Here is the live recording of Lead Leaf's show at Castro Arms Co-Op. Enjoy!

Lead Leaf Live at Castro Arms Co-OP in Berkeley, CA, August 6h

I forgot to mention that we had a show booked for last night.  Anyway, we had a great time and hope to play there again soon.  Many thanks to Travis Bill and Katie McCarthy for letting us play!

I can't stop listening...to your Felt guitar licks!!!

it's in a world of its own !

Black Walled

alone in bed again.

under your head

a pillow

cradling your dream:

scary, weary, strange

and bright over now

but still flooding

like a broken cloud

raining all day

all day long

inside & outside

your little smile.

what brought you here?

what caught you here 

in between sheets

of plaster?

why can't you move?

are you no longer your own master?

why is a smile

such a strain?

does it seem strange

to be surrounded by

people you'll never get to know?

but you're the stranger;

hiding in a shadow hole,

shallow, dirty, & cold.

please, complain to me, 

although I cannot, 

really,

I cannot help you.

but I'll pretend 

for awhile,

for your sake 

a smile,

on your lips,

in your eyes,

in my eyes

together.

but not forever.

the smile

fades back

into your lips,

into your eyes,

now far away from me,

deep in the recess

of your mind.

I cannot,

will never,

see.

Proto Tinman

    It has come to my attention that the Tinman design was directly influenced by the works of Dostoevsky.  Indeed the origins of the Tinman stem from Crime & Punishment and Notes from the Underground.  Raskolnikov lives in all of us, it seems.  

     Here is the original Tinman I drew in my Contemporary Literature class last semester.  This was probably a better use of my time than taking notes from the professor.  

     This is the cover design for the Tinman EP, recorded live in the psychedelic basement in June of 2011.  The art was inspired by a doodle in one of my notebooks for school.  Right after our first listen to the Tinman (then known as the lefty session on account of me being forced to drum with a backwards kit due to my bunk toe) it was undeniable that the idea, image, and sound of the tinman permeated through the tracks.  Of course, the idea of the tinman is loosely based off of the tinman from the Wizard of Oz, but I'm not sure if this is the same tinman, and if it is, it certainly is not the one we see in the movie.  Hopefully we will have more collaborative Lead Leaf art in the future.  

     First and foremost I'd like to mention my band, Lead Leaf.  My best friend and next door neighbor for 11 years back in Buellton, CA, Brian Azevedo, and I started playing music together sometime in 2008.  We basically played a bunch of shitty blues songs and space jams, and eventually, sometime in 2009, the incarnation known as Lead Leaf was born.  

     After moving to the East Bay, we relocated our practice and recording space to the dungeon (the psychedelic basement) of Cloyne Court in Berkeley, CA.  We have played shows at the co-ops and friends houses and the occasional club, but we have not been playing as much more recently due to other priorities.  However, we are sitting on two albums, video of a live show, and a psychedelic holiday special.  We definitely will be playing this year, along with Youth in Asia.