Tune In Saturdays: The High Llamas

I think I should have known about London's the High Llamas a long, long time ago. Seems they've been around forever, but apparently just out of earshot from me. It's brilliant elevator music, and that's meant in a good way. They sound like a Burt Bacharach/Brian Wilson sandwich. And, it tastes good, my friends.

From allmusic:

"Over the course of their career, the High Llamas successfully combined '60s pop sensibilities with burbling analog synth accents and laid-back, West Coast vibes with a NYC session cat's journeyman aesthetic. Every Llamas album has embraced these creative styles in varying degrees: from Gideon Gaye's decidedly '60s Brit-pop bent, to Hawaii's sprawling and breezy beaches, to Cold and Bouncy's warmly clinical brand of slickness, to Beet, Maize & Corn's detailed chamber pop, the Llamas have succeeded at every slight stylistic turn they have taken."

Home.MySpace.Reviews

Clown Co. Launches a New Mass Market

Ernie Schenck is brilliant. So is the Hill Holiday blog, to which he is a regular contributor.

"General Motors, E-surance and Royal Caribbean, are among the first advertisers to line-up for the yet-to-be-named "YouTube-killer" planned by NBC, News Corp., and Yahoo among others. No surprise there. The new site, yet to be named, promises content from a dozen networks to say nothing of three major film studios.

This is a problem for YouTube. User generator content is great. And it’s likely more than just a momentary phenomenon. But it often comes at a risk for advertisers worried about connecting their brands to possible– and let’s face it, probable–objectionable content. It’s a problem. And YouTube needs to solve it. Soon."

Sorry, Ernie, I'm just not buying it. The fact that advertisers are flocking to the so-called "Clown Co." has nothing to do with YouTube (besides maybe because the youtubers actually created the market in the first place). Advertisers are swooning over the corporate child because it lets them have a few more months of hope that the mass market isn't going anywhere, that there will still be one-stop shopping, and all this may happen without another addition to their rolodex.

Too bad it can't be that easy.

Tune In Saturdays: Andrew Bird

This weeks tune in is the Jeff Buckley-esque Chicago native and violin virtuoso Andrew Bird. It's definitely still pop music for the most part, but flirts with folk, classical and jazz. It's beautiful at times, and frantic at others. Big highs and big lows, but it's all interesting as hell.

From Drowned in Sound:

"Bird sounds more classical than ever; not classical in a strict sense, but each pull on the violin is more pomp than punk. This pulling strategy has crafted a fine album, full of subtle, melodic masterpieces that, while not trenchantly classical, exude romance via musicianship embedded in the classical realm."

I know it sounds rather weird, but it's friggin' brilliant.

Andrew Bird - Heretic (mp3)

Below is a live from Bonnaroo recording of A Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left.

The Network's Real Answer to YouTube

Well, here's the shocker to the century, NBC and NewsCorp are holding hands in a new venture, which they obviously think will be the next YouTube killer. And, they may be right, I guess. Lots of good (or mediocre, at least) content. Some Web 2.0 bells and whistles will probably be included. Their deals so far (including MySpace, MSN and Yahoo) cover 96% of the American web audience.

But they haven't made the site, yet. And guess what happens when one large behemoth of bureaucracy partners with another. They become an even larger monstrosity of bullshit, red tape, approval levels and group think decision-making. This isn't a couple guys in their dorm room just trying to make something cool, it's turning farmland into Las Vegas overnight. And they'll advertise the shit out of it. And, they'll have people. Lots of people.

Until, those people decide they don't really like the flashing lights and pre-roll ads. But it won't matter. That one show sponsor will become two. And one minute commercial breaks will become three. And, executives with dollar signs in their eyes and pacemakers in their hearts will ruin anything good they may have created in the first place.

But, by then, we'll probably need a DVR to battle the minefield they've created. Good thing there's already people working on that.

Good luck with all that mess. And what the fuck happened to Mark Cuban? He used to seem like such a man of the people, even with that massive war chest.

The Bumper Sticker Republic

Nobody ever said anything worthwhile that could fit on a bumper sticker.

If it won't fit on a bumper sticker, it's not very likely people will remember it.

Which is true?

Probably both. Unfortunately. The sound bite republic would argue that you "support our troops," or "just do it." You can definitely win a short conversation by saying "shock and awe," but it's a little more difficult to actually shock anyone, or make them awestruck.

Unless they give a shit about what you have to say already. If you can create a context for caring with your actions, it's possible to continue a conversation past three words. Maybe not so easy for most, but it's probably better than following Maurice Saatchi into the fool's paradise of one word equity, or any reasonable facsimile.

So, where does that leave us? We're not really just advertising anymore, are we?

photo thanks to Elliot Swan

Tune In Saturdays: The Rosewood Thieves

Here's one I bet the Copyblogger, Brian Clark will enjoy. This week, Tune In features The Rosewood Thieves, a group of barely 20-somethings that sound much more weathered than their age would indicate. It's country, but pop, but I wouldn't go so far as to call it alt-country either (thankfully). They bleed Dylan, and apparently are pretty enamored with the Beatles, although I don't really hear it any more than you might in any other band on the planet.

Check out MySpace for more songs From the Decker House,  or watch the video below.

Joost Token

I know you guys will be dissapointed that this post won't be all about twitter (muah!!), but I do have one joost token left to give. First comment gets it.

Likemind Dal 3

Likemind just keeps getting hugier and hugier. I'm not sure if that reads huge-ier or hug-ier, but I think both would be appropriate. Now, we're up to 17 cities all around the world. Check out Noah's blog for the complete list.

But, for the Dallasites, we're back to Panera Bread (map) at 8:00am this Friday, March 16. Do it to it.

UPDATE: Also, I didn't mention that the coffee is on Anomaly, so leave your wallets at home!

I hate you Viacom.

Stupidass Viacom. Go sit in the corner with the RIAA.

At first glance, that statement looks a bit incongruent. Viacom is suing a company, not 16 year-old music lovers like the RIAA. But, YouTube is a community, full of protective members looking to hold together a good thing, a place where they're comfortable and happy. And Viacom doesn't give a shit about them.

I get why they do it. The lawyers come in, blind to the free advertising, and want what YouTube already has. They look at it as if it were a series of x's and o's or 1's and 0's, and think they can offer us the same. Instead, they rush a shit product, and think sueing is a sufficient way to stuff it down our throats.

Maybe my view of what we need is a bit utopian, but I really just want to go to one place for all my video watching needs. Viacom can fuck off.

One of the great parts of Digg is the comment section. It'll always give you a quick overview of community reaction. Here's some comments:

From retroduds. "Boycott Viacom."

From the captainjs. "Man... is it just me or are companies turning into big greedy babies."

From moocat. "Viacom had all the time in the world (and still does) to make a simple video site where you can go and watch their shows with small advertisements but they chose not to. Instead they load up a page with crappy graphics, slow loading times and a bad player and then complain that they tried to do the same thing but YouTube stole all their traffic. It's a total setup of moronic proportions. This is a problem with most of american "competition", people don't fight at the product and quality level anymore, they quibble over legalese and faux marketing tactics."

From Stonewaljackson. "how can we collectively tell viacom to suck our balls?"

From Yez70. "I have parental blocked their channels on my cable box and cancelled Showtime and The Movie Channel. My Blockbuster Online membership is also being cancelled. The greedy SOBs can forget about winning me back this time.

I really liked Viacom when they had started playing nice with Google."

From DCgamer. "Here are the Viacom channels to Boycott...someone else can work out the advertisers.

  Atom Entertainment, Inc.
  BET
  College Publisher
  Comedy Central
  CMT: Country Music Television
  GameTrailers.com
  Harmonix Music Systems, Inc.
  IFILM
  LOGO
  MTV: Music Television
  MTV2
  mtvU
  MTV Networks International
  MTV Networks Online
  Neopets
  Nickelodeon
  Nick at Nite
  Noggin
The N
Spike TV
TV Land
VH1
Xfire
MTV Networks Digital Suite"

And it goes on, and on and on. Haven't we seen these mistakes before? Will these companies ever learn? Probably not as long as lawyers are running the show...

I'm Feeling a Little Internetty

Time Warner is really just wonderful. Just awesome. Great and perfect.

ok, strike that. Reverse it.

Sorry to everyone I've neglected for the past few days. I've been mostly internetless. If anyone feels neglected, let me know now, and I'll send you any cd from any tune in saturdays. Then we can be friends again, okay?

So, time warner. Appointment today between 2 and 5. 4 20 minute wait calls, with more and more bitching and cursing for each one. They show at 9:15. Cable's up and internets internetting at 10pm. Thanks, ya bastards.