Cleve Eaton Fundraiser March 28, 2009

There’s a fund raiser for Cleve Eaton in Birmingham at the Open Door Cafe this upcoming Saturday. its from 2:00 PM until 8ish. There are bands playing, and things for the kids to do. its $20.00 at the door, and includes a BBQ chicken dinner. More info can be found at Cleve Eaton’s web site.

Music this weekend

Birmingham has a music festival this weekend, City Stages, and it starts on Friday the 13th. I’m hoping to see L’Angelus play again. DH & I saw them at City Stages 2 years ago. They were lots of fun.

Right now the weather forecast say there’s a small chance of rain for the weekend, and the temperatures should only be in the mid 80s, not the mid 90s. I’ll take that for mid June any day!

fun video for your consumption

This post is a link to a video on youtube.

This version of Sweet Home Alabama is good, and not quite your standard version of it. DH and compatriots found it. Oh my!

Music rant

I sing in the choir at church. Our regular practice was tonight. When I got to practice this evening, there were folks there who aren’t singing in the choir.

Let me back up a week. Last week when I went to practice there was a gentleman there who is getting married in a couple of weeks who came in and took over our practice with preparation for his wedding. While he was there, he invited all the choir members to come and sing at his wedding with other folks for chorale music. This week, actually today, he called the lady who is organizing us and basically invited the entire chorale there to practice for his wedding. So we spent the majority of our practice time on his wedding music. First, I’m not impressed with the person that he has organizing and leading his music. I’ve heard his work before and it leaves me cold. Second, its our practice time for what we are working on for church. If he wanted to organize it after our regular practices, that would be different. We don’t exist just for his wedding. I’m probably going to be working elsewhere that day. Auuggggh!

Is the Government trying to kill Internet Radio Broadcasters?

A warning heads up here. I’m on my political soapbox now.

It appears that the entertainment industry has gotten to the folks who make regulations about what broadcasters should pay. The Copyright Royalty Board has set the new royalty rates to levels that will bankrupt most if not all of the different internet broadcasters. They have set these rates to be retroactive to 2006. It increases the licenses fees and royalty rates astronomically from where they had been. The Copyright Royalty Board set these rates with no regard for the broadcasters, it simply set the rates as requested by SoundExchange, the mouthpiece for the RIAA. I listen to Radio Margaritaville and Pandora online. Both broadcasters provide music online for free. Pandora offers listening without ads for a small ($36/yr) fee. Radio Margaritaville is broadcast on Sirius Radio and on Dish Network. Both of these broadcasters would be hard put to make the requisite payments that the new ruling would require.

There is an Internet radio web site that has links to things that you can do to help keep the internet streaming music! The Live365 website has a page that gives contact information for the Copyright Royalty Board, the various US senators and representatives, and a few other places. This page lists the royalties as they stand and the increases and percentages that the current ruling sets. You can get your senators and representatives contact information online at Thomas. It is best to pick up the phone and call their offices or physically write a paper letter to them. They have a tendency to write off any email communication from their constituents.

This declaration is BS. And you can help influence it by talking to your elected representatives and advocating for small broadcasters. The retroactive $500.00 license fee per channel and the rates that increase at 20% to 40% per year are ridiculous.

Get the word out about this stupidity! The broadcasters pay license fees and royalties, SoundExchange and RIAA just want more. And it will affect the quality of what is available online. But they don’t care about the quality of the music available.

SCOTs in Birmingham, Feb 28

Oh my! Southern Culture on the Skids is going to be in Birmingham on Wednesday! And I’m so busy I can’t see straight right now!

They are playing at Bottletree Cafe, along with Vulture Whale. I wanna go! But with all my work problems, and Happening starting next Friday, there is no way I need to go out and play on Wednesday night.  Boo!

Recovering from the concert

Well, it always takes a couple of days to recover from a Cowboy Mouth show, but this is ridiculous. Of course, Zydeco is a standing room only kinda place. But I’m no longer as young as I used to be, and the smoking others were doing was killing me. I’m just way too sensitive to cigarette smoke and my sinuses are letting me know about it now.

But the show was great! I danced and sang and yelled and laughed and had fun! DH enjoyed the music, but he’s a teacher, and a good one. Good teachers stand to teach, and he’s no exception. The standing room only was not a good thing for him. He trashed his knees when he was in the service, jumping out of airplanes when he was young. So he lets me do the jumping around for him.

Dumpstaphunk was very good too! They did a cool version of CCR’s Fortunate Son. and a number of their own songs, and a James Brown number that I can’t pull the name out of my head right now. After their set, we stepped outside to breath fresh air for a while. Ian Neville came up the steps where we were and I had the opportunity to thank him and shake his hand! Woot! No fangirly squeeing, but a heartfelt thank you for the great music. I will search out Dumpstaphunk again for live music.

Before the doors opened up and the folks who were waiting were allowed into the upstairs part of the building, the crowd were entertained by someone else. This was more along the lines of watching a car wreck, but everyone outside on the steps was amused. There is an apartment building about a half a block west of the club, across the street. The upper floor apartment has several very tall windows. One of those windows didn’t appear to have any blinds, unfortunately. That apartment was lit up better than the club and a guy inside was woring on something on the far wall. Which wouldn’t have been bad, except that he didn’t appear to have any thing on. With all his lights on and the window blinds wide open. The crowd was amused by his actions. More to the point, everyone wanted to call him and get him to close his blinds.

Going to Cowboy Mouth’s concert tonight!

Neener neener neener! I’m going to see Cowboy Mouth tonight at Zydeco here in Birmingham. I’m gonna dance and jump and yell, and have a great time. Fred, Paul, Sonya, and JT are coming, and it is going to be a fantastic show! Dumpstaphunk is opening up, and I’m looking forward to hearing them for the first time. Ivan Neville and Ian Neville are part of this band, so it should be great, too. Lots of good music tonight, what more can I ask for?