By Blood Alone » blog

By Bloood Alone’s New CD Thunderbirds Available Now!

bbaAdmin — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 14:22:42 +0000

Our killer new disc Thunderbirds is available for purchase at these insightful and tasteful retailers:

Amazon.com and iTunes will be on board as well as soon as they finish processing the info. Check back later.

Cruella and John Graveside on WBLM radio tonight!

bbaAdmin — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 14:11:39 +0000

By Blood Alone’s Cruella and John Graveside will be interviewed tonight on WBLM-FM, one of Portland’s commercial rock stations. Showtime is 8pm. To listen, tune to 102.9 FM or go to http://player.streamtheworld.com/_players/citadel/?sid=3006&nid=2920

Nominated For Best Heavy Music / Metal Act

bbaAdmin — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 15:35:08 +0000

Once again we have been nominated for Best Heavy Music/Metal Act in the Portland Phoenix Best Music Poll. Vote for By Blood Alone here: http://portland.thephoenix.com/bmp/portland/Vote/HeavyMusicMetalAct/

Spring 2011 Tour Starts Thursday

bbaAdmin — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 15:30:58 +0000

We’re hitting the road to support Thunderbirds. Here are the dates:

• April 14 – Cambridge MA – Cantab Lounge
• April 15 – Brookfield CT – The Room (all ages)
• April 16 – Clifton NJ – Dingbatz
• April 22 – Portland ME – Geno’s Rock Club

New Album “Thunderbirds” Drops Tues April 12

bbaAdmin — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 14:57:07 +0000

After a year incubating, the Thunderbirds cd is finally coming out. We will finally see the fruits of all our hard work. Feedback from advance copies has been very positive. Check out the music at http://www.reverbnation.com/tunepak/3274539

A lovely and heartfelt note from Cruella about our new cd "Thunderbirds" and the fundraising campaign to complete it

bbaAdmin — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 12:02:26 +0000

Hello friends, family and fans or “F” to the 3rd power….

I hope that everyone is fairing well in these winter months and keeping a healthy spirit and sense of purpose. I have to tell you all it sure can be hard in these times but all and all I am thankful for the time and times going by and feel pretty blessed to still be able to create and love while having fun (and being able to financially handle things, for the most part). Things usually happen the way they are supposed to.

The purpose of this note I will get to after a few thoughts. Read on if you have the time…..

In this current season and beyond me and my band, By Blood Alone, have been working very hard all D.I.Y.like to get our next full length musical release, Thunderbirds,. finished and pressed. Much of you musical friends out there know how much work that entails from start to finish… and how financially draining it can be even if you are traveling the do-it-yourself route. Ultimately, we are like any of you artists out there who must share an artistic and musical vision. As I write this I am processing and working on the artwork for the album itself while Graveside continues to diligently change his creative and work hats in his studio and office to make this album a reality. Our Jenny, Jack and Runtt are continuing on with their creative endeavors and working for “the man” full time and very often overtime every week. It has been quite the journey. When I think back to the beginnings of this album there has been an interesting narrative of sorts that has happened with the songs included in and written for this album.

For example, our song “Drive all Night” was written way back when, even before my whole breast cancer battle over 3 years ago. When the song was first presented to us by Graveside I immediately new what it was going to be about. I had been feeling sort of trapped and stagnant in my life and was fantasizing getting in my car with my man and driving far away from Portland to start a new life. I didn’t actually know if I was truly going to try it…. but the energy was pushing me in that direction, at least in my mind. However, if your heart or guts are not following your mind in these notions that can be kind of gross…. I mean no seriously… it probably wouldn’t be for the best. Well, believe it or not, my inspiration for this song is Cyndi Lauper’s song “I Drove All Night”. Not that that song remotely even comes close to being the same stylistically, I just wanted that same emotive grandeur to be conveyed in our song as in hers. And then there is our title track ,Thunderbirds, which is one of our so-called “newer” songs was born out of my undying fascination with crypto-zoology subjects and folklore. It basically is just about gigantic mythological birds or bats that like to harm men and whales and destroy stuff. “I Bleed” one of our more epic songs clocking in around a mere 10 minutes, was written during the end of my treatments for cancer. At this time I was feeling extremely thankful for my life and all of the wonderful humans that were around me giving me constant support. The song is about finding my spirit and feeling good about my life while destroying the bad thoughts and feelings that had plagued me for so long.

Now to the point of this note. I have always had a hard time accepting and asking for help from others especially financially. We all have our own struggles with emotional and monetary bills to deal with everyday. And times being what they are it is hard for anyone to do anything alone…. or at least in my experience. So… as a group we are asking our family and friends to help us out with a little fundraising for our next album thru a really great website called Kickstarter.com. To learn more, please visit our fundraising site here:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1130605973/by-blood-alones-new-cd-thunderbirds

to learn more. We have lots of cool things to offer you for your donations and who knows… I may be offering little incentives throughout the fundraising time-line as more incentive! Of course you will also have our undying love and thanks galore as well! We are trying to reach a goal of $1500 by February 28th 2011. Thanks for your time, support and love as always.

I am forever humbly yours…
Cruella/Melynda

Help fund our new cd, "Thunderbirds".

bbaAdmin — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 16:02:39 +0000

Hi all, we need your help. Our new cd “Thunderbirds” will be out in April and we need to raise money for mastering and pressing. We have cool and unique gifts for those generous souls who choose to help us out. Click the link below for details.

to donate, click the link below:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1130605973/by-blood-alones-new-cd-thunderbirds

The cd is coming along swimmingly btw, and we know you will love it. it’s our best one yet.

Furfright Show Was Odd But Fun

bbaAdmin — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 09:50:30 +0000

When our drummer Runtt first joined the band back in 2004 he told us about being a “fursuiter”. For those of you who don’t know, members of this very unusual scene feel a deep affinity with animals, many of them so much so that they like to dress up in elaborate animal costumes. (That’s the “suit” part.) They have numerous conventions all over the world where they gather to basically get crazy in their fursuits. Runtt is an organizer for one of these conventions, Furfright, and arranged to have us perform at this year’s con. On Halloween weekend, no less. We had been excited about this for months and were wondering what extraordinary sights we would see.

Jenny, Jack, Mrs. Graveside and myself drove down to the con in Connecticut and met Cruella and Runtt there. Load-in was to the main ballroom, a gigantic room with seating for maybe 600-800 people, i should have counted or asked someone but forgot. After soundcheck we had to navigate the halls of the large hotel to get up to our rooms and change. The sights were amazing. Many of the con-goers had gone all out! Their outfits we’re REALLY involved and extremely creative. My favorite was this sort of bat-dragon-wolf thing. (not all the suits were of real animals.)

Interestingly, only about half of the furries were in costumes. The other half really ran the gamut of subculture types. This leads me to believe that the furry scene is bigger than one would think and crosses over into a lot of other subcultures.

For some reason they had us go on at 6pm. I don’t think they have bands play at this con very often so they might have been at a bit of a loss as to where to fit us in. Showtime rolled around and the room started to fill up. It’s hard to say how many people were there – at first they seemed spread evenly but thinly, but taking into account how big the room was, the crowd was probably a lot larger than originally thought. Of course Runtt performed in his red panda fursuit, Jenny was Hitgirl from the movie Kickass, and Cruella’s extremely elaborate outfit was of a portuguese manowar. (the jellyfish-like critter, not the band.) Her costume won her an award the next day in Salem Mass. Jack decided to buck convention and go as a metal bass player. we have some pics and video at the links below:

Pics: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=247807&id=38637272185
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbbwvWr3fAk

The set went down great, especially Runtt not missing a beat in full fursuit. The crowd however was a bit hard to read. The cheers in between songs were quite loud as usual, but the looks on their faces during were a bit clouded. I couldn’t be sure if they were really focusing on us or politely waiting for the next event. And since there was a “backstage” area, we weren’t out in the crowd afterwards to receive whatever feedback they did or did not have for us. Later on however, we heard anecdotally that a lot of people were very impressed. That and the sights made the trip quite worth it.

Later on we engaged in some of the late night con activities – the missus and I hit the dance club in the ballroom we performed in (with a TERRIBLE DJ), and the others caught a midnight Rocky Horror screening. Apparently the furries went absolutely nuts at Rocky Horror. they are truly a crazy bunch.

Sunday was the ride home and uneventful. While it was just one show the trip was surprisingly draining. I was pretty much passed out by 8pm.

Nominated in Portland Phoenix 2010 Best Music Poll!

bbaAdmin — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 18:55:08 +0000

We are very excited to announce that By Blood Alone has been nominated in two categories in the Portland Phoenix 2010 Best Music Poll: Best Heavy Music/Metal Act and our vocalist Melynda Cruella Amann has been nominated for Best Female Vocalist. Please vote for us at the links below:

Best Heavy Music/Metal Act (vote for BY BLOOD ALONE):
http://thephoenix.com/bmp/Portland/Vote/BestHeavyMusicMetalAct/

Best Female Vocalist (vote for MELYNDA AMANN):
http://thephoenix.com/bmp/Portland/Vote/BestFemaleVocalist/

This year for some reason we have been moved from Best Category Defying Act to Best Heavy Music/Metal Act. The competition for Best Heavy Music/Metal is much stiffer, including Man-Witch, Twisted Roots, and Ocean, and we would very much value your support by voting for us. As many of you may recall, last year we were overlooked for nominations (after being nominated in 2006, 2007, and 2008), but ended up winning two awards as write-ins!

This was only possible due to the love and support of our friends and fans who made the effort to vote for us. As a token of our esteem and a thank you for voting for us this year, please feel free to download an exclusive song at the link below. it’s the little heard version of “Eternally” from our very first demo in 2004.

Eternally (2004 Demo)
http://www.reverbnation.com/play_now/song_3814758

xoxoxo
By Blood Alone

PS: Be sure to vote for our friends in other categories:

Best Rap/Hip Hop Act: Brzowski
Best Male Vocalist: Boo Deadswallows (write in)
Best Live Act: Covered in Bees
Best New Act: Hessian
Best Album: The Art of Intention by Dilly Dilly
Best Punk Act: Lost Cause Desperados
Best Rock Act: Sun Gods in Exile
Best Category Defying Act: Confusatron

Tour 2010 Wrap-up

bbaAdmin — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 11:24:59 +0000

Ok, so we’re back from our 2nd tour and much like the first one it was lots of fun and a huge success. 4 shows including the warmup show in Portland, a review in Worcester Magazine, a radio interview, and pics of all 4 shows. Way too much to write here, so just click on the links below to get the scoop.

xoxoxo,
By Blood Alone

Part 1: Port City Music Hall
Part 2: Worcester MA
Part 3: Albany NY
Part 4: New Bedford MA
Part 5: Heading Back
Blog Talk Radio Interview
Worcester Magazine Review
PCMH Pics
Worcester Pics
Albany Pics
New Bedford Pics