Veda Hille

in all the fuss and travel, i forgot to mention that skye and i had a great trip to new york a few weeks ago. this is him asleep at the chelsea hotel.

but now we are in berlin! at pentecost! there is something called Karnaval de Kulturen going on down the street, apparently there are one million people being cultural right now. i will go out soon and check it out. we´ve had our first two shows, in ingolstadt and fulda, and are gearing up for the next round starting tuesday in berlin. the band is in good form, the fits seem to be confusing people (despite our awesome new dresses), and my health is stellar. alle is gut.

newsy stuff: you can now listen to a 20 minute podcast that i recorded at my brother´s house all about the making of riot life. it is here on the ape site. apparently there are some good reviews coming out in the uk, despite my rude show cancellations. and most exciting for me, the 4 extra songs we recorded for riot life are coming out on itunes this week! that´s the japanese version of soapland serenade, the brecht/eisler tune song of the moldau, a little instrumental called lost, and the ever-popular first in your laboratory! which people ask about at every show, i´m happy that you can finally buy it for a buck. plus, my pal quinne and her posse of video makers have shot a video for laboratory, and it should be up on the ape site next week! we made it cheap and dirty, kind of an alien abduction blair witch project kinda thing. shooting on the fly in the vancouver woods in the middle of the night. with teenage extras. fun.

and fun for me, i get to see my husband´s band no kids at the volksbuhne tonight!  and maybe go to my favourite greek restaurant.  and wash my scanties.  a fine day off.  til next   xx v

  hello pals, and welcome to our updated wordpress existence.  the changes are subtle but important, and hopefully will ease your navigation, buying power, and general life expectancy.  do let us know if you find any oddness.  there are postal charges on top of basic cd prices now, and one column still isn’t registering the proper total, but rest assured you will be charged properly.  

and so many other things!  like for example, this picture here.  taken by my friend mark mushet at the red square (the excellent smoky smoke is from shirley’s bbq on the back deck), this photo has been nominated for the Best Portrait of the Year in the national magazine awards!  mark is a co-editor of the vancouver review, a fine arts mag here in our city.  they’re up for a few awards this year, good luck to them.  oh, and mark has a show opening at zulu records next week, more great photos of musicians.

and more:  the show Bone in Her Teeth, which contains the music that i’ve called The Raft of the Medusa, will open in vancouver on may 21.  that is of course with the leaky heaven circus.  i will not be playing live with this one, but i’ve passed the duties over to the lovely and talented chrisariffic.  i get home in time to see the darn thing at least, and i’m looking forward to it.

and of course, we’re hitting the road in germany, austria and switzerland next week.  band practices have been great, my health is fine, and we’re raring to go.  my husband’s band no kids is also on tour (check that link for details) and i’ll get to attend his show in berlin on may 11th!  fun!  ok, back to laundry and housecleaning and eating bon bons for me.   xv

so, yesterday i had the thrill and the honour of performing once again with the cbc radio orchestra. we premiered a set of 6 neil young songs with arrangements by giorgio magnanensi, as well as an additional song by buffy sainte marie and leonard cohen. it was a crazy few days of lead up, with scant rehearsal time, but as usual the orchestra and their fearless conductor alain trudel delivered beautifully on stage. giorgio’s arrangements are wonderful and overwhelming. it will be broadcast on cbc radio and online, but probably not for about a month. mixing these things take time. as soon as i know the details i will publish them. i can’t wait to hear it myself, actually.

and now back to band rehearsals, and writing songs, and presumably getting around to taxes at some point. life goes on and on, doesn’t it? the glamour is bright and brief.

xv

hello friends.

as you may know, my health has been up and down for the last few years. i seem to be in a delicate stage again, and my doctors (i have 3!) suggested that i cut down on travel. that said, i am feeling really well. rather than cancel the whole tour, i have opted to bow out of my 3 uk shows in may. this means that after new york i can go home and rest for a week before heading over to germany. i am really sorry to disappoint any folks in england and wales, but truly this feels like the right decision. peace of mind and rest of body. i promise to make it up to you on the next tour. 6 hour shows! burlesque dancers! an elephant!*

thanks for your understanding. and for you canadians, this is why i haven’t been able to tour canada with This Riot Life yet either. this and the darned opera that takes up all my head. but i will travel again. my psyche would not permit a quiet loner life.

and don’t worry. x v

*promises of elephants are not binding.

so, i’ve been slightly negligent in my wifely duties. my husband’s band no kids is in the middle of a usa tour with dirty projectors. they’ve been having a grand time, playing great shows, getting drunk, kissing lesbians in the village. if you feel like heading to a show you can check the links above for dates. and then no kids will be in europe in may too! if you attend, feel free to let me know how he’s behaving.

oh, he’s the cute one in the argyle. i guess you can’t really see him in this picture, but take my word for it. cute.
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weston has fixed up the paypal, there should be nothing stopping your shopping now! thanks for your help in noticing that right away.

cheers, v

hey gang

as a few of you have kindly pointed out, we have a little glitch on the site. we just changed servers, and it seems that now when you try to order a cd you just get sent to a test area of paypal, called the paypal sandbox. which isn’t as much fun as it sounds. we’re getting that fixed up for you, but in the meantime if you’d like to make an order you can send the appropriate amount of money to payment@vedahille.com and then send an email to the same address giving us your mailing coordinates and record choices. i wondered why the orders had suddenly stopped flowing in. sorry for the confusion.

and also to reassure, i just sent out 2 weeks worth of orders last wednesday. i have been quite swamped, and as a result i am going to hand over the mailing tasks to my most capable friend melissa. she can take care of it while i am on tour as well, which will help get rid of these pesky delays. i hope the personal service has been worth the quirks.

thanks all! xv

whew, i haven’t had a second to myself for weeks. finally here is a couple of pictures from our show on march 9, where we officially flung This Riot Life out into the world. these were taken by adam pw smith, and his website is here. he took a marvellous picture last year of geoff berner and carolyn mark lipsmacking at the railway club. sweet.

we had a nice little jaunt down stateside last week, to seattle olympia portland. and now i am home for a solid month! in which i will rehearse neil young songs, write an ice dance score, mail out all your orders, figure out our touring repertoire, and do my durn taxes. crikey, things are just not slowing down. but for now it is easter, and i’m making puff pastry thingys and prepping for an egghunt on monday. there’s something to look forward to.

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oh, the first free saturday morning i’ve had in about 7 weeks. we made vegan pear ginger pancakes, i had a cinnamon coffee, and had little jumpy feelings of something like….relaxed happiness? very nice.

thanks so much for the orders for riot life that are literally pouring in. i will be sending out the first round on monday, after our rocking party on sunday night. i’m going to buy the most indulgent amount of tulips that i can afford, to decorate the hall. i’ll make sure we have some posted photos soon too. and for all those outside of vancouver, you can have a listen to a radio show that i taped last week with my friend andras jones. it’s called radio 8 ball, and it uses music as a divination tool. it’s so totally westcoast, i love it. i’ll be doing a live version of that in seattle on march 13. gosh, that’s next week. the wheel turns round again.

okeydoke folks, the album is up on the music page! you may buy it! i see that we have a few orders in already. we are still working out a way to have a two-tiered price system, because i need to charge more for orders that are going outside north america. but we haven’t figured it out yet, so there you go. go ahead, take advantage.

what other news? i’m in workshop this week with 4 opera singers, running through some initial music for my children’s opera about trees. it’s wild, give a song to an opera singer and suddenly it sounds like opera.

things are looking good for the upcoming cd release in vancouver. at the wise hall on sunday march 9, doors at 7:30, show at 8. with duplex! (although alas, i have just discovered that the show is NOT all ages. the wise hall has to get a special permit for that, and i failed to ask for that. sorry, small ones.) and we had a grand time in toronto too, it is so gratifying to be playing live shows again. here’s to the next 3 months of fun. xv