Hello there...just wanted to point you to a new site that I've created to blog and add music and do All Things Slack/Holt etc.

Hopefully it will be both informative and entertaining, but I'll settle for the former if not the latter.

Check it out:
www.chrisholtsongs.com
www.theslackmusic.com

Both addresses lead you there.
Thank you come again!

CH 11/27/09

Hey everyone, I don't even remember the last time I posted anything...guess I've been outta touch. Shocker there, I know. Anyway, I'm relieved to announce that The Slack's sophomore effort, "The Deep End", is finished, in hand, and set for release on Idol Records on January 19th, 2010.

The cd release party will be Friday, January 22nd at Sons Of Hermann Hall, with support to be determined soon.

I've posted a few tracks for your listening enjoyment and/or annoyance, depending on which side of the ol' Slack fence you fall.

The final track listing for the album is:

1. Infatuations Never Last
2. The Fine Art Of Bleeding
3. Frostbite
4. The Deep End
5. Truth & Fiction
6. Follow On
7. Pipe Dream
8. The Rug
9. Indier Than Thou
10. The Talk
11. What If
12. Maybe Heaven

What's the single gonna be? Hell if I know. Make some suggestions! Somebody!

Thanks for listening...and Happy Thanksgiving!

CH 11/24/09

http://polls.dallasobserver.com/polls/dal/musicshowcase09/ Hey folks, this week is your last chance to vote at the Dallas Observer Music Awards...I'm nominated in two categories (Best Solo Act and Best Instrumentalist)...if you get a chance, click on that link and go vote! I'll be playing a set this weekend at the DOMA artist showcase, doing new material from my upcoming Salim-produced solo album, as well as a few oldies...Eric and Camille will be joining me for the set. ..come check it out if you get a chance. I've got lots to report on the new Slack record, the solo album, and other stuff...but I'll get to that in the next few days...stay tuned. And as always, thanks for listening! CH 7/14/09

Hey there...good ol' Hunter Hauk over at Quick asked me to submit some new Slack stuff for their "Hot and Fresh" upcoming music preview thingy...so I sent a few tracks to him to check out. They're pretty good mixes, though they might change a little before the final record comes out.

Check it, yo:

http://nightlifeblog.quickdfw.com/archives/2009/04/hot-and-fresh-the-slack-album.html


CH
4/13/09

So, they tell me I can add more music to the player, so guess what...I've got four more songs to beat you down with!

And they are...

"Are You Listening? (remix)" - This is an alternate (and better) mix than what made it onto the Summer Reverb album...don't ask me why...none of us were playing with a full deck that year, I'm not really sure how such a snafu escaped me. Anyway...you can hear the snare much better on this one and the vocals are a little cleaner. Anyway, same song, same recording, just a little easier to tolerate, right?

"You Deserve Better (live)" - Here's a live version of YDB that I've been doing recently...it's with me on piano and Britt Morris strumming the chords underneath. I really enjoy this as a piano tune now, it kinda presents the song with a different vibe.

"Porch Swing (live)" - Isn't it funny and/or sad how I always introduce this song as being on the new album, and yet its been rejected from the last three? Not because it sucks, it just never fits with the other material. I like this song, but I can never find a home for it. This live version is kinda charming, with Eric's drunken violin and Sluthy's honky-tonk solo. We're on the right track, I think...

"I'm Wasted (demo)" - This is a new song that I like. It's just a live take of me singing and playing it. I think it's too fast, but I anticipate doing a studio version of it soon. It's got an underlying sadness to it that hits hard sometimes, but at the same time, I think it's all about having no regrets. So, in the end, it's alright. Right?

Thanks for listening!

CH
4/4/09

So, I guess insomnia is to blame...finally I'm getting around to updating this page. All I hear is that no one looks at this shit anymore - the site, not just my page - am I so vain? Well...

The point is that I have neglected it for far too long. But not nearly as bad as my own websites. Crap, I can't remember the last time I put anything useful on THOSE sites! So, on with the long-delayed point...there's news.

For starters, my wife Aubrey and I are expecting a little girl in September. That's kinda big. Secondly, as you might've deducted from all my pictures, I put an end to eleven years of mourning the theft of my old Les Paul, and I bought a new one. Fuck the recession.

Also, I've got two upcoming albums on the horizon (more on that below), so here's some new music to listen to...and YES, most of it is actually new!

"Truth & Fiction" - This stomper is the title track to the second Slack album, which will see release this fall, after I figure out how to promote it and get it heard by at least somebody. There's some pretty fun stuff going on in this tune...Tom really slays the drum kit and Sluthy throws down a wicked organ solo. This mix is probably not the final album version, but it's good enough for you to hear.

"Incorrigible" - This is a Rectals track that Tom and I did a couple months ago...it's got a nice funky vibe to it. It's kinda like a cross between "Soulfinger" and "The New Pollution". That's actually me playing all the instruments...you can tell it's me drumming because of the sloppy kick drum work in the middle section! Listen closely and you might hear the great Micah P. Hinson helping out with the "hey" at the end. Oh, and I think that's Tom on the single cowbell plunk. He had a fever, but just a tiny one.

"Free Utah" - This is from the "Opal White" movie soundtrack. I wrote this tune years ago...it's based on actual events...but that's another story altogether. Sometime last year I got a call asking if I could do a country song for a bar scene in a movie, so Tom brought over his portable rig and we knocked this out in about twenty minutes. I was really happy to hear that they decided to use it. It's a pretty great version of the tune, actually...my vocals crack me up every time. I could make a living singing that kinda shit.

"Midrakeson (Japanese Shinata)" - Another Rectals track that we did last summer, with a heavy indie vibe. We were going for several different sounds with this one...it starts off as a tribute to our Denton heroes Midlake, before coasting through Elliott Smith territory, and taking off in a Shins-y kinda stomp. I really enjoy this piece of music. Oh, and that's me doing some megaphone crooning in the middle. Something about a sports bra.

"All Aboard (demo)" - This track is a contender for the solo project I'm doing later in the year. It's a funny little tune I wrote while Olospo was at Xingolati in 2005...the lyrics kinda tell the tale...but I guess you just had to be there to know. I dig the feel of this tune...it's indicative of where my solo stuff's gonna go in the next couple years.

"Abbey Road Blues" - I wrote this jump-blues slap-happy thing while I was in Galveston over the holidays, playing bandleader to a Xmas musical. Seriously. I'd never really written a tune with this kinda feel, so when I came up with the guitar bit, it blossomed really quickly. I'd been talking about Abbey Road studios and how I once got to record there, but it kinda sucked that I've never been back. I just kinda ran with that idea. The song doesn't mean much, but it's fun to play and it sounds kinda cool. If you enjoy a lame white guy trying to do Robert Johnson. End result: epic fail.

----

So anyway...as far as other news...The Slack album is being finished...we're just kinda wrapping up things at our pace, because we really have no reason to hurry...life gets in the way, and we're all old men now, so what's the rush? The track listing is finalized and it goes like this:

1. Infatuations Never Last
2. The Fine Art Of Bleeding
3. Frostbite
4. The Deep End
5. Truth & Fiction
6. Follow On
7. Pipe Dream
8. The Rumor Mill
9. Indier Than Thou
10. The Talk
11. What If
12. Maybe Heaven

Of course, six months from now, when the album comes out, maybe none of these songs will be on it :)

In OTHER NEWS, I'm starting a solo album this summer with Salim Nourallah producing. Salim and I have been working together for nearly five years now, and we've talked repeatedly about him producing an album of my songs, but we've never coordinated our schedules properly. Until now...we're starting in June and hope to finish it all over the summer before the baby arrives.

So, it's gonna be a busy year. I gave Salim 50 demos, and he chose roughly 20 to contend for the album. That leaves another 30 that I'll either record with Tom or Eric, or scrap altogether when I bring in the next 50. Maybe I'll just a take a long break and rethink this silly career of mine.

Thanks for reading this...hope you enjoy the new stuff.

Stay tuned for further programming.

CH
3/31/09

Don't get too excited (all two of you who read this)...this audio isn't "new" so much as "updated" from last month's Xmas Song overkill.

Here are some tracks to listen to:

"The Thief" - This is arguably the most popular tune in my catalog...when I came up with the riff (thanks Pete!), I figured it would be a good rock tune, but I didn't realize it would be so heavily requested...I'm very pleased with the final studio version, though Tom never plays that backward drum thing in the intro that I love so much. He claims it was an accident and he's never been able to figure out how he did it. Typical. The lyrics tell a true story, but I won't bother explaining :)

"Koka (reprise)" - This is a "Summer Reverb" outtake that wound up on the oft-mentioned and rarely heard "Winter Spark" EP. My friend Daniel seems to be the only one who really champions this collection! This tune is (obviously) a companion piece to the proper version from the finished "Reverb" record. It's a couple steps higher, and considerably shorter. And the words are different. Like you couldn't figure that out on your own.

"Dignity" - I wrote this song in less than five minutes, and recorded it an hour later. My friend Lindsay Graham asked me to contribute music to an improvised project he was spearheading with a bunch of other local artists. The album was eventually finished and titled "Telegram". Lindsay wanted the entire thing to be as spontaneous as possible, so we booked the session and I threw together the tune almost instantly. I went to his studio and played all the instruments on the track myself. I have mixed feelings about this tune...on one hand, I love the raw punk edge to it, but it's not gonna win me any songwriting awards. Not that my other tunes have ever done that either. To hear this, my other contribution "Never Alone", and numerous others, check out "Telegram".

"Maybe Heaven (live)" - We've been working on this ballad for the upcoming Slack record. Here's a recent live version from Austin, with just me and my piano. I'm very fond of this tune...it's a very emotional one. It's also one of the only times I've ever addressed religion in a lyric. The studio version is gonna knock your socks on your ass!

"Something In Your Way" - Here's one of the stronger "Reverb" moments, in my opinion. I'm a bit unhappy with the "Reverb" record as time goes on. On a recent road-trip, I managed to listen to this and "Wishful Sinking" all the way through. I was quite pleased with "WS", but "Reverb" really disappointed me. While I think it's a strong album of songs, I'm just perplexed and dismayed by how bad my singing is on a lot of tracks. I don't know how I let those bad notes slip through. I mean, there are always weird, pitchy moments in my singing, but I just hear way too many of them on that album. I'd love to go back and fix things, but I doubt I'll ever do that. At some point, I probably will have to remaster it, and maybe I'll at least remix a few things. This song remains a strong recording, I think. The original version was a faster, groovier track with a Doobie Brothers chorus, but I wisely took the advice of Lindsay Graham, who suggested I rethink the tempo and make it more of a sad ballad. I tried it, and suddenly the tune made sense. Thanks, LG.

"Alien Airbag" - Ah, the Rectal T's. Tom and I made this track in May 2008, after being asked to create a short instrumental modelled after "OK Computer". Well, on that level, I think we succeeded a little too much! And we threw some "Bends" stuff in there for good measure. I had a blast writing this tune. This track cracks me up in its blatant, repeated tips-of-the-hat. But that's what I love about it...there are four or five tunes that are all alluded to at various points. Can you name them all? Do you care?

----

Enjoy...and stay tuned. "The Slack presents Truth & Fiction" will be finished and ready for release very shortly...with a solo album to follow!

Thanks for listening...

CH
12/30/08

So...in the spirit of the season, I thought I'd offer up some new audio in the form of Xmas songs, Holt-style. Here are the only three Xmas songs I've ever done, and they were all done in the last two years.

"What I Always Wanted" - I wrote this Bacharachesque bounce and it was recorded on short notice for the just-released "Zounds Like Xmas" compilation, featuring the Zounds Sounds faculty. It was mixed on the fly, so there are bits that I wish I could re-do, particularly the tremolo guitar and my typically pitchy vocals. But check out the sweet lady vocals by Amy Curnow and Mary Armstrong-Solomon...fucking sweet. And the always dependable Sluthy's horns are the perfect touch. Oh, and the rhythm section is Mark Soloman as Paul and Wade Cofer as Ringo. The rest is me, piano, guitars, and vocals. Thanks, gentlemen.

"Father Christmas" - This is, of course, the classics Kinks song. And of course, I butchered it. Mark Solomon and I threw this thing together very quickly, singing a couple quick voice-shredding takes in less than an hour. And I threw down what might be my most wheels-off guitar solo ever recorded. Sorry, Ray.

"It's Xmas (Let's Pretend)" - I wrote this tune a few years back, and I made a demo of it at Tomcast with me playing everything. I meant to go back and re-sing it, because my voice sounds awful. And I definitely wanted Sluthy to do his horn thing on it, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. Maybe next year. It's chock-full of standard Holt Xmas sounds, like the lovely major-sevens and bouncy sleighbell beat. It's rather cynical lyrically, but I manage to top it off with "Jesus, happy birthday buddy!" That's good stuff...right?

Merry Xmas to all and to all a good night!

CH
12/15/08

I wasn't sure what to expect when I got to Dada Friday night, for the Olospo reunion, our first show in our hometown in more than three years. Sure, there was that brief period when the Olospo name was used to describe what is properly known as The Slack, and it's pretty much a given that both fans and band now accept that Olospo is and should always be the original four members– me, Britt, Nick, and Tom. Nothing against Eric and Steve and The Slack and what we do now…obviously that's my present and future in music. It's just a different beast altogether, and I'm glad that we now have the insight to separate the two, even if the repertoires might occasionally overlap.

So anyway, back to Dada. I got there with no real expectation, other than that I knew some old friends would show up, and I knew I was gonna have fun. After THe BAcksliders finished their raucous, energetic, amazing rock set, and we began to check our gear, I looked out and realized that there were a SHITLOAD of people there…I was really surprised and pleased to see that, after all this time, Olospo still sparks some interest.

So we fired up and played our first song…the first song on our first album…as it built to its climax, I could feel the energy off the crowd growing, like something special was happening. But I had no preconceived clue as to the magnitude of the audience eruption that took place after the final chord of the song. The crowd roar was so deafening that it took us all back in time to that euphoric buzz from years ago. It was so overwhelming that it took me and the guys a minute or two to gather ourselves and get on to the next song. I was, and am, so grateful that people still wanna hear us play together.

The rest of the show was surreal…an ocean of dancers…a flurry of nostalgia…an ongoing struggle to remember just how to play those damn songs…and to keep my guitar in tune...some of the tunes are so complex and my playing is so aggressive, it's hard to believe any guitar could weather that storm of abuse…I kept feeling my wrist and fingers cramping, as if to remind me that I'm no longer 25…I definitely struggled to solo on the guitar, but I wasn't completely lost…I could tell that the ability is there somewhere, I just need to tap back into that state of mind, that frantic style of play, and do it more often…when you're touring non-stop, it just seems like second nature...and on Friday, the songs themselves seemed natural, but it was the sheer speed and stamina that seemed so challenging to maintain. Nevertheless, we all had a magnificent time. Olospo is still a force to be reckoned with.

Now, the real question is…where do we go from here? I joked at the end that we'd "see you in five years". And clearly that's too long. But what is the next step? I suppose once my Slack and solo album duties are complete in '09, we could go back and try to finish that long-delayed "Film At Eleven" album, the lost studio project. Spo could move forward, I guess, but it would take some serious effort. We're all in such different places now, it would be hard to get everyone together consistently. But now that we know that we can still do it, it seems foolish to spend too much time apart. Perhaps we just need to try and get together a couple times a year, and see if the vibe is still fresh.

It certainly felt that way Friday night, regardless of the mistakes we made. It didn't matter to us or to you guys. Thank you for making it a magical night for us. We are eternally grateful.

Here's the set recap:

11/14/08 Club Dada, Dallas, TX

Bound, The Gooch, Choking On Pills > Chewing On Glass, Aseedafinque > Booty Raider, Bitter Beer Face, The Big Event, The Green > William And Aaron, All The Young Dudes^, Back Door Biscuit > Journeyman Butcher, Kid Charlemagne, Spindletop, Franks And Beans, Can't You Hear Me Knocking

E: Super Mario Brothers, Sack Of Grapes > Barbecue Line > Sack Of Grapes

^ - with Chris and Jason from THe BAcksliders on backing vocals.


So now then…that'll do for 2008…but before we close out the year, I'd like to invite you all to one more nostalgic event that will take place just after Thanksgiving. The reunion of Walter Mitty – the band that begat Olospo, way back in 1999. Mitty was my old band, and we were, like Ron Burgundy, "kind of a big deal" in our day. In fact, it was Mitty that brought Tom, Britt, and Nick and myself together to become Olospo. Many of Spo's great songs onstage, like "Grace", "Wiggum", "Blackhearted", "Aseedafinque", and "Journeyman Butcher", were originally Walter Mitty songs back in the late 90's.

On November 29th at LBG, James Ashcroft, Lindsay Greene, and I will reunite for our first gig in ten years, with Tom filling in on drums for Derek Williams, who can't make it in from Hawaii. The Slack and Here In Arms will open the show. If you're in Dallas that night and you're a fan of Olospo, please come see how it all began, with a special Walter Mitty reunion.

In a year of nostalgic trips down memory lane, this will be the ultimate journey back in time.

Thank you to everyone who has given me such great memories of playing music, and for listening all these years.

CH
November 16, 2008

Well, well. We did it. We played and we didn't suck. The Spo machine actually sounded much more "well-oiled" than I imagined it would. It was a rather surreal and yet exhilarating feeling to look across the stage and see that, despite years of inactivity, we were right back in our old pocket. Amazing.

Here's how it rolled out:

293 – 10/25/08 Twin Parks Country Club, Dripping Springs, TX
("The Baby Show")

Acoustic set (Chris and Britt only)

Family Tree*, Something In Your Way*, Las Vegas Trail*, You Deserve Better*, Square Peg*, Blackout*, Twisted And Tangled*, The Talk** > What If**, Back This Way***, Porch Swing***, Feliz*, Punchy*, Maybe Heaven^

Olospo

I: Smackin' The Corn > Franks And Beans^^, Kid Charlemagne, Wiggum^^^, Bitter Beer Face, English Roundabout > Beneath Between And Behind > Bound, Under Pressure, Way Too Many Shots, Dirty Rita, Booty Raider^^^^

II: Back Door Biscuit$ > Journeyman Butcher, Aseedafinque$$ > The Green$$$ > Under The Bus, Chewing On Glass > Step Up, Requiem (Lose My Number), The Big Event, The Song Remains The Same > William And Aaron, Flapjacks, Super Mario Brothers, Doolin' Blue On Grass%, Spindletop, The Gooch^^

* - Chris on piano and Britt on guitar
** - Chris on guitar and Britt on piano
*** - Chris and Britt both on guitars
^ - Chris solo on piano
^^ - with "Black Dog" tease
^^^ - with "Custard Pie" tease
^^^^ - with "Since I've Been Loving You" tease
$ - with "In The Light" tease
$$ - with "Dazed And Confused" tease
$$$ - with "Nobody's Fault But Mine" tease
% - with band introductions

Notes: This show was Olospo's first original lineup performance since the brief 8/18/06 set at Granada Theater, and the first full-length show since 2005. The band reunited to celebrate the pregnancy of friends James and Cindy Young. Britt and Chris played an acoustic set of (mostly) new material to open the show, followed by two sets of full-band Spo.

The show also marked the 40th birthday of Spo fan and friend Mike Aurzada, who happened to be born on the day that Led Zeppelin played its first official show in 1968. In honor of that unique historical note, Zeppelin songs were teased throughout the show.

------

We actually had about another hour's worth of material planned, but time and alcohol took its toll on everyone...rather than beat the dead horse into submission, we rode it off into the sunset. The songs that got snubbed will surely appear at some point. Now that we know we can still do it.

And so we move on to November 14th in Dallas...hopefully there will be a large swollen sea of old friends and fans. And then we'll rest again until the gods of stomp summon us again to rear our ugly four-headed beast.

Thanks to everyone who came out and made us feel young again...and many thanks and congratulations to James and Cindy for making it happen.

CH
10/27/08