As if it wasn’t crazy enough to record a whole album in four days (see below), we set out right afterwards for the Purim Tour. Really just two shows, one in Nashville and one in San Francisco. Ah Purim….a good excuse to play a show in fleur-de-lis fishnets, hot pants, tank top, and a lavender wig. And the skull headband from our tour to L.A. last fall. Pictures forthcoming, if I get brave enough to post them.

Nashville was pretty great, actually. It’s hard to believe it was my first time there, ever. I got to go to the Country Music Hall of Fame and see Mother Maybelle’s guitar, Bill Monroe’s mandolin, and lots of famous fiddles. Enough of them had mother-of-pearl inlays up the neck or fretboard with their owners name on them to inspire me to do the same. One of these days…just gotta find someone who can do it beautiful and cheap.

My roommate Corrie flew down and met us at the gig, which was a treat. We headed to the Station Inn after our show for the bluegrass jam. To my surprise, it was a whole lot quieter than the bluegrass jam up here at the Baggot Inn! Everyone was really friendly & so Taylor and I jumped right in and played the last few songs (thank you, Michael Daves, for teaching me some real bluegrass tunes as opposed to all that old-time I usually play).

For the last waltz, someone requested Ashokan Farewell, Jay Ungar’s gorgeous tune. This is one of the first tunes I learned, on that boat in the middle of the Caribbean - Justin and I used to play it in the evening and everyone would come up and listen. And then a few years later I ended up in a band with Jay’s daughter Ruthy, and sometimes we would play that waltz onstage with Jay & Molly. I haven’t played it in a few years so it brought back lots of memories, from the boat docking at Key West to dancing to that tune at the last night of Ashokan Fiddle & Dance Camp.

After informing me that I had sung in my sleep not one but three times that night, Corrie headed back to Brooklyn, while I flew with Golem to San Francisco, but with a two hour layover in Salt Lake City, where my dear friends Paul & Mary happen to live! They picked me up in the airport and we squished into their pickup truck and drove into town, past the gold spires of the Mormon Temple. This happened to be Purim evening so we had some Utah beer while I told them the story of Queen Esther and the evil Haman. Then back to the airport and we flew to San Francisco!

The SF show was amazing. The audience in SF is above and beyond…once again they did a hora which almost brought tears to my eyes. The lovely and talented Jewlia Eisenberg arrived dressed as a Golem, which should have won the costume contest. We got to ride around the city in Josh’s ark, I mean van, and I ate a delicious ice cream clown (remember? a bowl of ice cream with a cone for a hat, whipped cream for hair, a cherry for a nose…) before heading to Jewlia & AnMarie’s for dinner and drinks and sleep. And then back to NYC the next day. And here we are. Still finishing up the CD, getting ready for Oaxaca, and now looking for a luthier who will inlay “Alicia Jo” in cursive up the neck of my fiddle. Know anybody good?

Hello from the timeless world of the studio.

This is day 2 of Golem’s 4-day recording madness. We’re all holed up here on West 26th Street with a bunch of instruments, our fearless producer Emery, and some amazing food from our band caterer (and guitarist, and mascot) Jeremy Parzen.

The studio–Dubway–also features a number of handsome young men who are constantly cleaning up, washing our drinking glasses, etc. It’s a bit surreal. I think it’s cause they also record voices for Nickelodeon shows here, so a lot of parents come in here with their kids. Everyone who works here is very kind and the owner actually just bought a banjo off E-Bay so I showed him a bit of clawhammer this morning.

Today for lunch I had a portobello-&-mozarella sandwich. Apparently Jeremy had cooked the mushrooms in Prosecco. What did I do to deserve this? And for day two we’ve moved up from Old Grand-dad to Red Label.

As I write (in the reception area of the studio), Lenny Kaye - Patti Smith’s guitar player and a punk rock legend - is overdubbing some guitar tracks on our Hora song. Is that supposed to be a secret? Well, I won’t tell you about the other guests yet.

We somehow have managed to record all 13 songs in the first two days, which leaves us two more days for overdubs. The whole record is pretty much live, but some of the vocal tracks will be overdubbed as well as a solo here or there. I have been standing in a fort-like enclosure of “baffles” (movable walls to keep sound from going all over, basically to separate my mic from the drums). I hung my favorite red blanket on the baffle so it’s quite a cozy recording space.

Is this boring you? It’s hard to tell - my entire life has narrowed to this four-room area and I almost don’t believe there’s a whole world outside. But there is, and come Sunday morning, we will be flying to Nashville. I’ve been wanting to see Nashville for quite some time…never thought it would be with a klezmer band that I finally made it there. Well. Thank God for surprises.

So, lots of stuff happening with Golem right now.

We just got a record deal (!) with JDUB…who brought you Matisyahu, Balkan Beat Box and Socalled… we went out to dinner with them and Emery Dobyns, who is gonna produce the album (first time i’ve worked with a producer). He’s worked with Patti Smith and Ty Braxton and I can’t wait to see what happens.

I was very well behaved at dinner till the end when I knocked a glass off the table producing a giant shattering crash. but the guy who came to sweep it up turned out to be Serbian, so Annette and Aaron started singing him Mito and some other stuff, and he was singing along (they were songs he knew since childhood) and it was a regular Eastern European lovefest by the end.

So we go into the studio next week for four twelve hour days… and then the next week we head off to Nashville and San Francisco to play Purim shows which should involve getting so drunk that you can’t tell the difference between the bad guy and the good guy (hey, I didnt make it up, that’s what you’re supposed to do on Purim!) Costumes still to be determined.

Soon after we get back I am going to Oaxaca Mexico for 12 days to get better at Spanish and check out the traditional music down there… let me know if you have any tips… otherwise i’ll just sit down in the center of town and start playing and see what happens…!