Cousin Chris Music

Refreshing sound from a local musician: Cousin Chris. He plays every instrument on his new album "Moon Paper" and he is hanging with the right guys: Jay Pellicci (Deerhoof, Xiu Xiu) engineered all sessions and Justin Phelps (Cake, The Mars Volta) mixed most songs.

His sound is subtle, Neil Young twangish, that must only come from living in Boston, then Jamaica and settling in San Francisco. Stripped down production and pure music.

Music supervisors have been calling...

Be Thankful For What You Got

i realized i have been buying vinyl for 20 years. Collection probably hit 15k at one point, but that included doubles, triples and a box of 50 or so of William DeVaughn's "Be Thankful For What You Got" - with that green Roxbury label. Great record. Great mantra. An even better one is offered by DJ Bunny Ears: "Do what you can, with what you have, in the time you have, in the place that you are." I share this meesage with the musicians I consult with each week. Don't wait around for the big break to arrive. Keep doing what you do and find your niche. Music should be used to sell OTHER parts of an artist that can't be duplicated.

Search Inside the Music

Thursday, SanFranMusicTech Summit, Hotel Kabuki. Premier meeting of the minds. The new music industry is rooting in San Francisco + Silicon Valley
Highlights:
-Beni B. from ABB Records - a legend to the beatdiggers and hip hop community in the Bay Area and beyond.
-Ty Roberts, Gracenote - among other things, he mentioned album artwork + liner notes will soon become available with downloads.
-Paul Lemere, Sun Labs - Search Inside the Music presentation
"The goal of the 'Search Inside the Music' project is to explore new methods of categorizing, indexing and organizing large collections of music to allow more effective ways of searching through these collections. This project extends music search to search 'inside the music', that is, to search not just titles, keywords and artists, but to search music by music content and context. We want to help people find and organize their music based on all of of the properties of the music including such properties as acoustic similarity, mood, lyrics, musical theme, melody, tempo, rhythm, and instrumentation."
-Vince Milburn, Jr. - Miles Davis' nephew & 1 of 3 entrusted with Davis' estate. Stays true to the legacy and prestige behind his uncle.

Henry Brant - Great American Composer

It is sad to hear of Henry Brant's recent passing. He was a longtime collaborator of Daniel Kobialka and a great American composer.

His accomplishments:
1955 The Prix Italia (he was the first American composer to win)
1982 The American Music Center’s Letter of Distinction: he was described as “a pioneer of spatial and antiphonal music and a continuing influence on succeeding generations.”
2002 Pulitzer Prize in Music for Ice Field
Two Guggenheim Fellowships
Read more here: http://www.danielkobialka.com/blog/

Industry Rule #4080

I used to work for a label, Real Music. You might confuse the name for something larger or something cooler. Disappointing - like meeting a celebrity for the first time. This label was a mere blip on the radar of notoriety and just a small 3 inches of purchased shelf space at your local Barnes&Noble. I walked away last year knowing the label was not going to survive to see success again.

Its karma is finally reaping the evil it has sowed. For years, musicians have been exploited for their works and treated like enemies, leaving a very small selection to promote. Those signing new deals, get coerced into 4,5,6 albums, and might as well be signing their death certificate. To add humor to this horror, the owner is losing his hearing but still decides what music to release!

So now I have one goal: help artists make a business out of their music while owning their art forever. Jump on board, it doesn't cost a thing.