YOU-ME-GO MAILBAG #2: UPON A BEAUCHAMP REQUEST!

You asked for it. And who am I to say no?

IT'S MAILBAG TIME!!!!

"Dear Anathallo, I've been out of the country for four years and have been jamming your cds non-stop on my walkman. I just came back home, though, and found out about Myspace. I went to your page and didn't recognize anyone. I'm not sure if I like you guys anymore."

---David W. from Minneapolis, Minnesota

Well, friend. I hope your trip was fantastic. And to be honest, I understand the dilemma. You left the country thinking this:



or maybe even this:



and instead:



WHAT?
WHY ARE THEY ALREADY TAKING A MEANDERING RETROSPECTIVE LOOK AT THEIR CAREERS?
WHO IS THAT GIRL?
WHO IS THAT GUY REACHING FOR A BEER DURING THE INTERVIEW?
WHO OR WHAT IS A ZUNE?
WHY DOES THEIR RECORDED PERFORMANCE LOOK LIKE IT WAS FILMED FROM A DESERT STORM BUNKER?
WHY ISN'T THIS A VIDEO FOR A SONG FOR CHRISTINE?
WHEN DID THEY START PLAYING GOLF?

....

David, I understand.

Let me try to explain. We don't really play golf but it made for a clever video montage. A zune is a brown ipod. "The girl" is Erica. She has been in the band for nearly two years now. Just like MY BOY JER who also turns out to be the beer drinker. He is over 21 and the drinks were free. If both of those are not true for the reader, I recommend keeping clear of alcoholic beverages. THIS BLOG CARES.

And the song? It's another from the new record. It's entitled "John J. Audubon" and will pretty much be track three for the album. See! Look at all these treasures I am handing out. It's almost as if the Nearly September Santa stopped by.

Oh wait. He did.



Anyways, thanks for the e-mail. I hope we can still be friends in the future.

NEXT!

"I love your music. It really sounds like nothing else I've ever heard and is very refreshing. I write music myself, and am really curious as to how you think up your songs and what your songwriting process is, if there is one.

Thanks and be sure to come to Dallas, Texas, the next time you go on tour, if you can help it.

See ya!"

---Hunter Beauchamp from Dallas, Texas.

This was from our comments section and made it's way quite easily to the mailbag. Thanks for writing, Hunter! And thank you for your kind words. I'm afraid I don't have the most interesting answer... although I did ask Matt what he thought and we neeeeeearly wrote back:

"If the magician gave away all his secrets, what reason would you have to still come to the show?"

Fortunately, though, we are not out of our minds. And we don't really have any tricks. I think our songs are the combination of... a lot of us have been playing music together for awhile now. I'm sure it's like this with any group of friends who have been together for a long time - you get to know how each other works. So for us, we might bring a few melodies to practice... a lyric or two... a vague idea of where the song should go... and then we mash them all together. There's not really a set process - we just talk through everything and mess up each other's ideas. Surprisingly, this actually makes what we write way better. It's like Voltron but music.



Eventually it comes together and the result is a song that we all feel we had a hand in.

I'm sorry if that's super vague! If you have any more questions, there are plenty of mailbags where this came from. And we'll definitely try to get to Dallas when we jump back in the van.

What? There's more mail?

"Anathallo! You are all so wonderful! If you had to choose an animal for each band member to serve as a representation of their personality, who would be what animal and why??"

---Lauren H. from Tallahassee, Florida

I asked Seth and he said we're all dolphins.

And finally.

"Is it really true that you're playing with Hey Mercedes? And that it's free?! And that Southwest Airlines has all sorts of great deals from Denver to Chicago??"

---Julia Gulia from Colorado

Yes, yes, and yes.

Here is BOB NANNA from the past!

Hey Mercedes - Quality Revenge At Last

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Come see BOB NANNA in the present!

Click here for more details. Actually, if you click there it will take you to the Threadless t-shirt sale. But! If you scroll to the bottom of the page and click "news and updates," there will be all the details anyone could ever want. And maybe a shirt or two will strike your fancy? Perhaps.

Also. I've been thinking more about Lauren's question and we're not all dolphins. Seth was nearly right - I would say six of us are dolphins. But Jeremiah would unquestionably be a bulldog (UGA IS IN HIS HEART)... and that means our songwriting process probably looks more like this:



The North and South living together in harmony! Dogs and dolphins as friends! The perfect representation of our band as a geographical being!

Google Images finally comes through!!!

(if you can't tell, this mailbag is losing steam in a hurry... I think that's it for me)

ONWARD DAY TEN.
Bye!