Carpe Carmina: carpe carmina celebrates

It's been an eventful and exciting journey, a wondrous, delightful and compelling venture, a stirring and cheerful, a sometimes nerve-wracking and consuming yet always rewarding and satisfying voyage; milestones have been reached I never imagined to be met when this 'literary undertaking' began, new paths have been taken, traditions have been found and carried on, music has been embossomed, enjoyed, praised and shared. Its audience, carpe carmina's readership grew alike, and witnessing the progress of artists featured, seeing the amazingly positive response to their music, to my musings warmed my heart and made me proud contributing to a cause that is not only dear and important to me, but also worth taking a stand for - effort, time were invested, passion and words were set free in order to get promising and creative indie music heard, the songwriters and composers, the artists behind those musical gems acknowledged.

But let's not get overly nostalgic now, as there is enough reason to celebrate today: june 8th marks carpe carmina's second year of existence, two years of amazing music, two years of entertaining interviews, memorable gigs and hopefully captivating reviews went by - reviews that encourage(d) you to dig deeper and explore the sound of musicians being discussed and rated here; and to be honest, I'm still eager to share song after song with you, that made it to take my heart, my mind and soul by storm (here's to many more years of blogging!). Thank you, gratias vobis ago, you lovely lot, for helping to make carpe carmina prosper!

Enough of the sweet talk and nostalgic retrospective, the time has come to get the celebration started, however, not without a brief recapitulation of the ups and downs of planning something as big and exciting as carpe carmina celebrates.

What is the right way to mark a blog's birthday? To look back joyously on two years of wonderful experiences and lessons in this fabulous world that is blogging about music? When asking myself these very questions back in october 2014, it soon dawned on me that the celebration wouldn't go down well without those who have made carpe carmina what it is today: the musicians who have been collaborating with me from the offspring, who approached me for reviews and interviews, who submitted music to carpe carmina and shared my writing. Which is why I reached out to a few artists and bands to propose my idea and see if they are interested in contributing to the success and eventfullness of carpe carmina's second anniversary. The initial response was astonishing: most were willing to commit themselves to this project straightaway (hooray!), some didn't need convincing but had to check on their schedules, appointments. Being an independent artist is a worthwhile yet intense, demanding job, which is why initial disappointment about bands turning down my request or dropping out in the process, soon left room for understanding. Sure, it would have been marvellous to have High/Low involved, as it's been them who charmingly 'talked me into' blogging, encouraged me to write about music on a larger scale than simply 'just' sending off 140 characters concise reviews on twitter. Yet they had a new drummer on board, were in the studio to record new songs, as well as in rehearsal mode to 'instruct' Dave, said drummer, and prepare for future gigs, so all three could nail it live, with their fuzzy, passionately roaring epicness of sound. Busy schedules and some incertainties in planning prevented Narcs, Allusondrugs, Luke Cusato, Kiera Osment, Dirty Rotten Souls and Broken Witt Rebel to join the celebration as well, nonetheless it's not with a heavy heart but with honest gratitude that I thank all for trying to make it work, for caring about carpe carmina and for being supportive of what I'm doing. It means a lot!

Those musicians who stuck around ('till the bitter end) found themselves challenged with what I had in mind: the initial idea of carpe carmina celebrates was it to team up two artists and let them cover a song of each other, as well as having musicians involved who would cover a song requested by me. It didn't go all according to the plan, but the visual and audible realization of said idea has been a creative and inviting, overall stunning one (you will notice that soon enough, yet I won't spoil anything just yet by giving away who has collaborated with whom, which songs has been chosen eventually. Find out by checking back on carpe carmina throughout june. Sharing those performances you like, sure is appreciated!)

Now, with further ado, let's get to first performance dedicated to carpe carmina: it's by none other than Bradley Lodge, lead singer of my favourite band, Midnight Hour. Loyal blog readers (and probably most of my twitter followers) know about my affection for and gratitude towards the californian pop/rock outfit. That I'm beyond happy to have its singer/songwriter open the celebration with a beautiful (unfortunately often forgotten) ballad, 'Queen Annie', shouldn't be much suprising. Enjoy (I thoroughly did, watching the video over and over again)!

Where have Midnight Hour been when carpe carmina came into being?

In light of upcoming live shows, the OC indie rockers concentrated on rehearsing at the time carpe carmina was originated; earlier in 2013 the follow-up record to Midnight Hour's eponymous debut album was released in an all acoustic guise and the band was nominated in the 'Best Alternative' category at the annual OC Music Awards. Since featuring the alternative rock/pop outfit on carpe carmina for the first time in june 2013, not only Midnight Hour's line-up has changed, but their sound did too: it has become more peppy, electrifying, more infectious, gloomy even; the guys' musical agenda, however, remained the same, to write good songs that resonate with the listener, to find an even bigger and welcoming audience. And that's exactly what they are trying to do at the moment. Fruitfully as it seems. Musical teasers - visual and tonal ones - are ever present on their social media sites, excitingly spirited music is in the making ('I can almost hear it now ...' and some lucky ones might have enjoyed hearing yet unreleased songs at local gigs already, e.g. when Midnight Hour performed at the Wayfarer last month), which leaves supporters, fans alike wonder what it will be, an EP or a full length record in 2015?! carpe carmina cannot wait to find out!

What does Bradley Lodge have to say about carpe carmina and this milestone?

"I can't thank Carpe Carmina for being a positive addition to the music blogosphere. Nessi is the biggest supporter of new and upcoming music and her hunger for has been an inspiration for me. Nessi truly is a breath of fresh air in the music scene."