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Synthesizing Stories on Bad Metaphor 11

With some of my online homes I’ve been quite active and with others, not so much. One of the things that is quite enjoyable to do is record audio podcasts with my son John. We started doing the Bad Metaphor podcast (an audio podcast) a few years ago and would sporadically update it. Due to some perfectionism and procrastination the output has grown increasingly infrequent, but John always wants to create more, so we’ve started recording podcasts again in a more casual way to try and get them done and up more often.

The wonderful thing about technology is that it advances and makes things easier and cheaper all the time. So last weekend we sat down on the floor with my MacBook Pro, my Zoom H2, and John’s Nintendo DSi along with a stereo omnidirectional microphone from Giant Squid Audio Lab and we recorded a new episode of Bad Metaphor in Soundtrack Pro. The neat thing is that we were able to do some multitrack recording right to disk with the audio from each of us going to separate tracks and the music going to a stereo track. This means we can adjust the levels after the recording and also means that it is much faster to edit. It’s a setup that works and I’m really glad that we figured it out and I hope that we’ll be doing a lot more soon. So go on over and take a listen to the under 8 minute episode 11 of Bad Metaphor: Synthesizing Stories where John plays some music using his Korg DS-10 emulator.

November 21, 2009 badmetaphor, john, music, nanowrimo, podcast, synthesizer, writing

Sappyfest Year 3

I’m very glad that I have a perfect record so far with Sappyfest and the third year was the best yet for the indie music festival in Sackville, New Brunswick. This year I took fewer photos (but I have a Sappyfest 2008 set) and didn’t blog, but I was able to post short updates as things happened through my Twitter feed. Using my tweets I was able to reconstruct what I saw two weeks ago, since with a lineup of about 60 bands over three days, it’s easy to forget stuff. The rough statistics for me from Sappyfest 2008 are 27 bands, 4 readings, 3 films, and 1 dance performance.
What distinguishes Sappyfest is that it’s a more organic DIY hand-crafted festival. The performers are carefully chosen based on the Sappy Records folks (Julie Doiron, Jon Claytor, and Paul Henderson) having met and admired them. That provides a very friendly and casual atmosphere and at any time the audience is filled with people who will take the stage. The bands aren’t just there to play their songs and leave, but to see the other bands as well. The musicians wait in line like everyone else for food and beer, and there are lots of smiles and laughter all around.
Continue…

August 17, 2008 festival, music, sackville, sappyfest

CC:365

There is a lot of great Creative Commons licensed music out there, but it can be hard to find things that you like. Grant Robertson started a podcast at the beginning of this year called CC:365 where every day for a year he would post a CC-licensed song. I listened from the beginning and wrote a fan letter and then found out that Grant was moving up to Halifax, which is close to me and where I work every day. Things were rolling along quite well, but after 142 days and 143 songs (one was a preview) there was a bit of a break and Grant asked for help with the podcast and I eagerly jumped in and now there are 5 people doing it as a team that rotates the awesome power and responsibility of picking songs. I’m coming up to the end of my first round of picks and I love it. I’ve been able to convince three new people to officially release Creative Commons licensed tracks, so I feel as if I’ve really accomplished something. Now I have about a month to come up with another seven picks, so I’ve got to keep looking.
tags: cc365, music, creativecommons

July 4, 2006 cc365, creativecommons, music

Mermaid Avenue

Ain’t nobody that can sing like me
Way over yonder in the minor key

One of my favourite singer / songwriters is Billy Bragg who is not afraid to combine music and politics together. He’s able to mix the personal and the political in an entertaining way that also enables change. I’d heard a few of his recordings of some Woody Guthrie songs, but I didn’t know the story until I saw the documentary about the recording of Mermaid Avenue, Man in the Sand. The film follows Billy Bragg as he works with Woody Guthrie’s daughter Nora, who gave Bragg access to the huge library of unrecorded Guthrie songs to record some for the first time. Bragg brought the band Wilco to the project to collaborate with and the film about the project hints at some tension between them, but the music transcends that. The documentary is narrated by Nora Guthrie and she tells the story of her father as we see Bragg collaborating with the members of Wilco as well as Natalie Merchant in adding music to the lyrics that Woody wrote. It’s fascinating to watch the process and to see Bragg with Nora as they talk about the man and his music. It’s a great documentary that combines music, history and people together.
My favourite song from the project is She Came Along to Me (with the acoustic version from Live at the Barbican my preferred recording), closely followed by Birds and Ships, featuring Natalie Merchant’s vocals. Overall the recordings are solid but some of them feel a bit overproduced. I also purchased some Billy Bragg bootlegs with Guthrie songs and I prefer the live versions. Maybe the live performances fit in better with Guthrie’s lyrics or it’s just hearing a great performance live, but the different versions are fascinating (as well as Billy’s banter between the songs). With the recordings and the film, I’m realizing what a huge influence Woody Guthrie has had on folk and popular American music.

December 11, 2005 billybragg, dvd, film, mermaidavenue, music, review, woodyguthrie

Transatlanticism

This is the moment that you know
That you told her that you loved her but you don’t.

Gentle, understated and evocative are the lyrics and music of Death Cab for Cutie. I first heard Ben Gibbard’s voice and lyrics through The Postal Service and I just bought (from the iTunes Music Store) Transatlanticism by Death Cab for Cutie. At times I feel as if I’m reading the journal of a slightly-angst-ridden young man (which could have been me at one point). A beautiful mingling of sweetness and pain.
There is no shortage of angst out there, but the magic touch that Gibbard seems to bring is the way that the lyrics meet the music and how his voice shapes those words. It’s very difficult to explain in words and it’s probably the type of thing that you’ll either like or not, but it really works for me. The song Tiny Vessels is one of my instant favourites with a brutal honesty in the lyrics and a simple musical arrangement that builds to something larger and more complex. The album is filled with songs that mix pop-sensibilities with angst into songs that aren’t top 40 singles, but aren’t musically obscure.
With a new album out next month and a touring DVD out in a couple of weeks, Death Cab for Cutie will probably be mentioned here again soon…

July 12, 2005 deathcabforcutie, music, review

Podcasting, iTunes and Odeo

I’ve been listening to podcasts since last Fall and now that I have an iPod Shuffle, I’m listening to podcasts in a pod-like way instead of via burned CDs in the car or through the computer speakers. While I’ve been telling people about podcasting for a while, my less technologically experimental friends haven’t taken the time to download beta software and dig around to find things to listen to. With the introduction of podcast support in iTunes, things have changed dramatically.
Podcasting makes a lot more sense to more people all of a sudden. The podcasts that I love are personal and are done by people who care. Passion is the key ingredient. Many of the podcasts that I listen to I found through blogs or from mentions somewhere, and not through a guide. In the iTunes guide to podcasting there doesn’t seem to be a lot of independent stuff. In fact, there is a lot of Disney there with ABC or ESPN (both Disney properties) in all of the news slots. One of my favourite podcasts – Vu d’ici – Seen From Here by M-C Turgeon – is classified as an “Audio Blog”, but if I had to narrow it down, I’d probably put it under “Music”. M-C is annoyed at the iTunes thing and doesn’t want those commercial, slick and boring podcasts.
A really interesting thing that I noticed is that after listening to podcasts via the iTunes guide, a friend of mine asked where he could find the real indie podcasts made by people in their basements. I think that people will want to wander outside of the slick guides and find things that really connect with them. The iTunes guide is a good place to start and I hope that more people go outside of it (or even realize that they can add whatever feeds they want).
A very encouraging development is Odeo, which just opened up a bit more today. At first they’re providing a guide and a way to subscribe to podcasts. Later they’ll be providing podcasting tools to let you create your own podcasts. I’m testing the beta subscription thing now and I like it. You can listen to podcasts on pages on the site and add comments about podcasts which can help you figure out whether you’ll like the podcast or not. I didn’t use it for a while after the new version of iTunes came out, but now I’m back to use it. A very good sign is that they’re changing things quickly at Odeo and it’s very easy to add your Odeo subscriptions into iTunes through an RSS feed that is generated. So now I have the best of both worlds.
What makes me more excited about Odeo are the possibilities of community and more feedback that it provides. The other thing that will help people find podcasts that they like is the support of tagging in Odeo. Tagging and folksonomies are what allow many connections to be made in systems like del.icio.us and Flickr, and it will help a lot with podcasting. Instead of a gatekeeper coming up with a way to categorize podcasts (hmmm… “music” or “audio blog”…) the people who produce and listen to the podcasts add tags to categorize it themselves. That’s the way to do it. Down the road another feature for Odeo that I can see is people subscribing to certain tags via RSS feeds to be able to find new and interesting things.
We’re moving out of the first stages of podcasting much as independent film did a few years ago. While now there are films with massive, multimillion dollar budgets that are called “independent”, there still is a difference between a film with a marketing budget of several millions and a film made by people with a passion to tell a story and little or no money. That’s not to say that people can’t do good work for money in either podocasts or filmmaking, but the key is striking a balance and telling a story or creating something that connects with people on a personal level. Without passion you don’t have much and that’s what interests me in anything I consume.

July 9, 2005 itunes, music, odeo, podcasting

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