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Weekend Watching: Dig

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Possibly one of the great rock docs of all time, Dig takes a look at two bands who you don't need to be fans of to enjoy this amazing doc. Capturing the two seperate career paths of the bands, The Brian Jonestown Massacre and The Dandy Warhols, this is one of the most enjoyable displays of rock debauchery and music industry reality you will ever see. Don't miss it. 

#FollowFriday @CreateMusicTips

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At Musformation we have decided to follow Twitters lead and suggest you a Twitter feed we find to be totally awesome every week. We figure it is time to show people by example who is using Twitter right and good the awesome resources it holds.

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t's been a while since we featured a Follow Friday tweeter, since we haven't been finding new and inspiring tweeters to point you to. That ended this week when I stumbled upon the AWESOME tweeter, CreateMusicTips. They constantly tweet out the same kind of cool tips and tricks you find on Musformation and if you like us, you will surely like them.


The great electronic duo Modeselektor discusses their music (with plenty of dorky details from their personal lives) and also live setup.  

While it would seem like common sense to not put something dirty back in your ears when you can visibly see residue on it, everyday I watch musicians put wax filled dirty things in their ears. After doing this, these musicians will then wonder why their ears are clogged up and feel swollen. The easy solution is to carry some hydrogen peroxide with you in your road kit. Simply dip your plugs in and then with washed hands pull the gunk off. With In-Ear monitors, dipping the plugs in a cap-full of liquid may not be recommended, but you can Q-tip the solid part down with the liquid to get rid of any excessive gunk. 
crazygit.jpgThe time it takes you to change your string during a show is like dead air on the radio and is completely unacceptable. Worse, it gives your bandmates time to say stupid things on the mic as the audience becomes annoyed and or bored and very possibly leaves. Further, nothing comes across as more amateur than changing a string on stage - it makes even the best of players look like a total Poindexter. Can't afford 2 guitars or can't travel with that much gear? Ask the band you're playing with if you can borrow their axe if you happen to break a string. Most guitar players are very willing to do this. In addition, you'll want to tune the backup guitar as well before the show so you don't switch guitars only to discover it is way out of tune or in a strange tuning you aren't used to.  It doesn't matter if you're a light player or haven't broken a string in years, the momentum you loose when you have to stop and change a string could easily derail a show.  Breaking  a string during a set is bad enough, but don't make it worse by not being prepared.
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If there is anything most bands regularly hear from their adoring fans it is that they are, soooo much better live than they are on record. While some of this hyperbole just comes from the energy of live, loud music and enjoying it with others, there is many a time a band can bring a whole new experience to fans with their live show. The funny thing is, many bands who are great live do not exploit it and show this fact off to their fans as much as they should. After the jump we will go over some ideas on how you can show off your live skills.

Band Tip: Don't Sweat A Bad Show

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bad_show.jpgBecause you know your own music more intimately than anyone else, it seems only natural that you would experience more intensely the highs and lows of your musical trajectory.  Following a bad show it's easy to feel depressed and I've heard some musicians say they even feel suicidal.  For many of us, shows are a way to unveil who we really are and get across deep and complex emotions.  When that fails to happen it can feel devastating.  Maybe the sound guy hated you, or the PA was awful, or you broke 3 strings, or your bass player was nodding out from heroin...  it doesn't matter exactly what happened, the thing to remember is that bad shows are going to happen.  But also remember that people go see live music because there is an element of unpredictability and they appreciate that.  You might have a terrible night where you can't complete a song or you might blow the entire crowd away in a religious-like fervor of holy rock hymns - one never knows.  The good and bad thing about your fans is that they usually have a short memory.  People are so worried about themselves that they quickly forget trivial things like how out of tune your guitar was the other night.  The best thing you can do with a bad show is learn from it.  Maybe you should've gotten to sound check earlier or not have had 5 Gin and Tonics before you ever started playing.  There is almost always a lesson you can take from a bad show and to help improve your next performance.  In general people learn much more from failure than success, and that certainly applies in this case as well.  

Words Of DIY Wisdom From Blood Red Shoes

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Drowned in Sound has up a fantastic article on the buzz band Blood Red Shoes, who have dispensed some amazing DIY advice to up and coming groups that you don't get to hear everyday. A fantastic read with great advice like the tidbit below.
 
"This is a sad fact because there are people around our band, and a lot of bands, who really believe in what they're doing and will work fantastically hard to make things happen. I have a lot of love for these people. A lot of folk in the music industry are not evil contrary to popular belief. Actually they mostly start out really genuine music fans who want to work in a music environment and the issue is actually the system itself, which like everything else under capitalism, is set up so the workers are the ones getting ripped off the most. Nevertheless, no-one will quite feel like you do about your band, nobody will have that 10 minutes of suicidal end-of-the-world depression you get after a shit gig. Or that utter disappointment when you see they've printed your album sleeve on the wrong kind of paper."
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This past Saturday was March 6th, which while being insignificant in the grand scheme of things, this was a big day for Musformation. After two months of planning, brain storming and research Todd and I officially started posting to Musformation on a daily basis on 3/6/09. It wasn't a planned launch as much as a bunch of bugs got fixed, we started giving out the URL, and we had something to say. The later part of that saying is a lot of what this site is about. We have something to say.
musformation.pngFrom our initial conceptualization of Musformation, the idea was to help create an open community with spirited dialogue and a constant flowing ideas instead of attempting to be the final word or end-all-be-all site of musical elitism.  We are musicians and producers who write about our real world experiences that are our own personal reality.  But we also want to hear from you.  We have a loyal audience, a great set of consistent commentators and a very intelligent readership that always surprises us.  Agree with us, disagree with us, love us, hate us, but give us your own take.  We love links, articles you've written, ideas and anything you've got.  It's been an amazing run so far and 2010 is looking even better.  Keep it coming, ya'll. 

7 Ways To Inflate Your Mailing List

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  1. Musformation, FanBridge, ReverbNation and MusicGlue all offer way to trade free songs for an email list.
  2. TweetForATrack not only will have fans Tweet out a message about downloading a track from you, but will also capture an email address from your fans.
  3. Stores like Nimbit and Bandcamp will capture your customers email addresses for you.
  4. Make a email list sign up form available on your website and your Myspace. FanBridge and ReverbNation both have fantastic widgets to do this with.
  5. Offer giveaways only to mailing list members, like guest list passes etc. Announce them on Facebook and Twitter so your fans hear about them and sign up for the mailing list.
  6. Take credit card payments at shows through services like Square, which will capture your fans email addresses.
  7. Get a Netbook with a email list signup and give away something like a sticker, button or patch to anyone who signs up for your email list at every show you play.

Build A DIY Power Supply For Your Guitar Pedals

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Instructables has up a fantastic tutorial on how to make a multi-voltage power supply for your guitar pedals. A great learning experience and one that can be rewarding on your wallet to get rid of all those spare $9v battery purchases.
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Hey Everyone,
First off thanks for baring with us through our growing pains. As the site grows, the internal gears get cranky and need some oiling. Jackie as always did us solid and tweaked out some of the problems with RSS, Commenting and the site crashing. Thanks so much for baring with us and as always if you have any problems please email us here. Sorry for the trouble and as always thanks for the support.
These days there is a huge buzz around the power of texting fans and getting them out to shows. While we all get the annoying texts from our friends in bands, trying to get us to come see them at whatever hell hole they are playing on a Tuesday, the power of keeping fans informed by going write to their phone cannot be underestimated. The service Broadtexter will allow you to embed the above widget around the web and collect fans phone numbers in which you start a Mobile Club. With these Mobile Clubs you can setup alerts so fans are notified when you are in their area. Best of all it is free! Check it out now. (via Terra Terra Terra


Music Radar has up a fantastic article on the process that goes on behind one of the groups that is influencing a great deal of the musicians in the world today, everyone's favorite indie band Animal Collective. The article gets into great detail on some of the bands intricacies and creative thoughts and is a great read for anyone looking to steal figure out what they can learn from this innovative group.
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If you are in the type of group that is constantly looking for more paying gigs by any means necessary, GigLeader may be a great site to setup a profile on. Providing a list of groups indexed by location and genre, promoters are able to search their database to find talent for a wide variety of gigs. Check it out.

Band Tip: Get To Soundcheck EARLY!

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early_clocks.jpgBands are not often known for being timely, but there is one area where being early can really come in handy: soundcheck.  Not only will you get a chance to meet with the soundguy and make friendly, but you'll also be able to discover what the room sounds like, what the strengths and weaknesses are of the soundsystem and most importantly, it will allow you the time to find a way to fix any kinks in your sound BEFORE the show.  Further, if you do your soundcheck early you'll also discover if you're missing any gear you might need to run out and purchase or if your gear is acting up you can perhaps borrow someone elses.  You might be hungover, tired from a previous show or your singer might be more interested in being out on the town searching for tail, but bands who get in a good soundcheck always sound better.  Find out what the very earliest time you can get in the venue and get setup.  You'll sound better and be more relaxed when it's time to hit the stage.  Remember that music fans rarely ever blame the sound guy or the venue, they just assume the band sucks.  Make no assumptions about a venue or it's soundsystem - find out for yourself by getting an early and thorough soundcheck.  

Interview And Interactive Performance With Edison

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While many electronic artists out there seem to be phoning it in for their live show, Edison really takes performance to the next level.  In the above clip he shows off his custom Monome and Novation Launchpad and then tells us exactly how he does it all.  For more awesome performance footage check here.  

Make A Portable DIY Vocal Booth

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DIYvocalbooth.pngIf you are traveling the country trying to do the vocals for your record whenever inspiration strikes you can meet some very acoustically unfriendly environments along the way. This plan for a DIY vocal booth is a cheap and small way to cure some of these ills if you want to record in hotel rooms and nasty crash pads on tour. Check it out here.
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Anyone who has seen live music knows there is nothing worse then a shoe gazing anorexic sitting in front of the crowd strumming a guitar. However, some of you too-cool-for-school types don't seem to care and do this anyway. If this is the case, one way you can actually entertain us is using a slide show. Thankfully, Instructables has up a cheap way to make a slide projector out of an Ikea lamp. That way you'll have more money to spend on girls jeans!
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