The Last Dance Kickstarter

HOORAY! Folk Americana Family Band, The Hollands! are back in the studio, recording, The Last Dance, slated for release Sept 2018.

As a family and as a band, we have been following our calling to be conduits of creativity and kindness for nearly a decade and it is our greatest honor and privilege to share “The Last Dance,” our 4th full-length album.

The name is no coincidence, with the younger Hollands! beginning to launch out on their own, the name not only ties all of the lyrical themes together on the album but resonates with this season in our lives.

The Last Dance is our most diverse and comprehensive album thus far. The album comprises of twelve songs, written over the last five years featuring stories of true love, life and death, family, a sense of home or safety, and more love. The final track is the infamous Celtic song we play at the end of most of our performances, “The Blessing”, which was written by our mate, Sammy Horner.

Recorded over 7 days in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales, Australia with recording engineer, Chris Gillespie at his off-grid, solar powered, Blue Sky Recording Studios.

The musicality of The Last Dance holds to the essence of The Hollands! Folk Americana sound with beautifully woven harmonies and core instrumentation of Guitar, Cajon, Mandolin, Banjo, Piano, and Ukulele. However, in true Holland fashion, we’ve invited an all-star cast to join us on this album!

Let us introduce our kinfolk,

The Players:

Our dear friend and famed blues guitarist, Cameron Henderson added a few licks on the Gretsch hollow body, giving a few tracks that extra dose of effervescence

 

Our recording engineer, Indie Singer/Songwriter, Chris Gillespie set the tone on the Bass and added a bit of sunshine on the Dobro

 

Colleen Davick has showcased on three of The Hollands! albums and this time is no exception. Colleen adds her fine Penny Whistle expertise on The Blessing

 

Jeffrey Niemeier has toured with us on and off over the last three years. This is his 700th recording and we are very excited to have his fireball fiddling on The Last Dance. Photo by Adrianne Adelle

 

Composer and long time friend, Jeff Kurtenacker laid down an epic Hammond Organ track on one of the songs.

 

One of our favorite drummers of all time, Jason Torrens (of Cisco Caesar) added his drumming magic to The River and John Brown

Our visual artist:

Dalia Milan has had the fortune of being mentored by parents, John and Elli Milan, of Milan Art Institute. At 14, she has found her own unique voice among those in the world of fine art. We’re excited to partner with this young prodigy on The Last Dance

And YOU!

As you can see, we’ve assembled an amazing team of collaborators to make this project a success and our desire is to be able to compensate those artists for helping us fulfill our vision for The Last Dance.

This is where you are invited to join the fun! Your Pre-order and contributions not only help The Hollands! create a legacy through music but also supports a village of artists. You can do this by clicking HERE.

Our goal is to raise $6,700 USD. This will cover all of our basic recording/production/printing costs and allow us to care for those who have contributed.

Bringing something new and creative into the world is a deeply vulnerable thing to do, let alone to ask people to notice it, evaluate it, or pay for it. So, thank you for taking the time to consider partnering with us on the most important record of our career to date. We could not do this without you!

Love,

The Hollands!

 

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Sun Room Sessions

Our first recording sessions with David Fuller at Sun Room Studios in Portland, Oregon was quite fruitful.

Homeschool and Recording

Recording the Banjo

Inspiration

Drummer boy

Community and Song

David Fuller

Full day of recording

Sing little darling

Tuning

It was a first for our drummer and youngest Holland. With over 200 shows this year under his belt, our eleven yr old has become quite accomplished on the cajon (box drum). However, a strong live performance doesn’t always transfer to the studio and at an early age he has come face to face with his own inadequacies. And, through much perseverance he has overcome them. In fact, we all have. When you take away the energy that we offer during a live performance and break it down to just instrument or voice and the microphone, the truth of talent really comes out. That is when we really see what we’re all made of. Oh sure, we could auto tune, cut and paste, fabricate but we’re folkies and our hope is to create something genuinely us.

The process of recording really taps into all sorts of emotion from criticalness, insecurity, joy, laughter and delight. Half of our songs have a solid base, disciplined intent and a flavor of energy that comes from the excitement and anticipation of the final product.

Now, we take three weeks to write, refine and rest. Back to the studio early January.

New Album in the Works

The life changes we have made over this past year have been so mind altering and soul stretching. It’s been a process to digest it all but over the last few weeks we have put our minds and efforts into writing songs. We hope to record these new songs this December in Portland, OR with David Fuller. Looking to have it available Spring 2013.

Crux of the Album:

There is a great love and purpose for us that is worked out in the messes, storms, blue skies, daily work, and dreams of our common lives.  This album gives narrative shape to actual people and circumstances in their dealings with God, each other and the inner workings within themselves.

Themes: Community, Common Lives, Storms, Injustice, Faithfulness, Long-Suffering, Circle, History, Pastoral, Poetry, Kingdom, Voyage.

We’ve decided to redo Old Man’s Town from our latest album, ‘Ashes to Beauty’ and feature it on this upcoming album. It’s a song that has aged well and our hope is to really allow the energy that has been building in that song to have a second chance to impact.

We’ve also been working to incorporate the unified sound that has developed in us as a family, not just a duo. Over the last two years we’ve performed as a family 355 times. There is a solidity that has developed and we are looking to incorporate that into this album. So, although we will still have room for guest appearance’s, on this recording we will feature “The Hollands!” as a band and as a family, including musical parts and songs that have been written by our children, songs like “Lanie Done Did” written by Graciana Holland.

Here is an excerpt from that song:

“Just about 26 seconds ago/Lanie done something bad/That time that time that time/Was all it took to make him mad/And the waves came down/Like an earthquake ready to rumble/Rolling round, Lanie, done did stumble”

Clay Street Studios

We recorded our new album over the course of two weekends. The first weekend, Ed Bialach, a friend and fantastic engineer (and drummer) came up from Chicago, IL to our home in Green Bay, WI. He brought his top of the line equipment and we knocked out all of the base line. The second weekend, we traveled down to Chicago to finish the melody and a few extra’s.

We had the privilege of including a number of superb musicians on this album. Jahmes Finlayson, from Milwaukee, WI. stayed with us for the first weekend and poured his heart into the drum line. What a passionate man and pro! That same weekend, the infamous, Eric Blumreich punched out a few fancy base licks and Ms. Kimberly Souther graced us with her beautiful cello parts.

The second weekend, one of Craig’s old Ballydowse band mates, David Baumgartner shared his mad violin skills with us. Colleen Davick chimed in with some flute and tin whistle. Our dear Joby Morey, jack of all instruments, played some haunting accordion on a few tracks. And, last but not least, Debbie Baumgartner whipped up a choir for us. That’s right. We were sitting there finishing up Fair Land and I said, “boy, I can really choir on this part.” Ed said, “do you want a choir?” “Well, yes, but how do find a choir?” He proceed to call Debbie and the next day at 1pm The Alana Spring Hall Choir showed up!

What a blast and honor to be able to do this project with so many creative and kind souls. You can view all of the clips from the recording process by visiting www.thehollands.org/snapshots

PS. To top it all off, Josh Kufal shot video/photos of our process and is putting together a fantastic video for our CD launch. Now to find a venue to host our CD release. Any suggestions?