CockStrong in Colorado Springs

Hooch drank the "CockStrong" Drink, and then we got three for the road. Gotta stay up for those long drives

Sunday night we played in Colorado Springs. We haven’t been there in about two years so it was almost like our first show. The venue is a cool place called the Zodiac bar that features music, comedy, and even burlesque shows. Although it began as a sparsely attended and mellow affair, by the final few songs we had a rowdy crowd up in front dancing and singing.

Highlight: There is an energy drink manufactured in Colorado Springs called Cock Strong. Yep, it is also supposed to be a male enhancement thing. Pretty hilarious. We had a lot of fun making up taglines. It’s almost as good as “That’s what she said.” For example, when we were talking about pancakes at the end of the night, our Denny’s server said, “The cooks always make the pancakes different sizes. They’re supposed to be six inches, but everyone’s six inches is different.” CockStrong: Everyone’s Six Inches is Different.

Other random thoughts: Presidents’ Day
Why do we celebrate the presidents? Is it for their leadership? The things they’ve accomplished? What about the congress and the voters and the cabinet and judges and supreme court? What about Democracy? I guess that’s what Independence Day celebrates. I don’t know it just seems like a strange thing to celebrate. There are so many good things to celebrate in life, most of them small and everyday. I celebrate the smell of good coffee (I’m in a coffee shop right now), bright sun on a snowy day, waking up late, waking up early, the brilliance of technology, the soreness of muscles after a hard run or a tough climb. I celebrate deep conversations, catching up with old friends, making new friends, discovering something new about yourself or someone you love. These things don’t need holidays, of course. Maybe the presidents need a holiday… do you think the president rests on Presidents’ Day? I hope so.

You might think, “What does this have to do with Achachay!?” This thinking and discussion is one of the things our band is about. Plus, it’s part of the luxury of the road. Traveling the way we do, constantly interacting with new people, new geographies, and new situations, you get the opportunity to reflect on yourself and the world around you in a way that isn’t always available in a more stable setting. You’re shoved into new perspectives. It’s our job as a band to share these experiences with the you. It’s our job to offer you the same insights we receive from these perspectives when you join us in song and dance.

Commentary on a Fun trip to Junc Town

Grand Junction feels like a small town, yet there are 50,000 people in it. Our show was at a legendary venue called the Mesa Theater, where this month alone Los Lonely Boys and Rebelution are playing. David, owner and self described “one of the last mom and pop venues of this size” is a good guy who really likes to party.

We played a great two set show with lots of jamming and improv. Something about the space made us feel more open and we did some of our classics like “Tour Song” in entirely new styles. A decent crowd came out, partly due to our on air performance either that day on KAFM.

The station is really cool – community / volunteer run and totally solar powered. The DJs are always nice and everyone there liked our music. They all seemed very supportive of independent music in general.

It’s funny how people like to project whatever they like onto us. As soon as we got in the KAFM building, one of the guys started bashing Republicans and Conservatives, assuming we agreed with him- I guess because we’re from Austin and are in a band.

Yet a couple days later, another guy made a few incredibly racist comments as jokes, assuming we’d laugh. I guess he thought, “They’re from Texas, they must be racist too.”

Well, they were all wrong. I don’t think of us identify as Republican or Democrat, and we certainly don’t judge people’s character based on physical characteristics they are born with.

Anyway, we also had a really great couchsurfing host Jodie. All in all it was one of our most fun trips to the crazy city of Grand Junction.

photos from Friday at Stubb’s

What a crazy awesome weekend! Friday night we played a killer set after Rebelution’s sold out show on the Stubb’s outdoor stage. Check out these great photos from Evan Gilmore. We were thrilled to play for our amazing Austin regulars, always dancing full one in the front row, plus we won over a ton of new fans from Rebelution’s show.

photos courtesy of Evan Gilmore

Gorilla Run packed and awesome

The Gorilla Run was a huge success. Over 1000 people dressed up in gorilla suits and raised over $50,000 for the second year in a row last Saturday. I’m so proud of everyone who helped make this happen. I love all the participants, fans, and the spirit of Austin. I’m so happy to call this city home.

Our show was super fun. Playing to a crowd of a thousand people dressed in gorilla suits is an unforgettable experience. Hopefully we’ll get some pictures posted soon. In the meantime you can check out photos of the gorilla run at the official site. I never would have predicted this, but what with the Gorilla Run and Voodoo Fest, some of our biggest and most energetic shows recently have started in the early morning – at 10AM!

Big props to Hooch, as we got many compliments on the sound. He’s run festival sized sound before (Applejam’s Sunday jam last year, for example), but this year was a whole different beast.

It will happen again in 2013. We’ll see you there!

Let’s get Motherloaded

The Motherloaded Tavern in Breckenridge was our last gig on the most recent Colorado tour. We had so much fun there that we’ll be playing it again on February 18th, around 10p.

To kick it off, our buddy Ty from Gunnison drove up to party with us. Sweet. Then right before the show started three friends from Austin surprised us at the bar! My buddies Harrison, Andrew, and Bryant, whom I’ve known since elementary school, just happened to be in town that weekend for a ski trip. They wandered into the Motherloaded Tavern earlier that day and were told an Austin TX band was playing that night, so they came back to check it out. At the time they didn’t have a clue it would be us.

This weekend happened to be the “Dew Tour” weekend, which means that Mountain Dew and a bunch of other companies build a halfpipe in the middle of town and bring in a bunch of snowboarders to do crazy cool stuff in front of audiences in town and on the mountain. It also means that Motherloaded was packed. People danced on the tables from the first song, and didn’t stop until the end of the night.

Apparently Breckenridge can be a fickle town, so the bar encouraged us to only take one small break during our three hour set. Forget that, we said, we’re playing straight through. So we did. No breaks, three hours. People going crazy dancing on the tables the whole time. Ty and his friend flipping each other around like crazy swing dancers.

We stopped playing and people cheered and cheered. “Keep going!” People, we just played for three hours straight. “Ok, if you’re still yelling for us by the time we get back from the bathroom, we’ll do one more song.” I tell them. In the toilet two rooms over, I can still hear them yelling. They kept at it. So we decided to keep playing.

One more song. “Keep going!” A guy hands some money. “At least one more!” OK, we’ll keep going. The crowd had started to thin out at the end, but now people are filling up the place again. The place packed out, so we kept playing. 45 more minutes, until the bar had to legally kick people out!

What a crazy fun night. We had lots of offers for places to stay, but at that point it was two days til Christmas and we did what we always do at the end of a tour, no matter how far we are from Austin, no matter how late in the night it is. We hopped in the van and drove all the way home.

Breckenridge – come out and party with us on February 18th! It gets better every time.

Shug’s a Smacking Success

Hanging out at Kate's after the show

Wednesday we played Boulder, one of my favorite towns. We hit up a new venue called Shug’s and it is a sweet place – nice stage, good sound, probably the only place in Colorado you can get Abita and Dixie Beer (its got a Cajun theme). The crowd definitely grooved and played along nicely with all of our participatory moments. The stage was also big enough to allow me to exercise my jumping muscles to the fullest extent.

The show was awesome, with our new friends Smack Thompson laying down sweet Colorado jams in the style of Phish, String Cheese, Grateful Dead, etc. Unfortunately I missed the first half of the show because I was… looking for the van.

Hooch and Ryan parked the van, and they didn’t get me the most precise directions. It was also really cold. I wandered around for about fifteen minutes until finally Hooch met me to ostensibly guide me to the parking spot. Yet, we still wandered about fifteen more minutes until we found it!

Ryan being silly

RyOther highlights of the day / night included:
- Friends from the deep histories of our lives coming out to rock with us, including Camp Olympia, Elementary School, college, New Orleans, and more.
- New fans we met in Winter Park came to see us play again!
- Getting to attend a pre-game mediation session with Julie & friends

We can’t wait to be back on February 11th at the Dark Horse!

Overcoming with Optimism on the road to Winter Park

The booking game is a crazy world… we finally confirmed the show that was supposed to happen on December 10th exactly ten days before it was to occur. On December 9th, I got a call from the booking agent saying that their email account had gotten hacked and he never confirmed the show, so we were SOL.

Luckily, we have been through this before and applied the Achachay! spirit. Focus on the solution, see the opportunity and make the most of whatever is in front of your face. After a few phone calls, it became apparent that nothing would happen that night. I’d have to wait until the morning.

We woke up at the usual time and I started calling all the bars in Winter Park. At first I got the usual run-around, but when I mentioned “We’re an awesome Austin TX funk rock band that got our show cancelled, do you want us to bring you an awesome show TONIGHT?” or something similar, they get things moving.

The Winter Park Pub came through in the 9th inning and opened their arms… not just a place to play, but a decent last minute guarantee, free food, free drinks. The show ended up being packed and well received. The staff was cool, and we’ll definitely be back! Even though Hooch and I both felt a little sniffly and hoarse, we played a top notch performance and had a great time busting out some covers we haven’t done in a long time. We closed off a three day weekend of 4-hour-a-night performances with gusto and energy.

We’ve been shown time and time again to keep the faith. In spite of whatever circumstances life throws your way, maintain an optimistic outlook while working hard to achieve whatever your objective is. Almost every time we’ve done this, the result is better than what we expected from the original plan. Even if it isn’t better, the experience is beautiful.

To top it off, we all three got to sleep in individual beds at the family place of a buddy I studied in Ghana with. We got to meet some of his family and catch up on six years of traveling, craziness, and life. All in all, a phenomenal day.

Playing in Tulsa

Thanks to our musician buddy Trey, we finally busted into the Tulsa music scene. The cold and rain forced us to play just inside the entrance to the Hunt Club, but with all of Hooch’s Oklahoma connections we were able to bring out some friends and make it a fun night.

We had some time to chill in Tulsa, which (as I expected) is a really cool town. Did you know that since the 50′s, Tulsa has dedicated 1% percent of budgets of its major public works projects to public art to accompany those buildings? Did you know you can mountain bike, and rock climb in Tulsa? That’s exactly what Liza and I did one afternoon, meeting some cool people. I also got to catch up with some people we met in Stillwater on other trips, which was really cool.

Hooch’s buddies Kit and Natalie hosted us and really made us feel like home. We had a lot fun… there’s even a secret video of Ryan and Hooch dancing that will never be made public… oh no, the secret is out!

VoodooRules Interview: Achachay!’s Motivation

We had the opportunity to do a really fun interview before Voodoo Fest for the Voodoo Rules website. You can read it in its original format here. Our host, appropriately dubbed “The Witch Doctor,” asked some great questions, including:

1. How did the band get together?  
2. Who were your influencers?
3. What was your most unusual experience while performing?
4. Tell me about the low point in the band’s career.
5. Tell me about the high point, (so far) in the band’s career.
6. What unusual steps have you, as a band, taken to promote your music? Did it work? Did it fail? What did you learn?
7. Where do you envision yourselves in 4-5 years?
8. Tell me what’s unique about Achachay! and why that difference qualifies you for stardom.

I’ve copied the last two answers for our blog, because they cut right to heart of our purpose as a band. We’re motivated for reasons far beyond making great music, although that seems to be our most fitting, exciting, and inspirational conduit. Please enjoy and let us know what you think!

7. The Witch Doctor: Where do you envision yourselves in 4-5 years?

Ryan: I see us selling out huge concert halls and there being a high-demand for Achachay!. I also see us at the forefront of however the music industry has morphed at that point.
Hooch: Achachay! headlining festivals around the world.
Jordan: Our music is a great influence on people’s minds and hearts – they are inspired to push the boundaries of creativity, to search the depths of their psyches, all the while having fun, dancing, and remembering to laugh. Our success shines a light all over, in different industries. We develop a battery powered van so we don’t have to use gas, and we get other bands and shipping companies to use battery powered vans too, thereby cutting down our carbon emissions and our dependence on foreign wars. We’re able to bring great ideas like Conscious Capitalism and Holacracy, and good media sources like Ted Talks and Good magazine (good.is) that are now fringe to the forefront of the mainstream. We give voices to other artists, authors, philosophers and visionaries like Ken Wilber and Don Beck, just like Oprah did with Eckhart Tolle and Tool did with Alex Grey’s artwork. There’s so much good out there that gets ignored, and so much silliness that gets way too much attention. Four and five years might be a short time to accomplish all of this, but I know for a fact that in four to five years we’ll be empowering humans to think for ourselves, think outside of the box, find a deeper purpose, expand our limited perspectives on ourselves and our context, and shake our booties.

8. The Witch Doctor: Tell me what’s unique about Achachay! and why that difference qualifies you for stardom.

Ryan: Achachay! is unique because we refuse to settle and write songs that sound like what is deemed “popular”. We are trying to get people back on the dance floor with groovy tunes and infectious beats created by dedicated musicians. We pull from a ton of influences and don’t shy away from having songs that don’t all sound similar: you might here ska, samba, jazz, and funk all in one song. We realize there is no easy, golden ticket for success: we love to play and we are willing to work harder and tour more than everyone else to get to the place we feel our music deserves.

Jordan: Yes, it starts with our music, and continues with our mission, our attitude, and our purpose. We give stars an incredible amount of power and attention, and ask very little in return from them. Most people give stars value beyond their music (or acting, or whatever they’re famous for) but don’t hold them accountable for anything outside of their music (or whatever they’re famous for). I believe if you’re considered a star, you should shine light 360 degrees. We live everyday to make the world a better a place. We live everyday to wake the world up from the inside out. It starts with us individually, personally, and the small things we create. Achachay! will always make something you’ve never heard before, from us or anyone else. It will always be created with the intention of being fully honest, fully embracing, and fully inspiring. Whether it inspires you to dance or cry depends on the honesty of the moments we make it in. Our attitude is one of passion, service, and love, and our purpose wrapped up in all of these things. What qualifies us to be musical stars is simple musicianship; but what qualifies us to be true superstars is the creative light shining from every fiber of our being. To share something meaningful with the world and make every being in it better for it, that’s what really makes a star.

Read the Full Interview on VoodooRules.com

Blog catch up: Pagosa Springs

We’re almost done chronicling our last tour… Just about to get into the last week. This is a stream of consciousness post…

On Friday October 14th we woke and drove 7 hours from Denver to Pagosa Springs. We’ve done this drive twice before and its pretty sweet, but this time was more ridiculous since we had already driven 12 hours from Reno to Moab, and eight hours from Moab to Denver the previous two days. Both of those shows were four hour shows too. We’re putting in our 10,000 hours I suppose, although we’ll be better drivers than players at the end of it

The show was fun. The Bear Creek Saloon always has a new crowd of people and we never know what to expect. The funny thing about this time was that we didn’t have a place to stay. Normally, we just drive home to Austin because Pagosa is often our last stop, but this time we were playing Creede the next night, and its only 1.5 hours away.

We only took one break so sourcing a sleeping spot proved fairly troublesome. Luckily Liza saved the day. What would we do without her? She befriended a traveling troupe of friendly dudes traipsing across the US and they offered the floor of their hotel.

The great stories happened at the afterparty, as they are often wont to do.

Ryan and Liza were tired, so they headed back to the hotel. Hooch and I were pumped to check out this crazy after hours secret club run by a peaceful biker gang… that our friend Justine told us about.

The place was really chill. It was kind of what you’d expect: a warehouse with a pool table, music, dancing, and “free” drinks (you are expected to tip). I got invited to play a game of poker, so I got immediately sucked in. It was sweet. I played it really cool and knocked everyone out over the course of the next three hours until I was heads up with the host. At that point it was 6:30 AM so we decided to split the pot and call it a … morning.

Hooch and I managed to find a ride back to the new acquaintances’ hotel. We stumbled around the complex toting a bottle of whiskey, searching for the right room. Upon entering, we were surprised to find that sleeping bodies covered almost every single surface in the room. I managed to curl up in the corner between the wall and the bed, but Hooch would have had to sleep halfway in the bathroom. Pretty funny situation. Last thing I remember before passing out was that he was eating a leftover Subway sandwich, both in the bathroom and in bed since they were one and the same.

Of course it never ends on the road. The party goes on. Our gracious and generous hosts had to check out early the next morning since they were hitting the slopes and moving on, so they awoke us just two hours later. Where was Hooch? We hopped over to the van and found him comfortably clutch the whiskey and a spare pillow to his breast. I suppose the bathroom floor just didn’t do it for him.

Liza and Ryan fared ok, but Hooch and I had stayed up until about 7AM partying. I passed out in the van next to Hooch and we both slept for the next couple hours. I’m not sure what the others did – I think they checked out a hot springs and got some breakfast. I think I ate some oatmeal at a gas station later that day.

Yep. That’s the deal with Pagosa Springs. We’ve never really gotten to enjoy the daytime offerings of the beautiful town. Hooch befriended the friendly biker gang (They are called something ridiculous like the “He-Devils of Grace”) and they offered us a place to stay, so hopefully the next time will be a little more restful. Either way I won’t be surprised if we end

This was not our show at Pagosa Spings, but it captures the essence of the night's energy

up with a good story to tell.