Griff says; Rainy night in Austin

Just a short blog tonight to bring you up to speed with the latest songs from our old friends; quirky indie-pop duo, champions of Creative Commons, and all round nice guys, Julandrew (pictured below). We've written in more detail about them before 'here' but, in a nutshell, Julandrew are Julie and Andrew; a pair of free spirits who currently live in Austin, Texas and make lovely, poppy, music for the whole world to enjoy. The duo have been posting their music online since 2008 and have become something of an internet phenomenon. Check out their website (love that 'cost of U.S. wars' counter, wonder if we can get a UK equivalent?) and their Jamendo page.


Last year our own Ray did a wee video for their song 'Wait Just A Litle Bit Longer' and he has been something of a confirmed fan ever since. In a fit of enthusiasm, he's now decided to make two more videos for their latest single releases. The first is for 'Don't Wanna Wake Up' (this is my favourite as I like the psychedelic dream sequences, it's like he can see inside my head!).



The next is for the more melancholy 'Raining' (which Ray tells me is his favourite).




As ever, the songs are available as free downloads. Julandrew are quite the evangelists for Creative Commons licences and they appreciate the exposure it gives them. However, if you do like the songs enough to download them and want to do something in return then you should send them a nice e-mail to say thank-you. They'll like that.

Enjoy,

Griff
xx

Griff says; Wait no longer! It's a new Julandrew song!

Assuming that if you're reading this blog you're pretty much a confirmed fan of quirky indie-pop, then most of you will already be well aware of Julandrew. For those of you who aren't (where have you been for the last two years?) here's a potted biography;

Julie and Andrew met each other in October, 2006 in the driveway of where they both lived, in the musically thriving city of Somerville, Massachusetts. Without knowing what would become, they hit it off right away. They had the same musical tastes and shared their favourite bands with each other. Not long after that, they realized they were a couple and they dreamt of starting a band together. They started hanging out in that very driveway with a guitar and sang their favorite songs, sometimes creating their own.
On August 18th, 2007, they got married and moved to Austin, Texas. While Andrew was working and making just enough for the both of them, Julie stayed home and began officially writing songs. She would come up with a melody in her head, figure it out on the piano or guitar, then add lyrics to it. Andrew would come home to her new song ideas and help find the chords on the guitar. They together would arrange the whole song before recording anything.
Before they began recording, they knew that they didn't want to use the ear-candy features of the computer. They knew they wanted all the main tracks to be performed without "punching-in" to fix mistakes. They knew they wanted all the instruments to be acoustic. And, they knew they wanted real drums, so they bought a cheap, used drumset for $250.
In March 2008, they finally had two songs recorded and put them up on the internet for their friends and family to hear. The outcome was, however, not what they expected. People around the globe discovered the new songs and used them for videos, podcasts, or just simply their ipods.

They've become something of a success story on the Jamendo website and have two albums available for free download there. These are Julandrew:Sings Your Favorite Songs, which was released in May 2008 and Julandrew: Sings Your Favorite Songs II released in June 2009
What started out as a fun thing for this couple to do, has turned into a serious musical endeavor, and they are still cranking out new tunes every month, which can be freely downloaded from their website.

The reason I mention Julandrew today is not just because I seem to keep mentioning bands composed of married couples and want to make it a recurring Streetlamp feature but is instead, of course, that their latest pop nugget 'Wait Just A Little Bit Longer' has just been posted online this week. We've given it the 'Streetlamp' video treatment so that you can have a listen before heading to the Julandrew site to download the entire back catalogue. Enjoy!




Griff
xx