Quiet, Too Quiet...
by Amber
I completely own it. Life happened, things came up, and you haven't heard from us here the last four months. We never call; we never write...

But we weren't entirely quiet. We were on Facebook and Twitter...We kept working and moving...And we're hoping you'll still love us. Cos we're back and burning and blazing ahead. (That enough Bs for you to B Mine again?)

And, just in case you need a little bribery, we've swallowed our pride and accepted imperfections to share a little something with you. For quite a while, we did a cover of Crash by the Primitives and it was a crowd favourite. We had fun and some of us (not just me, but especially me) loved that this was a song where Johnny sang along a little. We've put it up on the site for you to listen to (and because you're one of the cool kids who subscribed to the newsletter, you're hearing about it days before we tell everyone else). Just scroll down to the bottom of the song list in the player on our Music page.

We good? Cos there's some stuff I need to tell you...First, the bad news...

A Sad Farewell
by Amber
Those of you who've been hanging out with us on Facebook and Twitter already know the bad news. If you don't follow us there, here's the sad announcement:

We're really sad to report that Johnny has stepped down as our bassist. He was an important part of the magic for almost 3 years, and it's difficult to even fully describe or acknowledge his contributions to Varnish. We love him and will miss him as a bandmate. The good news is that it wasn't personal (we're all still friends...hurrah!); he simply felt it was time to give more energy to his incredible main project, Post Adolescence. (If you haven't already, you should definitely check them out.) We all wish Johnny and Post Adolescence loads of success and look forward to our continued friendship with him and the rest of his band. In terms of what's next for Varnish, clearly, we've got to find and break in a new bassist. We'll be sure to let you know when we know. We love you, Johnny! xxx

(We're currently working to hunt down someone else to cover bass duties. If you're local and think you're up for it, there's still some time for you to throw your hat in the ring. Send us an email with your details.)

No Idle Hands
by Amber
In spite of holidays and losses and all sorts of other roadblocks, we've not been sitting around doing nothing. (Seriously, I may be having some video game withdrawals with all the time I've given to music instead.) Here's a little bit of what's done and what's coming:

• Gave the web site a little bit of an updated design.
• We've got 6 new songs in various states of completion. Most of them close enough to done that we'll be playing them out soon.
• Cos there's been a lot of curiosity, I'm working to update my personal site. I'm going to blog there at the very least. So let me know what you'd like to see on there. (If you haven't already hunted down a link to the blog, I'll post it in the What's New list when the site is updated and the blog has a new entry.)
• Our Twitter is getting regular use. Yep. I realised some of you love the Twitter, so I'm hanging out there as well.

Want to know what's going on as it happens? "Like" our Facebook page to stay in the loop and maybe chat a little.