The Harmonix folks were so, so good to us and it didn’t stop after they left the event, or after they sent out the Rock Band sets to winners from the night. No, their niceness train just kept on ‘a rolling into a amazing recap of the event on their podcast. We introduced them to the glory of Minneapolis, Surly Coffee Brew, the Roller Girls, The 501 Club, and how hard we rock it up here!

Take a listen and glow with us – we done good, folks!

Click on the picture above to go to their page, or click here to go straight to the MP3.  Thanks again, Harmonix!

As all of you who came to the event and played on stage know, we were super lucky to have Harmonix donate three Rock Band sets as prizes. We let people play all night, so we recently pulled winners from the slips that players filled out and let the lucky folks know. Congrats to Mike, Erica, and Daniel! You each won a full Rock Band set on the platform of your choosing and a two-year subscription to Game Informer (color us jealous!).

And big thanks to Harmonix and Game Informer, who both donated amazing prizes and amazing time to our benefit. It was a huge success in no small part because of them!

PS – Proving the Minnesota lets us each be who we want to be, each of the winners chose a different platform. How cool is that? We’re the universal supporters!

Be Excellent to Each Other 2009 was last Friday. It was a huge success and we’re all so grateful that you guys came out, had fun, rocked hard, and dug into your pockets to donate to kids in ways that you were comfortable with and could afford. Honestly, it was so huge and so promising. Thanks so, so much!

We’ve been in touch with the winners that needed follow-up information, but we’re going to be pestering the winners of the three Rock Band sets donated by Harmonix ASAP, so keep an eye out on your email and phone and we’ll get your info so you can get your prize! If we’re having troubles with anyone, a post will go up here and when they’re all set, we’ll let the rest of you on-pins-and-needles know too.

Again, thanks so much from Lisa, Jason, Anne and Chris and, most of all, from the kids. We did something really amazing on Friday night! Based on popular request, it would be safe to assume that we’re thinking about doing another one – you all just made it too much fun!

The Event Info page has some of the press coverage listed on it and the Facebook page is getting pictures trickling in as people sync up their cameras. If you took pictures, let us know!

Again, be excellent to each other (and party on) and thanks so much!

Lisa, Jason, Anne, and Chris

So we have a friend. And that friend has a really cool job – he’s a voice actor for the Venture Bros (among a bunch of other rad projects). And he’s a really nice friend, because he’s coming to the benefit tonight! And, he’s bringing three copies of Venture Bros. Season 3 on Blu-Ray and, oh yeah, they’re signed by the whole cast! Don’t say we never asked for any cool prizes for ya

We have some more coverage lined up with local outlets, but we’ve been getting some love from the weekend planning committees around the web as well:

• Game Informer talks about their double-booked Friday. Hint: There’s enough time to do two things!
• Areala (formerly of Game Bunker) does a mighty fine post on the event and has a great point – we should figure out how to let offsite people donate. It’s on the list for next year, promise!
• Oh, and we’re headlining Secrets of the City today! Hot!

For everyone who’s telling a friend or noticing a flyer or practicing for their Rock Band stage debut, thanks so much! You guys are amazing!

Sorry for the jumble post, but we’ve got to get this party set up, so this is going to be a quickie.

Some amazing new items have come in:

• Two tickets to tomorrow’s Wild game (color us totally jealous for whomever gets to go!)
• Two haircuts at the Uptown Hair District (check out organizers Chris and Anne for samples of their work – they have amazing hair )
• A one-hour photo shoot with Digital Crush (valued at $300 and they’ll make you look purdy)

The support for this event has been amazing. Thanks so, so much!

The Weisman is awesome – an amazing space with art that’s always interesting and worth checking out. They have an event tonight (a great opening from a couple’s private collection), but there’s no rivalry between our gig and theirs – they’ve donated a free household membership for us to set up as a prize for you!

A crew is making a field trip of the two events, so head to the Weisman and then scurry over to the 501 to rock out! It’s a win/win! Thanks Weisman!

As if we didn’t already love the Minnesota RollerGirls to freaking pieces for helping us out on-site at tonight’s Be Excellent event, they listed it as their Featured Event, are going to play some Rock Band on stage, and are amazingly supportive and way fun. But wait, there’s more! They’re donating a huge pack of goodies – tickets to any bout this season, pint glasses, cozies, lip gloss, bracelets, the works!

Thanks again to the RollerGirls. You are all totally amazing!

Hey everyone! We’re so excited to see all of you tonight, it’s going to be a blast!

This is just a quick post to outline how the night is going to work:

• Start time: 7pm (and we’ll go until bar close at 2am)
• Location: The 501 Club (501 Washington Ave S, Minneapolis)
• Cover?: Heck no!
• How to donate? We’ll have RollerGirls and a very special Game Informer cosplay group set up to take straight donations – just put what you want to into the bucket and revel in the warm, fuzzy feelings of helping someone out. We’ll also have blank Munnys available for $25 and craft supplies are on-site, so you can decorate and drink a beer at the same time! If you buy a Munny, you’ll be entered to win an artists’ kit from Art Institutes International – Minnesota. It’s amazing! Then there are the amazing prizes we’ve been talking about for the last few weeks. Those are each getting grouped into logical and interesting ways and we’ll have a drawing for each group starting at 11. There are 24 lots and 115 items total, so there’s something rad for everyone! Also, The 501 Club is donating 10% of the bar tab for the night, so you can totally just come and have a beer for the kids!
• Costs? Booze and food is however much you want to spend. There is no cover. Munnys are $25 (and we only have a few of them, so you might want to come early). Drawing tickets are: $5 for one, $20 for 5, and $35 for 10.
• What if I have questions or lost my mommy during the night? You can totally bring your mom if you want! But if you get lost, look for someone wearing a Staff lanyard, they’re with Be Excellent and can answer all sorts of questions. (Sneaky hint: black lanyards are for volunteers and green ones are for the four of us that have been organizing. If you want to bitch at someone about the website’s grammar, find a green badge).
• But what’s free? There is no cover, so… um… well coming is free. Oh, you wanted to ask about Rock Band! Yeah, we have two fine folks from Harmonix coming into town to keep us rolling through rockers and playing all of the DLC from Rock Band 1 and 2 live and on stage! Harmonix also donated three sets to winners for the night – you can enter for that after you’ve played one song on stage. Oh, did we not mention it’s on the stage, and there will be lights and it’ll be loud and people might cheer for you? Well, that’s all true. Between power Rock sets, Jake Rudh is going to DJ the heck out of the crowd, so look forward to that too!

Again, for anyone who can make it out tonight, thank you so much! We’ve been working really hard on this and the effect we can have by each donating so little (and in such fun ways) is amazing. You guys rock!

The Quiet Drive crew just put out a new CD (on October 13th!) and they were rad enough to send us a few copies of that new disc as well as their earlier, acclaimed release. Look for them tonight!