Okay everyone. The "official" release date for Save You From Yourself is February 19th. However, if you're a member of the Demo Club, you won't have to wait. You'll be able to get it in just a few days. I'll announce where and how over the weekend.
My hope is to sell a LOT of records, and get the music into the hands (and ears) of a LOT of people. So I'm offering special bonuses to people who buy more than one copy. You can give the extra copies to friends, donate them to your local library or school, send them overseas, give one to a radio station or newspaper in your town, resell them for cash -- heck, tie 'em to some balloons and let 'em go!
Demo Club members will get a special discounted price.
The first 20 copies sold will be autographed.
If you buy two or more copies, I'll email you a piano remix version of "You Are Loved" that Jim and I created during our mixing sessions, in 256k MP3 format.
If you buy four or more copies, you'll get the MP3, plus I'll mail you an autographed poster (shown below right).
If you buy six or more copies, you'll get the MP3, the poster, and the limited-edition bonus CD of acoustic tracks (I've got a few left over from the pre-order; they're numbered and signed).
You might have to wait a few hours for the MP3 to arrive, since I need to email those out by hand. I'll try to get those out at the end of each day, Seattle time. Posters will be mailed out ASAP.
Anyway, that's my plan. If you have any questions, please leave a comment below or feel free to contact me. Thanks everyone!
So remember Dennis, the drummer/percussionist I jam with every so often? He backed me up at my first Folklife gig, the gig with Artis the Spoonman, and lots of others (you can hear him in some of the live rehearsal MP3s). He also plays in a kabillion other bands around town.
A few weeks back some crackhead stole all of his drum hardware, right out of his bedroom. He still has the drums, but all the cymbals, stands and pedals are gone.
So tomorrow (Saturday) I and some friends are playing a benefit house concert to raise a little money to help Dennis replace his equipment. It's a semi-private party, but if you're in the Seattle area and want to attend, email me and I'll send you details.
If you're feeling generous, you can Paypal a donation to me using the button below, and I'll forward it on to Dennis. I'm sure he'd appreciate the assist.
So U2 manager Paul McGuinness wants to hold ISPs accountable for policing the content on their networks. He also loves France's plan to auto-disconnect P2P users and thinks more ISPs should be like Comcast and throttle the bandwidth use of Bittorrent-using hippies.
I have to say I felt pretty bad for Paul as I read his speech. I was all like: oh. OH. Paul, dude, you're not really gonna say what I think you -- oh, I guess you are. Wha? No. NO. STOP. Digg is gonna have your head on a pike, you know that, right? Oh geez, that's...that's just -- look, I gotta go.
I haven't looked, but I bet certain threads at Slashdot and Metafilter are burning right now.
"Forgive yourself for making unrealistic goals. Forgive yourself for making goals that aren’t big enough to keep you interested. Forgive yourself for doing work that’s not your best."
I'm curious what you'll think of it. The original version was always meant to be just a demo, with a "real" version to be recorded later. Of course, I didn't intend "later" to mean "four years later." It's by far the most popular song I've written to date (in terms of spins, scrobbles, iTunes money, etc.)
The Startup Weekend gig was pretty awesome. If you didn't catch it before, it's an event where a group of techie and bizdev people come together, brainstorm a business idea, then actually develop it and launch it within a weekend. I have to admit that I felt seriously nervous about pulling people away from their coding and bizdev-ing to watch lil' ol' me belt out a few tunes sans microphone, but it they turned out to be a really great crowd.
Update: Here's the business they built that weekend (daaaamn), and here's a Flickr set of the event, including some photos of yours truly.
Thanks to Andrew, Samantha and Kym for setting me up with that one.
In other news, Jerin and I looked into doing a week-long East Coast tour in June. A tour! Exciting! And then she ran the numbers and we had a good laugh. Even with cheap plane tickets and crashing on the couches of accommodating fans, there's very little chance we'd break even.
Heck, if I wanted to go broke, I can do that at home! So, for the moment, no East Coast tour. But I remain hopeful that I might be able to pull something together later this year. So please allow me to pimp my Eventful widget yet again, as a gentle reminder that if you'd like to see me play in our lifetimes, letting me know you're out there is a good first step.
This afternoon I'm performing a brief set for the lads and lasses attending Startup Weekend Seattle. The event is sold out, so it should be fun, despite the fact that I have no songs about revenue models or the benefits of an LLC over an S-Corp.
I've pushed another song from Save You From Yourself out of the nest and onto the web. Over in Weardale UK, Steven Wheatley's Dalecast podcast was the first to jump on it. Thanks, Steven.
I wish I had more to report these days, but all I've been up to is stuffing padding envelopes. I think I've only sent out about 30 packages but it feels like I've been at it forever. Plus, I have a head cold. Fun!
I'm also gearing up to send some CDs to local radio this week. The two big names in town are KMTT, a commercial station that plays AAA format (that's "adult album alternative" I think) and the promised land of indie rock, KEXP. I think there's a decent chance of some modest airplay from both, but I'm not going to fret over it. There are also a kabillion smaller stations in the area to approach.
The Metafilter Podcast features a clip of "At The Airport" following a really awesome interview with Jesse Thorn of the Sound Of Young America radio show.
Episode 30 of Justo Morales' The PePe Show features "You Are Loved" as well as an in-person interview we recorded when he was visiting Seattle waaay back in summer of '07. That may as well be the Cretaceous Period in internet time. Luckily I'm a musician and not a politician, and therefore can't be held accountable for things I said six months ago. Whew!
If you're a podcaster interested in songs from Save You From Yourself, keep an eye on Podshow and others. And drop me a line so I can link you up.
Okay everyone. The "official" release date for Save You From Yourself is February 19th. However, if you're a member of the Demo Club, you won't have to wait. You'll be able to get it in just a few days. I'll announce where and how over the weekend.
You might have to wait a few hours for the MP3 to arrive, since I need to email those out by hand. I'll try to get those out at the end of each day, Seattle time. Posters will be mailed out ASAP.
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