New bandmate, new single, new album

September 21, 2018

love morris + rbk = new music for you

As a band name, rushmore beekeepers kinda started (and continued) as a joke. When I saw the film Rushmore I immediately claimed the name, regardless of a lack of both band members and bees. Off and on over the years rbk has had guest musicians, sometimes improv at live shows and a recorded song here and there, but it’s been some time since this was a band.

(Cue dramatic music)

Meet love morris! If you haven’t heard her electro folk mini-album, have a listen here. You may already know love morris rbk-wise from her singing and bass on “the name of every building.” We’ve performed together in various musical settings over the years and, for the first time in many years, have collaborated on a bunch of songs.

love morris (also know as Amanda Hawkins) is all over the new album, co-producing and contributing vocals and a variety of instrumentation. It’s the first album we’ve recorded as a duo (!), which not only makes the songs sound one million times better but is also seriously overdue; Amanda is an amazingly talented musician and one of my favorite people and we should just always be in bands together.

We recorded semi-Postal Service style, mostly because I live on the road and Amanda’s house doesn’t have wheels. I recorded my parts, sent the files to her digitally, and she recorded at her home studio in Arizona. Every time she sent a finished song to me it was like getting a birthday present, or whatever the better version of a birthday present is. The band, as it were, has never sounded so good, and I’ve never been more excited to share new music.

The new album, a reasonable distance, will be available for preorder soon, so until then here’s our first single, “fighting monsters.”