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The BBC is reporting that acclaimed director Martin Scorsese will be doing a movie about the life of George Harrison.
"As well as Harrison's time in The Beatles, the film will look at his solo career and movie projects, such as Monty Python's Life of Brian and Time Bandits. Scorsese also plans to explore Harrison's faith in the Eastern spiritual pursuits that dominated parts of his life," the report said.
Sonicbids, the online music submission service that founds itself in the middle of the CMJ mess earlier this week , took the time to pass along their side of the story. Last night Ghost Media HQ got an email from Panos Panay, the CEO of Sonicbids, and he attached a copy of the open letter he posted on the company's website. While I think CMJ bears the lion's share of responsibility for this particular situation, I was critical of Sonicbids as well, and to that end I want to give Panay a chance to publicly respond.
I'll be posting my take on the whole mess on Friday, but meanwhile....leave your thoughts on the response in the comments section.
Here is the full text of the letter:
Sonicbids & CMJ Submissions: An Open Letter
I have received many emails and viewed several blogs in the past 24 hours about artists upset that CMJ rejected them without first listening to them; and also voicing their dismay at the cost of the submission through Sonicbids. Their concerns are based on a “not-selected” email that some artists received on Monday evening from a CMJ staff member who accidentally copied the other non-selected artists; and also from some artists checking their Sonicbids account and noticing that even though they got a rejection from CMJ, their Sonicbids “hits tracker” did not indicate that their songs were played. After carefully reading all emails and posts, I thought that it would be appropriate that I use this forum to respond.
First, let me say that to the best of
our knowledge CMJ did in fact listen to all artists that have submitted
through Sonicbids. How do we know this? Well, one of the nice things
about being an online company is that we are able to see activities
that happen on our servers such as page views, MP3 streaming, file downloads,
etc. The issue arose from the fact that the current version of the Sonicbids
EPK “hits tracker” tells you if an MP3 was streamed, but it does
not indicate if it was downloaded (yeah, makes no sense to me either,
but we are fixing that). Since CMJ prefers to review submitting artists
by downloading their tracks first, this resulted in several bands getting
a rejection from CMJ, but, when they checked their tracker stats, noticed
that their music was not registered as having been played. I would get
mad too, specially if I paid $45 to submit and thought that no one listened
to my music. Obviously that was not the case, and we are working as
we speak on making the EPK hits tracker a lot more accurate.
In addition to this, we know that CMJ
listened to the artists that submitted because, simply, we know CMJ.
Big deal, you say, right? I can tell you that there is hardly an organization
out there that has done more for independent music in the past 25 years
than CMJ has done, both with its Music Marathon and its music charts.
In fact, CMJ has booked and presented close to 2,000 different bands
through Sonicbids in the past four years – that’s TWO THOUSAND.
I can barely name an artist who broke big in America in the past quarter
of a century who has done so without benefiting from the exposure that
they got from playing CMJ or from appearing on their charts. If we trust
one organization to meticulously review all submissions that they get,
it’s CMJ. These people are music people, plain and simple.
Second, I understand that some people
are upset about the cost of submitting to CMJ through Sonicbids. Let
me make it clear that the cost of submission for CMJ is $45 whether
you submit through Sonicbids or not (if you still like sending in a
physical promo kit, that’s a $45 check plus the cost of the postage
and material). Unlike, say, Ticketmaster, MovieTickets, Active.com or
other similar services, we do not add a surcharge to the submission
cost. Instead, Sonicbids makes its money by taking a fee out of
the promoter’s submission fee so that the applying artist is not double-charged.
Why pay a submission fee for CMJ or any other similar event? Well, submission costs are fairly normal no matter the industry you are in. You pay them whether you are an architect submitting to a contest; an immigrant applying for a visa; a craft artist applying for a show; a college student applying to a university. Putting on an event, running a college, staging a competition is not free and yes, part of the costs of running these events is covered by these fees. No worthwhile “connection” in life is free. A phone call costs money, a meeting at a coffee shop costs money, even a call through Skype costs money as you still have to pay your internet bill. The real issue is to decide whether the upside of any submission fee (that is, being selected) is worthwhile. If not, I would strongly suggest that you do not submit, as it would be a waste of money.
As far as the total number of selections versus the number of applications, all I can say is that any event worth its salt will have far fewer slots available than applications. Would you rather go to a college that accepts 10% of all applicants or 90% of all applicants? Take a job that accepts all comers or be offered one that has a strenuous selection process where only the best get in? Anything with a high standard will also have a high number of rejections. That’s why CMJ is popular and that’s why it’s relevant to the college radio programmers that have attended the event every year for 27 years.
I know that rejection is disappointing
for everyone and it’s something that all of us - who care about becoming
something better than who we already are – experience, and will continue
to experience. It’s part of putting yourself out there. I also know
that on occasion, any website and any technological solution encounters
bugs and glitches and no matter how much testing one does, nothing is
fool-proof until it’s truly tested out there in the marketplace. We
do apologize for any confusion that may have arisen as a result of a
buggy tracker, which we are busy fixing.
We are committed here at Sonicbids to
creating the best site that exists to help every band and artist, no
matter which stage of their career, to find and connect with any gig
that’s appropriate for where they want to go next. We are doing,
and will continue to do, our best to live up to your understandably
high expectations of Sonicbids.
Panos Panay
Founder & CEO
Sonicbids
There aren't many music DVD's that I actually look forward to, but "Heima", which comes out on November 6th, is definitely one of them. From the press release:
"Heima-which translates as both "At Home" and "Homeland"-- chronicles a series of free concerts Sigur Rós played in their native Iceland over the course of summer 2006. Combining both the biggest and smallest shows of their career, the entire tour was filmed, and now provides a unique insight into one of the world's most fascinating and inscrutable bands captured live while exploring their natural habitat like never before. The film is currently being edited by Nick Fenton with direction from the Oscar-nominated Dean DeBlois.
The culmination of more than a year spent promoting their hugely successful Takk... album around the world, the Icelandic tour was free to all-comers and went largely unannounced. Playing in deserted fish factories, outsider art follies, far-flung community halls, sylvan fields, darkened caves and the huge horseshoe-shaped Asbyrgi canyon (formed, legend has it, by the hoofprint of Odin's six-legged horse Sleipnir), the band reached an entirely new spectrum of the Icelandic population; young and old, ardent and merely quizzical, entirely by word-of-mouth.
Material from all four of the band's albums is featured, including many rare and notable moments. Among these are a heart-stopping rendition of the previously unreleased 'Guitardjamm', filmed inside a derelict herring oil tank in the far West Fjords; a windblown, one-mic recording of 'Vaka', shot at a dam protest camp subsequently drowned by rising water; and first time acoustic versions of such rare live beauties as 'Staralfur', 'Agaetis Byrjun' and 'Von'."
The singer songwriter genre is riddled with talented people who write B-minus/C-plus songs, which only adds to the surprise when you stumble upon someone who writes truly great ones With "Hymn 101" Chicago's Joe Pug literally stunned me. The song is a gorgeous display of lyricism and melody, and it makes a strong case that Pug could hold his own with heavyweights of the genre like Richard Buckner and M. Ward. The singer is putting finishing touches on his first EP which will be released this fall.
I'd be hard put to come up with a better suggestion for the next four minutes of your life than to listen to this song.
Listen to "Hymn 101" by Joe Pug
He'll be playing a show at The Beat Kitchen on September 30th.
Joe Pug on Myspace
Chicago band Oh My God was in a head-on collision in their tour van this weekend, and while they all survived the accident, it sounds like they're in pretty rough shape. From the band's myspace:
We are so sad to report that a terrible, head-on collision in Ohio
(someone crossed way over the center line and hit us straight on) has
left me typing this with my left hand only, and has forced us to cancel
the rest of our fall tour. We have among us serious knee, wrist, back,
finger and nose fractures. Everyone in the band is alive, and if you'd
witnessed this crash you'd be surprised about that. So we are thankful
for that.
Thanks so much to all of you who've already heard and
have sent us such warm wishes. We have months of recovery and physical
therapy ahead of us. Hopefully we'll see you after that...lots of love,
ig w/ Billy, Bish & Matt
The CMJ Music Marathon, which takes place in NYC in October, may be rethinking their decision to use online submission site Sonicbids to do handle their band applications. To submit, a band had to pay a nonrefundable fee of $45. A major screwup by the site may just have shed some light on one of the organizations dirty little secrets.
Today, an email went out to a large number of bands telling them they were on "Standby" status, and to email the CMJ showcase director to let them know which days they might be able to play. About an hour later, the same bands received an email from CMJ Showcase Coordinator Robyn Baskin saying the following:
"There is a bug in Sonicbids system and the wrong email was sent out to many people. Sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused. This is the email that you should have received:
It is with regret that we inform you we are unable to find a slot for you to perform at CMJ Music Marathon 2007.
Please realize that you made it through a number of rounds in the selection process and the music that you are making caught our attention for one reason or another. Unfortunately, the sheer number of applicants in relation to the number of clubs in NY makes it impossible for us to give every deserving band a slot at the festival, and while it may not be much consolation, we did try our best to accommodate as many acts as possible, including yours."
Fair enough. Standard rejection letter. However, Baskin made the regrettable error of listing the email addresses of all 675 bands that got the email, rather than putting them as blind carbon copy. Within minutes, the predictable and pathetic self promotional spam started coming in, from bands who apparently decided that other CMJ-denied bands are a good target market. But then it got interesting.
One emailer noted, in a less-than-friendly email to Baskin, that "Apart from the fact that we are now open to a bunch of spam, it has also brought to my attention that sonic bids has collected the $45 fee from at least 670 bands ($30,450) knowing full well that you could never accommodate all of the bands." Soon the folks at Shiny Little Records pointed out a little known statistic that comes with every Sonicbids account.
Strong week for Conan....
Monday: Rilo Kiley on Conan, Kanye West on Kimmel
Tuesday: Sea Wolf on Kimmel
Wednesday: Bright Eyes on Leno, Devendra Banhardt on Conan
Thursday: Bjork on Conan
Friday: Jose Gonzalez on Conan
Bands playing latenight talk shows tend to be pretty staid and straightforward. Last night I happened to catch Mute Math playing their song "Typical" on Kimmell, though, and I can honestly say I was impressed as hell. I still have no idea how they pulled this off, but they managed to play the entire song backward, but....uh.....sort of forward too? Yeah.....just take a look. And someone please figure out how the hell they did this.
UPDATE: Google rocks. After a bit of research it turns out this was a live version of a video they did some time ago. And lest we forget the world is populated with useful nerds, a fan took the reverse-video and reversed it, thus giving a picture of what they actually filmed. It's basically them (pretty impressively) playing along to the song played backwards.
In a move that is hardly shocking, the Peter,Bjorn and John show on 9/25 has been moved from the Riviera to the cozier confines of The Vic. Making the jump from The Empty Bottle to the Riviera successfully would be tough under any circumstances, but I think that the hype has died down a bit and fans are realizing there's not much meat on the bone beyond "Young Folks". Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Live blog from Millennium Park: after War on War Jeff Tweedy gave a shout out to the chosen ones. "To all of our non-observant jewish fans out there....la shanah tovah. What are you doing here? This is our temple!"
