Its been two weeks on the road and we’re still alive! ha. Only one encounter with the police since we last spoke (no biggie ;P). Lessons learned:
Getting people out to shows is NOT easy. Just making a facebook event and inviting people to it IS NOT ENOUGH. With all the junk that goes on the internet these days its rare for people to really filter through all the invites. You have to make invitations PERSONAL. That’s the gift of the internet! To bridge the gap between people sitting in front of their computers and whoever is providing the entertainment.

Also, do what you can to remind the people without being annoying. For example, I update my status letting people know that I have a show that day, maybe the day before, but instead of shoving it down peoples throats repeating the same information, I hide it in new information. I’ll post a new video showing us on tour, then mention that I have these dates still going on. Or I’ll post pictures as I’m on tour, to promote the show… Give more content to promote whats already been said. Be creative!! Use your creativity that you already have in your art, and apply it to your marketing campaign!

Well there’s two more Amanda cents. Here’s another video blog!!!
Show in San Francisco TONIGHT (details here),
Davis June 1st, then back down to San Fran and Petaluma. Details here.

Follow our minute by minute progress on our respective twitters:
http://www.twitter.com/AmandaHolmes
http://www.twitter.com/JuliaJara

Read Julia’s blog here

Life is best when I’m on the road There’s nothing better than meeting new people, playing music, and traveling up the PCH. I may have lost my car keys yesterday in the gazillions of sand grains that make up Pismo Beach’s coast line…. BUT. Every tour I’ve done, there’s been some kind of car trouble. Tour #1, locked keys in car. Tour #2, car window broken and ipod stolen. Now, tour #3, lost car keys had to have it towed to get new ones (see picture here). Only this time, it happened right at the beginning of the tour (day 3) instead of at the end. I’d like to think that we just had to get it out of the way earlier than later

Shani is getting her Masters this summer so I couldn’t tour with her again BUT, we are having a reunion show at Genghis Cohen June 9th (details here). Instead, I got my roommate of the last four years, Julia, to come on the road with me! We made our first video blog, pretty entertaining if I must say so myself Check it out:

We will be on tour until June 9th in Los Angeles so come out to see us live!! Tour dates/locations/times here. Or you can go to my myspace.

To follow our random adventures on a daily basis, you can follow us on twitter at:
@AmandaHolmes or
@JuliaJara

Nothing in life is under your control. You can try really hard to make plans, but in the end, life brings unexpected circumstances which completely screw you up… The only thing you are truly in control of, is the way in which you decide to react.–I had an epiphany last week. –Since I am in control of my own thoughts and reactions, I chose not to care about the let downs, and criticisms, but instead, enjoy the moments and keep going.  Understand that if I choose to see let downs as learning experiences, then they’re not bad experiences at all, they’re what I make of them… Nothing is a failure, unless you decide its a failure. It was an interesting experiment…

Example, last week was CRAZY. I decided to react positive and hopeful, in an environment of let downs. Look where it got me…
On Monday, I entered a Grammy University contest against a bunch of Los Angeles bands, to open for major label artist Anjulie. Turned out, I made it into the Top 5 bands in the competition!! Celebration! Unfortunately, I didn’t make it into the top two.  But the night of the performance, instead of staying at home and pouting, I went to the event. Glad I sucked up my pride and went, because I ended up meeting a bunch of awesome people, and afterwards hung out with Rickey Minor himself! If you don’t know who Rickey Minor is, you should. He’s the musical director for American Idol, he was telling me about his schedule for the next month, he would be working with Jennifer Hudson, Celine Dion, and Carrie Underwood. In just the following three weeks. Life is what you make of it…

The next day I auditioned to open for Steve Miller Band!!! I walked into the audition not caring what the judges thought, I didn’t care if I messed up, or if I would get the gig. I ended up having a great audition, wasn’t nervous at all because I genuinely enjoyed the moment. Turns out.. I didn’t get that either… ha. But one of the people judging ended up offering me a gig the next day! woohoo. Life is what you make of it…

Then, the following day, I went to a mixer. Instead of sitting in the corner waiting for people to talk to me, I ran around introducing myself to everyone there! Ended up, I was offered a gig to sing the national anthem at the opening hockey game for the Reign, at the Civil Business Bank Arena! ha. Life must be what you make of it…

So basically, I think that you just have to keep going. You aren’t going to win every one every time. Its not an equation where 2+2=4. Music is biased and personal. Some people will like you, and some won’t. You just have to keep going, blindly, without faulter, and enjoy yourself. Of course it helps to have amazing friends and family around

There’s another Amanda Holmes epiphany, brought to you by the world of positive thinking. ha.

Check it out. Here’s a video of me singing the national anthem for thousands of people at the Citizen bank business arena

Hey hey

Life is AMAZING. First day of Senior year at USC today. So funny looking back to freshmen year when I was sooo terrified and thought that I was completely incompetent and would never succeed in anything! ha. Well now I’m happy, confidant, and doing MUSIC.

I have two shows in the next two weeks, one tomorrow August 25th at Crane’s, 1611 El Centro Hollywood CA 90028 8:20pm, FREE, so come! Next September 3rd at House of Blues upstairs Voodoo Lounge! $10 but there are 8 different songwriters playing and they’re all terrific! Info on myspace.com/amandaholmesband

Here’s me covering Build Me Up Buttercup, hope you enjoy!!

2009 West Coast Tour with Amanda Holmes and Shani Shousterman. Catch performances in San Francisco at the Rock-it Room.

2009 West coast tour! Performing at Barefoot Coffeeroasters! + check out our rendition of cribs:)

2009 West Coast Tour with Shani Shousterman and Amanda Holmes. Performing in Mountain View and Campbell (South bay in California). Catch a glimpse of performances, interactions with the crowd, stories about our trip, and more!

We love East Village Coffee in Monterey Always very music focused venue! Street performing, more perfomring, reflections on performing Artist’s life on tour check it out:

Another stop on the tour Loved Java Jones! Hangin with fun people!

First show of the 2009 West Coast Tour!! Shani and I are officially on the road! We played at a GREAT place in Long Beach on Saturday, Viento Y Agua. Omar Perez-Then also performed, you can hear his music at: www.myspace.com/omarperezthen 

If you look a little lower you can see the rest of the dates for the tour!! Come out to a live show!!

Check out a sneak peak of my song, “When Grapes Turn to Wine”

Hey hey!

I was lucky enough to go to FIJI for nine days during Christmas. It was AMAZING! Its a third world country, so there is a lot of poverty there, but ask any Fijiian how they’re doing and they’ll tell you, “Always good.” Its so eye opening to see these people that have nowhere near the amount of material possessions as someone in America, they don’t have the cars, the big houses, the money, and yet life is always good. Its weird, you’d think that people come to America for more opportunity, more advances in science and technology, and yet, in the scheme of things, it just complicates life and usually causes  much discomfort. I’ve never met someone in my entire life that says they’re “always good” until I went to Fiji. That was their mantra, along with no worries Sanga na langa!!

I was so inspired I wrote a song in Fijjian, here’s the video blog so you can see what heaven looks like

Happy New Year to everyone This vacation showed me that life is simple, do what makes you happy and you will be happy Don’t over complicate it.

From my heart,

Amanda

Insiders look into one of my songs thats a work in progress What do you think?! I just wrote it in the last week. Inspiration: Alanis…

Found

Here’s a little recap of highlights from my show!

Hey guys!!

I thought if you’d take the time to check out my blog, I’d give you a little sneak peak at one of the songs I’m working on! I just wrote it yesterday! So its obviously a work in progress. But hope you enjoy!! Tell me what you think!!

Sneak preview of one of my newer songs that I will be performing at my show October 25th!!

Hey! here are some highlights of the 24 video blogs posted!

1st Blog: San Diego

In Monterey, walking on my hands

Locking our keys in our car right before our gig!

Last gig in San Francisco

Goodbye to tour! Reflecting back

Random pieces of performances throughout

Hey everyone!!

I finished my tour! It was an amazing experience. Being on the road for a month really made me see that I want to do MORE tours, and for much longer spans of time! Every show was different, the audience has so much of an impact on the outcome of the show. If the people were excited, I’d get even more amped! If people didn’t care, I’d fight to win them over Shani and I made 24 video blogs of our journeys! You can see them all at http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.ListAll&friendID=50443421

I’m planning on doing lots more blogs, so keep coming back for more!!

from my heart,

Amanda

in loving memory of Nicole.

Hey everyone!

I am officially on tour! I’m playing a bunch of little coffeehouses up the coast of California with another singer/songwriter Shani Shousterman (www.myspace.com/shanimusic). For dates check out the “Tour” page on my website. Here’s the video blog we made for the first few days of the trip! I will be posting more as we go! Enjoy!

We had to split the footage into two videos, one is the drive and getting to San Diego, the second is pieces of our performance, click on the links to take you to YOUTUBE!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=vT-9jKSfkS4&feature=related

http://youtube.com/watch?v=_SPc0VbhshQ&feature=related