Amanda and Zach stand among mountains in the desert

New bandmate, new single, new album

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.”

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House show in Arizona + new songs

Zach playing guitar and singing

Photo by Roger Hawkins

Played a house show for some family in Mesa, AZ, and decided on a whim to live-stream it on Periscope. I played five brand new songs from my upcoming album-in-progress and a few oldies. I’m going to do this more often (most likely from my much smaller Airstream home), so be sure to follow me on Twitter and/or Periscope to get in on the live action.

Watch (most of) the show here.

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If you’re fighting monsters, here’s a new song

After quite a bit of time spent not writing, I managed to get productive and wrote three songs this October. Carrie shot a video of her favorite of the three, “fighting monsters,” on a cold fall day at Charlestown State Park, Indiana.

Lyrics:

don’t think you have to go down that road alone
someone is on your side
don’t wonder how you’ll do what you need to do
hope is endless as the sky

but it’s long and twisted, the path that you’re headed
there’s no way to get through but to go through it
if you’re fighting a monster, you know how that goes
there’s no way to get through but to destroy it

wind blows cold and leaves rattle, fall on the roof
sirens whine, don’t see the lights
when you do what you need to do you’ll see
hope as endless as the sky

it’s long and twisted, the path that you’re headed
there’s no way to get through but to go through it
if you’re fighting a monster, you know how that goes (2x)
there’s no way to get through but to destroy it (2x)

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Zach sings, plays guitar and drums at the dining room table in his travel trailer.

First RBK band practice in the Airstream

First full band (guitar, drums, keyboard, and loop pedal) practice session in the new place was a success! Had to block the door for a little while, but I kept the volume down so I think Carrie and the dogs were okay with it. Preparing for my first Connecticut show at Molten Java in Bethel this Wednesday.

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