2009 EP Club Newsletter, Volume 2

Ladies and gentlemen,

Welcome to Volume 2 of the Wizard Rock EP of the Month Club Newsletter! Most of this newsletter was written and ready to go way back in May, but I guess things have been kind of busy around here since then.

First off, if you are a current subscriber, shipment #3 is next week, so please get any address changes is ASAP! Just email us! Thanks!

If you're a subscriber for 2009, you should have received your first few shipments of CDs by now. Which means that you've already had your mind blown by Mary and the GrandPres. Am I right? And then you had your mind TOTALLY BLOWN by MC Kreacher. You know it, baby. Good god. I wanted to write a review of the MC Kreacher album that proclaimed the death of Wizard Rock and it's resurrection with the sweet beats and flow of Alone in the Dark, but never got around to it. Don't let my laziness diminish the singular importance of that record though. It is seriously a turning point and Wizard Rock will never be the same.

What's that you say? You haven't subscribed to the 2009 club yet? Well dude, GET ON IT! The third shipment is being mailed in LESS THAN A WEEK!!! Order now or wait until December to hear all the best wizard rock of 2009.

This next shipment coming up is an unapologetic continuation of the awesomeness that has been 2009. The Moaning Myrtles (how did it take 3 years to get them in the club?) drop an entirely a capella that will blow what's left of you mind, Danny Dementor dips you into a sonic jello from which you'll never wish to emerge, and the trio of discs is capped by a special guest. You seriously have no idea what is headed your way. You will be astonished.

SUBSCRIBE NOW and you will get the first 9 CDs of 2009 ALL AT ONCE!

And if you haven't yet gotten the discs from the 2008 edition of the EP Club, we're offering a pretty HOTT sale this week! You can save $5 when you order the Complete Box Set of 2008 EPs. We made some special box sets for LeakyCon and we're selling off the remainders now! Only 25 of these exist. If you don't act fast, you'll have miss out on these awesome boxes. Wow. BOXES! And all proceeds go to the Harry Potter Alliance! Golly!

Details in the new post directly below this.

And now, let's hear from some of 2009 EP club contributors:
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Milo of Mary and the GrandPres:

this boy chris goes to my college
when he was a senior in high school he took a course called
"AP Harry Potter"
which was 7 weeks long and they read a book a week
and in addition they read the lord of the rings trilogy and the his dark materials trilogy and the 7 narnia books

and then !!
he had to write some final paper
and his thesis was something like
muggles are silly
except more academic than that

HAVE ANY OF YOU HEARD OF THIS?
I AM FREAKING OUT

meanwhile my room mate insists that
harry potter is owned by corporations and is a major pop icon and that I am
not sticking it to the man
but giving it to him on a silver platter

he listens to a lot of rage against the machine

I watched we are wizards this weekend and that
very conservative very anti-harry woman in it is terrifying
so right now I am thinking that wizard rock should be very overtly political

which mary and the grandpres album is not
bummer

wizard rock may be dying but wizard rock is also like a phoenix in that
its tears have healing powers
and it brings harry the sorting hat in book 2

THIS IS REALLY INTERESTING:
we wrote a song called "the phoenix lament" and then the ministry of magic wrote a song called "a phoenix lament"

we wrote a song called "the lightning struck tower" and then the ministry of magic wrote a song called "the lightning struck tower"

we almost called our song in "wizards and muggles rock for social justic II" "a call to arms" but we DIDN'T, and then the ministry of magic released a song called "a call to arms"

they clearly want to join mary and the grandpres
this cannot happen

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Stacy of Swish and Flick:

Swish and Flick have been throwing around ideas for songs for a while now. We've got songs in various stages of completion. I have a very long writing process in which I build the song in bits as inspiration strikes me. It can take anywhere from days to months to complete a song. Inspiration can come in the form of a general concept for lyrics, a couple of witty lines, a feel for a beat or melody, or an amorphous idea of "hey, I like that song playing on this Pandora station; I want to wirte a song that's sort of like that." I'll pen lyrics in my head as I'm washing dishes, showering, lying in bed, sitting in the car/train. I scribble stuff down on scraps of paper and then file them away on my computer to expand upon when inspiration strikes again. I noodle on my sparkly blue acoustic Danelectro, playing with vocal melodies and lyrics. Quite often I get a feeling for a song and I just start making beats and synth patterns on my computer with Rebirth or Reason. Sometimes I use the emotion of the lyrics of a song I'm writing to shape the beat/synth composition, and sometimes it is the other way around.

I have said that my greatest muse above all is Draco Malfoy. But I find inspiration everywhere. I get pumped to write more music every time I go see a live concert. For example, yesterday I saw Ladytron in NYC and it made me want to write an electro-disco-new-wave kind of song about Death Eaters going clubbing. I've been inspired lately while reading Harry Potter fan fiction, which may sound a bit blasphemous to hardcore HP fans who feel wrock should reflect canon. Personally, I feel Wizard Rock should be about anything and everything related to Harry Potter and one should not constrain their creativity. I happen to enjoy reading fic almost as much as I enjoy reading the books. So if a Harry/Draco song ends up on our EP, please don't hate me. Yes, I know it isn't canon (unless you feel like extrapolating hidden meanings in "Malfoy was screaming and holding Harry so tightly it hurt." pg. 634, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.)

With Love and Poison,
Swish
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And finally, we have an awesome Wizardly Word Search created by the lovely ladies in RiddleTM. Check this thing out!!!

That's all for now, friends. Be well and enjoy the end of summer!

Love,
Paul and Matt

How the Wizard Rock EP of the Month Club works:
Subscriptions cost $60 (more for international) and each subscriber is sent 12 different wizard rock CDs over the course of 2009. Subscribers will get EXCLUSIVE discs from the following bands: Harry and the Potters, the Whomping Willows, the Moaning Myrtles, Tonks and the Aurors, Peeved, Swish and Flick, Mary and the GrandPres, Danny Dementor, RiddleTM, MC Kreacher, and the Shrieking Shack Disco Gang. All proceeds from the EP Club benefit the Harry Potter Alliance.

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