The Station: News

The Mother's Day EP, our one-day studio project, is now available to order and download!  Listen to tracks by clicking below:

 

Coming up this weekend we'll be heading down to the Lake of the Ozarks for two nights on the beach at Captain Ron's.  Both shows are free and there a handful of cabins still remaining.  Check out our dates page for all the info!

The Station gearing up for their 8th straight Summer Camp appearance Memorial Day weekend!  Official schedule TBA.

 

Jam and Jay Goldberg Events and Entertainment is proud to announce the Summer Camp 2010 Music Festival.   This will be the 10th Annual Summer Camp Music Festival and will feature over 55 bands on 5 stages over the course of 3 days. Taking place at Three Sisters Park in Chillicothe, IL (just 20 miles north of Peoria), the festival also features a kid’s camp, an extensive representation of non-profit organizations, on-site camping, lots of unique arts & craft artisans, a variety of good food and plenty of ice cold beer.  Tickets are currently available via the official festival website www.summercampfestival.com or by phone at 1-800-514-ETIX

 We'd like to introduce The Station's newest member Howard Freitag on lead guitar, guitar synth, and vocals.  Howard is bringing nearly 20 years of professional experience to the table and his addition is having a great effect on The Station's music.  Howard's past credits include Soul Pudding (with Jeff Cunningham), Senses, The Roger Kimball Band, Triple Lindy, and more.  Rehearsals are going well and we can't wait for you to see the new lineup. 

The debut will take place this Friday night (2/26) at the Stagger Inn in Edwardsville, IL, followed by The Canopy Club in Urbana, IL (with Cornmeal) Thursday March 4th, and Bar None in Springfield, IL Saturday March 6th.  We hope you can make it out to witness the start of the next chapter in our career, we can't tell you how excited we are. 

LIVE ALBUM OF THE YEAR: The Station - Speed of Sound - Live at Marley's offers two plus hours of ambitious, genre-bending rock and roll. The songs are characterized by incredibly strong guitar work, energetic, effusive lyrics, and a stark mixture of musical styles ranging from progressive rock and horn-driven funk, to spacey jams that remain sharp and on point. Read our full review.

While we are in the midst of narrowing down our choices for The Station's next guitar player, Dave, Jeff, and Dave will be once again performing as the Three Amigos. The amigos first formed in 2004, playing mostly covers with a healthy dose of original music that included the later-Station-staples Rural Route One and Midwest Moonshine. We're very excited to be turning back the clock a little bit with a healthy dose of Station-approved cover songs and a return to Three Amigos' original repertoire. We look forward to funk-rocking you while we continue our search for The Station's next member!

Sometimes in life we find that change is the only thing we can count on. As we all continue to evolve, The Station is no exception to the rule. After nearly 6 years of performing live together, Kevin Lemen and The Station are parting ways. Kevin's last shows as a member of The Station will be 11/27 in Springfield, IL, 11/28 in Edwardsville, IL, and 12/12 in St. Louis, MO. Please come out and join us in wishing Kevin the best of luck in wherever life takes him. Rest assured that The Station is hard at work writing, rehearsing, and eagerly working on the music that we feel will come together into our most solid and focused album yet. There is much, much more in store. - Dave, Jeff, and Dave, The Station

From: http://npaper-wehaa.com/illinoistimes/2009/09/17/#2009/10/29/?mode=2&article=627193
CENTRAL ILLINOIS MUSIC BEST ORIGINAL BAND The Station The Station, repeating as Best Original Band (also, in 2008, the Band Most Likely to Hit it Big) celebrates 10 years as a band in 2009. Just a few months ago founding bassist Josh Kerska left the group and local bass virtuoso Jeff Cunningham joined, while the band continues on as one of the hottest progressive rock acts in the Midwest. The jamming quartet of Cunningham, Dave Littrell, Dave Carter and Kevin Lemen, obviously known for original music, presents an annual Halloween show focusing on a specific music group or event. This year see the Best Original Band for 2009 perform a night of Sly and the Family Stone tunes at City Nights Theater on Oct. 31. Be sure to check out another Station show to hear the catchy and intricate selfpenned tunes that won them this category for two years straight.Runner-ups Micah Walk Band and NIL8 show the incredible range of talent our readers had to choose from within the Springfield original music scene. Runners-up: Micah Walk Band, NIL8

Hello everyone, we are pleased to announce that Springfield/Chatham native Jeff Cunningham has officially joined The Station on bass guitar. You may remember Jeff from the Three Amigos, featuring Jeff and Dave and Dave from The Station, a musical trio that spawned The Station staples Rural Route One and Midwest Moonshine. Jeff, a graduate of the University of North Texas, has been an awe-inspiring fixture of the Central Illinois music scene performing in Soul Pudding, Lowphatt (with NIL8’s Bruce Williams and 56 Hope Rd’s Greg Fundis), Senses, Los Injectors, The Three Amigos, and many more over the years on the 4, 5, and 6 string bass as well as the fretless and upright bass. Jeff will bring years of experience and jaw-dropping virtuosity to the stage. We’re very excited as we look towards the future, which includes beginning work on our fifth album this fall, and we can’t wait for you to hear what we have in store!

Our fall schedule will include stops in some our favorite cities across the Midwest as well as a two-night Halloween extravaganza in Springfield, Missouri and Springfield Illinois! So make sure you don't miss the start of our next chapter. Full show details at www.TheStationMusic.com
August 29 | Saturday
Patton Alley Pub | 313 S. Patton Ave
Springfield, Missouri
10pm, $7, 21+

(September 4th in Chicago is being rescheduled)

September 18 | Friday
The Waiting Room | 6212 Maple St
Omaha, Nebraska
9pm, $8, All Ages

September 19 | Saturday
Marly's | 9 SW Old State Capitol Plaza
Springfield, Illinois
10pm, $5, 21+

October 7 | Wednesday
Marly's | 9 SW Old State Capitol Plaza
Springfield, Illinois
10pm, 21+, free full band acoustic show

October 9 | Friday
The Stagger Inn | 104 E. Vandalia
Edwardsville, Illinois
10pm, 21+

October 24 | Saturday
Spookstock | Camp Zoe
Salem, Missouri
Visit Camp Zoe for camping, ticket, and lineup info.

October 30 | Friday
Patton Alley Pub | 313 S. Patton Ave
Springfield, Missouri
Halloween Extravaganza Night 1!
10pm, $8, 21+

October 31 | Saturday
City Nights Theater
Capital City Bar and Grill | 3149 S. Dirksen Pkwy
Springfield, Illinois
Halloween Extravaganza Night 2!
Doors at 8, show at 9, $10, 21+

If you’d like to help promote shows in your area in exchange for free concert tickets, please email Sarah at StreetTeam@thestationmusic.com and don’t forget to become our fan on Facebook at www.facebook.com/thestationmusic We’ll see you soon! The Station

Hello everyone, we are pleased to announce that Springfield/Chatham native Jeff Cunningham has officially joined The Station on bass guitar. You may remember Jeff from the Three Amigos, featuring Jeff and Dave and Dave from The Station, a musical trio that spawned The Station staples Rural Route One and Midwest Moonshine. Jeff, a graduate of the University of North Texas, has been an awe-inspiring fixture of the Central Illinois music scene performing in Soul Pudding, Lowphatt (with NIL8’s Bruce Williams and 56 Hope Rd’s Greg Fundis), Senses, Los Injectors, The Three Amigos, and many more over the years on the 4, 5, and 6 string bass as well as the fretless and upright bass. Jeff will bring years of experience and jaw-dropping virtuosity to the stage. We’re very excited as we look towards the future, which includes beginning work on our fifth album this fall, and we can’t wait for you to hear what we have in store!

Our fall schedule will include stops in some our favorite cities across the Midwest as well as a two-night Halloween extravaganza in Springfield, Missouri and Springfield Illinois! So make sure you don't miss the start of our next chapter. Full show details at www.TheStationMusic.com
We’ll see you soon! The Station

In a year full of changes, The Station is going through our fair share of evolution as well. After a decade of sharing the stage together, founding bass player Josh Kerska and The Station are parting ways. As we look into the future, we’d like to wish Josh the best of luck in his future endeavors and leave him with our sincere thanks for sharing all those miles on the road with us. Stay tuned for updates on The Station’s fall plans, there's quite a bit in store.

The Station full St. Louis set on iClips.net

The Station's set at St. Louis' Loyal Earth Festival was shot and produced in Hi Def by the iClips.net crew April 16th. You may can watch this set, as well as hundreds of other live shows at www.iclips.net These guys are doing some great work, make sure you keep up on what they're up!

http://illinoistimes.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid:9818
Please join me in offering hearty congratulations to The Station as they commemorate 10 years together as a working band in 2009. Over the last decade, the Chatham-based group spent about half of that time playing on the road, released three CDs, including a double live set, Speed of Sound (2008), and won in two categories of Illinois Times’ Best of Springfield in 2008, for Original Band and Band Most Likely to Hit it Big.

The nucleus of the group, known around here as the Two Daves — Carter on drums and percussion and Littrell on vocals, guitar and saxophone — are founding members of The Station. Two other original members swapped out with current Stationers, Kevin Lemen on lead guitar and John Kerska on bass, in 2004. According to Carter, that’s when they increased gig dates from 50 to more than 150 per year and began the transition, “from a young band starting out, into a working business with year-end plans, books to balance, and meetings to make.”

Many changes occurred in the music industry over the last 10 years and The Station has seen its fair share at the independent, working-band level. In 1999 most artists didn’t have Web sites, there was no MySpace and digital downloads on handheld personal players had yet to replace CDs as the favored form of listening to recorded music.

“I was 18 years old when we started, so needless to say, everything has changed for me,” said Carter. “Literally everything has changed for us as a band too, from marketing to music.”

Music-wise the band progressed from a jam-band-influenced group barely out of high school to a well-tempered combo of musicians able to perform dozens of originals and countless cover tunes on the spot. Through challenging themselves and their audiences by continually performing new self-penned material and doing fun takes on other music, The Station found themselves growing as a musical group and earning a credible fan base. All that is to be expected after 10 years of playing together, but what the band, or anyone else for that matter, couldn’t anticipate was the vast change of technological advances coming in the information world.

“In the last few years we’ve gotten over any fear of new technology and worked with connecting with fans and making personal relationships,” said Carter. “Understanding how to take full of advantage of all the technology out there now is essential to getting ahead.”

Carter should know. While working at a local Internet provider back in 1999, he started a band Web site just a few months after The Station’s inception. Since then they’ve ridden the wave of Web-based promotional tools available to music artists, including MySpace, Facebook, podcasts, Twitter and a host of other sites and programs, connecting the band to an ever-growing base of fans through the Internet.

“I can get on Twitter and Facebook at 2 a.m. after a show and going through ReverbNation, a Web site for bands, it gets started and immediately posted to everyone who’s connected to us. It’s amazing.”

With a celebration of the past comes an inevitable look into the future and as this quartet of young men, now having fun playing in the band, head toward the inevitable choices of mid-life, what might happen in the next 10 years?

“I see us continuing the trend of fewer and bigger shows, recording more albums, and all of us having families — I’d be ecstatic if we’re doing this same thing,” said Carter. “As long as this band and our music lights a fire in us and we’re constantly striving to create, we’ll keep going.”

The Station celebrates 10 years as a band with an anniversary concert at City Nights Theater in the Capital City Bar and Grill on Friday, April 10, with 56 Hope Road opening the show.

The spring of 2009 will be very busy for progressive rockers and juggernauts of the Midwest, The Station. The band’s spring tour kicks off on Friday March 13th at Patton Alley in Springfield, MO Friday and will end Saturday April 25th with a "Halfway to Halloween Party" at the Scarlet and Grey in Columbus, OH, before the band returns to the studio then switches gears for festival season. The tour will have many highlights including the Station's first trek to the Southeast hitting the regions favorite music cities such as Knoxville (3/16), Charleston (3/18), Asheville and Nashville. Also slated on this tour is a Sound Tribe Sector 9 after party in St. Louis at the Broadway Oyster Bar on March 14th, a stop at the legendary Copper Dragon in band’s home away from home, Carbondale, IL, on April 4th, and an always eventful Umphrey's Mcgee after party at Fatso's in Lawrence, KS March 27th. The Station will also celebrate their Ten Year Anniversary April 10th with a monumental show at the City Nights Theater in the bands hometown of Springfield, IL. This show will be journey through the last decade that was the Station touching on highlights of the bands progression over the past 10 years. The band’s long time friends 56 Hope Road will be opening the night. The Station is touring in promotion of 2008’s double-live release “Speed of Sound”, which has been applauded and respected by critics across the globe. SeaofTranquility.com’s Michael Popke calls the double-disc “jaw dropping”, and adds “[They] aren’t just another progressive jam band that you’ll soon forget.” The Home Grown Music Network’s J. Evan Wade calls The Station’s sound “ambitious, genre-bending rock and roll… worth of our attention.”