Hey everybody!

First of all, thanks so much for your continued support. We could not express how wonderful it is to know there are people who believe in what we do. Also, we're very sorry that there haven't been any shows in a while. The two of us are separated by hundreds of miles... maybe a couple thousand? I don't know, I haven't really sat down to calculate, but it is a lot.
We are each focusing on our academic studies, John at a very advanced level. Clearly we've been busy pretending to be smart and trying to be good husbands to our smoking hot wives.
We are still active, though, and we do have an entire record of material to release. The mastering process has been far too slow, as we're trying a diy approach. That may not have been the best idea. We'll see how it pans out. Just know that eventually it will be out there to enjoy, and we are counting on all of you to spread the word to your friends and family about it. We're very proud of it, and both believe whole-heartedly that there is not a weak track on the record (and we all know that wasn't necessarily true of the last one). Thanks again for all your support and we look forward to hitting the stage again in the future!

Shayne

To Whom It May Concern:

My name is John Baker. I am a member of Joon, an electronic band based in Lakeland, FL. We were selected to play the 2009 Florida Music Festival. This was our third year participating in the festival, although I fear it may be our last. Our experience this year was so frustratingly negative that I find it hard to believe we will ever choose to play at Florida Music Festival again.

Initially, however, we were quite excited to perform. Our showcase was scheduled for 10 p.m. on Saturday at the Backbooth, a prime spot as far as we were concerned. I have performed at the Backbooth a number of times (although not with Joon) and always enjoyed the experience, so my bandmate and I were looking forward to the festival.

On the Friday afternoon before our performance, we received a phone call from our stage manager informing us that our set time had been moved forward to 9 p.m. Although this may seem like a minor change, FMF’s showcase schedules are intensely precise (with 30 minutes for performance and 30 minutes for changeover) and so our audience was now at risk of missing us. FMF advertises itself as a festival filled with opportunities for networking and promotion, but how is a band supposed to promote itself when its set time is changed at the last minute? The schedule for Saturday at the Backbooth was now completely incorrect since the band before us also had their set moved forward. As soon as I learned of the change, I posted on the FMF website requesting an updated schedule. As of this writing, the website has not been altered.

During my conversation with our stage manager, I asked her about the reason for the change. She didn’t really know, but later mentioned that (1) a band had dropped out (there was an empty 8:00 spot on the FMF schedule) and (2) the Backbooth has a regularly scheduled event on Saturday nights at 11:30, so they were trying to finish up before it began. I assumed, then, that the band scheduled for 11:00 would simply go on at 10:00 and then the show would end. I was wrong. Upon arriving at the Backbooth, I noticed that two bands were scheduled after us, neither of which was on the original schedule. One, therefore, would play after us at 10:00 and another at 11:00, thereby rendering excuse number 2 basically false. As far as I can tell, our spot was simply given away to someone deemed more important and our schedule was changed at the last minute to accommodate them (and FMF). Needless to say, we felt completely disrespected as artists.

We became friendly with the band before us (Wheels Above) and made sure to catch their set. They experienced some substantial sound problems during their performance, which we hoped would be rectified by the time we began. Since our band is electronic (and does not have a drummer, only a drum machine) setup can sometimes be complicated. Luckily, we had a good 20 minutes of changeover time. Once we took the stage and began setting up, the sound tech asked us what we needed. He acquired the necessary direct boxes (for the drum machine) and was initially very helpful. Soon, however, it became apparent that he was intent on rushing us. He even said to me, “We’ve got two minutes.” To which I replied, “No, we don’t. It’s 8:45. We have fifteen minutes.” I pulled out my phone to prove it. The sound tech mumbled an excuse, but continued to press us to begin. 

While checking the microphones, we noticed an obnoxious amount of feedback coming from the vocal mics. We informed the sound tech about the problem but he failed to do anything, obviously preoccupied with rushing us to begin our set. We soon began performing and the sound was, quite simply, awful. During the first song, my bandmate’s guitar was not in the monitors and possibly not in the house mix, even though he checked it successfully with the sound tech during setup. The vocal mics were still feeding back, filling the Backbooth with high-pitched squeals that rendered our set basically unlistenable to the audience and maddeningly frustrating to us, since we had to continue with our 30 minute performance despite the sound problems. Throughout the set, we requested that our vocal mics be turned down or eq’d differently in order to decrease the feedback. Unfortunately, the squawking continued. We finished our performance feeling dejected and completely disrespected by the festival. Not only had the schedule been changed, but our set had been ruined by audio problems that any experienced sound tech should have been able to fix.

Independent artists have a lot of reasons to avoid Florida Music Festival. Its corporate sponsorship, occasional crass commercialism and radio-friendly headliners engender mixed feelings in a lot of us who ideologically identify with minor labels and the various indie artists they employ. Despite these misgivings, many of us choose to play the festival out of a sense of pride in our state, which isn’t exactly known for its artistic merits. Disrespecting local artists, however, is a surefire way to destroy this sense of solidarity and give fuel to the many critics of the festival. I understand that the Orange You Glad festival has set itself up as a kind of anti-FMF, filled with indie artists who eschew the corporate environment that pervades the Florida Music Festival. Our negative experience at FMF 2009 certainly casts OYG in a good light and we will likely consider performing at the Orange You Glad festival in 2010. I seriously doubt that our opinion of Florida Music Festival can ever be reverted back to our initial positivity. However, I hope that this letter encourages FMF to substantially improve its festival in the coming years.


Sincerely,

John C. Baker
Joon

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This letter was originally emailed to FMF on May 17th.  We have yet to receive a reply.

We greatly appreciate all of those who came out to support us at our set during the Florida Music Festival. Many of you had encouraging words for us after the set, which was very frustrating at times due to some serious issues with the sound. Special thanks to Wheels Above for getting behind us in our confronting the FMF people about some of the shady dealings that took place. We also want to thank our stage manager, who was very understanding and helpful. Hopefully some of these hiccups can be fixed for future FMF events, and bands will some day no longer have to deal with poor treatment and shoddy sound.

we (joon) are currently collaborating on a project with the florida dance theatre. if you're interested, you can witness a preview of the show on saturday, april 18th @ the polk theatre in lakeland. for more info, click here.

I just thought I'd let you know that we're working on something along with the new album that we hope you're all really going to love. hopefully we'll be able to unveil it in march, but it's new territory for us and we're really excited to share with everybody. also, the new album is still in progress. I know it seems like it's taking forever, but we really want it to be right. prepare!

go!

hey everybody. I just wanted to write a quick blog informing you all that we've been recording for our next record. we're pleased with how it's sounding and we hope to have some demos up for you to listen to very soon. we've got a lot of new material written, so we'll be narrowing it down to tracks we think work best together. thanks for listening, everybody!

next week (sep. 9-15) will be joon awareness week. the success of this coming week is in your hands. we're asking you, our wonderful friends and fans, to do whatever you can to raise awareness of joon. we'd love for you to pick a song and make it the song on your profile. in fact, if there's a song you'd like to put on your profile and we don't have it available to choose from, please send us a message asking. we'll choose the most popular request and replace the least popular request.

other things you can do -

1. make banners featuring our new cd!

2. write blogs about how much you love our music!

3. post wonderful things about us!

5. remix a song!

and anything else you can come up with to make joon awareness week a hit. we love what we do and we want to find the widest audience we can, but we need your help. we appreciate all of you, and as a thank you for your participation in joon awareness week, we will be putting up demos of new songs. they're sounding pretty cool so far, and we should have a couple done by the time joon appreciation week is over. thank you for everything you do for us!

with all kinds of platonic love,

the members of joon

p.s. - we'd love to see your comments telling us what you're doing for joon awareness week :)

you can now purchase "the uncanny valley" on eMusic!

in fact, if you're not already an eMusic member, they are offering 25 free downloads to new members! so, not only could you get the entirety of our record for free, but you could get plenty of other stuff too! so go sign up for eMusic now!

also, if anyone has purchased tracks through SNOCAP, we'd love to get some feedback. we're curious about how quality it is and if you're satisfied with it. so please, let us know!

before I end this, I want to remind everybody that we'll be very present in all of central florida very soon, and also reaching north florida for a show. if you live anywhere in the area, or plan on being around central and/or northern florida for the next couple weeks, please look at our shows and plan to come out. we're looking forward to it!!!

"We're done..." is such a relief to say. After a year of recording, mixing, and mastering we can finally announce "The Uncanny Valley" is finished.

Over twelve months ago, in May 2006, we started recording this album in an old, second story apartment bedroom. The space was tight and the recording techniques unusual, yet successful. Evenings were spent twisting knobs, strumming chords, and sweating away as we endured the early summer heat trapped in our little "studio". We chugged along and had half a record done in three months, then the lull came. During this period, we knew their was an album to finish, yet our desire and inspiration was gone. At the end of the year, a member was let go and a friend took his place.

With a fresh lineup and outlook, we tried to complete what was started seven months before. Everything came together, new songs were written and recorded, and old ones perfected. Rough demos were put to CD and shown to friends and sold at shows. We were proud of what we had done. Then (make sound of a hard drive erasing everything) and you get the picture. All of our recordings were gone. All that work and stress and devotion, deleted. Luckily we had a few songs on CD that were still salvageable, but not editable. We started over.

Over the month of February 2007, we went into super high gear and got everything done. We layed guitar riffs, bass lines, drum beats, synth sounds, vocal tracks. Mixed and faded and panned. Listened, listened, and listended again. We had a complete album. Now to the master for the mastering.

This took some time, and rightly so. Everything had to be perfect, every level situated exactly as needed in the mix.

Then came the artwork and layout, the little Joon eskimo. If you only knew the time and expertise that went into this "simple" step of making a record. Massive thanks to the Brothers Kilby for that.

Finally the whole kit and kaboodle was done. Completed. Finished. Realized. And now we blog here today, with that good news to tell you.

Check it out here.

alright everyone, thank you for being patient with us. we had a few hold-ups, but soon we'll be bringing you what you've been waiting for. we have the final master of the record and the artwork and layout for the initial run of the record is all done. now we have to put in our order and wait for it to arrive. also, we will be making it available online for you to download at a low cost (probably on itunes and/or emusic). we have new mp3's up, which are the mastered versions of the songs, so we hope those can tide you over until the official release. thanks to everyone who helped and thanks to our fans, who have been very patient with us through the whole process of getting this record together. we are looking forward to great things!

it's been far too long since I've updated, and I apologize for keeping you all in the dark. recording was finished at the end of february. currently the record is being mastered, and before that we were collaborating with our good (and extraordinarily talented) friend james kilby for album art. we put something pretty cool together, so we're really excited about the finished package. so yes, the time is nearing. but we do need something from you all. this is a very special request, because it's the only way we can get this record out. it requires lots of money, and the best way for us to make money is when there's great turnouts at shows. SO! what we are proposing to you is that you keep any and all of our show dates that you can possibly make it out to marked on your calendar. bring friends and spread the word. we are playing in a lot of different areas in florida now (last night we had an INCREDIBLE night in clearwater, and a couple weeks before that we went up and played gainesville), so there should be an opportunity eventually. there's a show at the bank and blues in daytona, which will be really cool, and we're not forgetting our hometown. we've got a big show with summerbirds in the cellar coming up at lillian's on april 22nd, so mark those down and make plans with your friends. these are going to be great shows, and we have grown so much as a band in the past few months... chances are if you saw us before, there will still be something new for you (not to mention new songs being debuted at the lillian's show).

also, for those of you who book shows at venues or are in bands and looking to fill a spot on a show, we are not too proud to ask for your help as well. please take us into consideration when booking your next show! we basically want to whore ourselves out to the entire southeastern region so that we can get this record out. so do it for the love of music, do it for the love of joon, and do it for the uncanny valley!

we love you guys and thanks SO much for all of your support! can't wait to see you soon!


shayne
joon

when we last updated, we told you about how we were on the cusp of finishing our record. it was sounding good, yes, and so few details were left to be finished. we had 6 songs completed and mixed, ready for mastering. just waiting on the minor details for those other 7 songs. well, I made a big mistake. a big one. I accidentally erased our record.

yes. I, shayne soderstrom, erased our entire record from the hard drive of our recorder. nothing. luckily we had the master copy cd of those six songs which we had mixed, so those songs are still done. but we had to start over on the rest.

believe me, I freaked... john was depressed by the news as well. justin was busy at work and didn't even find out until I had already finished all my tracks, and john had finished his for one of the new tracks. this show of initiative softened the blow for justin, and we all agreed to look at this as an opportunity to make an even better record than we were set out to make before. it's working, friends. we're putting our all into these recordings, AGAIN. nothing will keep us down, and we want to put out the best record we can possibly make. rest assured, we are not rushing it together. we're merely inspired to improve upon what we'd already deemed good work. get excited with us. completion is still near. we still hope to be finished by the end of the month, and that is looking pretty realistic at this pace. thanks for reading, thanks for supporting, and please continue to tell others about joon! we love you!

shayne, joon

we've been hard at work in this past month. we've played out as much as possible, trying to tighten up and get our act together on the stage as well as off. we've practiced and written songs and recorded pretty consistantly. we're happy to say that our full length record, even after having to start over, is nearing completion. small things to finish on a few songs and then 3 new songs that we have to finish programming and writing. we're approximately 75% DONE! but we aren't stopping to rest. we have set aside a couple of days this coming week to continue writing and recording. we're working hard, trying to make an asset out of what could have been a setback. the fortress of solid dudes has been a good home for us to get all our work done, and shows have gone fairly well (some more-so than others). we're looking forward to really getting out there and introducing joon to the world. thanks for reading and we hope to see you at a show very soon.

thanks to our girlfriends and the other bands for coming out to the show last night. it was fun. also, thanks to the few sundry folks who showed up in time to see us. it wasn't a big crowd, but we enjoyed seeing those who were there.