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Consider the Source Sells Over 1,000 Bottles of Hot Sauce, Celebrates w/ TourInstrumental Prog-Rockers Consider the Source found themselves with the opportunity to collaborate on an unlikely merchandise item about 4 years ago. After a show in Minnesota, long-time fan DJ approached the band offering to make a custom hot sauce through his company, Lost Capital Foods. What seemed like a pipe dream to the 3 musicians at the time became very real months later with a taste testing and refining of the original recipe. CTS artwork aficionado Nate McClennen tied the whole thing together with his signature psychedelic cartoon artwork and "Consider the Sauce" was born.The delicious sweet and mildly spicy Green Chile Saison sold over 500 bottles on Tour and online, quickly becoming a favorite for many fans with some even buying a case at a time. To celebrate the 500 milestone the band listened to their fans who craved psycho levels of heat and added a special Xtra Hot Edition with a heat level of 9/10.Fast forward a few years and Consider the Source has steadily been selling their 2 varieties of hot sauce at their merch tables at shows across the country and online. At the time of this article they have sold approximately 1,250 total bottles of hot sauce and have no sign of turning back. Drummer Jeff Mann says, "To be completely honest, at this point we're selling more hot sauce than any of our music based products. We thought about packing up the music thing to focus on our sauce game but decided we can still do both. We're calling this Tour "The Heat Is On" after our song "The H Is O" to celebrate how successful our sauces withLost Capital havebeen. It's really more of a hot sauce tour than a music tour but we'll be up on stage with our instruments each night doing our thing. We hope you can come catch a show but we'll know why you're really there."More on CTS…Sci-fi fusion trio Consider the Source defy easy categorization. If intergalactic energy beings, upon their initiation into an order of whirling dervishes, built a pan-dimensional booty-shaking engine powered by psychedelic math…it would sound like a cut-rate CTS cover band. With their blend of progressive rock and improvisatory jazz, soaked in Indian and Middle Eastern styles, CTS blends disparate elements into an utterly original whole. A relentless touring schedule has earned them a fervent following around the world, with fans ranging from tie dye covered hippies to metalheads decked out in black. Freshoff the heels of a tour of seated performances whichhighlighted their acoustic instruments and first ever "hybrid" album, the band is getting back to the face-melting electric shows they have become known for. Their previous Maxx Power Tour featured material from throughout the band's history, bringing back songs from the very beginning, each album, and a couple of the electric tracks from their latest effort "Hybrid Vol.1: Such As A Mule". Additionally, the band is preparing for the release of their next album in 2023 which they have shared will include "some of the heaviest music we have written yet" and plan to begin weaving into their live shows on this tour. CTS have performed in a half-dozen countries across three continents. They have shared the stage with a wide variety of artists, including: Victor Wooten, King Crimson Projekt, Wyclef Jean, Ozric Tentacles, Soulive, The Disco Biscuits, Papadosio, Turkuaz, Pigeons Playing Ping Pong, Wayne Krantz, TAUK and many others. They have performed at festivals and events including: Electric Forest, Peach Fest, Gathering of the Vibes, Resonance, Summercamp, Shakori Hills, ProgDay, and Progtober.
District 97 is undoubtedly the most musically adventurous rock band in the world to feature an American Idol Top 10 Female Finalist. Formed in the Fall of 2006 by drummer/primary composer Jonathan Schang, keyboardist Rob Clearfield, bassist Patrick Mulcahy and guitarist Sam Krahn, the band drew upon influences from heavy metal to avant-garde jazz. The foursome from Chicago honed a no-holds barred style of eclectic and intricate Instrumental Rock before deciding the right vocalist was needed to complement their sound: enter 2007 American Idol Top 10 Female Finalist, Leslie Hunt. With a look, sound, and stage presence comparable to a young Ann Wilson from Heart, Leslie's dynamic performances pushed the band into a new direction that forged a unique marriage between accessible, catchy vocal melodies and an adventurous instrumental prowess. She was followed shortly thereafter by one of Chicago's finest guitarists, Jim Tashjian. With this new blend of charisma and stellar musicianship in place, their live shows over the past several years at festivals such as RoSfest, Prog Dreams II and V, and numerous appearances across the USA, UK and Europe cemented the band as a force to be reckoned with onstage as well as in the recording studio.Hybrid Child, the band’s 2010 debut on record label Laser’s Edge, immediately made a big impression worldwide. The album garnered praise such as “District 97 is a wildly ambitious progressive-rock group whose youth belies its accomplishments onstage and on its new Hybrid Child CD” (Jim Derogatis of NPR's "Sound Opinions" and Rolling Stone Magazine). The release of 2012's critically-acclaimed followup Trouble With Machines proved the band was the real deal. They had attracted the attention of legendary bassist and vocalist John Wetton (King Crimson/UK/Asia), who sang the role of Chicago serial killer H.H. Holmes on Schang’s “The Perfect Young Man.” With the collaboration heralded as a “tour de force” (dprp.net), the band and Wetton joined forces in 2013 for tours of both Europe and the US, later documented on 2014's live release, One More Red Night: Live in Chicago. 2013 also saw the band nominated for a Breakthrough Artist Award by Prog Magazine. Rather than rest on their laurels, District 97 took to the studio in 2014 to record the new material they'd been honing at home and on the road. The resulting album, In Vaults (released June 2015), continued and accelerated the upward trajectory of great songwriting and incredible musicianship that had become their hallmark.In August 2015, Rob Clearfield and Patrick Mulcahy left the group and were succeeded by Andrew Lawrence and TIm Seisser,
