Now It's Overhead...for everyone! yay!

For all things musically-current, I bop on over to my friend Stephanie's Blog All Shook Down. This week (just so I can also stake my claim as a believer) she has information regarding a genius DVD being released documenting the first 10 years of Saddle Creek Records. You can check it out here at Plexifilm. I'm such a big fan of Saddle Creek, almost to a fault. It's like a religion or cult for me...whatever they put out goes right into my iPod! No questions asked! It's like ear crack! Their legacy is staggering; if record labels were people, Saddle Creek would be the Doogie Howser...er, by that I mean a child prodigy. After only 10 years, Robb Nansel and Jason Kulbel have managed to turn the musically sleepy midwest into the epicenter of progressive culture. As closeknit as kin, Saddle Creek's roster of bands all hail from the same molecular structure which split and multiplied many times over like some musically nuclear Adam and Eve. From their humble beginnings in 1993, no one knew that Lumberjack Records would become what it is today...so you better pay attention because the ground floor is still accessable.
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(Taken from the Plexifilm site)

In 1993, a group of childhood friends in Omaha, Nebraska released 100 copies of a cassette tape by a 13 year-old singer-songwriter / little brother, Conor Oberst. Two years later, the name Saddle Creek Records was etched in vinyl and what began as a collective local music scene would soon gain attention as a center of independent music in America.
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SPEND AN EVENING WITH SADDLE CREEK is the story of the record label as told by the people who made it happen. With extensive interviews, rare performances and archival footage, the film is an oral and visual history of how the combination of talent, dedication and collaboration launched bands like Bright Eyes, Cursive and The Faint into the national eye and has fostered a close-knit family of artists that continues to inspire each other and their fans.

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Now It's Overhead

Bright Eyes

Cursive

The Faint

Broken Spindles

Tilly and the Wall

Azure Ray

Rilo Kiley

Beep Beep

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In other Saddle Creek news, if you haven't yet made your vacation plans to Omaha yet, wait a couple of years.

I ran across a story at Tiny Mix Tapes detailing Saddle Creek's efforts to build a culture clutch in the heart of downtown Omaha, no doubt to capitalize on their self made fame...and I'm all for that. Named Slowdown (after Slowdown Virginia, an early Saddle Creek band that featured Tim Kasher from Cursive), the entertainment complex will feature a concert hall/bar, a pizza shop, a theater run by a non-profit cinema showing indie/foreign films, and additional retail space and residential areas. Can you imagine pretending you live next door to Conor Oberst! :)*

Not surprisingly, they are being met with some resistance from the local old biddies who have complained about the "possible litter, alcohol-induced violence, and drug use that the venue would bring onto their turf." To which Tiny Mix Tapes puts so nicely into perspective for us "Clearly, they had never met a Bright Eyes fan." So you never know...Seattle had their coffee houses but the midwest music scene may never see it's pizza parlor. At least not for a little while. Check out the story here.