Happy Fun and the Saints song

Who would have thought that my first two releases after my hiatus would be a children’s album with my daughters and a duet with my wife on an ‘80’s cover song remade with New Orleans Saints lyrics? Good thing I’m not a betting man, but I wanted my family to be involved and they certainly have been!
Happy Fun has been just that. It was fun recording in the studio and fun making the Happy Fun and The Turkey Song videos. We have more videos planned—assuming my aged camera holds up. It has been a bit fickle of late. Of course, if anyone with higher grade eqiupment wants to be involved, feel free to let me know.
Not sure what happens other than that. We would like to do some live shows but don’t have anything planned yet. We also have a new song and a few others in the works. We hope to record another album if sales of Happy Fun justifies it. I am very encouraged, and it is good to know that fans are making multilpe purchases.
Fred Clark-- Happy Fun is available at Cdbaby and iTunes. Videos are at http://www.youtube.com/fredclarktv .

We’ve been talking about doing a Saints song since before the season started, and pretty early on I thought the Sly Fox song, “Let’s Go All The Way” would be perfect. I always liked that song. We were distracted by Happy Fun, the holidays, and other day to day responsibilites in general. Lauren kept saying we had to get it done, so she wrote the new lyrics and set it all in motion. Trenell was able to lay down the instrumental tracks and have everything ready for us when we went into Big Bang Studio on the 10th. Things went very smoothly in the vocal booth. Lots of discussion went on about the mix—-long story short—Lauren was right, and we were able to release the song on the 14th. Lauren did an excellent job on the video. She has some other ideas in mind for future “Fred and Lauren” projects.
Fred and Lauren—“Saints Go All The Way” is now available at http://www.fredandlauren.bandcamp.com and will be on Itunes in 2-4 weeks.
The video is on Lauren’s channel-- http://www.youtube.com/llotty1966 .

My mind now turns to the non-children, non duet aspect of my career. 2 songs were recorded last summer back in the St. Louis area. I have about 9 other songs that I want to record with my mates up there. I’m thinking I will be releasing those songs as singles eventually.
I’m also hopeful to record an album here. I’ve recorded some of those demos with my mates in Luling. Now its just a matter of finding the time to rehearse with the band, record the demos and putting the financing together to go into the big studio.
I have another project in mind too, but first things first. I also wouldn’t mind playing bass again in a band either, just in case someone is looking....
Anyway, thank you so much for your support. Hope to see you soon.
Fred

The New Years Cup

Our first annual New Years Cup soccer match was played today at Barrios Park. Bernadette and Colette comprised the FC Clark Gold Stars, while Bridget and I were members of FC Clark United. The Gold Stars struck first, and we traded goals throughout the duration. The Gold Stars made some fine passes, and Bridget made some fine defensive plays for United. The match ended in a 4-4 tie. Bridget was named MVP.
The next match in the cup series will be in a couple weeks, in the Daddy's Birthday Cup.

Opening Ceremonies and 8th Grade Geography

I watched part of the Olympic opening ceremonies last night. My favorite part is always watching the teams from all the different countries marching into the stadium. I've always been fascinated by other cultures. While watching, I remembered the '76 Olympics, which was held during the summer between my 7th and 8th grade years. I had injured my foot that summer, and had to have a minor surgery, so I spent a few days in the hospital, most of which was watching the Olympics. One of the nurses was a track and field fan, and we found some common ground in a 800 meter runner by the name of Rick Wolhuter. I believe he was the favorite, but alas, he only took the bronze.

After arriving back home, I had to spend some time off my feet. We had a set of Rand McNally atlases, and if memory serves me right, it was a 12 volume set. So, with nothing better to do I memorized every country and it's capital in the whole world.

Every single one.

I'm talking all of them.

Fast forward a few months and I am sitting in my 8th grade geography class at Webster Jr. High, taught by the football coach, Coach Presson. The Coach kind of makes an offhanded remark about the capital of Botswana, thinking nobody would know and I very nonchalantly say "Gaborone". Of course the whole class (20 girls and 7 other boys) looks at me in bewilderment, and the Coach has to actually look it up. "How do you know that?" He asks. I tell him I know all of them. "What do you mean all of them?" and I say "I know every capital of every country in the world" So then he asks me a few more, and of course I get them right. Then one of the girls blurts out "Clark, you are so fruit!" Yeah, whatever. Anyway every day from then on the Coach would ask me the capital of some country. Once he tried to get me on a technicality but it didn't work. He never did stump me.

Unfortunately I have not retained that information over the years. In fact I had to look up the capital of Botswana to write this blog! Chalk it up to old age.

Ironically, I have never traveled outside of the United States.

Mississippi FC 2, New Orleans 1

I took the girls to see their first professional soccer game yesterday at Tad Gormley Stadium in New Orleans. The New Orleans Shockers play in the lowest level of professional football here in the United States, the PDL. Many of the players are from England, and South America, as well as New Orleans. It rained prior to the game but the skies cleared just in time. We got to our seats just as the players came onto the field.

My girls were just as interested in buying snacks and soft drinks as they were in the game, but led cheers of "Go New Orleans!" throughout.

Mississippi FC, nicknamed the Brilla--(I must admit I don't know what a Brilla is, but I am going to look it up!) got out to a 2-nil lead in the second half. Near the end of the game, we finally got on board, sparked by the play of #20, who had the assist. Despite the small crowd and the loss, all in all it was a lot of fun and I hope we can make another game before the season ends in July.