Kore Ionz perform at Bumbershoot 2011 on Sunday, September 4, 2011.
Love You Better EP released May 28, 2011. Cover artwork by the Super Shantz Bros.
SEATTLE!!! Last night you completely packed Nectar Lounge. Fully. Like that old “sardines in a can” saying. Legendary DJ Soul One rocked classic roots reggae cuts mixed with all the hits you hear on KCCN back in the islands. Medium Troy and naturalHI got the party started, and by the time we took the stage, all we could hear was screaming. YOU screaming!
We heard so many amazing stories last night! Like our braddah who rode his motorcycle from Seattle to Reno with Half-hour Revolution on loop the whole way down. And the beautiful young couple, recently engaged, who met for the first time at a past Kore Ionz show at Nectar Lounge! It was nothing but love in the building. Photos coming soon!
If you didn’t grab a copy of the Love You Better EP last night, be sure to pick it up at Easy Street Records, Silver Platters, or ‘Ohana Belltown. Retail outlets in Hawai’i, California, and Oregon to be announced soon. And of course, you can always download it on iTunes. Big shout out to the Super Shantz Bros. and all the families that made the amazing cover artwork a reality!
In June we’ll be making our way down to Eugene, up to Bellingham, back to Seattle for a quick marathon, and down again to Portland (see all tour dates). And then it’s right back to the studio to finish the full album, which will be out later this summer. More music coming soon! To be continued…
Intensive rehearsals in Monk's Garage began in February 2010.
Weekly philosophical discussions filled the margins of song arrangement sheets with all sorts of notes.
A huge milestone was reached after we finished recording the drums and bass with an old-school reel-to-reel tape machine. This is us celebrating in the control room with our producer Mell Dettmer.
After recording all the basic rhythm tracks, it was time to bring in some heavy lead guitar...
...some anthemic horns...
...and then we edited, mixed, listened, mixed, listened, mixed, and listened some more.
After mixing and mastering it was time for the packaging. Here's the final proofs for the Love You Better EP artwork designed by the Super Shantz Bros.
With the EP now ready for release, it's back to work on the full album, out later this summer. And just for you, we brought in some friends to get on! To be continued...
Photos: Paul Grady, Absalom Shantz, Teo Shantz, Sony Timer, and Daniel Pak
Love You Better EP Release show Saturday, May 28, 2011 at Nectar Lounge. Design by Rock Paper Sketch.
Seattle world-reggae-rockers Kore Ionz kicked off the New Year with a live in-studio performance on KEXP 90.3 FM that peaked at #19 on the station’s Top Live Performances chart, falling right below Death Cab For Cutie. Kore Ionz finished off the four-song set, hosted by Kid Hops, with a world premiere of the title track from the ‘Love You Better’ EP, to be self-released on May 28th at Nectar Lounge.
Written by Hawai’i-born singer/songwriter Daniel Pak just months before his first son was born in April 2009, “Love You Better” is an optimistic glimpse into the future. “I took our Shar Pei for a walk at Seward Park and was listening to some Gregory Isaacs,” Pak recalls, “and all of a sudden the combination of Gregory’s voice with the sunshine released this hurricane of emotions I was feeling at the time, with fatherhood on its way, and a new album (and band, really) finally on the horizon. The lyrics came in five minutes.”
The second track on the EP is “Conductor,” an uplifting, Echoplex-propelled call by Pak to an anonymous “conductor” to “keep us on the track…keep us moving like in my dreams.” The EP also features a dub version of “Sweet Reggae Music,” which was digitally released as a single in late March 2011.
Co-producing the EP (and the forthcoming full-length, out this summer) is Mell Dettmer, producer for the king of Seattle roots reggae, Clinton Fearon, and caretaker of front-of-house sound for Femi Kuti, the eldest son of Afrobeat creator Fela Kuti.
Back in January, Kid Hops invited us to perform a live in-studio on his Saturday morning Positive Vibrations show on Seattle’s KEXP 90.3 FM. We’ve been working (procrastinating) on producing a video with the audio mixed by KEXP’s bad Bahamian house engineer Julian Martlew and the video shot by the one and only Absalom Shantz, and we’re so happy to finally release it for your viewing pleasure. The video was shot with a Canon VIXIA HV40 and edited in iMovie.
FUN FACT: The performance peaked at #19 on KEXP’s Top Live Performances chart, right below Death Cab For Cutie!
Kore Ionz at University of San Francisco, April 1, 2011. Photo by John Tremeroli.
April 1, 2011
6:15AM Kore Ionz wake up call after performing the night before at The Triple Door. Quick jump in the shower. No time for breakfast. No time for coffee.
7:15AM Drop off cars at Teo’s. Everybody jump into the tour van. Pick up Thaddeus. He’s still in his underwear. On to the airport.
7:45AM SEA-TAC Airport. Aham gets off the light rail. Brendan and Kiley arrive. Quick coffee stop and on to the gate.
8:55AM Southwest Airlines flight 1003 to Oakland. All roof panels of the Boeing 737 remain intact.
11:35AM Pick up mini-vans at Enterprise. It’s hot. And sunny. Beautiful drive over the Bay Bridge into San Francisco.
1:30PM Amazing lunch at Mexican spot two blocks from the USF campus. They have Wi-Fi! So nice outside, warm and slightly overcast. Waiting around on the street for something to happen is no problem at all.
Kore Ionz at University of San Francisco, April 1, 2011. Photo by Pak.
3:30PM Soundcheck finished. Thanks to the headliner Augustana (Epic Records), we share the same backline. Logistics is rice and gravy. On to interview with USFtv and Kayla Kuhn of Resin Music. We are invited to an afterparty.
4:00PM Brendan leaves to meet with San Francisco friends. Kiley leaves for a small-kine family reunion. Aham, Galen, and Teo go wandering with friends. The rest of us jump into one of the vans and hit the city. No map, no smartphone. Just instinct.
6:00PM Lost on Fillmore Street. Thaddeus gets out to check out the Boom Boom Room. Randomly run into Elliot Martin, lead singer of John Brown’s Body, on the street. They’re playing at The Fillmore. Love John Brown’s Body.
Kore Ionz with Elliot Martin of John Brown's Body in San Francisco, April 1, 2011. Photo by Pak.
7:00PM Back in the greenroom at University of San Francisco. Trading stories from the day. Changing clothes. Brushing teeth. Making pretty. Almost game time.
8:15PM Intimate crowd at the War Memorial Gymnasium, with girls in the front row singing all the words for songs from Half-hour Revolution. A third of the audience is from Hawai’i. Good to catch up with island people after the show.
Kore Ionz at University of San Francisco, April 1, 2011. Photo by John Tremeroli.
9:30PM Post-concert reservation at Hukilau, the most popular Hawaiian food spot in the city. $5 loco moco hits the spot. The place is packed with drunk college students who all look like they’re from the islands.
11:30PM Teo, Aham, and Galen move on to approximately five afterparties. The rest of us get back to our respective lodging-provided-by-homies spots. Wake up call will be at 5:45am in the morning. Snoqualmie Casino with Katchafire awaits tomorrow…
Kore Ionz close out La Festa del Arte at The Triple Door, March 31, 2011. Photo by 254mochacharlie.
Last Thursday we kicked off a whole weekend of shows starting at The Triple Door in support of Arts Corps, the largest non-profit arts educator in the Seattle area. Over the course of the night, Arts Corps was able to raise over $140,000 to continue providing arts and music education to more than 2,500 youth each year.
We’re honored to have been asked to close an amazing night of performances by the youth and their teaching artists, including breakdancing by the Vicious Puppies Crew led by Jerome Aparis of Massive Monkees, Washington Middle School’s Drumline led by Aaron Walker-Loud of Big World Breaks, and a live performance by Wild Syde, a new pop rock band fresh out of West Seattle High School produced by Kore Ionz very own Daniel Pak.
From beginning to end, The Triple Door was alive with a roaring wave of cheering and applause. To watch the youth express their artistic creativity on a stage of such grand scale was the ultimate inspiration for everyone who attended…including Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn AND Dave Matthews!!!
Kore Ionz released the "Sweet Reggae Music" single on Tuesday, March 29, 2011. Cover design by Kris Wong.
It’s midnight right now on Tuesday, March 29, 2011. We just got home from rehearsal for our shows this week at The Triple Door (Thursday in Seattle), the University of San Francisco (Friday in San Francisco), and Snoqualmie Casino (Saturday in Snoqualmie, WA with Katchafire).
Popped open a slew of ice-cold beers. And now we celebrate because our baby, the “Sweet Reggae Music” single off the forthcoming EP, is now live worldwide!!!
Get it right now by clicking right HERE! No questions, no surveys, no email list signup…nothing at all. Tell your family and friends. Share it, burn it, love it (hope you do), learn it!
So why are we giving it away for free? Good question. We got families to provide for. We got too many bills to pay, just like you. Some of us even lost our homes. But no matter what the system can take away from us materially, it can never have our music. Well…unless it clicks on the free download link above! You know what we’re talking about.
Music was, is, and always will be for the people. You will be the voice. And we will be your messengers. Your servants. And to celebrate our first release in three years, this song is dedicated to you.
By all means, if you still have that iTunes gift card your auntie gave you last Christmas and got a couple bucks you haven’t used up yet, go get it on iTunes – it’s up there as well. But more than anything, music should never be about spending money. And it’s sad that we have to live this way. Is the ultimate goal of all the work we do the annual international tours that will keep our band of nine brothers sustainable and able to support our families through music? Of course.
But this is the very beginning of something beautiful. Like an anxious father waiting for his first child to be born. Like the fresh new growth bursting out of the earth as spring approaches, bringing the sun back to us in the Pacific Northwest. And we thank you for opening your ears and hearts as we pour out our own to try to do our part to make this aging world a better place for everyone.
Thanks for listening. Hope you like the song. And see you at the next show. Much love.
Woke up this morning to fresh coffee already in the pot. Plugged back in to the trustworthy MacBook Pro and started surfing through a few music blogs. And surprisingly discovered that our friend Erika Hobart at the Seattle Weekly had posted (at 7am!) the very first media announcement of the “Sweet Reggae Music” single, to be released worldwide next Tuesday, March 29th!
There is a way to get the single before next Tuesday (join the email list to the upper right) if you simply can’t wait. If you happen to be in Seattle next Tuesday, we’ll be at ‘Ohana in Belltown the night of the release, co-hosting a benefit to raise money for our brothers and sisters in Sendai. Hope to see you then. In the meantime, check out the story written by our Seattle Weekly homegirl back in 2009, titled “REVERB: Kore Ionz’s Rub-A-Dub Style.” Much love.
The following is an email that was just forwarded to Kore Ionz singer and songwriter Daniel Pak by his father, an English professor at the University of Hawai’i. The email is from a woman who lives in Sendai, Japan. A much different account than what we see on the news. Heartwarming and hopeful.
Hello My Lovely Family and Friends,
First I want to thank you so very much for your concern for me. I am very touched. I also wish to apologize for a generic message to you all. But it seems the best way at the moment to get my message to you.
Things here in Sendai have been rather surreal. But I am very blessed to have wonderful friends who are helping me a lot. Since my shack is even more worthy of that name, I am now staying at a friend’s home. We share supplies like water, food and a kerosene heater. We sleep lined up in one room, eat by candlelight, share stories. It is warm, friendly, and beautiful.
During the day we help each other clean up the mess in our homes. People sit in their cars, looking at news on their navigation screens, or line up to get drinking water when a source is open. If someone has water running in their home, they put out sign so people can come to fill up their jugs and buckets.
Utterly amazingly where I am there has been no looting, no pushing in lines. People leave their front door open, as it is safer when an earthquake strikes. People keep saying, “Oh, this is how it used to be in the old days when everyone helped one another.”
Quakes keep coming. Last night they struck about every 15 minutes. Sirens are constant and helicopters pass overhead often.
We got water for a few hours in our homes last night, and now it is for half a day. Electricity came on this afternoon. Gas has not yet come on.
But all of this is by area. Some people have these things, others do not. No one has washed for several days. We feel grubby, but there are so much more important concerns than that for us now. I love this peeling away of non-essentials. Living fully on the level of instinct, of intuition, of caring, of what is needed for survival, not just of me, but of the entire group.
There are strange parallel universes happening. Houses a mess in some places, yet then a house with futons or laundry out drying in the sun. People lining up for water and food, and yet a few people out walking their dogs. All happening at the same time.
Other unexpected touches of beauty are first, the silence at night. No cars. No one out on the streets. And the heavens at night are scattered with stars. I usually can see about two, but now the whole sky is filled.
The mountains above Sendai are solid and with the crisp air we can see them silhouetted against the sky magnificently.
And the Japanese themselves are so wonderful. I come back to my shack to check on it each day, now to send this e-mail since the electricity is on, and I find food and water left in my entrance way. I have no idea from whom, but it is there. Old men in green hats go from door to door checking to see if everyone is OK. People talk to complete strangers asking if they need help. I see no signs of fear. Resignation, yes, but fear or panic, no.
They tell us we can expect aftershocks, and even other major quakes, for another month or more. And we are getting constant tremors, rolls, shaking, rumbling. I am blessed in that I live in a part of Sendai that is a bit elevated, a bit more solid than other parts. So, so far this area is better off than others. Last night my friend’s husband came in from the country, bringing food and water. Blessed again.
Somehow at this time I realize from direct experience that there is indeed an enormous Cosmic evolutionary step that is occurring all over the world right at this moment. And somehow as I experience the events happening now in Japan, I can feel my heart opening very wide. My brother asked me if I felt so small because of all that is happening. I don’t. Rather, I feel as part of something happening that much larger than myself. This wave of birthing (worldwide) is hard, and yet magnificent.
Thank you again for your care and Love of me,
With Love in return, to you all.
Members of Kore Ionz will co-host the Seattle ‘Ohana for Japan ‘Ohana benefit on Tuesday, March 29, 2011 at ‘Ohana Belltown, 2207 First Avenue, Seattle, WA 98121. 7-10pm.
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