaintive mandolin, while the poetic imagery of “November” will take your breath away. Check it out, you won’t be sorry.

3 1/2 Stars!

Sensitive singer/songwriter for the leather jacket crowd

Itinerant singer/songwriter Colin Spring may strum an acoustic guitar and sing songs of social consciousness but he’s not about to ditch his leather jacket. His raucous punk aesthetic and rock and roll heart drive these songs beyond sentiment, adding a fierce, defiant edge to even the most plaintive confession. Album opener “Joe McCarthy Is Sweeping Off His Grave” rips along with a rollicking Blonde On Blonde guitar/organ carnival lope and topical song rage, but tracks like “Does She Still?” and “November” best represent Spring’s street-tough purple heart. Here, he recalls the pensive, acoustic side of Peter Laughner (rocket from the Tombs, Pere Ubu) with songs of Dionysian indulgence and pining nostalgia. Spring is joined by an able cast of Norhwestern indie rock underdogs. Most notably The Walkabouts’ Carl Torgerson, who harmonizes without sweetness during the rugged doom of “Lover, There’s A Light On”. Rob O’Conner

COLIN SPRING- HOW I CAME TO CRY THESE TEARS OF COOL- HOME RECORDED CULTURE- This is Spring’s 4th record but the first one I’ve heard and from the liner notes on the back of the cd he sounds like he’s had a helluva life (hippy parents who moved around A LOT and briefly were involved in crime ) and his songwriting is only stronger for it. Having a who’s who of Seattle musicians helping him out doesn’t hurt either (and a producer the caliber of Johnny Sangster.) with Screaming Trees Mark Pickeral and Walkabout’s Carla Torgerson in the mix. The guy, not unlike a Bob Dylan, is a great storyteller and tunes like the opener “Joe McCarthy is Sweeping off His Grave” or the dramatic “Chinatown” (plus “Fresh Kill in Nowhereville”) prove the guy is a winning talent . Still ,as good as this record is, something tells me that Spring’s real strength is in his live show and now that he’s living in Portland I will be checking the gig listings with bated breath

I have some end of old/beginning of new year news to share and I wanted to send a big thanks some people.

First Barbara Mitchell has been plugging away and “How I Came To Cry These Tears Of Cool” has been given 1/2 by Paste Magazine. It is by the far the largest magazine I have been reviewed in and Performing Songwriter has selected it for inclusion in its 12 best DIY albums next month!

Also Gary Evans author of Music Inspired by Art: A Guide to Recordings (Scarecrow Press) will be including “Sistine Chapel Ceiling” in his second volume. Sounds like an interesting topic, see the link below.
http://www.scarecrowpress.com/Catalog/SingleBook.shtml?command=Search&db=^DB/CATALOG.db&eqSKUdata=0810845091

Lynne Robin Greene has been pitching the album to Hollywood, not the district in North Portland, but the one with the palm trees! Her new website is one of the nicest I have seen www.lwbhmusicpublishers.com

Speaking of movies Collin O’Kelley has included the song “November” in his movie “Punk Girl”. It is filmed entirely in Seattle and the song occurs during a love montage, with handholding (another joy I may have again), and sushi feeding. I am thrilled!

Also Dan Craig of Yakima fame will be doing some of my booking having recently declared himself Tumbleweed Entertainment. If you are a band/musician planning a trip to Washington’s east side he may be able to help you out with a show….

Finally Gordon Potter webmaster extraordinaire has set up a fail safe system where by even a knucklehead like myself can update my calendar as dates come in! Check it out. I got some pDctures up too!

Review by John D. Luerssen
Balancing folk-rock intelligence and indie rock swagger, Colin Spring blossoms on his fourth album, How I Came to Cry These Tears of Cool. A young master of heartfelt story-songs in the tradition of vintage Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan — a notion supported by titles like “Fresh Kill in Nowhereville” — Spring has a knack for tales of cross-dressers and drug deals gone awry. Produced by Seattle boardsman Johnny Sangster and augmented by the likes of Mark Pickerel (of Screaming Trees) and Jim Sangster (of Young Fresh Fellows fame), How I Came to Cry These Tears of Cool sounds as inventive as the stories Spring tells. The power of “Joe McCarthy Is Sweeping Off His Grave” gives the disc wings, but songs of immigrant struggle (”Chinatown”) and desolation (”November”) are where this rising talent from Washington state soars.

allmusic.com