Here is an example of how someone put out a submission call on Sonicbids for $5.00-10.00 bucks or whatever. Usually how they will get you "out there" radio track, what have you...Sometimes they have a larger name act they can refer to to get your confidence -like yeah we worked with Kings of Leon...maybe they had an opening act or something but have no dibs on any of this really. Next thing is we get an email "submit your song for our cancer drive CD..." which is odd being we just paid for "consideration". OK. Now  today we get this email:

Hey, this is SLIME (name changed to protect the guilty) with A&R FooledYa.    I'm making some decisions right now about what artists I'm going to be able to get involved with this week, so if you're still interested in working with us, I would need to hear from you within the next couple of days.  If you want to give me a call, it's 555-555-5555.

This guy can't even flip for the long distance but he wants to represent you. Be able to get involved with - you mean who's money smells the prettiest and fastest. me me me...

Classic sales stuff to put the pressure on claiming a time delay and how he will have to "choose to work with you". The real makers and shakers don't do this at all. They don't have to pitch you on a website full of "desperate to get famous" bands.
Here's a better and safer marketing idea - Why not pay a friend you trust who needs a job an hourly wage and plan this stuff yourself. There's a lot on th eweb, self marketing and there are indeed basics steps to get your music out there. No one is going to get you signed so simply. 
I was about to call him after I got the Cancer drive CD scam and give him an earful - but I'd rather blog it and have more reach - cause I CARE! To add insult to injury as a cancer survivor it is really irksome when people uses a cause thinking it's good marketing. Yeah maybe it is, but not when you're so blatantly dishonest and even more so- really stupid, about how you time the whole thing. SONICBIDS is  a swarming ground for this...too bad. It's not up to me to leave negative feedback...it's up to portals like SONICBIDS to qualify they're leads. Keep it clean folks. Musicians need to trust their source.

OK seriously I cannot tell you how many times my eyes light up, my heart pounds, and my palms sweat in that far but small hope for yet one more "opportunity" in which I have to pay for in order to be "considered" for the "possibility " of a licensing and such campaign. Oh how lucky we are to have been "chosen" by so many companies  that have "auditioned you" and "chosen" you to be on their roster. They ask for a submission fee making shady murky written pitches on websites, email you at Myspace or have a posting that you apply for on Sonicbids.  Sonicbids has an essentially good even great service and some interesting things have happened. BUT it is also a swarming ground for festering larvae blood sucking money grabbers. It is the nature of you, the good willed always say "maybe one day, maybe this time, I'll be lucky..." you know the tune - seasoned but still bewildered and beguiled starry eyed musician who simply cannot give up the dream. And by all means DON"T EVER GIVE UP.
Well yes it takes one to know one. And what indeed are we, am I, hoping for? Get it straight up now - here's the straight dope: there is no more music industry as we thought we knew it. It is none existent. NUL & VOID. The days of the majors, or minors major indies now it's the diminished. OVER. Today, it's real estate investors and gold miners who are new music money people behind "the latest record" of a girl (or guy) they'd like to SHAZAM! I can make you a star I can take you very far so let me do it do it do it for you. And they may very well do so if they want you baby. The bigger issue here are the posers  asking for thousands of money $$ cold cashola to shop/license you. Not true when you need to think about it> Their fast guy reply "Oh well we haven't made up our minds yet..."
 Count your cash. Keep it in your pocket. Baby you can be a STAR.

Chiwawa on iLike - Add iLike to your MySpace

CHIWAWA has locked into a gear that's seems to comply with the terrain on which we are travelling. No this isn't meant to be esoteric babble, and yet now that I have written the word "esoteric" it has now  become exactly that - esoterica.
 Yoga this morning is preferable but compression of the spine and 3 espressos later is so much more appealing. I will build an office desk treadmill and run run run and get nowhere fast.




 

 


OK DO IT FOR ME
Madonna's grand entrance on The David Letterman Show the night before his big grand jury confession doing naughty things with his associates; (Specified as female), was well, rather a failure of the not so important kind. Football players brought "Madge" onto Letterman's stage M draped in black social chic dress and necessary superstar shades. Madonna atop a Cleopatra style floating bed. The "M carriers" had their big bulky backs faced to the camera for a long time for television,  then didn't know where to put the floating bed down Madonna mid-air; having to be tapped on the shoulders to release floating flying M on the tarmac. A definite blooper.



 Letterman's Confession
So yeah . I hate when this shite happens. Like with Woody Allen f*cked his kid  (oh she was only adopted, was almost legal), maybe not as bad as "Woody's" as in erect. It's not the sex with associates thing either (do we really care, Hey you. Yes, you. Stop hanging around the water cooler). Gossip is food for father or is that fodder?  It's the deception that hurts, yeah? But who knows. Maybe Mrs. Letterman, Regina Lasko (last name suggests Hungarian connections) is cool and has her own slew of lovers, and it's more that the appearance of what appears to be illicit affairs or illicit sex - is there any other kind, is what's getting everyone going. Oh and this Halderman guy charged with trying to extort $2 million from his friend Dave,is a SLIME bucket unless of course, he's been framed and he is totally innocent. I dunno, suddenly Letterman seems a bit creepy. My mother never liked him..and ain't she always right? But as long as Letterman didn't say "sex now - "bend over or you're fired" and it was mutual - well then America - EYES WIDE SHUT.
 
oh yeah and don't forget to take what's comin' to ya QUANTUM LEAP divin remix. NOW.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/health/research/...

Research based on advances in technology and biology is raising hopes for progress on one of science’s holy grails.

I'm in a medical mood - wowee how cool is this?

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/09/25/brain.scans.wir...

Scientists are one step closer to knowing what you've seen by reading your mind.

This is f*oking amazing - if you could read my mind love, what a tale my thoughts could tell...

So , yeah it's been a while and sometimes things just go really fast and other times, crawl at a steady but barely noticeable rate.
I wanted to catch up with you folk to say that we're working it for bigger , better, brighter, practicing as a duo and planning logistics for album, shows and videos, films and bus stops, you know it by now, yeah?
I just got back from London screening Spare Change at the London International Film Festival also judging the Digital and Abstract Panorama. Dog as judge.Judge like dog - it's alright.
How does one "judge" abstract.

It was great fun and indeed we were able to work it out by consensus.

May the best film win but alas the winner isn't always a judge's fave.
I thought I should let you know how it goes on the other side of the fence...its not what it appears but alas a win or a loss can change a trajectory in a BIG way - or not so much.
Just don't let it get to you, if you can help it.
On that note
SCREAM.

http://blip.fm/~9okid

You Must Learn-KRS 1

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If you can't groove and think at the same time then go back to school because YOU MUST LEARN

http://www.cnn.com/video/?JSONLINK=/video/showbiz/...

In an exclusive video obtained by CNN, Michael Jackson rehearses with dancers during June 23 session at the Staples Center.

Setting aside your opinion of MJ's personal life and tastes in music aside, MJ still had all his talent in th eglove of his hand. He was tight in the groove, timing impeccable, moving with his usual graceful groove monster moves and twirls. All this to say no one is invincible. Money nor fame will save you from the Grim Reaper...

Me, Nile Rodgers, and ?

When I was just a baby my father died. My older sister had an Elvis poster a closeup of his face, on her bedroom wall. This image would trigger a wish that Elvis was my daddy. I didn't understand that he was famous but the kindness that shown through his eyes in the poster was all I needed. I would often ask "Mommy, why don't you marry Elvis."? A few years later, I went to see an outdoor Jackson 5 concert in Montreal at an amusement park venue, certainly not the biggest venue around. A new group, The Commodores, a band I had never heard of,  was the opening act and I remember screaming my head off when the lead singer, Lionel Ritchie, announced to the crowd that he was a Gemini. Did I even understand astrology? No, of course not. But there was a connection and this is what excited me.
 When the Jackson 5 came on, I danced and danced non-stop until the show was over. I was so small, I don't think I was even able to see them on the stage. I was on the grounds, my sister sitting on the seats behind me. I was lost in a world of music, only able to listen to Michael and his brothers. But I had enough space around me to dance all by myself. I cared not of being alone. I had a feeling someone was watching me. I was so young I must of looked kind of out of place. I felt the connection. Michael was my first crush and I remember after that J5 concert, I could not fall asleep at night. I was love lorn and would fall asleep with a Tiger Beat poster of Michael under my pillow. For years, I wished that he and I could kind of one on one dance together. He had an almost Fred Astaire elegance about him even in black leather.
Elvis would die when I was in Italy vacationing during summer break. I remember seeing an Italian newspaper and reading "Elvis Morte". But I assumed it must have been his father. Elvis was simply too young to die. I was all shook up.
Years would pass and indeed when Thriller came out,I was thinking, "Oh it's you again." How you doing, Michael? But the truth be told, I was never as connected to Michael again in the same way, not because I didn't love his new music but simply he was like an old familiar face. It was now the time for another even bigger audience to discover the new MJ. He was more like a friend coming around the old neighbourhood to say "Hello". Michael was already important to me and now the world was catching on like never before.
When the news flashed that Michael died, "Michael Jackson est Mort" I was somehow not phased but not because I didn't care, not because I didn't think he was special anymore. I perhaps unconsciously had felt that Michael had been gone a long time ago. Of course when I hear his music now everywhere I go from car stereos blasting down my street to the grocery store, it is painful and I wish they would stop playing the music. It's hard to hear his voice these days. Soon enough this phase of mourning will pass. It has  occurred to me that indeed, my wish did come true. I did dance with Michael, in a frenzy of groove and creative spirituality at the outdoor amusement park so many years earlier. My wish had happened but I didn't realize it until Michael died.
Cirque du Soleil Beatles LOVE documentary & Spare Change  @ Festival du Nouveau Cinema after party