Wednesday, March 30, 2011

You and Your Girl Simulcast Countdown!



Hey friends: We want to share this new video with you! We're talking about our new release coming up, plus the first-ever You and Your Girl Simulcast event we're leading worship for on April 9th. It'll be amazing to have so many churches across the U.S. gathered at the same time, to worship, to learn from Vicki Courtney, and connect as moms and daughters! Check out more and find this event at a church near you here.

-Becca & Elissa

Monday, March 21, 2011

Elissa and Becca enjoy some Pinkberry

While recording in Franklin Tennessee, we discovered a frozen yogurt place called Pinkberry!


I think this healthy + sweet dessert is the perfect way to end a long day in the studio. Or better yet, any time of year. I'm counting down days until Pinkberry opens a store near me.


(Um, I think a full day recording guitars makes Chad do this)

Check out loads more pics on our website! I'm loving the journey this project is taking us on...

-Becca

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Lumberjacks and Frozen Yogurt

We pulled up to LifeWay's headquarters a week ago, excited for the Girls Ministry Forum. It was a great event!

While staying at a hotel nearby, we noticed many trailers and large vans parked outside. Most of them said "log homes", "taxidermy", and similar things (but, those things aren't similar). Then I was asked the first morning if I was kept awake by noise coming from the Lumberjack convention. Thinking this was a joke, at first, but it ended up being totally true. The road is never a boring place...

We had a great time tracking in Franklin this week. Recording is not the easiest thing in the world (for me, at least). It stretches me, shows me my weaknesses but encourages me at the same time. I see how I've grown since the last recording. I am seeing these songs take shape, and it's like building a house. Each step is important, and the process requires a lot of patience!

Something I realized is that it's very common here for every other house to have a studio in their basement. It's like every other house having a pool in Texas.

This is our last night in Franklin. We're staying at the house of wonderful friends we knew in Colorado. Their dog "Snuggles" has become my favorite, but I must say goodbye in the morning.

Franklin is also home to "pinkberry", my new favorite frozen yogurt in the world. And since they are opening a location in the Springs, I can enjoy it on a regular basis. That makes me happy.

Now I'm off to prepare my bass
guitar for TSA and pack to head back to high altitude and freezing temperatures. Home sweet home.

-Becca



Sunday, February 27, 2011

Hello Nashville!

It's Sunday afternoon. The birds are chirping outside, preparing us for a new day of tracking! The CD is underway, and it's going to be a fun process this week as we focus on guitars, bass and drums. Chad and Elissa are nailing the guitars, and I will handle the bottom end.

Right now we're at Kent Hooper's house doing guitars. He is also mixing the project, but not yet...first thing's first! We got to pull the song together and add instruments, vocals, and probably other things as creativity sparks.

Yesterday we finished a conference called the Girls Ministry Forum at LifeWay. Downtown Nashville is a great place, but we mainly saw a few square blocks of it walking to and from our hotel to the venue. I learned so much this weekend, it almost felt as if I was attending and not leading worship. But the times of gathering for worship together were incredible. God's presence was real and tangible.

We met so many girls and adult women who had a great calling for ministry, simply normal people serving and volunteering at their church. They were all about giving - not getting. Serving is only through giving. I learned that in a fresh way from these women.

I'm so glad God gives us opportunities to grow even as we lead worship and "give" out. I enjoyed going to church with the Hicks family and just absorbing this morning. Now for some music...

Becca

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

A Day at the Studio

Check out some photos from our rehearsals and recording sessions at Matthew "Fallenti" Fallentine's studio! We cranked out bass and drum tracks to 3 songs, managed to have lunch at Chilis and took breaks watching funny YouTube videos (which somehow make us better musicians).

The bass cabinet was put in the bathroom, the secret to a great sounding amp. I think the tones we got were as smooth as Garnier hair products. -B





Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Update on the Songwriting Process

Well folks, the songs have come together. This week we start rehearsals, tracking throughout the months of February and March, and I'm excited just thinking about it. Here are some snapshots that Chad took while we co-wrote with Don (producer) at the Tipps' house here in Colorado Springs!

Do you think there are enough Apple products in this room?

Don rockin' the piano...lets face it, he plays better than me.



Thinking deeply (I look mad, but I'm really not!)



Stay tuned! :) - Becca

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Monday Morning Songs


How does a song come about? Every song has a different way of arriving. The most important thing is that a song begins with inspiration and that we let the inspiration ride as far as it can go.

Today, Becca came over to my house with the purpose of polishing up a couple songs for the new album. It was majorly cold outside. Everyone says we are expecting a blizzard, but so far just a few flakes of snow have shown up. This is good songwriting weather.

We gathered in my little home office. Okay, not much inspiration here besides the Compassion International calendar I have hanging and my iTunes folder. I have demos of all the songs in progress and we listened through a couple times. Becca suggested we write a bridge for this song which is currently called “In You Alone”. With the theme of the song in mind, the bridge needed to communicate something that the rest of the song wasn’t already saying... Something that maybe we haven’t said yet in any of the other songs for this upcoming album... Or even the album before! Here is where a lot of songwriters hit a wall. It has to be something new! Well, thankfully, something new came. It was new for me. I can’t tell you what it was exactly in this blog, but I wanted to sing it over and over again. This is a good sign.

Becca was jamming on the guitar, changing the chords around a few times. I was interjecting thoughts. How about... No, what about... Thankfully, we are the kind of sisters who can handle each other interrupting and tossing thoughts right and left. This is a creative process we have down! I sang the melody and Becca brought a sweet harmony that engaged the lyrics.

What fun we are having! Becca and I haven’t always written together. I used to be a solo songwriter, but now I’m much happier writing with someone so I can bounce ideas back and forth.

More songwriting will happen on Wednesday or Thursday I imagine. That is, if we don’t get that blizzard everyone is talking about.

-Elissa
(the pic above is from our time with our Producer, Don K., songwriting for the new album a few weeks ago!)