Ah, this is the way to do it. Just unpack your axe, shut the ramshackle wooden door with a little loop of string, and get down to it. No distractions, no inconvenient intrusions on your privacy … no interruptions, like those times when you take nutrition in some form. Nothing like that.

Hi, folks. Yep, we’re woodshedding. Not the kind you’re thinking about, you musician types. No, we’re actually just living in a wooden shed – specifically, the garden shed in the courtyard of the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, our erstwhile squat house in upstate New York, a region known for bands making do with very little and making it big on something small. Bands like The Band, Rusted Root, uh …. and others. We’re sort of following in the tradition of clubhouse recording … not out of choice, you understand, but out of necessity. This place is barely big enough to be considered a club house. And frankly, I’m not sure what club would want us as members at this point.

Our hammer mill has been taken over by belligerent squatters – not the nice kind, like us – so we’ve retired to the garden shed where the mansized tuber keeps his watering can and fertilizer. He’s a little put out, I should mention. After all, he’s had the place to himself for about nine years, and all of a sudden five disheveled refugees crowd into his space, knocking things over and generally putting his life into disarray. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) has graciously agreed to stay outside of the shed, where he’s doing service as a scarecrow. (Not real good at it. The crows laugh at him … or at least it sounds like they do.)

If Anti Lincoln pushes over a bit, I have just about enough room to set up my throwaway electric piano. In return, though, he insists that I only play songs that remind Lincoln of the war. It’s all about give and take in this place – everybody looks out for everyone else. Everyone except Mitch Macaphee, who looks like he’s ready to go to one of his mad scientist conferences in Madagascar or Belize or someplace less well-known. I’m expecting an ultimatum any day now – either let him have his basement lab back or it’s off to hyper-scientific crazytown. Who can blame him? (Another week in this woodshed, and I might just tag along with him.)