I mentioned a couple of days ago that I've been writing, but not necessarily on my mystery. It seems Gloryhound & the Skyhawks needed sort of a press release written for The Coast, our local free weekly. Someone had written them a draft that wasn't working out, the deadline was looming, and I understand at some point the question was asked, "Okay, who do we know who might be willing to write something about us?"

Well, now that you mention it...

Outside of work I am really not used to writing anything that comes with guidelines, so this was fun and kind of different. It was supposed to be 400-600 words. I sent Evan a message asking him a couple of questions about the major points I planned to cover. His responses were detailed enough to use as quotes (it was a bit like an email interview, really) so I wrote the first draft based on what I thought was important and sent it to him. The band had a look at it and Evan got back to me with their thoughts about what parts should be emphasized. We agreed to go over the word limit (which I did... by about 200 words.) It turned out the word limit was in fact firm, but at that point I knew what the band really wanted in the release. (We could have gotten to that immediately if we'd been in an office together working on the thing, but this wasn't an inefficient method either.)

So I went back and cut around the band's most important points, got the article down to within range of the word count (there was a little rewriting involved, as well as a few waste words to be removed, but fewer than I would have expected considering it's me) and sent it back to the band.

So we made the deadline with plenty of time in hand and the bandmembers I've spoken to seem happy with the results. I don't think there's any guarantee The Coast will actually use it, but I got it in under deadline and I think it expressed what we wanted it to. So yeah, kind of a fun thing.

I assume, if it's used, it'll be in the issue for the last week of May, to promote the CD release party at the Seahorse on May 31st. I've mentioned that, right? ;)

I may have mentioned that Gloryhound & the Skyhawks' CD is being released on May 31st. Well, I'm mentioning it again. And here's the poster advertising the party!


L-R: Evan, Shaun, Jeremy, Dave

(Nope, Adam is not pictured. As of June he has moved on to another project. Which I can guarantee means you have not heard the last of him on this blog, either...)