MyStudio Video - HANDS ON THE ROCK

MyStudio Video - HANDS ON THE ROCK

2010: The Best of Times, the Worst of Times

Best of luck to all of you this coming year. We’re going to need it. If I can help you with mentoring, production and artist development services, I have a price range you can afford and I know I can make a difference in your career. The world is our oyster right now, and there are a lot of things to stay on top of. A listen to my v-logs at http://www.wedontneednostinkingrecordcompany.com/ and books at http://www.gigsterclinics.com/ should help. Professor Pooch (David J. Spangenberg) and I will keep you up on the latest with our ongoing “Gigster and the Pooch” series at www.youtube.com/gigsterandthepooch. And as Pooch says, “stay tuned,” because there’s a lot more great stuff on the way.

New Year’s Eve, 2010. An incredible year—18 months, actually. Okay, so near-financial destitution does bring a few things into focus: family, friends, stark-raving terror. But as I talk to my friends, we all seem to have gotten a lot of living done and accomplishments checked-off despite the economy.

The first thing I’m thinking of is how thankful I am for the new acquaintances I’ve made, my old friends, and the dozens of opportunities afforded me by my fellow performers, venues, and my contemporary music gurus. The list is way too long to mention everyone, but many come fresh to mind such as Ron Logan, my steadfast friend, engineer, and producer. Jimmy Clark, the best long-term friend I could ever have. Professor Pooch, Rebecca Firstenfield, Wicked-D (Don Harrison)—new business associations with opportunities full of promise. Todd Johnson (Dazed) of http://www.mixposure.com/. Randy Tredway and Helen Kennedy, king and queen of the Texas song-hunters, and their new and fabulous intimate venue “The Music Room.” The inspiring Michael “The Mudcat" Reames and partners Dave Williams and Wayne Folse. Supportive fellow songwriters and musicians, such as Matthew Gaskins, Chad Ireland, C. Aaron Moore, Diane Hart, Sam Moore, John South, Tony Vea, Lee Trawick, Dano Parr, Steve Anderson, Anna and Scott Thomas, Anne Abercrombie. Movers and shakers in my fledgling field, such as the ever supportive GoGirlsMusic.com founder Madalyn Sklar and http://www.openmic.us/ founder David Craver. Throw in new acquaintances such as Steely Dan bassist Chuck Rainey, hit songwriter and inventor Barry DeVorzon, Crystal Clear Sound studio manager Keith Rust, and Performing Songwriters International founder Lorelei Loveridge, and venues such as Lone Star Wine Cellars, Gator’s Croc & Roc, Aloft Frisco, Republic Grill, The Chilepepperama, D’vine Wine, Churchill’s, Thai Star, and Shuckers. It’s been awesome and kinetic.

My family has been both tolerant and supportive of my musical efforts, including my sister and brother-in-law who ask me to jump up and play at family events, my brother and sister-in-law, who facilitate and support epic trips to the Northwest, my mother who has always been there for me artistically and every other way (and especially so this year), my wife and all my children who have put up with missing me on gig nights and tour dates, gone out of their ways to adjust to my schedule and whereabouts, jumped in and played on various sets and jams, helped me set-up, shuttled equipment to me, and applauded while I publicly played the songs I had ruined for them in rehearsals at the house.

Since October 25 of 2009, I’ve made over 370 video blog posts—including some that went beyond the music realm and into autism and Asperger Syndrome, a gift and challenge that I share with a number of family members. Since December of 2009 I’ve played over 100 dates (300+ shows), some with my son Aaron Yuhas playing awesome sax before he left to start his new adventure in the US Air Force. All the while, I’ve managed to continue consulting and mentoring almost full time. I never thought it would be possible to do this and still stay sane (or married, for that matter—thanks Jenny).

The biggest lessons for me in the last year-and-a-half speak to the incredible level of effort one needs to embrace to try for something big. The pace of gigs and blogs was a huge challenge, but proved to me it was possible. The effort resulted in my performances getting to the best level I’ve ever enjoyed, and the reach of my influence going much further than I ever expected to see. Though the direction of my efforts in 2011 will change significantly, the level of activity will not. I advise anyone who wants to get something done this coming year not to take it casually. Your competition is simply working too hard for you to think you can take them on without going over the top.

Peace, Love and Rock&Roll…

Ryan Michael Gallowayryan@ryanrocks.com

ASCAP DAILY BRIEF (repost)

The ASCAP Daily Brief from Dean Kay has a ton of interesting and provocative information, but IT'S NOT POSTED ANYWHERE that I can find.  I'll occasionally share my copy with you in hopes they eventually understand how important it is to post this stuff...or they tell me to stop.  ;-)

Subscribe directly to the email list (recommended) here:  http://www.magnetmail.net/actions/subscription_form_ascap.cfm


First, who's Dean Kay?


From the brief:


Dean Kay has been at the helm of some of the most highly respected and forward thinking music publishing companies in the world, first as COO of the Welk Music Group, then as President/ CEO of the US division of the PolyGram International Publishing Group, and now as President/CEO of his own precedent setting venture, Lichelle Music Company. Prior to his involvement in publishing, he was a successful songwriter, having had hundreds of his compositions recorded - including "That's Life" by Frank Sinatra. Mr. Kay has been a member of the Board of Directors of ASCAP since 1989 and is Chairman of its New Technologies Committee. He is also on the Board of the National Music Publishers Association (NMPA).


Now the material...this time from Friday, April 30, 2010:

"When consumers AND creators are happy everyone in the middle will have gotten digital distribution right."




Video Highlights of Quincy Jones's Interview with Ludacris at the ASCAP EXPO 


"You're a terminal for a higher power."... "I don't take it for granted."... "I never turn my curiosity off."



A Look On the Bright Side: What Actually Grew In 2009... 


Several developing formats showed growth in 2009. What are they? The IFPI offered a closer look at the data to Digital Music News


The 'In' Sounds from Way Out


By Matt Learoy -- When the early '00s brought Napster and the revelation of widespread file-sharing, the breadth of music it made available was unprecedented. As impressive as it was, though, that wealth of music only hinted at the leagues of worthwhile material that would soon be reachable by the long arms of the Internet.

 
Technology Pushing Music Ahead With Mood-Based Playlists


By Erica Clayton -- Music has forever been an outlet for us to express ourselves in an almost unexplainable way. We classify it by genre, by era and by band, but now we have a way to define our music a little differently: by mood. Stereomood is a free "emotional internet radio" that allows users to choose a playlist based on their mood.


Google Shuts Down The Playlist and Other Music Blogs


By Krystal Clark -- Does Google have a personal vendetta against smaller blogs that maintain a solid readership? Yesterday evening they shutdown a premiere film site called The Playlist for some unknown reason, making it the latest casualty in a long line of sites destroyed by the host.

 
Even Through a Recession, We Want Our Web


By Kevin C. Tofel -- Given recent economic challenges around the globe, one might conclude that demand for the web is down, but apparently not. According to a report from research firm TeleGeography, international bandwidth usage continued to grow in spite of the global recession of the past few years.

 
Glee Madonna Soundtrack Album Sales Reaches Number 1 in First Week


Digital News Report - The 'Glee' TV show recently had a Madonna themed episode, which was turned into a soundtrack album and then went on to makes is release as a number one album sold in the US with 98,000 copies sold in its first week.




What If You Had Bought Apple Stock Instead of That iPod?


By Mark Milian -- Sometimes, especially when we're down on our luck and looking at all the money we've wasted on frivolous gadgets, we might ask what would have happened if we had invested. Web developer Kyle Conroy provides an easy-to-read spreadsheet to illustrate how shortsighted we all were. It's called What If I Had Bought Apple Stock Instead?

 
The Enormous Promise of Location


By Colin Gibbs -- Location, one of the hottest segments in mobile, is a key component not just in navigation apps but also social offerings such as Foursquare, Google Buzz and even Twitter. There's plenty of opportunity in mobile location. And there will be for quite some time.

 
Encouraging the Text Generation to Rediscover Its Voice


By Susan Dominus -- Last week, researchers at the University of Maryland reported that college students who swore off social media showed signs of withdrawal similar to those of drug addicts going cold turkey. So how would scores of middle-schoolers fare under the same circumstances, what with their underdeveloped frontal lobes and raging need for affirmation?

 
MXP4 Raises a Further $4m for its Remixable Music Widgets


By Mike Butcher -- Launched in 2007, MXP4, which offers a digital format to music that rivals the MP3 format, lets users remix tracks, add images and video content, add music layers and more. In the past year, over 100 recording artists including David Guetta, Michael Jackson and Britney Spears, and brands including Air France Music and Coca-Cola, have used MXP4 on the web and iPhone.



5 Things iTunes Must Do to Stay Ahead of Spotify


By Gerald Lynch -- What must Apple do to keep iTunes king of the digital music libraries?


The Bricks With Which You Will Build Your Palace...


By Scott James - There are an awful lot of bands out there who spend their time thinking about the future. They imagine everything they've ever wanted, but fail to give themselves fully to what's already in front of them. It's like the minimum wage worker who says to himself that he'll start to care when he gets paid more. Meanwhile, the fact that he doesn't commit himself to his work will keep him stuck where he is.




The Top Ten Reasons Artists Don't Register with SoundExchange


And ten reasons why you should. Hint- there's no downside.


Stupid Stuff Your Smart Phone Can Do


By Alan Greenblatt -- When he first heard the iFart, Tim Yewchuck was inspired. Many people thought the "app" that produces indelicate noises on iPhones was juvenile or funny (or both), but Yewchuck sensed a business opportunity. The iFart phenomenon was part of what started the gold rush in the app world," he says. "We had dollar signs in our eyes. We thought there was money to be made." Plenty of people do.


 

Time to Dust This Off and Get Going Again

Hello, friends...

I've just completed 365 v-log posts in 365 days, which is why I haven't had time to post here in over a year.  While I'll have some written material to share here and will continue to post v-logs at www.WeDontNeedNoStinkingRecordCompany.com, I plan to also grab material of interest from around the world and repost it here.

Hope you find this information useful.  If you need stuff organized and all in one place, I suggest you acquire some of my books on songwriting, promotion, and getting your act together.  These are available at www.GigsterClinics.com. 

Cheers,

Ryan Michael Galloway
Alpha Gigster, producer, speaker, and performing songwriter
972-841-0226
www.RyanRocks.com

In songwriting, what is a hook?

When I was starting out as a songwriter, this was one of my most frustrating questions. I would meet with publishers and record companies, and they’d say, "Great lyrics, nice music—where’s the hook?"

I’d say something like, "What’s a hook."

They’d answer back that it was that, you know, thing you could "hang your hat on" or other such garbage.

Simply put, a hook is something that stays in your head the first time you hear the song. It can be a repetitive lyric/music combination, or it can be a musical figure like the slide guitar in George Harrison’s "My Sweet Lord."

There are some tricks to coming up with hooks. It’s worth taking a minute to define one of the classic kinds of hooks that works so often in formulaic writing. You can find a lot of lyric/music hooks in the choruses of songs. They often are, or contain, the name of the song. Some examples:

Bridge Over Troubled Water – Simon and Garfunkel
It Only Takes a Minute, Girl (to fall in love) - Tavares
She’s Gone – Hall and Oates
Take it Easy – The Eagles
Peaceful Easy Feeling – The Eagles
Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown – Jim Croce
One Thing – Finger Eleven
Calling All Angels – Train
Another Day in Paradise – Phil Collins
American Pie – Don McLean

The list could go on and on, and there's a reason for that. If you can come up with a hook, you know what your song is headed. Without it, you are meandering all over the place until you find one, so I like to have the hook figured out first.

Take a look at this:

When you're weary, feeling small
When tears are in your eyes, I will dry them all
I’m on your side, when times get rough
And friends just can’t be found

Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down
Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down

*from Paul Simon, Bridge Over Troubled Water

Notice that, since the hook, "Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down,' is SO strong, that it becomes a sort of psychological magnet that encourages every line to lead up to it. This is the magic of a good hook. It helps the song almost write itself.

Don't get me wrong, I’m sure Paul found lots of challenges for his formidable songwriting talent to turn this song into the masterpiece that it is. But I submit that it was probably easier to write if he came up with the hook first.

Pay attention to that the next time you write. Try to find a phrase, as I mentioned in another post (Where do ideas come from?) that encapsulates the idea of the whole song. Then make sure every line of the verse leads up to that payoff, the chorus (and the hook line).



See Ryan Michael Galloway's video posts nightly at:  http://www.WeDontNeedNoStinkingRecordCompany.com
See Mr. Galloway's books at:  http://www.GigsterClinics.com

Where do ideas come from?

Who knows. I've had some of my best while I've been doing something mindless, like ironing, showering, or washing dishes (yes I do those things, despite rumors to the contrary).

In Nashville songwriting circles, "ideas" are those unique phrase turns, exploded clichés, and "wish I'd thought of that" moments. There are a million of them, and they go from the ridiculous to the sublime.

An old lost friend of mine, Nashville songwriter Rick Giles, teamed up with Eddie Rabbitt to write "I Love A Rainy Night." What made that an idea worth using? The answer is that it gave the songwriters something that they felt they could expand upon--and other ideas that supported it. It's simple, but if you listen to the song, you can almost see them sitting in a room with a couple of guitars or a piano, thinking of all the reasons they loved a rainy night. It spoke to them, and they were able to make it speak to us.

An idea for a songwriter has to either be unique, or has to be something that inspires them to explain it in a unique or new way. "Beer for my Horses"? Now that's unique. How about "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me, than have frontal lobotomy?" It's Five O'clock Somewhere, if I told you you had a beautiful body, would you hold it against me?, she's got to be somebody's baby, Magaritaville, Lord have mercy on the frozen man, I've got friends in low places--and all the lyrics buried deeper in well-written songs. One of my favorite ideas was from Paul Simon (despite its musician-oriented focus), "I was underneath the stars, playing my guitar, just thankin' the Lord for my fingers."

I have a few tricks for coming up with ideas, but it is going to depend on you as to how you use them. Different phrases will speak to me than will speak to you. It's what gets your creative juices flowing.

When I'm dry of ideas, I do a lot of reading. Sting used to read the classics--even the Bible, though he's not very religious. I used to read a lot of self-help stories (and not just about sex) in women's magazines, because I thought it helped me develop a more sensitive approach to my writing. It worked pretty well, too.

One day I was walking by a bookshelf at a savings and loan where I worked. There were a bunch of old, out of print books on the shelf just for effect. I read "Give Sorrow Words" on the spine of one of them. I had to write the song, and I never read the book. Another was an article about women fighting abuse and rape. It was called "Take Back the Night." I used it in a totally different way, but what a great phrase.

Another source of ideas can be your own vision. What sort of title would look good on a CD cover? When you come up with the title, do you see a video or pictures in your mind? It helps you come up with ideas that have gravitas, bold and weighty.

I've been talking about mostly titles, but there are ideas deeper inside the lyrics, too. My song, Man on the Moon--written years before REM's--has some okay examples:

"I'm makin' love to you and you're here, but you're gone
It seems like we're both in tune, but we're singing different songs"

That's a real oldie for me, but in context of the time and the song, it was pretty good.

I've discovered a really interesting source of ideas recently. Horse names. Go to the paper right now and look at the section on local horse races. A lot of effort went into naming these horses, and I'll bet you'll get some ideas just reading them.

Every once in a while, I'll tune in Delilah's syndicated romantic request show on the radio, just to hear people's stories. A few months ago I was driving home late, and a guy came on the line. She asked him to tell her about his girlfriend. He said "If God could sleep, he'd dream of this woman" because she was so beautiful. I had the chorus written before I pulled into the driveway (see www.RyanRocks.com/videos.htm).

Let's Write Some Songs

I’ve noticed some real schlock songwriting out there lately, and my friends have been pestering me to teach songwriting classes…or at least a master class. When I realized that some of that schlock was my own songs, I figured it was time to re-examine the basics. This is gonna help me as much as it’s gonna help you…I hope.

Teaching songwriting is like teaching judgment or creativity, it really can’t be done. It is up to the individual to figure a lot of these things out for themselves. However, a mentor can at least tell you when you’ve got a good idea, have turned a clever phrase, or have lost your audience because you’ve gotten undisciplined or confusing.

In subsequent posts, I will talk about hooks, ideas, rhymes, structure, and a few tricks to keep you from writing yourself into a corner.

Do you have a lyric, demo, or recording that you want someone to critique? Send it along or post it here. I’ll be honest and gentle. I’m no Paula, but I’m no Simon either.

Ryan Michael Galloway
972-841-0226
http://www.GigsterClinics.com
http://www.WeDontNeedNoStinkingRecordCompany.com

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