ALI's INTROVERSE

Taking one final break before jumping back into the whirlpool that is September. Skipped the rehearsal this week, but still had quite a few things to take care of: kicking off planning for the single release with Deni (our PR/Manager), finalizing the timetable for the upcoming gig and biting nails about Tony's flight back from a wedding on gig day, reviewing the first shots from the video shoot, writing a blog post, shooting selfie videos on vacation for the social media, getting educated on SoAlive conference format, etc. The video stills look amazeballs. Not wanting to rush anything we've given the director/editor ample time to finish, so we expect to present a ready video end of September, as opposed to middle of the month. We have full and unconditional trust in the crew, but it does feel different not having been on the actual shoot. And this was a three-day ordeal. The trust comes from seeing all the prep work and emotional engagement. I guess it's just getting antsy ...

The week started with the fan purchase marked with an argument between two employees around how to best pack it. The exchange escalated quickly as we watched standing by to react, as one of the employees was holding a paper-cutting scalpel. It quieted down just as quickly as the manager got involved. Peace to both otherwise lovely ladies trying to offer good service. The event of the week was the Nick Cave concert in the magical antic theatre in Plovdiv. A legend's live performance is hard to describe in words. Nick on piano and Colin Greenwood (!) on bass engaged the audience in an intimate setting and got us singing along to epic cantos like "Into My Arms" and "Push The Sky Away". Simplicity and depth, poetic storytelling during and in between the songs, demonstration of the power of quiet and understatement, all wrapped around a full spectrum of emotions. Nick is a master of delivery, subtle humor and ruthlessly but lovingly conducting the audience. More to l...

Bad news of the week is that our only fan has died. Our loyal ally since the beginning succumbed to damage incurred as a result of an accidental fall. Luckily finding and buying a new one online is easy nowadays. Keeping the air fresh and circulating in the rehearsal room, especially in the summer heat is a problem. In between rehearsals we snuck in a marketing revamp call on Teams (for better or worse that's what we use, it used to be Skype up until recently). An hour was spent trying to remotely coordinate an Instagram <> Linktree integration, but it kept spewing out a 400 error. Tony has been charged with seeing it through with Linktree's backend. We also quickly agreed that we should go for the tag "alitheband", "ali.the.band" or "ali_the_band" wherever we have an online presence. I just counted 22 different accounts for online tools and communities. There's got to be more. Meanwhile, the preparations for our new video are almost comp...

The glamour of today's rehearsal began with pampering our faithful black-and-red rehearsal room with a vacuum cleaning. Very much necessary because we take our shoes off while we're there and the splinters from Orli's drumsticks are particularly effective at perforating the socks and the soles of our feet. "Slit my feet lover" the lyrics go, I believe. The refreshed red brightness of the cheap, but loveable floor gives off good, new beginning vibes. The sad part was realizing that the vacuum cleaner has only got a few of these cleanings left before we send it off to the vacuum cleaner farm in rural Bulgaria.  The hot summer air coming from the ventilation forced us to open the door. Like everything else in life, a tricky trade-off. This time between some fresh air and the smell of the fast food being packaged into mysterious black boxes next door. Then came the good stuff. Ali had almost finished adjusting the sound on his stereo IEMs (rest of us use mono) and his...

Depending on how you count them, five or ten years into this journey, we decided to start building this band in the open. For those who don't know, we started as a cover band consisting of office colleagues (with one notable exception), and then Ali decided to share his little treasure cove of song ideas on a Google Drive which paved the way to our first original single in 2020, then full album in 2025. Thanks to support from our PR/Manager Deni, the band's secret weapon, we were lucky enough to have played close to 50 concerts, including warming the crowd up for names like De Staat, Sisters of Mercy, The Editors, Massive Attack... Still feels surreal, especially as we return to the daily non-performer selves. But we like to think that's what keeps us grounded. We love every bit of the adventure. Including the hard stuff (e.g. moving from seven members to six, and then from six to five - hopefully temporarily). We learn, mostly from each other. We learn to trust each other....