I am exhausted!
…and exhilarated from the energy of everything happening in the past month. Here is a small recap of June as well as some photos, sounds and future events.
Soup 21
First of all, I want to issue a full-bellied Justin Ancheta Band thank you to the organizers of Soup 21 for inviting us to play this year. In their words: “the Soup is a private, 100% volunteer-produced event that builds community and fosters organic fun while raising money for worthy beneficiaries.” What that description doesn’t mention is that there is a ton of great music from beginning to end of the event. We were lucky enough to be asked to play on Friday night, and in return we laid down an epic three hours of music. No wonder I’m exhausted and exhilarated.
We had a blast, we enjoyed meeting every last one of you Soupsters, and we definitely loved the fact that you were so down to get down. We especially love the New Roots program which is the main beneficiary of the event this year. Check them out, they’re doing wonderful things helping refugees continue to grow food as they are accustomed and also orient these newcomers to healthy options in our Western food system. Thanks, New Roots, for bringing more local, healthy food to Oakland and helping these displaced people!
Extra special thanks goes out to Tony Glaser who connected us with the Soup crew. Not only that, he learned all of our music and rocked out on bass all night long. If that wasn’t enough, Tony then went on to play bass for seemingly every other band at the Festival. If you see Tony walking down the street, give him a nice big round of applause.
We hope to play for all of you Soupsters sometime soon. Keep your eyes peeled for an event in San Francisco in the coming months!
The Full June Report
June has been a rush. So, so much has happened. Here is just a small taste of what has been going down:
- We opened our new Soul Graffiti headquarters in Emeryville/Berkeley/Oakland (officially ‘Oakleyville’, we are told)
- The band has been spending night and day in the new space: rehearsing more than ever; booking bigger and bigger shows both nationally and abroad; and just generally plotting our world revolution via music.
- LOTS of gigs:
- As mentioned, JAB was the featured headliner at SOUPFest 2014 Friday night performance.
- Soul Graffiti had its opening party way back on June 1st.
- We played the Maker Faire with Rock the Bike, our partners at our headquarters here at 64th and San Pablo.
- We were featured at Berkeley Sunday Streets ‘Eats Beats and Brews’ on June 15th.
- We continued our own night of singers and songwriters of the Bay called ‘Folklyrico Nights’ in both SF (Revolution Café) and Oakland (Awaken Café) monthly.
- I played the ‘StoryTelling Festival of Waldorf Applegate, and Club Car – Acoustic, to have a full weekend with friends and family.
- New merch! Our new order of t-shirts came in and they look fantastic.
And the month isn’t even over yet. Watch out! Here are some tunes, pics, and love from all of the many June events:
Soup ‘Reaching Jam’: https://soundcloud.com/soulgraffitiproductions/rooted-soup-live-jab-w-maren
Upcoming Art
Mona Caron and Rich Black (The artist for our album Plant) are pairing up to paint the façade of the Rock The Bike and Soul Graffiti headquarters. I hope to show pics soon of the amazing art that is to come.
Many Thanks
Of course, all of this energy is the result of many, many dedicated individuals. To call out a few:
Thank you to Rock The Bike for supplying pedal powered lighting panels to both SOUPFest and the Waldorf Story Telling Festival this past weekend.
Thanks to Alex and Damian for rocking out and making this website (www.justinanchetaband.com, if you didn’t know) the premiere band website on the internets today.
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