Tendinitis

After electrocution, tendinitis, or tendonitis, is the worst thing that can happen to a guitarist. Electrocution is almost out of your hands (no pun intended) thanks to the unpredictable poor wiring situations in any given venue. I've only been shocked badly once, and it resulted in soreness and swelling in both my hands, wrists and arms. Now I bring my own surge protector and unplug it the way you're not supposed to... by yanking on the cord about two feet from the plug.

Tendinitis is your own fault. I started feeling soreness in my left hand back in college, when I'd practice upwards of eight hours a day and did a lot of instant messaging with my long distance girlfriend, usually with a guitar in hand while I waited for the response. In the long run it all worked out. I got a lot better at guitar and married that girlfriend. But that soreness comes back every now and again. This week was the first time I felt it in about 4 years, likely from playing a lot of mandolin. Those tiny frets can be tricky.

The best way to prevent tendinitis is to warm up properly, so now I've dedicated the first hour of my day to running a series of exercises and then some free improvising to a metrenome. The goal is relaxation. Tension is the enemy. Relax the right hand, and the left hand follows. There are a number of methods aimed at preventing these sorts of injuries, but the basic message is to relax, find the most comfortable position for playing, and follow the path of least resistance.

The only campaign ad you need.

Silly Politics

I didn't even know Alaska needed a governor. Last I heard, vampires took over. I liked McCain in 2000, when he seemed different than the other Republicans, but now I'm not so sure and this latest move has me wondering whether he's getting bad advice or made the most genius move ever in political history of all time. Ever.

Fact is, I'm going to vote for Obama. The most important issue to me is health care. Health is a basic human right, and this is one instance where I wish even Libertarians understood that the market shouldn't control the cost, quality and availability of health care. For a country built on the American Dream, where the entrepreneurial spirit is supposed to be encouraged, one would think an affordable, comprehensive health care plan would exist for small business owners. Instead, we have a system of survival of the richest. And look, for those of you that say universal health insurance would equal long waiting times and poorer quality of care, maybe you should hold your elected officials accountable to do their freaking jobs. Stop telling us it's too hard or complicated and figure it out. We're not idiots.

After health care, I'd like the earth to be preserved so we all have the option of enjoying our health outdoors. After the environment, I think civil liberties needs some work, especially for women and minorities. The best way to do that might be to not allow white men to vote for a few years. Give everyone else a chance to catch up. As a white man, I won't mind. Just don't take away my universal health insurance and clean, renewable energy.

Recording, recording, recording

I've been doing a lot of this lately. Using a MacBook, Lexicon Omega interface, Cubase LE software, an Audio-Technica AT2020 mic, and a little creativity, I've figured out a few ways to make some great sounding recordings. It's been primarily acoustic, so mic placement is crucial. Beyond that, if you have decent sounding instruments you can get a very true sound.

I've also been using GarageBand to lay down the basic ideas behind a new song I'm writing. This has been really, really helpful as I keep working on different projects. I often forget the exact feel that was in my head when I first got the idea, and you can't really notate it quickly. But now I just record it and forget about it until I need it again.

Many of these recordings are for projects with bigger pictures. I'm working on a album with Matt Ketteman. I'm recording some new material with Lauren Zettler. And I'm almost perpetually recording some sort of project with a couple guys that we hope to use for licensing opportunities, as well as just sell it on iTunes.

Speaking of licensing, I've started uploading some of this music to YouLicense.com, which will help people or companies that need music for film or TV find my music. We'll see if this yields any results, but quite frankly, anything is better than what I make now from licenses.

MySpace

I've been convinced of this for a long time, and I'm definitely not the first person to say it, but the MySpace community is not going to buy your album. The social networking site is a decent place to spread the word about your band, maybe gain a few new fans, and the band profiles have definitely become a familiar status quo to booking agents, club owners, record labels, and the general music loving public. When I want to hear a song by a band, I usually find myself going to MySpace before the band's own website. How fucked up is that? But at least I know the band is only going to put forth a select six songs. A nice little sampler before I move onto their site.

But back to sales. Do people wasting their time surfing MySpace actually decide to buy music? If you send a personal message to all of your friends telling them about your new album, how many do you think will buy it? My estimation is about 1%. One person for every hundred you write will buy it. And that's if your friends list consists of people that might actually care about your music, not other bands padding their friend count or those sexy vixens that update their status every 40 seconds so they show up in your friend updates.

MySpace is an easy method of stalling. When you don't know what else to do for your album, you start adding friends or leaving comments. But sit back and take stock of what you're getting back, and you might find that it's better to invest your time doing something else. Like blogging...

Physical Formats: Doing it Right

If you're going to the expense of manufacturing CDs, vinyl, tapes, memory cards, download cards, anything tangible that will either be sold or given away, make it look good. Even if you're doing a very simple package, like a CD with a two sided front insert, it is still worth your time and energy to make it professional. Here are some things to consider:

Cost:
Create a budget. Cost is clearly an issue for most independent artists. I understand that, I'm in the same boat. But since we know that we're more likely to sell digital albums, we can do a lower run of physical product and save a little money. Don't try to do too much yourself to cut corners if it's not going to look how you want it to look. Don't let the upsell of cheaper per unit convince you to order 2,000 jewel cases when when what you really want is a digipak with a die-cut. Maybe you can only order 500 of this packaging and it eats up any room for decent profit. But your digital sales can offset the cost, and it's always a bad idea to let profit margin affect artistic decisions, especially your own.

Package Copy:
Before you begin envisioning the artwork, start thinking about the words that go into the package. This is called the 'copy,' or specifically 'package copy.' I'm a fan of consolidating things to have as few words as is necessary. For example, list the musician credits in one place, unless every track has a different combination, in which case it's good to list them track by track. And many people are starting to leave copy out of their package and putting it all on their website. But whatever you decide to include in the package, figure out your lyrics, thank you's, legal lines, track list, writer credits, liner notes, and all else before design begins. Then separate them out in each area or component of the package. What needs to be on the cover? What about the back? How about the disc? Finally, proofread. Ask somebody to help you with this. It's a lot easier to catch typos now rather than once it's in some fancy, tiny font in the artwork. Plus it will save you time and money once it goes to design, which brings us to the next part.

Get a Designer:
Or at least consult a few. Unless you've designed CD artwork for many, many other musicians, you don't have enough experience to do this properly. I've seen many talented graphic designers try to put together a CD package and fail. They don't don't consider all the realities of printed components. Printing has some physical limitations with paper types, ink, screening, etc. that a web designer won't know. There are also some cool tricks a good print designer will know to really make your package stand out. The best CD artwork I've ever seen are designed from the perspective of the customer--as you open it up and turn the pages, the story of the music unfolds before you. A good, experienced designer is worth the expense (and will probably work with you on your budget). You didn't cut corners to make the music sound right, why not make it look right?

*The biggest pitfall I see with inexperienced designers happens on the disc label. The disc surface is a tricky place to print. Most manufactures print a three color disc, NOT the four color CMYK used for the paper. Gradients don't usually print smoothly, meaning most photographs do not look right. Therefore it is important you and your designer understand the process your manufacturer uses so you can translate your design to the disc label.

Create Dummies:
Your final CD artwork will not be viewed on a flat piece of paper or on a computer screen. Print it out, cut it out, fold it up, put it in a jewel case, and flip through it like you just tore off the shrink wrap. This is a great way to catch mistakes.

Manufacturing:
The manufacturer is the critical end of the line for your CD. This is where it your design is printed and will either pop off the shelf or blend in with everything else. There are many, many places to manufacture CDs. To find the best one for you, do some research online and ask other indies where their CD was made. Decide what kind of package is right for you and figure out who does it the best for your budget. "Green" packaging is becoming more popular, and there are some very cool package designs that don't use any plastic (other than the CD itself). These open up new design possibilities and will stand out at a store or on your merch table. Get samples from several companies to see different finishes, paper stock, and package options. Look closely at the black areas--do they have a greenish tint? There are a number of factors that will alter the way your final print turns out. Ask questions about how they gang up jobs on the line. Grouping multiple jobs on one press is a common paper-saving practice, but it can slightly alter the colors on your print. Bottom line, allow plenty of time to find the right manufacturer.

Don't Go it Alone:
Most importantly, don't let your ego as a creative individual get in the way. We're creative people, we express ourselves through music, and we might even be talented visual artists, painters, illustrators, web designers, or whatever else helps pay the bills. But if you don't have experience designing CDs, it's going to show. Take your time getting the package copy together. Put together a budget. Research manufacturing companies and ask them a lot of questions. Get the help of a professional so you can be happy with your final product. After all, you'll probably have a few boxes sitting around the house for a while.

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Before I close, I need to give a lot of credit here to the folks I used to work with at Verve Records creative department. Hollis King, the art director, is easily one of the best in the business. Every day I went to work it was like going to school. The three designers that worked there every day, Kazumi, Philip, and Sachico, all had different approaches to their designs. It was a blast looking at a round of comps with everyone and narrowing down the choices. And then all the artists and managers that we worked with, plus the sales, marketing, and executives' feedback exposed me to all the perspectives one could imagine when putting the pieces together of a new CD.

Physical Formats: General Thoughts

When I signed up my first album through CD Baby in 2004, they were just beginning to distribute to digital service providers. Even though selling digital formats was very new and basically untested, it seemed like a great opportunity for independent artists. Manufacturing physical copies is expensive, and nobody sells as many as they order (see the unopened boxes of CDs in my closet. And bedroom, and I think there's one at my parents house). And since we're all used to barely selling anything, why not barely sell any downloads too? CD Baby even explained how you could create a digital only album to sell through them but warned that 90% of album sales are via physical formats, so do you really want to pass up those sales? Over a couple years though, it became clear that indie artists generally sell much more music digitally. It's a combination of having a greater reach through the internet and the shifting trend of people buying more music as downloads. I also believe that the type of person that goes exploring for good music by relatively unknown artists is the same type of forward thinking individual that would consume music in digital formats (such as the a la carte or subscription services that were starting to pop up at the time). Fast forward to today, and many popular acts sell more than 30% of their total sales via digital formats, and iTunes is arguably the largest music retailer in the US.

But despite the growing digital trend, there is still a lack of credibility surrounding a digital only release, or perhaps it just doesn't have the same amount of respect as something critics or customers or radio progammers that want to hold a tangible CD, even though they will likely rip it to their computer and transfer it to their MP3 player with the rest of their collection. It's also harder to sell downloads directly at a show, when the crowd is high on your music and their wallets are open (in theory). Even so, indie artists are highly unlikely to get a decent physical distribution deal to sell any meaningful amount of product through mainstream, national retail. In the end, how many physical CDs will you actually sell? Does that make it worth the cost to produce them?

I say it depends heavily on the act and their audience. Clearly a younger crowd probably cares less about a CD and just wants a few of your songs. Older audiences and niche oriented music might be more inclined to buy a CD either out of habit or because the full album is best experienced as a whole. The music and artists I tend to listen to usually don't shoot for the hit single, and I much prefer an entire album (keep in mind, I'm 27 and Napster was in it's heyday while I was in college). In high school I used to buy jazz albums and comb through the liner notes and pictures to learn as much as I could about everyone on the album. When I bought rock albums, it would be to learn every song on guitar, and this ranged from Hendix to Alice In Chains to Led Zeppelin and back again. I'd like to believe there are plenty of people that look at music the same way I do, and so as long as I want to buy full albums, somebody else will, too. I write this knowing fully well many people I know probably haven't bought music since 1999, and to people under 20, spending money on music is unheard of.

Even so, I've been able to create some profit from the music I sell. In fact, that's the bulk of my income. The vast majority (I'd guess 90%, but I don't have figures in front of me) is from digital sales, and almost exclusively iTunes. I've only manufactured CDs for two albums. I'm now sure what I'm going to do for the next album with my trio--maybe a short run of CDs and some vinyl. CDs are good for mailing to press or for the few people that still want CDs. Vinyl is gaining in popularity again but is still a tiny slice in the pie. However, I think a big chunk of that slice is made up of people that could be fans of my music. But the bulk of my focus will be on the digital release because I know that's how I make my money back so I can record more music, pay my band, and ultimately make some kind of living. The physical formats are simply for credibility. Perhaps this is a new form of paying your dues.

Leo Tolstoy

I'm out of town this weekend, and trips that involve airplanes are always a good time to start a new book. I've just dug into Leo Tolstoy's Collected Shorter Fiction Vol. 2. It was recommended to help get me adjusted to Tolstoy before going further in War & Peace. But the thing I really love about short stories is the relatively limited amount of time the author has to create his or her desired effect. It's not that different from playing music. Writing a song, or improvising a solo, requires an acute compositional sense to know where you are and where you are going, and how you plan on wrapping things up, and all in a very short time. You're essentially creating a moment in time, conveying a feeling or mood that is experienced in one sitting. It can be experienced repeatedly if one chooses. This is exactly how you read short stories.

New respect for Bob Dylan

Yesterday I got the idea that I would play a little chord progression I wrote on mandolin while playing a melody on harmonica. Not easy. I can do either one perfectly fine on their own. I can even pat my head and rub my stomach at the same time. But it's going to take some serious shedding before I can execute this together. And I need to figure out a better way to hold the harmonica, because that metal neck contraption that Dylan used is a piece of junk.


But let's face it, Bob Dylan sucked at harmonica. Now I know why.

Free Jazz

I love free jazz. At least, I love the idea of free jazz. The basic concept is to freely improvise whatever you want. Ultimately, it's an open conversation between musicians. There's little, if any, preconceived notions of what is going to be said, but when done well the end result will speak volumes. The problem is many musicians don't really know how to listen and you get the equivalent to one of those conversations where everybody keeps changing the subject back to themselves and talking over each other. When you consider that most people don't even know how to listen to jazz when it's played straight ahead, never leaving the form and rarely going too far outside the chord changes, it's a wonder anybody ever decided to take things further.

Socks

Sunday and Monday I recorded all day and well past midnight. Thursday is going to be another marathon session. This is all tracking that is easily done in a quiet apartment on home studio equipment, but if you heard the end result you'd have no idea this was the scene vs. a polished studio. At least not for the kind of music we're recording right now.



There are a few things I'm noticing about myself now a days. I wear socks less often. I also eat less. As new music comes to mind, I stop whatever I'm doing to write it down. That's been Rule #1 since quitting the day job--treat every new bar of music like it's an investment in my imaginary 401k. Of course, this interrupts whatever routine I'm trying to piece together for myself, including getting completely dressed or making a sandwich, but I think it's ok. This is what I do now, and I can do it with bare feet.

Print Advertising... does it sell CDs?

I recently took out a 1/3 page ad in a jazz magazine. Like any jazz mag, the circulation isn't huge (22,000 or so), but it's going to a niche audience. It makes more sense to me to focus on your audience than to throw spaghetti at the wall. I got a deal too, or at least that's what I was told, and it seemed like something I could afford. Anyway, I looked at the SoundScan DMA sales (broken down by metro areas) and saw NO SALES in any of the major metro areas where the magazine circulates. It's also worth noting my trio has never played in any of those areas, so it's not like anybody knew who I was before they saw that ad and the album review.

I'm still reflecting on the value of advertising. I've never been a fan. It feels like a lazy strategy. If you have money, you can advertise. And there's so much of it out there, we're all desensitized. Even though I sold no CDs, was there value in placing that ad? Does it put my name in the back of people's heads? Does it give people the impression that I'm somebody they should know?

I'm not convinced, but I don't regret my decision and appreciate the support of the publication.

Fingerstyle Guitar

There are many ways to play guitar if you don't have a pick. I've seen guys play with a pencil, drum stick, bow (saw part of The Song Remains the Same tonight), you name it. I happen to be talking about what you can do with your fingers.

You've got your flamenco players, classical guys, folk guitarists, hybrid pickers, Mississippi John Hurt disciples... you name it. There are many, many ways to play a guitar. I'm trying to figure out the finger style method that suits me best. As long as I've played, I've been a pick sort of guy, and early on I started using my ring finger and pinky to grab a string here or there to bring out the soprano voice in a chord. I've also studied classical guitar and done my share of etudes that build right hand strength. But I still trip up a little when I'm just playing through a progression and want to keep a pattern up, but the voicing looses a string (5 string pattern all of a sudden hits a 4 string chord voicing). Maybe it's my left hand that needs to make the adjustment? Regardless, I'm not there yet.

If you're a finger picker and have any tips, I'm all ears. I'm not looking for an explanation of somebody else's style, I can hear all of that, I'm just curious to see what goes through your mind when you're just kind of jamming along.

Duhnam Van Durham

Speaking of harmonica, I highly recommend the album Simpler Times by Dunham Van Durham. It's got a nice use of blues harmonica in Americana music. Top notch compositions to boot.

Click the album cover, it'll take you to album on iTunes:

Harmonica

I've been playing guitar for about 20 years, and always prided myself on being just a guitar player. I focused my energy on being the best guitar player I could be. Sure, I could bang out some notes on a bass, it's basically just the lower for strings of a guitar. And yes, I've sat behind plenty of drum kits at the end of rehearsal... you know, that time when everybody switches instruments and all of a sudden the band sounds like a bunch of junior high kids again. I also had to take piano classes in college to learn some scales and to be able to somewhat competently comp through some jazz standards. But I never put any real effort in learning how to play those instruments because I didn't want to cheat on the guitar.

Well, last year some friends of mine started learning blues harmonica, and it wasn't long before I became fascinated by the raw sound of that little instrument. The thing looks like a toy, and most people associate it with the suck and blow style of Bob Dylan or a handful of other folk artists. But once you've heard Little Walter, Junior Wells, Sonny Boy Williamson, James Cotton... all of a sudden that little toy is a huge, expressive force of sound. So last winter I started to practice.

We learned from some YouTube videos posted by Adam Gussow. I'd recommend them to anybody that wants to learn blues harp. Start with his introduction, and work through the first 15 or so to build a solid foundation to learn the rest.

What's been best for me, as a guitar player, is learning to phrase differently. You don't have to breathe to play guitar (though it helps keep you alive, which is required to play guitar), so a lot of guitarists just play rapid fire, nonstop lines with no breaks. I think it's natural to just keep going, thinking about the chord changes and wanting to hit everything, but the best notes you can play are usually the ones you don't. And with blues harp, you run out of air, or actually, you run out of lungs, because it's mostly pulling air in, through the harmonica, and filling up your lungs. That's totally backwards, because I do tend to take a deep breathe to help space out my phrasing when playing guitar, and for harmonica you have to empty all your air before playing a phrase.

The lesson here is at a certain point, changing the way you think about and play music is essential. It will pull you out of a rut on your primary instrument. You might have some fun at the same time.

Ideas don't snooze

This morning my wife had to get up earlier than usual. Normally I try to roll over and pass out again, but sometimes a little ditty will pop into my head and if I don't write it down, it's gone. Such was the case this morning. On the plus side, it's 8am and I've already written a new song.

Blackberry

When I worked for Verve Records, I had a blackberry. Then I quit and kept just a very simple Nokia cell phone. But as I get more things going, I realize how helpful it was to stay organized with that thing. On top of that, my Nokia and my wife's Samsung, both free phones when we switched to Verizon, were over two years old and starting to act like it. I had to press the 4 key at least 7 times to get the desired result. Over the weekend we decided to order some new phones, and both went with the Blackberry Curve.

It's a good phone, let's me keep all my contacts organized and I can use the calendar, which is what I really needed. But it's not going to sync with a my MacBook, and let's face it, it's not an iPhone. But I can't afford the iPhone, especially with the discount we get on Verizon through my wife's company.

Now the goal is to not become one of those people. You know who I'm talking about. Here are my rules: No belt clip. No texting/emailing while out with friends (while you don't need a Blackberry to do this, you just look like a bigger asshole with one of these things). And perhaps most importantly, no bluetooth ear piece.

Wish me luck

2008 Fender American Standard Telecaster

I just got this guitar yesterday. It's a great instrument, and from what I can tell so far, a pretty good deal even if you pay the retail price. I played the three American made versions: Highway 1, Standard, and Deluxe. The Highway 1 was a great instrument, but the Standard just felt more substantial, had a smoother feel in the volume and tone knobs, and was a bit more balanced across the strings. The Deluxe, while it felt great to play, just doesn't really sound like a Telecaster, so nevermind.

The only problem I really noticed after getting home, which would have been impossible to notice in the noisy store anyway, was a buzz on the open B and A strings. Turned out it was coming from the nut, and after a little research figured out it was a shallow angle of termination. To correct it, I took a very sharp razor blade and lightly etched out the back 2/3 of the nut, on the tuning peg side. I went in tiny, tiny increments and tuned back up several time until the problem was eliminated. I'll get this taken care of when the guitar gets set up, but for now, this is a decent fix.

You'll hear plenty of this guitar on some of my new tunes for my trio. You can really get down with this tone, and through my Bogner it's going to be dirrrtaaay.

Gear

My first band back in junior high spent more time keeping a binder that listed our gear and how to set it up than making any actual music. A couple years later I had a conversation with a neighbor that played viola in the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, and he said you've got to have a piece that you can play at the drop of a hat, on an acoustic guitar. To do that, it doesn't matter what kind of guitar you play, what kind of amp you've got, what kinds of strings, picks, or pedals you use, or anything other than how well you can actually play. Experience has shown me that most people that aren't very good, especially guitar players, usually try to cover it up with all those smoke and mirror effects, while the best players can take the cheapest piece of junk guitar and make it sound beautiful.

After a few years of just running my guitar straight to my amp with maybe just a volume pedal between the two, I started using some effects again with my trio. I'm also expanding my arsenal to give me greater flexibility for different types of gigs. The downside here is that I often have to carry close to 100 lbs. of gear to and from gigs on the subway!

Here's what I use:

Guitars:
Gibson ES-175 (vintage 1967)
Taylor 210ce
Fender American Standard Telecaster
Cordoba classical
ESP Eclipse (mid-'90s custom)

Amps:
Bogner Duende (15 watt, Class A)
Polytone Minibrute (12")

Pedals (routed in this order):
Crybaby
Turbo Rat
Mini Q-Tron
Boss Giga Delay
Boss Flanger
Boss EQ pedal
Ernie Ball Jr. Volume
+Vibrato effect built into Bogner amp

Misc:
Fender Mandolin
Ukulele (no brand)
Honer harmonicas

I'll never tire of this album.

Music Major?

A few high school musicians have asked me if they should study music in college, or pursue some kind of "practical" major. I've talked to a few of my friends that make their living playing music, and we generally all agree higher education helped us in two areas:

1) Networking. The world is pretty small, and you're bound to run into some of your classmates down the road. And for that matter, the competitive environment you'll experience in a college music program all but disappears in the real world, so be nice to the people you might not think are very good. They might be hiring you for a gig someday.

2) Intensive practice time. There will never be another time in your life that you get to practice eight hours a day and have a handful of experts trying to help you get better. While you'll continue to develop your individual style and sound well after school, most of your post-college woodshedding, when you find time to do it, will probably be to maintain the techniques you honed at school.

New York City tap water

They say the tap water in NYC is what makes the local pizza crust and bagels so good. But it's magical properties go beyond flavor, because my best musical ideas always hit me when I'm in the shower. Always. I'll mark the tracks on my next album with an asterisk if at least 51% of it was composed in the shower.

All About Jazz review of "Life Is Loud"

Review by George Harris
Appears in All About Jazz
July 2008, Vol. 6 No. 6
LA/Bay Area/Chicago editions

Guitarist Cameron Mizell leads a trio with keyboardist Brad Whiteley and drummer Mike Fortune that is joyously reminiscent of the classic groove/funk rhythm sections of the '60s. Think Booker T. & The M.G.'s or The Famous Flames, and you are walking down the right street, probably somewhere in Memphis. The Stax Records/soul groove is deep and rich on compositions like "Fearless" and "Pungee." Mizell is able to let out some Beale Street ("home of the blues") style guitar chords as on "Soulfunksticat," as well as layout some clean guitar picking ("Get Out" and "Thursdays"). His workout with Fortune's snapping high hat on "Los Bandidos" is ultra hip (think an uptempo Marc Ribot Y Los Cubanos Postizos). James Brown's "Cold Sweat" has some great shifting grooves, with Whiteley's playful keyboard solo that keeps your feet moving. All that's missing is Maceo Parker's alto saxophone. The cover of Blood, Sweat & Tears' "Spinning Wheel" is tight and in the pocket, while "Let the Music Take Your Mind" has some real kinetic interplay between a string wizard Mizell and the hard hitting Fortune. You might build up a sweat just listening to this one! Turn Life up real loud.

The Album

Today I'm working on a new covers album. Years ago my friend Matt Ketteman and I recorded one that is now available on iTunes, called Follow Through. It was fun to record and a few tracks have sold moderately well. We always wanted to do another, and recently on a visit to Brooklyn, Matt recorded vocal tracks for 11 songs. Now I've got to do all the music.

But before I start, I do my daily scanning of a few blogs, including Seth Godin's. One of his posts mentioned how some companies build their business to get people to spend more money. For a musician like me, that's the equivalent of getting people to download the whole album on iTunes instead of just a song or two. Think about any Pink Floyd album, or Led Zeppelin IV, or Coltrane's A Love Supreme... even in the digital age you don't buy single tracks off those, you want the whole album!

I don't know if this can be truly achieved with an album of cover songs, but I'll see what I can do. More importantly, this is going to be THE focus of my next trio album. I've already started writing the music, and the goal is to make it a cohesive work, start to finish. There will be individual songs of course, all worthy of their own listening, but in the context of the whole album each piece becomes stronger. This is an old concept, but it's been abandoned by many artists and producers over the years. I'm not aiming for commercialism though, I want artistry.

Introduction

Per the unspoken New Blogger protocol, allow me to introduce myself and why I've started this blog. I'm a musician, and I'm proud to say full-time musician now that I've quit my day job. I used to work at a record label. Unlike a lot of musicians with day jobs, I actually kind of liked mine. It was the perfect desk job for a guy like me. But over time, it simply became too much work and didn't pay nearly enough, not for what my market value would have been at another label, and not for what I felt my time was worth when I could have been pursuing my true passion. After many discussions with my wife, we decided we could afford to have me quit and start making something happen with music.

Now I get up everyday and focus on music. Unfortunately, that's more than just practicing guitar--it's also figuring out ways to monetize my skills as a musician. To stimulate that side of my brain I read a variety of blogs and newsletters, and sometimes get ideas that I want to share but I'm sitting at home alone (well, my cats are around but those two are lousy conversationalists).

This is why I'm starting a blog. I'll post the things on my mind that fall between the cracks of the actual music. I'll also try to write a little about what life as an independent musician is like, at least for me. Everyone has different experiences, but maybe somebody will find mine helpful or at least insightful.