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Wassapp everybody,
I hope that all is well with you cats. I haven't heard from yall in a while so, I just wanted to say "wassapp cats!" You know, since there haven't been any field trips in a while (and since I haven't been on any conference calls or anything), it's been a second since I've heard from you cats.
First off, I wanna say thanks to Ms. Jamie for that lil' shout out on the interview with Creme Magazine. That was a cool lil' deal, and it's good publicity. So thanks for makin' me look good and stuff! You da man cheef (da man is, a term that can be used across the board, so don't play into the symantics!)
School is comin' along just fine. I'm good in everything except my Jazz Theory 2 class (and I HATE IT! AHHH! MAKES ME WANNA PULL ME HAIR OUT!) But I'll be alright. Just, at the end of the day, I feel like I won't remember anything about untranscribing instruments back to concert key when I'm in the studio trying to create my own songs! O well. Gotta do wha ya gotta do.
I've been workin' on landin' a job as a summer intern workin' for the DC Grammy Chapter. That should be fun. And things might work out where I don't even have to move out of my room this summer, so, I could definitely live with that.
Hope yall have been digin' this years addition of the NCAA Basketball Tourney (Men's side at least). Man! George Mason has the world watchin'. They're not too far from DC so, everyone here is definitely embracing them. But I also kinda hope that it'll be an All-SEC Championship game (ESPECIALLY since I can sleep easy knowin' that over this season, Bama beat both Florida and LSU). Should be fun to watch this weekend though.
I hope yall are doin' well. Hope to hear from you cats soon. Keep reppin' WTD and, most importantly, if noone else has told you, please have a nice day!
Have Peace,
Brian
So ok first off, so sorry I missed the call last week. I felt like such a poopy head when at like 12:30am (my time) I realized I had missed it. I got out of class and ended up going to a pub to hang out w/British classmates and lost track of time. It's all the British people's fault. Really, I had it written down and everything and I didn't mean to do it. Also, Ron your Eternal CD got lost in the mail and I had to send the distributor a very mean email. So I will be re-ordering that like I promised. And hi to all of my fellow board members, I hope you're all doing well in your respective places of residence. London's alright but I miss LA/America so bad. Now on to the music part of this whole rant...
So it's looking like it's gonna be a SUPER AWESOME year in music for me. Let's see at the end of Feb. Ne-Yo's CD dropped and it was good as expected. March was supposed to be Robin Thicke's release month but that didn't happen so I'm a little sad because I feel like his record company or whoever's in control of his release date is screwing with his success but I got to see/hear some new songs on AOL Sessions (which is a really awesome way to see an artist perform live if you can't go to a show I must say). But I did get hooked-up with the Sergio Mendes' new album from the awesome charts editor at Billboard so that made up for the lack of Thicke. Ok so then in April Pink's new album comes out...and it sounds way better than whatever that last album was supposed to be so that is good. Umm in May India Arie's new CD comes out and it's the 1st half of the a double CD set...nice. June is Christina Aguilera's CD. And then after that comes JC Chasez, Justin Timberlake, and a whole bunch of other people I like. Which also means it's gonna be an awesome summer for going to concerts, rocking out in my car while i'm driving, and hopefully interviewing people.
Ok and I've realized that as much as I love CDs, I wouldn't be a happy camper over her if I didn't have my computer/iPod. All I do is sit and look on my computer for new music. It's pretty much all I do when I'm not reading celebrity gossip blogs. And it's also very awesome that iTunes still only charges a dollar for a song even though I'm logging on from England. Cause that would suck if I had to pay twice as much, if I had pay in pounds, for the songs.
And yeah...British hip-hop sucks. It's just really bad, British accents and rapping don't go together at all. But the R&B has promise. And they also have garage music which is something like two-step mixed with R&B, so the beats really fast but the singing is at normal speed. It's starting to grow on me. Anyway, like I said I hope everyone over in America is doing well. A month and a half to go people...then I'm back!
-joy
SXSW
consists of panels during the morning at the convention center and musical acts
during the night at many nearby venues. The number of people that attend the convention center in the morning is
far less then the number of people that attend the shows at night. Over a 1,000 bands from around the world
were present at the 2006 Music Conference. SXSW is bitter sweet: While attending a great showcase, there may be an
even better act playing down the street that you will miss. Nonetheless, it is an amazing
experience. SXSW, in Austin, is perhaps
the biggest and longest music party that spans over four days. The streets were packed and venues were
constantly inspected by fire marshals. I spoke to a lot of people that have attended SXSW back when it only had
unknown/unsigned acts playing. They
spoke reminiscing of past festivals and stating that it used to better. This was my first time at SXSW and the only
disappointment I faced was when Bettye LaVette could not make it to
perform. I do not want to make it seem
like SXSW was all fun and no work … Christie and I attended digital panels
during the mornings.
There
was an underlying theme to all of the digital panels at the SXSW Conference:
Music is ubiquitous and more available. At the same time, music also is still difficult for consumers to
purchase music online. The San
Francisco Tribune noted that iTunes comprises of 83% of downloadable music on
the Internet. To date, no other model has been able to penetrate the online music
market the way Apple has. Not even
Walmart’s cheaper 80 cents/song online model could compete. In order to increase competition, there has
been a lack for interoperability. In
other words, music purchased through iTunes cannot be played on Windows Media
Player and vice versa. The issue of
interoperability was barely touched upon in the panel discussions. In fact, during one panel discussion it was
even referred to as “the big elephant.” This reaction is not surprising since the panel comprised of some online
music companies. However, if the
problems of interoperability are not fixed then it will lead to an increase of
both physical and online piracy. Rules
will have to be set to determine an industry standard.
...
More on that to come later in version 1.1
-Bahareh
Hey all,
Christie here. This blog is all about the amazing day that was March 16th at South by Southwest (SXSW). B-reh and I met up at the hotel in the early afternoon and caught a ride downtown to check out all the action. I have never seen so many music people in one place at one time, you know the kind—awkward guys in too tight women’s jeans and black chucks and women who look like they had a blind monkey pick out their clothes.
Armed with official What’s the Download swag, we set out to promote WTD around the trade show. Most of the vendors were merchandising and tech companies, but there were also lounges set up to promote international bands. These lounges not only had comfy couches and bowls of candy; they also boasted uber-clever names like sUK on this (promoting bands from the UK ) and Aussie Assault with Australian artists.
After filling our own bags with other swag, B-reh and I sat in on about 30 min of an industry panel titled “Artist Development Death Match.” Not sure where the death match part came into the discussion, and I’m not sure where the Artist Development part came in either. The panel consisted of lawyers and managers who talked about artists as merely a means of generating revenue, one even termed bands “businesses.” Throughout the discussion, not one of the panelists showed interest in the artistic quality of the music. The panel would more aptly be titled “Behind the Music: Pissed Off Managers Rant on the Industry,” since they mostly complained about artists who expect them to do the job of the label and vice versa. Sitting on the other side of a panel really showed me just how boring they could be.
We took a short walk over to the Four Seasons for the annual Texas Recording Academy Chapter meeting. You can always count on the Recording Academy for good food, and as we filled up on hors d’oeuvres, B-reh and I talked to Recording Academy friends Daryl and Barb as well as Terry Lickona (of Austin City Limits Fame), and then at the meeting, the chapter showed a video that featured WTD and our efforts as a board. B-reh doubted we would make the video, and ended up owing me a meal because of it. The meeting then turned to a discussion between famed producer Jimmy Jam and legendary performer Charlie Sexton.
Before we knew it we were headed downtown to begin our first SXSW concert experience. Too bad the venue I was most stoked to spend time at—The Parish—decided at the last minute that 21+ was the way to go. This meant no Nada Surf, John Vanderslice, Rocky Votolato, or any of the Saddle Creek/Barsuk artists for me. Lame. Things worked out however because as we walked into Stubb’s to check out the venue, we stumbled upon a surprise/secret performance of the Beastie Boys. Pretty freaking sweet.
The rest of the night we went to places like Emo’s Main Room to see Zox—a rock band from Providence, RI with a super talented violinist—as well as the best Irish punks around, Flogging Molly. We caught the end of the Dresden Dolls, and then I saw Anberlin on accident mistaking Redrum Annex for the bar, Redrum whilst looking to see chillingly talented Damien Jurado. After realizing that no one in their right mind would book a songwriter with such depth of lyrics after the screamo band of the minute, I went into the bar, took a seat on the floor with the rest of the fans and listened to songs from albums like Rehearsals for Departure and Water Ave S.
Returning to the hotel around 3am, B-reh and I discovered that the hors d’oeuvres from 8 hours before had left us with gripping hunger, we walked the mile or so to an IHOP overrun with SXSWers. The food hit the spot, and we went back to the hotel to crash before doing it all again on Friday.
Check in later for the thrilling conclusion of our trip to the biggest music conference/festival in the world.
Keep rockin,
Christie
Wassapp everybody,
How yall doin'? (Yep, I gotta ask). It's good to be back on the mic though, since, I've been a square from the blog scene.
Just to let everybody know, I wasn't on the conference call this past week 'cause I was out in LA for my Spring Break. Man, I had a ball out there. Funny 'cause, I got out there March 9th, and it's so funny because when I got out to LA, it was CHILLY! What's funnier is, while I was out in LA, it got WARM here in DC. And now that I'm back in DC, it's BACK TO BEING COLD. Goodness. Global warming has a way of playin' pranks on people man. I'm tellin' yall. We should all buy hybrid cars right now so we can just, get our normal weather patterns back. Crazyness.
Today, March 18th, I celebrated my 21st Birthday. Yah, I'm pretty excited about that. But it's kinda weird havin' a b'day when all of ya people are still on Spring Break. It's cool though, 'cause, I'm just, happy to still be alive and kickin'! Nothin' to wild and crazy though. You won't see me on the evening news. I just, got a nice pound of shrimp from the bay, I went to Yankee Candle (and was able to talk the cashier into lettin' me get a $20 for $8 since it was my b'day), and I just chill'd. It was cool to see my boys Alabama play ucLAME (I mean, ucla). We lost at the last second, close game. I think it was wack just 'cause we were playin' out in San Diego, but oh well. Good times. That was cool.
Well, I don't wanna go back to class, but I know it's gonna go by fast. Now, I'm just hopin' that I can get a job up here for the summer. That should be, fun I guess. But I'm hopin' for somethin' cool to work out.
I hope yall have been watchin' the games. As yall know, I'm a huge sports fan, especially when it comes to college football and basketball. This is the best time of year though cats! Spring is on the horizon, so, hit the gym and pull out the cargo shorts and capri pants! Take it easy lovely people and, keep smilin'!
Have Peace,
B
Hey all,
If bands are seeking a way to keep fans happy between albums, they need look no further than a few video cameras and a concert. That’s right. A DVD. Music fans are so visually oriented in this day and age of music videos—well the ones they can find between the hours of 11pm and 3am on Vh1 or Mtv. The release of a DVD chronicling a few shows or even one set from a recent tour can do a lot to boost the morality and faith of a fan who may have pushed this artist aside.
With that in mind, I have a little story for you. I am an avid Bad Religion fan, and on November 14, 2004, I went to see them at Soma in San Diego with two of my close friends. The show was phenomenal— although I wouldn’t expect anything less from Greg and Co.—and since then, the majority of the Bad Religion that I have listened to has been a CD made from the set list my roommate snatched from Jay Bentley at the show. It’s 27 tracks of political punk bliss, however I haven’t really listened to much of the three part guitar melodies at all in the last 18 months let alone delved into their archives stored on my computer.
Then the other day I was wandering around Twist and Shout in Denver looking to empty my bank account, and I realized that the Epitaph originals had finally released the much awaited Live at the Palladium DVD featuring a performance from the Empire Strikes First Tour similar to the one I saw over a year ago. The DVD has interviews with all band members interspersed throughout the feature, but I also have the option of watching only the concert footage. I can thus either take it easy and learn a bit about the 26 year history of the band, or I can spend two hours rocking out to classics like “No Control” and “Modern Man.”
Now, as I sit on a plane on my way to Austin (for SXSW!), watching the DVD, all I want to do is listen to Bad Religion and go to punk shows. I’m having a hard time resisting the urge to sing along and pump my fist. Currently the band is working on their next release (and apparently Greg is working on a solo album with the Weakerthans—holy wow!), and the release of this live footage has been perfectly placed to appease rabid fans, as the release of the album is not yet determined.
So bands listen up. Take the time and money to tape one of your shows, get a camera crew to listen to you talk about your life, edit it, and sell it. Here’s the deal: your fans/music geeks really care about you, and they want to know all the stupid details about how you got together, how you came up with the idea for that one song, and how music has changed your life. And if you really want to please your fans, send a camera out to interview them about you after the show. They love talking about you, and they will now support you with more fierce loyalty because they realize that (shock!) you care about them.
Keep rockin,
Christie
Current listening: Bad Religion- No Control, Suffer, The Empire Strikes First, etc.
We Are Scientists
Nada Surf- Let Go
Hey everyone!
I wanted to let you all know that the What's the Download MySpace profile is no longer dormant. I will be using all the time that I typically spend procrastinating on MySpace towards keeping our profile up to date. As a board we will be posting blogs keeping our "Space friends" up to date. Keep checking up on us and posting your opinions!
Keep rocking,
Christie
Current listening: Jenny Lewis & the Watson Twins, !!!, and Wolf Parade
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