BitTorrent is a dirty word in the music industry, as pirated copies of full albums and many other digitally downloadable files make their way on to peer-to-peer file-sharing networks every second. What BitTorrent can also do, along with other similar services, is enable the further spread of music education to the masses. Hypebot reports that Berklee Online released a series of online videos and eBooks for people to download and use for free (you can download the Berklee Online Musician’s Guide here). The online division of the Berklee School of Music, Berkleemusic, also providesfree music lessons via Coursera, an online education platform that partners with many notable institutions to provide courses in a variety of subjects including music.

Even brick-and-mortar universities are getting smarter about online education. They know that not everyone will be able to afford, and might not even be selected to attend, a school like Berklee School of Music or an equivalent style of college. Although the move to online education, and occasionally giving away some free material, won’t be bringing in immediate revenue, it’s a somewhat inexpensive marketing maneuver. An act of goodwill also helps spread the word. Maybe it leads to new students at Berklee School of Music or paid courses through Berklee Online, and maybe it doesn’t.

“Free” is the new marketing. You might think, “Well, free is the old marketing too.” And in a way, you’re probably right. But what savvy artists started doing by giving away their music for free to market other revenue-generating products like merchandise and concert tickets, high-priced educational institutions and universities will have to replicate in their own business model. Online is not only the quickest distribution channel for content and education, but it will also level the playing field over time. Higher education in music is the next hurdle.

Comedian Jon Lajoie racked up a quarter million hits in the last couple days for his YouTube video outlining his idea for a Kickstarter project. The YouTube parody king is known for such works of art as “Everyday Normal Guy” and “Show Me Your Genitals.” Lajoie wants to piggyback off the success of Kristen Bell’s "Veronica Mars Movie Project" and Zack Braff’s "Wish I Was Here" Kickstarter projects. Those two projects raised $5.7 million and $3.1 million, respectively. How much does Lajoie want to raise? $500 million! Why? To become super rich!

Kristin Bell and Zach Braff have caught a decent amount of flak for their Kickstarter projects. Critics say that well-known names don’t need to raise money from fans; they can easily find the funding for their creative projects in the industry since they have the contacts that many up-and-coming indie filmmakers don’t have. However, what Bell and Braff want is creative control over their works, what people often refer to as final cut in the movie biz. Kickstarter even wrote in their blog that Blockbuster projects like those of Bell and Braff actually increase the funding to indie filmmakers on the site, bringing people onto the platform who previously never backed a Kickstarter project and who later browse the site to back other projects.

Unlike the real Kickstarter projects that are housed on Kickstarter’s website, Lajoie isn’t directing viewers to a Kickstarter page. He is directing people to his website to pledge hypothetical money to him, of which he has raised over $10 billion so far – not too shabby! His original goal was only $500 million and he still has 88 days to raise more money from his Internet audience. It helps that you can put in an amount under “other” instead of a measly $50 or $10,000 pledge. Many will think this whole gimmick is stupid, but it’s as smart as Internet marketing gimmicks come.

When you pledge, the “send me email updates” and “send me text message updates” boxes are default checked, meaning that Jon Lajoie is happily collecting thousands of email addresses to add to his growing online presence separate from any ad revenue he splits with Google on his YouTube video plays. Tricky? Yes. Genius? Of course. Lajoie is big enough in the YouTube and comedy world to get people to spend the time to donate fictitious amounts of money, but it’s harnessing that wasted time into marketing value that takes the cake for innovative online business prowess.

The Wall Street Journal just tweeted: “Breaking: The Yahoo board has approved a deal to pay $1.1 billion in cash for the blogging site Tumblr.” The acquisition was rumored for days now, as Tumblr struggles to make money off their huge userbase and Yahoo attempts to become relevant again by scooping up the teen-heavy blogging network and its billions of pageviews full of cat gifs, Bieber fandom, and soft-core pornography. 

Tumblr does house many sophisticated blogs and has redeeming content, but Yahoo is making a big bet that they will be able to bolster their future prospects on Wall Street by catering to the younger demographics that spend their days sifting through their Tumblr dashboards.

The acquisition, though not final, will be met by a vocal backlash of teensters and other social media addicts who don’t want to lose their sense of community by being bought out by an aging, albeit massive entity. Tumblr users have already started a petition to stop Yahoo from buying Tumblr, so far with over 150,000 digital signatures and climbing, and I don’t think they care whether somewhat newly-minted CEO Marissa Mayer is trying to turn a new leaf in Yahoo history. 

Every community faces growing pains and backlash. The Instagram community threatened to boycott the app after the company finally released their Android app (yes iPhone users wanted Instagram all to themselves). They also threatened to boycott when Facebook bought Instagram for a billion dollars in cash and stock. You know what happened? Instagram kept growing. I assume the same thing will happen with Tumblr.

The true test will be when Facebook and Yahoo try to monetize Tumblr and Instagram, respectively, to their fullest extent. The “cool” factor might not be there anymore if there isn’t a balance between sponsored content and organic content. Facebook has been slowly ramping up their advertising on their own platform with a long-term reluctance to degrade the mobile experience (ads only appeared on mobile more recently when compared to their desktop experience). Yahoo is desperate to pick up talent to improve their mobile footprint and Tumblr is one bold move they’re betting over a billion in cash on. 

The New Music Economy is upon us. Independent artist duo Macklemore and Ryan Lewis made a guest appearance on “The Colbert Report” to discuss their decision to stay independent and not sign a 360 deal with a major label despite their megahit status with their song “Thrift Shop”.  Apparently, not only do you keep your creative freedom by staying independent, but you can also make more money too. 

Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, instead of signing an onerous contract with a  major, “rented” Warner Brothers to help them get radio airplay. As much as the digital age and YouTube make radio feel obsolete, it’s still a big force in mainstream America—outside of the subways of big cities and Spotify-filled speakers of young company offices, terrestrial radio dictates chart-toppers. 

Radio is just one slice of the pie though, so Macklemore and Ryan Lewis really didn’t need the all-inclusive deals the major labels thirst for up-and-coming artists to sign. The successful indie artists now have the leverage in negotiation and major labels aren’t as relevant as they once were. Expect the major label and big studio dominance to corrode even more as artists like Amanda Palmer crowdfund full album recordings and tours on Kickstarter or Zach Braff (“Scrubs”) and Kristin Bell (“Veronica Mars”) raise their own money from fans to create full-production movies. 

The answer for all the artists still trying to gain a footing in this crazy industry? You no longer have to ask permission to succeed. The cost of doing business is coming closer to zero, so no more asking big-wigs at major labels (or even small indie labels) to take a chance on you. The world now has to take a chance on you and the best way to do it is to release stuff early and release it often: for everyone to see. Now.

1) “Thrift Shop” by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

This isn’t about buying bling or spending money on Ferraris, this is about going cheap at a thrift shop. And it’s got swagger to boot.

2) “212” by Azealia Banks 

If the lyrics aren’t too fast for you to catch, you can tell Azealia Banks oozes attitude but with a smile the whole time.

3) “Gangnam Style” by Psy

With over 1.5 billion YouTube hits, you haven’t tuned in to the Internet or TV in the last year if you haven’t caught on to this track yet. Although it’s easy to be sick of this overplayed track, it doesn’t quite feel dated yet like the past generation’s “Macarena”.

4) “Harlem Shake” by Bauuer 

With a  few hundred million hits spanning all the “Harlem Shake” joke videos, this beat is hard to forget. If you listen to the whole track, you might think it’s a bit repetitive, but for some it might be hard to resist a few nods of the head and a shake of the entire body.

5) “Make It Bun Dem” by Skrillex & Damian Marley

Skrillex has the groove, Damian Marley has the rhymes. This track lights up EDM floors worldwide while merging a variety of styles.

6) “Bad Girls” by M.I.A.

A little desert flavor and a beat and lyrical hook to bring you back for more each time. M.I.A. keeps attitude high with “Bad Girls.”

Nothing helps define a time, a decade, or a moment like a perfectly crafted song choice for a TV show or movie soundtrack. The hit show and not-so-underground cult favorite “Mad Men” comes back to AMC for its two hour Season 6 premiere tonight (4/7/13), and I’m sure the music will suit the scenes just as much as the suits on the characters. No one knows how to strike up the atmosphere for a period in time like the writers and directors for the show—song choice included. 

Lionsgate, who produces “Mad Men”,  paid $250,000 to license the Beatles’ song “Tomorrow Never Knows” for an episode in Season 5—by then it was obvious that the show was a huge hit so they could afford such an extravagance, but it shows how important music is to define a necessary aesthetic. Movies have much bigger budgets than single episodes of a TV show, so it’s even more important to get the period music just right. “Son of a Preacher Man” and “Misirlou” made appropriate appearances in director Quentin Tarantino’s movie Pulp Fiction as did “Fortunate Son” and “All Along the Watchtower” in Forrest Gump. Forrest Gump happened to beat out Pulp Fiction for Best Picture in 1994 so I guess that year really knew its period theme music!

What will be the songs that define our current generation? It seems like the YouTube hits come in one day and go out the next, so it’s hard to imagine songs like Psy’s “Gangnam Style” or Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” playing in our movies 30 years from now. Perhaps they don’t evoke the necessary atmosphere, but something like Adele’s “Rollin’ in the Deep” in a drama or Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” in an action flick  could very easily make a future soundtrack that wants to wax nostalgia over the as-of-yet unnamed decades between 2000 and 2020. Oh and if the song is about New York, I’m sure Jay-Z and Alicia Keys’ “Empire State of Mind” will find a way to make an appearance if it’s not a Frank Sinatra with “New York New York” kind of movie.

Spain is now proposing a law that would make it illegal for companies to advertise on sites that infringe on copyright. If the government finds a site to be a major distributor of copyright infringing material, like an mp3 hosting site for instance, they could fine advertisers who pay to advertise on that site. 

The story, reported by Digital Music News, notes that Education and Cultural Minister Jose Ignacio Wert is heading a major initiative to put a stranglehold on piracy in Spain with a bill that puts the onus on advertisers to help stop the lucrative business of Internet piracy. Wert stated: 

“This is about a philosophy of going after large-scale distributors of infringing content.”

Advertisers don’t have to be too worried just yet, as the government wants to put a stop to distributors more so than advertisers. There’s no question that Spain and many other countries want to be proactive about piracy. One-off takedown notices just aren’t cutting it, so governments want to hit infringers where it hurts (i.e. by stopping those who help pay the bills for these sites). 

The FBI in the United States hasn’t been shy about seizing certain website domains, only to find later that the same website has been copied over to a new URL. Of course, awareness is a big part of web traffic, and not everyone will follow the trail to find the new version of an infringing site. Many people pirate music, movies, and TV shows simply out of convenience more than anything. Not all content is easy to acquire legally as fast as people want to consume it so they turn to piracy. 

Should we be punishing the companies who host these files? I’m sure there are many illegal files hosted on Dropbox, YouTube, SoundCloud, and many other popular platforms that host content. It’s inevitable. While I think it’s a bit harsh to put the onus on the advertiser to control where all their ads are being shown online or for websites to be responsible for every file that crosses their servers,  if a site that hosts thousands and thousands of infringing files is complicit in the activity or at the very least takes very few steps to prevent this kind of activity, the government should be able to step in. 

Unfortunately there is a large gray area here where the right answer might not be evident, and we have to trust that technology and government can play nicely together so no one overreaches their bounds both in terms of following the law and enforcing it.

 

Nothing can replace the live concert experience, but not everyone can be in Miami and shell out a few hundred bucks for a weekend of EDM and partying. Because of this, the YouTube live concert series has gained popularity over the last couple of years. But it’s not just about the music, it’s about the video and feeling like you’re part of something. Ultra Music Festival was smart enough to put a chatbox on the right-side of their concert stream on their website so you could talk about set times, what song a DJ is playing at any given moment, or just make fun of the crowd for not showing enough energy. You weren’t there sharing the experience with audience, but you were sharing the experience with others in a completely different way.

While some concert promoters might not like the idea of live streaming a show because they’re going to make money off ticket sales more than you getting a free look into the concert from home, it’s hard to believe that online streaming will cause ticket sales to go down. If people can see what they’re missing, they’ll make sure to get out to the next concert when an artist or festival is in their area.

From a mental standpoint, it would be interesting to find out whether live streaming a concert from home makes you feel like you’re part of the event or an outside peeking in on something you’re missing out on. Even though you might be missing out on the true physical experience of a concert, at least you don’t need to earplugs to save your hearing for 20 years down the road (unless you have a really powerful sound system at home of course and understanding neighbors).

by Jonathan Jaeger

South By Southwest, aka SXSW, hit Austin with a groundswell of enthusiasm this weekend, with thousands of musicians, techies, and people looking for a party. Everyone is swamped with places to go, bands to see, digital gadgets to use, and new tech startups to checkout. “Who is having the best launch party,” “Who is giving out the greatest swag?” and, “Where can I recharge my iPhone?” are probably thoughts on a lot of people’s minds this weekend.

Many artists and tech startups come to the promised land of digital overload to get a piece of the action. But is this the best place to go right now? Regardless of whether you break out at SXSW, you’re probably going to have a solid time and make some good contacts, but maybe it’s not the time to put your hopes and dreams into the hype. 

The geolocation app Foursquare that took SXSW by storm just a few years ago took advantage of the situation in the best way possible. They had a location-based app that allowed people to show (and show-off) where they were in real-time. It was perfect for SXSW because it created value while also making for the best possible launch—a ton of people all in the same location trying to find places to go. In music, Janelle Monae, The White Stripes, Foster the People, and The Strokes all got some extra PR from their performances at the fest.

These cases are all outliers. They found a good thing and took advantage of a situation before it was everybody trying to take advantage of a good situation. Perhaps there’s nothing to lose by going to SXSW, but the lesson might be to strike while things are just about to get real hot because then once the secret is out everyone will be on the bandwagon. Time to find the next hot place and cleverest tactic to get discovered.

Many social media critics (and skeptics) are warning people to not rely too heavily on social media or expect it to deliver your hopes and dreams on a silver platter with a nice pink bow. Jon Ostrow of CyperPR notes: “Social media is a conversation tool – that’s it,” and as Wes Davenport claims on Hypebot, social media won’t write your press releases, plot your tours, make your live performances better, or help manage your finances.

All these claims are true. Social media helps spread the word and isn’t the “answer” to saving the music industry from low record sales and pirating. However, there’s a flip-side to all of this. Think about all the businesses and companies that help artists from creative to financial matters that wouldn’t be possible in their current state without social media.

Kickstarter is a funding platform for creative projects. While it is a social network in its own right, it’s first and foremost a tool to help you raise money from an extended audience of people interested in your work. Artists like Amanda Palmer are known in the music industry for raising tons of money to help fund touring and album production, much of it done with the help of Kickstarter’s platform. She leveraged her existing social media presence on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks to bring fans to Kickstarter. If social media didn’t exist, it would be a lot harder for sites like Kickstarter to thrive because the users of the site are evangelists of the platform itself, bringing droves of people from other social networks onto the funding platform. It’s all a virtuous cycle, and the same is true for many other sites.

Other online services that can do things like manage your finances (think Mint orBetterment) or help you book gigs online (think Sonicbids or GigMaven) are all part of a growing number of services that leverage social media to grow. Without social media, many of these sites wouldn’t exist because people simply wouldn’t know about them. So, sure, as Wes Davenport argues you can’t have your career handed to you by merely having social media skills. However, social media is often the glue that helps the whole ecosystem grow. Of course at the end of the day all these tools that help us get things done also need to keep a sustainable career going, but that’s another discussion altogether.

It might be a little premature to call it a hit single, but lately everything Avicii has touched has turned into EDM gold or at least was met with some fanfare from the Swede’s rabid fanbase. Partnering with Ericcson, Avicii launched Avicii X You to be the “world’s largest collaboration,” a crowdsourcing project that Avicii is using to bring in DJs, fans, and songwriters from around the world to work together on a new song.

The move is brilliant. You can see crowdsourcing with popular remix contests on sites likeIndaba Music with famous artists and brands and crowdsourced funding projects on sites like Kickstarter. While crowdsourcing is a valuable tool to invoke the masses from the ground up, it’s also a brilliant marketing tool. It will be interesting to see if the collective minds of thousands of DJs will come up with a track that is better or more diverse in sound than something Avicii would come up with himself. Either way, it’s going to get tons of attention and will get people excited about participating in something that will probably be heard by millions. As he mentions in his YouTube promo video for the project, wouldn’t you like to hear your melody, your beat, or your little synth sound on an Avicii track even if it’s for only a second or two? 

To keep it organized, Avicii is breaking up the project into steps, with the first step as the melody. Nothing gets a song going like a good hook, as many know from Avicii’s summer anthem, ‘Levels’, which hit its stride in summer of 2011. Now Avicii has the fame to really make a huge crowdsourcing project work. However, you don’t have to be famous to try to get help from others. The Reddit community had their own take on crowdsourcing a generic hit single, which got a lot of community engagement. Clearly the tools are there, whether you’re famous or not, but Avicii is making a statement by opening up his creative process to everyone. Who knows, maybe this will catch on as a legitimate source of songwriting, or maybe it’ll just be a fun experiment in music marketing.

 I have wanted to write a blog on this subject for some time now and there's no better time than 1:23 am as i sit here 45 minutes from the canadian border, sleep deprived and contemplative. I enjoyed the recent release of "Black Radio" by Mr. Robert Glasper and his experiment brothers and thought that he contributed something worthy to both genres that can serve as inspiration and a blue print of one type for the future. Both art forms require dedication and technical skill. I think the allure of combining them is in the true spirit of jazz exploration and experimentation. Purist may not understand or believe this should be an undertaking for any serious artist, but anytime new ground is to be broken it is often broken by the few, and the lonely. Is there any other way?  If you are fully immersed in both art forms then inevitably a percentage of musicians will not be able to resist the allure of entering  the lab and attempting "mixing" and searching for this new sound. I think being honest and true to oneself about what is required to seriously explore both genres is obviously a requirement to do it well as well as a child like curiosity. I've searched many years for that" new" type of sound and one day just made the decision that if i gave up years in pursuit of a genre that may not even be accepted or appreciated so be it. I think the rigor of instrumental music studies combined with the soul bearing honesty of a true hip-hop lyric are endeavors that some  artist simply can not resist.Much thanks to Mr. Glasper and all those that come after him who have the courage to push this new envelope and continue to search for this new and exciting sound that we all crave and enjoy so much. God bless and guide the explorers of this new uncharted frontier in music as the spirit of Miles Davis meets the rawness of Run Dmc in the new age. One....                   J. Gray

Yet, after you posted one song after another; songs that you worked hard on - but nobody was listening. After that you decided to advertise a little, so you went on YouTube and put one of those DJ 'sob stories' in the comments section just to be flamed by other producers telling you to shut up. All that time you put into making your songs perfect, all that time you put into advertising - it was all wasted.

Now, let me tell you what you really need to come out on top in this industry. It took me 5 years to discover this, but after one of my friends (who is a world-famous DJ working with Steve Aoki) told me the secrets to success; I couldn't believe my ears. Had I really been doing all this for nothing? Of course, the answer was yes.

The first thing you'll need is good music. We'll call this your product - you're selling your product to consumers and you need to make sure it's what THEY want. You need to get feedback from your peers and the best way to master this is to 'imitate' your favourite artists in your genre and just implement your own style.

The second thing you'll need is advertising. People who have a larger friend circle are noticed a lot faster and are usually 'over-hyped'. Remember; your product is NOTHING when people don't know about it. The best way to advertise is not to spam messages to people but to associate it with something you enjoy. Send your music to small-time labels, listen to other artists' music and provide critical feedback (yes, I mean listen to their whole song - they're in the struggle too!) and favourite/follow other artists to give people a positive impression about you. You can also distribute free music to remind people about you when they play your song on their iPods.

The last thing you'll need, and I can't stress this enough; is the energy to create and advertise your music. Without the passion to distribute your music, your music means nothing. Put 100% of your effort into making your music unique and if it isn't perfect - then my advice would be not to distribute it at all. The more instruments, melodies and subtle noises you put into your song, the more commercial it sounds.

I have heard countless songs from various artists and only a few of those have been successful. Some of those artists had awesome music, but what held them back was their ability to advertise. My advice to those looking to be the next 'big thing' in the music world? Give it up. Do it for the music, not for the publicity or money.

This is Stock Loc wishing you the best of luck and a prosperous outcome.

“Gangnam Style” was the perfect storm of continuous and monstrous daily and weekly view counts on YouTube as Korean pop-sensation Psy climbed his way to a historic one billion plays, a record for any single YouTube video and all that in less than six months. Other than having an insanely infectious beat and a hook with ambiguous yet highly memorable lyrics, what catapulted Psy to one billion plays? 

You can point to the well-produced video, the catchy song, and a imitable dance akin to the last generation’s “Macarena”, but it’s a little more than that. Psy had no massive presence outside of South Korea before “Gangnam Style” hit its viral stride, but the track met the sensibilities of pop suitable for any culture. Some American pop doesn’t sit well all over the world, and much of the East Asian pop doesn’t make its way overseas to the States. “Gangnam Style” was met with curiosity and was just the right amount of familiar and mysterious. As YouTube commenters joked, what is Psy chanting during the chorus? He’s singing “oppan Gangnam style” repeatedly. As the annotated lyrics encyclopedia

RapGenius points out in a further elaboration of the lyrics:

“Psy is saying in third person he is boyfriend material, or an attractive guy. Gangnam is a wealthy district in Seoul, where the young people are known to be very prim, proper, and professional during the day, but get crazy at night. ‘Gangnam Style’ connotes not just wealth, but the aforementioned lifestyle.”

Psy mixes just the right amount of mainstream pop with silliness and over-the-top theatrics in the video, all the while leaving himself ripe for parody of his unique style. Part of YouTube viral engine of views is the ability for viewers to make reaction videos. Just like “Call Me Maybe” had the perfect lyrics and hook to be parodied ad nauseum, “Gangnam Style” adds the quirky dancing element to it where copy-cat videos can throw in choreography as well as altered song lyrics to suit their parody’s intentions.

Even for artists who don’t expect to hit a billion or even a million views, in their first go-around, there are a number of strategies to attempt the ultimate viral package: 

Mainstream: Catchy song that is dynamic but still adheres to a pop or rock format.
Video: Unique video concept with enough production and slick editing.
Hook: A chorus that can be sung by anyone even if they don’t know the native language.
Edge: Just enough edginess and innuendo while still maintaining a PG-13 rating and a sense of humor.
Parody: A format, in terms of song and video, that opens itself up for parody or strong reactions of some kind.

With so many artists vying for your ear, it’s tough to cut through the noise. Sometimes it helps to have a unique persona that is not separate from your music, but complements your artistic goals. In the metal world, bands like Slipknot, Gwar, and Mushroomhead use masks and over-the-top theatrics to enhance their live show. For Slipknot, wearing masks is a part of their message but it’s not a defining characteristic—from what I can tell, the music is the most important part to them and their fans. What they gain from the masks is immediate recall from the masses who automatically associate Slipknot with “masks”. When done right, this can be great for viral marketing purposes. Gwar, on the other hand, wears grotesque costumes and shoots random liquids into the crowd while in concert. Part of Gwar’s allure is the gimmick, though I’m sure many like their sludgy riffs and abrasive vocals too.

The question then becomes whether the persona or “image” you create for yourself will define you as an artist, will be a gimmick, or will be a logical extension of the music. When people think of Deadmau5 or Daft Punk they might think first of the onstage attire, but for the most part the two artists have risen to electronic music stardom with popular dance-ready tracks. The costumes merely put a visual stamp on the music. 

Then there’s the name to think about. Regardless of whether you’re going to don the strangest of attire or just put on a t-shirt and jeans for your live shows, a name goes a long way in establishing yourself as someone quirky, weird, funny, or just plain ordinary. When you hear the band name The Tony Tapdance Extravaganza, you can’t help but laugh a little. A play on words like Mord Fustang or Com Truise is a little more subtle, and equally hilarious, but doesn’t connote the same absurdity that a dance dedicated to former actor and “Who’s the Boss” TV star Tony Danza seems to contrive.

Be mindful early on about how someone interprets your name if you’re trying to make a statement or get attention. Ask some friends, some fans, and some random music enthusiasts what words come to mind when they hear your name. The worst thing you can do is attach a certain idea or image to yourself as an artist that is in direct conflict with your intentions. I can’t remember the last time I heard a jazz fusion artist with a band name like Hon Jamm or The Doogie Howser Merengue Party.

I recently wrote a news blurb on HypedSound about the 25 highest paid artists from May 2011 through May 2012. Dr. Dre topped the list with $110 million in gross revenue, before accounting for taxes, fees, overhead, and related expenses. That’s a lot of money for someone who hasn’t released in album in over a decade! 

Dr. Dre’s been meaning to release his album Detox for some time, but probably got sidetracked with selling a 51% stake in his massively popular company Beats By Dre for $300 million. You know, those headphones with the letter ‘B’ on it that you can’t help see all over the subways in New York City (and probably in your suburban high schools too, I just wouldn’t know about that those).

So what does this all mean? It means hip-hop moguls like Dr. Dre and Jay-Z are more business moguls than anything else. They leveraged their music fame to create branded businesses centered around their larger-than-life personas. This might not be something the average indie musician can do, but they certainly can take a couple lessons. 

When it comes down to it, don’t sell your music—at least not at first. The reason Facebook, Instagram, and many other social networks didn’t focus on making money at the beginning was because they knew they had to get the eyeballs before they could get advertisers interested. The same is true in music. If people don’t want to listen to your music for free, at first, do you really think they’ll pay for it? It’s hard enough getting attention with the word ‘free’ let alone getting someone to open up their wallet for someone they don’t know about. 

I’m not saying artists shouldn’t sell music, but their should be a strategy behind selling. If you give music away for free and increase your fanbase to the point you sell more merch or concert tickets, then perhaps you’ll make more money than if you sold your music straight out of the gate.

EDM and dubstep phenom Skrillex released an advergame, SKRILLEX QUEST, that is promoting his single for ‘Summit’ by having players experience the song rather than merely listen to it. While creating an advergame (advertisement + game) is probably out of the budget or skillset of an up-and-coming artist, that doesn’t mean they can’t a) come up with something interactive to boost record sales, or b) come up with something interactive to boost awareness about you as an artist that will turn into revenue later. 

What we’ve seen with advergames, Kickstarter campaigns, Google Hangouts, and other promotional tools is that it’s no longer just about the music. It’s about an experience. Invest inyour experience.

Now more than ever is when you need to make each post count. Facebook status updates and shares, tweets, and email marketing newsletters are all important to maintain your fans, followers, and userbase. However, it’s getting harder and harder to cut through the noise. As more artists embrace social media 24/7, more companies bring their marketing online, and more “stuff” tries to get in your inbox or in your feed, which makes it harder to distinguish between the good and the fluff.  

Facebook is trying to take a proactive stance for quality. Their EdgeRank algorithm sorts what comes into your News Feed every time you login to Facebook. If you login every few minutes, you’ll see the best stuff from the last few minutes. If you login once a month, you’ll only have some of the best stuff over the last few days or the last few weeks. If you, as an artist or a brand, want to make it into that News Feed to reach all the people who already liked your page, then you have to tone down the number of posts that people don’t care about or are unlikely to get any engagement (i.e. likes and comments). You need to focus on quality. Once people stop engaging with your content, you’re almost lost from the News Feed entirely. 

Many Facebook page owners and marketers were up in arms when Facebook introduced the pay-to-promote option. If you pay a certain amount, you can reach a certain number of your followers. So instead of the EdgeRank algorithm deciding which 10-30% of your followers would see your post, you can guarantee views to your post and reach a lot more people. The conclusion was that many people paid Facebook for their likes through Facebook advertising and now Facebook was asking for money to reach those followers (double taxation, if you will). Some felt duped. 

Facebook is grappling with two different pressures: the pressure to increase revenues to perform well on the stock market for their investors and employees and to maintain the user experience for their users. Even if you think what Facebook doing is in part to increase revenues, which it is, they are also combating the increasing amount of noise on the platform.

The story? Facebook gets huge. Marketers flock to the platform for cheap advertising or for “viral” and organic ways of reaching more people. Facebook has to deal with all the noise and turns down the noise of not only the bad actors but also legitimate actors who can’t fit all their content in the News Feed. As social media gets flooded, social networks will turn to algorithms to chop down the noise or add in expert curation to pick out what’s the best content. No matter what the method is that prevents posts from being seen, you have to make sure you focus on quality to get through the clutter and actually stay visible to your audience and your potential audience.

Most musicians approach their craft from an auditory level. How does this production sound? What melody is appropriate for this song? Or on an even more granular level, what kind of filter should I add to give this intro a contrasting sound from the rest of the track? Oftentimes, artists who think of music first are so enveloped in the songwriting and production process that there is no consideration for the visual aspect, at least at first.

As much as humans love a nice catchy melody, we are visual creatures. While we’re not going to be thinking about how something looks when we listen to music with our earbuds tucked neatly in our ears and our eyes on the road (or on the treadmill, or in our bedrooms), it can be a great exercise in creativity to think about the visual aspect of your work first. 

As the cliché saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. I’m not sure how many words a musical note is worth, but I can venture to say visuals are pretty important in expressing creativity as much as sound. If you think of what kind of visual and emotions you want your imagination to convey, as you would with the music you create, you can get a good sense of what atmosphere you’d like to evoke.

For fun, start writing a song by drawing a picture or recording a video. Maybe take a couple pictures. Find the visual first and then craft a song as if that visual was the summary of your song. This can be a powerful tool to cure writer’s block or it can just be an interesting project. On the plus side, if you like the music you create after creating your visual, you’ve already got your album artwork, music video, t-shirt design, or a concert stage prop ready to go along with your composition.

Duff McKagan tells you how to say no to drugs. At one point in time, drug use in the rock n’ roll scene was not only expected, it was a given. McKagan, of Guns N’ Roses fame, writes for Seattle Weekly: 

“Rock and roll definitely has the stereotype of being connected to drug use. I get it. The cliché has been earned. But in our modern era, it seems like drugs have finally lost the status of being a mystical and romantic part of the rock persona. Maybe we've seen too many people implode, with public meltdowns, and worst of all, death.”

This mentality goes back to the days of wild nights in L.A. and NYC. McKagan notes:

“Places like The Viper Room--and the old CBGBs, come to think of it--only have one set of bathrooms. Everyone shares. Your columnist went into the men's room at the Viper Room in L.A. Your columnist simply has to urinate. Your columnist is nervous for the show, as he patiently waits his turn for the urinal. Your columnist gets offered a bump of cocaine right there--dick in hand and everything!”

It’s funny to come across this article at around the same time I watched a documentary on the old days of New York city in a VH1 documentary called “NY77: The Coolest Year in Hell.” The infamous Summer of Sam was also a time when NYC hit rock bottom, going through bouts of crime, unemployment problems, a city-wide blackout, and the beginnings of the disco craze, hip-hop birth, and punk rock underbelly. 

It’s easy to look back on an era in a favorable light, despite its problems, romanticizing the excesses and the newness that is now nostalgia. Rockstars from records labels and punk bands like The Ramones and Blondie reminisce about the early days of CBGBs and how 42^nd street was crawling with drugs and hookers. As one put it, the days when it wasn’t safe in Times Square for women and children, those were actually the best days for the arts.

In the same way that modern day New York City might be bland for a punk band from the late 1970s, drugs are often seen as the alluring and commonplace part of the artist’s lifestyle. Clearly McKagan doesn’t think it’s necessary even though many of his fans offer him joints at shows as if its second nature, thinking that it’s a given that a rockstar would partake in drugs handed to him (or her). Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple, was open about his experimentation with LSD, so even in other fields than rock n’ roll a drug can be described as providing a spiritual or creative awakening. However, all the coke, heroin, or pot in the world won’t help you write the next “Sweet Child o’ Mine” or “Welcome to the Jungle.” 

As musicians scramble to find new ways to make money in the digital era, Jakprints released data on the profit margins for a variety of popular merchandise options for artists (see photos). Digital Music News broke down several merch selling strategies, including everything from partnering with distributors who organize drop-shipping, sales, and merchandise printing to organizing touring inventory and merch giveaways.

In an age where the top DJs don’t sell many records, the modern day musician needs to professionalize the rest of their trade (i.e. stuff other than recording music) and concentrate on diversifying with alternative revenue streams. When people think merch, most  think of t-shirts first because fans proudly sport the latest in their favorite artists’ fashion. Artists know people need to wear clothes, so fans might as well support artists at the same time as they pick their wardrobe.

T-shirts provide a good profit margin, as Jakprints’ data shows, but there’s no reason to ignore little knick-knacks that are fun for fans and easy to produce cheaply. This means everything from stickers to magnets to patches. These are all items that fans can easily stick on clothes, laptops, and their local indie club’s stall doors (disclaimer: I’m not condoning graffiti, but some clubs dig the grungy vibe provided by a sticker-covered bathroom). This all means getting free marketing as you would with a fan wearing a t-shirt, except that fans can’t wear the same shirt every day, assuming they have some sense of proper hygiene.

Not only should you look at other options other than clothes, but you should think about what fans can wear year-round. A t-shirt is good in the summer, but hoodies, hats, and maybe even a wool scarf is something your fans could be into. If you’re pinching pennies, ask your fans what they want via an online survey before making an investment in merchandise—use a site like SurveyMonkey if you have an email list of your fans all ready to go. Alternatively, run a presale for items on your website or an online store widget and only commit to charging your fans for an item once you’ve sold enough of a specific item and can commit to ordering the item from a manufacturer.

Merch is just one of a varied number of ways to make money as an artist, but even within that one category of sales, dig deeper and find new ways to take advantage of product offerings. 

Check out the profit margin of each product type below:

Songkick, a music concert discovery service, is going into the business of helping artists crowdfund their concert experiences. CEO Ian Hogarth wrote a blog post about how Songkick helped electronic artist Tycho organize a gig for 500 people in London.

Ian wrote about the process of spreading the word for Tycho’s crowdfunded concert: 

“We chatted to Tycho and his team and it seemed like they’d need to sell a few hundred tickets to make it feasible to come to London, so we created a simple website, Detour to allow Tycho fans to pledge. What happened next was pretty insane! We emailed the fans on Songkick who were tracking Tycho, and over 100 of them pledged money for a ticket. Gideon was pretty thrilled to see how many other people shared his passion for Tycho. But 100 or so wasn’t enough to get the show confirmed so the Songkickers took it into their own hands & started to contact friends and music fans who were either into Tycho or should be! Within a short while we hit our target and the gig was on! Wow.”

This isn’t the first foray into crowdfunding events, but Songkick might have the technology to take it up a notch. Kickstarter, the most well-known of crowdfunding sites, helps artists raise money for album releases and tours, helps film-makers shoot documentaries, helps product designers release their newest project, and enables many others to realize their dreams. However, crowdfunding a concert is only one very small chunk of the Kickstarter platform for creative projects. Songkick, which ties into Facebook and other social media sites to help get the word out about concerts in your area, is perhaps the ideal location for bands to raise money for  tours they don’t know they can afford.

As Hogarth notes, social media sites are filled with comments from fans asking artists to come to their city. Sometimes it’s very hard to know whether there is enough demand for an artist in a particular city if the artist only sees a few comments. Artists can use data and analytics sites like Next Big Sound to see what cities are most interested in them or can look at song and album sales to gauge some idea of where to travel next. For independent artists or bands on a budget, this might not be enough to commit to an expensive gig in a faraway city. 

If Songkick can not only provide the platform to help artists raise money to play in different cities, but also help spread the word about a concert, there might be a whole new market for concerts all over the world. Kickstarter already proved the power of ecommerce, patronage, and donations all wrapped into one platform. If Songkick has the formula to reach more people who like to attend concerts and helps fans put their money where their mouth is, we might start to see a much more efficient market for artists who don’t find themselves on the Ticketmasters of the world.

The most damage you can do to yourself is to treat all numbers alike. Social media is not a number. The race to some elusive goal (3K Twitter followers, 10K Facebook likes, or 500K YouTube views) is just a goal. But not all numbers are created equal.

On the one hand, a high social media count for one page can certainly give you a perception of importance. If my Facebook page has a million likes, people will come to it and view the page more seriously than a page with just a few likes. Big numbers do matter, but context is everything. Having a large presence online can act as a snowball effect, so as your numbers get bigger they continue to get bigger faster and faster. This is the viral effect, whether it be an increase in credibility that leads to more sharing by people or it’s a boost in a website’s algorithm that floats you to the top of the stack and gets you many more views. This can be a great form of free marketing. 

At the end of the day, the goal of obtaining a high number of social media followers should be more than just for ego-stroking. Ask yourself why these followers are important. How did you obtain them? Did you spend thousands of dollars on a marketing campaign that got you thousands of “fans” in a day or did you shake a thousand people’s hands at gigs across the country that led them to following you online and telling all their friends about your music? Or did you pay someone $5 to give you 1,000 Twitter followers that turn out to be mostly fake? Each kind of follower is different and increasing your following only matters insofar that the followers are there to stay and engage with you or your community.

Many music and business folks talk about 1000 fans. All you need is 1000 true fans to have a solid career doing what you love in the arts. Having 1000 true fans doesn’t mean having 1000 Facebook likes. The 1000 is for the truly devout fans that do more than press a button (be it to follow or to like). Even if someone is not that invested in you as an artist, you shouldn’t turn them away if they happen to follow you on a social media site. No one is saying that. However, think of where you are putting your energy to reach your goals. Are you being authentic in obtaining fans? Time spent on the business side of things is time spent away from the creative production of your art (be it music or otherwise).

If you’re just rigidly optimizing for a certain number instead of trying to create genuine relationships with your fans, growing revenue for your career, and making lasting connections, perhaps it’s time to consider that not all numbers are created equal.

Apple has become synonymous with simplicity of design and ease of use with their iPod and iPhone products. The way we experience music and related applications will never be the same after Steve Jobs helped make it possible to “fit your whole music library in your pocket.” While it’s hard to argue with the quality of Apple’s product, there is no question that the marketing and hype machine surrounding Apple’s product launches is nothing short of genius. The Apple fanboys and fangirls of the world will buy anything Apple, and even if competing companies build a worthy product, many won’t turn their heads.

Digital Music News wrote a piece on the new iPhone 5 and how it is an evolution of the iPhone 4S but is not revolutionizing the way people use smartphones—most of that work is already done. Other than making the device much faster and lighter, there aren’t that many new bells and whistles unless you consider a new headphone name (EarPods) to be exciting. While the kind of headphones that comes with the iPhone is not a big selling point, the audiophiles of the world will see their audio experience very differently based on different types of headphones. 

With smartphone choice, other than noticeable differences in speed, app selection, and other core parts of the iPhone experience, the Apple branding has a strong psychological influence on one’s perception of the product. Whether it’s the marketing or the fact you expect quality when you buy an Apple product, there is still a subliminal desire to think highly of an Apple product regardless of all the factors at play. Then there is the case of headphones, where one would think that quality trumps branding (since we trust our ears to tell us what sounds goods, how can branding have an effect on what we perceive to be good sound quality?).

Enter Beats, the company that makes the headphones that command 51% of the premium headphone market that’s worth about a $1 billion in the U.S. alone (according to Digital Music News). In the professional audio community, Beats sometimes gets a bad rep for being overpriced—that is to say the quality is not so great, and you’re paying double a normal sticker price just for the association with Dr. Dre and the Beats name. It seems that Beats is not just a headphone choice but also a fashion choice, with the trendy headphones easily spotted in New York City subways and on college campuses across America. This might be one of those times that branding gets ahead of product, unlike with Apple products that seemed to impress a smaller core group of Apple fanatics early on before hitting the masses. The NPD says:

“Thirty-eight percent of premium headphone owners say their device is part of their personal style and one-in-four say it is important that their headphones are fashionable.”

For audio geeks such a statement seems egregious and that sound quality should be the first thing people think about when deciding how to listen to music, but our devices are more than how fast or how well they get us from Point A to Point B. Products that we wear every day are also a reflection of our personalities and how we want to be perceived by other people. That’s where branding just beat out product, even if the product itself is in fact of sound quality.

As reported by New York Times and many other news sources, Apple will be launching a Pandora competitor within the next few months. While Pandora already has many streaming Internet radio competitors, with the likes of Slacker and iHeartRadio, and other music listening platform competitors like Spotify and rdio, Apple is the behemoth that could put Pandora in a shaky situation. 

Pandora’s stock dropped nearly 17% at the news, Hypebot mentions. This comes at a time when Pandora is still having trouble reaching profitability, as its spending is tied heavily to current regulation that requires a payment for radio streams to record labels and other sources that seems to prevent it from being in the black.

While Pandora expects to turn a profit sometime in the coming year or two, the allure of switching to an Apple product might be too great for some and could stifle Pandora’s growth. With the upcoming iPhone 5 release, and the design-focused company that is Apple, consumers will soon have a choice between what service they want to use and how tied it will be to the device in their pocket. 

Is this time for Pandora to panic? Perhaps not, considering so many consumers’ daily office experience is related to the customized radio stations Pandora offers them, catered directly to their tastes. Many companies know that the switching costs of leaving a service that knows so much about you to a competing service is high. What that new service has to offer must be 10 times better than the old service, otherwise most are too lazy to switch. Who cares if Bing is better or worse than Google—we’re used to Google and we’re going to keep going to that homepage or using that Google search toolbar until some cathartic experience with a new search engine causes us to switch.

However, if Apple provides a service that seamlessly ties into your devices, whether it be through the all-too-familiar iTunes, iPod, or iPhone, it’s going to turn a few eyebrows. Apple will easily bring the fanboys and fangirls on board, but will they have the music discovery ability to snatch away a growing Pandora userbase? We’ll have to grab some popcorn (and our nicest earbuds) and wait to see.

Yeah. I remember that.

Think about it: the whole point of turning on the radio is to hear something new; something exciting - not something you've heard before. The media installed the idea that 'new' music featuring somewhat old artists (like Lil Wayne, Lady GaGa, Ke$ha etc.) is the best music out there right now. Every time I turn on the radio I hear the DJ say 'the latest and greatest hits' but then I hear a combination of repetetive words to a repetetive 4/4 beat.

What is this? What has music come to?

What I miss most about music is the 'fresh' feeling I get when I discover a creative track. I seriously thought the music industry, like the television industry; died out. I was wrong. I stumbled upon HypedSound one day and I found new artists (literally, some artists just started days before I discovered them) whose songs were awesome. What used to go on in the radio industry is now going on the internet. This site does not promote those who are the most 'popular' but literally those who can create music.

I still miss the ability to turn on the radio in the car and just roll down my windows, and blast some music I haven't even heard of. I'm sure many people who live in here, in Toronto; share my ideas as well. I rarely catch anyone flip on the radio anymore. They either play CD's, or drive around with an iPod earphone popped into their ear. That is the sign the radio is dead, my friends and the only way to redeem the radio is to create competition. That competition is the internet.

The future of music lies in the internet, and one day internet radio will most likely be accessible in vehicles. Maybe then I can re-roll down my windows so nobody will catch me playing 'Lady GaGa'. Think about it: instead of turning a dial to reach a certain frequency, you type in the domain name of your favourite station. Genius right? Heh, I know.

What is it about musicians and politics that gets the mainstream so intrigued? If you oppose the artist’s political philosophy, then you’re probably saying to your friends, “Why do musicians have to talk about politics? No one cares about their opinion, they should just play music and shut up.” If you agree with the artist, you’ll probably tolerate the mixing of politics and music. Perhaps, you’ll be drawn to the music even more. Is it that we hate politics in our music or that we just hate politics that we don’t agree with?

Take Dave Mustaine for instance—he’s been taking a lot of flack for his recent accusation onObama for staging the recent massacres at Aurora and the Sikh temple. Mustaine is free to speak his mind, even if metalheads across the world don’t agree with him. Much of his music and lyrics is politically-charged, so does it make sense for Mustaine to share political opinions in the middle of a concert? If you don’t agree with a musician, is it possible to separate their opinions from their music? I’m sure there are many Mustaine and Megadeth fans who despite enjoying the music have a hard time embracing the artist behind the music—maybe they give up on the music altogether. While his lyrics might be political in nature on occasion, Dave Mustaine’s music is appreciated for the guitar riffs, hooks, and overall metal sound. When one thinks Megadeth, one doesn’t think politics. If there is no definitive connection between the medium and the message, it isn’t in your best interests to alienate fans with your politics.

On the other hand, there are artists like Tom Morello, who recently spoke out against Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan and his affinity for Rage Against the Machine’s music. Music and politics are at the heart of Rage Against the Machine’s music, so it’s hard to believe their fans resent the band for bringing in politics outside of their own song lyrics. Political activism and Rage Against the Machine’s music go hand-in-hand, from the distorted riffs of “Bulls on Parade” to the public statements of protest. When you listen to the music you know what you signed up for, and that’s vital to the social contract between the artist and the fans.

So if your politics isn’t core to the music and one of the most identifiable bonds between you as an artist and your fans, it probably is wise to drop any politics you have from the public consciousness. Making a difference is important, but if you forget why your fans made you successful in the first place, you could start a divide in your fanbase that can’t be fixed. Next time you want to mix music with politics, think about why your fans listen to your music and whether mixing in your own political viewpoints will add value to the discourse or just ruin the excitement of the music.  

Not one to stray from the provocative, Marilyn Manson showed up at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) with profanity written across his face in the hopes he’d prevent paparazzi from selling his photograph to the highest bidder. A witness of the encounter, who goes by the name j_patrick_12, wrote:

"I just went through the LAX security line with Marilyn Manson. He had 'F---' scrawled in large letters across the bottom half of his face, with what appeared to be a grease pencil. As we each removed our boots in the security line, he kindly explained that it was not directed at me or anyone else in the airport, but rather at the paparazzi, so that they couldn't sell any photos of him that they took. He was really apologetic about it, and covered his mouth around young children while apologizing to their parents for exposing their child to profanity."

While many celebrities try to seem anti-establishment by doing something controversial, Marilyn Manson puts thought behind what he does—perhaps a lesson many should take in celebrity. Some celebrities will take the spotlight when they can get it, some will shun their celebrity despite fighting so hard to get it, and others, like Marilyn Manson, just do whatever they want. Manson doesn’t go for shock for the sake of shock. His name came up in the media after the recent The Dark Knight Rises shooting—parallels to Columbine were all too apparent. Manson’s open letter to the public after being blamed for Columbine by the media shows the artist’s true colors: 

“When it comes down to who’s to blame for the high school murders in Littleton, Colorado, throw a rock and you’ll hit someone who’s guilty. We’re the people who sit back and tolerate children owning guns, and we’re the ones who tune in and watch the up-to-the-minute details of what they do with them. I think it’s terrible when anyone dies, especially if it’s someone you know and love. But what is more offensive is that when these tragedies happen, most people don’t really care any more than they would the season finale of Friends or The Real World. I was dumbfounded as I watched the media snake right in, not missing a teardrop, interviewing the parents of dead children, televising the funerals. Then came the witch hunt. Man’s greatest fear is chaos. It is unthinkable that these kids did not have a simple black-and-white reason for their actions. And so a scapegoat was needed.”

There are celebrities, musicians, and artists of all sorts who look for controversy. They live off of it. Marilyn Manson, on the other hand, is equal parts business savvy, thoughtful artist, and outspoken in appearance and words. Perhaps that combination makes for fame, intrigue, and relevance. Or perhaps the man behind the makeup, Brian Warner, is smart enough to appear all those things when and if he wants.

I first noticed Pop artists using House beats in 2009. Back then I was happy to hear the genre growing into something more...until I started hearing music by Flo Rida, Rihanna and all the other mainstream pop artists who get their songs played on the radio 15 times a day for 3 months. As a music producer, I always look up to other producers who have 'made it' and try to implement techniques used by them and make my songs my own.

Bottom line is: modern Pop music is poorly produced. I constantly hear the same two notes being played on a 130 BPM beat with absolutely nothing new added. I thought it'd get better. I hoped for it to get better. But then that Rihanna song came out...what was it? "We fell in love in a hopeless place," where she repeats the same lyrics throughout the whole song with 4 notes being played. That made me just stop listening to the radio.

Where has all the good musicians gone off to? I'm sure there are AMAZING producers out there, I've heard them; but they aren't getting plays on the radio because they're too 'old'. None of the modern musicians on the radio are above the age of 30 (with the exception of a few). I think if the radios continue playing the same songs every day for months, the public will grow tired of listening to house-type beats and will look for something else that'll sound different.

Bottom line is - if you're an electronic dance music producer; do a good job and put 100% into each song. Take months to finish a single song, make sure it's perfect because people like me will whine and complain like little children until it gets better.

My rant is complete.

A study coming from Spain uncovered the not-so-surprising truth that pop music all sounds the same nowadays. Reuters wrote that a team of artificial intelligence specialists led by Joan Serra at the Spanish National Research Council took music from 1955-2010 and ran it through complex algorithms to determine various musical attributes. The team discovered that music has not only become louder but also more repetitive in chordal structure and melody. Serra told Reuters:

"We found evidence of a progressive homogenization of the musical discourse. In particular, we obtained numerical indicators that the diversity of transitions between note combinations - roughly speaking chords plus melodies - has consistently diminished in the last 50 years."

There seems to be two forces working in tandem making music sound all too familiar: the notes themselves and modern day recording practices. The four-chord song, parodied so aptly in this YouTube viral hit, is simple enough to write and makes for a Billboard chart-topper. There is no need to experiment outside of this convenient box if you’re looking for pop stardom. That doesn’t mean your song doesn’t have to be catchy, it just has to fit in the right box. Notes alone aren’t responsible for the sameness that is modern pop music—the way sound is treated also plays a key role. 

Sound engineers dubbed the blandness of the sonic structure as the ‘loudness wars.’ Every record is competing to be the loudest record possible, whether it be rock, pop, or metal. On the radio or on your mp3 player, the band wants their sound to pop out at you. By compressing and limiting tracks, producers and engineers are able to minimize the dynamic range of a song and push the overall volume of the entire track up. While this has its benefits – when playing music in the car or on the subway, you don’t have to do much fiddling with the volume knob – it also makes many recordings feel the same sonically, whether or not the music is unique from a melodic standpoint.

The database of music for the study stems from the Million Song Dataset, so the results seem to be statistically significant. But can the next million pop songs change this pattern? Perhaps due to the proliferation of iPods and iPhones, it will be hard to ever reverse the trend of pop music blandness. With music on-the-go, the convenience of homogenization in the sonic spectrum is almost necessary. However, it will take away from the music’s ability to breath and deviate from the norm. The expressivity of a note played at any point of the dynamic range is important for artistic integrity, although this has increasingly become an afterthought in pop music. When it comes to creativity, on the other hand, that must be the initiative of the pop star and his/her respective mainstream fanbase to change the trend of music, and that might be an even bigger impossibility. 

Some can use Skrillex to both defend and accuse those who merely put on their hit records and push play (or at least mostly push play with some added pizazz). Skrillex is a producer. He produces original music that is loved by millions and his longtime roots are not in mixing live music, spinning vinyl, or taking advantage of complex MIDI systems to perform. On the other hand, purists for live DJ music can use that as a criticism for the exploding EDM scene.

One of my favorite DJs from Europe, Alex Kenji, recently wrote on his Facebook Timeline:

“wow sometimes i miss minimal, techno and tech house. i like EDM but too many idiots in this scene... jesus christ”

The post gathered many more likes than his average posts and created some back and forth in the commenting. Clearly people have opinions on the matter. And it’s partly true—I’ve very much enjoyed live concerts where you know the DJ is putting in a ton of effort to get an original once-in-a-lifetime sound across, a sound you don’t get by playing the original tracks off of YouTube. Compare this to the party atmosphere where people are in it for a different experience rather than reveling in the DJ’s spinning prowess. 

The question I sometimes ask myself is whether either experience is inherently better. Perhaps if you’re not performing I feel like I shouldn’t pay exorbitant ticket prices, but at the same time, I’m going to a show to have a good time. Have I had less fun at a DJ show where I knew in the back of my head the DJ wasn’t actually doing that much? Not really. It plays a role in the consciousness, but it’s not a dealbreaker.

This might be a crude analogy, but take the business world as an example. You use services like Google and Facebook for free, but what you give up in return is your information. These companies must make money by selling your information to advertisers, plain and simple. Do you still want to use the services for free rather than paying? Most people would say yes despite having a slightly grossed out feeling in the back of their throats about the whole situation. I think the same is true for many electronic music concerts. You know what’s really going on in some cases, but you just don’t want to think about it. You just want a good time. Ignorance is bliss.

To cap a fireworks-filled July 4^th here in the U.S., what could be more appropriate than a little nostalgia for your Independence Day celebrating. Check out music videos that display fireworks! 

Muse – “Starlight”

Animal Collective – “Fireworks”

Katy Perry – “Firework”

Drake – “Fireworks”

Kelis – “4^th of July (Fireworks)”

Audioslave – “Cochise” 

Diddy – “Dirty Money”

“Amazing Fireworks Music Video” 

Despite being arrested for criminal copyright infringement, Kim Dotcom has been resilient in his efforts to bring his new service MegaBox to the masses after the shutdown of Megaupload and Megavideo in January 2012. Kim Dotcom tweeted to his followers:

“The major Record Labels thought Megabox is dead. Artists rejoice. It is coming and it will unchain you.” 

What is MegaBox and what is its answer to the current woes of the music industry? Dotcom described the almost too-good-to-be-true business model:

"We have a solution called the MegaKey that will allow artists to earn income from users who download music for free. Yes that's right, we will pay artists even for free downloads. The MegaKey business model has been tested with over a million users and it works."   

Dotcom expects to not only pay artists 90 percent of all download earnings, but also to compensate artists for free downloads. It’s too early to tell how much artists will actually make and which major label artists will support the new service. Despite having artists

like Kanye West, will.i.am, Jamie Foxx, Sean “Diddy” Combs, Alicia Keys, and Chris Brown defending Kim’s business in their “Megaupload Song,” without major label backing the future MegaBox service might not get the traction it seeks. It does however have beta users like 7digital, Gracenote, Rovi, and Amazon MP3. So even if it doesn’t have Universal Music Group (UMG) on board, it has some goodwill from other important names.

According to Digital Music News, there are already rumors that artists are making money off of MegaBox: 

“…we’ve heard that some major rappers were already making money off of MegaKey, and rumors also point to development efforts by incoming CEO Swizz Beatz. Which sort of corresponds to what Busta Rhymes was angirly tweeting a few days ago. ‘1^st of all I am sooooo proud of my brother @THEREALSWIZZZ 4 being apart of creating something (MEGAUPLOAD) that could create the most powerful way 4 artists 2 get 90% off of every dollar despite the music being downloaded 4 free…’”

Regardless of its future success, and whether it will even see the light of day amidst ongoing litigation, Dotcom is showing the feds and the music industry that he doesn’t take a fight sitting down. He clearly has a chip on his shoulder, wants to challenge the status quo, and is willing to do so by jeopardizing his freedom—whether it’s on a quest for revenge or the Almighty Dollar.

1) Songkick: The site and app provides a dead simple way to track your favorite artists and sends you notifications when one of your tracked artists books a gig in town. The site also lets you browse through your location to find out who’s playing in your city on a particular day. Other than the tracking feature, which works great, the site also recommends you similar artists to start tracking. When visiting their browser site for the first time, it’s much easier to find artists you already know about than to discover new artists that happen to be in your town. If you download their iPhone or Spotify app or integrate with Facebook, Songkick will scan your music to find artists you listen to who have concerts scheduled nearby. 

2) Bandsintown: This app works similarly to Songkick, where you can track artists that you like for upcoming shows. Bandsintown has a very deep integration with Facebook, with many artists keeping a tab on their Facebook Timeline specifically for tour dates through Bandsintown. One great feature included on the website is a “Concert Cloud”—just like a tag cloud, the Concert Cloud tab includes a list of artists with ones that you track in bigger and bolder typeface. Even better, there are three sliders that let you select the date range, distance from you location, and maximum ticket price to narrow down the search results. If you happen to be in a city like New York, where a lot is going on, the list can be a bit hard on the eyes. The customization on the left, however, makes it easier to tweak your searches without navigating to a new page. 

3) Live Nation: The LiveNation Concert Calendar app pulls in your data from Facebook to recommend you shows in your area via Ticketmaster’s concert and comedy show listings. Although it’s not as snazzy as apps like Songkick and Bandsintown in terms of its functionality, TechCrunch’s review says the graphical interface is worth checking out.

4) ConcertCrowd: This app works mostly on your Facebook ‘likes’ to give you concert updates in your area, but you can also follow what your friends are interested in to get more recommendations. ConcertCrowd works off of new music you discover through the app, your current ‘likes’, and your social graph.

5) SeatGeek’s Columbus: Not to be confused with Columbus, Ohio, SeatGeek expanded their product offering to give you personalized live event recommendations. Submit a few of your favorite artists and performers and they’ll do the rest. SeatGeek provides interactive maps of venues to give you the best deals and information on ticket purchases—now they do live event recommendations as well.

1) Come Up With a Clever T-Shirt: Sure, not everyone can be as Internet famous as Amanda Palmer (or real-life famous either), so you might not be able to make $19,000 in 10 hours using Twitter and sell more than half of that from merch alone. However, people like buying band t-shirts. At your next gig, make your t-shirt more than just your name—make it clever, funny, or even shocking. Whatever it is, make it memorable.

2) Sell Track Stems: If you’re a DJ and you have a following, or even if you’re a rock band with fans looking to morph your music into a new sound, try selling the stems of your music on sites like Beatport. This way people can get a hold of separated tracks of your songs and can much more easily remix your music.

3) Fan-made YouTube Video Contests: Have your fans upload their own music videos for your song. Since you, the artist, owns the rights to the music you can make money on advertising showed before each video (see more info about licensing here).

4) Raise Money Online: Use crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter, IndieGogo, or PledgeMusicto help bring family, friends, and your online following into the mix (pun intended).

5) Create an Interactive App: Know someone who codes? Make an app or use OneSheet Mobile to have an on-the-go app to promote at your shows. Collect fans and try to up-sell fans whenever you can.

6) Teach: Know how to sing, play guitar, or even DJ? Don’t think it’s below you to teach some cool kids how to do what you do. Keep yours creativity going and funds your next tour or album! With apps like BANDHAPPY, you can even teach from the road.

7) Sell the Rights: Have some music that would fit well in a commercial but not on your next album? What about something perfect for an indie soundtrack? Lend your music or take part in recording sessions for some extra dough between gigs.

8) Give Yourself Away: Time isn’t scalable. You only have so much time in a day, but if you want music to be your job, then on occasion you should look for music-related gigs outside you main duties as an artist. Keep money flowing in along with your creative juices. 

Amanda Palmer, part member of musical duo Dresden Dolls and part solo artist and social media extraordinaire, raised a whopping $1,192,793 on Kickstarter from 24,883 backers who supported her project with contributions of $1 all the way up to $10,000 (with rewards appropriate for the amount given). Palmer set her funding goal at a more modest $100,000, but a tidal wave of support from her cult fanbase and the very word-of-mouth online community helped her smash all notions of what a music project could raise from crowdsourced fundraising and what a record deal means in the modern music industry. To top it all off, the money is going to fund the project, so the lion’s share won’t even end up in anyone’s pockets, just invested into getting rewards to backers. 

After parting ways with her former record label Roadrunner Records, and calling herself a “major label refugee,” Palmer decided to take the conventional idea of a record deal into her own hands. Palmer proved that if you have the right idea and enough of an online presence, you can essentially ask your fans to be your record deal (not your label). I often talk about how up-and-coming musicians should forget about record deals before they even lay as much as a digital footprint. It’s a chicken-and-egg problem. You want the record deal to help you get promotion and build a big following, but you can’t get the record deal unless you have a big following. And if you do get a record deal, well.. you can just read this long piece about how you won’t make any money anyway.

If you have the DIY mentality, you don’t need to raise $1 million on Kickstarter, but it’s very possible to raise $5,000 to get things started. Many companies have been bootstrapped off of the gracious lending of family and friends—now you have online platforms like Kickstarter, IndieGogo, and PledgeMusic to give you that same nudge with the added benefit of an online community to get you over the top.

What made Palmer’s Kickstarter campaign work? Other than her prior fame, Palmer set up the campaign for success. This wasn’t JUST a record release or JUST a tour—she was selling an experience. Everything from music to signed memorabilia to concerts to custom painted turntables to house parties to paintings of you on a canvas. This is intimacy, art, and entertainment at its best. This isn’t an impersonal stadium tour, you’re meant to feel part of something. This is a lesson for all musicians out there: people want to be included. Up-and-coming artists without a fanbase might not have as much to offer, but that doesn’t mean you can’t bend over backwards for the fans you do have. 

As Amanda Palmer so aptly put it, “This is the future of music.”

Digital Music News wrote an interesting piece on giving away music in the days of declining music sales and illegal pirating. Often times, the mantra these days is to give your music away for free. Since there are more and more artists using readily available equipment to get music into the world and online, it’s harder to cut through the noise as an artist. So the next logical conclusion would be to give your music away for free to get it into the most hands of as many people as possible and to “spread the word” quickly. Apparently that’s not always the wisest decision when it comes to the lessons of supply and demand that Economics 101 taught us so long ago.

One DIY artist commented on Digital Music News: 

“But it's funny that even when I used to give away [my music] for free, there wasn't much traffic nor many downloads, almost nothing. Then we decided that we should put it up for sale so that we might be able to recoup some of the money spent on making the music videos (when it's your brother making the videos, I still consider it DIY). Anyway, as soon as people saw that the music was up for sale, the website and other related social media gizmos received much more attention. Also, people began looking for ways to download it for free, which isn't always a bad sign."

So the people who are willing to pay for music perceive the music from this artist as having greater value because they are charging for it. If a brand name is willing to charge more than the no-name brand, then certainly an artist who charges for something rather than giving something away is brand name caliber too.

The people who don’t pay for music are still interested because of the perceived value of the music and will seek the music out through illegal channels—but there is still a demand there that might not have existed if the music was free from the start. If your goal is to get into the hands of as many people as possible, perhaps having that price tag makes your music seem worth it, regardless of whether someone actually pays for it in the end.

In a world of branding and image, sometimes it’s important to start off with a level of perceived quality. Of course this strategy might work out differently for different artists. If you can’t actually deliver on that quality, perhaps putting a price tag on your music won’t actually tip the scales in your favor (rather you’ll be digging yourself just as fast into obscurity). But if you know your production value is there and your songs are what people are looking for, the right strategy could be to charge. If you notice charging for music in the conventional sense is slowing you down, see if you can give away your music for free but charge for extra perks like bonus packages, behind-the-scenes footage, meet and greets, signed memorabilia, merchandise, or other unique items that go beyond just a digital download. If the money’s not in the music, it might be in the experience you’re selling. 

The popular technology and startup blog TechCrunch posted an article today that claimed “Plays Can Increase iTunes Sales. Here’s Proof!” The beginning of the article reads as follows: 

“Despite fears that streaming access cannibalizes sales, classical music record label X5 tells me when it launched an app within Spotify and saw streams of one album increase 412% in a month, that album’s iTunes sales shot up 50%. The Swedish label’s “The 50 Greatest Pieces of Classical Music” soon reached #1 on the iTunes Classical charts, and broke into the iTunes Top 200 album charts for the first time, hitting #152.”

This example is clearly just one of many potential case studies, both pro- and anti-Spotify. Paul McCartney and The Black Keys both publically pulled their music from Spotify and other streaming services due to lackluster results from their point of view. In the comments of the article, many TechCrunch readers were quick to note that classical music is a very different kind of genre than the rest on Spotify and caters to a different kind of listener. So while Spotify might be great as a discovery tool of classical and other forms of music, people who already know a genre or artist in-and-out might be more reluctant to buy albums off of iTunes if they know they can stream it off of Spotify for a fraction of the price (or for free).

Another tech blog AllThingsD, had a realistic (although a bit more sobering) outlook on the Spotify effect compared to TechCrunch: 

“Some people who weren’t buying any music at all start shelling out a monthly fee for subscription services, turning pirates into profit centers. That still won’t be enough to replace the dollars the industry has lost since its pre-Napster party days. But it is much, much better than nothing.”

Clearly the pre-Napster days are a dream far gone, but artists want to know whether Spotify helps or hurts their bottom line (compared to the current status quo). Spotify CEO Daniel Ek obviously has been open about defending Spotify and their business model, which he says does not cannibalize music sales. Regardless of the cause of album sale decline, Ek told Evolver.fm in February:

“You're talking 10 million active users, 2.5 million subscribers - most of them paying $120 a year, which is double the amount of your average iTunes user. Do you really want to hold back your album from people who are finally paying for music again?” 

To be fair, most aren’t paying for Spotify’s premium service, but their absolute user number is increasing by millions as the months go on and their integration with Facebook’s Open Graph deepens. The question now becomes which audience is more affected by Spotify: an audience willing to go out and buy albums but is currently not doing so because of streaming services or an audience that is now paying a monthly subscription cost when they would otherwise being paying nothing or close to nothing for music. What do you think’s more likely?

Digital Music News wrote a story about further signs of record label erosion:

“Thursday was an extremely crappy day for the crew at Roadrunner Records. That's because parent Warner Music Group chose Thursday to slash substantial parts of the sub-label, with complete shutdowns happening in several offices outside of the US.”

The hard rock and metal label under Warner Music Group is feeling the pain, with Billboard saying 36 were let go. While not every label is downsizing to such a dramatic extent, it’s definitely a time when record labels need to be lean and prioritize their biggest leads for cash returns. This means not only adapting to the changing economics of the music industry, but also not taking risks on artists who they don’t think can make them money under this new model.

Other than digital piracy, social media has changed the game for up-and-coming artists trying to get that once coveted record label deal. For many, a record label deal won’t make sense – even big name artists can get screwed when it comes down to the nitty gritty of a record label contract – but for those who are deadset on getting signed, social media has created the landscape to prove yourself as an artist.

A huge marketing push by a label is no longer the end-all-be-all of album release and touring promotion. Record labels now want to see social media traction as an indicator of independent success. Social media, although not foolproof, is easier to track than old school marketing campaigns. At the same time, labels want to see significant social media traction BEFORE they sign you. The way labels see it, if you don’t already have a big social media following, somebody’s going to have to build one from scratch. Quite possibly, there might not be enough fans who like you. Unless you’re already on terrestrial radio, which is more so the case for major label artists, you’ll want to start online.

Record labels are like investors. The more indicators of success they can see, the more likely they are to fund you. If you have great music, that’s like a company having a good idea for a product. Until an idea, or in this case music, is turned into a business, then it’s still just an idea.

So as labels continue to cut staff and costs, don’t think which labels will still sign you. It’s not time to shop for a record contract, it’s time to shop for fans. 

 

As Mashable pointed out, the user Indubitable_Smoo came up with the idea for Reddit to crowdsource a  hit song after “listening to an urban music station, which plays generic music that all sounds the same.” The effort now has its own subreddit called REDDITTOTP. Musicians who frequent Reddit started posting submissions, beginning with the background instrumental track that would provide the ground floor for the generic poppy sound they are striving for.

So far, the voting has narrowed down the instrumental track to one by Random Insight, who posted his generic pop idea on SoundCloud. The reactions in the comments? Everything from “I can literally hear a Pitbull verse here. This is brilliant.” to “It seems as generic as can be.” But that’s the point! With such a strong community, it wouldn’t be surprising that almost anything the Reddit puts out as a single could somehow make its way onto the charts. In this kind of record industry environment, it really doesn’t take much to chart anyway. Although Reddit’s strategy of piecing together tracks might not yield the most cohesive or polished of pop hits, it has the potential to be infectious nonetheless.

On the UPDATED PLAN OF ATTACK: page you can see a continuation of the original mission, with links to all the areas that need help for finishing the song. Other than having a decent amount of time on their hands, the Reddit community shows that they can actively get things done once again. Many people are idea-makers or stand behind an issue, but it takes an active person or group to actually pursue something rather than passively letting it slip by the wayside (a problem often seen among political dissenters and people trying to start projects from scratch). Although the song is not completed yet, Reddit shows the power of crowdsourcing behind something as simple as an idea.

Funny or Die wrote a hilarious, and quite accurate, article entitled 7 Types of People at Coachella. From Hopeless Drug Addicts to Bro’s to Industry Assholes, you’ll find a variety of folks at an increasingly mainstream music festival like Coachella. You’ll see similar types at other festivals. At Electric Zoo Festival you’ll see more of the Kids on Ecstasy but you’ll get fewer of the Dirty Hippies and People With Babies. Every festival has it’s own signature groups, and as festivals invite a greater variety of artists, you’ll get more distinguishable sects of festival-goers that tend to pop up out of the woodwork and make themselves known. At some point, you reach a tipping point where a music culture no longer belongs to one type of music fan (and most certainly doesn’t comprise solely of Music Lovers, the last remaining of the “7 Types”). 

So what is the shelf-life of cool? When do the early adopters give up on a scene that’s no longer their own? I already see cries on the Internet about how EDM (Electronic Dance Music) is not the same. Bro’s in their yellow wifebeaters and scantily-clad young women in tutus are the norm now. Perhaps drug culture is now the mainstream, as more reports of Ecstasy use are alluded to (even by Madonna), and a scene becomes more focused on its excesses than its music. That doesn’t necessarily mean the music is any better or worse, it just means some fans don’t feel the same connection to the movement as they did before.

When a genre of music is not known typically as “mainstream” but then quickly rises in popularity, you’ll get a greater diversity of fans and concert attendees. At Coachella, a festival that invites all kinds of music from electronica to rock to hip-hop, the disparity in the crowd is widens every year. This can be interesting for some and off-putting for those who feel like they enjoyed the music before everyone else and don’t want to taint their scene with non-Music Lovers. Growing pains!

It’s an amusement park where some are there for the rides, some are there for the games, and some are just there. When a theme park  has too many themes, some people might not even know where to begin (or whether at some point, they should ever be there at all). This is in no way a knock on diversity. But when things are no longer about the music, how long do they stay cool?

"Since our inception in 2000, we have incurred significant net operating losses and, as of January 31st, 2012, we had an accumulated deficit of $101.4 million.  A key element of our strategy is to increase the number of listeners and listener hours to increase our market penetration. However, as our number of listener hours increases, the royalties we pay for content acquisition also increase. We have not in the past generated, and may not in the future generate, sufficient revenue from the sale of advertising and subscriptions to offset such royalty expenses.

As a result of these factors, we expect to continue to incur operating losses on an annual basis through at least fiscal 2013 [ie, January, 2013]."

And it’s not just Pandora that gets the brunt of difficult licensing structures and demanding major labels. With only around a 20% conversion rate from free to paid subscriber, Spotify is facing an uphill battle to justify their massive funding rounds totaling $189 million. Michael Robertson, always the contrarian in the music industry, went as far as to say Spotify can never be profitable. Factors including deal structure, labels demanding equity of companies, and up front payments all the way to more technical issues such as non-disclosure, data normalization, and reporting needs all work against massive scale streaming apps like Spotify (where content is licensed, rather than artists uploading music to the service on their own profiles). 

How do services get out of this mess? Well it’s difficult since it comes down to supply and demand. As Robertson continues:

“The sale of EMI to other music companies means there will shortly be only three major labels. If a music service rejects terms offered by a label, then that service’s offering will have an enormous hole in their catalog of 25 percent or more of popular songs.” 

Unlike Spotify, Pandora abides by U.S. laws based around terrestrial radio, and does not face some of the same problems Robertson lists as business obstacles for Spotify. Clearly, both are going to have a tough time hitting that coveted goal of profitability as record labels don’t always feel like budging and consumers don’t always feel like paying. 

More Best Buy stores are closing their doors. A store that used CDs as a loss leader to get you in the door to buy more expensive items is now losing the battle on the big ticket items as well. People go into the store to browse, but ultimately people are buying off Amazon and other online retailers. Best Buy can’t compete.

The CD store hasn’t been able to compete for years. Walmart’s music section has shrunk. Apples iTunes takes a 30% cut of your sales and expects you to sell singles one at a time rather than the more lucrative deal of selling your whole album to a consumer who only wanted to own one or two songs.

Is there an answer to this. David Lowery, founder of Cracker and Camper von Beethoven, said no at this year’s SF MusicTech Summit. As Digital Music News summarized: 

“Record labels and artists don’t need to reinvent their business model to match the new reality. THEY ALREADY DID. That’s what we’ve all been doing for the last ten years. AND WE NOW KNOW IT’S ACTUALLY WORSE FOR THE ARTIST.”

Lowery argues that artists used to use touring to boost sales, rather than using touring as the end-all-be-all of revenue generation. However, there is more than one possible revenue stream that bands are trying these days. While many will struggle to make a middle-class income, many are embracing new models to make the industry work for them. Gabe McDonough, vice president, music director at Leo Burnett in Chicago said:

"It used to be pretty rare to hear an indie band on an ad. It's not that rare anymore. Somebody's got to pay the bills.…In 2012, brands are one of the few entities in human culture that are willing to pony up." 

In many cases, the corporation has replaced the individual as the source of income. For some bands, this might equate to selling out. When your band’s song is playing on a Lowe’s commercial, are you still hip and trendy? Facing the reality of the music industry, it’s probably time to stop worrying about selling out and start worrying about whether you can devote 24/7 to your music.

Would Lady Gaga be popular even without her award show entrances where she’s covered in meat or hatched from a giant egg? Probably. Would 50 Cent be famous if he didn’t get shot nine times? Most likely. Regardless, it’s all the little things, whether it be a unique upbringing or controversy hitting the headlines, that add up to celebrity. Constantly being front and center is what helps you gain share of mind.

I don’t think anyone denies that Deadmau5, the popular DJ, has serious musical chops—but  his mouse hat and costume and his onstage persona help add to the allure of his music. The performance and the visuals surrounding the artist fill in all the gaps for listeners when they’re listening or not listening to the music itself.

This doesn’t mean that artists should fake controversy or create a ridiculous image for themselves that doesn’t fit their music, but it does mean that artists need something more to latch onto than just music if they want to reach an iconic status or help spread a certain message. Kurt Cobain did this exact thing by trying to be the anti-image. The plaid and jeans were a statement against 80’s glam rock, but that in itself was an image. It was radically different and people could relate to it. 

Some latch onto trends. That can work for a little while. Being different is what lasts.

Five Seconds

Bam! Have you grabbed your audience’s attention in the first few seconds of your video? You have to. If you didn’t, edit your video until those first precious seconds are the most compelling few seconds of any viewer’s day.

Digestible 

The most viral videos are short. Yes, even 30 seconds short. If you top out at a minute, that’s fine too. Music videos for full-length songs tend to be longer than a minute, so you’ll have to keep the attention of the viewer through storylines (think Lady Gaga) or through visual mastery (think OK GO). Without plot or a visually compelling piece of work, you’ll just be relying on the music. Music is great, but it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll go “viral” unless you’re a famous artist or just really lucky.

Social

As Kevin Allocca mentions in his video “Why videos go viral,” tastemakers can help start the snowball effect that creates a viral video.  A tweet from Jimmy Kimmel or a mention on Tosh.O can all help start the ripple effect. But once a tastemaker gives a video an initial push, it’s up to social media sites and the blogosphere to keep spreading a video. Even if the tastemaker is just a prominent player in your industry (or your music genre), there is some beginning step to getting your video into the community you want or even to the masses.

Replicable

Does your video lend itself to parody? Can others respond to it on YouTube with commentary or potentially interesting follow-ups? Another option is for others to make a mashup version or their own cover of the song. The more people that can spread your video through their own videos, the better chance your video has of going viral.

Controversy

What helped make Kony 2012 the most viral video of all time? Not only was it well edited and helped show an emotional story, but it created controversy. Did the creators of the video put too much emphasis on awareness over action? That’s a subjective matter, which created a firestorm of debate that helped make a viral video gain even more heat.

No matter what you do, you won’t be able to dictate whether your video goes viral. However, if you follow the previous patterns of viral videos – in terms of optimal techniques, not predictability – you’ll have a much better shot.

See how Adam Dadowsky engineered OK Go’s virality in “This Too Shall Pass”:

1) Do NOT update your status with your music profile links every day, it’s gets old and people will start ignoring you. 

2) Do NOT go searching for a record deal before you’ve established a large following and have many shows under your belt. Even then, a record deal might still not be the right move for your career. 

3) Do NOT expect a fanbase to come find you. You need to find them.

4) Do NOT skimp on producing your music—a well-produced track is the first step between you and a potential fan.

5) Do NOT think you are above engaging with your listeners.

6) Do NOT delay playing your music live in front of as many audiences as possible, even if your set isn’t perfect yet.

7) Do NOT say ‘no’ to opportunities early on in your career, no matter how small they are. 

8) Do NOT promote too many songs at once. Focus on your best couple songs and market those to a new audience first. 

9) DO NOT be afraid to reinvent yourself.

10) Do NOT charge people upfront as a new artist. Embrace the power of free.

Much has been said about the supposedly dying music industry. What many people don’t distinguish between is the music industry and the record industry. While the record industry is dying in many ways, the music industry is as alive as ever. Tunecore founder Jeff Price said at the Digital Music Forum East in New York (via Digital Music News):

“This was not a fucking golden age. Artists did not swim in money in the traditional music industry… This concept that the music industry was so fucking great is just wrong! It was great for like, one band!”

And the Price is right (pun intended)! In the past, the industry relied on the hits, while artists who couldn’t come up with a successful first or second album were quickly forgotten. As Price notes, these days artists can fail on one album and go straight into making their next album because the price of recording and releasing music to the world has dropped immensely.

Without gatekeepers, it’s anyone’s game. Now you don’t need to ask anyone’s permission, you can just make your art. Whether your art will later be accepted and will help you launch a career is another question, but you don’t need a label’s check to tell you if you can or cannot at least attempt to have a career. 

Hypebot does a good job of showing how MC Lars gave away his music for free so he could jumpstart his merchandise and ticket sales. As you can see in the chart above, 87% of his music income arose from merch and tickets (not CD sales). And instead of getting a label to fund the recording process, he used Kickstarter to help raise the money. MC Lars commented on the changes in the music industry:

“Being a musician no longer means simply being a songwriter and performer. One must also know a little about business, branding, t-shirt design, social networking, production, publicity, accounting and tour managing."

The music industry is now one of long-tail economics. There might be smaller riches in it for the anointed few, but there are certainly many more who have a shot at a piece of the pie.

VEVO was caught illegally streaming the Super Bowl after some investigative journalism by Jason Kincaid of TechCrunch. VEVO, an entertainment company owned in part by Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment, is openly against piracy. That’s what makes their illegal streaming of the Super Bowl even more ironic in the eyes of consumers, artists, and music businesses that have bore the brunt of the record labels’ wrath over the past decade.

VEVO CEO Rio Caraeff wrote a post explaining the mistake, which can be read in part below:

“A guest of our lounge asked for an NFL game to be aired. We said no. There was a laptop hooked up to VEVO.com that fed into the large TV screens around the bar. Unfortunately, the laptop was easily accessible to the public. That was our mistake for not making sure the laptop was more secure. While VEVO staff was in other areas of the venue, the game was put on – via a website transmitting ESPN’s broadcast of the NFL game – without our permission or knowledge.

As soon as we realized the game was airing to the room, we removed it and went back to playing VEVO videos. The game was not aired in its entirety. Rest assured, we rectified this mistake as soon as we became aware what was going on.”

I’m going to give Caraeff and VEVO the benefit of the doubt, they probably did not intend to illegally stream anything. It just happened. But I think this event puts many current technology issues into perspective. Clearly some people at Vevo’s event wanted to see the Super Bowl and coming across a legitimate streaming source for the game probably isn’t easy if you don’t have the proper TV setup.

What consumers want is ease of use and access, even if it’s at a price. Apple’s iTunes made music consumption easy—their catalogue is fairly robust and provides music at a decent price and in a way consumers favor (i.e. you can buy one track instead of the whole album, and you can do it quickly). The entertainment industry as a whole needs to come up with a viable model for distributing all forms of content at the click of a button in order to curb piracy. 

I’ve listened to several technology podcasts where very wealthy individuals admit to piracy even though they are more than willing to pay for content. In many cases it’s not about paying for content, it’s about accessing content. Between Netflix, Spotify, Hulu, and many other content providers, consumers still can’t get everything they want. Until technology catches up with the demand for readily available content when and how people want to consume it, then piracy will be the fall-back option for a sizeable percentage of consumers (regardless of ethical considerations). Now all we need to do is replace decades of backroom deals and outdated corporate structures so we can aggregate all the content as we please.  

Electronic and DJ music is sweeping the Grammys, apps let you tag audio at the Super Bowl, sites like uJam let you manipulate music with nothing more than your browser, and people record sound straight to their mobile devices. The lines are getting blurred when it comes to music creation. I had to defend the art of DJ-ing to a coworker of mine, who thought that DJs just made a playlist and pressed the play button on their console or laptop. Simply put, that’s not the case (most of the time).

It’s clear that music creation is much easier now than it was in the past. Clearly it’s no longer about how you make your music – you don’t need a guitar, piano, or a mic to be considered a musician – it’s what kind of music you make that determines your success, not how you made it. Any person in their room can consider themselves a DJ, but why are certain artists relegated to the bedroom while others find themselves performing in front of thousands? Simply put it’s the nuances of a mix, a vocal melody, or a beat that make a song what it is. Original creation is still a must. Even still, two different DJs can play the same song, but one somehow gets a little bit more energy out of the tune. It’s all about dynamics. 

As technology improves, the cost to run an online business, create an application, store files, or create a song all decreases. But creativity is a constant. More creative people are enabled to make something that we call music, but we still need the creative people in the first place. What changes is how we define music. Some define music as any sound, others fall into a more rigid, traditional criteria for what constitutes music. As you see more and more categories pop up in the Grammys and more genres getting their own cultural piece in The New York Times, the more accepting people will be of all forms of new music.

This generation’s rock n’ roll might be rock n’ roll. But it’s also electronic music, hip-hop, and everything in between.

In recent years, the game of poker has skyrocketed in popularity due in part to televised poker.  Shows like the World Poker Tour and the WSOP on ESPN did for US poker what MTV and later VH1 did for rock and roll.  With the popularity of the game, it shouldn’t be any shock that many rock stars have decided to take up the game.  Today let’s look at a few of those stars.

Scott Ian is best known as a founding member and lead guitarist for 80’s supergroup Anthrax. In addition, he helped pioneer the rock/rap genre with in 1991 when they did a crossover with Public Enemy.  In addition, Ian hosted The Rock Show on VH1 and is currently rhythm guitarist for The Damned Things.

Ian made headlines in 2007 when won an entry in the Aruba Poker Classic and then started taking lessons with various poker pros.  Soon after, he showed up and played in the World Series of Poker.  This eventually led to him being signed by online poker site UB as a featured pro.  Ian loves the game so much that he worked his tour with Anthrax around the 2009 WSOP Main Event.  He literally flew back and forth to gigs on off days of the event.

There are many other players that enjoy the game as well.  For example, Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains, Slash of Guns N’ Roses, and Vinnie Paul of Pantera and Hellyeah all play the game.  Granted, they are not as into the game as Scott Ian, but they all regularly play.  They are all very busy with their music and have to find time to squeeze in a game.  That is where the internet helps.  It has been well reported that they all regularly play Texas Hold em poker online and often host their own home games.  This allows them the time to play without having to make significant changes in their lives or schedules to do so.

Playing in front of a hot crowd is an adrenaline rush like no other.  Poker may not be played in front of a massive crowd as concerts are, but it can still give a great rush.  Considering that many rock stars live for that kind of rush, poker would seem the obvious hobby of choice.  

Sometimes it seems artists like to stir up controversy just because they can. The idea that all press is good press. I often wonder if there’s any need to single out one particular artist when you’re trying to bash radio-friendly music. The Ting Tings did just that. NME reported that the band is straying from their first album sound and don’t expect everything to turn out so hot on the charts:

“The band said they would rather ‘puke on their own feet’ than sit alongside the likes of Guetta on radio playlists and that they aren't after ‘cheap nasty hits.’”

Many would find it noble that a band like The Ting Tings are willing to sell fewer records in the hopes that they won’t have to water-down their music to fit some mainstream ideal for pop chart success. That’s perfectly fine.  But why single out David Guetta? Is he even the most cookie-cutter you can get? While very pop-friendly, Guetta still appeals to a whole scene of electronic dance music fans outside of the mainstream radio audience. It’s too easy to bash Nickleback or Justin Bieber, so The Ting Tings picked the next rung of music celebrity.

The comment section in the same NME article has several references to Noel Gallagher, formerly the main songwriter of British rock band Oasis. One says: “What does Noel Gallagher think of this?” Gallagher is  notorious for controversial statements about fellow musicians. His outspoken personality has garnered him a lot of press, for better or for worse. At the same time he is also a veteran of the business. The Ting Tings are still up-and-coming, so their reputation can help propel them or hold them back. It seems like they have to make a decision what kind of reputation they want to embrace.

One-off comments will probably come and go, but some musicians keep adding to the fuel and build a reputation of critiquing over time. Kanye West didn’t just interrupt Taylor Swift’s speech at the VMA’s, he built his reputation of controversial actions over time. They all added up to what the public now perceives of Kanye. For some, the controversy creates an allure—an intangible quality that makes many artists seem less human but all the more unique. Other artists might fall into the category of bitter, jealous, scornful, or just plain mean.

The question is, is this a risk worth taking? Or maybe it’s not calculated and you just speak from the heart. Audiences reward authenticity, so if you’re going to call someone out based on something you believe in, you better mean it.

Some tech savvy individuals are decrying the shutdown of MegaUpload, the file-sharing site that allowed for numerous public file transfers (both for legitimate and illegal purposes). The FBI seized MegaUpload on charges of conspiracy to commit racketeering, conspiracy to commit infringement, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and criminal copyright infringement. Many worry that the FBI’s seemingly calculated move after the SOPA/PIPA protests to shutdown MegaUpload represents a slippery slope that will lead to other file-sharing sites like Dropbox or SoundCloud getting the brunt of the government’s wrath. 

The problems happen not when sites like MegaUpload make it too easy to put up files, but when they make it too hard to take them down. Sam Rosenthal, owner of Brooklyn-based Projekt Records, wrote on Digital Music News about the takedown policies on sites like MegaUpload that operate under the DMCA:  

“Your file will be gone within 24 hours. If not, file the complaint again with your next batch of illegal files. Because yes, you will be doing this same thing next week. And the next week. And the next week.... it's a never-ending process. The DMCA puts the burden on you. Thanks, Mr Senator.”

Unlike YouTube, which works with rights-holders and their own algorithms to take down copyright infringing files along with any duplicate files, MegaUpload does not remove every file that is the same as the original copyrighted file that was taken down. Instead, the onus is on the rightsholder to keep issuing takedown notices after new versions of the original copyrighted material pop up again and again. This kind of burden for artists and other creative authors does not offer a balance between the freedom of speech the Internet provides and the fairness intellectual property owners deserve.

Some argue that we shouldn’t blame MegaUpload or other file-sharing sites for piracy. We don’t blame car companies for drunk driving accidents or for people exceeding the speed limit, so why are we holding file-sharing sites accountable? I believe the analogy holds true, but we must also recognize that some nefarious actors in the business want you to share files illegally because it helps their bottom-line (i.e. more activity nets more premium account subscribers or advertising revenue). It is not illegal for a company to WANT something, but if they are willfully disobeying the law to promote illicit activity, that’s a different story. It’s unclear exactly where MegaUpload falls under this legal umbrella, but maybe the FBI knows more than we do in this situation. Or maybe they wanted to assert a little control after the Internet pointed a big middle finger at Congress over SOPA and PIPA.

Update: I recommend reading "MegaUpload Could Spawn Caselaw More Destructive Than SOPA" for all those interested in getting more opinion on the legal matters.

Here at HypedSound we appreciate a little creativity. If you’re willing to pour your heart and soul into your music, and then name your band something outrageous or downright farcical, well we’re on board. We put together a list of 20 weird band names from bands you might have heard of (i.e. they sold an album or two, got some press, swung by your town on a package metal tour, or just downright blew up).

1. The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza

2. Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band

3. The String Cheese Incident

4. Dog Fashion Disco

5. Rumplestiltskin Grinder

6. Butthole Surfers

7. …And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead

8. Colonel Les Claypool’s Fearless Flying Frog Brigade

9. We Were Promised Jetpacks!

10. Throbbing Gristle

11. Meat Puppets

12. Iwrestledabearonce

13. Death Cab for Cutie

14. Between the Buried and Me

15. Mr. Mister

16. Jesus Lizard

17. Anal Cunt

18. TV on the Radio

19. Gov’t Mule

20. They Might Be Giants

So how many of these 20 bands have you heard of?

Listening to the stories of the most legendary bands, you often get the sense that not all bandmembers were created equal. There often seems to be one bandmember or a couple whose ego or power outshine the other members. The members of Metallica were notorious for hazing Jason Newsted when he entered the band after Cliff Burton’s death and clearly Jason didn’t have an equal say in matters. UrbanDictionary even has a term called Lead Singer’s Disease (LSD): “The tendency for the lead singer of a rock band to become egotistical and impossible to work [with].” Tags for the term include Axl Rose, David Lee Roth, and Liam Gallagher.

But does a band’s rise to fame create the inevitability of LSD or other frontman equivalent? Not with Zakk Wylde and Black Label Society. In a recent interview, Wylde presented an alternative style of bandsmanship, where all members are equal and free to do as they please. An excerpt from the interview reads:

Wylde: If anybody wants to leave Black Label for those reasons or you get a higher paying gig if you go out with Celine Dion, I’m not gonna stop you. It’s like, ‘Steve, you can always come back here.’ I’m not gonna stop you from makin’ more money. Go and make the dough and if one of the guys wants to jump onboard a Whitesnake tour or something, you can always come back here.

Ultimate Guitar: Black Label is a real democracy. 

Wylde: That’s the way we roll and that’s what makes it unique. ‘Cause we all still talk and hang out and I mean even the guys that aren’t in the band that are playing in other bands.

Being a leader doesn’t necessarily mean you’re The King. In the case of B.B. King, well you’re known as The King, but you can still be diplomatic. In Soul of the man: Bobby “Blue Bland”, author Charles Farley writes about blues great Bobby Bland:

“Bobby Bland was also a leader easy to follow. He deferred to Scott in almost all matters musical and was fair, calm, and evenhanded in dealing with all members of the group. Unlike other stars who were infamous for their inflated egos and hair-trigger tempers, particularly in dealing with band members, Bobby was firm but always a gentleman.”

Farley goes on to write that even after jazz musician Glenn Miller disappeared in bad weather over the English Channel, the band still was able to move on. Just like a CEO of a Fortune 500 company, you want your band to live on despite your departure or passing away. Obviously a major organization and business runs differently than an artistic band that only holds a few members, but why not at least provide an opportunity for the legacy of the band to remain? Some bands break up even during their peak because the inflated egos of its bandmates (or one singular bandmate) ruins it for the rest. Tensions rise and things fall apart.

1) Learn the classics

Ever feel like you’re so absorbed in your own music creation that you forget about the tunes that started it all? Go back and learn a few classics on the instrument(s) of your choice. They’re great for around the campfire singing or possibly sparking your own creativity for new music.

2) Support local music

Show up to a local show, or if you’re going to see your favorite headliner then show up early to see some local talent. Everyone could use a little support sometimes. 

3) Donate to a Kickstarter music project

Help fund someone’s record production or local concert! With your help, they can make their project happen and you can get a CD, concert ticket, or other incentive the band wants to give out. Electronic music group Late Night Alumni recently completed their own Kickstarter.

4) Listen to the whole album 

Haven’t listened to a whole album from start to finish recently? We’re all busy, but try to find that artist that you really enjoy and listen to one of their albums all the way through. Sometimes listening to a whole piece of art puts you in a mood where you see things differently.

5) Thank everyone

Have an email list of fans you’ve been neglecting? How about some bloggers that could use a quick ‘thank you’ for covering your work or the work of your favorite artists? Whoever it is, send them a short (or long) thank you for their support of the music scene.

6) Practice everyday           

Don’t let a day slip by without practicing. Maybe you can’t fit in two hours today, but you could slip in 15-20 minutes before bed or set your alarm so you can play before leaving your house in the morning. The minutes add up over time.

7) Warm up

Sometimes we get overzealous and don’t warm up properly before playing. For vocalists, this could be dangerous, for those with an instrument, it could be hurtful as well. Don’t forget to warm up every time. Electronic artists might not have the same physical constraints as other musicians, but it can help to get the creative juices flowing to spend a few minutes messing around. 

8) Discover ‘The New’

Go out and find a new genre that you’ve never listened to or gave a chance. Try to understand the nuances of the genre. Or if you want to really test your boundaries, find at least one song you like in a genre you normally hate. Maybe you’ll find a new guilty pleasure.

9) Use a new music tool or application

There are hundreds of music apps and tools to help you share, discover, or manage music online. Find a new one and take it for a test run. This year I started using ex.fm to help me aggregate music I listen to from across the web.

10) Network in the physical world

Most artists probably do a fair bit of networking online, but don’t forget to network in real life and make some lasting connections. If you don’t play live much, consider joining a meetup in your area based around the kind of music you like. 

According to a recent poll by ReverbNation and Digital Music News, musicians believe Facebook “likes” are three times more valuable than any other social connection with fans, be it email list signups, Twitter followers, or Youtube subscribers. Facebook likes eclipse MySpace friends and Google+ subscribers by an even greater margin, though those statistics don’t seem to be as much of a surprise at this point—MySpace has steadily gone downhill in attention and Google+ has yet to make its definitive mark on the music world. 

Based on the time people spend on Facebook, I am not surprised at the degree to which Facebook Likes beat Twitter followers. Twitter is a broadcast medium that doesn’t play as well with video, music, and sharing as Facebook does. But what about email list subscribers? Is an email address three times less valuable than a Facebook like? I’m going to argue ‘no’. Keep in mind, the poll was for what artists think is better based on their own perception, not a measured study on where value is created (be it in engagement or through monetary results).

My comment on Digital Music News for why email addresses beat likes goes as follows:

When you have someone's email, you have them for life (assuming they don't change their email address frequently or you manage to get unsubscribed/lumped into junk mail). With Facebook, if someone stops engaging with your page for a little, you'll quickly be replaced in the algorithm that determines someone's news feed. There are many liked pages that I never even see anymore in my feed. For email newsletters, I might ignore you for a while, but you might get me back a little later when I have more patience or interest to click on your email.

Even if your fans spend more time on Facebook than in their email inbox, you’re always going to be at the whim of Facebook’s algorithm for showing stories, the security of your Facebook fan page and potential spam, or worst case scenario Facebook could lose popularity over the coming years. Do you believe people will stop checking their email three years from now? Whose going to be around longer, Facebook or email? Maybe everyone will be using a Facebook email address eventually, although at this point, that’s a little hard to believe given Facebook’s track record of privacy concerns. I personally don’t have too many concerns with my own privacy on Facebook, but I generally like to keep my business email separate from my personal email and separate from my Facebook messaging. Each one has its own purpose.

If you want to have the closest relationship with your fans, with the least amount of competition from competing marketers, brands, and other musicians, email is probably your best bet. Coming from experience in the lead generation business, there is a reason brands are willing to pay more for an email registration than a Facebook like—in e-commerce, emails are more important. I’m willing to bet the same is true in entertainment, especially if as an artist you’re trying to sell music, tickets, or merchandise to fans sometime down the line.

Hey Chormps,

So here are some really easy ways to get your tracks to sound a little bit more "fuller" in a stereo Mix

Panning

Don't just through down an instrument visualize in your head where it sits. What I mean is everything in your mix can't sit at Pan= 0, because it will 'mud' together.

Here are some simple things to try:

Drums: Kick and Snare: I put the snare and kick to 0, but I make overly produced dubstep music, so yeah. What is fun and  a lot of modern rock bands do is they pan the snare slowly left and right on the slower parts to give it that ambient feel, more realistic or tribel I guess. I usually leave the kick pan to 0 unless I want to do some crazy depth effect.

              High Hat: These guys are the fun one/tricky one. You have to mix the high hats to balance out the rest of the mix. If you track is sitting heavy on the right, pan your high hats more over to the left to fill out the final spaces. If you know what automation is: you have to automate the highhat pan throughout the track to maintain that stereo balance. There are exceptions for example, if you want a soft snare part ot build up into a main rift you might have it heavy, to the right or left and then slowly culmate to the middle with the rest of the instruments.

Instrumets--Lead Guitars/Synths; When it is these guys time to play they usually sit at about -3 or +3. When the heavier leads come in or its just the lead instrument bring the pan back to zero. On big speakers with alot of depth you can tell -3 to +3 pan even know that minisicules, you can tell. If you want to play it safe and you only have about 2 to 3 instruments including drums, by all means just keep it at 0. Its also really fun to pan these instruments back and forth to really give it that wah-wah depth. If you have never experimented with heavy panning for a lead instrument I would try that as well. Only do it on part that don't have a lot going on, like really put emphasis on the shift in left to right.

Bass Guitars/synths-- they usually are at 0, if they are EQed properly they won't mud out the tracks. you could try and pan the kick drum and the bass really slightly like 2 plus or minus, but I wouldn't recommend it if you are just workign off of laptop speakers or target/walmart brand headphones, not to say those are terrible, but you will do your track more harm than good.

Rhymth instruments-- These are the instruments that need to be hard panned to the maximum left or right!

Compression--

A lot of questions on compression, if you have logic pro 9 use the mult-pressor, and then use the regular compressor for the single insturment tracks. For compression, stick to the presets for the most part, use your judgement, if you hear a big difference in sound-- sadly its probably not that great of a tone, it might just be louder.  

I'm going to turn it over to this guy, but basically don't go to overboard making your song sound better is a game of minisicules rather than big changes, because all the miniscule changes add up to something huge.

Finally

player.soundcloud.com/player.swf

Louis C.K. decided to sell his latest live DVD, Live At The Beacon Theatre, as a DRM-free DVD download on his website for only $5. What are his intentions? What will be the result of this foray into online distribution? The reasoning for this he explains below:

So how bold was Louis C.K.’s move? After a post on TechCrunch, a commenter named Sean Hammons replied, “The publicity he’s getting is worth this decision alone. I didn't know he had a new special coming out anytime soon, but because all the nerds love how he's doing it, I am aware and he has my $5!” The self-deprecating comedian also made it to the top of Reddit with the news and gained publicity all over the Internet with his appeal to the good graces of the masses.

Radiohead attempted a similar gesture back in 2007 with their album Rainbows, where they used a pay-what-you-want-to pricing scheme. For their subsequent album The King Of Limbs, the band decided to go back to a regular flat pricing model. Radiohead’s idea for music downloading was an attempt at getting goodwill and a reasonable return. Will Louis C.K.’s decision succeed with this same philosophy? Definitely. All the publicity Louis C.K. gets for his album is free marketing. If you take away the need to pay for this kind of marketing, then you significantly increase your margin (even if you’re charging much less to buy the DVD than you would otherwise). Also factor in the benefit of not having to cut in others on the profits.

Now fans, or prospective fans, don’t have to think to themselves whether paying $19.99 for a live DVD of Louis C.K.’s comedy is worth it. Now they can pay the equivalent of an expensive cup of coffee, and even if they don’t enjoy the DVD or think it’s “worth it” in the conventional sense, they can think to themselves that they did a good thing by buying into Louis C.K.’s business model. It’s win-win for Louis C.K. and the consumer.

When an artist gets their 15 minutes of fame through American Idol, a controversial news report of some sort, or comes out with their one hit wonder single, you can expect a healthy surge in search traffic for that artist on Google. Not Skrillex. As Digital Music News cleverly pointed out, the dubstep artist has slowly risen in popularity in terms of his Google search growth (this is based off of the search keyword “skrillex” and Google’s trend algorithms).

While some of the search growth can be attributed to American dubstep’s rapid rise in popularity in the last year or two, it is also a good sign that Skrillex is not just a flash in the pan sensation. There is no one-off press mania around Skrillex and there is no sharp spike that indicates a particular new story breaking and gaining some extra search juice before tapering off.

This healthy and steady growth is promising and hopefully will continue for the  artist, who started his career early in an emo rock band called From First to Last under his street name Sonny Moore.

So what does this mean for up-and-coming artists who haven’t yet made their name? Well it means you can hope for the pipe dream of quick success and get a lot of mainstream coverage right off the bat, or you can grind away and slowly build street cred over time. Even Skrillex had a boost because of his connections from producing music under his name Sonny Moore and playing in a popular rock band before that. That’s years and years before he reached the success he has now.

Up-and-coming artists probably shouldn’t hover over their computers tracking search traffic of themselves on a daily basis, but it might be the time to start slowly building your fanbase and online presence (thanking each fan individually for their attention). One day all those small little gains will add up to a career or better. Every overnight success, as they say, is 10 years in the making.

Tips On Songwriting...Sort Of

 
I am not a published songwriter...well not yet anyway! But I have been devloping myself as a writer on and off since I was 12. I get asked from time to time how to write a song and so I thought I would blog about it!

You can't be taught to song write…only the conventions of it. Everyone has there own style of writing and there is no wrong way to go about writing a song. You could start with lyrics, or with a melody or with a guitar riff…A lot of song writers wait for inspiration to hit them…but they will often be waiting a long time. So I want to inspire you to write when ever you can, whether you're in the mood or not.

Think of songwriting as the sound track to your life. Everything can trigger an idea. Use anything you can to create a song. Life is whizzing by and there is so much in it that is just waiting to be written about and interpreted. Next time you leave your front door or look out of your window, turn on the TV or read the news, really open your eyes and view life from a writer's perspective. Life is happening now & it would be a shame to waste it.

Don't feel that you need to stick to a specific genre. Feel free to experiment and push the boundaries. Write every day about everything and anything. Make it a part of your life. Don't be put off if you write a bad song - It's totally normal! Even the best songwriters will write loads of bad songs in between writing the great ones. You can't be expected to be on form every day!

Music is just a movement of air. It's not something that you can hold or see yet can you imagine what society would be like with out music! Your music will out live you, so have a stab at immortality. Make it the very best you can. Keep it real and incorporate yourself in it. If you're a middle class boy from Sussex it probably won't sound right if your singing about gangsters, guns and fast women. Don't try to be somebody else. Its always far better to be yourself.

 Great music is all about empathy. It connects with you on an emotional level.  Try to put emotional commitment into everything you do. Play to your strengths. I know im never gunna be able to sing like Christina Aguilera or play like Jimi Hendrix, so I don't try becuase it will only leed to feeling not quite good enough. I've spent time experimenting with musc and I now know what i'm good at and I make it work for me. Don't be afraid to put your head on the line, take risks and have the courage to fail. It will only improve you as a writer, performer, artist and person.

The more you write and practice, the better you will get. Put the hours in and never give up. Believe in yourself, believe in your writing and believe in music. You can do it and don't let anyone else tell you otherwise.

 From Tumblr to Google to Facebook to eBay, companies and citizens are up in arms over the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) that is up for a vote in Congress. Wikipedia summarizes SOPA as follows:

“The bill expands the power of U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders to fight online traffic in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods.”

 While major labels, Hollywood, and other big businesses centered around copyrighting content favor the Congressional bill, there is growing opposition to SOPA. As Digital Music News puts it:

“The question is whether a more reasonable, middle ground can be forged. Shutting down sites with minimal due process seems like a recipe for disaster, though the status quo is increasingly being viewed as unfair and stacked against content interests.”

The bill attempts to curb “rogue” websites from copyright infringement and allows the government to seize websites before those websites see their day in court. This essentially inches America closer to a police state that seeks protection over due process and technological innovation. For example, Youtube is a platform that works hard to curb piracy and should not be held accountable for every wrongdoing on the site. Should a company like Youtube be deemed a threat?

Even House Minority leader Nancy Pelosi tweeted that we need a better solution to the problem of intellectual copyright protection than is currently planned through SOPA. An initiative by social blogging platform Tumblr helped bring in 87,834 phone calls to representatives to protest the bill. Along with ads in various media, the biggest names in tech banded together to write a joint resolution to Congress expressing their concern with the bill and how it will affect innovation and stifle job creation.

While everyday artists and content creators are trying to protect their work from the infringing hands of pirating businesses and consumers, there are less nefarious ways of going about change. Tech pundits and industry experts are assuming this law won’t pass, but at that same time, that doesn’t mean people shouldn’t do everything they can to stop the worst-case scenario from happening.

The Patriot Act might save lives in some instances, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t come at a price. The same is true for the Stop Online Piracy Act—although lives might not be on the line, the future outlook of our society might be. 

Popstars have officially embraced the edges of mainstream music. First Britney Spears took a foray into dubstep music on her track “Hold It Against Me,” and now Rihanna is sampling Metallica. According to Blabbermouth.net, Rihanna will be incorporating a sample from the metal legends’ track “Wherever I May Roam” from the band’s self-titled album (also knows as “the black album”). While 1991’s the black album ended up selling almost 16 million copies worldwide, it still is no mainstream pop album in the same vein as Britney Spears or Rihanna and doesn’t cater to the faint of heart.

Rihanna is also incorporating music from Chase & Status’ “Saxon”, which features electronic sounds and heavy dubstep drops. Both Metallica and Chase & Status will have their music on the tune “Red Lipstick” on Rihanna’s new album Talk That Talk. What does this mean for the state of mainstream music? It means pop artists, those  who in the past were more accustomed to bubblegum sensibilities, are pushing the envelope of musical exploration. Sure it might not “be good enough” for the fringes of music society (those who stick to their niche genres like a badge on their respective niche jackets), but it does mean a melting pot of ideas for the mainstream.

As of now, it’s tough to tell whether this was a conscious decision by Rihanna or a calculated move by her managers or a producer cluing Rihanna in on some new sounds. But does it really matter? The fact is that it’s getting done, and whether sounds are watered down or butchered, there are going to be a lot of streams online for songs that otherwise would not have been found. Metallica has solidified its fanbase long ago, so they won’t need any help from Rihanna to introduce news fans to them. But look at the Youtube video for “Saxon”, embedded below, and you can see that there are already comments about how Rihanna’s album tracklisting brought her fans to a dubstep song from 2008. How could that not mean good exposure for non-mainstream music? 

Recently Hypebot has been reporting on potential class action lawsuits against Universal Music Group. Chuck D and other artists are alleging they got stiffed on song and ringtone royalties. One statement on the claim reads:

"According to Ridenhour's claim, under UMG's current method of accounting, artists and producers receive $80.33 for every 1,000 downloads, when the correct amount should be $315.85 per 1,000. On the ringtone side of things...The suit claims that UMG's current accounting method yields $49.89 per thousand downloads, as opposed to the $660 per 1,000 that the suit claims is actually owed."

Regardless of the legitimacy of the statement, it is not unheard of for record labels to play hardball with paying artists (even more so when they are struggling to keep their businesses viable).  However, it is not only the big labels that are hearing complaints from artists.

In a recent spat with progressive rock legends King Crimson, Grooveshark has repeatedly been unable to stop copyright infringement of King Crimson’s works on their popular streaming service. While Grooveshark has taken down King Crimson songs from the application, the same songs reappear within hours of them being removed (you can read the heated email exchange on DigitalMusicNews).

After the King Crimson emails, other complaints have popped out of the woodwork. Lisa Thomas Music services wrote:

“I am the publishing administrator for the main songwriters of the Eagles and have spent hours upon hours serving DMCA takedown notices on Grooveshark’s designated agent demanding the site remove all of the compositions owned and controlled by my clients. I have cited specific url’s of each infringing post in the notices. To date, Grooveshark has not removed any of the material.”

Above are two examples of artists getting the raw end of the deal from two different businesses: one the old school establishment (UMG) and one digital music service (Grooveshark). I can attest to the fact that many users love Grooveshark, and I’m sure many artists do too, but often there is a fine line between creating a great product and playing fast and loose with other people’s property.

Spotify seems to be the darling child of Facebook and many new users of their product in the U.S., but even they have seen record labels leave them due to ambiguous terms and small royalty checks. Whether you are the entrenched industry companies or the up-and-coming digital innovators in the music space, sometimes it is hard to please everyone when it comes to pleasing the artists and the listeners. Can everyone be happy?

1. rid corporate dominance in politics and economics
2. restore the middle class which has been slowly eroded by the 1% who control the bulk of the wealth in this country
3. to bring attention to the plight of the 99%, who are losing jobs, losing their homes to foreclosure, over taxed, and under heard.

We’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore. We want the balance and fairness restored to this country that Wall Street destroyed through their greed and “anything for a profit” mentality. In short, we demand CHANGE of the status quo. Are you going to just sit there in the shadows of your government or are you going to take a stand and make your word heard http://occupymusic.org

1) No Auto-start

Don’t have your music start automatically! There are so many reasons why this annoys the average visitor, even if the visitor wants to hear your music. Hypebot outlines a few of the reasons in this article.

2) Share Buttons 

Integrate social sharing buttons such as those for Facebook, Twitter, and AddThis (which contains sharing capability for tons of social websites all in one button).

3) Social Profiles

Some listeners just want to come to your site, but others might prefer to visit you on the music site of their choice. Make sure your social links are prominently displayed for others to follow you elsewhere and where they spend more of their time.

4) Mailing List

Email is king! Provide easy access for someone to join your mailing list straight from your homepage. Fans are much more likely to see your messages if they come through email, rather than a fleeting tweet or Facebook post. Make sure you provide relevant content because you want to create an email relationship with your fans where they click-through to your message every time.

5) Call-to-action

What is the most important thing for you to communicate to your fans? Where they can buy your album? Where you’re touring next? Where they can find you elsewhere online? Whatever it is that you feel is most important for you to build and maintain a fanbase or make money, make sure that that is the most prominent thing displayed on your website.

6) Video

Don’t underestimate the power of a video. Many companies use introduction videos to explain how their site works. About two out of every three new visitors that come to a site watch those introductory videos. You can explain yourself as an artist in your video or put a promo.

7) Mobile Access

Make sure your website is mobile-friendly. This might not mean making a dedicated app for you as an artist, because that can be pricey, but make sure that visitors can still use the basic functionality of the site within their mobile phone (play music, sign-up or buy things, etc.).

8) Personality

Good design is good design, but since this is a website that represents you as an artist, don’t forget to inject your own personality into the design. This might be tough if you’re not the one designing the site or doing the coding, but make sure that whomever is in charge of that has your frame of reference as an artist in mind. If you’re using a pre-built template, consider paying a small fee for a more personalized design or one that is more unique. Either way, know your personality before you go into the design process.

The world of technology and music are both witnessing their own stories of fragmentation but are merging into one long tail. In some instances this will mean more (but smaller) winners and in some instances it might mean very few winners at all. Chris Anderson coined the term the “long tail” as a means of “describing the retailing strategy of selling a large number of unique items with relatively small quantities sold of each – usually in addition to selling fewer popular items in large quantities.”

The long tail is applicable both in music and technology. For example, in the world of online business, more and more startup companies are getting funded as it has become easier to start companies (Amazon EC3 cloud services for scalable web development, open-sourced programming software, etc.). Eventually there will be too many companies and not enough follow-on investment or talent to help take these startups to the next level. As a whole, however, these companies manage to create software that enables consumers like you to discover, listen to, buy, and download music in a much easier fashion than in the pre-Internet days.

What does this mean? A lot more music by a lot more people with fewer and fewer high-selling records or singles. In a recent post, Digital Music News asked Apple how much artists should expect to receive from streams off of Apple’s music streaming service iCloud. While Apple mentioned that iTunes receives a 30% cut of sales and declined to comment on streaming rates, Digital Music News says artists can expect royalties in the range of $0.0007 to $0.0035 per stream. One can assume that regardless of volume, even bigger names will have trouble making as much money through streaming as they did on album sales before the digital era of music downloading.

This long tail of music downloads paints a grim picture for artists looking to scratch by.  At the very least, royalties grew 9.1% in 2010 to a total of $1.6 billion globally (via SoundExchange figures). With streaming services like Spotify breaking into the U.S. and leveraging Facebook’s massive userbase and Pandora finding more distribution channels for their music services, we can expect streaming music to keep gaining steam. However, more streaming won’t mean much more in terms of financial return for artists. The winners will be those who ride the coattails of the digital music revolution by gaining exposure and finding new ways to monetize their content. The music industry has always been a story of few winners, but now it’s going to become a fragmented story where we’ll have to piece together the spoils amongst a larger number of players and smaller bits of data.

Everything is moving to simple. The Internet is barely an adult, but despite having more and more experience online every year we all gravitate toward the simple. Simple means products that create value in the most user-friendly and intuitive ways. Clean design and utilitarian beats out complexity and feature creep any day.

What made the iPod and iPhone so popular? Of course viral commercials helped a lot,  they were a pop culture phenomenon, but it was the easy-to-use interface and storage capabilities of the iPod that started the most recent digital revolution. Solving a real need in the simplest way possible. Steve Jobs did everything he could to take away features, not tack them on. You want an extra USB port on your computer? Sorry. You want a bigger keyboard on your iPhone? Sorry. Not. Going. To. Happen.

The new online era follows the same philosophy. Pareto’s Principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, dictates that 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. This means, for example, that 20% of your product’s features account for 80% of the time spent using that product (or 80% of the value of the product, or any other metric that you deem important). The fact of the matter is that companies like Apple are not successful for adding more and more features, instead they highlight the features that dictate 80% of the customer’s needs.

One problem that arises is separating the majority of people from the individual. If you try to appease everyone by fulfilling every individual’s request, you’ll end up satisfying no one. You’ll end up with a laundry list of things that you need to change and ultimately hurt the user experience. This is as true for a technology company like Apple as it is for a touring artist. You can’t give every fan what they want. You can give them your undivided attention, perhaps, but you can’t always give them what they want. Whether you’re designing a website to highlight yourself as an artist, planning how you will turn music into a business, or building a tech product, know that everyone wants something simple. Bite the bullet and get rid of “that one more thing” you wanted to add because you thought it was necessary. Most people probably won’t need it or want it.

Focus on the 20% of the things that will take you 80% of the way. The rest you can focus on after you nailed that first 20%. And if doing extra in some way hurts what you accomplished with that first 20%, then forget about it.

And I cannot wait until it will stop being cool to hate the Doors and the Beatles, or the moment that people will finally recognize Sonic Youth as a force beyond ethereal, but concrete and infinite; the second Bob Dylan is remembered for his scorching tempos and uproarious melodies rather than his negligible word and sentence structures.

Or perhaps the vital instant where we forget the Madonnas of world and instead revive the idols we let die; maybe somewhere in the age, or the vast wastes of time, or in my generation, we can reignite the old flame and the visage of once celebrated tones. Maybe one day soon we can abandon this new concept of popular music as music for the corporations instead of music for the populace.

Oh well, there is no hope for rock music; only for its many illegitimate children spawned from countless moments of heated promiscuity.

Rest in peace.

Digital Music News reported an interesting statistic: based on songs counted in the Gracenote database, there are 97,000,000 songs in the world. MusicHype’s CEO Kevin King presented this stat at the Digital Music Forum West in Los Angeles last Thursday (10/6/2011). The number 97 million seems a bit arbitrary given the number of people who play music and never unleash it all to the world. Of course there are millions and millions of songs that don’t see the light of day outside of a band’s garage, but the number puts a somewhat tangible grasp on the amount of noise (both good and bad) online and in physical music form.

As an up-and-coming artist you’re probably thinking this is a lot of competition. Who’s going to hear my song? At the very least, you have one-leg up on a great number of the 97 million simply because there are millions of songs in the world that seek no promotion. The songwriter might want the song to reach the masses but in most cases is creating only as a hobby or without any will to market the music. Small but meaningful measures on your part to promote your music will get you past much of those millions.

In the land of free (free music downloads, free music hosting, free video hosting, free recording software) this is only going to become a more crowded space. Music creation has little barrier to entry and the only thing separating you from artistic notoriety is the extent to which you can utilize these free tools and get your message out.

Of course the more you can invest in improving the whole music experience, from production to distribution to marketing, the more viable your music becomes (in terms of sound quality and awareness surrounding your name). What 97 million teaches us is that you’ll need a little bit of luck and a lot of perseverance to be discovered. Sometimes you’ll have to discover yourself, meaning you’ll have to believe in your music and push it out into the world before anyone else does the heavy lifting for you.

1. Exclusive Photos Inside Your CD

The band The Good Natured posted their marketing idea on their Facebook page. They took 100 limited edition polaroids to go inside 100 of their EP’s. Exclusive, creative, and fun.

2. Countdown Clock

Got a big announcement, contest, or giveaway? Try a countdown clock to increase the suspense for your announcement or giveaway end date. But remember, you don’t want to be anticlimactic, so make the countdown worth it at the end. Try It’s Almost as your countdown clock or find one online that you can embed in your site.

3. Live Streaming Concert

Not able to do a show everywhere in the world and at the same time? Stream a live concert online via the many live streaming services (Ustream, Livestream, Justin.tv, Youtube, Google+, etc.). Play in your garage, in your room, or record a gig at a venue. Either way, get some live piece of your music online and in real-time.

4. Curate the Best Content

People don’t want to follow you on Twitter or Facebook just to get updates on your latest tour or music release. Curate the best content on your social networking feeds for music article links or songs you dig – if people trust your taste, they’ll probably follow you and check out your music udpates when it organically meshes into your stream.

5. Number Your Albums

Once again, it’s all about exclusivity. If you number your albums, fans will have a unique CD that is not a 100% duplicate of someone else’s purchase. Also, the lower the number the greater sense of value for the fan.

6. Remixes

Include remixes of your favorite song on your album. Perhaps this means using different effects, changing up the mix, or even changing the genre of the song entirely. Experiment! If you have a wide audience, you could even consider holding a remix contest for the song. With a top-notch remix, you can include it on the CD or a subsequent release if the album is already finished.

7. Track Analytics

Where do you want your fans to go? If it’s your website, make sure you have Google Analytics installed and track what sources are providing the most (and best) traffic. Once you find those sites, double-down on the amount of time you spend on those sites. If you use other websites to share music with fans, see what those sites offer you in terms of analytics.

8. Flash Mob

Organize a flash mob based around one of your songs. Then hope it goes viral once you post the video on Youtube!

9. Segmented Email List

Don’t you hate it when people invite you to events and concerts on Facebook or other social networking sites when you’re not even in the same city? It feels spammy. Make sure that when you’re building your email list, segment your emails based on your desired target for each specific email. Services like Mailchimp help you manage large email lists and segment your audience.

10. Limited Edition Vinyl

Because all the cool kids have it on vinyl.

Sources that inspired this article and fuel for more ideas:

Music 3.0

Hypebot

Hypebot 2

Buzzsonic

After witnessing the onslaught of updates by Facebook this week, I started to notice an influx of real-time updates regarding my friends and their Spotify listening habits. I personally don’t use streaming services like Pandora, Spotify, or Rdio because I like to browse the more artist-centric social networks and music aggregators that aren’t assaulted by record label constraints and rampant advertising, but that doesn’t mean I don’t see how big of an impact this will have on the average music consumer.

Facebook has done something interesting here. Many people live off of music recommendations from their friends and family, so isn’t it an organic fit for Facebook to update you on your friends’ current playlists in real-time? Yes and no.

I remember the days when Facebook bombarded your notification stream with gaming updates (so-and-so leveled up in this game, downloaded this app, etc.). It got to a saturation point where you would just want to ignore notifications entirely. Facebook needs to make sure Spotify and other music updates stay at a comfortable level. You don’t want to get to the point where there is so much that it makes the experience as a whole into a burden, and even worse, irrelevant. Of course, users can customize their updates in a very granular way as to prevent repetitive updates, but the average Facebook user doesn’t want to go to such lengths to modify their experience. This is an instance where the machine (i.e. the algorithm) needs to be fully aware of who you interact with and whose music you interact with on a regular basis. The two might or might not be the same.

Getting music recommendations from your closest friends is an important element of music discovery that a machine can’t replicate. You trust your friends, share some similar tastes that you are already aware of, and you know the number of close friends is limited (thus preventing an overload of information). Facebook added their lists function as a way to keep up with people in your news feed that you actually care about. Let’s hope the same stays true for music.

Sometimes it’s more than just the music. It’s a conversation. Are you following any well-known artists on Facebook or Twitter? Big names are not just sharing music, they’re sharing their lives. You might not be at the stage where fans are fawning over your every move -- that often takes somewhat of a celebrity status in your niche to achieve that sort of following -- but that doesn’t mean you can’t create value outside of just promoting your music.

As much as everyone might love your music, if all you do is PUSH PUSH PUSH your song embeds, your profile links, and other “me-oriented activities,” then soon enough your following will be ignoring your updates if not outright unfollowing you. Instead, create value by starting a conversation. Whether directly or indirectly related to your music, point out interesting topics about music, art, or media that will inspire. If people trust your voice and opinion, they will most likely give your music more thought and feel closer to you as an artist.

What are some ways to make things interesting? If you make music, why not attach music to a visual? Album cover art is becoming less relevant in the digital age, so start an Instagram or Flickr profile where you can create a tone of visual aesthetics that match your music and gets you in front of a new audience. Like sharing a mixture of videos, photos, and short writing snippets that appeal to you? Start a Tumblr blog that others in the community can reblog and share. Are your lyrics political or controversial in nature? Start a Posterous blog describing your stance on issues that are important to you. Whatever it is, start it now.

There are dozens of sites that have already hit critical mass or a meaningful enough scale where you can help build an audience for your content (with the end goal of creating new fans and opportunities). You can do this by being a voice for a certain segment of the community that matches your artistic message or sound. At the very least, your content will all link back to your main website or online profile, thus creating more link juice for you to appear higher up in Google search results. Just remember to be authentic and mean what you say, what you share, and what you believe in. The rest will follow (and hopefully so will the fans).

Cheers.

"Without music, life would be a mistake." - Friedrich Nietzsche 

"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." - Decca Recording Company rejecting the Beatles (1962) 

“When words fail, Music speaks.” - H.C. Anderson 

"One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain." - Bob Marley 

“Music is not a matter of life or death...
It's much more important than that.” - Unknown 

“Play the music, not the instrument.” - Unknown 

"I would rather play Chiquita Banana and have my swimming pool than play Bach and starve." - Xavier Cougat

“Wagner’s music is better than it sounds.” - Mark Twain

“Never look at the trombones, it only encourages them.” - Richard Strauss 

"I think popular music in this country is one of the few things in the twentieth century to have made giant strides in reverse." - Bing Crosby 

“Videos destroyed the vitality of rock and roll. Before that, music said, ‘Listen to me.’ Now it says, ‘Look at me.’” - Billy Joel 

"The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side ..." - Hunter S. Thompson 

"I don't know anything about music, In my line you don't have to." - Elvis Presley 

"There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself." - Johann Sebastian Bach 

"Music is love in search of a voice." - Leo Tolstoy

The audio industry has been abuzz over the latest Red Hot Chili Peppers album, I’m With You, because it has three mastered versions including one made specifically for iTunes. For those who don’t know, iTunes uses an AAC file format that is superior to mp3 but still contains some audio degradation compared to the normal CD format.

Despite the lossy format’s sacrifice in quality, many claim that the AAC format used in iTunes has its own peculiarities that can be sonically interesting. In a NYTimes article back in 2007, Robert Levine described the mastering process for Ry Cooder’s My Name is Buddy and the influence of a supposed iTunes mastering sound:

“When he burned a copy of the album using Apple’s iTunes software, it sounded fine. He didn’t know why until one of his younger engineers told him that the default settings on iTunes apply a ‘sound enhancer.’ (It’s in the preferences menu, under ‘playback.’) Usually, that feature sweetens the sound of digital music files, but Mr. Cooder so liked its effect on his studio recordings that he used it to master — that is, make the final sound mixes — his album. ‘We didn’t do anything else to it,’ he said.”

We are now living in a generation that is being brought up with iPods and iTunes—and that means audio engineers across the world have to make production choices as a consequence of this phenomenon, whether borne out of necessity or choice. Vlado Meller worked on the Red Hot Chili Peppers master with Mark Santangelo at Masterdisk studios. In an interview with Digital Music News, Meller stated that:

“With an iTunes optimized master, the listener will be able to enjoy more clarity and an overall better sound quality than is otherwise currently available… With iTunes optimization during mastering, the AAC files are much closer to the sound of the commercial CD.”

While many audio purists might decry the generation of Apple earbud headphones and degraded audio formats, there is still the hope that technology will usher in an era of new audio formats that do not sacrifice on sonic characteristics in the same way. Right now audio engineers are making the best out of a bad situation, where consumers choose convenience over optimal sound quality. The sacrifice might be worth it for most, but all convenience comes at some price. Hopefully we’ll all be able to have it both ways in the future. Until then, expect more albums like the latest Red Hot Chili Peppers album to get mastered specifically for iTunes and digital downloads. 

Remember that shiny record contract you’ve been salivating over since you were four? What! It’s not coming? The record industry is in shambles? Digital music has taken over?

Now you CAN’T sell out! You have no choice but to make the music YOU wanted. You have no choice but to communicate directly with your listeners, picking up new fans one by one as they dissect the nuances of your unique craft. You have no choice but creativity.

Yes there will be followers. Cookie-cutter remixes of the sound one artists discovers. But it all started with an idea, an extraordinary tone, inflection, nuance, and melody. The start of something new! A signature sound.

The newness will wear off, and the new trend will begin, but the motive is still there. Unbridled freedom of expression! A crowd that will turn away at first glance of selling out. Fragmented music! Dictatorships gone and we are left with a bunch of city-states. Powerful nonetheless, made up of early adopters and distribution fiends. “Share share share” they all cried in unison! Anything short of force-feeding is fine. Cause it’s all good in this game.

It’s all good! Even the bad is good. And if not, it’ll be gone tomorrow! Because why not? Transaction costs are small (and getting smaller), the noise is tough, but we’ll get through it. Cream still rises to the top last time I checked.

TV killed the radio star. Digital killed what was left in its path. Hurry up before the cycle begins again! You have no choice but creativity. 

In the United States, sometimes we all need a little reminder that we live in a place where freedom of speech and freedom of expression are so commonplace that they are second nature. Of course there are instances where lawmakers try to pass laws that inhibit those freedoms, but for the most part, we live in a pretty “free” society.

After reading an update on Ultimate Guitar, I was pleasantly surprised to hear that Nergal, frontman for extreme metal band Behemoth, was found innocent after being arrested for tearing up a Bible on stage at a show in Gdynia in 2007. The concert where Nergal ripped apart a Bible was in his native Poland, where there are strict laws against anti-religious actions that might offend others.

Regarding the verdict, Nergal stated:

"I'm so glad to see intelligence won over religious fanatics in my home country. There's still so much work to be done to make things right, but I'm sure I'm on the path to ultimate freedom… The battle is won but the war ain't over."

Ryszard Nowak, chairman of the Polish Committee for Defense Against Sects, accused Nergal and Behemoth of promoting Satanism. Fortunately Judge Wiechowski sided with Nergal, claiming that no one in the audience was offended by Nergal’s act and that it was a form of artistic expression.

Even in the U.S., some cases slip through the cracks and people go to jail for seemingly minor offenses that don’t warrant serious jail time or significant taxpayer dollars to cover inmate incarceration. Nevertheless, some countries get it wrong most of the time and getting arrested for speaking your mind is not an aberration. Luckily in the U.S. and in many other countries, we are able to judge a piece of art or music based on its quality, no matter how extreme, without the fear of any excessive repercussions. Whenever you add extra filters to what you can or cannot do in society, you water down the culture. The verdict for Nergal is a small bit of liberation for Poland.

“Friends don’t let friends use Apple headphones.”

I’m not sure if that’s an actual phrase by someone other than me, but it’s the statement I’ve lived by since my early years of iPod use. The earbuds that come with iPods never seemed to match the audio fidelity of bigger headphones or smaller noise-canceling earbuds that seem to keep a lot of the pleasant frequencies flowing into my eardrums.

Since I listen to a lot of mp3s and don’t have a vinyl player sitting in my apartment, I’m not sure if you can consider me an audiophile or music snob in the High Fidelity sense (if you haven’t seen this scene with Jack Black and John Cusack, then you need to). However, I’m very particular when it come to my daily portable music player listening experience.

So when I found out that Dr. Dre sold a 51% stake in his audio company Beats Electric for a cool $300 million (read about that here), I thought to myself: “Damn, those must be some nice headphones.” The popular product in Dr. Dre’s audio line is the Beats By Dr. Dre headphones that apparently sell like hotcakes. People still like hotcakes, right?

Question is, is the Dr. Dre name and hype worth the price tag to pay between $100-300 for earbuds or studio headphones? Lady Gaga and other artists also have their own custom headphones as part of Dre’s product line (also at a high cost). The price would be hard to justify for the casual music enthusiast hitting the gym three times a week, and the audio fidelity would have to be exceptional for a studio producer to pay for high-tier products.

Unfortunately I have yet to try the headphones out, so don’t make my skepticism out to be a product review. But I always like to engage the Reddit community with my news posts, and a conversation actually started around Dr. Dre’s headphones (see comments here). While Amazon’s ratings can be quite solid if you have enough data points, you can often find some straight shooters on Reddit telling you the real deal about a product or service without to much hassle. The expected answer to the question was that Dre’s headphones are heavy on the bass and don’t offer too much more in terms of quality than some of your cheaper more run-of-the-mill headphones.

If that’s the case, buying the earbuds for daily use comes down to personal preference and whether you’re willing to fork over the extra money for a popular name attached to a brand. For studio musicians and engineers, they’ll want a flat sound that accurately resembles the frequencies and range of music as they recorded it. I’m not sure if the Beats By Dr. Dre headphones delivers on that end, but I’m sure professional studio engineers don’t want to pay for a name.

Sometimes with name brands you’re actually getting a superior product (as true with sweet-tasting cereals as it is with quality guitar craftsmanship). The company that bought a majority stake in Dr. Dre’s brand, HTC, will use the audio technology for their smartphones. That makes it seem like there’s more to it than just a name, but you never know . However, if a celebrity is attached to a product in any way, you can be sure you’re paying a premium for that product no matter what the product or industry vertical.

In a recent study, Pollstar charted the top grossing US tours for 2011. As you can see in the chart above, older acts are earning the majority of the touring revenue. Digital Music News brought up an interesting question about the future of the music industry: what will the touring industry look like in the near- and long-term? 

Rock bands with deep-pocketed fanbases continue to rake in the big touring money—acts like Bon Jovi, U2, and others never fail to fill the seats. Even if the dynamics of the concert industry always favor older acts with long-standing followings and more disposable income, will the younger generation be able to fill in the gaps in a decade or two when they become the legacy artists? The question then becomes whether the Generation Y audience is a more fickle bunch. We are used to downloading songs off the Internet, putting it on our iPods, and having access to an unlimited amount of music. We’re often exposed to so much but give back so little (in monetary terms, that is).

What might result is a more fragmented system of music and allegiances to artists that won’t last for decades to come. Paul Resnikoff wrote:

“Instead, younger acts are probably making their biggest impact at festivals, a huge growth category that could represent a massive shift in future concert-going (and probably wouldn't be well-represented in this study).”

Younger audiences have the endurance to go to concerts for full-day shows with dozens of acts. The thirst for endless choice in music directly at our fingertips is translating to the concert experience as well—Lollapalooza, Coachella, Electric Zoo Festival, and many other annual events are staples of the younger generation of music listeners.

For the concert industry as a whole, the sum of all its parts might make up for any future shortcomings in legacy acts that bring in large sums of money on an individual basis. Hopefully, younger artists will still be able to make touring work without losing steam as they mature into Generation Y’s future legacy touring acts. 

After somewhat of a riot in downtown Los Angeles at the Electric Daisy Carnival film premiere, sparked in part by a tweet by the famous deejay Kaskade, a couple popular blogs brought up the subject of electronic music becoming the new rock n’ roll for the current generation (those articles can be found here and here). While there are some elements of the rock n’ roll movement of past generations, this electronic music movement has very different cultural implications – while it is easy to see some similarities between the two, this is not a new revival of the “rock n’ roll” mentality and atmosphere of the 1960s and 70s.

As we know from Los Angeles sports events and famous jury case verdicts, LA is prone to rioting and the most recent “riot” is not representative of a broader social movement in the U.S. The electronic music scene, while it has built up steadily in the clubs and festivals over the last several years, is culturally disparate from rock n’ roll. Electronic and deejay music is not a particularly rebellious form of music that fights against the tyranny of war and governments or espouses a counter-culture lifestyle. While some deejays might certainly include political messages in their lyrics, most opt for lyrics centered around a fun, party atmosphere not too unlike pop (although often slightly more nuanced in feeling and intention).

Electronic, house, and dubstep music is gaining mainstream acceptance and is rising in the ranks of music in the same way that rock n’ roll did decades earlier, but its cultural references are fewer, its drugs of choice are much different, and its intentions are to mash up and remix every other genre one can imagine. It is a cultural amalgamation of sorts, and while it might be here to stay in all its hype and glory, it is not your parents’ rock n’ roll and nor should it be.

If you haven’t been living under a music discovery rock for the last month, you’ve probably tried (or at least heard of) the new social music discovery site Turntable.fm. The site allows users to become virtual DJs, where people take turns picking songs from their queue to play to listeners in rooms for specific genres. Everybody has an avatar and the ability to chat with others, fan different “DJs”, and make playlists. A fun idea, though it’s important for casual listeners to distinguish between a DJ who plays their favorite songs all in a row and a DJ who carefully crafts and manipulates songs in new and unique ways. But I digress.

In the never-ending quest for more music, I’m always trying the latest music apps so I can stumble upon a new artist or song that I might come to love. My personal preference for music discovery in the last couple years has been to browse artist profiles on various music social networks, whether that’s on my own site HypedSound or on the various other platforms (SoundCloud, ReverbNation, MySpace, YouTube, etc.). Streaming music websites that have restrictions in terms of song selection, too much advertising, and other limitations never interested me much. I tried out Pandora a couple times but I couldn’t find the consistency in song quality for what I was looking for.

The passive music discovery channel that is Pandora and other streaming sites, that let you press the play button and stop worrying about what song to put on next, never met the quality I was looking for in a more personalized experience. Turntable.fm bridges that gap by letting you discover music alongside like-minded people. For funk, jazz, electronic, and dubstep I found that the songs being played were consistently up-to-par with a song that I wouldn’t press the skip button for on Pandora. If appropriate, it can also skew to the underground or more up-and-coming artists.

What is evident to me now is that the future of music, or at least for the more diehard music fans, is not a passive music discovery channel but a constantly evolving one that allows for a number of different options to discover music within a social environment. While I prefer music websites where artists are the ones broadcasting their music profiles themselves, rather than an algorithm choosing a song from a catalogue or a virtual DJ putting up their favorite tracks, I see the merit in every different type of model.

Turntable.fm offers the intimacy of a social environment with few options for direct-to-artist interaction. Pandora offers simplicity with little of the social factor. HypedSound and similar sites offer more complexity and the ability to reach artists directly, but they require more from the users in terms of interaction and searching. Every platform has its own strengths and weaknesses, but so far, I’ve benefited off of many different models of music discovery.

  credit: William Brawley

Do it Today, not tomorrow or in a week...your website is a leaky bucket if you don’t have a way to follow up with your people.

Article Source: 26 Email Marketing "Hacks" For Musician

Forbes released a list of the 25 highest paid artists of 2010 last week (see below), which got me thinking as to why certain artists make the list on a reoccurring basis. While I normally don’t dwell over lists like this, I came across a question on Quora that made this list even more relevant (side note: Quora is a Q&A site that seems to have hit a stride amongst the techie/early adopter crowd). So what makes U2 perfect for high earning potential?

As the answers on Quora suggest, U2 is able to reinvent themselves throughout their career while still staying true to their core sound. They stick to an environmentally-friendly, socially conscious message that is not too divisive that it alienates a major ethnic or demographic group. There is also a huge market of older fans with deep enough pockets to pay premium prices for greats seats at their concerts.

Daniel Rosenthal, co-founder of Exercise.com, put it this way (and in narrative form): 

“Earnest, melodic, Oprah-endorsed U2! $200 a ticket? No problem. You get a sitter. Your wife is excited – this is going to be great! You invite some friends from college to join you. On the way, you listen to the “early stuff”. Joshua Tree pumps through the speakers of your Lexus SUV (no judgment - you have two kids!). The harmonies soothe. The lyrics are straightforward.”

The complete answer can be read here and is worth an entire read if you enjoy humorous, somewhat cynical but 100% dead-on commentary.

And who is after U2? It’s Bon Jovi, a less adventurous artist in terms of sonic exploration, but just as appropriate in terms of pinpointing that ideal age and demographic that will not only come to a show but also shell out the big bucks for the experience.

Of course you’ll get newcomers on the list when they hit it big for a stint or two, like Justin Bieber or Rihanna, but to make it to the Top 25 on an ongoing basis for years or even decades, you need a degree of predictability in music. The ability to keep pumping out radio-friendly hits without crossing the border into stale, boring, or even worse outdated is key. There seems to be a happy medium between taking risks and staying true to what the broader mainstream audience wants. If you can make sure that your songs are just as catchy as they were 20 years ago, then at least you do not have to rely 100% on the “nostalgia act” (ahem ahem, Margaritaville).

Forbes’ list of the world's 25 highest-paid musicians:

01. U2 ($195 million)

02. BON JOVI ($125 million)

03. Elton John ($100 million)

04. Lady Gaga ($90 million)

05. Michael Buble ($70 million)

06. Paul McCartney ($67 million)

07. BLACK EYED PEAS ($61 million)

08. EAGLES ($60 million)

09. Justin Bieber ($53 million)

10. Dave Matthews Band ($51 million)

11. Toby Keith ($50 million)

12. Usher ($46 million)

13. Taylor Swift ($45 million)

14. Katy Perry ($44 million)

15. Brad Paisley ($40 million)

16. Tom Petty & the Heartbreaks ($38 million)

17. Jay-Z ($38 million)

18. AC/DC ($35 million)

19. Sean "Diddy" Combs ($35 million)

20. Beyonce ($35 million)

21. Tim McGraw ($35 million)

22. MUSE ($35 million)

23. Rascal Flatts ($34 million)

24. Kenny Chesney ($30 million)

25. Rihanna ($29 million)

by Jonathan Jaeger

This weekend I came across a Business Insider article that described why buying Pandora stock doesn’t make financial sense. The key takeaways? More listeners are using Pandora on mobile, which in turn hurts ad rates, Pandora won’t be making much money on ads anyway, and the costs of paying music royalties are getting higher and are eating away half of Pandora’s revenue. The outlook is bleak and as music label royalty rates increase through 2015, and possibly beyond, one can only imagine the difficulties lying ahead for Pandora to turn a profit.

As Hypebot pointed out in a recent post, analyst Rich Greenfield of BTIG had some sobering remarks regarding the impending Pandora IPO:

“As consumers we love Pandora. It is free, incredibly easy-to-use, works across a growing array of platforms in/out-of-home, and has a de minimis amount of advertising compared to terrestrial radio…Investing in Pandora is a whole different story. While Pandora is creating a large active user base, its reach/frequency continues to pale in comparison to terrestrial radio, as does its profitability….We recommend investors do not participate in the Pandora IPO.”

Ouch! With every article I come across, people question the future of Pandora and its ability for financial success. They almost went under in 2007 and we don’t know what’s in store in the coming years. While there is still the possibility that Pandora finds its way into more devices and even into every new car, there are no guarantees that Pandora will be able to penetrate the market to the extent it needs in order to become a profiting juggernaut.

This disconnect between the love people have for the product and its ability to monetize is a problem faced by many digital companies in recent years. Facebook struck gold with their ad platform and other strictly online sites have been able to succeed off a freemium model (meaning free for most users with the premium, paid accounts carrying the financial burden for the rest). Unfortunately for Pandora, not enough users are willing to pay $36 per year for a premium account to make the freemium model work on a large scale.

For many digital companies, if you build a compelling enough product then you can expect a small but meaningful percentage of your users to pay to use it. By allowing people to try it your product for free and only upgrade if they want premium features, you can build a large enough userbase while still getting enough loyal subscribers on the premium side. With Pandora, on the other hand, the users tend to be listeners who are passively listening rather than engaging in multiple ways (as you would find on other more social sites). Most listeners expect music to be free and don’t gain much utility from the product otherwise, so it’s harder to get them to pay when they can look elsewhere for music (Grooveshark, Spotify, etc.).

The lesson from all of this: no matter how many people love and use your product, you don’t have a guaranteed road to financial success unless you can find a model that works for both the company and its users. With Pandora fighting an uphill battle against increasing royalties and content costs, the future remains shaky. Until then, many will probably hold off on purchasing Pandora’s stock when IPO time rolls around. Of course in a hot market like we’re in right now, many won’t be able to resist.

Sky News recently posted an article explaining AC/DC’s firm stance on online downloading and how the legendary rock group would never allow their songs to be available for download.

Says guitarist Angus Young:

"I know the Beatles have changed but we’re going to carry on like that... For us it’s the best way. We are a band who started off with albums and that’s how we’ve always been… We always were a band that if you heard something (by AC/DC) on the radio, well, that’s only three minutes. Usually the best tracks were on the albums."

It’s interesting to note that AC/DC’s stance on making music available for download is based on the idea that they want their listeners to hear the album all the way through from beginning to end. While this makes perfect sense if you’re listening to Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, a concept album, or any progressive rock band, AC/DC’s music strikes me more as the short rock single that makes for a perfect radio spot.

Either this hard-line position on legal online downloading signifies a severe lack of economic judgment and willful ignorance to the way the music world currently operates or it represents a principle that the band wants to keep at any cost. Prince claimed that “the Internet’s completely over” in what appeared to be a streak of sheer stupidity. AC/DC, on the other hand, might be less afraid of technology and are just purists when it comes to the consumption of their music. Obviously they know that many people will just download their music illegal anyway, but they prefer to remain steadfast nonetheless out of respect for themselves and the music they created.

On the other hand, I think an artist should pick their battles and this doesn’t seem like a battle that needs to be fought. People who buy AC/DC albums the conventional way, in a store or online and in CD form, will often listen to the music on a track-by-track basis with no adherence to song order or album flow. For something as commonplace as an iTunes store or other online download location, AC/DC could be raking in a lot more money while providing their fans and would-be fans a convenient way to consume their music without resorting to illegal measures. At the very least, that appears to be the courteous thing to do in the current music industry climate and in a time where everyone carries around their iPod or smartphone to download and listen to music.

On an ambitious, multi-leg concert tour, the celebrated UK singer-songwriter gets intimate with his fans.

BY NICOLE ROBERGE

I meet up with David Gray backstage in his dressing room at The Wang Theatre in Boston, Massachusetts - the first stop on his "Lost and Found" tour. (The newest U.S. leg will resume in late June; go here for tour dates.) Different than his typical shows, where the set list embodies both rock and quieter songs, the focus of these shows is more intimate, with an emphasis on his most recent album, "Foundling," and stripped down and acoustic versions of songs off his other albums.  It is, he says, different than anything he's ever done before.

When I walk into the dressing room, Gray is sitting on the couch, scribbling in a notebook.  His tour manager leaves us alone and he immediately welcomes me to sit down, and then shows me what he has been writing.  Sprawled across two pages are the titles of songs from all of his albums that he hopes to cram into a two hour set-list.  As a special treat for this tour, he provided fans the opportunity to write in and request songs to be played, and he is trying to accommodate all of them.  The response he got was surprising. 

"It was quite moving," he says.  "I got 156 different songs requested, which is an awful lot and we can't do all of them.  Some of them were so obscure that I don't know what they were.  They were barely written, some of them I don't think I've ever performed.  I think it's fans trying to outdo each other.  I'm going to try and do as many as I can.  Some off my first album, ‘Shine,' and many I play quite regularly anyway.  There were some crazy requests for covers.  A Doors song.  And there are memories attached to each song.  This tour is very much about trying to do justice to the album I just released, ‘Foundling,' which I didn't think would be as tactile if we played it in the usual way. It seemed to just be quieter.  The whole volume of the show tonight will be much quieter than the usual rock show.  But in representing this new music, I'm also going to be taking a giant sweep of my music from the beginning so it's probably the most in-depth tour of all the records I've released and the music I've made, which is great.  I've given myself two hours tonight.  An hour and a half is a normal set, to go over that I wouldn't always do.  But with this, I don't know how to fit it in otherwise."

Read the rest of the interview at http://blurt-online.com/features/view/877/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By IAN MOORE

I could tell you the story about the night I slept in a bloody bed from a murder the night before (the hotel manager had simply flipped the mattress over).

I could tell you about the night when our song "Muddy Jesus" (the closest thing El Paso had seen to an homage since Marty Robbins) caused us to be mobbed on a seemingly quiet night in Juarez, and a mob morphed our vaguely exciting identity to a much more thrilling one – Pearl Jam, over the course of a few hours. We narrowly escaped before evading the head of the biggest drug cartel in Mexico, who wanted to pull us into a multi-day, locked-door party where we would be the "guests of honor," of course not allowed to leave until he declared the fiesta over.

I could tell you some juicy, fucked up stories, but I would rather rest my road-weary brain and simply wrap it around the 20+ years of touring haze to tell you about the most brilliant, fucked up thing I have ever done: sing in a rock 'n' roll band.

Being in a rock band is like permanently being a senior in high school waiting for college to start. An endless summer of reckless abandon, ambitious half-formed plans, and the promise of something much more grand in the coming Fall that never quite materializes. Short-term glory buttressed by seemingly endless stretches of monotony and indecision.

I watched as my friends grew up and seemingly went through adult-forming school. They adopted different, mostly healthier, habits, and faded into a gentler phase filled with adult conversations that seem formed and appropriate for our age. Meanwhile I was stuck in endless conversations about why The Teardrop Explodes matter (or don't), why ironic dress and facial coif had its place until a couple of years ago, and other forays into the minutia of pop culture that truly should be mainstay thought for an 18-year-old, but are more suspect when calling 30-year-old friends "kid" and still chasing down your bartender friends for free drinks.

Being in a band is a youthful endeavor. It is amazing to look out onto a packed room filled with attractive people who believe that music can change the world. Unfortunately I believe the same thing as well? When do you get the mailer that actually explains what the 'grown ups' are supposed to really think? When do I get the insight that allows me to stop being so idealistic and cash in on the collective sins of our species? I'm stuck in this fountain of youth and it stinks of urine and folly. The kids are splashing around, oblivious to anything but the importance of their play in the cultural waters, long fouled and drained of meaning, each waterfall smaller than the one before until the final drip is sliding out of the concrete orifice of some suburban kid with X-ray vision specs that say "Google".

Speaking of fucked up, what is it with drummers? Am I the only one who finds it ironic that the very person that we rely on for meter and time is completely incapable of simply showing up at the same time that all other adults can? Of all of my drummers, and there have been many, I can think of only one person who was capable of actually showing up at the time he said, and he quickly got out of drumming and started trying to save the world by selling eco building products to yuppies who needed a slight hedge to hide their rabid consumerism.

If I had any sense I would have bought a stopwatch years ago so I could keep a running tally of time wasted to gripe about in the golden years. I do believe in irrefutable truths. I believe that humans are inherently good and that we are all capable of change. Consequently I am repeatedly dumbfounded as our drummer saunters towards the van, elegantly smoking, and seemingly troubled by nothing, a good 30 minutes after our said departure time, as we wait outside his house in complete awe.

I keep waiting for this phase where I am bestowed some flowing robe of knowledge and my acolytes surround me being filled by my vast musical knowledge and discourses on integrity. I see that Willie Nelson has released his book The Tao of Willie and is being considered for Sainthood by the Catholic Church, who are willing to look past his phenomenal marijuana consumption. Meanwhile I am stuck in this half-form, not able to speak of my rock 'n' roll exploits lest I sound like a braggart, but considered smug and distant if I stay tightlipped when my younger friends educate me on their new cultural bounty – a bounty that we pawned many years ago to lighten the load.

Excuse me. Didn't mean to sound bitter. Now, that's fucked up. I can't think of anything cooler than playing in a rock 'n' roll band.

Did I mention heavy metal soundmen?

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By SHUNDA K.

The most fucked up thing I have ever seen is how parents verbally and emotionally abuse their children, which leads to low self-esteem and insecurity, which can turn into teens harming themselves and contemplating suicide.

Abuse is any behavior that is designed to control and subjugate another human being through the use of fear, humiliation, intimidation, guilt, coercion, manipulation, etc. Emotional abuse is any kind of abuse that is emotional rather than physical in nature. It can include anything from verbal abuse and constant criticism to more subtle tactics, such as repeated disapproval or even the refusal to ever be pleased.

Emotional abuse is like brain washing in that it systematically wears away at the victim's self-confidence, sense of self-worth, trust in their own perceptions, and self-concept. Whether it is done by constant berating and belittling, by intimidation, or under the guise of "guidance," "teaching", or "advice," the results are similar. Eventually, the recipient of the abuse loses all sense of self and remnants of personal value. Emotional abuse cuts to the very core of a person, creating scars that may be far deeper and more lasting than physical ones. In fact there is research to this effect. With emotional abuse, the insults, insinuations, criticism and accusations slowly eat away at the victim's self-esteem until they are incapable of judging the situation realistically. The person becomes so beaten down emotionally that they blame themselves for the abuse. Their self-esteem is so low that they cling to the abuser.

Emotionally abused victims can become so convinced that they are worthless that they believe that no one else could want them. They stay in abusive situations because they believe they have nowhere else to go. Their ultimate fear is being all alone.

I can relate so much to this and have endured much emotional, even physical abuse at the hands of my grandmother, growing up as a kid. My grandparents raised me because my mom was strung out on drugs and my dad was around only when he had time, which was very rare.

I'm not sure why my grandmother was so harsh to me, but the only conclusion that I could draw, now that I'm all grown up, is that she was raised the very same way. She has told me many stories about how her parents raised her and her siblings and how they never had a chance to go to school or have a childhood because they had to work in the fields from sun up to sun down.

My grandmother came up during the time of sharecropping (where former slaves used the land of former slave masters to farm in return for 50% of the crop), so they never had a life outside of work. And, with my grandmother, I believe there was much resentment and animosity built up due to these facts, and so, what other way to express herself aside from the way she was raised and brought up.

I can remember many times being cussed out because I was on the phone all day or wanted to go somewhere. During my childhood, I was always into athletics and, when it came time to be picked up from practice, I had to walk home many nights because grandma felt like it was a waste of time.

Once a person inflicts verbal and emotional abuse for so long, the next thing will be physical abuse. My grandmother didn't mind beating my ass and would use anything she could get her hands on. I was genuinely afraid of my grandmother and always sought to please her, but it seemed like the more I tried the less she was satisfied.

What finally pushed me over the edge and made me leave the situation was when I graduated from high school (with honors may I add) after being told I would never be shit. I earned an academic and athletic scholarship to college.

One day I came home and my grandmother always had a thing of opening everybody's' mail. On this particular day, my grandfather gave me an envelope from my financial aid that had been opened and my check cashed (my name was on my grandmother's bank account so she could cash checks in my name, etc.). With my money, they went to the dog track and spent my damn money gambling.

After everything I had to endure coming up in school, with no support, after all the hard work I had put into being who I had become, they felt like they could just cash my check and give me the excuse that they've been raising me all these years and so I shouldn't have shit to say about what they do with my money. That was all I needed to step out on faith and keep it moving.

In my life, I had always felt alone. I was terrorized in school because I didn't have the name brand clothes and with no support at home, when it came to everything I aspired to do, I had to do it on my own. Of course, it was a very lonely road, but if I didn't do it for myself, no one else was going to.

So, I'm here today, standing strong, though my faith in God, to let each and every one of you know that you too can make it out of any drought you find yourself in. Life is worth living and just because someone is in your life, making it a living hell, that's no reason to end it.

As I mentioned before, it's hard to leave an abusive relationship, but if you don't, the consequences could very much be death. You have to encourage yourself and keep it moving no matter how hard it may seem.

To be free is definitely a gift from God and if you're dealing with people in your life that are only tolerating you and not celebrating you, you need to stand up to them (give them a piece of your mind) and keep it moving to a healthier environment, even if you have to stay in a shelter.

Now and days, my relationship with my grandmother is a strong one because I stood up to her and let her know that she wasn't going to talk to me like that anymore. It took me a few times saying this, because any habit is hard to break. But, she now recognizes me as a human being that she is no greater than.

In conclusion, God is love and no matter whom you are and where you've been in your life, the people you surround yourself with need to exhibit this love. Life is what you make it. Take charge of your life and love yourself enough to accept nothing less than the best!

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Jason Reece

Yeah, Hawaii doesn't seem to like the place to have a seedy underbelly. It's a paradise for fuck's sake. Big Island tropical fever madness strikes deep in the back wood boonies. Meth heads growing weed, burned out hippies living the dream gone wrong and pissed off Hawaiians mad at the "fucking Ha'ole's " who stole their land. The tourist brochures never covered that part. I lived in a half-built house with no electricity, no running water, out in the middle of a rain forest, far from the main city of Hilo. This was a drenched and beautiful place, but we were bored poor fuckers living off the land, off the grid, looking for something more.

At my friend Ani's house getting ready to go to some shitty high school dance. Heavy metal blasting out of the speakers – Judas Priest's "Hell Bent for Leather" was our jam. There's nothing like smoking some strong-ass bud straight from your backyard garden and killing a bottle of some shit whiskey before hitting the high school function. There was nothing to do but this.

It was time to walk a few blocks to our friend's house, whose parents would drive our license-less asses to the dance. We needed to get some air and composure to face them, so the walk – we thought – would do use some good. It was drizzling and very quiet as we hit the street. Several loud pops destroyed the eerie silence. We thought that was strange, but continued on as if it was nothing. As we turned on to a more populated block, we could see a man on the ground. His head was blown off; his brains were all over the street. People started coming out of their houses to see what the commotion was as police sirens blared in the distance. We were stunned to see a real murder, a violent death that happened within blocks of our homes and our slow-motion Hawaiian existence.

We started laughing, and kept laughing, as we ran to our friend's house. It was the only emotion that I could express because it was so fucking crazy and real. I had never seen a dead person; this was my first and it was a fucked up as it gets. I found out later that it was a dispute over a drug deal. They caught the murderer immediately and he was high as shit on meth. We headed to the dance to tell the all our friends. Curiosity ensued as all of our friends wanted to see the murder scene. They wanted to see where it all happened.

We left the dance at around 10 pm. We decided to meet at Ani's place because his folks didn't give him a curfew, or didn't really care. Some of us had to sneak out. A group of five trudged through some cold rain sipping on Old Crow whiskey. There were no street lights and the dark wet added to the creepiness of the adventure. The flashlights guided us to 4th and Hamakua St. where the deed was done.

We could see the chalk lines fading in the rain. The outline of the unlucky soul. We then saw his fucking brains still on the grass and pavement! What the fuck? The police just let that shit slide. They hardly cleaned the scene up. There were skull fragments everywhere, and a bunch of [us] giddy children jabbering away about how fucking weird it was. This dude was there, alive, hours ago – and now his head was blown the fuck off. Death became very real to me that night.

We ran away again, howling like dogs down the dark, rain-soaked road, trying to kid ourselves that death was a joke and that we were never going to die. It seemed all too wrong for a kid to see this, but there it was. It could happen anywhere, I guess.

Aloha 'Oe, dead guy. Aloha 'Oe.

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By TYLER PARKFORD

Birds have always fucked me up. I remember a pigeon exploded in my face once when I was 10.

I used to hang with a bunch of kids at this little burger joint in Long Beach near a busy highway. There were always tons of birds trying to steal our french fries. Everyone would try to throw food in the street to see how close the birds would get to the oncoming traffic. None of them were stupid enough to take a chance. They'd always scramble away to safety at the last minute.

Weeks went by and nobody got even close to killing one of them. I always would just watch. One day they all threatened to squash my cheeseburger if I didn't participate. I threw a piece of fried zucchini in the street just as this huge truck was approaching. A pigeon flew over to grab it but accidentally tripped on something and exploded under the front wheels of this truck. All I saw was a gust of feathers shoot out at my face and this low-frequency "pop" sound like a handgun. I guess that was the sound of all the air in the bird's lungs getting rapidly pushed out.

When the feathers cleared we looked down at our burgers and saw that they were covered in bird guts. One of my friends started to cry but everyone else thought it was funny. For the rest of that day I was completely mortified and didn't say a word.

That night I woke up in a sweat and ran to my parent's room. I told them I couldn't go to sleep since I'd killed a bird. My dad told me to put on my clothes and get in the car. We drove to where the pigeon exploded and he gave me an empty pizza box. The bird was completely flat by now.

"Scrape it off the street, Tyler."

I had to peel the thing slowly off the asphalt with my little fingers and put it in the box. It smelled like tires and grass and looked like a feathered football that just got deflated.

"This used to be alive 'til you blew it up, Tyler. I want you to put your hand on it and think about what you did."

Cars whizzed by and strangers slowed down to see what I was doing. After a few minutes my dad took the bird away from me and I threw up all over his sneakers.

That was the first bird flu. The second didn't happen 'til years later when I was in high school. There was this new kid who didn't talk a lot and was kind of a jerk to anyone who tried to befriend him. It was a boarding school so everybody stayed in their rooms and had to sleep, eat, play and shit during specific times. One day I found this dead pigeon in the bushes and put it under the guy's bed sheets when he was out taking a shower. It was after "lights-out" and I heard him screaming at the top of his lungs: "Who did this?!"

I walked outside and saw that this kid was completely naked and pounding on everybody's doors holding this dead bird. He came up to me and I could see that he was crying. "Did you put a bird in my bed? Did you put a bird in my bed? Did you put a bird in my bed?"

He kept saying it like he was in a trance. I told him I didn't and he just walked on to the next room. I think he transferred later that year. To this day I wish I had the balls to apologize to him or at least put a face on such a horrible gag.

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By JEFFREY CAIN

Years ago my band and I packed up our belongings and left our home of Alabama to record an album out West. We spent several months secluded in a house on the outskirts of Santa Rosa, California where we would rehearse, write, and record day and night. Occasionally we would make our way into town to attempt being social and to clear our minds with a good late night drink. Our local haunt was a small bar in the basement of the old Belvedere Hotel. The Pixies, GBV, or The Wedding Present would usually be playing on the jukebox and the bartender would start pouring your favorite drink as soon as you walked in the door.

The night I saw the most fucked up thing I've ever seen was an ordinary night. My friend and I arrived at the bar just at closing time, yet we somehow talked them into letting us throw down one whisky. As we drank our nightcap a young girl approached us. She seemed to know we weren't ready to go home and suggested we walk her home and come up for a drink.

Without a second thought we found ourselves walking through the foggy streets, up some stairs and into her small bare apartment. I have no memory of any details of the apartment, maybe a bike in the corner of the room, a futon, a stack of books. She poured us a drink and we sat down on the hardwood floor then asked, 'Do you mind if I play my drum?' Of course not, please... we'd love to hear you play.

Within a few moments she had found a small hand drum with some kind of skin pulled over it, rested it between here legs and started to lightly tap a loose rhythm. The beat was so faint, it hardly kept my attention at first. My eyes and thoughts wandered for the next several minutes, then I noticed something had changed. Her beat became very steady, her head hung low, and her body was deathly still except for her hands which moved as if they were no longer attached to her body.

Not a word was said between us as the beat grew louder and with more authority, I could feel it straight in my chest. The pulse of my heart was now the drums... and the pattern she played became more and more intricate. I had never heard such a complex beat, I was amazed, I was entranced, and I was becoming scared. Losing my breath, I tried to break this hypnotic pull I felt. Her hands continued to play as her head hung down. Suddenly I knew I was beginning to lose control, something was taking over me. Was this really happening?

I turned to my friend to see if this was all just in my mind. I will never forget how pale he looked, paralyzed with fear and unable to utter a single word. Like trying to wake out of an awful dream, I finally broke through the heaviness that had taken hold of me and screamed, "Who are you? Who are you?"

The hands stopped and the room was finally quiet. She raised her head, every the muscle in her face had dropped. I was staring deep into the eyes of a two thousand year old Chinese man.

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Amy Speace

Bangkok, June 2000. My younger brother Matt was living in Southeast Asia and invited me to come visit to trek around for a month. We had no set itinerary, just a desire to see Vietnam and Cambodia and the Thai islands and have an adventure.

A few weeks and a 17-hour flight later, I was walking down Kao San Road in Bangkok, looking for the café my brother said I'd find him in. It was very The Beach: a road that seemed to be the gateway to the backpacker trail of hippies and ravers and dropouts and walkabouts, a steaming, humid pavement that reeked of pot and piss lined with outdoor cafés filled with hippies and ravers and dropouts and walkabouts making plans, waiting on visas, drinking morning beers with their banana pancakes.

I heard my name called amidst the steaming throngs and turned to see my brother sitting casually at a café, waving, just as he'd told me. He held up two chilled beers. I was bleary and tired after the long flight, but he'd had the day planned well, from the beers to the two-hour Thai massage to the temple tour to dinner to a late-night hang on a road called Soi Cowboy.

I'd heard rumors of this place – the red light district. Although I'm a fairly well-mannered folk singer, I've been to a few strip clubs with friends. I've had friends who stripped to make rent, or to pay for law school. I'd seen the lap dances, smelled the cocoa butter, wondered about the law of gravity when flinging triple-D's around an oily pole. So it didn't creep me out – too much – to go see a Thai strip club with my little brother. We hopped a rickshaw that darted through the chaos of Bangkok nightlife. The creep factor crept in when the rickshaw driver leaned back and said in his broken English, "You want go see sex show? Girls fucking donkeys. You want?"

Um. No. Ew.

I was surprised that this district seemed rather civilized, less like the seedy street I envisioned. More like Bourbon or Beale Street. There were clusters of post-college backpackers with the boys trying to seem cool and girls giggling and well-dressed elderly older couples, out on date night, and junked out single men, leaning into the alleys, in torn military fatigues, a cliché from a 70's film. Beautiful Thai women stood at the club entrances like carnival barkers, "Nice naked ladies inside. Come in. You like?"

Matt and I chose one at random, lured in by the lack of cover charge and the need to get out of the Bangkok steam, a humidity that clings to you like syrup. We took seats at the bar, a large semi circle stage with two gold poles at either end and two bikini-clad women working the bar. Red velvet curtains, clean lounge, black leather barstools, the dark club lit by purple and blue neon, like a mid-high range corporate strip joint in NYC. Not Joe's Topless in Newark. We ordered drinks and the show began.

It started slow and, to my experience, normal. Pole dancing, choreographed erotica, G-strings with paper money tucked in like flags at the hip. Then a girl, completely naked and shaved, sat down, spread her high-heeled legs wide and proceeded to slowly pull a long string tied with what looked like little Koosh balls out of her vagina. I shifted a bit uncomfortably. The next girl sat down and pulled a similar string, but tied with razor blades.

I squinted, shifted and crossed my own legs. Drank another beer. Looked to my brother, who said, "Just wait." This went on, and alongside the women who pulled long strings out of their ya-ya's were the women who shot bullseyes with darts, launched ping-pong balls at customers, sucked on cigarettes and blew smoke rings out of their nether regions. This was impressive. This was no NYC strip club.

But then, the piece de resistance came. I was unprepared.

A woman danced out, naked, and shimmied over to the bartender, who placed one of those old-fashioned bottles of Coca-Cola on the dance floor next to the pole. The dancer stood above the bottle, legs parted, and pliéd seductively over it, teasing it with the lips of her bread box, up and down, side to side. Then, in one move, she grabbed the bottle with her hoo-hoo (No. Hands.), flipped herself upside-down on the pole, and drained the soda into her shoo-fly pie.

The patrons clapped and shouted, slapping their hands on the dance floor. I was aghast, and laughing, probably a bit drunk at this point. The dancer righted herself, placed the empty bottle down (again: No. Hands.) and twirled up and down the runway. Not a drop escaped.

The bartender then placed another bottle down. Jack Daniels. Next to the pole. The dancer again shook it on over and did her thing. The crowd went bat-shit wild as she chugged the entire bottle with her watusi. Once more, she flipped herself upright and danced down the runway.

My jaw scraped the tabletop as my brother laughed himself to tears. The crowd cheered. I was dazed, confused, a bit freaked out, and yet I couldn't take my eyes off her. Again: nothing drained out. She held that shit inside of her.

I thought I heard my brother say, again, "Oh, no. Wait for it."

The bartender took bids from the crowd like farmers at a pig auction. An Australian man won, and plopped his money down. The dancer was shaking her groove thing, stirring up the booze in her coochie. Mr. Oz frothed at the mouth while the bartender produced a glass of clinking ice cubes and placed it in front of the big winner. The dancer strutted over to Winning Bidder, gave him a flirty look, did a fifth-position plié over the glass and peed out a Jack & Coke. Winning Bidder raised the glass high to the cheering crowd and downed the drink in one gulp, slamming the glass upside down on the floor to a wolf-rabid crowd. The dancer kissed him full on the mouth, licked her lips, smiled and left the dance floor to a well-deserved standing ovation.

And that is the last time I ever need to step foot in a strip club.

Check out these screenshots and read them from the bottom up so they make sense. 

Exhibit 1 - Lawyer e-mails and proof it was just the other Relik
Exhibit 2 - MySpace tough guy trying to convince me his lawyer is real
Exhibit 3 - The other Relik's friend tries to convince that his lawyers are real.

I'm not an emcee, but I decided to make a quick beat and do a 16 bar diss in his own element. He has not battled back.

soundcloud.com/relik/the-real-relik

First Aid 4 Souls – Deathstep -2011- (Electro Arc Label) Germany

EAN Code:    4050486040898
Catalog No.: 1001019
Release date: April, 2011
Label: Electro Arc
Genre: Electronic
Style: Electro, Industrial
Cover Art: Gábor
All music by: István Gazdag

Tracklist

01 You Are In A Box
02 Among Strangers
03 No More Smile
04 Agony
05 The Watchman's Circle I
06 Lifeforce
07 Sekuhara
08 House Harkonnen
09 Notes From Underground
10 Wrong Call To God
11 No Mercy (Cybertears Mix)
12 Seelenlos (Deathstep Version)
13 The Watchman's Circle II
14 Soulscape
15 The End Of Culture

Singers:
Katalin Helfenbein, Aaron Russell (Impurfekt),
Mark Duffield (I Am One), Mir Colon (Kifoth), 
David Konsiczky, Istvan Gazdag

Everyone is talking about the „generation facebook"; a movement which
expresses its protest, anger, and even its battle not only on the streets but
in particular by using the new electronic media.

Following this movement, FA4S contributes the adequate soundtrack
with their new album „Deathstep".

The new release is even more aggressive, compared to their last one, „Brutpop".

It is obvious that FA4S has a lot to say.

Doomsday-watch shows 5 to 12 ,the civilisation is approaching abysm and
hence its death.

But, it's not too late. Gloomy is the scenery, indicating a possible futur between
value-deteriaration and pseudo mass-entertainment. Daunting and not at all beautiful.
With aggressive rythms and distorted vocals FA4S wants to awake us from the
tawdry TV entertainment.

Atmospherical sounds with elements of ethno-rythm, classical strings and samples
from computer games and SciFi-Effects. Make „Deathstep" not only being mainly
EBM orientated, but also offering elements of a radio drama.

Combining creative potential from american, english, german, slovakian, hungarian
and japanese musicians FA4S sets new priorities and emphasizes a multicultural project.

FA4S are angry about the threatening deteriaration of our planet and mankind.
Angry enough to even not shy away from heavy „punk-attacks" in conjunction with EBM
and industrial sounds on their new release „Deathstep.

On the other hand FA4S remain truly with their unique feature of soul and feeling within
electronical sounds , which is expressed even more in their detailed and atmospherical
arrangements , sounds and samples, as in their vocals and extremly danceable rythms.

„Deathstep" ist the musical basis and last emotional rebellion of the so called
„generation facebook". A foundation where they finally find their own music, the sound
for the streets, the internet and their clubs. Considering the generation of bloggers,
the cultural superstructur is quite intelligent. By all means eloquent, they claim to be
influenced by Kafka, Dostojewski and Lovecraft

Deathstep is a fighting dance performed by musicians who won't dismiss this world
without resistance. It is loud, tempting, emotional and atmospherical.

Let's fight together with FA4S , it makes awful lot of fun.

i

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Blurt Staff

Between the summer of 1966 and early 1967, The Beach Boys recorded, in several sessions, a bounty of songs and drafts for an album, SMiLE, that was intended to follow the band's 1966 masterpiece, Pet Sounds. The sessions were ultimately shelved, and The Beach Boys' SMiLE has never been released. With the full participation of original Beach Boys Al Jardine, Mike Love, and Brian Wilson, Capitol/EMI has collected and compiled the definitive collection, 'The SMiLE Sessions,' for worldwide release this year in multiple physical and digital configurations.

The SMiLE Sessions presents an in-depth overview of The Beach Boys' recording sessions for the enigmatic album, which has achieved legendary, mythical status for music fans around the world. The SMiLE Sessions will be released in 2CD and digital album packages and a deluxe, limited edition box set.

Co-produced by Mark Linett and Alan Boyd, all of The SMiLE Sessions' physical and digital configurations will include an assembled album of core tracks, while the box set delves much deeper into the sessions, adding early song drafts, alternate takes, instrumental and vocals-only mixes, and studio chatter. The SMiLE Sessions invites the listener into the studio to experience the album's creation, with producer, singer and bassist Brian Wilson's vision leading the way as he guides his fellow Beach Boys, singer Mike Love, drummer Dennis Wilson, lead guitarist Carl Wilson, rhythm guitarist Al Jardine, and newest member Bruce Johnston (who'd replaced Brian Wilson in the touring group during 1965), through the legendary sessions.

"I'm thrilled that The Beach Boys' original studio sessions for SMiLE will be released for the first time, after all these years," says Brian Wilson. "I'm looking forward to this collection of the original recordings and having fans hear the beautiful angelic voices of the boys in a proper studio release."

"One of my favorite songs from the SMiLE sessions is 'Wonderful'," says Mike Love. "The song truly lives up to its title, as do many of the tracks on SMiLE. Cousin Brian was at his creative peak during those sessions. I'm unaware of anything that comes close in pop music."

"I recently played some of my personal acetates from the SMiLE sessions and they held up really well," says Al Jardine. "We would come home from touring and go straight into the studio to record. Brian couldn't wait to show us his latest ideas. We were recording SMiLE and Pet Sounds material simultaneously, so the tracks and vocals all have the same great quality. Most of the vocals were done at Columbia Studios in Hollywood, across the street from Western Studios, where most of the tracking was done."

"For me, it's always been about the way Brian Wilson brilliantly composed and 'voiced' his amazing chord progressions and melodies," says Bruce Johnston. "SMiLE really made me smile!"

"Personally, I loved it," the late Carl Wilson said in 1994 of the SMiLE sessions (from the Don Was-directed documentary, Brian Wilson: I Just Wasn't Made For These Times).

"In my opinion it makes Pet Sounds stink - that's how good it is," the late Dennis Wilson told a journalist in 1966 of the planned SMiLE album.

What Brian Wilson brought to the table, in his effort to maintain The Beach Boys' position among the top rock 'n' roll bands of the day, was beyond what anyone could have expected. Beginning with "Good Vibrations," then into SMiLE, Wilson had begun to construct songs in a modular form, crafting individual sections that would later be edited together to form a coherent whole. In several intense bursts of creative energy, Wilson, drawing on the talents of the finest studio musicians in Los Angeles and utilizing the best studio facilities available on any given day, laid down dozens and dozens of musical fragments, all designed to fit together in any number of possible combinations. No one had done this in pop music, and Wilson had just created "Good Vibrations," The Beach Boys' best-selling record in a long string of hits, by using this method. His next endeavor would be an album-length version of this unique and luxurious songwriting parlance: SMiLE.

In 1965, Brian Wilson had met an up-and-coming session keyboard player and songwriter, Van Dyke Parks. Noticing Parks' conversational eloquence, Wilson felt that he could help to volley The Beach Boys' songwriting into the wave of broader-messaged and socially-conscious rock 'n' roll that would come to define the '60s. They were soon collaborating on keynote songs for SMiLE, including "Heroes and Villains," the band's follow-up single to "Good Vibrations." Wilson and Parks would also co-write "Surf's Up," "Vegetables," "Cabin Essence," "Do You Like Worms," "Wonderful," "Wind Chimes," and other bits and pieces of the SMiLE tapestry. Parks also introduced Beat-Pop artist Frank Holmes to create album sleeve art and a booklet interpreting the album's James Joyce-mode lyrics.

The reason SMiLE did not see a release in early 1967 had more to do with back room business that obscured the creative side of the program than anything else. In late 1966, The Beach Boys formed Brother Records, initially to produce outside artists. Soon, however, The Beach Boys would become embroiled in a court action with Capitol Records with the goal to become the top-selling artists on their self-owned, independent label. The group withheld "Heroes and Villains" and announced they would instead release "Vegetables" - recorded with the band's own money in April of '67 - on Brother Records. By July of 1967, Capitol Records and The Beach Boys had come to terms, with Capitol agreeing to distribute the band's Brother Records, and it was agreed that SMiLE was no longer to be the band's next album.

The SMiLE Sessions' global release date, complete track lists, and artwork will be unveiled soon.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Read more at

Read more at

Originally published on

Read more at

Read more at

 Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Tim Hinely

Hungry Ghost, Sara (Unwound) Lund's new band opened this evening but I didn't arrive in time to see them perform. I did get to the venue in time to catch the second half of the Corin Tucker Band's set.  Her debut record, which had some interesting moments, didn't do much for me, but live the songs really came to life. I didn't catch any song names but the last 3 or 4 songs rippled with the kind of electricity that the record didn't. The few folks I spoke with who caught the whole set said I saw the best part.

It had been at least a decade (maybe more) since I'd seen NYC's Versus, a longtime favorite upon hearing this first single (1992's "Insomnia"). The band had had some different folks in the lineup over the years (including Patrick Ramos and a 3^rd Baluyut brother, James). For this tour the band was back down to the original trio of Richard Baluyut on vocals/guitar, bassist Fontaine Toups and drummer Ed Baluyut while adding Margaret White on keyboards and violin. They played a nice mix of songs, both old and new. (For the new ones, however, when Richard said "new" I did not know whether he meant brand new or simply from the latest record, On the Ones and Threes.)

Still, it was hard to complain with a set that included "Thera" (from their Teen Beat debut, The Stars Are Insane), "Circle," "Into Blue," "River," "Double Suicide," "Forest Fire" and plenty more. For encores they played "Bright Lights" (their amazing 2^nd single) and "Blade of Grass" (for which ex-Team Dresch-er Jody Bleyle came on stage and did the oooh-ooohs).  None of us wanted it to end, but sadly, it had to. A band can't play forever.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

 Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Carl Hanni

We live in the age of global groove cross-over, and the musical migrations seem to be picking up speed and shedding inhibitions as they go along. Nations may fuss and fight, but increasingly musicians, it seems, want to mix and match from the wide palette of world musics. This is nothing new, of course; musicians worldwide have been crafting all kinds of fascinating combinations for as long as music has been prefaced with the word ‘popular.'

South America and the Caribbean seem to have consistently been ahead of the game here. Going back at least as far as the late ‘50s and early ‘60s and you'll find thousands of examples of local combos taking little bits of whatever they heard on the radio, mixing it in with what was hot at the local record shop or sound system with their own local music, and turning out one fabulous hybrid after another. Whether it's from Columbia, Peru, Cuba or Jamaica, this part of the world has long embraced music-as-melting-pot. 

Fast forward to 2010 and we have Fantasma, a group of multi-disciplined musicians, artists, and filmmakers from Buenos Aires, Argentina. Not to be mistaken with Austin's fabulous Grupo Fantasma, Fantasma play a spirited, polyglot mix of electro, cumbia, hip hop, reggaeton and whatever else they take a shine to that has a sexy groove. Fantasma is pushing the pulsating cumbia groove into some new territory and inviting everyone along to the dance. Definitively electro based (but still using plenty of accordion), Fantasma make bouncing, buoyant, infinitely danceable music that also has both humor and a socially relevant aspect to it. 

Pretty much everything here is really strong and consistent. "Danza Danza," with a jaunty whistling chorus, melds electro cumbia and reggaeton into an instant dance floor classic. "Encantador de Serpientes" sounds like Egyptian Lover reborn as an intergalactic DJ street gang. "Cumbia Que Pega" and "Muevelo Que Sube" bring the hip hop forward, while "El Paisano," "Esto Es Asi" and "Cumbia Callejera" work the electro cumbia groove to perfection. Sure to draw some attention is a sci fi, Kraftwerked cumbia version of "Ghost Town" by The Specials, a wickedly great re-imagining of one of the signature songs of the 1980s. 

If you're looking for some early summer in this endless winter, Fantasma have condensed it down and put it onto a CD. Look no further.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originallu published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY WILSON NEATE

We continue our sprawling spiel with the legendary bassist. To read Part 1, please go here.

BLURT: The idea of constantly learning from people - is that something that motivates you to collaborate with other artists as much as you do?

MIKE WATT: Yeah, and with bass, too, the politics of it is interesting. You look good making other people look good [laughs]. We're kinda like the grout between the tiles. Most people go in the head and they look at the tiles, and I'm the grout between the tiles. It's kind of a mysterious thing. Everybody's different, so you gotta fit to them, and you learn different ways. Even when you've played with somebody before, you don't wanna bogart and dominate and stuff; you avoid just rubber-stamping things where you've been. So, each time, I really try to approach it like I'm here for the first time, thinking, how do I make an interesting conversation out of this? It is a challenge; it is tough. But it's worth it. Like on this album, I asked Tom and Raul to set the direction - I don't think you can learn everything by always being the boss. Life is about taking turns.

        You know, no matter what humans do, it seems the longer they do it, the more they do. But the weird thing about bass is that, often, the physics punishes us; we get all small, we have too many notes. So it's always this big search for the right notes, and that's why somebody who's just started playing can write a great bassline. I've been surprised so many times when I talk to people who've just started out. It's not about more and more with the bass because of the long wavelengths at the low end...and, of course, it's a rhythm thing too. And everybody sees that stuff differently, so it's good to have a lot of different teachers.

Has it been a learning experience working with the Stooges? You've been doing that for the last eight years.

The Stooges come from a '60s sensibility. I was only a boy then, and I wasn't playing yet, so playing with the Stooges, it's a neat classroom to sit in. It's the primary source, man. I mean, now you get it second- or thirdhand with other bands, and these guys are the daddies. So that's pretty intense. Ig's really helped me become a better bass player. For one thing, he doesn't work a machine; he's almost in a conductor position, and he's also like a bridge to the gig-goers. He gets the big picture that us people working the machines don't get, so he's given me a lot of perspective in playing. It's different than the trios I do, where we're all engaged in working our things, and it's hard to get a big sense of it ‘cuz you're so involved with yourself. So Ig's helped me a lot. Also, Stooge music is really about feeling; it's not really about a bunch of complicated parts, so that's helped me too.

Did you ever go to any Stooges gigs back in the early days?

I didn't see the Stooges in the '70s. We didn't know about clubs. We were into arena rock - my first gig was T. Rex. We didn't know about clubs until punk, and stuff from the '60s was long gone by that time. I guess there was a little of it still up in Hollywood, but we didn't know about it in Pedro. I wouldn't have believed it at all if somebody had told me I'd be playing with the Stooges one day. It's pretty much of a mind blow. I love playing with those guys. I just got back from Australia - the first Stooges gigs of this year. It was my third Big Day Out tour there. I blew some clams, but I always try my hardest for the Stooges. It was a little difficult with my knee still hurt. I dislocated it - last note of the first song, "Raw Power," at a gig in France, in July last year.

How different is it with James Williamson playing guitar now, instead of Ron Asheton?

It's just like when you hear those records - they're different Stooges. I know it's only one different guy, and Ronnie was on bass on those records, but it was a different band. You know, even though James didn't play for a long time, he's still got the sound. He didn't play for like 30 years! His son wrote an essay in college called "Coffins in the Corner," about the guitars in the house that never came out of their cases. The first practice I did with James, I could tell right away this was the guy that played on Raw Power - it was that guitar sound.

Listening to hyphenated-man, the Beefheart feel seemed especially strong. He's always been a big influence, obviously.

Yeah, big time! Minutemen was way into Beefheart. Big time. When punk came, to us, Beefheart and the Stooges were already doing punk - they just didn't call it that yet. Then, the Pop Group was a big influence on us, too: they took Beefheart and put it with Funkadelic, which to us was almost the perfect thing. Beefheart really resonated with us. I saw him on the Doc at the Radar Station tour at the Whisky in Hollywood. My leg was in a cast [laughs] - I'd just had knee surgery. I even talked to him on the phone once. He was taking calls on KCRW, and I was the last caller. I was talking about Strictly Personal, and I told him how [the gatefold photo] used to scare me when you opened up the sleeve, and he said, "Yeah, it scared me too." I was wondering if there was something behind it, and he just said it was stuff he had laying around in his garage.

Although he'd been ill for ages, his death felt like a big deal. He really was a major figure.

It was very heavy. I was doing an interview and the guy had just heard and he told me about it, and it was hard to talk. I knew he was sick for a long time but still.... He was Big Daddy. And as way out as he was, he always had this big blues thing that was very traditional. It was different than, say, the Zappa prog thing - that was fusion. His way, his vision, was very personal, but it was grounded in Howlin' Wolf and stuff. You can hear it big time. We always thought that was a trippy thing. It's like writing a book where you don't have to invent new words. But it was really original.

Talking of unique artists, you recently played with Jandek at my old school, UC Irvine.

That was a trip. Mr. Jandek - or the Representative from Corwood Industries - is a very interesting cat. All black clothes and, for the gig, he had maybe a Stetson. Not a total cowboy hat, but it had a big brim. That was one of the wildest live gigs I've done. It was me and a younger drummer, BJ Miller from HEALTH. He said to the drummer, "You ever hear of Ginger Baker? Maybe you should play like that." He was giving no real direction! I just met him there the day of the gig. In fact, at one point, he asked me, "So what are you gonna do?" [laughs] So I said, "Maybe you want something like a Jack Bruce thing?" And he said, "Yeah! yeah!" Then I said to him, "I gotta tell you, I'm way into doing this, but I'm a little bit scared." And he said, "Don't worry, it's gonna be right up your alley" [laughs], and we went into this 100-minute song that went to a lot of places. I kept trying to change the motifs, and the drummer stayed in this one kind of thing - he'd never done anything like that before.

        His music is very interesting. He used effects at this gig on his guitars. He'd never used effects before. He's got a trippy way of playing - a lot around D and G - and that was really interesting to follow. It wasn't like a guy wanking at the Guitar Center. It kind of reminded me of some of that Pop Group guitar by Gareth Sager. Also, he said, "You know, usually I don't do lyrics live," but he ended up doing some lyrics. The people there dug it big time, but he never really spoke with them. He never introduced us or said thanks or anything - just started playing. Then, when we were done, we were done. I hugged him at the end and told him, "Man, any time! I'm there for you." ‘cuz I really dug it.

Without wanting you to betray any confidences, what did you guys talk about? Did he say anything about why he'd suddenly started playing live after all these years?

Well, we never talked about any of that stuff. He talked real regular, not weirded out at all. He didn't come across like a total hermit in the mountains. He knew about stuff. I talked to him for maybe three hours, about playing gigs, about going to Russia. He did know about our scene. He didn't ask me about much current stuff, but mainly about the old days. He knew about Black Flag and the Minutemen days, and he asked me about a Bad Brains documentary. The closest I got to it was when the drummer was talking about writers, and I brought up Mr. Pynchon. I mentioned Pynchon on purpose, saying, "This guy doesn't like getting his picture taken," to see if the Representative would say anything, but he didn't. You know, I never even heard his name. He never said it. But if he doesn't want to say, then he doesn't want to say it. I only knew him from the records, and instead of laying some trip on him, I just wanted to check out the music. He just seemed like a guy who was into music.

You're sure it was really him?

[laughs] Well, it seemed like the same guy from the records, ‘cuz Jandek did have his pictures all over the records, of all different ages...actually, he looked like Thurston [Moore] a little bit.... But I thought, if that's the way he wants it, then that's good enough. He didn't wanna talk about that stuff, and I was there to play with him. That was quite enough for me. Look, I got in trouble once with Richard Hell on my radio show. He was my first punk hero, and I asked him about the clothes - ‘cuz I was way into those clothes - and he was all pissed off. He didn't want to talk about it. I don't know why. I felt really bad, too. So maybe I learned a bit from that. These guys, they'll let you know what they wanna talk about.

Getting back to hyphenated-man...for this album, you've started up a label again (clenchedwrench).

We had New Alliance in the '80s, and we put out some Minutemen records, the first Hüsker Dü album and three Descendents albums, so I feel like I've gone full circle. I've got so many projects coming out, and these times are more copasetic to doing stuff like this yourself. In the old days, we kind of had to do it ourselves because no one else would put it out. So now I've got like 12 or 13 projects in the pipeline, and I wanna get 'em out and not have to play the game or anything. I just want it out. They're all different. They're not me just doing the same old thing with different people. They're shaped by the people I play with. My trios are my trios, and they're my link to my past, but when I do these collaborations it's a whole different thing - now you can trade files with people over the internet, and you don't even have to be playing with 'em in the same room. So I can do that more now and not be the one-trick pony. I can make these things have their own lives and give respect to the people I collaborate with.

You seem to gig endlessly but, in comparison, you haven't been so prolific in terms of recordings.

I've tried to address that by doing more collaborations, starting in 2007 with Funanori [a project with the Go! Team's Kaori Tsuchida]. Up till then, apart from the operas, I did some Unknown Instructors records, a couple of Banyan records, the Stooges record. There's not a lot of recorded works, but thousands of gigs. I wanted to get that more in balance, so I've been on a tear recently.

Did you used to place more value on live performances than recording?

I used to think that, big time. The punk thing was so profound on us. We thought the gig was everything. Me and D. Boon, we divided the world into two categories: there was gigs and flyers. Everything that wasn't a gig was a flyer. Fuck the recordings! We never thought of them as being here after you'd gone. But I think of 'em more like that now, like children or something. I never had children, so this is the closest I get. With gigs, life-in-the-moment is very important, but they go out there and dissipate into the ether or in people's minds, or whatever. But that's it. If Bosch had just talked about those little men instead of drawing 'em, I wouldn't know about 'em. So the work as a concrete entity is more important to me now. The songs get lives of their own: when people hear 'em, they get their own ideas about what they're supposed to be, away from me.

You don't feel over-protective about them once they've gone on their way?

People have so much control over their lives anyway, so I don't wanna put more out there. I don't wanna put a chain and collar on 'em. I've done it to other people's songs - I've got my own meanings for 'em, and then, when you talk to the people who wrote 'em, it turns out they weren't about that at all! [laughs]

You're about to embark on another epic tour, doing the bulk of the driving yourself. Do you ever get tired of being on the road and gigging?

If I didn't have Pedro to come back to, maybe I would. The bungee cord snaps you back and you roost, then you roam, and then you roost. And I've always had good guys to tour with, so I don't have the dramas to deal with: they know it's all about doing the gig. It is a little harder now. My hands get sore from playing, so the vibrations from the steering wheel help me out a lot. The body ain't as strong, but I like playing for people. I can still manage. I ain't totally lamed out. My knee's still all stiff, but, fuck, it could be worse. It could be sawed off!

        Gotta keep it in perspective.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Fred Mills / Interview by A.D. Amorosi

BLURT hasn't exactly been coy about our excitement over the second album by Swedish chanteuse Lykke Li; the followup to 2008's Youth Novels was recorded in Sweden and Los Angeles and features Björn Yttling, of Peter Björn and John, producing, and as early tracks began rolling out last fall along with provocative videos, it was clear that the young lady was building up to something unusual.

Wounded Rhymes is finally out this week (it's also still streaming online) and in addition to a review coming soon at Blurt-online, we also have an extensive feature on Lykke Li in the new issue of BLURT (our 10^th) that will hit newsstands in two weeks. Contributing Editor A.D. Amorosi sat down to talk with the singer, and among the tidbits he obtained:

On finally getting started on a new record after two years of touring and promotion: "I guess I'm happier in the beginning of a project than the end. It's only then that you have all these possibilities in front of you. When you can dream and everything is ahead of you, that's really something. I like being done as well. There's mystery that lies ahead in that next step. It's just that middle time, when things are the most painful, where I go over the edge."

On swapping the frigid cold of Sweden for the sunny clime of California for a portion of the recording: "The desert and nature is so overwhelming-in a good way. It was just so fucking hot it was great and radically different than my usual experience. It wasn't so much sensual than it was magical."

On the album's singular rhythmic-psychedelic vibe: "The type of sound where five minutes has passed and you don't even know what's hit you or how long you've been hit by it: I like that. I also think a lot of blues inspired me. The repetitive thing where you don't need to change a melodic or rhythmic line."

On why first single "Get Some" isn't about sex (despite containing lines such as "I'm your prostitute" "It's about empowerment and motivation over someone - to avoid more problems."

On her uncanny ability to look positively smashing in all her photos, no matter the setting or occasion: "I got the ability of being photogenic from my photographer mother as she took a lot of photos of me. That's not about the vanity of looking good. I don't think that I am. It's just that I don't want to die when I see the photos snapped of me."

No problem in that regard, we suspect. Read the full interview with Lykke Li in our new issue....

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Blurt Staff 

American Laundromat Records just aqnnounced plans to release a Smiths tribute CD titled Please, Please, Please: a tribute to The Smiths. The CD will feature newly-recorded covers by The Wedding Present, Greg Laswell, Doug Martsch (Built To Spill), William Fitzsimmons, Trespassers William, The Rest, Katy Goodman (La Sera, Vivian Girls), The Leisure Society, Joy Zipper, Tanya Donelly and others. The CD is slotted for Autumn 2011 worldwide release. 

Confirmed Artists Thus Far / Track Covering 

Cinerama / London

Class Actress / Ask

Dala / Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me

Doug Martsch (Built To Spill) / Reel Around the Fountain

Elk City / I Know It's Over

Greg Laswell / Half A Person

Joy Zipper / What Difference Does It Make?

Katy Goodman (Vivian Girls, La Sera) / track to be announced

Kitten / track to be announced

Mike Viola / How Soon Is Now?

Sara Lov / track to be announced

Sixpence None the Richer / I Won�t Share You

Tanya Donelly w/Dylan in the Movies / Shoplifters Of The World Unite

The Leisure Society / That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore

The Rest / Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before

The Wedding Present / Hand In Glove

Trespassers William / There Is A Light That Never Goes Out

William Fitzsimmons / Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want

For the album cover, American Laundromat Records secured rights to use a Sandie Shaw photograph (Shaw famously covered te Smiths' "Hand In Glove" and later collaborated with the band) and tapped rock-poster designer Lonny Unitus (Apples In Stereo, The Decemberists, Willie Nelson) to design the cover art and eco-wallet packaging. 

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Tim Hinely

I had never seen Sweden's Concretes before and couldn't tell from vocalist Lisa Milberg's comments that whether it was their first time in Portland or first time in the States (I'm assuming she meant the former).  While the rest of the band was silent, the friendly Milberg chatted up the crowd about our fair city, how happy they were to be here and what there was to do tomorrow since they were going to stay here rather than head to Seattle early.

The band hit the stage as a 6-piece with guitar/bass/drummer, two keyboardists and the striking, icy cool Milberg up front on vocals (and occasionally shaking her money-maker on the dancier cuts). The band has been through quite a few changes the past few years with former vocalist Victoria Bergstrom going solo (as Taken by Trees) and one member apparently leaving the band to join the circus (!!??). Their latest record, WYWH, lacks the spark of earlier records, with a more sophisticated, groove-oriented dance pop sound, and while it didn't sound bad on headphones, on stage it seemed to lack that specialness of the earlier records (or what I'm guessing earlier gigs would have been like), and it seemed the set was made up mostly of songs off WYWH. They opened with "Good Evening" and sifted into other new cuts like the title track, "My Ways", "Crack in the Paint", "I Wish We'd Never Met", "Knck Knck" and others. They saved the single, "All Day' for last and then came out for a so-so encore and called it an evening. 

Memo to the Concretes: time to regroup and decide on ways to spruce up the live show.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY WILSON NEATE 

If you're going to suffer an excruciating knee injury, you want disaster to strike in the least public of circumstances, when you're engaged in something that involves no major responsibilities so you can collapse discreetly and writhe largely unnoticed. Mike Watt wasn't so lucky. Last year, the man from Pedro went down with a major blowout onstage in front of thousands of people whilst working "the thud staff" in France with the Stooges. Worse still, it happened during the opening song of the set ("Raw Power"). 

But Watt soldiered on, finishing the gig and the remaining dates. Still not fully recovered - but now operating without crutches - Watt's just returned from Stooges dates in Australia and he's got a new album out, hyphenated-man (ORG Music/clenchedwrench). Rather than put his feet up, he's heading out on the road again for a marathon North American tour in support of the record: 50 shows, 52 days, 31 states, two countries - and he's doing the driving. 

Following on from Contemplating the Engine Room (1997) and The Secondman's Middle Stand (2004), hyphenated-man is the third in a series of thematically unified, multi-part works that Watt describes as "operas." Recorded with the Missingmen, Tom Watson and Raul Morales (pictured above, with Watt), this is his most ambitious and idiosyncratic project thus far. Consciously returning to the super-short song format that was a Minutemen trademark, Watt's new 30-track opus draws inspiration from an array of sources: the composite figures (or "hyphenated-men") who populate Hieronymus Bosch's paintings, the experience of middle age and even The Wizard of Oz are all grist for Watt's creative mill. 

Watt's not only one of the hardest-working men in show business these days; he's also one of the most decent, and it's always a genuine pleasure to talk to him. In what follows, the "man in the van with a bass in his hand" spiels in his inimitable, wide-ranging way about the new record, about jamming econo with the Minutemen, jamming not-so-econo with the Stooges, and even jamming with cult legend Jandek. 

***** 

BLURT: Your new album is the third one you've described as an "opera." In what sense is it an opera? What is it about that format that attracts you?

MIKE WATT: We got the opera idea from the Who's "A Quick One, While He's Away" - the idea that you could have one big song be made up of different little ones. I never really envisioned doing this form at all. I never thought I'd get into that stuff. With Minutemen, I come from a tradition of making short, little songs - we got that idea from Wire - but it seemed like I didn't have the talent to get what I wanted to say into just one tune, a regular smaller thing, like D. Boon did: it had to make a journey. That opera structure - one big song made up of lots of parts - makes it easier for me to get across the things I'm trying to talk about. I couldn't really do it another way. So the first opera was kinda talking about Minutemen [Contemplating the Engine Room], the second one was about the sickness that almost killed me [The Secondman's Middle Stand], and now this one is about midlife. So I call hyphenated-man an opera ‘‘cuz it's all supposed to be parts of one song. I've got an album coming out with the Black Gang - Nels Cline and Bob Lee - and that's about the idea of autumn. I'd call that one more of a concept album. 

And when you play hyphenated-man live, you perform it in its entirety, with all the parts in sequence.

Yeah, from start to finish. It's one piece. But it's hard to perform the operas because they're like 45 minutes to a fuckin' hour! It's like a life, so I live the life of the thing when we perform it. The first one was really tragic; the second one had a happy ending but with big hell parts that I actually lived through, and so when I did these things, I'd have to go through 'em. And hyphenated-man is hard because of all the small parts. There's a lot of fuckin' parts and stuff to remember, but it's kind of neat to challenge myself like that, I think. Technically, this one's the toughest of the three because it's got so much stuff to remember. Or maybe my memory's just worse ‘cuz I'm less young now [laughs]. I did a tour in Japan of the album last autumn, and that was the first time I did it, and it was tough, man - especially the first gigs. I think the more I do it, the more I'll get the hang of it. 

So you're using the short songs like you did on the Minutemen records, but the difference here is that they make up a more thematically unified whole.

I hadn't really listened to Minutemen that much since D. Boon got killed, ‘cuz it's heavy and stuff, but when the We Jam Econo documentary was being made, I had to listen to the music again. They [director Tim Irwin and producer Keith Schieron] wanted me to drive around Pedro and spiel about it, and hearing it again, it was like, Whoa! This is kind of interesting - the idea we had of distilling it all down to little things like that. Like I said, we originally got the idea from Wire, but then the idea of Bosch making one big thing out of a bunch of little things also struck a parallel with the Minutemen. 

Did you find it difficult making that documentary?

You just have to deal with it. I was thinking, "You know what? If people see the Minutemen story, maybe they'll realize that anyone can start a band." ‘cuz that was the whole idea: if these bozos can do it.... So, in a way, I got fired up on a mission - if I tell 'em the thing the way it really was, it can be empowering, and it'd be part of the debt I feel I owe the punk movement. ‘cuz I don't know if we'd ever have done any of what we did if it wasn't for the punk movement. I've always felt a debt, and it was a way of giving back, by telling the story of these guys making a band out of nothing, like a lot of people did. I wanted to show people that it wasn't just about one time and one place - it can happen any time. So I got into it like that. Also, those cats who were making the film never saw Minutemen, and they were learning about us too. That kind of made it interesting also. They were younger, and they'd seen fIREHOSE, but they didn't really know about Minutemen. So it wasn't like they were coming with an agenda or trying to put it all into their own context. They were actually just listening, trying to learn about us. 

You wrote the new record on guitar, not bass, which is unusual for you.

Part of this thing was to confront myself musically with some weird stuff, and I hadn't written on guitar in a long, long time, so that was kind of a fresh way to do it. Most of the time, I like writing the bass first because it gives the other guys a lot of room, but in this case, for this piece, because of the little songs, I thought, fuck it. ‘cuz one thing about going back to the little song thing was that I was very concerned with giving respect to Georgie [George Hurley] and D. Boon. So I thought that to keep it from being too Minutemen-y, I'd get rid of the only Minuteman. So I didn't want to write the bass parts first, and I did some kinda extreme things: when I taught it to Tom and Raul, I didn't let 'em hear the bass. In the second song, "beak-holding-letter-man," there's one little guitar solo, and that's Tom's. All the other things, all the little melody lines and stuff, he follows the things I wrote.

Playing with D. Boon, he wanted the assertive bass, and I kind of developed that thing - although some of the great players, like Jack Bruce and John Entwistle, a lot of those guys had an intense influence on me. But I just wanted Tom and Raul to play together and make the relationship that way, so they'd be playing to each other and not be so much pulled by the bass. I actually wrote it all on D. Boon's black Telecaster. He got it in Kent, Ohio. It's the only electric guitar I have - I'm a bass player, I don't play guitar that much! You can tell if you hear the demos with just me. They're pretty palsy. I had to get Tom on there. I can't even hold a pick. I learned the guitar off D. Boon, so he's in there kind of, but maybe not as strong as if I'd put the bass out there from the start - although Tom does have some D. Boon influence. 

And the recording process itself was different from previous ones, with the guitar and drums being done first and then the bass and vocals much later.

Yeah, so I had those guys learn the thing without any bass or singing, and then when we were in the middle of a tour in May 2009, we recorded guitar and drums for three days at Tony Maimone's studio in Brooklyn. Then, a year later, when I had some time off from Stooges touring, I went back to finish it with the bass and the vocals - which is kind of hard to do, waiting a year for the bass. 

You mentioned Hieronymus Bosch. His paintings provide a sort of frame for this record. You're drawing on his major triptychs, with their characters and composite figures - what you call his "hyphenated-men."

Yeah, it's The Garden of Earthly Delights, The Last Judgment and The Temptation of St. Anthony - the main ones. I saw The Garden of Earthly Delights at the Prado, in Madrid, when I was touring with the Stooges. That's when I got the idea of making a piece about it. Actually, I've now been there three times to see it. Each time I go to Madrid, I go see it. I like the little creatures made of different parts. We don't really know what Bosch was saying with those paintings because he didn't write anything, so we don't know his thoughts. Some people just thought they were visualizations of proverbs and aphorisms and stuff. Some of it's really obvious, like the guy blowing his own horn, but I didn't know 500-year-old Dutch, so I just made up my own shit, my own meanings.

In the songs, most of the amalgamations - the men made out of different parts - they're the bad guys; there's hardly any of the good ones. But my point wasn't to make character judgments about the amalgamations. I used it all for inspiration, for the motifs, music-wise and subject-wise. It helped me focus things. You know, when I wrote songs in the Minutemen days, and ever since those days, when I write songs I start with titles because I need some kind of focus - or I end up just repeating myself. So Bosch helped me like that, but it wasn't really about his big statements, it was more about his studies, his little creatures and little men made out of different parts. 

So most of the imagery derives from Bosch's depictions of torment and damnation, but it's not as if the album is literally "about" the paintings.

The way I used Bosch was kind of pragmatic and nuts and bolts-y, even though it's all psychological, based heavily in the realm of the imagination, which I like. But I did get caught up in it a little bit. That was something I never envisioned until I was sitting there in the studio at the very end. The record was supposed to end with the track called "man-shitting-man," and I told Tony, "Man, I can't end this thing with this song." I got too caught up in the Bosch Last Judgment shit - and that's just not for me. It wasn't supposed to be like that, but I don't know how that happened. So I took [a more positive song] from the middle of the record - "wheel-bound-man" - and I put that one at the end. 

Have you always liked Bosch's work?

I was intrigued by his little guys as a boy, because it just looked trippy - like dinosaurs, it was the same kind of thing. It was otherworldly. 

OK, to sum up so far, hyphenated-man is an opera inspired in different ways by midlife, by Minutemen, by Bosch....

And the other part of it is the Wizard of Oz and Dorothy thing, with the Tin Man, the Scarecrow and the Lion - the farmhands. The way I take that story is that Dorothy is just trippin' on what dudes do to be dudes, and even the Man Behind the Curtain says stuff about that, like, "Oh, you're smart, where I come from you'd get a diploma!" or "You're brave, where I'm from they'd give you a medal" - so he's implying that those guys always had the things they want. 

You're thinking specifically about masculinity, from the perspective of middle age?

I hadn't really thought about it until recently. People always talked about old and young, and I'd never really thought about the middle. It seems to me that a big chunk of the middle age thing - what they call a crisis - is about this kind of thing, this questioning, which I think is kind of healthy. People should do it all the way, but I guess you start doing it because your body starts getting worse, and you start adding up things, asking what it's all about, asking what's your journey, your mission. 

Is this Watt's midlife crisis album, then?

Well, in a way, my work is a kind of Peter Pan world, but on this record there is the thing about being older, middle-aged.... I don't know if it's so much a crisis ‘cuz I think it's healthy to look at it. It's more of a crisis when you try to be a 20-year-old again, get a convertible, a young girlfriend and all that stuff - and try to act like a young guy. That's more like hitting the panic button, whereas I was just trying to confront myself on certain things. I probably always had a crisis! You understand this as a writer: every time you have to go to the plate and reinvent yourself, that's a crisis, no matter what age you're at. We have to do this all the time when we come up with new pieces. Sometimes the work does come a little easier, but you always feel, "Whoa, what am I gonna do?" But maybe it's like that for all humans when they come up to the middle part and say, Yea, what is to be done?

 I guess this is also about our mortality and crap like that, too. I feel my body's not as resilient as it was, but on the other hand I have experiences that I didn't have; I don't know if I'd trade that to be all stupid and go through all that fuckin' shit again - just for a more resilient body [laughs]. So there's really no crisis on that end of it. I accept it. I'm very reconciled with the fact that I'm no longer a younger man. But, hopefully, I'm not at the end of the road either. Being in the middle's okay, in a way. It's not such a nightmare. 

What advice would a middle-aged Watt give to a younger Watt?

Life's for learning! That's the one thing that I really wish would get out from the new piece - and why I put "wheel-bound-man" at the end [the last lines of the song are: "I think I've learned that life's for learnin' as I'm goin' through my trips - me on the wheel as it's turnin' "]. I really think that everybody's got something to teach, and it's kind of hard ‘cuz you know everything when you're younger! Everybody's got something to teach me: somebody who's starting out, somebody who's done it a long time. I think this is a good thing to learn. I don't know if you can tell somebody that. They have to realize it for themselves.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

Review and Photos by Logan K. Young

Any review of Gang of Four, now, has to consider the Gang of Four then.

Alas, such is the case when Britain's leading post-punk Marxists decide to get the band back together. Ideally, a new GoF record like Content - their first since 1995's surprisingly relevant Shrinkwrapped - would be judged on its own merits. And as good as Content actually is, really, the fact matters naught whenever that Kinect 360! advert featuring 1979's "Natural's Not In It" comes on the tube.

Gang of Four shilling for Microsoft? Say it ain't so, blokes!

Then again, in a world where PiL plays late night talk shows and Steve Ignorant assembles a tour to perform vintage Crass music sans Penny Rimbaud, perhaps it's petty to beg discretion of nostalgia -- especially for a band so of its time. For starters - ding-a-ling dong! - Thatcherism's dead. No longer do Brittany's downtrodden have to suffer the vestiges of her trickle-down syndromes. Closer to home, though, in a U.S. capital where Henry Rollins isn't scooping Georgetonians ice cream, Inner Ear has moved to Arlington and the new 9:30 is one OK Go show away from Live Nation hegemony, we the Whigs have never needed Jon King's voice and Andy Gill's guitar more.

Yes, that is a partial swipe at the present GoF rhythm section -- bassist Thomas McNeice and Mark Heaney on drums. Just as Chairman Mao was nothing without his full quartet, this gang is certainly lacking the verve and insistence of the original, reunited lineup that ripped it up and started again back in 2004.

It has little to do with the material, too. Set opener (and recent Letterman feature, itself) "You'll Never Pay for the Farm" is about as classic Gang of Four we're gonna get, now that founding drummer Hugo Burnham is firmly ensconced in the ivory tower of academia. Followed by a song like Entertainment's "Not Great Men," however, and it's readily apparent that McNeice and Heaney possess neither the chops, nor the context, that Burnham and original bass player Dave Allen could replicate in spades.

And honestly, that's why you go to a Gang of Four gig here in 2011. Not that newer cuts late in the set list like "Do As I Say" or "A Fruitfly in the Beehive" don't cut deep. They do. It's just that, for those of us who missed them in their prime (or maybe had a problem letting them go in the first place), it's the encored numbers like "Damaged Goods" or "At Home He's a Tourist" or, in spite of the BBC, "I Love a Man in Uniform" that cut the deepest. And it's for precisely this same reason that I have Wire tickets for April 7. And it's also how Peter Hook can charge thirtysomething quid to hear him and his son's friends play Unknown Pleasures back to front. But when the songs are good enough, and their message remains potent, it hardly matters -- not in the long run of rock 'n' roll anyways.

To be fair, Gang of Four mattered much more then, than they ever can now. And as everyone from Alphonse Karr to G.B. Shaw to Kurt Russell himself have noted, the more things change...the more they only stay the same. To wit, some thirty-odd years later for these post-punk proles, God save the queen is still not what she seems.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Blurt Staff

Fresh off his and musical partner Atticus Ross' Oscar win last night for the soundtrack to The Social Network, Trent Reznor has indicated that he's "finished" laying down tracks for the next How to Destroy Angels album. Speaking to Billboard, he's quoted as saying all that's left now is the mixing.

"I just finished recording a How to Destroy Angels project with my wife [Mariqueen Maandig]," Reznor said. "We have to mix it. [It will be out in the] early fall, most likely."

The record will be offered up as a free digital download as well as a higher-quality physical release (for pay), as was done with the first HTDA EP.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Jud Cost

For Yo La Tengo to play live twice on the West Coast within an eight-month span is a rare treat. When they headlined San Jose's Left Coast Live festival last summer, they were pretty much ducking flak from anti-aircraft ack-ack guns, flying under the radar and searchlights of Bay Area publicity.

Tonight, kicking off the 2011 Noise Pop mini-season at Oakland's palatial Fox Theater, the storied Hoboken, N.J. threesome were preaching to a near full-house of longtime fans who had, perhaps, seen them more than 20 years ago at hip San Francisco nightspots the I-Beam or the Kennel Club. "This is a nice place. The first time we played in the East Bay, it was kind of like this...at Berkeley Square," deadpanned band leader Ira Kaplan, referring to the microscopic University Ave. punk joint that held about 75 people, max.

Over syrupy canned background music that could have been the theme for The Merv Griffin Show, Kaplan, in his milkiest talk-show-host voice revealed how the band's set would be determined tonight. Someone rolled out an extra-large Wheel Of Fortune-style spinner with all the set-list possibilities painted on an oversized clock face. Kaplan, as Pat Sajak, chose an audience member to try his luck and the arrow landed on "Dump." Which meant the first set would consist solely of psychedelic guitar-laced numbers from bassist James McNew's long-running side project of that name.

It was an extraordinary "coals to Newcastle" treat to hear the hulking McNew (who usually plays bass in Yo La Tengo), featured in a 60-minute, fuzz-laden, guitar freak-out in the backyard of such fabled "summer of love" stringbusters as John Cipollina, Barry Melton, Jorma Kaukonen, James Gurley and Jerry Garcia. McNew, with a little help from drummer Georgia Hubley, did all the singing, too. Kaplan played bass and rested his pipes for the second set which I, alas, had to miss so I could catch the BART train home.

Besides, I'd already scratched a 30-year itch by getting to the Fox early for a heroic 40-minute set by legendary Los Angeles punk trio the Urinals. Arising phoenix-like from the affluent surroundings of UCLA in 1979, the Urinals took out their comfortable upbringing on their classmates by waxing punk gems like "Salmonella," "Ack Ack Ack Ack" and "I'm White And Middle Class." Bassist/songwriter John Talley-Jones, guitarist Kjehl Johansen and drummer Kevin Barrett somehow fit into a loose-knit, Velvet Underground-influenced, intercontinental scene that also included London's Wire, New England's Mission Of Burma and New Zealand's the Clean.

Regrettably, I missed the Urinals if, indeed, they ever did play San Francisco's punk citadel, the Mabuhay Gardens. Growing tired of their Moms-unfriendly original name, the trio adapted and morphed into 100 Flowers around the time the Paisley Underground bands were venturing north in the early '80s. 100 Flowers were slotted to play the Old Waldorf in early 1983 with Green On Red and the Bangles, but their last-minute cancellation was turned into a bonanza when Rain Parade took their place on the bill.

And now, 28 years later (with guitarist Rob Roberge on board for Johansen), here they were, about to ignite a crowd of about 100 of the curious, rattling around in a room that could hold about three thousand. Barrett banged his sticks together, one, two, three, four, and they were off to the races as though they'd never left: real, honest-to-god, two-chord punk rock as it was meant to sound. They must have exploded through 20 songs in 40 minutes with a blast-furnace intensity, like the day your Mom turned up the vegetable pressure-cooker too high and splattered the ceiling with broccoli and zucchini.

"It's been great seeing Yo La Tengo every night on this tour. We're not used to being the second best band onstage," said a grey-haired Talley-Jones, breathing hard between songs. "Yeah," cracked Roberge. "We usually play with three bands."

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Blurt Staff

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds reissues are is in the wings for May 17 via EMI. Let Love In (1994), Murder Ballads (1996), The Boatman's Call (1997) and No More Shall We Part (2001) -- their eighth, ninth, tenth and eleventh studio albums, respectively - are en route as separate deluxe double-disc Collectors Edition.

These latest releases are the third set of reissues from a series that will ultimately see Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds' entire album catalogue digitally re-mastered and remixed for 5.1 Surround Sound for the first time since their original release.

Each deluxe double-disc Collectors Edition contains the re-mastered stereo album, the new surround mix, a specially commissioned short film made by UK artists Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, plus b-sides from the singles, videos and exclusive sleeve notes.

The first three consecutive albums in the re-mastered deluxe edition series -- From Her to Eternity, The Firstborn Is Dead, Kicking Against the Pricks -- were released in 2009. The next four in the series -- Your Funeral...My Trial, Tender Prey, The Good Son and Henry's Dream - were released last year.

Tracklistings:

Let Love In [CD/DVD; digital audio]

CD

Do You Love Me?

Nobody's Baby Now

Loverman

Jangling Jack

Red Right Hand

I Let Love In

Thirsty Dog

Ain't Gonna Rain Anymore

Lay Me Low

Do You Love Me? (Part 2)

DVD

Let Love In (re-mastered album in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo)

Additional Audio Tracks (in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo)

Cassiel's Song

Sail Away

(I'll Love You) Till The End Of The World

That's What Jazz Is To Me

Where The Action Is

Videos

Do You Love Me?

Loverman

Red Right Hand

Short Film: Do You Love Me Like I Love You (Part 8: Let Love In)

Murder Ballads [CD/DVD; digital audio]

CD

Song Of Joy

Stagger Lee

Henry Lee

Lovely Creature

Where The Wild Roses Grow

The Curse Of Millhaven

The Kindness Of Strangers

Crow Jane

O'Malley's Bar

Death Is Not The End

DVD

Murder Ballads (re-mastered album in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo) 

Additional Audio Tracks (in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo)

The Ballad Of Robert Moore And Betty Coltrane

The Willow Garden

King Kong Kitchee Kitchee Ki-Mi-O

Knoxville Girl

Videos

Stagger Lee

Where The Wild Roses Grow

Henry Lee

Short Film: Do You Love Me Like I Love You (Part 9: Murder Ballads)

The Boatman's Call [CD/DVD; digital audio]

CD

Into My Arms

Lime Tree Arbour

People Ain't No Good

Brompton Oratory

There Is A Kingdom

(Are You) The One That I've Been Waiting For?

Where Do We Go Now But Nowhere?

West Country Girl

Black Hair

Idiot Prayer

Far From Me

Green Eyes

DVD

The Boatman's Call (re-mastered album in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo)

Additional Audio Tracks (in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo)

Little Empty Boat

Right Now I'm A-Roaming

Black Hair (Band version)

Come Into My Sleep

Babe, I Got You Bad

Videos

Into My Arms

(Are You) The One That I've Been Waiting For?

Short Film : Do You Love Me Like I Love You (Part 10: The Boatman's Call)

No More Shall We Part [CD/DVD; digital audio]

CD

As I Sat Sadly By Her Side

And No More Shall We Part

Hallelujah

Love Letter

Fifteen Feet Of Pure White Snow

God Is In The House

Oh My Lord

Sweetheart Come

The Sorrowful Wife 

We Came Along This Road

Gates To The Garden

Darker With The Day

DVD

No More Shall We Part (re-mastered album in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo)

Additional Audio Tracks (in DTS Surround Sound 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround and stereo)

Good Good Day

Little Janey's Gone

Grief Came Riding

Bless His Ever Loving Heart

Fifteen Feet Of Pure White Snow (Westside Session)

We Came Along This Road (Westside Session)

God Is In The House (Westside Session)

And No More Shall We Part (Westside Session)

Videos

As I Sat Sadly By Her Side

Love Letter

Fifteen Feet Of Pure White Snow

Short Film: Do You Love Me Like I Love You (Part 11: No More Shall We Part)

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY RON HART 

For nearly 35 years, Gang of Four from Leeds, England, have pressed on - albeit in a fit of stops and starts (much like their music) - as one of the true purveyors of the sound commonly known as post-punk. Alongside the likes of Wire, Liliput and The Fall, they helped create a unique strain of eardrum buzz that piggybacked off the momentum of the success of fellow Brits The Clash and The Sex Pistols.

However, in the case of the Four, the group pole-vaulted the genre to such dizzying heights of Trotskyist confrontation that they simultaneously challenged their audience to dig a little deeper within the premises of their politics and social standings in the world. And in a modern age where governments have been diluted to just another commodity to be traded on the global financial market, blind consumerism and detached social networking are usurping the life's blood from the soul of the human race and people are forming united fronts to rise up against the tyranny of their longtime oppressors across the Middle East, the quartet's incendiary strain of funk-informed guitar polemics is as timely as ever.

It's a notion that had made Gang of Four's new album, their first collection of new material in 16 years, one of the most anticipated releases of the still-young year of 2011. Content (Yep Roc), a record that was funded through online donations via Pledge Music, is the follow-up to Return The Gift,  their 2004 re-recording by the original lineup of their greatest hits as a calculated strategy to divert money away from the group's original label EMI. It finds the foursome of vocalist Jon King, guitarist Andy Gill and new members Thomas McNeice and drummer Mark Heaney (replacing classic members Hugo Burnham and Dave Allen, respectively) taking aim at the personal and economic struggles of maintaining a functional way of life in the Internet era and stands tall as their strongest set of songs since 1981's Solid Gold (still in dire, dire need of a reissue).

BLURT recently caught up via electronic mail with Mr. King to talk about the new album, politics, the MP3 revolution and the group's questionable decision to go against their anti-advertising ethos to have one of their songs appear in an Xbox commercial, among other topics.

***

BLURT: In hindsight, how do you feel the PledgeMusic campaign went for the funding of Content?
JON KING: It's been an interesting exercise and raised a useful amount of money to help fund the album. We've always said that musicians should get reasonably paid for what we do.  But the new model - where music is shared and downloaded for nothing, where traditional record companies are doomed but where technology based intermediaries - like Apple, who don't invest a cent in talent [yet] are making almost all the money - means that it's no longer  possible to earn any money from recorded music. So everyone's been trying to find an alternative way to do things.  This almost always ends up embracing advertising or sponsorship, which is weird for musicians to want to do so wholeheartedly. It's a collective act of desperation.  

        If you want to know how a society is going, follow the money.  And the money doesn't go to creative talent or their support networks but to advertising. This is what filesharing has led us to. I'm with Jaron Lanier on this, whose recent book, You Are Not A Gadget, makes the case very persuasively.
 
Did skirting the whole record industry machine in the creation of Content inspire a desire to record more?
We didn't want to waste our energies looking for a patron or a record company. We wanted to concentrate on the music.  The record industry's a busted flush and boring to engage with; we wanted to do things on our own.  Musicians have to think differently about their craft if they want to make a living or publish our recorded music now that music has become effectively worthless due to illegal file sharing. The fans who do this are killing the bands and their support networks.

Why did you choose to go with Yep Roc to release the new album?
It's a great label who loves what we do and knows how to get non-commercial music like ours out there in a professional and commercially sound way. I trust them. This is very important to us . Yep Roc's passion is what we wanted, not their money.

In the actual recording of Content, what were some of the different approaches you took in contrast to your last set of all-new material [1995's Shrinkwrapped]?
We wanted to make music where every segment plays an equally  important part, but has a relentlessness that took you somewhere else, like a train falling off a cliff. It was intentional. I'm so bored by endlessly layered, over-produced commercial music. Stops and starts feature as much on Content as back in the day. It's much sparser and raw than our last set of new records, like Shrinkwrapped, which had grown as a project from soundtrack music we'd written for an indie film directed by Peter Hall called Delinquent; the songs had an atmospheric feel that were quite worked up to as a result.

Was there anything you were listening to casually as a fan that had a creative effect on the outcome of Content?
Sometimes you hear a tune that mixes up rock guitar, pop and hip-hop in an interesting way. I like PLAN B for example. But a big reason to make Content, as for Entertainment!, was that we couldn't hear things out there that hit the spot. This is when you have to do it yourself.
 
Where do you stand in the argument of digital music vs. physical product (CDs, vinyl)? How do you keep your own collection these days?
I hate the sound of MP3's. It's shit. But, like everyone else, I can't live without portable music so I put up with it. It's a shame there's nowhere to buy a 20-20 recording online that's as good as on a CD. But my iPod would explode with the noughts and ones.  I have a superb old Linn record deck that makes every piece of vinyl feel like a luxurious and erotic sonic massage that's superior to CDs. We live through times when every audio technology advance makes the music sound technically and emotionally worse.
       Physical things allow us to play with words and imagery (and smells).  It's obvious we really value artwork, which can make an album richer; we spend a lot of time on this, as you can see in the special edition metal box and on the early records. It adds to the music.  
 
How does the integration of Thomas McNeice and Mark Heaney as permanent members of Gang of Four affect the dynamic of your sound, in your opinion? What do you feel this new rhythm section you have brings to the table that sets them apart from original members Dave Allen and Hugo Burnham?
There've been many versions of the band. The first founder members were Hugo, Andy and me, and our first bass player was a guy called Dave Woolfson. He's the bloke referenced by an audience member ("Who's the hippy on the bass?") on the cassette tape of our first ever show in Leeds.  Hugo, a good friend, was a magnificent drummer and had his own style.  Dave Allen was great, too. But after he quit very early on, we hired Busta Jones (ex-Remain in Light Talking Heads), my personal early days favourite; then we hired the wonderful Sarah Lee (ex-Robert Fripp's League of Gentlemen,  later in The B-52's and Indigo Girls). Sarah was great, too. And after her, Gail Anne Dorsey, who left us to play with the Stones and Bowie. Mark Heaney is currently one of the world's top five drummers. He's a genius: solid, talented and inventive. It's wonderful to play with him. Thomas combines elements of Dave Allen and Busta Jones' style and brings an intensity and attack to it. The guys are world class.
 
What were your initial thoughts when the Xbox people approached you to use "Natural's Not In It" for a TV commercial?
We thought it was fantastic.  Ten out of ten! If we'd ever been asked to define a dream scenario for this song, the first lines of which are "The problem of leisure/ What to do for pleasure", this would be it. Superb. Just like, back in the day, when we decided to sign to EMI, the ugly, corporate beast of a record company. Some people were outraged, saying we should be with an indie, but our music really made sense with a major at that time.
 
Are there any plans to reissue the rest of your catalog following the great re-release of Entertainment! from Rhino in 2005? What album of yours would you most like to see revisited and why?
There aren't any plans to do this. I do love Solid Gold and Songs of the Free, however. 
 

The title of your new album is Content. What meaning of the word were you thinking of when you chose it?
Well, the album is full of content. So the title's good as a descriptor. And creative people are all "content providers". Journalists, writers, musicians, artists, filmmakers etc. We collectively grovel to the technology intermediaries who suck us dry, like the evil Apple Corporation, who don't invest a cent in music but charge a massive percentage for every track sold on iTunes, worse than the worst record company. Worse, even, than EMI, I might add. Another meaning is to be content, which is hard.
 
What do you think of the idea that some people believe Barack Obama to be a Communist?
They're crazy. He's not even left wing. In Europe he'd be seen as a centre-right politician. The people who say this know nothing of ideas or of history, especially U.S. history. It was President Eisenhower, the war hero who helped win World War II who warned us all to be wary of the military-industrial complex, and the conspiracies in the right.
 
What are your thoughts on David Cameron as Prime Minister of England?
He's a millionaire aristocrat who has 22 millionaires in a 30 man cabinet. He represents the interest of the rich against working families and the poor.
 
What do you think about WikiLeaks and its place in the world?
Our rulers depend on silence for compliance and that their secrets are never revealed.  
 
Since Gang of Four has been a band, you have seen six American presidents sit in office, from Jimmy Carter to Obama. Who do you feel was the best president of those six and why?
I liked Bill [Clinton]. America had a balanced budget, the rest of the world thought highly of the USA, a country I profoundly love.
 
What are your thoughts on the American Tea Party?
They should read some more books and get out more!

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By David Downs

An arctic blast of wind, rain and cold descended on San Francisco Thursday night, but inside the packed Bottom of the Hill club, down in front, at Ted Leo's second solo show this year - the vibe was warmly defiant.

Damn the brutal conditions outside, the New Yorker played over an hour-long set of songs from his huge back catalog, marking another intimate highlight from Noise Pop 2011, the 19 year-old week-long indie music festival featuring about 100 bands at around 20 venues, including Death Cab's Ben Gibbard, Yo La Tengo, No Age and Wavves.

Called a "goddamn national treasure" by Noise Pop writer Kevin Seal, the New Jersey native has been in the game for 25 years, morphing from punk rocker to indie rock to his current, stripped down and plugged in act - featuring just him, a mic, his guitar and amp.

He's sort of adrift in 2011, he says, and looking to reconnect. So he's struck out without his backing band The Pharmacists for one of his longest solo stints ever. Whip smart and powder dry, Leo kept his rock talk terse late Thursday night and focused on song after song of amped up singer-songwriter storytelling - a less emo Elliot Smith. Reflecting on his career crossroads, Leo said simply, "Honestly, there are very few things I'd do differently."

Tracks like "Bleeding Powers", and "Six Months in a Leaky Boat" came out forceful, confident and raw. The forty-year-old's voice was both thin and tight from winter travel and a cold - yet another reason why bands tour in the Summer. He said he might lose his voice Thursday, screwing his Seattle audience out of a show.

"Don't worry, I'll leave it gasping and bloody on stage. Seattle can deal with the aftermath," he said. Then later, "Don't tell Seattle I said that."

Cue: "Bottled in Cork", "Colleen", "The High Party Lyrics, "The Gold Finch and the Red Oak Tree" and numerous others. The crowd of Leo die-hards - some grizzled and bearded, others still in braces - lapped it all up.

He concluded with a thank you to his opener Kevin Seconds, who nearly missed his set time after his car died in Southern California Thursday morning.]

No matter how long artists tour, they remain one breakdown away from a shitstorm of problems, Leo noted.

"It's inspiring to see Kevin's performance after all that crap. And it's a privilege to get to do this."

Tonight: The legendary Kid Koala does things with vinyl records that no one else can do. And darkwave rock act Tamaryn takes us to a sinful place.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By A.D. Amorosi

That sinking feeling that R.E.M. seem to be on about in their new album's title doesn't manifest itself within their most sonically diverse body of work since 2001's Reveal. Mind you, it's not that this is a positivist manifesto for the new decade. The now-ness is simply about shaking loose the head fuzz that marked their last 15 years.

This R.E.M. sound present-or at least as much as they did on 2008's Accelerate. When Stipe croons through the grungy ring of "All the Best" the line "it's just like me to overstay my welcome," you're not looking for something sarcastic to say back to him. Stipe's got a lot of shopworn platitudes and attitudes used as lyrical motifs here: he's "never felt so calm" ("Discoverer") and he "earned his wings" ("It Happened Today"). Luckily these are some of Collapse's brightest moments, the former borrowing its crusty melody and guitars from PIL's "Seattle" and the latter, one of the trio's chillier anthems.

The album is at its best on the piano-driven "Walk It Back" and the raveup "Alligator Aviator Autopilot Animator." Both benefit from Patti Smith's influence, the previous track a Smith-attack on her Phil Spector period, the second actually featuring punk's godparents Patti and Lenny Kaye attacking their instruments and R.E.M.'s melody like rabid dogs. (Eddie Vedder and Peaches also guest on the record.) While most of its soft ballads are on the OK side, their finest moment is the twinkling Velvets-like lullaby "Everyday is Yours to Win."

Funny, that. I think R.E.M. won this round, big time. Welcome home

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Fred Mills

It's an old story: a respected, revered, beloved or otherwise influential musician pens a hit song (or several), but ultimately gets screwed out of his royalties, either due to youthful carelessness (particularly back in the ‘50s and ‘60s, when artists were notoriously un-savvy about the way the music biz works) or by falling prey to an unscrupulous manager or record label head. In recent years, there have been the occasional efforts by individuals or organizations to help musicians or their surviving family members finally receive a just and equitable payment, and once in awhile there has even been the notable person willing to step forward and do the right thing by the artists even if specific legal technicalities didn't require him to do so.

Apparently that ain't the case for the late Sky Saxon, frontman and chief songwriter for ‘60s garage legends The Seeds. Saxon - born Richard Marsh - passed away in 2009 (read our obituary here), but long before then he'd passed into the realm of the iconic, a genuine godfather of the Nuggets generation thanks to such Seeds hits in the mid ‘60s as "Pushin' Too Hard," "Can't Seem to Make You Mine," and "Mr. Farmer," tunes often covered by young artists coming up through the ranks, as well as his subsequent journeys in rock ‘n' roll, from his involvement with the Source Family in the ‘70s to his latterday appearances at garage rock festivals such as Cavestomp.

Now we learn that Saxon received no royalties from record sales or music publishing for most of his career, a matter that his label and publishing company attributes to his selling his artist's and producer's royalties for $350 and his music publishing royalties for $250 back in 1973. Apparently both Saxon, while he was living, and his widow attempted to recover royalties but were repeatedly turned down, so the matter has now landed in L.A. Superior Court and a hearing is scheduled for March 8. Here are the details, provided by the Saxon camp:

***

Saxon signed a record deal in 1965 with GNP Crescendo Record Co., Inc., a Los Angeles-based company that specialized in jazz recordings, run by Gene Norman, a former concert promoter and disc jockey. At that time, he also signed a music publishing deal with Neil Music, Inc., which is a sister company of GNP.  But for 37 years, since 1973, GNP and Neil Music have stubbornly refused to pay Saxon, or his heirs, any royalties whatsoever. These companies maintain that Saxon signed away all of his royalties, forever, based upon three minor transactions:  A $500 payment for "Pushin' Too Hard" in late 1972, a loan for $250 in mid-1973 (that Saxon did not pay back), for all of Saxon's other songs, and a loan for $350 from late 1973 (that Saxon also did not pay back), for all of Saxon's record and producer's royalties.

The Estate of Sky Saxon (represented by Evan Cohen, and S. Martin Keleti and Sommer Issaq of Cohen and Cohen) has brought a lawsuit against GNP and Neil Music for rescission of Saxon's record and publishing deals, and for royalties for the past four years.  In response, the companies (which are now run by Neil Norman, son of Gene Norman) have taken the position that the three petty deals from 1972 and 1973 are "buy-outs" of any and all royalties forever.  The Estate has asked the court to set aside these three transactions, on the grounds that they are so oppressive and unfair that they should be void, as a matter of public policy, that is, "unconscionable." "Unconscionable" contracts are deals that are so oppressive and one-sided that they literally "shock the conscience" of the court and of civilized society, or which have no place in the legitimate business world.  In that the alleged "buy-outs" fit that description exactly, the Estate has asked the court to set them aside.  The Estate has also asked that on account of the 37-year failure of GNP and Neil Music to pay any royalties, that the original 1960s deals be rescinded, and the Estate be given back all of the musical properties.

In recent years, GNP and Neil Music have exploited Saxon's songs and recordings to a substantial extent. "Can't Seem to Make You Mine" has recently been used in a commercial for Axe Body Spray. "Pushin' Too Hard" has been used for numerous film and television projects, as have other songs by The Seeds.  The songs have been covered over the years by numerous artists, including The Ramones, Johnny Thunders, Billy Corgan, Garbage, Alex Chilton, Murder City Devils, and Yo La Tengo.

The motion to determine the issue of unconscionability will be heard on March 8, 2011.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY LEE ZIMMERMAN

Cayamo. The word itself conjures up a celebratory sound. It even leaves a rather indulgent impression, especially if said in the midst of a chorus of fellow revelers. Cayamo! Witnessing it firsthand, it becomes a veritable call to party hearty. CAYAMO!

That was certainly the case most recently as the fourth Cayamo cruise embarked from Miami, setting its sites for the Caribbean. Yet, it wasn't the destination that mattered; rather it was the journey to get there. Ensconced onboard, in the midst of over 2,000 partying passengers, were nearly three dozen of the finest Americana artists modern music has to offer, much less the finest contingent of musicians one will ever find on the high (at times) seas. BLURT was fortunate to be there for the third year in a row, documenting all the high (at times) lights over the course of an entire week. BLURT's own participation in a pair of seminars is also duly noted during the course of these proceedings, but it's the artists themselves, both singularly and in a seemingly unending parade of guest appearances and cameo occasions, that make Cayamo the most exhilarating experience a music lover could ever wish for.

To overuse a tired cliché, it rocked! Then again, words, ordinary or otherwise, don't do this event justice. Nevertheless, we'll try. What follows then, is our day-by-day rundown of Cayamo 2011.

[Ed. note: to see our photo gallery from the 2011 Cayamo! please go here.]

***

DAY ONE, Sunday, February 13

The first introduction to any cruise is always somewhat disconcerting. There's much to learn about the ship's layout, and this year it was especially challenging as the ship of choice had changed to the Norwegian Pearl after the last couple of years spent on Norwegian's Dawn. With a music cruise as intensive as Cayamo, however, preparation becomes even more of a necessity; since several concerts occur simultaneously, it's essential to thoroughly plan a personal schedule so that one can catch as many acts as possible, while contending with conflicting performances at the same time. Some of the shows are set in stone; each passenger is given assigned seating to one of three main stage shows that take place every night in the Stardust Lounge, an onboard theater with a seating capacity in excess of 1,000. In addition, there are special "hot seats" that allow a repeat ticket to one of the headliner shows with upgraded seating. Plus, the special alumni perks allow entrance into special performances that are apart from general admission. The opportunity to trade tickets made this location the most flexible of all in terms of planning a course of concert action, and passengers posted notes at a central bulletin board offering to exchange tickets for a show more to their liking.

In general however, Cayamo cruisers are responsible for setting up their own schedules, and in our case that often meant darting madly between shows on the pool deck, in the atrium, in Bar City, the Bliss Lounge and more consistently, the Spinnaker Lounge, where the majority of the must-see acts made repeat appearances. The latter venue often became a particular challenge; with an array of artists that included Richard Thompson, Loudon Wainwright, Allison Moorer, Scott Miller, Works Progress Administration, Ellis Paul, Shawn Mullins, Lucy Wainwright and ex-Men at Work mainstay Colin Hay, demand often exceeded seating capacity. Some shows were wisely moved; tickets to Loudon Wainwright stretched from deck five to deck 13 at one point, but nevertheless, the rule of thumb was first come, first served, and grab your seat as quickly as possible when inside.

Once the boat set sail, the music began in earnest. Shawn Mullins, a perennial Cayamo favorite, kicked things off on the pool deck with a set of songs that included highlights from his excellent new album, Light You Up. The crowd, already stoked, greeted the set warmly, and when Brandi Carlile, another icon adored by the Cayamo crowd, made the first of several cameo appearances, the audience predictably roared its enthusiasm

Later, it was off to Bar City (a strange name for a lounge, I reckoned, in that this particular city had no police or fire department or other internal governmental workings as far as I could see) to catch a talkative and charming Lucy Wainwright with a special guest appearance by dad Loudon, followed by Shannon Whitworth, one of the more promising newcomers on the cruise. The night ended with a performance by Work Progress Administration, or WPA, the indie super group that made its bow on Cayamo 2010 with mainstays Glen Phillips (Toad the Wet Sprocket), Sean Watkins (Nickel Creek), and Luke Bulla (Lyle Lovett). As a bonus, last minute special guest Dan Wilson sat in and played a couple of his spectacular songs as well. It made for a perfect cap on a day that was exceedingly satisfying, to say the least. Astonishingly, this was only day one!

Star sightings: Richard Thompson, with wife Nancy Covey, standing idly by during the boarding ritual; the aforementioned Glen Phillips, chatting at the service desk onboard; and Shawn Mullins, responding to a fan's inquiry about his general state of being by affirming, "Man, I've had a great year!

DAY TWO, Monday, February 14

Being Valentine's Day -- by any standard, an ideal day to cruise and listen to music -- the ship was festooned with streams of hearts and plenty of references to romance as well. I co-led a seminar on pop music's greatest love songs, sharing the spotlight with another journalist and playing samples of songs that we felt fit the occasion. My choices included Van Morrison's "Have I Told You Lately," the Beatles' "Here, There and Everywhere," "To Love Somebody" by the Bee Gees and "Unchained Melody" from the Righteous Brothers. I worried that my selections might seem a bit pedestrian to this sophisticated crowd of music aficionados, but when my partner offered Olivia Newton John's "I Honestly Love You," I figured my own hipness factor couldn't take too bad a beating. In truth, she did trump me with a song from Ani DiFranco and this very cool band from Seattle whose name I can't recall. She also knew how to program her music via IPod while I was forced to rely on a mix CD. Hey, just saying the words "mix CD" makes me feel kinda cool anyway.

Besides, by this point, everyone was in ecstasy, not the least of which the stars themselves. "It's invigorating to play for so many new people," remarked David Ryan Harris, a supremely gifted singer/songwriter and another holdover from a couple of years before. "It's also great to just sit and watch the other artists and be a fan. It's great to be stuck on a boat and casually observe all these other artists I love and respect."

Sam and Ruby, first time performers on Cayamo, echoed Harris' enthusiasm. "I can do this!" Ruby affirmed. "It's like band camp. You make friends right away and they become friends for life."

Much of the afternoon was spent crowded into the Bliss Lounge with several hundred other new friends, witnessing the end of Kevn Kinney's set as he sang, "This one's kinda like you... A little bit lost, a little bit blue." With his cowboy hat, hefty girth and long black hair, he created the impression of the stereotypical cosmic cowboy, but his amusing stories suggested he could also be everybody's best buddy if they and he were so inclined.

Scott Miller and Will Hoge, two excellent Tennessee singer/songwriters shared the stage next, swapping songs and stories for a session recorded for World Café. Both men boast a terrific catalogue of original material, and a good reservoir of wit as well. Miller, who is originally from Virginia, remarked that his wife is from neighboring West Virginia, adding, "When you get married you always have to give something up. In my case, it was half my jokes." However, despite his jocular personality, Miller's songs are infused with heartrending pathos, particularly "Lo Siento, Spanishburg, West Virginia," a tale of transformation in small town America, and "Freedom's A Stranger," an affirmative anthem even the Boss would likely love to call his own.

Our first show in the Stardust occurred that night, with John Prine taking the spotlight, accompanied at one point by the ever-present Brandi Carlile. Looking older and grayer than I had recalled, he nevertheless put on a great show, with the weary ballads "Angel from Montgomery" and "Hello In There" providing the emotional highlights. The crowd roared its approval, fully cognizant of the fact that they were witnessing a venerable old master at work.

Ellis Paul, up in the Spinnaker, provided another tender touchstone, his expressive vocals and tight two-piece backing band adding poignancy to a remarkably revealing set of songs. Damn if I didn't have tears welling up in my eyes from the first song on. The man's a treasure, as surely as James Taylor or Jackson Browne, and one can only hope someone recognizes that fact and clears him a passing lane on the road to the big time.

Keith Sewell, another one-time member of Lyle Lovett's touring band and a former foil to Ricky Skaggs, provided the musical nightcap with a rousing set of Bluegrass revelry. "Man, this is the best festival in the U.S.," he proclaimed. "Hell, it's the best festival in the world!"

We couldn't agree more.

Star sightings: Hanging with my new best friend Scott Miller, introduced in absentia by Mic Harrison, a Knoxville pal and Scott's onetime band mate in the late, great V-Roys.

DAY THREE, Tuesday, February 15

There was clear indication that overindulgence has already set in. My wife Alisa and I spot a semi familiar face on the stairwell. "You were terrific yesterday," Alisa enthuses. He thanks us and scurries away as I turn to her and ask, "So who was that?"

"I don't really know," she replied. "He did look kind of familiar though."

I run into the Steep Canyon Rangers at an interview session as they slowly, sleepily drift into the conference room. A group of best buddies who happen to be adept at old fashioned bluegrass, they've become stars of a genre that's become more and more popular with mainstream audiences in the past decade or so, a trend they attribute to the crossover acceptance of artists like Dolly Parton, Elvis Costello, Steve Earle and Robert Plant. The band's own jumpstart to fame and fortune coincided with a fortuitous partnership with Steve Martin, a subsequent world tour and a string of television appearances that has swept them into the late night and early morning talk show circuit over the past several months. Their new album with Steve Martin is scheduled for release in March, and with a cameo vocal by Paul McCartney, it's likely to bring them even more well-deserved attention.

Colin Hay proved a no-show for our interview session when it's disclosed that he's complaining of a stomach ailment and has been confined to quarters. I suppose that made him a Man from Down Under (the weather), although fortunately that would prove momentary.

A few songs with Glen Phillips solo in the Bliss Lounge led into a much-anticipated Richard Thompson show in the Spinnaker, another of the undisputed highlights of both the day and the week as a whole. Droll as always, Thompson charged into a string of classic works from his repertoire - "Misunderstood," "Turning of the Tide," "Walking on a Wire," "Wall of Death," "Feel So Good," "Misfortune," a searing take on "Vincent Black Lightening" and an emotional "Who Knows Where the Time Goes," penned by his late partner in Fairport Convention, Sandy Denny. Once again, I catch myself batting away a glistening tear. Thompson likened being on a boat to a Jimmy Buffett moment, but happily decided a traditional sea shanty will suffice instead.

An hour in and its over, and RT clears the stage for the first formal set by Scott Miller, who, in his usual aw-shucks country boy way, charms the crowd, which is rapidly warming to him after only a couple of songs. "It's one thing to make fun of the beast," he offers as he trades on some homespun philosophy. "It's quite another to try to outrun him." Fortunately, there's no need for any sprinting. By the end of the trip, he will have sold out of all his CDs at the merch store and raised his profile considerably among the Cayamo crowd. I go over to congratulate him afterwards and find him surrounded by admirers, a good thing and well deserved.

We'll take in a double header in the Stardust tonight, beginning with a rousing show by the Indigo Girls, who seem to have brought their own contingent of fans with them. Brandi Carlile makes another obligatory appearance with her two gal pals and they end their set with an anthemic "Galileo." As the fans exit the theater, it's impossible to spot anyone who doesn't have a smile frozen to their face.

Steve Earle follows and he proves as incendiary as ever with a band that includes wife Allison Moorer, dBs drummer Will Rigby and a husband/wife duo dubbed the Mastersons. They offer riveting renditions of "Copperhead Road," "Guitar Town" and the incendiary "The Revolution Starts Now." Yet, despite the high energy, Earle seems notably less insurgent and lots more accessible, casual and almost offhanded. "I've gotten a lot of second chances," he allows.

The night concludes with a hilarious set by a rubber-faced Loudon Wainwright, now moved to the Stardust to accommodate an overflow crowd shut out of his earlier show in the Spinnaker. "I'm Steve Earle's half brother," he declares, eliciting a roar of laughter. He references his role in the film Knocked Up, generating further hysterics when he announces, "You're looking at Katherine Heigl's gynecologist. Man, we just had to do that scene 30 or 40 times." Songs about over enthusiastic fans, prescription medications and the inevitability of aging, as well as ongoing pleas to snatch up his offerings at the merch table provided further reason why the crowd to convulsed with laughter. Wainwright redefines the entire concept of being laugh out loud funny.

Star sightings: None today really, but after colliding with waiters repeatedly for days, I actually witnessed two servers crashing into one another. Still, I love those guys and gals. The plea for "washy washy" as they sprayed my hands with disinfectant is destined to become my mantra.

DAY FOUR, Wednesday, February 16

We make landfall in Tortola, take a wonderful private tour, briefly hit the beach and enjoy a relaxing lunch before making our way back to the ship. We miss sets by Will Hoge and the now fully recovered Colin Hay, but do make our scheduled show with Brandi Carlile in the Stardust. Sixthman's head honcho Andy Levine, the founding father of the company that launched these theme cruises some ten years prior, intros her with a cryptic reference to her unbecoming behavior that afternoon, suggesting that her return next year may be in doubt. The crowd's baffled, being that she's been a Cayamo staple since the beginning. Nevertheless, there's growing suspicion it's all an inside joke, and as she takes the stage following a thunderous drum solo, she's clearly nonplussed about any idea of a conflict. As always, she incites the crowd with her rock ‘n' roll posturing and proves herself the ever-enduring star. She then briefly turns the stage over to "The Twins," the gawky, baldheaded Hanseroth brothers who are at the core of her backing band. They perform a note perfect rendition of "Sounds of Silence," after which Brandi asks, "Isn't that the creepiest, most beautiful thing you ever heard." The audience roars in agreement.

We catch a reprise of WPA in the Spinnaker and stick around for Kevn Kinney's Truck Stop, which, its banner aside, proves to be a surprisingly tender slate of rotating performances from Will Hoge, Shawn Mullins and Ellis Paul. By now it's late, and after an active day of sightseeing, we're clearly ready for bed. But what a way to wrap things up!

Star sightings: Brandi Carlile on her way to an excursion, holding her niece's hand; and Dan Wilson, unrecognized until it was too late, as he hurried off to catch a tour bus. Also, chats with Ruby of Sam and Ruby, and the ever-amiable David Ryan Harris. 

DAY FIVE, Thursday, February 17 

The morning arrives in St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, and we awake early to catch a catamaran for some sailing and some soaking up the sun. An abundance of rum punches makes us oblivious to the sun's rays and I return to the ship looking like a lobster. I'm not bothered by it at all - at least not at this point - and opt to catch the Celt combo Enter the Haggis, who are stirring up a storm on the pool deck. Indeed, the waves are rising and the boat is rocking - literally as well as figuratively. Patty Griffin, the evening's headliner, makes note of the rolling motion during her set that night, declaring, "If I fall over, I'm going to keep on singing." Having just been accorded a Grammy the previous Sunday, she doesn't allow her serious stature to get in the way of some silliness. "Whenever I find myself in a precarious situation," she says, referring to the tossing and turning, "I find it helps if you just go ‘wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee'." The crowd takes the cue, and from that point on, her show is punctuated by "wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee's" throughout. 

Exhausted, we opt for an early evening retreat. But the ocean keeps on pounding. 

Star sightings: Steve Earle and Allison Moorer having lunch with baby John Henry at the next table. They took turns taking their meal from the buffet line, but when the baby starts getting antsy, they opt to leave. "The baby tells us when it's time to go," Earle explains. Also sighted: Luke Bulla, on our sailing excursion, accompanied by a lady friend who kindly buys Alisa a drink; and Sam, of Sam and Ruby, who's made his way over to the beach and now wonders how he'll get back to the ship. Take the catamaran back with us, I suggest. "I'm not brave enough to be so bold," he replies. Presumably, he got back safely anyway.

DAY SIX, Friday, February 18

Or maybe not. Sam was to have been the special guest for my Bob Dylan seminar this afternoon, which would find him strumming his guitar and doing a Dylan song. Then again, the seasickness bags that draped the entrance to the elevators was not a good sign so he could have been a casualty of the motion. The waves rocked the boat and the passengers were finding it hard to keep their balance... and in some cases, their meals. Fortunately, nobody lost their lunch during my presentation or I might have taken it personally. Of course, encapsulating Dylan's 50-year career into less than an hour of talk time is a major challenge, but the crowd seemed pleased. I was stopped several times by those who had attended my seminar, and I got to stretch my fifteen minutes of fame throughout the rest of the cruise. For once, people weren't gawking only because my fly was unzipped. Heck, I even got to sign an autograph. (Note to editor: I also got in plenty of plugs for our beloved BLURT.) [Ed. note: Ya done good, kid. You can keep your job for another year.]

 One perk of doing a presentation in the Spinnaker was the assurance of great seats for the concert that followed, which happened to be by none other than Allison Moorer. With hubby Steve Earle's band in tow, she put in a blazing set that included the stunning "Alabama Song," Crows" and "Hard Place to Fall." As Earle waited in the wings, she clearly couldn't help engage in a bit of one-upmanship. Recalling her Oscar nomination for her contribution to the soundtrack for The Horse Whisperer soundtrack, she noted that at the time they weren't married. "Who's that little bitch?" she remembers him saying. "He's still waiting on his nomination," she said ruefully, and with no small amount of glee. 

Other shows of note that day included a now fully recovered Colin Hay, accompanied by his wife and the Steep Canyon Rangers for some stripped down renditions of his newer songs, as well as old Men at Work standards. Chuck Canon proselytized in Bar City, singing, "God doesn't hate Muslims, God doesn't hate Jews, God doesn't hate Christians, but we all give God the blues." A second Steve Earle show, possibly even more stirring than the first, followed in the Stardust. A reprise of Shawn Mullins took place soon after. The evening was capped by Buddy Miller, a Cayamo constant, accompanied by a band that featured Cody Dickinson of the North Mississippi Allstars on drums, Joel Guzman on accordion and the lilting harmonies of Patty Griffin.

Star sightings: Seeing Loudon Wainwright in the Stardust, I jokingly mentioned to him that I was also his biggest fan, but I wouldn't harass him like the stalker in his song. I also got opportunity to speak with Will Rigby, who not only graced me with my first autograph of the cruise, but also promised that a new dBs album would make it way to store shelves by year's end.

DAY SEVEN, Saturday, February 19

The last day of any event, especially one as grand as this, is always bittersweet. Knowing that in 24 hours, you'll be back to an ordinary life, bereft of the camaraderie of the other Cayamo passengers, the magic of the music and the superb hospitality afforded by the Sixthman staff, makes a return to reality all the more difficult.

Fortunately, our final day was a full one, beginning with an afternoon spent at the beach at Norwegian's private island, Stirrup Cay. The music was, as usual, plentiful that evening as well, particularly the pair of Alumni Shows that began with the teaming of Richard Thompson and Loudon Wainwright, who were cleverly billed for the occasion as "Loud and Rich."  The duo leaned heavily on covers - "You Ain't Going Nowhere," Sloop John B," and "Love Hurts," which Loudon introduced by remarking, "Now that Valentines Day is long gone, let's get negative about love." These two were indeed an odd couple, and for their first show ever as a duo, they worked remarkably well together, a kind of musical take on Martin and Lewis as it were. Prefacing one of Richard's songs, Loudon suggested it might be older than most of those in attendance and then asked that the lights be turned up in order to get proof. Seeing the crowd, most of whom were well into their 40s, 50s and 60s, he shrieked with horror. "My people!" he exclaimed. Later, after asking Richard what it was like to meet the Queen, from whom he had received the Order of the British Empire honors, Loudon suggested he'd be lucky to meet the surviving members of Queen.

You had to be there.

We took in a second Buddy Miller show immediately after which Miller, a clear Cayamo Cruise favorite, noting that it had been two years since his heart attack onstage and the subsequent triple bypass surgery which prevented his Cayamo appearance in 2009. He humbly offered thanks for the cards and emails he received from well-wishers and then noted that among those urging his speedy recovery was guitarist Steve Bruton, who sadly succumbed to cancer only a short time later.

Afterwards, we hightailed it to the Spinnaker for a standing room only performance by Scott Miller. Scott had really worked his way up to the Cayamo hierarchy in a very short time it seemed. There was then a scramble for seats for an encore performance by Richard Thompson, forcing me to sit on the on the floor and crunch myself in a compact position that precluded any possibility of comfort. Midway through, someone whispered, "Lee, behind you," as they prepared to exit and graciously give me their seats. I'm not sure who it was, but if you're reading this - thanks!

Star sightings: There were a plethora of farewells after Thompson ended his set. He autographed my album after I had taken the opportunity to chat with his wife Nancy, who, by the way, organizes Festival Tours, a jolly trip to the U.K. for Fairport Convention's anniversary gigs at the Cropredy Festival. It was also picture taking time with Buddy Miller, who played on Thompson's encore; the aforementioned Mastersons; Cody Dickinson, to whom I paid complements for the North Mississippi Allstars' latest album, and, finally, my new pal Scott Miller, who repaid my affection with a solid kiss on the cheek. The sentiments are mutual, Scott, I assure you.

*** 

So that's it. Another year with a wonderful Cayamo adventure. As my friend Dan reminded me on Friday night, there really is no way to aptly describe this cruise to those of have never been on it. I've attempted to do so of course, but if you're swayed at all, I'd also suggest you partake in it yourself next year. As stated earlier, it rocks... even when the seas are calm.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY JENNIFER KELLY

"When we started the Luyas, the concept was that there were no rules about what it had to be or what it had to sound like," says Luyas singer Jessie Stein. "The band was conceived as a band for fun."

The Luyas have been keeping it fun for roughly half a decade now, playing secret shows in and around  Montreal, relying on non-traditional rock instruments like French Horn, strings and a 12-string, three-bridged lute called a Moodswinger, and recording two albums. The first, Faker Death came out as a self-release in August 2007 and was reissued the following January on Pome Records. The second, Too Beautiful To Work, arrived this week on the much larger, much more visible Dead Oceans label.

Stein says that the record's title, which is also the name of its opening song, is partly a reference to a girl she knows who seems to get by solely on her looks. But it's also an observation about her band's languid, dreamily gorgeous sound, which proved to be a surprisingly hard sell when she went out to pitch it to labels. "People kept saying that they loved it, but they didn't know what to do with it," says Stein.  

The Luyas began with Stein and her friends Pietro Amato and Stefan Schneider, all living in Toronto as part of the Blocks Recording experimental music scene. Stein was in an indie pop band called SS Cardiacs. Amato and Schneider had a three-piece instrumental outfit called Torngat. Their sounds could hardly have been more different, but they became fans of each other's work and embarked on a lasting friendship.

Later, when Stein turned up in Montreal, she began to think about collaborating. "I thought, it would be awesome to just take my songs and hand them over to somebody whose aesthetic sensibility was so different from mine," she says. "To let another set of ears and another style of musicians arrange it. I guess I got that inspiration from the record Destroyer did with Frog Eyes."

By then Amato and Schneider were both in Bell Orchestre and Amato had toured as a horn player with Arcade Fire. Stein began playing casually with Amato, in the process incorporating one of the Luyas more unusual elements, the French horn, into her songwriting. "It was more because of the fact that he's Pietro than because he plays French horn," she says. "He was my friend and he was a musician. There has never been any notion that, ‘Oh, we need a player who plays this.'  So it's a really organic band. Everything happens for some natural reason."

Schneider joined next, and the band began playing live as the Luyas in December 2006. They released Faker Death on their own in 2007. In 2010, McSweeneys  writer Sean Michaels documented a secret show in Montreal, where would-be concert goers were summoned to a meeting point, blindfolded and led by rope to the show venue. Michaels' called the Luyas music "an art-pop that's supple, gold and silver, with messy choruses wedged between swells of scattered sound." A week or so later, Stein was at SXSW, taking meetings and trying to find a label for her band.

For Too Beautiful To Work, the band added a new member Mattieu Charbonneau.  This first album for Dead Oceans also has string arrangements by another old Blocks Recordings friend, the composer Owen Pallett, who was once Stein's roommate.

 "Owen's a really good friend of mine. I met him when I was maybe 18 and living in Toronto," she says. "He was writing the first Final Fantasy record when I was living with him.  We've gone through a lot together through the years, eight years."

The mutual confidence built up in that long-term relationship allowed Stein to simply hand over her tunes and allow Pallett to realize them more fully. "I really trust Owen. He's known every piece of music that I've made since I started recording music, basically. So I know that he has a very good sense of who I am."

For Too Beautiful to Work, Pallett arrived at the studio one day and took over. "He just walked in, and he said, these people are coming today. How much time do I have?  He called a bunch of his friends, and just told them what to do.  It was amazing."

"Owen's an incredible conductor," she adds. "He's very good at getting people to do a very specific thing that he wants them to do."   

The full palette of instruments transforms the Luyas' dream-like songs into lusher, more complex compositions, as on the album highlight "Canary," where a wash of strings adds tension to Stein's languid vocals. The Moodswinger plays a role on that song as well, first in its traditional guise as a strummed, stringed instrument, and later in a giant crashing sound as Stein moves the third bridge mid-cut.

"The third bridge on a Moodswinger is a sliding bridge, kind of based on the concept of a screwdriver under the strings. It slides on two metal bars pushed up on the strings at different positions on the neck to create different overtone structures," says Stein. Normally, a musician would set the third bridge at the beginning of a song and leave it there, but it is possible to reposition it on the fly. "You can do that, yes, but it makes a big, loud scary noise," says Stein. "In ‘Canary,' that happens. When it goes to the instrumental section, there's a big crash." It was no accident, and Stein would do it again in a heartbeat. "It was a total move," she adds impishly.

That sense of play is maybe the central think about Luyas. This is a band that's always willing to try something new. For instance, the song "Too Beautiful to Work," was one of the last ones to be recorded for the second album, after new member Mattieu Charbonneau had joined Stein, Pietro Amato and Stefan Schneider. Along among the CD's tracks, it has an antic, manic, dance-friendly vibe, with careening piano lines and a percolating electro beat. "We never made a song that is remotely like that one before, but that's the spirit of our band," she says. "To do whatever... to follow our hearts."

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Fred Mills 

Yesterday we took a look at music industry douchebag, er, veteran Steve Stoute's recent open letter to the Grammys and how, among other things, he floated some vague notion of a conspiracy theory surrounding Arcade Fire's Best Album win (at the expense of Eminem, of course, who clearly "deserved" to win). Stoute clearly stirred up some shit, as it was juicy watercooler talk for several days, and among the commentators who weighed in was industry watchdog Bob Lefsetz (of "The Lefsetz Letter"), who seemed to echo Stoute's suspicions when he wrote, in part: 

"Obviously NARAS knew Arcade Fire was gonna win.  Otherwise, why would they close the show?  And they got two numbers.  If there was gonna be extra time couldn't there have been another performer, or one of those legendary Grammy love-ins featuring Stevie Wonder and a whole host of legends, maybe playing a classic with Arcade Fire?" 

This apparently caught the attention of the Arcade Fire camp, for today Lefsetz (who is nothing if not fair about allowing both those who agree AND disagree with him have their say) published a letter from the band's manager, Scott Rodger, who very firmly insists that there was "no big plot" whatsoever, and that in particular the fact that the band played a second song, at the end and as credits began to roll, was merely because there was enough time for it. 

Rodger's letter read, in part: 

"Arcade Fire had the final slot on the Grammys as the ratings are low at the end of the broadcast. It really is that simple. We were one of the least known acts on the bill for a network audience. Don't you think I wanted a better slot for the band? The reason we got a second song was also simple. No big plot. We had no guarantee of air time, but it was simply to play out the end credits of the show, if we're even had that much. The show never runs like clockwork to an exact time so the end is always loose. As it happened, the broadcast was covered by sponsors messages and the end credits."

Rodger added that the international broadcast of the show not only cut the band's main performance earlier in the evening, the end-title performance was "bastardised."

Continuing, Rodger noted, "Arcade Fire deserved the win this year. They made the best album. If the award was named "Album Sales Of The Year" award, there would be no discussion. Stoute's letter was a nice piece of self publicity. Did he see Kanye's tweets when we won and the praise he gave us?? He needs to tune in. Eminem made a big selling album but it was far from being his best work. Katy Perry made a big pop record that simply didn't have weight or credibility. Gaga's repackage, great album but it was a repackage of the main release. I think everyone felt it was going to be Lady Antebellum's moment having won 5 out of 6 awards to that point. We all felt that way too."

Rodger additionally pointed out that the band "didn't lobby any organisation for [the Grammy win] and that they had to pay their "own overhead to do the event, thus the lack of onstage gimmicks. No label picked up the tab."

Amen. So much for the conspiracy theory. Once again, hats off to Arcade Fire. You can read all about this and more at the Lefsetz Letter.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Fred Mills

Greying musos (such as yours truly) can do a merry arm-in-arm jig with younger freak-folkers at the recent news from venerable archival label Light In The Attic: they've reissued the legendary British folkie Michael Chapman's 1970 classic Fully Qualified Survivor, a platter that has long eluded fans on these shores for a good time now (to date it had only been reissued overseas), and one which the original vinyl has no doubt been wore thin from constant spins over the years. The album's stature is indeed justified; Chapman, a peer to the likes of John Martyn and Roy Harper, recorded early on for the Harvest imprint and was championed by no less than BBC maestro John Peel, who helped make the track "Postcards From Scarborough" a minor hit in the UK.

Chapman's four-album run for Harvest earned him a rabidly devoted following, and although his profile was considerably lower from the 1980s onward, he remains a much-loved icon in the roots and folk community and continues to record and perform to this day.

And because we feel like LITA's official product description for Chappo's album is absolutely stonkin', we're gonna share that with you. Check it out:

Oh yeah! Are you ready to get qualified??? Fans of John Martyn, Roy Harper, and Bert Jansch get ready for a little trip back to England in 1970 when the Harvest label was playing mother hen to the psych-folk-rock scene. First time ever on CD in North America, and the first vinyl reissue in decades, this reissue of Michael Chapman's classic 1970 album Fully Qualified Survivor sports re-mastered audio, old school tip-on gatefold jacket, 180-gram vinyl, rare archival photos, and notes by Mick Houghton (Uncut). And for you CD lovers, better put on your shades when picking this one up, as the silver foil deluxe Digipak is a real shiner! Like other Harvest artists, Chapman's music contains a slightly drugged out feel, sublime guitar playing and intense lyrics. What makes Fully Qualified Survivor such a special album (besides being a vehicle for a young pre-David Bowie Mick Ronson's mind-blowing guitar heroics) are the layers of beautiful acoustic guitars, deranged vocals, floating conga drums, and the cello of Paul Buckmaster, all floating along in a slightly druggy haze.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY NANCY DUNHAM

Think of Sarah Lee Guthrie and Johnny Irion as living in something akin to a snow globe, where musical influences scatter down upon them.

As the daughter of Arlo and granddaughter of Woody, Sarah Lee has always embraced her royal folk heritage. After the two married, Johnny - well known in rock notably for Queen Sarah Saturday - joined in the family's folk endeavors through such projects as "The Guthrie Family Rides Again" tour and even riding with the family on a Thanksgiving Day float in last year's Macy's Day Parade.

"I've played loud versions of rock and roll and put out some solo records," says Irion, "This was a turning point for Sarah Lee and me."

Irion is referring to Bright Examples, the new album from the pair that some label as country rock, others label as alt-country and still others just call indie. Whatever the assigned musical genre, reviewers agree the songs - nine written by Irion, two by Guthrie and one written as collaboration - charmingly swirl the duo's many musical influences. That's just what the two were going for as they approached the album as a way to set a musical soundscape for their work together.

In a way it was a move from South Carolina to Massachusetts, near where Guthrie grew up, that prompted the pair to write what they now call the album they were always meant to record.

"We left South Carolina and I just started maniacally writing," Irion says. "At the end we had about 50 songs."

Some tunes, such as "Never Far From My Heart," are examples of Guthrie and Irion embracing a shared experience, while others ("Target on My Heart") are Irion's more solitary musings. Suffice to say the songs are richly textured, which is no doubt why U2 guitarist the Edge expressed interest in producing the album.

"I was thinking that the Edge has worked with [great producers and musicians] and learned from each of them," says Irion. "He was really interested but he's crazy busy right now and we didn't want to wait. I'm so glad he didn't [produce the album] because we ended up with all kinds of great stuff on this album we might not have gotten."

Although the stars didn't align to work with the Edge, Irion and Guthrie knew they wanted a producer who was also a player, not just a technician. The duo's creation process is quite organic, and producers who aren't players don't add a lot to the mix.

Enter the production dream team of Vetiver's Andy Cabic and Thom Monahan (who in addition to Vetiver has worked with Devendra Banhart and the Black Crowes' Chris Robinson), who had first introduced Sarah Lee and Johnny. Almost from the first time, Cabic and Monahan heard the 50 odd songs the duo sent them, the match seemed ideal.

"We sent [the songs] to Andy and Thom, and they wrote back and says, 'We have two records here. Here is the record we can make with you guys,'" says Irion. "I'm still looking forward to making that other record though."

Perhaps now more than ever, because of the magical process that surrounded the recording and production of Bright Examples.

"Thom is one of those guys, he is maniacal," Irion continues. "He is there and in the moment and if he thinks one way, you're going to have a hard time changing his mind. Thanks to him for that. We owe a lot of the way the record turned out to that."

Consider the track "Butterflies" that Irion and Guthrie had envisioned as an ethereal, floating tune: Monahan heard the song as something else and convinced them to record it with plenty of bluegrass sounds that the duo is convinced ultimately brought it to life

"It's one of those 'clean your palate' songs," says Irion. "It really works for the record." Guthrie agrees, noting that the entire process was an act of faith in many ways. "I am often of the thinking if there are too many chefs in the kitchen, it might come out fragmented," she says. "In a way, you have to sacrifice and learn from everything. That was the pool we were swimming in with Andy and Tom. We loved the experience and we learned a lot from these guys who make great music. That's why it sounds complete and beautiful."

Adding to the mix were flavors of several guests, including Gary Louris and Mark Olson of the Jayhawks who brought their own style of harmonies to the tune "Seven Sisters."

"Without the Jayhawks we wouldn't have Wilco," says Irion. "Those two, when you blend their vocals together it is like blending Sarah Lee and me. It just worked on that song and that's why you have something of a Jayhawks' feeling."

In fact, the entire album has the laid-back Laurel Canyon vibe of friends that are comfortable enough in their own musical skins to team together with such disparate instrumentation as lap steel guitar and Hammond organ and lovingly knit what seems to be a one-of-a-kind sound.

Irion says that it was the careful choosing of the producers, the guests, and others involved in the album that made the songs work. "It all harkens back to a great team. When you listen to all the great records, obviously, Paul McCartney made great records [as solo albums] but he also had to rely on a lot of other people to get there."

Many songs on the album were recorded live, resulting in a spine-tingling immediacy, such as when the vocals of Irion and Guthrie swirl together on the aforementioned "Seven Sisters." Take some Neil Young and a dab of Tom Petty, mix in touches of Tori Amos and Stevie Nicks, put in a dash of country - and you have Guthrie and Irion.

"This is a turning point, absolutely," says Guthrie, "We have been waiting for this for a long time, preparing for it. It's what we have always wanted to do. This has been the ultimate experience for me and now we'll take it from there."

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Fred Mills

By way of introduction: Paper Tiger is an Asheville, NC, -based duo, vocalist Molly Kummerle (of well-known regional jazz/pop outfit Ruby Slippers) and Isaac Gottfried (aka MINGLE, noted deejay and remixer). Since joining forces a couple of years ago, Kummerle and Gottfried have quickly amassed a reputation for crafting brainy electronica that dips equally into hypnotic trip-hop and danceable, pop-tilting sampladelica; they were among a handful of local acts selected to perform at last fall's MoogFest, which featured such heavy-hitters as Massive Attack, Big Boi, Jonsi and MGMT. Me Have Fun (Boy Girl Recordings), their debut, more than reaffirms that reputation - in its quietly compelling, get-under-your-skin brand of understatement, it actually winds up saying more than 99% of the new releases that have appeared so far this year.

First and foremost, Kummerle brings her jazz-trained pipes to the party with such seductive grace that you half expect her to step out from behind the stereo speakers wearing nothing but a sheer silk robe and a coy smile. Yet there's also a palpable vulnerability to that voice. The first time you hear her clearly is in the second song, the title track, cooing "ahh-ahh-mmm" softly, but with purpose, and as the smokey, loungey tune gradually unfolds, the singer confesses her lust and her confusion and to how her "rules start to come undone" as she confronts that desire. In her voice, one hears echoes of Dusty Springfield, Billie Holiday, Beth Orton and Beth Gibbons - fire and ice, ice and fire.

The Gibbons comparison isn't a stray one, by the way; Portishead is the contemporary act that Paper Tiger most closely resembles, along with fellow Bristolians Massive Attack. Gottfried's fertile trove of samples and liberal deployment of keyboards (by both Gottfried and Kummerle, plus guest Chuck Lichtenberger from stephaniesid) all synch organically to cast a widescreen, cinematic glow. From the sweeping strings and noirish vibe of "Hibiscus" and the chilly orchestral minimalism of "Softly" to the eerie-yet-lush "Hugo," whose Beach Boys sample is guaranteed to permanently alter the way you hear "Good Vibrations," these compositions push beyond merely "compelling" to become insistent, the transformation occurring on an almost subliminal level. Another band simpatico with Paper Tiger's crate-digging aesthetic: Saint Etienne, particularly on the surreal, flute-and-horns flecked "Paper Tiger" and the dreamy, yearning "Freezer" (with its suite-like arrangement that slips deliciously into breezy ‘60s pop mode, then back again, this song is destined to find its way onto a movie or TV show soundtrack with the right marketing push).

Seamlessly sequenced, with Gottfried supplying brief (under 30 seconds) instrumental interludes between each proper song to lend an additional filmic heft to the proceedings, and remarkably diverse for a quote/unquote "downtempo" project, Me Have Fun is the type of record that pays dividend after dividend with each new spin. It's the sound of late-night romance, of early-morning musings, and of all the refracted beauty of the daylight that falls between.

Incidentally, don't bother Googling the band's name; it'll just drive you crazy, as there is also a Dutch indierock band called Paper Tiger, a rock/funk outfit from Wisconsin called Paper Tiger, the Doomtree hip-hop collective producer who calls himself Paper Tiger, some teenage band that goes by the handle of My Paper Tiger, and assorted non-musical Paper Tiger entities. If you want to chase down this Paper Tiger and hear assorted album tunes and remixes, go directly to the official website or to the duo's MySpace page. But be careful: the music may be atmospheric and dreamy, but it's hardly toothless. Once it gets you in its maw, it doesn't let go. Rrrrowwrrr.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Fred Mills

Aaaannnnndddd the post-Grammys Arcade Fire backlash rolls on.

You may have heard that the Merge band won a Grammy last week; something about the best album of 2010. And you may recall that in the wake of that win, a lot of creeps - most of them hip-hop fans, plus Rosie O'Donnell - came out of the woodwork to rain on A.F.'s parade, spouting claims how Eminem (and in some instances Justin Bieber - now THERE's a juxtaposition) wuz robbed.

Add Translation marketing company CEO Steve Stoute, apparently a 20-year music biz veteran (who?), to that chorus of nattering nabobs of naysayerdom. In a story published at Billboard.com, the record industry bible takes a look at Stoute and the full-page ad he ran recently in the New York Times that was essentially an open letter to the Grammys for this year's "snubbing" of Eminem and, you guessed it, Justin Bieber, along with Kanye West.

Said Stoute, "The awards show has become a series of hypocrisies and contradictions, leaving me to question why any contemporary popular artist would even participate. We must acknowledge the massive cultural impact of Eminem and Kanye West and how their music is shaping, influencing and defining the voice of a generation. [And] how is it that Justin Bieber, an artist that defines what it means to be a modern artist, did not win Best New Artist?"

Stoute singled out Arcade Fire's "surprise" win as proof of the Grammys having tin ears, writing, "What truly inspired the writing of this letter was that this most recent show fed my suspicions. As the show was coming to a close and just prior to presenting the award for Album Of The Year, the band Arcade Fire performed "Month of May" -- only to... surprise... win the category and, in a moment of sheer coincidence, happened to be prepared to perform "Ready to Start." "

Hmmm, that's a real smoking gun, ya know? Read the full article here, and you can also read Stoute's own commentary over at the Huffington Post.

Meanwhile... hey Stoute - go fuck yourself, you constipated nitwit.

Incidentally, I'm not the only one who took note of Stoute and decided to point out how far up his ass he's lodged his head. Music industry observer Wayne Rosso, in his latest "Wayne's World" blog, penned his own open letter, this one to Stoute, and swiftly dismantled most of Stoute's core contentions (adding that Justin Bieber is an "irritating little snot").

Writes Rosso, to Stoute, "I think that you may have to go back to school. Your impassioned defense of Justin Bieber, Kanye West and Eminem, accusations of NARAS members' collective pop culture ignorance and intimations of chicanery may be misguided or at the very least uninformed...The implications of some sort of bizarre Grammy conspiracy sounds more like the single bullet theory or a Glen Beck rant."

Indeed.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY STEVEN ROSEN

Willie Wright's Telling the Truth, the latest reissue/rediscovery from the archivists at Chicago's Numero Group, gets off to one strange start. A jivey voice, which sounds like it's introducing a live-radio broadcast from a glittery nightclub, cheerily says, "Hello, music people of the world. Hotel Records and Variety Recording at 130 West 42^nd St. in New York City, we proudly present Mr. Willie Wright." There's a slight New York accent to the voice and you wonder what kind of dated, hipsterish hokum you're in for. But then Wright starts to sing a laid-back, introspective, lilting jazzy-folk number - " Nantucket Woman" - pushed gently forward by the expansive, Allman Brother guitar licks of the fine Harry Jensen, and you're taken aback. This sounds intimate, personal, real. What gives?

That's all part of Wright's unusual story - this album was originally (and barely) released in 1977, when Wright was just shy of 40. An African-American born in the South who moved early to New York, discovered his relaxed, mellifluous, honeyed voice (with a touch of Lou Rawls) and spent a peripatetic career traveling between New York, Boston and points between.

He could have had a career in the 1970s to match Bill Withers, O.C. Smith or Terry Callier. And he seems to have tried. But he also seems to have been infused with quite a bit of the countercultural spirit. According to the copiously detailed liner notes accompanying this reissue, he and a partner once ran a head shop in Allston, Mass., but broke up when he wanted to shift all the contents vertically by 90 degrees. That meant the counter and clerks would have to be suspended from the ceiling, which struck the partner as a bit impractical.

Maybe that kind of spirit is why Telling the Truth was released on Wright's own barebones Hotel Records. And in order to afford its production, he cut a deal with Variety Recording, a studio. It halved its rate and got a plug on the album's first cut. Wright pressed just 1,000 copies, selling them himself in Nantucket where he was a popular club draw.

All this makes Wright seem like a total eccentric, a flake, but he doesn't sound like that at all. True, the production limits the dimensionality of the recording, so his voice isn't as dynamic as it could be. But nevertheless, it is friendly and unpretentious, romantic but never melodramatic - it finds the groove and works intuitively with the limited accompaniment (he, himself, plays rhythm guitar and flute). At times, the songs have a solid Southern rock-and-soul dimension. These are tunes Van Morrison would love - quietly trying to push the romantic into the mystic. Greg Allman, too, would have admired the funky-rock fatalism of "It's Only Life, That's All."

The songs are often quite touching lyrically. Wright seems to know his dreams of musical success are slipping from him, and he expresses it with wise resignation. He seems badly to want love - a good relationship - and to need it to get by. (Apparently he found it on occasion. the photo above depicts Wright with his "one-time muse" Susan Hayes.) In "Dressing for the Occasion," he finds solace from job-hunting frustrations in his woman's love. On "In the Beauty of the Night," a ballad that Wright prefaces with flute and some dreamy "la la las," he sings, "Searching through our sounds, for our favorite LPs/There isn't anywhere on earth I'd rather be."

According to the liner notes, Wright had a troubled family life. And that seems to bother him. The ballad, "Son, Don't Let Life Pass You By," which has some gorgeous minor-key chord changes to highlight its generous lyrics, is directed toward a resentful offspring. The piano wisely plays off of Jensen's guitar - at key moments the voice is double-tracked. On the carefully pulsating groove of the celebratory "I'm So Happy Now," Wright is joined by a daughter on back-up vocals: "Finally decided, we can't be divided."

The reissue includes three extra cuts, two of which are also included on a CD-45. One is a version of Curtis Mayfield's powerful "Right On for the Darkness.

Wright, now just over 70, lives in Providence and fights  Parkinson's disease. Numero Group doesn't dwell on this, but the liner notes do have a recent quote from him: "I'm trying to do something comfortable with my life. It's not really about the money. I want to contribute something...something timeless."

He's a little late getting discovered, but with Telling the Truth he just might have done that.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

Last Sunday, no one could shut up about how this year's Grammy award had turned the tide around for the music industry. For once the Grammys got it right, right? But the Arcade Fire and Esperanza Spalding had less than a day in the spotlight as the industry's beacons of hope before Radiohead completely stole their thunder by announcing that their eighth record The King Of Limbs would be released five days later. By the time anyone actually came to some sort of conclusion about the relevance of those Grammy wins, it was a moot point.

For four days following the album announcement, Radiohead captivated the minds of fans worldwide with their cryptic secrecy with no supporting hype machine, virtually no record information, mysterious Japanese Tweets about potential secret performances and an earlier than expected release date. As a result, The King Of Limbs became a blessing and a curse for the British rockers. On one hand, Radiohead's unsurprising surprise had no pre-formulated expectations attached due the fact there were only a few days between the initial announcement and actual release date. At the same time, however, this short notice made everyone pay all the more attention when the record dropped a day earlier than its announced target of Saturday, on Friday morning. ("It's a full moon," quipped the band, via a note on their website, by way of explanation.)

So what does The King of Limbs hold in store for Radiohead four years after their brilliant In Rainbows came out?  For starters, it's an undoubtedly a challenging record - the closest thing to Kid A that the band has created since. It makes senses given that some of these songs have been performed live dating back to that period of time. With that in mind, The King of Limbs seems like a patchwork of the band's musical journey from Kid A, Hail To The Thief, In Rainbows and beyond.

The new record offers a varied collection from the group, surveying the modern electronic climate. Jumping around from dubstep to ambient, The King of Limbs is not Radiohead's most cohesive effort, but still offers an abundance of moments exemplifying their brilliance. "Bloom" opens the record with a seemingly solo Thom Yorke effort, as the frontman's voice and frenetic drum samplings showcases the band's return to left-field experimentation. Radiohead provides a more than ample supply of previous examples from the bands previous repertoire. "Morning Mr Magpie" resonates as a Hail To The Thief offering, while "Little By Little" sounds like a B-side to Amnesiac's  "I Might Be Wrong."

While the first half of The King of Limbs is a scattered assortment of songs that may or may not work together, the second half of the record resonates with several of Radiohead's most delicate moments thus far. In particular, "Codex" glows as an absolutely stunning, heartrending gem, surpassing the group's haunting trio of melancholic ballads found on In Rainbows. "Codex" is downright brilliant, echoing as one of the most beautiful tracks the band has ever coined. "Separator" closes with an intriguing combination of Yorke's floating vocals and Phil Selway's crisp drumming, recapturing some of the haunting magic found on the band's Grammy-nominated track "House of Cards." 

Once you get past all the hype and flash-in-the-pan hoopla surrounding the record, The King Of Limbs ultimately emerges as an album filled with shimmering glimpses of what Radiohead could have done if they created a new record, rather than revisiting much of what they have already accomplished. With that in mind, the album still carries plenty of weight and reason to listen. While this record only holds a few transcendent moments, at the end of the day all Radiohead is good Radiohead--an easy thing to lose sight of amidst the enormous amounts of current musical skepticism and judgment surrounding The King of Limbs.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Jud Cost

Sometimes you think crazy things when you start to feel trapped. About halfway into Godspeed You! Black Emperor's opening 12-minute aural assault, I began to wonder if a person could die from listening to music - just sitting there while all your systems completely shut down from sensory overload. Or possibly whether the old Warfield Theatre, an ancient structure built in the 1920's that has seen better days and survived recent attacks by the Stooges and Motorhead, might give up the ghost tonight and implode.

A rafter-rattling bass drone had filled the dusty old hall for the entire 40 minutes it took the band to set up tonight. As the scrawled word "HOPE" flickered on a large screen behind them, the first selection by the notorious Montreal-based octet started out extremely loud (even with earplugs), then just kept getting louder and louder and louder. As someone who had survived Blue Cheer, the '60s poster boys for premature audience deafness who once roamed San Francisco's hippie ballroom scene, Godspeed was on a totally different arc of magnitude tonight.  

There were guitars, keyboards, a drum kit and, oddly enough, a standup bass being played onstage by members of the band but, for all you could distinguish from any one player, there might just as well have been a platoon of department-store dummies seated behind the gear. The upright bass is hard to hear on some vintage jazz records. It didn't have a prayer in hell of making a dent in this sonic explosion. The band's sound at full throttle was something akin to being ferried to the space station while strapped to a NASA rocket full of liquid oxygen. At the conclusion of round one, some people screamed and applauded, a few got up and departed, and most sat there stunned as though they'd just witnessed the annihilation of a heavenly body.

When one of the players spoke to the full house in a distinct New York accent after the band completed a second harrowing trip to outer space, it took me back to the good old days of the Terrastock festivals, held in various U.S. and U.K. ports of call more than ten years ago. "When I was a kid, I used to love to go to Coney Island. My parents would take me there, and I even got lost on the beach, but they found me. We used to go there at night sometimes and sleep on the beach. But you can't do that anymore. They've shrunk Coney Island almost down to nothing." It was the perfect intro for one of those Alastair Galbraith-style mind-expansion gems. And GYBE obliged with a perfectly rendered, slow, almost acoustic-sounding coffee and scones number. And then, after a few minutes, it started getting louder and louder again.

As the one-hour mark fast approached, it was plain to see the Godspeed experience had shown most of its portfolio. This had been the triple espresso after last night's bottle of house Cabernet (Beach House and Papercuts at the Fillmore).  On the way home, I stopped off in San Bruno to get a cup of decaf and a doughnut to restore my chemical balance. Since the wind was blowing pretty hard after a week of torrential rain, the air traffic for San Francisco International had been re-routed to its alternate takeoff and landing pattern. A 747 jumbo jet flew directly overhead, very low, just as I walked across the parking lot. And it didn't really sound all that loud (even without the earplugs).

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Tim Hinely

Sold out crowd for this Yo La Tengo tour (last time here, a year or so ago, they played the larger Crystal Ballroom) but let's not forget about the openers The Urinals, for whom the place was only half full by the time they went on at 9:00 PM. The first word that comes to mind when describing this longtime L.A. band is "seminal," since that is the word that critics use most often to describe them. They'd been around since the late ‘70s but morphed into 100 Flowers in 1980. The band now is two-thirds of the original lineup (vocalist John Talley-Jones and drummer Kevin Barret) and then a newer guitarist (original member Kjehl Johansen quit some years ago to go solo but was also in underrated SST band Trotsky Icepick).  The trio played an energetic, punchy set of fairly short tunes (and surprisingly melodic) that really seemed to win the crowd over. Don't think we heard "I'm a Bug" but they definitely played "Sex," "Surfing with the Shah," "Ack Ack Ack Ack" and more.  Well done, gentlemen.

Yo La Tengo hit the stage about 10:15 PM and for this tour the band is doing a little spin-the-wheel for song selection. What is that, you ask? It is where they have a big wheel on stage, bring out an audience member to spin it (in this case a preppy looking blonde gal) and then whatever it lands on they will play that for the night, or at least for the first set. It could have landed on several different things: songs that begin with s, a set of Condo Fucks songs (YLT's alter ego), or a set of Dump songs (bassist James McNew's solo project) or even on where they act out an episode of Seinfeld for 20 minutes (sitcom theatre, we ALL wanted that).

But when this gal spun it landed on The Sounds of the Sounds of Science. This was the one thing many people in the crowd didn't want it to land on (including myself), as it was an instrumental record (released on the band's own Egon Records) that was moody and atmospheric and definitely not everyone's favorite. A few moments got quite frenzied, but all in all many folks were relieved when it ended (two of my friends walked out and went home mid set). After taking a short break the band came back out and reversed any unhappiness by playing "Sugarcube," "Autumn Sweater," "Tears are in your Eyes," "Stockholm Syndrome," "Can't Forget" and others. This second set was the Yo La Tengo I know and love; one treat for me has always been watching Georgia Hubley on drums, truly one of the underrated drummers of our time.

In a live setting you're never sure what band is going to show up, and while a few of these live performances over the years have sent me away scratching my head (or occasionally bummed out), one must give credit to a band that does what it wants and not necessarily what the fans always want. It probably keeps being a band fresh and interesting for these guys and thus, explains at least part of their longevity.

The Yo La Tengo/Urinals tour continues this week on the West Coast. Dates can be found here. Also, there will be a live Ustream broadcast from Eugene, Oregon, tonight, with show time approximately at 8pm (Pacific time) - go here to watch the webstream.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

by Jonathan Jaeger (credit to Kyle Bylin of MusicThinkTank and Hypebot for the clever new title)

The new Britney Spears video for ‘Hold It Against Me’ got me thinking about product placement and monetization possibilities for the music industry. The video has overt references to Britney’s fragrance Radiance, Makeup Forever, Sony, and the online dating site PlentyOfFish. I have no idea how much it costs to get into a video that will most likely garner tens of millions of views over time, but I can imagine it is not insignificant (UPDATE: it's $500K, not insignificant by any means). Britney Spears isn’t the only one to include product placement in videos either—Lady Gaga didn’t shy away from video advertising in Telephone and even some rock musicians are starting to go with the trend to make up for lackluster CD sales. Clearly it’s becoming a staple of the music industry just as it has been in television for a long time. I always enjoy a good product placement bit on 30 Rock.

As Youtube increases video traffic more and more by the day, you can expect product placement to become more prevalent in the music industry and to start getting money from all those eyeballs that never seem to look down at their own wallets to fork over the dough. While advertising and product placement will help some get a few extra dollars for the stars, it won’t save the rest of the music industry from starvation.

Unlike Google Adsense or other advertising opportunities offered to people with only a small number of hits on their videos, product placement requires a calculated inclusion of an object in a video—something clear enough to get the message across without seeming too obtrusive to the actual content (the degree to which that is possible is subject to argument). The smaller artists who won’t be able to negotiate product placements with a  brand’s sales team simply won’t be able to incorporate products in their videos for small amounts of money. An efficient marketplace for product placement in music videos just isn’t feasible at this point (note: if such a marketplace exists and I’m just ignorant, please email me at jonathan@hypedsound.com and I will eat my words).

Even if product placement was possible for the more middle-class artists, that doesn’t mean it actually makes sense in a video’s context. Some artists would consider product placement to be selling-out and others would not be able to incorporate it into the style of video they produce. Could you imagine a Tool video with product placement?

No matter how much it makes me cringe, I can deal with product placement in pop music videos to the extent I can deal with pop music itself—just a little bit. However, it’s not right for everyone and certainly won’t save the music industry. For now it’s just one small tool in the arsenal of big artists. It will not save the music industry or the record labels.

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY MAX BLAU

Last Sunday, no one could shut up about how this year's Grammy award had turned the tide around for the music industry. For once the Grammys got it right, right? But the Arcade Fire and Esperanza Spalding had less than a day in the spotlight as the industry's beacons of hope before Radiohead completely stole their thunder by announcing that their eighth record The King Of Limbs would be released five days later. By the time anyone actually came to some sort of conclusion about the relevance of those Grammy wins, it was a moot point.

For four days following the album announcement, Radiohead captivated the minds of fans worldwide with their cryptic secrecy with no supporting hype machine, virtually no record information, mysterious Japanese Tweets about potential secret performances and an earlier than expected release date. As a result, The King Of Limbs became a blessing and a curse for the British rockers. On one hand, Radiohead's unsurprising surprise had no pre-formulated expectations attached due the fact there were only a few days between the initial announcement and actual release date. At the same time, however, this short notice made everyone pay all the more attention when the record dropped a day earlier than its announced target of Saturday, on Friday morning. ("It's a full moon," quipped the band, via a note on their website, by way of explanation.)

So what does The King of Limbs hold in store for Radiohead four years after their brilliant In Rainbows came out?  For starters, it's an undoubtedly a challenging record - the closest thing to Kid A that the band has created since. It makes senses given that some of these songs have been performed live dating back to that period of time. With that in mind, The King of Limbs seems like a patchwork of the band's musical journey from Kid A, Hail To The Thief, In Rainbows and beyond.

The new record offers a varied collection from the group, surveying the modern electronic climate. Jumping around from dubstep to ambient, The King of Limbs is not Radiohead's most cohesive effort, but still offers an abundance of moments exemplifying their brilliance. "Bloom" opens the record with a seemingly solo Thom Yorke effort, as the frontman's voice and frenetic drum samplings showcases the band's return to left-field experimentation. Radiohead provides a more than ample supply of previous examples from the bands previous repertoire. "Morning Mr Magpie" resonates as a Hail To The Thief offering, while "Little By Little" sounds like a B-side to Amnesiac's  "I Might Be Wrong."

While the first half of The King of Limbs is a scattered assortment of songs that may or may not work together, the second half of the record resonates with several of Radiohead's most delicate moments thus far. In particular, "Codex" glows as an absolutely stunning, heartrending gem, surpassing the group's haunting trio of melancholic ballads found on In Rainbows. "Codex" is downright brilliant, echoing as one of the most beautiful tracks the band has ever coined. "Separator" closes with an intriguing combination of Yorke's floating vocals and Phil Selway's crisp drumming, recapturing some of the haunting magic found on the band's Grammy-nominated track "House of Cards."

Once you get past all the hype and flash-in-the-pan hoopla surrounding the record, The King Of Limbs ultimately emerges as an album filled with shimmering glimpses of what Radiohead could have done if they created a new record, rather than revisiting much of what they have already accomplished. With that in mind, the album still carries plenty of weight and reason to listen. While this record only holds a few transcendent moments, at the end of the day all Radiohead is good Radiohead--an easy thing to lose sight of amidst the enormous amounts of current musical skepticism and judgment surrounding The King of Limbs.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

Can we all agree that 2008's Walk It Off was not as disappointing as the backlash would suggest? Tapes ‘N Tapes' first album was certainly better, but Jesus - Walk It Off would barely rate a footnote in "The Illustrated History of Sophomore Slumps." Which leads us to an album clearly meant to generate its share of press declaring Outside Tapes 'N Tapes' return to form. And it probably is -- a slight return from a slight disappointment.

Not much of a headline, is it? Any way you slice it, the self-produced Outside is a good deal closer to the spirit of their celebrated, blognoscenti-courting coming-out, The Loon. That much is clear from the opening track, "Badaboom," the first of several numbers where the arrangement just keeps taking unexpected turns. Highlights range from the Libertines-esque leadoff single, "Freak Out," to the soulful, post-Bob Dylan swagger of the Hammond B-3 organ-rocking "The Saddest of All Keys." And while they clearly put their share of thought and effort into making this as interesting as possible, it's just as clear that these guys know their way around a pop hook and you'll find no shortage of those hooks here.

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

By Fred Mills 

The BLURT staff put our heads (and ears) together and we have the latest pick for our Blurt/Sonicbids "Best Kept Secret": it's Preachers Son, from Dublin, Ireland - our 15^th  BKS since commencing the program of spotlighting new and under-the-radar artists back in 2008. 

Preachers Son comprises multiinstrumentalist/vocalist Brian Hogan (also bassist with Meteor award-winning Irish band Kila) and drummer/vocalist Emmaline Duffy-Fallon (late of Engine Alley, who notched considerable acclaim in the early/mid ‘90s).. The name refers to Hogan's father, who was a singer and a preacher, incidentally. They got together in 2009 and quickly started picking up press for their hi-nrg, at times atmospheric, at other times rootsy, sound, which the musicians themselves describe as being "like a David Byrne, Scott Walker collaboration, or Queen's greatest hits circa 1980 vs Morrison Hotel. A Led Zeppelin / Leonard Cohen crossover sort of Johnny Cash, Duane Eddie, Bowie doing Talking Heads kinda thing." 

It's a truism that one should never trust an artist to describe his or her music, but in this case - wow. Boy howdy: among the key tracks dotting their spectacular Dave Bascombe-mixed debut Love Life and Limb (released last October) are "26 Years," which does indeed suggest the improbably Led Zep/Cohen blend (due in no small part to Hogan's impossibly deep, resonant voice); first single "X For Sandra," which marries Bowie drama to a kind of Exene/John Doe vocal parry-and-thrust vibe; "Should Have Been Gone," a minor-chord, strings-powered country twanger which taps the aforementioned Johnny Cash influence; and "Lipstick," a moody, swampy slice of gothic noir featuring guest vocals from Gavin Friday. And wait'll you hear their raucous, street rumble of a cover of Dusty Springfield's "Son of a Preacher Man" (Duffy-Fallon takes lead vocal on that one, natch).

The band is reportedly a dynamo in concert, frequently joined on stage by guest musicians including Tabby Callaghan (X-Factor), Kieran Kennedy (Black Velvet Band, Hothouse Flowers) and Shane Fitzsimons (Lisa Hannigan, Damien Rice, Paddy Casey). Here's hoping we can get them over to these shores in the near future.

We'll have an interview with the band posted to the site shortly in which we let them fill you in on all this and more. Meanwhile, check out their official website as well as their MySpace page and Facebook page for additional details as well as song samples. They're one of the good ‘uns, trust us.

***

Bands, go to www.sonicbids.com/blurtonline to submit and have us review your materials for feature consideration.

>Our November ‘08 Best Kept Secret: The Handcuffs, from Chicago.

>Our December Best Kept Secret: Black Swan Green, from Brooklyn

>Our January 2009 Best Kept Secret: stephaniesI­d, from Asheville

>Our March Best Kept Secret: Polly Mackey & the Pleasure Principle, from England

>Our June Best Kept Secret: Wiretree, from Austin

>Our August Best Kept Secret: Bulletproof Vests, from Memphis

>Our November Best Kept Secret: The Vivs, from Boston

>Our January 2010 Best Kept Secret: The Public Good, from D.C.

>Our February Best Kept Secret: Dirty Dancing, from Austin

>Our April Best Kept Secret: Jenny Dee & the Deelinquents, from Boston

>Our June Best Kept Secret: The Rebel Set, from Phoenix

 >Our August Best Kept Secret: Alice Austin, from Los Angeles

>Our October 2010 Best Kept Secret: Doug McCurry, from Charlotte 

>Our January 2011 Best Kept Secret: Drunken Prayer, from Portland

Read more at http://blurt-online.com/

Originally published on http://blurt-online.com/

BY ANDY TENNILLE

20 years ago, Patterson Hood packed his shit and left Muscle Shoals, Alabama, distraught following the break-up of his band of six years - Adam's House Cat - and disillusioned with the small town in northern Alabama that his father - David Hood - and his colleagues at FAME Studios and Muscle Shoals Sound helped put on the map in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s recording classic hits with Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett and the Rolling Stones.

Like any good teenager who grew up in the late ‘70s listening to The Sex Pistols, The Clash and Elvis Costello, Hood rebelled, choosing to leave behind his hometown, his family's business and his father's music for life on the road chasing the rock ‘n roll dream.

"I didn't really intend to rebel against Muscle Shoals as much as I feel like Muscle Shoals rebelled against me," Hood says. "When I started trying to play music, I was viewed as this snotty-nosed loser, fuck-you kid that it made me rebel further. I mean, I wrote ‘Buttholeville' as a response; I didn't come out punching. I felt like I was punched and so I punched back. There are still some people in that town who are mad about that song, and that was in 1988. I tried for a long time to stay there and finally just left after Adam's House Cat broke up with a lot of frustration and anger, feeling like I had to leave."

Searching for a more welcoming music scene, Hood relocated to Athens, Georgia, founded the Drive-By Truckers with former Adam's House Cat bandmate Mike Cooley and the rest is history. Over the next 15 years, the band would go on to make eleven albums, record with Booker T. Jones and Bettye LaVette and tour the world, earning a reputation as one of rock's road warriors. All the while, Hood formed a musical family in Athens that interestingly mirrored what his father's generation developed in Muscle Shoals. David Barbe came on board for Southern Rock Opera and quickly became the band's close confidant and de-facto producing partner. Wes Freed was tapped to illustrate the band's album artwork. Scott Baxendale met the Truckers when the Decoration Day tour hit Denver and has built custom guitars for them ever since. Last year, Hood and company moved their band office and warehouse to Chase Park, the same complex that houses Barbe's studio and Baxendale's new guitar shop. Every January, the Truckers host three nights at the fabulous 40 Watt that benefit local non-profit Nuci's Space and serve as a reunion for their friends, extended family and the entire Athens music community.

"Everyone who has an extended relationship with them are just really quality people, from the folks at Red Light to Traci Thomas at Thirty Tigers to Matt, Damon and the road crew," Barbe says. "It is like a big family, and now that they've moved their headquarters over here next to my studio and Scott's guitar shop is here as well, we're all here next door to one another. We all work together, and there's a lot of love and a lot of loyalty, and that starts with the band."

With Go-Go Boots, their new album out this week on ATO Records, the Truckers have once again turned to their hometown for inspiration, tipping their hat to the country soul made famous by Muscle Shoals while covering two songs by the late Eddie Hinton, one of the town's greatest talents. It's perhaps their most well-rounded effort since The Dirty South and further solidifies their place among America's best rock bands.

*****

BLURT: Well, congrats on another fine album. Lots of people are saying Go-Go Boots is the Truckers finally embracing the more soulful, Muscle Shoals side of the band. In looking back over the last three albums, Brighter Than Creation's Dark was almost an extension of the Dirt Underneath tour, a more intimate, acoustic side of the Truckers. The Big To-Do - a big rock record - seemed like a reaction to that, like the pendulum swinging back in the other direction. What is Go-Go Boots?

PATTERSON HOOD: I think it's probably a little of all of the above. We certainly didn't go in the studio and say, "Well now we're gonna make the Truckers soul record." Any talk of that was more after the fact, when we realized this was the most Muscle Shoals-sounding record that we've ever made. At the same time, it doesn't sound like any particular record ever made at Muscle Shoals. It sounds like a Drive-By Truckers record to me. It's a little heavier on the storytelling aspects than anything we've done since The Dirty South, and in some ways, it's kind of a follow up to that, except musically it moves in different directions.

You recorded Go-Go Boots and your previous album, The Big To-Do, during the same sessions. Why is this band suited for that approach?

 Our band is not economical. We're not aerodynamic. We're a big, gas-guzzling dinosaur of a road hog. We're made of big heavy steel, we're hard to parallel park, but if you get us out on the open road and gun it a little bit, we're good on a nice long trip. That's just who we are. There have been times when we've gone through periods where we've tried to be a little more agile and it's just not what we do best, unfortunately. So there's an inherent bigness that comes with what we do, and recording two albums at once was a way of embracing that without putting out another two hour-long record like Brighter than Creation's Dark. I personally have a real strong soft spot for that record, but I didn't want to do another one like it, not any time soon.

I don't know if we'll ever choose to or get to do a project the same way again, but I'm really glad that we got to do it this time and that it turned out the way it did. In a lot of ways, doing two records at once really, really worked for us; the way we operate and the way we record. I wish I could do it that way from now on, but the reality is that to do it that way, you've got to put both of those records out in a relatively timely fashion, which means having two records out in eleven months. As cool as that sounded on paper, that's a lot of work.

I need to follow up on something you said a little bit earlier. You said this could be considered the follow up to The Dirty South. I find that interesting because to me that record represented the peak of that particular lineup. Now you've had a couple of records with this band. Is this record a good representation of the potential of this band?

 I have no idea where this band will go next or could go next. The lineup is so stellar right now, and I feel like in some ways we're running at the peak of our potential, but in another way I feel like we're almost just now scratching the surface and getting to the good stuff underneath. It's a really fertile band in a lot of ways, and there's plenty of the good kind of dynamics that can make something interesting without any of the troublesome dynamics. I've never had a band that's played just like the sound in my head, only way better. The band in my head is the same as this band, and that's really a good feeling.

Let's talk about Go-Go Boots. How did you differentiate the songs for it versus the ones for The Big To-Do?

I knew that there was a record somewhere in my head that I really wanted to hear, and that became Go-Go Boots. When we went in the studio, there was a very clear-cut idea of what The Big To-Do was, and then there were these other songs that I felt just as passionate about, maybe even more so in some cases. I knew it was gonna take a little more time than we've ever really had the luxury of having to find that record, so we went about it at our own pace while taking care of the business at hand, which was making The Big To Do. As we wrapped that record up, we knew that we weren't gonna be shut out of the studio for the next two years like it used to be between records. We knew that we had this ongoing thing that we could work on at our leisure. So we'd do a leg of the tour, and I'd be listening to what we had so far on the Go-Go Boots stuff and thinking about what's next. We'd book a little studio time when we got home, go in there and apply what we worked on or talked about on that tour and then go back out on the road some more. It was really enjoyable to have this ongoing thing. I tend to write more if I've got a project I'm writing for. That was the thing about the two-year gaps between working on records in the past - I would tend to just not write during that time. It's an easy thing to put off when there's nothing looming. With this record on the horizon, I pushed myself to keep writing because I knew that we had this record that had the potential to be as good as anything we've ever made, but it still hadn't found its identity yet. We had these really great songs, I thought, but there wasn't that thing that makes a collection of songs a great album, that unifying thing that ties it all together.

In the midst of all this, we were asked to record a song for an Eddie Hinton tribute. That turned out to be kind of the missing piece. That opened a creative door that was like, "Wow, this really ties in with these Go-Go Boots songs we're working on." Once we decided to include those songs on the record, this other running theme emerged in the record that inspired me to dig out "Mercy Buckets" and turn it into something that we could use. I'd had an earlier version of that song for many, many years that actually predates the Truckers. If someone asked me to play at their wedding, I'd play it, but it wasn't a song I really heard on one of our records. Hearing the Eddie Hinton songs on there changed my mind, so I went back and rewrote the song and made it a much better song. We knew as soon as we recorded it that it was the way the album should end.

The last thing I wrote was "I Do Believe," which I wrote right as we were finishing the record. Originally, we were gonna begin the record with "Go-Go Boots", but then once I wrote that song, it became pretty clear that it's gotta be the first song. Having that as the first song, "Mercy Buckets" as the last song and the Eddie Hinton songs in the middle gave the record this arc that counterpoints all of the darker killing songs in the middle.

You've chosen family as the source of inspiration or song subject matter many times throughout your career, "I Do Believe" being the latest. Tell me who that song is about?

 "I Do Believe" is about my grandmother, Sissy, on my mom's side. She's the person on earth that I was the closest to, as far as a child and as an adult. As long as she was alive, she was the person I was the closest to. I really haven't written about her much. Some aspects of her have popped up in "Old Timers' Disease," which I definitely count as one of my family's songs even though it's a fictional story. My granddaddy used to talk about walking down the street with her when they were young, and cars would just about start colliding because whoever was driving would be so busy staring at her butt that they'd run into telephone poles. She was a really stunning woman, so I used that imagery in "Old Timers' Disease." She's in "Little Bonnie," too, but I'd never written specifically about her or our relationship.

I've been writing since '73, since I was eight years old, and I've written a shitload of songs, but it's still as much a mystery to me now as at any point in time as far as how it all happens. I can tell you where specific things in a song came from, but I can't tell you what made me think of it at that moment. We were riding down the road in our van and we'd been to Europe, and then Colorado, and we were on our way home, and everyone's exhausted. We were driving home from the Atlanta airport, and I was sitting in the back of the van and that song just hit me. I wrote it down right there on a little notepad I had in my bag. I was no more thinking about Sissy or any of the stuff that's in that song...it was as far as anything could have been from my mind, and yet, in about a ten-minute period of time, I wrote that song. It was a very vivid snapshot of a moment in time when I was about my daughter's age, five years old or so. It wasn't until after I finished writing it that I realized I'd just written about Sissy. I can't remember the last time I'd thought about that day, but it's all there in that song.

Does that happen a lot for you, where a song just comes out of the sky like a lightning bolt?

 Almost all the good ones. In a lot of cases, it's an idea I've had for years, but the actual writing of it happens like a lightning bolt. For years, I've wanted to write a song about the cop that "Used to Be A Cop" is about. I had the basic idea for that song when we were writing The Dirty South, but the song never got written. I have no idea what caused me to write that song out of the blue one night a couple of Novembers ago when I was just sitting in my office. I wasn't thinking about it then, I wasn't thinking about any of that. It just came out. I had my acoustic guitar, and I pretty much played what I play on the record, just that four chord little circle that plays throughout the song. I demoed it as soon as I finished writing it, and it already had the jagged staccato, psycho thing at the end, which was definitely borrowing kind of a Bernard Herrmann feel, ‘cause I love Bernard Herrmann.

As far as the disco beat and all of that, that all happened when the band got a hold of it. The song's set in the late 70's, early 80's, so that's the music that would have been playing at the bar when the former cop's watching his ex-wife dancing with some dude and thinking about following her home. It's so weird. It's 7 minutes long, and it's already gotten more radio play than any song we've ever put out. We've always said if we ever have a breakthrough hit, it's gonna be from the outer edges of what we do. It's not gonna be the hit version of the thing we do, it would be from a different direction. I've always thought that. It has gotten more radio attention than any song we've ever put out, and it's seven fucking minutes long. It's funny. The studio version's even longer than the version live. It's a minute longer on the record than the live version. When does that happen? (Laughs)

So what's the story behind "Go-Go Boots?" When you see these things on the TV, hear them on the radio or read them in the paper or online, what's the first reaction?

 When I was a little boy there were two things I wanted to do; I wanted to either be a rock star or a film director. I always wanted to make movies and always wrote stories and outlines for a number of things. Southern Rock Opera started off as an outline for a screenplay me and Earl (Hicks, former producer and bass player) were gonna write, and then it made more sense to just make a record. That was when it first dawned on me to merge those two worlds, so that's been a big part of what I've done over the years.

The murder that inspired "Fireplace Poker" and "Go-Go Boots" was a real event that happened in my hometown in the late 80's. It went down over a week or 10-day period of time and was pretty much the front-page story every day. It was all unraveling before your eyes, and just watching it all happen, I thought, "I wanna make a movie about this." I thought it would make an incredible Southern gothic, Night of the Hunter-style movie.

I wrote the song a long time ago, over the course of a number of years. I probably wrote the first draft of it in the late 80's and wrote pretty much the version that we have now in the mid-90s. I had it in mind for the album I referred to as "the Heathens record," which was the album that morphed into Decoration Day, so it was definitely on a list of song titles leading up to making that record. By the time we finally made the record, we had so many songs and it was already going in so many directions that it got shelved and put aside. It just wasn't the time for it, but I was still drawn to that story, so I wrote "Go-Go Boots" a little later as another attempt to tell that story, just in a different form. That ended up being one of the first songs we recorded for this album. It was a magical take, and we knew early on that that was definitely gonna be on the album and that it was like gonna be the title cut for this darker, weirder second record we were working on as we did The Big To-Do.

As we were finishing the record last summer, the same weekend we did "I Do Believe," "The Fireplace Poker" reared its head one more time. We were about to finish the record, we didn't really need another song, and we sure didn't need a nine-minute long narrative about a murder that we already had another song about, but if we didn't do anything right now with, I knew we'd never do anything with it. So we gave it a stab to see what we could get, and