Dream Team

Do you remember last week when I was talking about something crazy cool that was happening that had nothing to do with blogging or DIY or before and afters?

Well, I’m telling you about it today! (You might have seen some sneak peeks if you follow me on Instagram). So sorry if you are came here looking for makeovers, because I don’t have any, but this is a pretty cool story, so I think you will like it even better.

Ok, settle in.  Here goes.

Around this time last year, my BFF Shanell invited me to a 3rd Eye Blind concert in Vegas. I’m always down for a good time, so I said sure, and lugged my eight-months pregnant self to this show.

The opening band was called Team, and they caught my attention right away.  Normally, you can’t wait for the opening band to wrap it up so you can move on to the main event, but not this time.  I was an instant fan.  I went home and looked them up online, turns out they were a fairly new band and the Vegas show was only their 12th show ever.  I love discovering new music, so I downloaded everything they had released.

And I freaking LOVED it.  I listened to their EP every single day for months.

I actually forced myself to stop listening to it for awhile, because I was afraid I’d get tired of it and I didn’t want that to happen, but then I couldn’t help it and I started listening to it again, and good news, I never got tired of it.

If I had to attempt to describe their music, I’d call it a perfect blend of indie and alternative rock while still managing to avoid all the cliches of each genre.  Indie can often be a little too twee for me, and a lot of alternative music these days just sounds like mopey high schoolers, but Team was none of those things. Catchy without being ‘poppy,’ hard enough but without losing a melody, really interesting arrangements and lyrics, and the lead singer/songwriter Caleb just has such a unique, cool sound. Every song seems to take a little twist at some point and give you something unexpected.  I couldn’t get enough.

They came out with a new album over the summer called Good Morning Bad Day, and I downloaded it right away, but I didn’t even listen to it for a couple of weeks, because what if I didn’t like it as much as the first one?!

Guess what, it was twice as good. I loved every single song again! I kept looking to see if they were ever touring again in this part of the country, but they never did any shows west of Texas for a long time.

Finally they announced some new tour dates a few months ago, and Mesa, Arizona was one of them. Of course I was going to go, and I even planned to get there early to see if I could possibly run into them for a minute and just say hi.

Then one day, I noticed a tiny little link at the bottom of post on their Facebook page.  “Would you like TEAM to come play in your living room? Contact J.R. for house show availability.”

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT? I could have my favorite band come and play for me at my house? Stop it.

So I emailed their manager J.R., thinking there was probably no chance of this being real. I was in the worst part of my recovery from my eye surgery at this time, and wondered if I hadn’t imagined the whole thing.

Turns out, it was real.

And that’s how my favorite band Team came to play a house show for me in my backyard last week.

Shanell, Caleb and me

Not only did they come and play … they actually stayed the night.  We have a little guest casita at our house that we rent out on airbnb sometimes, so they crashed there after their concert in Mesa. They woke up the next morning and hung out and ate lunch with us, then played an awesome acoustic set for me and my friends in my backyard.

It was the coolest thing ever ever ever.

They are the nicest guys. SO talented. They even played my very favorite song “Am I Alive,” which apparently they never perform live.  James actually had to go learn it in the casita an hour beforehand.

They all have been in bands before. Jared on the left was recently in a band called Dresses, so he played a couple Dresses songs for us, which I also loved.  He has a beautiful voice and is an amazing songwriter.

James on the right was also in another band called The Background, and Caleb and Rico (left in the below pic) had a lot of success in their previous pop/punk band Forever the Sickest Kids.

Such a tragedy that I didn’t get any pictures of Rico’s magnificent hair.

I had no idea what to expect, I don’t often host rock bands at my house, and they actually had never done a house show before either, so I think we were all collectively happy that it  worked out so awesomely and none of us turned out to be murderers.

I couldn’t let them leave empty-handed, so I had Meredith at Lemon Bliss Bakery whip up some custom cookies for me. She did an awesome job, no surprise there. They turned out so cute.

It is totally non-crazy to give your favorite band cookies with their faces on them, I swear. I think. They really liked them anyway.

So. Now you must download TEAM and tell me if you like them as much as I do.

* You can get their EP right here for THREE MEASLY BUCKS. Deal of a lifetime alert. Do it. Tell them Lindsey sent you.

* You can download Good Morning Bad Day on itunes, worth every penny.

* My favorite Teams songs are: Am I Alive, The Man in a Suit With His Eye to the Sky, Sinking, Come To My House, I’m Just Like You, and I Like It, and I’ll stop now before I list them all.

* Also, check out Jared’s band Dresses, my favorites are Sun Shy and Painting Roses.

Cool story, huh?