Saturna have just returned from a west coast tour with Bob Mould and have had the time of our lives. We hit San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, Seattle and Vancouver BC and thanks to Bob played amazing venues to sold out crowds. We made tons of new friends and fans, sold a slew of CDs and had a complete blast. Bob and everyone in his band and crew were the nicest most professional people we’ve met in the industry. We want to thank them for everything that they did to make this tour the best it could be.

We also want to thank all our old and new friends for coming out and seeing the shows. It was so great to have everyone’s support and to see your faces in the crowd. Thanks for the pictures and video you took as well. We are still sifting through everything and its going to take a while to get it all up in the Internet because there is so much, but that’s a good thing.

We’re putting together a lengthy tour log for all of you who want to know all the dirty details, but I’ll write a short synopsis here:

Our first show was in Solana Beach, CA a city just north of San Diego. It was a gorgeous little town and we stuck our feet in the sand and sea before we did our sound check. We were definitely a little nervous when we did our sound check, mostly because we couldn’t do a real sound check, the sound guy wouldn’t let us put our whole drum set on stage, so we kind of winged it and made sure the vocals and guitars sounded good. Bob and his crew came by to welcome us to the tour and everyone was really nice. There was a local band opening the night, so they warmed up the crowd for us and that helped ease our nerves a little. When we took the stage the house was full and the crowd got right into it. My voice was a little shaky for the first couple songs, but everything went well and I relaxed and got into it by Just For Thrills. It ended up being a really good show and we were excited to be heading to LA.

The El Rey Theater was amazing. We got their early in the afternoon and had some time to hang out and absorb the energy of the place. El Rey is huge and has a great stage with a curtain. We had an excellent monitor sound and really rocked. It was possibly our best show ever. The light guy really went all out and gave us a great light show. We got a really great response from the crowd as well and had such a great experience.

The Great American Music Hall in San Francisco was one of the most gorgeous venues I’d ever been in. It was built in 1907 and was gilded in gold with an awesome balcony and great sound. The people really took care of us here with a free buffet and really nice dressing rooms. We played a great show to a full house and met a ton of cool people.

We played the Doug Fir in Portland and Neumos in Seattle and it felt really good to see all our home town fans, friends and family. By this time we were in the groove and our sets were really tight and felt really good. Richards on Richards in Vancouver, BC was our last show and we were sad that it was over so quickly. We’d made friends with Bob and all the guys in his band and crew and can’t wait for our next adventures together.

Hold tight and we will put up the rest of the blogs, pics and some great video as soon as possible. Thanks to Curtis Finger, Pneyu, and Nelson Clay for all the pictures we posted on this blog. We also have some big news coming about some of the opportunities that presented themselves on this tour.

Saturna are pleased to have been included in the March Mix from the After Hours blog along with R.E.M., Lightspeed Champion, and M. Ward and Zooey Deschanel’s new project She & Him.  They also announced Saturna’s upcoming tour with Bob Mould and stated that Saturna, “Brings a deliciously dirty rock with a touch of a rhythmic psychedelia.  Often compared with Jesus and Mary Chain and Lush,” and “is starting to get that all important and well-deserved buzz.”

Big thanks to Kyra Reed, on the Tunecore blog for using Saturna as an example of the right way for a band to utilize their blog.  We appreciate the kind words and recommend that if you’re a band interested in more information on new media and marketing that you check out KyraReed.com and Tunecore.

Thanks to Sonic Slang for writing about Saturna’s upcoming tour with Bob Mould. They also posted an mp3 of Pop Rocks and said it was, “A groovy slice of indie pop that we’re diggin’ so far. Think dream/psych in the vein of Dandy Warhols and you’re on the right track.”

Pop Rocks also won the MP3 Jackpot this week. They called Pop Rocks, “A psych pop treasure,” and added “Saturna is wildly crafting songs in the vein of The Stone Roses, drenched with teenage power pop sensibility that’s screaming for some of that fancy broadcasting compression.“

In the last couple of weeks Saturna has been getting radio airplay and press in advance of our tour with Bob Mould.  Jay Ziegler of Consequence of Sound wrote a nice article about Some Delicious Enemy and says Saturna has, “swirling shoegaze and dreamy pop textures large enough to fill a football field.“

Altrok radio included Saturna song Pop Rocks in their latest Tuesday showcase along with artists like Depeche Mode, The Cure and Tones on Tail among many others.

Thanks to Thomas Bell, Saturna also made Ricks Picks on CD Hotlist, a website that recommends new releases to libraries.  Some Delicious Enemy was featured along with new albums from Hot Chip, U2, Justice and more.

And the always entertaining Jules got into the spirit, providing Pop Rocks as a soundbite  on her blog

Saturna are excitedly getting ready for tour in support of Bob Mould and wanted to thank a bunch of people on the web for the buzz they’ve help create.

Big thanks to OurStage.com who earlier this week featured Saturna as Rock Artist of the Day. They also included Saturna in their recent press release on the Business Wire, where they discussed Saturna’s performance at last year’s Bumbershoot festival.

The Plastic Ashtray from England also featured Saturna this week. This is what writer Pete Stanley had to say, “We described Saturna’s debut album as “diverse, powerful & elegant debut by a band who are quite simply brilliant”, and we weren’t wrong (honest!). As the band get their heads around going from obscure to US tour alongside Hüsker Dü legend Bob Mould, we ask you…. why aren’t these guys your new favourite band?” - Thanks Pete

And last but not least, thanks to Indie Mom from Speed of Dark also gave our show at the El Rey, LA a shout out. We’ll see you in LA!

Saturna are excited and honored to announce that we have been invited to go on tour with Bob Mould of Husker Du & Sugar fame. Bob Mould is on tour in support of his new album District Line. Bob Mould’s band includes Jason Narducy and Brendan Canty of Fugazi. Saturna will be hitting the whole west coast with Bob Mould from San Diego to Vancouver, BC including stops in LA, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle. We will be playing songs from our debut album Some Delicious Enemy along with some new material that will appear on an EP later this spring. Check out these amazing venues:

3/24 - Solana Beach, CA @ Belly Up

3/25 - Los Angeles, CA @ El Rey

3/26 - San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall

3/28 - Portland, OR @ Doug Fir

3/29 - Seattle, WA @ Neumos

3/30 - Vancouver, BC @ Richard’s on Richards

Saturna is excited to announce that we will be doing some touring during the month of March.  We’re putting it all together right now and will announce dates and the headliner soon, but keep your eyes peeled, this is going to be huge!

I want to take a second to thank Kyra Reed for her amazing ideas, untiring help and willingness to listen at a moment’s notice.  She is someone that can help take bands to the next level and should be the envy of every band not working with her.  Check out my endorsement of her along with testimonials from our friends The Upsidedown and Saskia Vogel.

http://www.kyrareed.com/?page_id=52

Big thanks to McLindy, a new friend, who took the above photo of us at our house party in early January.  Tons of people showed up and we had a complete blast playing with our friends Dance Terror and getting down to the sounds of some local DJs.

http://www.tigerfight.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=52&forum=16&post_id=120

Saturna are excited to have inked a deal with Toronto outfit, Bearsuit Publishing to license their music to TV, film and other media. Bearsuit have been licensing songs on shows like The Hills, Dirt, The L-Word, Grey’s Anatomy, Numb3rs, and tons more. By signing with Bearsuit, Saturna are joining a team of great artists that includes Great Lake Swimmers, Madrid, The Caribbean, Stirling, Paper Moon, The Heavy Blinkers, and Sinewave as well as Mancunians Rebelski, the official fourth member of Doves, and Beats For Beginners who is being remixed by the Doves guitarist.

Check out the Saturna page that Bearsuit put up.

http://www.bearsuitpublishing.com/blog/?cat=48

Saturna also continue to get radio support on tons of college radio as well as internet stations like Radio 0 in Russia and Basic Rock Radio on podcast #5. Check it out.

There have been quite a few Saturna mentions and shout outs lately in the blog world.  Thanks to Bag of Songs for the shout out in their review of Panda Riot.  They said that if you dig Saturna you’ll like Panda Riot and we agree. 

Music of the Moment included Saturna song Much More in their list of current favorite songs along with songs from Blonde Redhead, Band of Horses, Secret Machines, The Charlatans and tons more.

Blogorock from France says Saturna’s takeoff is imminent and lauds Pop Rocks.

And lastly Rachelandthecity from Scenestars and The Bloggeratti show on Breakthru Radio ended her show with Saturna song Periwinkle, in a set that also included an interesting interview with Whitney Mathison of USA Today’s Pop Candy blog.  

Bag of Songs - http://bagofsongs.blogspot.com/search?q=saturna

Music of the Moment - http://res1999.blogspot.com/2007/01/hot-tracks.html

Blogorock - http://gurus-blogorock.blogspot.com/2007/07/decollage-imminent.html

Scenestars - http://scenestars.net/?s=saturna

Saturna are pleased to have been given a rave review in Sea of Tranquility.  Reviewer Ryan Sparks calls Some Delicious Enemy, “Infectious” and “A breath of fresh air.”  Read the whole review here:

“Call it alternative, college radio friendly or music for the myspace generation but whatever tag you choose to slap on Saturna, their style of indie / alt / pop (there’s my tag for ya) can certainly be called infectious. The quartet which hails from the Pacific Northwest (a region known to have spawned more than a few noteworthy bands in the early part of the 90’s) delivers a tightly woven mix of original songs combining elements of electronica, with jagged, inspired moments of muscular guitar driven rock. Sure vocalist Ryan Carroll’s layered and almost ethereal delivery brings to mind some of the finer moments of The Jesus and Mary Chain, but the band isn’t setting out to follow down someone else’s well traveled musical path. The game plan here is to carve out a sound that they can distinctly call their own and for the large part I think they’ve succeeded on Some Delicious Enemy. At least half of the tracks on this album could easily be thrown into heavy college radio rotation and I’m sure they would create a buzz immediately. If you like your music on the indie / alternative side then Saturna are going to be right up your alley. The songs on Some Delicious Enemy are a breath of fresh air and exactly what’s needed to combat the seemingly endless amount of plastic, candy coated flavors of the week which permeates much of today’s pop music.  (Ryan Sparks)”

http://www.seaoftranquility.org/reviews.php?op=showcontent&id=5624