Ante Up!!

Today's Wake Up Jam: "Say It Ain't So" by Weezer

I've got a loud speaker set to deliver me from my slumber, but the soft opening in this tune eased my transition between worlds. For a few moments, the the distinction between dreaming and waking states evaporated. Good morning, Universe!

Kutiman, YouTube Music Mix Master, Does It Again

Kutiman is back with another awe-inspiring video edit job. Kids, you can try this at home, but remember, this man is a professional. In the beginning, there was this amazing video from March 2009, edited together from unrelated YouTube videos to produce an integrated track of mindblowingness:

Now, he's back, two years later, with an amazing new slice of awesome to share with the world

I'm in Boston Saturday night hosting #Soozapalooza2 and #WhiskeyFriday at the Middle East

That's right, Boston. I'm baaaaack! For a few hours only. This Saturday night I'll be the MC and comedic guide to an evening of pretty incredible music organized by Sooz (aka Susan Kaup). It's known asSoozapalooza; it's at The Middle East downstairs, and it's gonna be great. 

We begin with a special, extended #WhiskeyFriday (48-hour edition) at 8pm upstairs at the Middle East. Consider this an office hours/meetup/drinkup. No charge for this part. Come by, say hi, stay for the show. As for the event itself...

Soozapalooza is the annual spectacle of awesome hosted by Sooz featuring music, bourbon and hashtags. This year's bands include a special reunion show by Mistle Thrush, the first band Sooz became a fan of when she moved from Nebraska to Boston in 1994. Kristen Ford Band, The Lights Out and The Candles will also perform. The Soozapalooza Supergroup, a big group of local rock heroes, ends the night with inspired performances of six cover songs selected by Sooz.

Advance tickets are available for $10 at the Middle East Box Office in Central Square, Cambridge and online through TIcketWeb. Tickets will cost $12 at the door. This is an 18+ show.

Twitter Hashtag: #Soozapalooza2

Nine To Five by Dolly Parton, in honor of my latest Foursquare badge

When I checked in to work today on Foursquare, I discovered I'd unlocked a new badge!

In honor of this latest achievement, I present to you, "Nine To Five" by Dolly Parton. Enjoy Monday!

More memories of Greg Feldman

First, his graduation speech to the 2005 class at Harvard Medical School.

Next, one of the many songs he wrote and sang.

So Many of My Friends (Greg Feldman) by GregFeldmanSongs

In the mood for some Oscar D'León

Reminds me of a dear friend and great dancer. The first salsa album I ever owned was a gift in the form of an Oscar D'León CD in 1999, and I used to rock it constantly, especially driving to Sophia's latin dance club in Boston from about 2000 to 2004.

For the homies who ain't here...

I was in the mood for a Fuck Shit Stack, so here's Reggie Watts with just that

All vocals and instrumentals written and composed by Reggie Watts, one of the greatest performers I've ever seen. Try to catch a live show, won't you?

Day-starting music: Skins Theme Song by Fat Segal

I am obsessed with the TV show "Skins" and love this eletronica/dub-step-infused track. The full song is even better than the clip they use for the show open. The reward is really at around 2m40sec

Where Do You Find New Music? A Twitter, Facebook And FriendFeed Survey

This is the question I posed to my social networks (twitter, facebook and friendfeed) Saturday evening. I asked folks to be specific. Here are the Top 20 sources I got back as of 7pm ET Sunday February 8, 2009: I got 76 total responses. If one person mentioned three sources, that is three responses. Radio was very, very low on the list as I expected. Several folks mentioned music blogs in general or specific sites. The blogs cited were OkayPlayer, Gorilla vs Bear, Che Sing The Cool and Brooklyn Vegan. Some interesting comments that accompanied a few of the responses (names redacted):

• pandora, friends, 101.9 RXP in NYC, and oddly enough if i like a song enough from a commercial to wanna track it down i will
• I'm finding new stuff from the DJs at Cafe Wellstone on Second Life - last.fm works, too
• When I'm starting a new genre, I find allmusic.com's articles incredibly helpful. Their subdivisions are pure music geekery: you get sample lists of key albums for, say, Chicago blues, jump blues, Delta blues, piano blues, acoustic blues, and on and on...and that's just blues.
• OK - I may be 100 years old compared to y'all - but did you notice that only one of us mentioned radio? I am old enough to remember when radio was THE place to hear a new song. Funny...
• typically last.fm for music - use to like Pandora but that was before they had to geotard themselves
• Last.fm, Friendfeed, and opening bands at concerts. And, sadly, iPhone commercials
• iTunes/Genius. Books good, TV bad (except Lost & BSG - WOM)

Why is this on my mind? I don't listen to music on the radio anymore, except for whatever is blasting out of a car driving past me. Of course, my friends play a big role, and for a while, my Salon.com subscription came with regular mp3 packs that were awesome, but they've stopped doing that. I also would get the occasional promo playlist from iTunes for members of the Apple Facebook group/fan page. I've found some of my best music via TV shows. The O.C. introduced me to Imogen Heap, and Gossip Girl brought me MGMT. My posting this question was part of a larger interest I have in how the explosion of media choice, social media tools and distributed network technology affect us. I used to think these thoughts for a living and still love to philosophize about our networked future. On Friday, I was interviewed by a NY Times reporter for a story about people who've canceled their cable in favor of an all-online video diet. That's another big blog post, but I'll give you a hint: Boxee made it possible. Back to music for now though. So I've been thinking on all this and realize that our technology has dismantled the former aggregation model for music. We used to have record labels, radio stations, music reviews and sage wisdom from record store clerks (and our friends) to help us make sense of the world by limiting, vetting, categorizing or explaining the wide world of music. Now, we have new points of aggregation: our iPods/iTunes and various other online services. We've dismantled the old world, but the new one is still under construction. Massive choice with incomplete filters makes for a confusing market. For example, iTunes is my primary music interface. However, it is closed to the world of trusted curators and music advisors in my life. I'd love to have an iTunes experience that is filtered or influenced by OkayPlayer, the music my wife likes and Pandora's music genome engine. But I can't do that. I've got to go through different interfaces to access these curators though the technical ability to do what I want is (nearly?) possible. I'm done rambling for now. More thoughts on the future of media in the future. Meanwhile, you can get full access to my raw unscientific music source survey data via this Google Spreadsheet. As I was about to post this, someone on FriendFeed pointed me to Adam Lasnik's Google Spreadsheet which provides a directory of online music services. If you're on FriendFeed, you can join the discussion (sadly, twitter and Facebook make it impossible to point people to a specific conversational thread).

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