Keepin It Real

I love working in this biz. Every day is so different. And within the same day, you have to be a business exec, creative person, accountant, web promoter, and part of the "job" is going out to other people's shows :) Man. It's a rough life. :)

I had my first co-write with Emily Shackleton today. What a great way to start the day! She's a fellow Berklee girl, although she started the year after I graduated. Last year we did a song writer's round together for the Berklee trip that comes down for spring break every year, and that is when I fell in love with her music. She is an extremely gifted writer, singer, piano player. And we wrote a great song today called "I'll Be a Fool For You"

She was PUMPED this morning. Her husband who's been out of work for over a year just got offered a dream job this morning! AND yesterday she found out that one of her songs is getting cut by an Australian country artist named Stephanie Brownlee. And she's already shot the video for the song!

The song is called "Keep It Real" and it is adorable. Here's the video!


I am so excited for her! Emily works her tail off. And I am looking forward to writing with her again. First writes can be the most difficult, but you wouldn't know it from today. It was easy as pie! (What a strange expression... pie ain't all that easy).

Off to meditate on song ideas for tomorrow's write!

Peace. Love. Fiddle.
~natalie

That's a Lot of Presents

First of all, I want to say a HUGE thank you to everyone who came and participated in the Have A Blues Christmas Benefit Concert this past weekend. We raised $11,000 for the kids!!! That's a LOT of Christmas presents for children who wouldn't otherwise have them on Christmas morning. So THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!! The event keeps getting bigger and better. :)

Jenn Bostic and I wrote together today. It was so much fun getting to catch up with her and start creating with her. It was our first write... which is in many ways like a first date. It is a sort of getting-to-know-you period. You start to figure out stylistically what the other writer leans towards and where their tendencies are. It helps with the next time, so you have a better idea of what you're getting into! We got a really good start on a song. But of course, Jenn is going on the road until the day that we leave again in January. So we scheduled our next co-write for February. hehe :)

Tonight we watched Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy Tour: 30 Days in 30 Nights. I hadn't heard about it, but one of our friends recommended it, and it was awesome. It doesn't just show the comedians performing... it focuses a lot more on the behind the scenes, their stories and backgrounds, and then integrates it their acts. It is a really great look into the world of comedians and how they deal with the same things that bands deal with - audiences that react strangely, personal feelings about performance - it's fun to see the parallels. :)

Peace. Love. Fiddle.
~natalie

College Eel at Eastern Connecticut State University

We left DC at 9am. At 7pm we pulled into our destination. That was a looong day. We even ate lunch in the car... to go. The traffic was ridiculous in Ct. From the second we got over the George Washington Bridge, it was just a nightmare.

But we were still at Eastern Connecticut State University with plenty of time to load for the show. I had to get ready like a speed demon in the ladies bathroom... I'm used to that, but I usually have a little more time than 15 minutes. It takes me about 15 minutes to brush this mane out half the time ;) Isn't being on the road glamorous?

Gordon Brown - one of my FAVORITE people and co-writers in the world lives in NJ. His niece goes to school at University of Connecticut (which we are playing tomorrow), but she and her boyfriend came tonight! It was so good to meet her. I feel like Gordon is family - therefore any of his family feels like family :)
Here's Mandy!


This was one of my favorite audience members! She was so cute singing along right up front!



This is Chris, he's the entertainment director for the Campus Activities Board. He took REALLY good care of us. I had a yummy buffalo chicken sandwich from that Mondo's SUBS place behind us :)


They had a bunch of activities going on after the show - they had a roaming magician, you could make your own bags, chia pets, and Transformers 2 was playing in their really nice theater they have in the student center. We were all hanging out eating, and Michael Kent, the AWESOME magician came up to us and showed us some card tricks. I was blown away. I have NO idea how he was doing it. I even wrote my name on the card - and it was showing up in his shoe.... would appear out of nowhere. His sleight of hand was truly remarkable. It was so cool to meet him! (And he's hilarious, too. VERY good at what he does. He was like Dane Cook, but way cooler because he does magic.)


And yet again - Chris was being adventurous in his eating. On our first trip he ate "Mall Eel". As in, eel sushi in a mall food court. That is WAY braver than I would ever be. Tonight, he tried "college eel". I'm not sure why they took this picture. But Chris said something that made Miguel really uncomfortable right as I pushed the button. I don't want to say what... but yeah.


That's our day in a nutshell. Hope you had a great day. Here's to a two-fer tomorrow. UConn and New England College.

Peace. Love. Fiddle.
~natalie

Writing with Pat McLaughlin

I wrote with Pat McLaughlin today!!!!! I feel SOOOO freakin cool. I LOVE his music and his feel and his groove and his guitar playing... and... and.... SO I was PUMPED when this appointment hit the books. I have seen it on there for weeks now, and I was anxiously anticipating this day. I had some ideas going in, but nothing too specific.

We started with one idea... which led to another... which took us somewhere completely different, and then by the time we got to the one we actually wrote we had probably started 10 different songs.I LOVE writing like that. That's how you find the magic :) We continued bouncing ideas off one another until we eventually ended up on this whole "Step By Step" thang. I LOVE it!!! We recorded a quick video of it to share with everyone. Don't mind my "waking up" the computer in the middle of the song so the screen wouldn't go dark :) And the image is reversed, so it looks like I am a left-handed fiddle player!!! It freaks me out a little....

ENJOY!



Not bad for the first time writing together, eh? :)
When we finished recording he said, "I wasn't ready for that 'amazing' adjective in the beginning there...." :)-

Step By Step we'll all get a little Peace. Love. and Fiddle.
~nat

Natalie Unplugged

Today is the first episode of "Natalie Unplugged" ;) This is a chance for me to share songs with you at their birth!

It's so funny because as a writer - you write lots and LOTS of songs. And not all of them are ever heard. (sometimes with good reason! HA!) Even some of the songs that I love singing and playing still may never make it to an album. (At least, you hope you write SOOOO many great songs that you have the luxury of being very picky) There's always a lot more that goes into picking songs for an album than just "liking" them!! ;)
But the beautiful part? I don't have to decide right away if a song is going on my next album! And I can just share these with ya'll - and you can let me know which ones speak to YOU. Who knows? Maybe YOU'LL be the ones deciding the track list for my next album :)


Featured in this video is my co-writer for this one, Mr. Charlie Hutto :)
Many of you will recognize Charlie as he was in the band for almost a whole year. We met at Berklee and have been playing in bands together.... well... since Berklee!