Wednesday, 01 August 2007
Current TV: "All Eyes On My Morning Jacket"
CrazyTalk's moles at Current TV, Douglas Caballero and Alex Simmons of The Current Fix, are back with another round of wily interactive shenanigans.
Following on the heels of their Shins user-gen coverage, The Current Fix is getting the crowd to "turn on" My Morning Jacket in the band's Lollapalooza show with the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra (Sunday, Aug. 5th).
The concept: Fans at the show whip out their cell phone or digicam & shoot a video of the experience. After the show, they upload the video to the Current "All Eyes on MMJ" microsite. Douglas & Alex then piece together the jigsaw puzzle to create a user-gen concert video, which is then available on the "All Eyes" site.
If you're a student of music & "the new media" (bandwagon, jaded or plain old fascinated), "All Eyes" is a core requirement for your education.
With hyperbolic sincerity, I've said it before & I'll say it again: THE FUTURE IS NOW!
(BTW - The Fix has some great little pods on Girl Talk, Feist, The Black Keys, MSTRKRFT, Earl Greyhound, Eef Barzelay, Of Montreal, Shiny Toy Guns, Little Man Tate, and Maps. And if you haven't seen the one of Doug as a Flaming Lips dancing santa - its pretty much mandatory at this point.)
Posted by Howie in Current Affairs, Howie, Music News, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Thursday, 05 July 2007
Rock Quilts: Quiltsryche
Unbelievable.
For catching a few crook-necked z's in your 15 passenger van between Des Moines and Sioux Falls.
Or for curling up on your futon with a Led Zep DVD and a bucket of donut holes.
These are the quilts for you.
The touch, the feel of cotton. The fabric of our lives.
Posted by Howie in Current Affairs, Howie | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Tuesday, 03 July 2007
Incoming! July Shows
(courtesy of my profile on Bandega.com)
There's tons of great shows coming up in July. Some of these bands I'm genuinely a fan of. Others, well - I just like their name. For instance, Raccoo-oo-oon.
Bands with stars next to them are the ones in my Bandega profile.
What shows are YOU going to?
| Jul 03 Tue |
Independent
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| Jul 03 Tue |
Hemlock Tavern
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| Jul 05 Thu |
Great American Music Hall
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| Jul 05 Thu |
Make-Out Room
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| Jul 06 Fri |
Cafe du Nord
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| Jul 11 Wed |
Bottom of the Hill
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| Jul 13 Fri |
Hemlock Tavern
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| Jul 13 Fri |
Cafe du Nord
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| Jul 17 Tue |
Great American Music Hall
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| Jul 19 Thu |
Independent
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| Jul 19 Thu |
Great American Music Hall
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| Jul 19 Thu |
Berkeley Community Theatre
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| Jul 25 Wed |
Bottom of the Hill
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| Jul 27 Fri |
Bottom of the Hill
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Posted by Howie in Howie, Music News, Show Reviews | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Music Video: Datarock "Computer Camp Love"
This video warmed the digital cockles of my digital heart.
Posted by Howie in Howie, New Bands, Video | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Friday, 29 June 2007
Show Pics: Birds & Batteries @ Cafe Du Nord
Local slow-fast alt.dance-folk phenoms, Birds & Batteries, played their CD release party at Cafe Du Nord on the 29th. 90% of the people I talked to after the show were 100% blown away. Having spun the album several times before the show, I can confidently state that the album is great and the live show is greater.
Though some of the transitions between live drums and electronic beats could've been a tinge more fluid, this is a very tight band and everyone seemed on their game for this important show.
Here's my shots from the show.
Check out a review of the new album, "I'll Never Sleep Again" here.
Posted by Howie in Howie, Music News, New Albums, New Bands, Show Reviews | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Music Video: Ryan Adams' "Two" on Letterman
A snapshot of Ryan Adams' day:
- Wake up.
- Don't brush hair.
- Drink coffee w. nipper. Accompany w. inhaled drug of choice.
- Write and record 13 songs.
- Eat breakfast.
A couple of nights ago, he played a track ("Two") off the new album "Easy Tiger" with the Cardinals on Letterman.
Not his most provocative songwriting, but still a pretty song.
Who's listened to the album - any thoughts?
(thanks to Miley for the link....)
Posted by Howie in Current Affairs, Howie, Music News, New Albums, Video | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Wednesday, 27 June 2007
Music Law: M.E.L.O.N. Blog
YO. Lawyer life has kept me pretty tied down lately - but my fingers have not been idle on my keyboard.
I'm running a blog called MELON - Media and Entertainment Law Online News, with trillions of awesome articles for lay peeps on the ins and outs of the entertainment & technology industry.
Some of the topics are copyright, music law, music business, trademark, internet law, digital rights management, film law and the TV business.
Here's some links to my most recent articles:
- Podcasting Music for Money, Part 1
- Podcasting Music for Money, Part 2
- DRM Primer, Part 1
- DRM Primer, Part 2
- DRM & Incentive Theory
- DRM & Labor Theory
My brain has swelled to dangerous proportions. I believe the medical term is Rock Law Edema.
Posted by Howie in Current Affairs, Entertainment Law, Howie | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Tuesday, 19 June 2007
Show Pics: Menomena & All Smiles @ The Independent, 6.8.07
This was a very, very good show.
Not counting All Smiles. They were sick - literally.
Menomena was phenomena(l). Someday I might even have the time to post the audio review up here.
Meanomawhile, satisfy with these delicious shots of an exciting band.
I was rocking the telezoom from the back of the room, so most are head shots.
Posted by Howie in Howie, New Bands, Show Reviews | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Sunday, 10 June 2007
Album Review: Birds & Batteries' "I'll Never Sleep Again"
I don't know what happened when I first heard Mike Sempert's Birds & Batteries. My wife Kate had struck up a conversation with him in early 2006 at Albany's now defunct Ivy Room after a show, and he gave her a copy of the 18-song demo "Nature vs. Nature." Kate gave it to me, and after giving it a once through - I found myself slipping it into my car's CD player whenever I drove across the bay bridge into the city.
What drew me into "Nature" was how it combined elements of music I loved in a way that seemed wholly original. And because it is so rare for a band's music to strike me this way, I have become an unapologetic fan of Birds & Batteries (see the end of this post for old reviews & audio interviews).
The San Francisco based quartet have just come out with a new album entitled "I'll Never Sleep Again," which they recorded and mixed at a couple of big whoop studios - Vanderslizzle's Tiny Telephone and Hyde Street.
Before listening to it, I was honestly prepared for this to be a band that put out one great album that never matched up to later recordings. And I would have been okay with that.
But "I'll Never Sleep Again" is a damn good album - every bit as good as "Nature vs. Nature." Although the previous album did amazing things with garage folk-tronica, the new album has kept the same general aesthetics but also utilized insightful production to capture and hone that sound.
Here's a play-by-play:
1. "Heart of Gold": Just like Nature rolls off with a
spacey interpretation of "Albuquerque," Sempert paralleled this in
Sleep by starting with a similarly spacey "Heart of Gold", which has
been a show staple for quite a while. Yes - there's the plaintive
pedal steel, but the melody is played by a weird multi-tone synth
with an underscore of heavy "ursh" synth bass. The synth-guitar break
down in the middle is somehow still able to capture the longing
poignancy of the original. This is a very slow start to the album,
which as a whole takes a while to peak. Just consider it foreplay.
2. “Jungles (Oceans)”: This track is more like the second
half of the previous song – a similar synth hook, but slightly more
epic and all instrumental. Its more like beautiful filler – breathing
space before the next song.
3. "I'll Never Sleep Again": Here's another example of the evocative mixture of pedal steel and synth melodies. Not to mention great songwriting. I also noticed on this track that Sempert is taking more vocal risks, which is something that continues throughout the album. Once it gets to the swell towards the songs end, I wish it would just explode. But he gets to exploding later in the album.
4. "A Passenger": Like track 2, this track is like the second half of a 2 part suite – an extension of the previous song. There’s also mention of jungles and never sleeping.
5. "Ocarina": An unassuming anthem of good times
past. Hard to know if Sempert’s referring to the ancient wind
instrument or the Zelda MPORG. LOTS of water imagery in this one:
underwater, rising swamps, water in sinking shoes, aquariums &
shark tanks and oceanography. Great song, although I think the ending
is wrapped up too neatly.
6. “After a Flood”: Oddly infectious dance beat intro – I’m
picturing a Justin Timberlake video with Sempert’s face superimposed.
The break down is pretty amazing. It has the strangest chord
progression you’ve ever heard (which at first makes no sense but later listens reveal to be genius) coupled
with a sick & funky bass line. Then it launches into an intense
recap of the song’s beginning, this time in a dance club swarming with
sexy ladies and henchmen.
7. “Starclusters”: This may be my favorite song on the
album. The first 30 seconds alone make it – stuttering electronic
beats in strange succession followed by BLAM – the song proper. The
lyrics seem to be about how all stars die and give up their light to
the universe. But laid on this is the most fascinating assault on my
ears, in the form of synth effects. One of my favorite lines on the
album: “Out there in the open / Where the big things happen slowly / I
can feel it coming towards me / Like a skater, it’ll crack the whip” –
then BLAM – back into the synth assault. Love it.
8. “Turnstyles”: This is the single. Possibly the most
perfectly constructed song I’ve heard in a long, long while. Extremely
catchy synth hook to open, then add steady kick drum, then add keys and
bass. Mix well. The lyrics tell a bit of a story as well. Simple yet
wailing guitar solo leads into a surprising horn backup in verse 2.
Towards the end, massive vocal layering leads the way back to a more
upbeat recap of the initial hook. My only complaint – this part of the
song requires dancing, but as soon as you realize you’re required to
dance – the song ends.
9. “The Squeaky Wheel”: Now we turn the pace down about 5
notches (out of 10). A simple piano ditty – “The squeaky wheel gets
the oil / the squeaky wheel gets the oil / make a sound while you toil
/ the squeaky wheel gets the oil.” There’s several iterations of the
same melody. In the movie, the main character has just accidentally
taken a several oxycontins and laid down by a tree in the park “just
for a sec.” 7 hours later he snaps out of it and staggers home.
10. “Soft Surveillance”: Here’s the mandatory acoustic one….or so you thought! The dance beat, bass, synth and pedal steal kick in. More on this track than anything yet, I see that this album is driven by its driving electronic dance beats – beats that by themselves would be the center of the “Night at the Roxbury” skit on SNL. But the addition of pedal steel, interesting bass lines, otherworldly synth textures, inventive guitar accompaniment and broadly-themed lyrics take the tongue out of the cheek of the dance beats.
11. “Humanization”: A slow dirge that will be played
by the gods at humanity’s wake. But this will be no ordinary wake,
because the gods will get drunk and sway in a very epic manner.
Featuring great, echoey female harmonies.
12. “Mythology: The Great Director”: Another synth slowcore song with lyrics front and center. The harmonizing guitar solo sealed this one for me.
13. Extra Track?: This one wasn’t mentioned on the jacket I
got. Mostly an outro of musical ideas that seem to stem from the
“Humanization” track.
Holy wow this album is good.
If you still haven't gotten your fill:
- official website
- myspace site
- CrazyTalk 3.23.06 show review - Hotel Utah
- CrazyTalk 3.23.06 interview w. Mike Sempert @ Hotel Utah
- CrazyTalk 1.12.07 show review - El Rio
- CrazyTalk 1.12.07 interview w. Mike Sempert @ El Rio
Posted by Howie in Album Reviews, Howie, Music News, New Albums, New Bands | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
New Web Music Delish: MXPLAY
To put it simply - MXPLAY is a new kind of music player. But that's putting it simply. Its like iTunes, Google, YouTube, MySpace, internet radio and a Dolby listening station all rolled into one - and then some.
I have to admit - I had major doubts about this. I'm still having trouble wrapping my mind around a music player that allows you to catalog all your music, drastically adjust the sound quality of songs, find streaming music and video & share playlists, and create and share streamed mashups.
But when the gentlemen at MXPLAY popped into my office to give me a demo, my mind was sufficiently blown.
I've been playing around with MXPLAY off and on for about a week, and here's what I've learned how to do:
1. Adjust the "Audio Space." Imagine your typical iTunes set-up, with the huge catalog of music on the right and the folders & playlists on the left. MXPLAY has a similar setup, except instead of folders & playlists on the left side - they have the "Audio Space."
This is essentially a window with a picture of a human head and 2 speakers. You can move both the speakers and the head around in the space and place all three in any proximity to one another you want. Also - it adjusts in real time, so if you move the speakers in a circle around the head, the results in your speakers dizzying.
One of the better aspects of this feature is the ability position the head closer to a speaker in order to better hear certain parts of a song.
2. MP3 Streams Searching. MXPLAY also has an internet side. By clicking a button, your personal music catalog is replaced by a web browser. Type in the URL of a site that has streaming MP3s, and MXPLAY will find them & organize them at the bottom of the screen. You can then take these streams (or rather the links to these streams) and save them in a Playlist, which you can share with other MXPLAY users.
You can also post a playlist to a blog, but as this is the beta version of their software - I should note that I had a problem when I tried to post a Playlist on CrazyTalk. When I embedded the code & then clicked on the Playlist image in the posted article, I received an error message.
These problems will be ironed out, no doubt, and in the meantime, the feature of being able to troll streaming MP3 blogs and create playlists is pretty dang nifty.
3. Mashups. In addition to being able to conveniently find & catalog streams, you can also do cool stuff with streaming video & pictures. Just below the "Audio Space" on the left hand side, is the "Audio Space Mixer." Here you can go to streaming video & picture websites and import that videos or pictures into the Mixer, where you can mash them up with streaming songs you found. You can then save your final creation (or rather, save a link to your final creation) and share that with others.
Notice that the only downloadable content you're interacting with is the content already sitting on your computer. You cannot use MXPLAY to find & download MP3s, videos or pictures, to use that content in mashups or share downloaded content with others. Everything is based around streaming and sharing links to streams. As far as I can see right now, this neatly avoids lots of copyright issues.
Apparently, there's also an application for Nintendo Wii users that works with their Wii remote. Click here to see a YouTube video of that.
The program still seems a little daunting, and I have a feeling one could do much more with it than I am currently doing. I haven't really explored the mashups feature that much, but the other two features - the "Audio Space" and the streaming MP3 troller make it well worth a look.
Download it real quick, check it out & drop a comment about it with your thoughts. I'm curious to know what other people think of this.
Posted by Howie in Howie, Music News, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Tuesday, 29 May 2007
Tech: Buzzcaster - New Music Video Aggregator Site
Buzzcaster aggregates music vids posted to over 2,000 popular music/mp3 blogs (like elbo.ws and hype machine but for video) and also lets users submit & vote on music vids & footage (like digg and videobomb).
Apparently, they have just gone live with the site and are looking for feedback. So check out their site & drop some comments.
Here's some info from their "ABOUT" page:
Buzzcaster is a music video discovery tool that helps you find videos and footage of interesting music from the past and present…
Blogs!
There are tonnes of amazing mp3 and music blogs out there that often link to really cool videos – buzzcaster is an aggregator that brings the videos posted on these blogs onto one site, so you can discover what videos the bloggers are talking about and so you can also discover some of these amazing music blogs.
Fans..
You can also get involved in helping other people discover good music by submitting links to music videos and footage hosted on most of the main video sites (youtube, myspace, google and dailymotion). All you need to do this is click on ‘Submit Video’ and post the video URL.
Create your own music videocasts
By adding a video to your favourites, you are also casting a vote and creating your own mini-music video channel that other people can subscribe to. To subscribe to other people’s music videocasts, just click on the users name under the video that you are watching. The same can be done for individual blog video feeds.
Discover!
Check out the Discover function, here you can type in the name of an artist you like and you’ll get a bunch of recomendations of other artists whose videos you can watch.
By the way - from now on all tech related posts are getting the matrix picture. That's just how its gotta be.
Posted by Howie in Howie, Music News, Video, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)