Well, the year is ending, which means, if you're anything like me, that you're burning calendars in your backyard and prepping for one to two, possibly three, holidays in the coming days/weeks/months. It also means you've got a duck-pin bowling work holiday party thing this Friday in Fountain Square, and you left your coat at your parents' house last weekend, so unless you get it together and head down there between now and then, if and when things go all White Christmas between now and Friday, you're probably going to do a lot of walking around "The Square" all cold, looking for those stolid few who, like you, are warming themselves on the soft glow of a flaming calendar.

If indeed you are just like me and you find yourself in Fountain Square this Friday looking to warm up, drink some beer, see some live music, and support Musical Family Tree, then I've got just the ticket: The Amo Joy Holiday Show at Fountain Square Brewing Company. In addition to the delightful and mighty Amo Joy zipping through their holiday-themed repertoire, the show will feature the musical stylings of DMA, Oreo Jones, and the Jefferson Street Parade Band. And add to that that NUVO's Kat Coplen and myself will be emceeing--yes, friend, we are monsters on the mic--and playing straight Indiana jams between sets because this party goes on for miles. And the musical angle doesn't even begin to touch on the full array of stuff that will be going down at this event. For something that might charitably be described as "beginning to touch upon" the full scope of the event, please traverse with me the blank space between the end of this paragraph and the beginning of the next one, and we will grow and learn together.

Beyond being a fine music concert in its own right, the Amo Joy Holiday Show--put on in conjunction with the gracious sponsors General Public Collective, BrainTwins, and Fountain Square Brewing Company--is also something of a fundraiser for ours truly Musical Family Tree.

You see, FSBC has very kindly agreed to give a portion of all beer sales throughout the night to Musical Family Tree. What's more, proceeds from the sale of art hung on the walls of FSBC will also go to Musical Family Tree, as well as any money made from the raffle that will be going on throughout the evening (check the Facebook event page for constantly updating info on the types of fabulous prizes that will be available in the raffle as well as a full list of everyone who is planning to donate). And, with a low low cover charge of exactly zero dollars, there's truly nothing stopping you from coming to enjoy some music and help support Musical Family Tree's effort to keep doing what we're doing, with maybe even a little bit expansion tossed in for good measure.

"You know, now that you mention it, what exactly does MFT do?" Glad you asked. Quite simply, MFT is all about archiving, supporting, and spreading Indiana music. Sometimes that takes the form of putting on shows like this one, sometimes that takes the form of helping local artists put tours together, sometimes it takes the form of writing and thinking about interesting local stuff here on the blog (peep our blog in review post from earlier in the week for a primer), and sometimes it just takes the form of providing a space for local artists to share their work.

Take, for example, the super relevant recent upload of S.M. Wolf's full live set from Halloween (embedded above). Not only is S.M. Wolf a band that's pretty substantially related to Amo Joy (sharing several members), but these are the types of recordings you're just not going to find anywhere else online, and MFT's got a deep archive of all kinds of stuff just like it just waiting to be blasted out of whatever speaker's you've got sitting closest to you. Start digging here.

The event kicks off at 7pm and it's free. I'll accept no excuses.