Category: music

My buddy Justin arrives tonight. Mix Weekend has begun!

Every spring since 1994, two of my closest friends from college and I get together. We each bring a tape/CD of music that meant something to us that year, organized in a way that tells our story. We go somewhere beautiful, play each others music and talk. Talk bout where we are and where we’ve found ourselves a year later.

Dave and Justin are arriving in San Francisco next week for “Mix Weekend.” I have all the songs lined up for my presentation but haven’t organized them yet. Usually I wait for a sign, something to tell me when the moment is right.

It just told me. I’m going to do my mix now.

Thanks to the sharp eyes of my friend James and the creative crackle of Sooz in Boston, I’m having a Jim Dandy of a Time contributing to Listen Up!, a collaborative weblog about music. Think of it as Kazaa with a human face and no ads.

Purty Neat.

Does anyone else find Pollstar a disorganized mess? I know it’s useful when you want to know if a specific artist is coming to your town but that’s nothing you can’t do through the artists own mailing list. Say you want to know who will be playing in your town in the month of May? A jumble red links like a blood splatter across your monitor. Too small, badly organized, lots of information, little use.

There’s got to be a few web geeks out there who could create a service a la Moreover that harvests concert information from the web sites of bands, labels, and concert venues that could then be transmited via email. A music lover could select a list of artists, where they live and the service could update them accordingly.

It was only a matter of time before the music I grew up with came back into vogue: loud, silly pop you can’t get out of your head, sung by ugly white boys from Michigan. May I present, dear readers, Andrew W K.

If being hooked on Cher’s new tune “Song for the Lonely” is wrong, then I don’t want to be right.

"Transmission and you’re a live wire!"

From my friend Jenn on evidence that Hall and Oates were trying hard to be black: “That’s why Oates had that Lionel Richie hair.”

Finally found “This Year” by Chantal whatever-her-name-is on WinMX. Sarah Hatter was kind enough to email me with advice on how to find it. Thanks Sarah!

I’ve been trying for the last week to download “This Year”, a song by Chantal Kreviazuk from the Serendipity soundtrack. It’s got those burnished chords and harmonies that leave me breathless.

WinMX lists hundreds of songs by this artist but no sign of “This Year.” I know it’s a new soundtrack but back in the days of Napster, my fellow music thieves would have mp3’s ready for download the minute an album hit the shelves. C’mon people, it’s the digital age! You don’t expect me to actually wait for something…

Do you?