Recently in Music Category

As I've written here before, I've been a fan of Brad Sucks for a few years now. I don't just like his music, I like how he's working out how to get his music out into the world.

His new album, Out of It, is due out on 8 September. I already pre-ordered my CD copy. I like CDs still, I can't help it. I haven't figured out how to get someone to autograph an MP3.

The first single from Out of It is going to be "Fake It" and Brad's making a video. Not just any video, he's trying to make the most cliche music video ever and he needs our help! The assignment is as follows:

1. Choose one or more music video clichés. (What's a music video cliché?)
2. Video yourself singing along to Fake It [mp3], including at least one or more music video clichés. Do the entire song or just a part, anything's fine.
3. Upload your video to Youtube with the tag "bradsucksfakeit".

I try not to ask people to do things that I wouldn't do myself. Last week, I uploaded a set of clips to YouTube as my contribution to the project.

I have three videos up now in my Youtube channel. All totally raw and unedited, unrehearsed and intentionally so. I might do some more and I might pay more attention to the audio next time. Here's mine, where are yours?

It's a pretty popular thing as one gets older to complain about the crap music that is "in" with the kids. I've listened to a lot of trash on XM while I was on vacation so I'm particularly sensitive right now....even when I'm trying to avoid it I still got a load of Jonas Brothers, Rihanna and "I Kissed a Girl" and I've had enough.

I'm sure when I was a kid though that my parents had similar reactions to the Run DMC, Metallica, and Steve Vai coming out of my stereo. I get a similar reaction from Margo when my iPod goes from Daath to Saul Williams to Muris Varajic now. The more things change, the more they stay the same, as they say.

Maybe things are not quite as bad as I thought though...

I just noticed that someone posted a pretty good live video of Brad Sucks doing Bad Attraction from the beginning of June.

I think it's kinda odd that there aren't more decent quality videos out there of his performances. Oh well. I'd keep an eye out between now and the beginning of September. He has a project coming for a video of the new single, Fake It so maybe we'll see something interesting then.

Months after acquiring the hardware to do some recording, I tried my first serious recording session tonight and I'm shocked at how disgusted I am with myself.

The first thing I worked on wasn't so bad. I have a really short voice recording to do for a little project someone else is doing that I didn't finish. I wasn't too pleased with my voice but I'll get over it. I was surprised at not being able to get through what I was trying to say when the microphone was on. I don't have any trouble talking in front of groups but I'm not standing up too against my critical listening. I'm going to give it another go tomorrow and not listen to it anymore. Maybe I'll link it when it comes out..

The second disappointing project of the day was recording some guitar. I learned that the only thing more critical of a guitar player than a Youtube commenter is the guitar player himself as he's recording something that might end up on Youtube....

I was starting simple with a direct-in recording of how one of my guitars sounds without an amp. Next step would have been a walkthrough of my amp settings, and then later a walkthrough of my distortion pedal.

This stuff was going to be a soft intro to me putting out a practice diary online to hold myself to the fire on practicing by opening it up to the net. Problem is that after giving it a hard listen, and I just can't put it out there.

Tomorrow I'll try it again through the amp. Maybe it'll sound better. Maybe I'll be less embarrassed. I'll get something out eventually....it just might take longer than I had planned.

I discovered Brad Sucks back in 2006 or so and blogged about it at the time (Brad Sucks: Open Source Musician?). I've enjoyed his album, "I Don't Know What I'm Doing" quite a bit since then. I realized recently that I had just downloaded the album and never really got around to paying for it...which really sucks because I really like to support what independent artists are doing.

I got around to fixing that a couple weeks ago by hitting the tip jar on his Music page. When you hit the tip jar, Brad sends a button. The button I got was of the cover of the album. Sweet.

In January, Chris Whisonant did a blog post called "Do guitar players really play Guitar Hero?" Most of the guitar players answered "no" in the comments. I play Guitar Hero and I play guitar, but I suck at guitar, so I don't think my opinion counts on that yet. I did find video on Youtube of a genuine guitar player playing Guitar Hero...

These are becoming interesting times for music in general and for a Nine Inch Nails fan in particular.

Last month, Ghosts I-IV was released online with no warning. My copy of the CD version arrived last week.

Then the other day, the main NIN site updated again with another "2 weeks" post...like the one that went up two weeks before Ghosts dropped.

Yesterday, the single "Discipline" drops in all its disco industrial pop yumminess with a free download. The Comments field in the MP3 says, "Go to www.nin.com May 5." A new album or EP maybe? Rock! I like the new clean, sober and beefy Trent.

The multi-track remixable download is out for download too.

Would it be snarky for me to post a remix that just clips the vocal false start at the beginning of the song?

I little while back, i am jen posted a new idea on her website. She offered up custom hand made CDs for sale. You pick the tracks and the title, she creates unique artwork to go with it.

I have a thing for signed stuff, not so much as a collector, but more for the experience of connection and closeness to the artists whose music I love. So of course I had to jump on this. I agonized about the playlist and title for a long time but got there eventually, and here's the result:

....or how I noticed my body language at concerts.

On March 13th, Margo and I went to see Toby Mac and Jeremy Camp with some friends at the Patriot Center. I never saw or heard their music before, so I was going in having no idea what to expect. Also since I was there with friends that knew their music, I felt like I was being watched. Kind of like when you're at an ethnic restaurant and they give you something to try...and they watch you eating it to see if you like it.

For some reason, I was paying attention to my body language more than normal. I was stiff, a little closed off and looked like I wasn't into it. Actually, Margo asked me if I hated the show.

I did really enjoy the concert though. Jeremy Camp and his band were fantastic. I wasn't as much into Toby Mac's music but he and his band put on a really entertaining show.

I thought about it and I think I know why now. When I'm watching someone perform, I'm paying real close attention to what they're doing. How they vocalize, how they hold and play their instruments, when the guitar players change effects, everything. I think it's the frustrated musician in me. This concentration tends to keep me from more outward appreciation of what's going on.

It makes me wonder for smaller venues if anyone on stage looked out, saw me and thought "he thinks we suck". I hope not.

I can't do anything about the past but moving forward, I'm going to be more aware of my body language out there. I hope that maybe if there's other people out there like me that they'll pay more attention too.

Michael Jantz and the Davenports are a band local to the Washington DC area. I had the pleasure of meeting Michael and see him perform solo at a Digital Freedom sponsored event back in October (link here). I really enjoyed his performance and guitar playing.

It looks like they have released a live album as a free download from their website. Aside from being some really good music, it's a good way to get an idea what their live shows are like too for anyone that prefers to know what to expect before going to a show.

One of these days I'm going to brave our hellish DC-area traffic and get out on a weeknight to one of their shows...it takes a good hour plus to get from Centreville to Arlington or Old Town. sigh.

Anyway, you can get the MP3's for "Live at Jim's" here:

http://www.michaeljantz.com/hearsomesongs.html

Their show schedule's posted on the site as well if you find yourself in the US mid-atlantic area.

The video edition of Samantha Murphy's SMtv launched last night and I didn't even notice til this morning. Maybe I can save my reputation by pointing out that I heard about it from Samantha Twittering it.

I watched the first episode so far. The featured artists are Jonathan Coulton (I can't get that Portal song out of my head...huge success!) and Jesse Malin who were both previously featured on the SMtv audio podcast.

I was surprised by the format. Samantha has been talking about a video version of SMtv for quite a while now and I was expecting just a video feed of the podcast recordings. Parts of the show include video from previous podcasts, there's a lot more to it. There's an interview with Terry McBride, part of Jesse Malin's performance at IOTA, and Mike Schmid fawning over Johnathan Coulton (I would too, probably so it's OK) and a couple other surprises.

It's definitely worth a look. I enjoyed it quite a bit. It's not in the podcast feed yet so you'll have to go direct from the website for now. I'm going to try to get through episode 2 before I head out to work.

Link: The Samantha Murphy Show

I've been trying to learn to play guitar over the past year and most of the progress I have made on that has come from my being on the guitar site, GuitarMasterClass.

I discovered the Argentina-based band Cirse when Gabriel Leopardi, their guitar player, and Luciana, their singer, became instructors on the site. The band put out a CD called "bi-polar" this past December. Gabriel has a couple of lessons on GMC lately that show how to play some of their songs which is really cool, I think.

Of course, I had to have a copy of the CD and Gabriel and Luciana were kind enough to sign it for me:

So it's SXSW time again this week. From a distance, it always seemed to me that it was more of a blogger/hipster gathering for some reason.

I noticed this year that there's a torrent out there with 700+ songs it from bands that are going to be playing SXSW this year. I snagged it over the weekend and started listening to it on the way to work yesterday.

It'll take me a long time to get through all the music in there but what I've heard so far is really good stuff. There's a lot of different styles represented. If you're looking for new music this torrent is a quick way to sample a bunch of quality artists all in one place.

Link: SXSW Showcase Torrents

I hate doing these kinds of things because it feels like I'm just running around following the crowd. This particular thing is going around the Lotus Notes/Domino community.

I do tend to get some odd results on these things though. This is no exception.

I'm learning to play guitar these days. I'll have to remember this if I ever have an album to do.

The game goes like this:

Band name from Wikipedia random page, the album title is the last four words from the final quote on the random quotes page and the art should be the third image from the Flickr Interestingness / Last 7 days page.

Frank Docherty posted his iTunes top 25 playlist as a challenge. I looked at mine and I'm not as up to the challenge as I thought I was. Oh well. I gotta work on that. I do have an odd collection, I promise.

I struggle a lot with thinking of ways to support the independent musicians that I love. I buy a lot of music and I get to shows when I can. It doesn't seem to me like it's enough though. It's hard to think that $15 for a CD here and there and a piece of the door or whatever at concert is helping considering what it costs to make a living these days.

Samantha Murphy mentioned recently on her podcast that one of the things we can do as music lovers is help to take care of artist's human needs where you can. Offer an extra bed if you have one. Give them a homecooked meal if you can cook. Being on the road can be hard and lonely and it can mean a lot to help give artists some of the comforts of home. I think it's a fantastic idea, but it's going to take some effort to work that out when you live as out of the way as I do. If you see an artist you like out there, invite them to a meal...maybe they'll say yes.

I've seen enough in my life lately to be sure that sometimes if you step out and reach out to someone, sometimes it can be just at the right time for them.

On 15 January, David St. Lawrence did a blog posting about house concerts that explained to me what they were. Read it with its links yourself for the details. I've seen some of the musicians I follow post house concerts on their schedules here and there. David's post really made it hit home for me that home concerts are a great way to help support artists and it's not scary difficult to do. I don't really have any place to do something like that in my house, but I think that's something I can actually do. It might not be this year, but whenever I make it work, I'll get the details up here. I'm excited.

It really hit home for me this year that for some reason, the end of the year has become particularly musical for me over the past three years.

In December 2005, I was struggling with learning to play a little electronic keyboard that I have here. I just wasn't getting it for some reason, and I wasn't able to find any decent resources online for learning how to play keyboards/piano. Music has always been difficult for me to understand on a technical level, so I had decided that it was time to figure it out.

In December 2006, I won the Dark Star which put me on the path of learning to play guitar. In January, I started a subscription to Guitar Masterclass, which is a fantastic guitar learning site. I spent most of 2007 practicing less than I should be practicing, but I'm a lot better than I was when I started.

In November and December 2007, I bought two more guitars...which I think officially makes me a guitar player finally.

In December 2007, I won a copy of Reason 4 from AudioMIDI.com, so suddenly, I have a software-based music production suite. Given my interest in blending guitar music and electronics (industrial and electronica), it's an interesting addition to my stable of musical gear.

For 2008, I'm going to spend a lot more time learning how to play and learning music theory and try to make something about my recent musical giftings. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens this coming December. I will be better at playing then, I'm sure..

Laura Tsaggaris is starting a tour of the US this week.

Just in case anyone reading this is going to be in the area, she's going to be in the southwest in February and has a few stops on the way back in the midwest in March.

I saw her perform at the Digital Freedom U thing in October at AU with some other singer-songwriters and really enjoyed her music. She signed my copy of her CD, Proof and chatted for a bit after the set which was cool.

She has the tour schedule posted on her Myspace page along with music and some other stuff.

Check her out, if you can.

Otto's Daughter's new album, "A New Kind of Heroine" is finally out! Yay!

This is the album that I preordered in 2006 that lead to my winning the Dark Star guitar. This is what got me playing guitar after a lifetime of meaning to try.

I pre-ordered it just so I could get it signed by the band:

The new album's an interesting evolution for the band. I like it. I'm just pissed that my car stereo's not working so I've only listened to part of the album so far. bah.

So Fluffy Starr's first album, "Come on!" is out. I've been waiting for it for what seems like years...since the first time I heard "Perfect"...and then somehow I missed the actual release date. Fortunately, I caught it in time to get mine autographed...

Not many people are allowed to call me "Scotty". Fluffy is on the list.

With the new job, I haven't had a chance to listen to the whole CD yet. The recording itself is interesting...lots of detail...the breath, the pick on the guitar strings...stuff you don't usually hear in albums like this...it's kinda organic. The music's completely different than "Perfect" (even though it's track 13 on the CD). The rest of "Come On!" is more electronic pop rock with an industrial edge, I think. Interesting. I like it.

For a preview, check out some of the other videos on the Fluffy Starr TeeVee Youtube channel. There's a lot of silliness going on there, but there are song clips in the background. The Fluffy Starr MySpace page has previews too.

My copy of Love Letters from the Electric Chair arrived the other day and I'm enjoying making my way through it.

While I was thinking about her, I noticed that Izzy Cox had posted a set of videos on Youtube. I'm really digging Man of the Cloth today so I'm adding that video below. The others are posted on Izzy Cox's YouTube profile and I really recommend checking them all out. Good stuff.

Ever since I started posting these signed CDs a while back, I've been looking for this one. I won a copy of Samantha Murphy's 'somewhere between starving and stardom' from a podcast contest. Signed, sealed and delivered. The silver sharpie didn't show well in the photo..it says "Thanks for winning me".

One of these days, I'm going to have a chance to buy a copy for someone else.

On Wednesday night, I saw Laura Tsaggaris play part of a free concert hosted by Digital Freedom. I got there late, so I didn't really see most of the songs she did that night but I did see her do the title track for her album, "Proof" and it was riveting. Of course, I bought the CD.

We chatted for a bit and Laura was very nice. She offered to sign my CD, which I accepted of course. I'm looking forward to listening to her music and will definitely have to catch one of her own shows.

So I finally actually saw Samantha Murphy Wednesday night at a free concert hosted at American University by the Digital Freedom Campaign. Traffic sucked and it took hours to get there and I ended up not getting to the 7:30 show til 8:30 so I missed most of if...but I made it!

When I got there I was surprised to see that Laura Tsaggaris, Michael Jantz and Josh Read were onstage with Samantha. Laura and Josh have been on the SMTV podcast. They all played in a round-robin style so while I only got to hear 2-3 songs from each of them, it worked out better than it could have been with my late arrival.

Laura Tsaggaris was pretty intense. Michael Jantz was interesting in a way I have a hard time describing and understanding. Josh Read just sounded huge up there and had some great songs.

Samantha Murphy was fantastic. Between the podcast and having had her CD for a couple years I'm already pretty familiar with her music so it was great to see her do a couple of her songs live as straight-up acoustic. Great stuff. Very dynamic and engaging onstage. I promised myself that I wouldn't gush, so moving on...

After the show, I bought some CDs, of course. I don't think Josh had any, but I bought "Proof" from Laura that she signed for me and "Snapshots from the Universe" from Michael. I already have a signed copy of "somewhere between starving & stardom" but Samantha had a free 2-track sampler with a track that isn't on her album. I'm looking forward to digging into all this music in the next several days (it takes a while the way I have my iPod playlists set up).

After the show, I chatted with Laura, Michael and Samantha for a while (trying out my new "I'm an introvert, but I'm not shy" mantra). They were all very nice even though they had stuff to pack up and I wasn't an AU student.

I took one photo while it was Michael Jantz's turn to sing. I was too far away to get a good shot with the camera I have and I didn't want to get up into their faces for a better shot. Laura Tsaggaris is on the left, half of Samantha Murphy is on the right. Josh Read was out of frame to Samantha's left.

Generally, I don't really like using labels to find new music. I am frequently disappointed when I go looking for new music at a label for an artist that I already like. For some reason, the “if you like that, you'll like this” approach to labels never really worked for me.

I discovered Radio Active Music a couple months ago and it has me re-evaluating my judgment on the issue. RAM is an interesting entity...part label, part distribution channel, part promotional network. What caught my attention was the fact that most of the bands that I've discovered and enjoyed over the last couple of years have some kind of connection to RAM and I didn't even know it til very recently.

Lunarclick, 51 PEG, Otto's Daughter, 23 Rainy Days, Fluffy Starr, Collide, and Mankind is Obsolete all have some kind of connection to Radio Active Music. The label is still relatively small but there's good stuff there.

I'm actually looking forward to exploring the other artists that they work with. I'm listening to more guitar music these days because I'm trying to learn to play, but synths are still my true love.

Update: Added links to band websitesl

Technorati Tags: Music

Last time I mentioned i am jen, it was about the youtube video on how she makes her Broken EP's before shipping. At the time, I couldn't find my copy (I ripped it to iTunes and listen on the iPod). I found it over the weekend and its picture is below.

This example also came with an extra “Broken Robot Girl” sticker and a personalized note from jen. I think it's really cool how much time she spent on this, changing it from a purchase transaction to a human, person-to-person interaction. I appreciate it and will continue to try to support her in her music.

"Thanks for your support! JVB and Jim' I preordered Otto's Daughter's EP "Becoming 001" in 2005 and they signed it. I did the same for the upcoming "A New Kind of Herione" and won a guitar.

The first 300 orders of Freezepop's new album Future Future Future Perfect got signed by Liz, The Duke and Sean Drinkwater. I guess I made the cutoff. Yay! Time to Rokk!!

Technorati Tags: Music

I made it out on Friday night to TT Reynolds to catch a slice of the DC area's goth music scene. I specifically went to see 51 Peg, as I've been a fan of their music for a few years but never got around to actually seeing them live.

The opener was a band called Chrysalis and they kicked my ass. Their music was awesome and their stage presence was outstanding. A plus for me is that they play this music live with Telecasters and a hollowbody Gibson. I wish they had a better online presence than the MySpace page...with a common name like 'Chrisalis', it makes them hard to find. They're opening for Powerman 5000 at Jaxx on 6 Oct and Margo and I will probably be there.

23 Rainy Days came up next. Interesting and well done. They call what they do "post punk dance metal." Their MySpace page goes on to describe them as a mixture of emo, melancholy new wave and modern rock, which I think fots better. They're also the only band of the night with a bass player. I dunno if it's quite my style yet, but I'm keeping an open mind. The thing is that the other two bands had a heavier sound which made it hard for me to get into. Will keep listening. They do have a live video online: 23RAINYDAYS "Fire in Tokyo"

51Peg closed the night out with a really short set. The set was all killer and no filler though. I'm just sorry I hadn't seen them earlier. I'm sure I'll see them again and again though. They have a unique sound anchored by their singer and hard, driving synths. While they're electronics-heavy, I never lost the feeling that they're a hard rocking band. There's quite a few live videos of them out there on the net. The one I'm posting below is on their Myspace page. It's the best quality out there as it's a produced live music video rather than the camcorder in the crowd kind of video.

Technorati Tags: Music

I was at TT Reynolds last night to see a local band that I've wanted to see (more on that later). I was surprised to see that the place is potentially in danger of shutting down.

Apparently, the landlord has put the building up for sale because of the recent redevelopment of the the Old Town Fairfax area. New owners in a redeveloping neighborhood usually means higher rent and driving out the old businesses.

TT Reynolds is an important fixture in the local music scene here and it would be awful to lose it. I love the place...it has a lot of atmosphere as the great music it hosts.

I'm not one for joining movements, but it would really suck to lose TT Reynolds. They have a website called Save TT Reynolds where you can read up on the situation, get updates and make a donation if you want. Those of us that live near TT's and love it like I do would be grateful.

Technorati Tags: Local Issues, Music, Politics

If I had one of these setups and fast keyboard hands, I'd lock myself in a room and do this all day long. Someone would knock to try to get me to eat...I'd turn the volume up and keep going.

Moot Booxle has a Myspace.

Technorati Tags: Music, Video

If it wasn't for episodes 15 and 65 of the SMtv podcast, I probably never would have heard of Izzy Cox. Even if I had heard of her somewhere, I would have seen the "voodoobilly jazz" description, dismissed it as 'way not my style' and moved on.

My style or not, I find her music to be fascinating in a way I find hard to describe. It has a vintage style to it but it's hard for me to pin it to one particular era...20's, 40's, 50's or whatever the new modern is. Her voice is raw and full of personality. I see her music described by saying "she has a style of her own" and I definitely agree. Someone posted some video clips of a live performance to Youtube, so you can figure it out for yourself. One of them, called "Devil, Devil," is embedded below.

Izzy's MySpace page has a link back to CDBaby where you can buy her music if you like.

Technorati Tags: Music, Video

I love Freezepop and I love Guitar Hero. I love keytars too. Good thing they come together...even if it is a bit odd that a band with no guitar is in a guitar game.

Less Talk More Rokk is one of the bonus tracks on Guitar Hero 2. When I'm just playing around, it's one of my go-to songs behind Jordan. Freezepop just put out a video for it...It's watchable below. Fun stuff.

Also, the new album Future Future Future Perfect is up for pre-order at Newberry Comics

Technorati Tags: Games, GuitarHero, Music

Annoying issue that's pretty typical with new guitar players. In the middle of the A minor pentatonic box. The 1 and 3 fingers are down on the D string. The 2 and 4 fingers are curled up under themselves. Working on getting them straightened out. I know I need to keep my thumb lower and that'll help some...it's just uncomfortable to me at this point.

And the game goes on.

Sometime in 2005, I discovered the artist known as 'i am jen'. The Electronic Periodic podcast played one of her songs in an episode. I loved the music and bought a CD copy of 'the broken ep'. I loved the rest of the music, of course. The packaging of the CD was interesting, but I figured that it was made through some odd printing process.

A few days ago, the i am jen website relaunched with new music and links to her Youtube videos that I didn't know existed. Check out what's there...I really, really dig her music and you might too.

You can get a taste of her style there and on her Myspace page. I was fascinated by the “Making of the Broken EP' video (which I've embedded below). I had no idea how much manual work was put into creating the CD package. It's a very neat personal touch that I probably never would have imagined if I hadn't seen the video.

Technorati Tags: Music

Youtube is home to a lot of interesting (and not so interesting) guitar work. Being a new guitar player, I find it interesting to see other player's style. I think the guy below is pretty interesting. Unique style. Not perfect, but interesting.

Update: Ok. Maybe the “not perfect” comment isn't smart considering that this guy's better than I'll probably ever get.

Technorati Tags: Music, Video, Youtube

It made me smile.

Updated: Here's the original. Also makes me smile.

Technorati Tags: Blogging, Music

I've been watching more live music videos on Youtube lately as I'm still working on learning how to play the guitar. A couple of days ago, I came across the below clip of the bass solo from Metallica's 1998 DVD Cunning Stunts.

The first 1:45 of the clip before he starts in on the beginning of My Friend of Misery (also a beautiful bass piece) is an especially beautiful piece of music. Simple and sweet. Makes me want to learn bass too. Stuff like this probably should have been a clue that Jason wasn't really cut out for Metallica.

Update: I just read that last sentence and it sounded more negative than I meant it to be. He's a great bass player, don't get me wrong. It just seems that what Metallica does and what he did when he was able to do what he wanted are two completely different things. I enjoy both (well, I'm on the fence about Rockstar Supernova).

Technorati Tags: Music

I saw on Digg not too long ago a posting about using tag clouds to analyze candidates speeches during the Democratic debates. With a new album out, I was curious what a tag cloud for Nine Inch Nails would look like. Especially since Year Zero goes into new directions for Nine Inch Nails...being explicitly political and also not having a Parental Warning like all of the other albums have, excluding Pretty Hate Machine, I think. Feel free to interpret the results any way you like.

Tag cloud for all of the NIN albums (excluding EP's, singles, remixes, etc):

Here's the tag cloud for just the new Year Zero album:

Technorati Tags: Music, Politics

John Head had an amusing post yesterday: Soundtrack of your life

The idea is to put your music library on shuffle, hit skip 3 times and then write down the songs that come up in order and then line them up with a set of life events. With my music collection, I thought it'd be an interesting thing to see, so here goes:

Opening Credits: Collide "Halo" from Chasing the Ghost
Waking Up: Cruciform Injection "Vacant Bodies" from Epilogue
First Day at School: Metallica "Prince Charming" from ReLoad
Falling in Love: Third Eye Blind "Thanks A Lot" from Third Eye Blind
Fight Song: Megadeth "Ecstasy" from Risk
Breaking Up: Korn "Freak on a Leash" from Follow the Leader
Prom: Metallica "Hero of the Day" from Load
Life: Kate Bush "Sunset" from Aerial
Mental Breakdown: Innocent Blood "Enter Sandman" from The Blackest Album 2
Driving: Marty Casey & Lovehammers "Clouds" from Marty Casey & Lovehammers
Flashback: Fatboy Slim "Santa Cruz" from Better Living Through Chemistry
Wedding: Buckethead "Machete Mirage" from Bucketheadland Vol 2
Final Battle: Prince "Sign O' The Times" from The Very Best of Prince
Death Scene: AC/DC "Hell or High Water" from from Fly on the Wall
Funeral Song: Gary Numan "I Can't Breathe" from Pure
End Credit: Marilyn Manson "Antichrist Superstar (Live)" from Remix & Repent

Um. Wow. That's weird.

Technorati Tags: Blogging, Music

Business & Technology | Starbucks launches Hear Music record label:
via Slashfood

So is this part of Starbucks' new strategy to re-find its soul?

Things like starting a label and signing Sir Paul take time so it's my guess that this is another way Starbucks us losing it instead. It kinda makes sense given that part of the "Starbucks Experience" is the music played in their shops. The Hear station has been on XM for a while...I even had it in my presets before I dropped my subscription.

I'm still waiting for a coffee-related change that shows they're serious about getting that lost soul back though,

Technorati Tags: Food, Marketing, Music