Things are going well right now in terms of getting asked to play gigs. We were invited to headline a local band showcase because, as the woman on the phone said, "you guys are great." Our lawyer invited us to play at one of her functions in November, which is a good sign, because it means she believes Joel will still be in the country in November.
On the immigration front, we did get some questions back from the INS about our application to hire Joel. They wanted proof that Joel is getting financial support from family and friends and they wanted more info on what makes Joel a composer for OVERHANG. We will send back our materials and probably hear from them in a week and a half.
Dan and Matt are back from a two week break in which they are trying to figure out their mixed feelings about being in this band for the rest of their lives. We talked about how that probably is not the best way to think about being in anything. It's a pretty overwhelming thing to think about being involved in something for your entire life. Dan returned yesterday and says he feels like he might not be right for OVERHANG...so we are now looking into other bassists. (The matter-of-factness of this sentence does not accurately reflect the difficulty of the situation, but we'll leave it at that for now. God knows what he's doing.)
The album is sounding great. We applied for a grant from Angel's Net (a non-profit organization that helps support artists financially) to finish the album. We really believe that we've created something very new and exciting sonically (based on our responses from various engineers here in Chicago), so we can hardly wait to get it out there for people to hear.
Words of encouragement for Christian artists who want to make something really special for others: "Don't give up, Don't give up, Don't ever give up! People need what you want to give them." At least that's what we tell ourselves.