Buick Audra

Everything Is Noise has shown us so much love over the past year; truly grateful to be included here 🏆💎🖤

Happy new year! Just published yesterday, the mighty “Best Albums of 2023” list by Everything Is Noise included MASS and said:

“There are no two ways about it: MASS is an absolute belter of a record from Friendship Commanders. The magnitude of Buick Audra’s thunderous, bass-driven riffs and Jerry Roe’s cacophonous drum work is no mean feat, even for such a talented duo. Consequently, MASS hits a melodic rock sweet spot where objective heaviness and tints of ’90s grunge dance freely with Audra’s tuneful versatility.”
-Shaun Milligan

We’re so grateful and proud to see MASS on this and other incredible year-end lists among so many records and artists we love! Thanks to all who have tagged us in your personal lists, as well! Humbled by the response to the work. Link in comments!

💎Photo by Pete Duvall💎

Grateful for this rad post about the MASS album & book! Really appreciate Garrett DeVaughn Music for taking the time to not only listen & read, but to share it! Rules. Thanks, Garrett!

Book "Mass" by @buickaudra Album "Mass" by @friendshipcommanders For 2 pieces of work that stand alone excellently, taking them in at the same time is a next level experience. It's a masterclass in creating multiple mediums around the same content. The writing has honesty that takes deep conviction and courage, the kind that often evades the best of us. Well done Buick #myfriendsdocoolstuffs #morningreadings #morninglistening #MadUkeBard #PaintedGentleman #supportindependentartists

🖤💎🖤

One byproduct of releasing the CWMOV and MASS albums and books in rapid succession, is that now I’m just cleaning house. Literally and figuratively. It was such a massive push for me to write and release those 4 bodies of work, that I have almost no sentimental feelings about anything I needed along the way. Many trips to goodwill and other stores. Many rounds of reorganizing and putting away what will stay. Can finally start to delete the emails, texts, and DMs. The thing about writing memoir, whether in music or prose—or both in my case, is that you keep the facts and artifacts around in the process. You need them. You reference them, make sure what you’re saying is accurate, double- (and then triple-, and then quadruple-) check the quotes, etc. If you’re from gaslighting, this is maybe especially true. And if you’re like me, and used actual messages from other people as entry points to each of the essays in your second book, this is essential. I couldn’t believe I still had some of that stuff, and the research/tracking down was its own project. But I did.

And now I don’t need it. When I say I feel lighter on this side of the releases, I don’t mean healed (my least favorite word); I mean free.

Happy new year and new beginnings! Look at this very clean desk. Ready for what’s next✨

Here are my lists rolling into 2024:

OUT
-obligatory hangs that drain my battery
-comparison
-playing along
-keeping gifts out of guilt
-piles
-lifestyle influencers/coaches
-centering ourselves in every huge cultural event
-sean combs, dre, & timbaland
-asking women if they’re married

IN
-no thanks
-less social media time
-making waves
-getting rid of stuff
-shelves
-autonomy
-empathy & concern for other people
-dee barnes, gina prince-bythewood, & renée graham
-asking women about their guitar tone

2023 held a lot. I’m not qualified to speak on the enormity of what it held for humankind or the planet, but I can speak on what it held for me—because some of it was wildly good. Some of it was difficult, too, but I’m learning to note the bright parts when they occur, to document the yellow, not just the blue.

Releasing the MASS album by was a huge personal, professional, & creative milestone. I’m so proud of what & I accomplished there; it’s an honor to do this with you, JR. Publishing my second book was massive, too! The tale I never thought I’d tell is out in the world, on other people’s stereos & nightstands. Wild. Having those 2 projects out on the heels of releasing the Conversations with My Other Voice album & book last year has left me feeling lighter, brighter, louder. Playing many FC shows & a couple of solo ones was soul-nourishing. I also wrote & tracked new solo work, published an essay in , said my friend Marc Orleans’ name on stage at every FC show, and showed up for things that would once have been too big to approach.

All of this was true, too: the amount of fear I felt was immeasurable, the f**k-ups on stage, uncountable; I compared myself to others & came up short every time; I blocked numbers; I had one friendship end definitively while others fell away quietly; AND (🥁🥁🥁) the morning BLUE was released, I received an email (addressed to Jerry!) about one of my social media posts, calling my words libelous & threatening a public response. Absurd. Also sexist, which was what the “libelous” post was about in the first place (life IS a fu***ng highway, pals). I flatly hated some people & boldly loved others. I grieved. I was imperfect in all of it. But I gave it a shot.

As I said, it held a lot.

I don’t make resolutions anymore (I’m an adult child who will hold myself to impossible standards when given the chance), but I hope to be courageous in 2024, to make & release more work, & to meet whatever happens with the better parts of who I am. To forgive myself when I don’t.

Thanks to all who sang/cried/laughed along. I love you for it. I hope 2024 rips for all of us ✨
📷 JR, Denver 🥤
#2023

This made me cry a little when I first saw it. I’m gonna spoil it for you and tell you that MASS by Friendship Commanders made the #1 slot. Made me cry because Jesse and Rock And Roll Fables are based in Boston, and the Boston piece of this has been wild for me this year. Of course, the album is about Boston—my time there, to be specific—and some of that story is tough. As we rolled the story out this year, I stopped hearing from longtime friends there altogether; still haven’t heard from them. They didn’t come to the Boston show, they haven’t said a word about the record, and they probably never will. Because what I did was a tell a story that some of them don’t like, for reasons that range from them still being friends with some of the weird folx in the story, to just being bummed that I told the truth and it differs from theirs. You’d think I’d be accustomed to this, being on a this side of two memoir albums, but it still hurts. I’m used to holding my chin up and maintaining a “f**k it” attitude most of the time, but when I saw this post, I realized my neck was tired from holding my chin up. Cried in my car.

It’s been a big year.

To know that someone with great musical taste in Boston loves the record makes me so happy. Thanks, Jesse and co., for everything you’ve written about MASS in 2023. So appreciated. This made the end of my year.
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23 in ’23 & Then Some (Or “Why Do We Keep Making The List Length Correspond With The Year We’re Covering) Eventually this list is really going to be insane. But for now it’s manageable. Mostly. And we know we have control over it but something just clicks when the number of titles in the list is …

Thank you for showing Friendship Commanders so much love this year! 💎💎💎

Soldering in my pajamas because this is what relaxation looks like for me. Haven’t had time to mess around with pedals all year, so I’m taking this glorious day off to see what’s up with this goddamned build that doesn’t work yet.

Also wanted to say that when I was writing MASS, and BLUE in particular, I had a heightened awareness of the intensity of statements like, “family is all that matters,” or, “family is key in this life.” Because it just isn’t true for some of us. It can’t be, for all kinds of reasons. And I’m including family of choice, too (controversial, I know). I don’t like the idea that outside people make or break our experience while we’re here, that our lives have to be defined by the quality or quantity of those relationships. People are important, but that also includes us.

I don’t see family of origin at holidays anymore, and I honestly keep the whole thing pretty low key. I do like holidays, but I’m always in the process of learning what’s best for me, and how I can be okay regardless of who else is or isn’t around. And whenever I see those absolutist statements about family or friends being all that matter, I silently add, “for you.” Because I think that’s more accurate and respectful. All anyone can do is speak for themselves. Me too.

If you’re on your own this season, I send you love and solidarity! I send it to everyone else, too, but iykyk. I recommend melting s**t with a hot thermal transfer tool. Really calms the seasonal nerves lol.

Have yourself a merry little Monday, pals. Hugs from nash.🎄

So stoked to see that CVLT Nation named MASS as one of their top 10 Alt Rock albums of 2023! 🖤💎🏆

This quote was taken from a podcast interview I did; I was talking about writing MASS by Friendship Commanders—and in particular, the song, FAIL. As I’ve said before, FAIL was written after the death of my friend Marc. His passing made me examine friendship dynamics, the ones that work and the ones that don’t. In the song I say, “I hope that you felt known,” because that’s what comes up when I think about his su***de. That I hope there were times when he felt known. By me, by others, just at all. Because I don’t think we’re nailing that out here. I don’t think enough effort goes into our interactions. I have had so many people in my life who have wanted to have me around as a sounding board, or the strong one, or the good listener. And they have never—not one time—asked how I’m doing. I’ve encountered it in the last 24 hours.

When I say that Marc’s death changed my life, I’m talking about all kinds of things. But one of the primary areas is this one, where I make an effort to tell the people I care about that I see and hear them. And the people who routinely demonstrate that they can’t see or hear me? They get less time now. Because it’s actually harmful. It’s dangerous to feel unknown. Very.

I hope that you feel known. I hope you’re faring this season with any kind of ease or sense of calm. I’m hanging in there myself. Glad to be here.

Link to listen to this episode in comments💎

✨✨✨

✨’TIS THE SEASON✨ One time I was wearing this jacket and a guy said to me, “Wow, I don’t think I’d ever have the confidence to have my own band’s name stitched on the back of my jacket.”

I didn’t! We named the band after the jacket. This jacket is like 35 years old. I know, because after years of wearing it as my winter outer layer, I finally figured out who the original owner was a few years ago. That story is told in the Weekly Featured Artist piece that .is.noise published about and MASS in September! In addition, that piece and story are referenced in the ✨NEW✨ EIN review of the album by , which just came out 2 days ago. Super grateful. Thanks again to EIN, Shaun, and David for the rad coverage of our new album!

If you want to hear other music-related stories, check out my conversation with on his podcast, You Could Be My Aramis. That interview just went live today! Thanks for having me, Mike.

In summary, I’m not that confident, and I find friendship to be one of the most complex, confounding concepts and realities in this life. That’s why the name is so wild, those words next to each other. I couldn’t keep my hands off of it. I may spend the rest of my days figuring out what it means. In songs.✨

All links to read and listen in comments, enjoy the media! ✨✨✨

I don’t think we’ve ever had a project reviewed TWICE by the same publication. Floored, honestly. Huge thanks to Everything Is Noise for their support of MASS and what we do! Means the world. 💎

“There are no gimmicks here to bait you into listening – it stands firmly on the merits of excellent songwriting and boisterously enjoyable performances from a hugely talented duo. It’s an added bonus that when you drill deeper into the melodic rock of Friendship Commanders, you find a richness and relatability in the messages of MASS. Perhaps you’ll even find that it’s something to bolster you in your own times of turmoil: as Helen Keller once said, ‘Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light.’”

Honored and surprised to see a 2nd (!) review of MASS from Everything Is Noise - this time by Shaun! Huge thanks! Can’t tell you what it means to us. Link to read is in the comments, as is the first one, written by the ever awesome David Rodriguez! Thank you for this kindness, EIN. We so appreciate what you do.
💎💎💎
Photo of us by Anna Haas Creative!

I was so overwhelmed by last night’s turnout that I had to play the first 2 songs with my eyes closed 😭

Thank you Nashville
Thank you thank you thank you
🖤🖤🖤

THANK YOU NASHVILLE 💎🖤😭 What an incredible night. Everyone who came out, everyone working at , our friends in & : we can’t thank you enough. Please accept this late night photo of us from Waffle House, (where they were playing Otis Redding’s “White Christmas” and serving delicious hashbrowns at 1 AM) as proof that we were so happy and grateful after the show. We love you, thank you so much. Best way imaginable to bring MASS home.
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Final post in the 10-day series about the tracks on MASS by Friendship Commanders - DISSONANCE! Huge thanks to all who have followed along; I’ve really enjoyed writing these. The Nashville album release show is tonight 12/8 at DRKMTTR! See you there, and enjoy this last bit of writing! 💎

The 10th & final track on MASS is DISSONANCE, the spoken word piece! This was written in fragments in the van, both on tour & and on the way home from tracking the music for the album with Kurt in Salem. I recorded all the vocals for MASS myself in Nashville, so I knew I had room for one more thing as long as it was just voice. DISSONANCE was an idea that took shape after many conversations with Jerry in which I shared parts of my Massachusetts story—including some beautiful times, like temporarily living with my friend’s family the summer I was moved back to Boston. In the MASS book, I describe it as the simplest time in my life, and I believe it was. This track was my way of showing a broader, more detailed picture; of illustrating how many things can be true at the same time. I wrote each stanza as they came to me, and sequenced them later.

Tracking a spoken word piece has its challenges. The vocal rig you use to record a loud rock vocal is not the same one you use for this kind of thing. Every single sound picks up. In the end, I tracked it in my office, under a blanket, holding my SM7. It added to the intimacy of the presentation. To this day, I have only read it aloud one time, and that’s what’s captured on the recording. It’s imperfect, and my voice cracks toward the end—an honest reaction to the prose—but I left it. I didn’t want it to be “performed.” I didn’t want it to lose shape. Jerry and Kurt both heard it for the first time on the recording.

“Dissonance” is a word people have long used when talking about my guitar playing, but I happily take it into my whole identity. I’m okay with the rub, with the disharmony. I think it’s honest & true. Today, I understand & accept that I am multiple things at once, & I finally embrace the extra note.
-Buick Audra

Thank you all for following along with this series! It’s been lovely to write about the individual tracks! Join us tonight 12/8 for our hometown album release show at DRKMTTR! We can’t wait. See you there!

💎Full transcript in comments
💎MASS album & book in 🔗

📷 Marsian DeLellis - Polaroid of me as a teen in Belmont MA, “listening to Badmotorfinger on repeat” 🖤

Pals, you can now buy these two books (and albums!) together in one spot! If you’d like this bundle for yourself or someone else, last day for media rate shipping is this coming Monday, 12/11. Get your order in before then!

Both books are memoirs, and both albums that they were written to accompany are memoirs in music. CWMOV is about voice, and MASS is about language. The books come with downloads of their respective albums. I consider them to be sisters. I’ll put the link in the comments! 🎁

Day 9 of the 10-day series about the tracks on MASS by Friendship Commanders! This is the last proper song on the album, and it was also written last. Closes out the musical portion of the album with a big ol’ declaration.

Part of not having the literal or proverbial keys anymore, is not having to know what every unkind person I ever knew in Boston is up to these days—which some people still bring to my doorstep, like a dead bird. No thanks. Moved. On purpose. Better days. Observe the boundaryyyyyy

Hope you enjoy this writing, and hope to see every single human being I know in Nashville at our album release show at DRKMTTR tomorrow night, 12/8! 💎

The 9th track on MASS is MOVE, & it was the last musical composition written for the album! I wrote it the day before we left for the tour that would take us right up to the tracking dates in Salem with Kurt. This song & several others were so new that we booked rehearsal space time in other cities on our days off on that tour, just so we could rehearse the album. We sequenced it before we got to Salem so we could run the songs in order & make sure they felt good in that line up. MOVE felt like a necessary piece, one that talked about not having to toe the line, to be the one to make it work. We love a peacekeeper, don’t we? But do we care about what the peace cost them? Felt good to say, you don’t have to do any of that. You can pack your things & go. Everyone else will figure it out. Because they will.

MOVE is a rare composition in that the verse was built from something Jerry and I played around with in the rehearsal space months prior. We tend to record our not-so-common “jam” sessions, & I remembered this particular section and went back for it. I wrote the rest of the song around the verse, & then we really brought it to life in those rehearsal spaces on the road. The loud, apocalyptic sound at the very beginning of the track is all of our music stacked; Jerry did that, as well as the strings at the end. We spent a good bit of time on the post-production on MOVE, & the BV layers are rivaled in number only by VAMPIRE. We wanted it to be a true musical punctuation at the end of the story. We felt it deserved that.

Someone wise once said to me, “if you have keys in your hand, you’re an adult & you can leave.” So true. The parts of me that were once not adult & couldn’t leave need to hear that every day. Maybe you need to hear it, too.
-Buick Audra

💎Our album release show is tomorrow night 12/8 at DRKMTTR in Nashville! 7 PM. Would love to have you there.
💎Lyrics in comments
💎MASS album & book in 🔗

📷 Zach Weeks - the night before we started tracking MASS at GodCity

Day 8 of the 10-day series about the tracks on MASS by Friendship Commanders. A RETRACTION was the first song I wrote for MASS—an album I didn’t know I had inside of me at the time. Art is wild. Our album release show is Friday night, Nashville! DRKMTTR. See you there! 💎

The 8th track on MASS is A RETRACTION, the first song written in the collection! I wrote most of it in one sitting, played it for Jerry, & was immediately aware that I was writing about Boston. That list bit was a surprise. I didn’t yet know I had a whole album on the subject inside of me, but I understood that I was returning to old grounds here, & unsaying all kinds of things, including, “I love you.” It felt good, to be honest. I think I even laughed out loud at one point. Songs can show me what I’m slow to learn otherwise. In this case, it showed me that my old, unchecked loyalties were worth examination, & that I was still protecting the bad behavior of other people. It was a beginning. A big one. This song was the first shovel into the ground.

My notes on the original lyric sheet for A RETRACTION say the composition was worked on over an unfathomable 4 months. I never work on songs for that long. Like, ever. I know it did undergo some changes along the way. The verse was originally written in a different time signature, & the bridge was written at the very end. Jerry felt strongly that the verses should be super stark on the recording, which they are. I remember this being tricky to track without a click because of the hits at the end of the bridge. Jerry did the cool reverse vocal treatment over that part, too. Oh, and on the “if I told you I love you, I don’t” sections, I asked Kurt for the vocal treatment from the “don’t switch the blade on a guy in shades” part of SUNGLASSES AT NIGHT by Corey Hart. I was & am obsessed with it. Kurt delivered.

I’m always advocating for us all to update our files, to see things through a current lens, not one colored by bias, nostalgia, or habit. When I wrote A RETRACTION, I updated my own files. I don’t have to love everyone forever. And I don’t have to protect garbage behavior until we’re all dead. What an enormous relief. Long overdue.
-Buick Audra

💎Lyrics in comments
💎MASS album & book in 🔗
💎12/8 @ DRKMTTR - MASS ALBUM RELEASE SHOW IN NASHVILLE

📷 Kim Maroon

Day 7! Writing these track-by-track posts about MASS by Friendship Commanders has been such a cool experience for me. Thanks to all following along! This subject, the resilience subject, is a big one for me. Big reckoning, big undoing. So big, in fact, here’s a quote from my first book:

“People love when women use the word resilient; it means we don’t have to talk about it.”

Enjoy the writing! 💎

The 7th track on MASS is DISTORTION. We released the first 6 tracks on the album as singles (in order), so this was the first song not to get that treatment. It’s the other FFCCCF tuning composition, written toward the end of the writing process. Last year, a peer asked me to be on her podcast which had a resilience theme. I was grateful to be asked, but said that I would only be able to speak to another side of that idea, the counter-argument. “Resilient” is a word other people have put on me, an expectation, a badge—often in place of acknowledging difficult things that have happened in my life. And when I was in a different part of the story, I wore it proudly. I thought I was supposed to, especially in Boston, in those uneven dynamics. DISTORTION outlines all the things I thought I had to say in order to make my story easier for other people. They were taught to me. Loudly.

This song almost didn’t make the record. It had a subtler presence in the pile of songs we were shaping up for the studio, but I believed it belonged in the group, both narratively & musically. The form is atypical for my writing; there’s no obvious chorus & it ends with a verse, but it’s how the song goes in my head. As always, the riff came first. Jerry found his parts quite easily on this one, & the ambient slide guitar overdubs (which I’m tracking in the photo) were Kurt’s idea—though my approach differed slightly from the original concept. They add a kind of ominous vibe to the recording. I asked for that long delay on the vocal at the end of the quasi-choruses (which are really pre-choruses with no proper choruses to follow).

MASS is, in part, about acknowledging what was learned & what had to be unlearned. In DISTORTION, I’m naming the unlearning, which has been long but liberating. If I don’t have to be a healed, resilient beacon of strength, I don’t need to expect that of you, either. We can just be people next to each other, doing our best. What a thing.
-Buick Audra

💎Lyrics in comments
💎MASS album & book in 🔗
💎12/8 @ DRKMTTR

📷 Jerry Roe

Sixth post in the 10-day series about the tracks on MASS by Friendship Commanders - WE WERE HERE! Couple things:

1. I love this song; it might be my current favorite. Come see us play it live at the Nashville album release this Friday 12/8! DRKMTTR

2. I have more to say about this, but the email mentioned in this post would never have been sent to a man, and it would never have said “it’s especially disappointing to see women doing this.”

This thing, where people who think they’re feminists decide that women owe us more labor or responsible behavior in certain areas of culture, is fu**ed dot org. I’ve received this double standard from cis men AND women alike. I find it bizarre and entirely biased. I’ll be back to this subject, I promise.

Enjoy this writing!

The 6th track on MASS is WE WERE HERE, the first standard tuning song on the record! It’s fitting that it’s the opening track on the 2nd side of the vinyl, because it does feel like a shift to me. I’m looking back here, instead of standing right in the story. For a good while after I left Boston, I couldn’t remember most of what had happened there. I forgot entire people (which social media makes incredibly awkward). My mind just didn’t want to hold it. I would jokingly say that I had “deleted files” when I couldn’t remember something that another person expected me to. It wasn’t until Marc passed & I was writing this record that I was able to see most of the picture. And when I did, I could see the good, too. It didn’t balance out the other events, but it was there. The breakthrough for me, was being able to say, “it was hard for me,” and not have to take care of anyone else’s feelings. Even still, some of my old community can’t hear it. They just tend the gardens of their own nostalgia and pretend I haven’t said it. But I have. Writing this song was prompted by an email from someone I used to know there, shaming me about one of the venues we were playing on an upcoming tour. He’d never come to see us play, never offered a word of support, but felt entitled to that brand of communication after all the years that had passed. Classic, I thought. Still not good enough for Boston.

WE WERE HERE came together pretty quickly after I wrote the alternating melodic guitar part in the verse. Compositionally, it’s unusual in that the bridge ends on the same note that the chorus begins on, but I chose to keep it that way. It acts as a musical ellipses between the sections. Musically, this song and the one after it, DISTORTION, sound the way my memories of Boston feel. Jerry’s parts really brighten and empower the track, and Kurt mixed the BVs on the bridge so that it’s almost a duet there. I like it.

The growth, is that now I delete emails that shame me, instead of trying to change anyone’s mind. Some minds don’t change. Gotta tend to my own.
-Buick Audra

💎Lyrics in comments
💎MASS album & book in 🔗
💎12/8 @ DRKMTTR

📷 Kim Maroon

STILL LIFE! Here’s the fifth post in the 10-day series about MASS by Friendship Commanders. People mention this song to me often. It came on like a fever dream, as some songs do. Enjoy! 💎

The 5th track on MASS is STILL LIFE, the first song I wrote in the FFCCCF tuning for the album. Like HIGH SUN, writing it was immediate & easy, like it had always been in my psyche, hiding. That said, it took me a minute to decipher the message. I’ve come to realize that it’s a compilation of actual statements & attitudes I waded through on my way out of Boston, out of the circle I once ran with. A combination of downplaying my injuries while elevating the slightest emotional inconveniences of others—primarily the men. There was an awful lot of tending to every single ego fluctuation of the dudes around me, especially the male musicians; yet, when I was actually backed against a wall by one of them, I got the equivalent of “walk it off.” My perspective was the only problem. The duality was and is striking to me—& would be true today if I’d stayed.

I barely remember writing this song, to be honest, but I know it happened quickly. It came on like a fever dream. The pace of it, the urgency, the forward tilt of the riff & the rhythm, all mirror what panic attacks feel like for me. Jerry followed my right hand & played double pedal through the entire song, which was perfect. We both have a funny memory of Kurt standing & watching this performance from the other side of the glass, I think because it was so athletic. My primary guitar on this track is the Mascis Jazzmaster (with Novak pickups), but live, I play it on a 1995 Gibson Nighthawk. I need the low end.

As I wrote about in the MASS book, I wear a necklace every day that says “Still Alive,” which is a reference to the lyrics in “The Enemy I Know” & my status as a survivor. It wasn’t until I wrote MASS that I fully realized how remarkable that status is. We should stop telling people that what doesn’t kill them makes them stronger. We should start addressing what makes it difficult to stay alive. That’s the real work out here.
-Buick Audra

💎Lyrics in comments
💎MASS album & book in 🔗
💎12/8 @ DRKMTTR