Lauren Frost brought her sophisticated cool sound and hipster jazzy group to Denver on the 14th of April to Rock the new LiveNation sponsored Comfort Dental venue. From my insider reports, all of the big wigs from LiveNation were also in attendance–and they loved Lauren’s music. Not hard to believe as Lauren has been busy producing great original material for the last 5 years.

Now if anyone out there is listening–please send her on tour with Sondre Lerche and have her open a few show for Michael Buble. She would be such a great tour-mate for cool artists like these folks. I mean she already toured with Barbra Streisand around the world–so she is used to the rigors of putting on a great show every night in front of packed houses!

Check out Lauren’s stuff in the licensing library and also click on over to her personal site at LaurenFrost.com!

Lauren is still in Denver rockin’ a few other venues and getting up close and personal with her super fans…

We are relocating! The new studio will be up and running in about two weeks and it is going to be even better. There is a much more room and the studio will be able to run 24/7 without any noise concerns. So, expect alot more tube-amp driven rock n’ roll in the next few months. Kirk Medland will be the first to try out the new digs for his new EP in May. The songs are already together–now we can start laying it down.

Then Robert Coates will be stopping by in the middle of the month to work on some new material. After that visit from Bob, then Julia Kay heads into town as we finalize her record release–also expect acoustic versions of her songs so you can see that Julia doesn’t need any studio magic–just a guitar and her powerful set of pipes. We’ll also start working on brand new music for her next album.

Expect cool things as we will now be able to do more video production!

Cheers,

3B

This is too cool… I have been on a major space mission for the last five years–I mean just look at the blog and the OAKDALE3B logo.

I was first introduced to to Julia Kay when I had been heavily researching symbology and its relationship to the arts. I can remember Julia’s mother, Julia and I all talking about how incredible it is to look up into the night sky. We began working off of images of space as we wrote “Reaching To The Moon.” The music that was written to accompany the lyrics was a very droning kind of Nick Drake thing–a hypnotic kind of groove.

After Julia recently sang this song at a fashion show in Chicago, she was approached about singing for an upcoming conference in Chicago–a conference where NASA is the sponsor and the room will be filled with astronauts. SHE GOT THE GIG!

More details to follow…remember I told you that some new things were literally out of this world!

Everybody has their own way to restring their acoustic guitar. But, I remember when I got my first acoustic and I was confused about the whole process. So, here are some things I’ve gleaned along the way. Hopefully, it will make it easier for new guitar players to restring and get playing.

I like to use a nice pair of wire cutters and a modified peg winder. I put a little duct tape on the inside of the peg winder so that it is nice and soft in there–so it won’t damage tuning pegs.

Duck It

To start, loosen up all your strings on the guitar so that when you go to cut them, it is not a huge tension shock to your instrument. Then, when all the strings are loose, use your wire cutters to cut the strings so that you can gently remove them.

Now that all the strings have been removed, you can clean up your acoustic with some nice polish. Also, you can oil your fretboard with a little lemon oil.

All clean–time to restring. Remember to work from the outside in–that is work from the low E string to the D string or the high E string to the G string. If you work from the inside out, you will be stuck trying to work around the other strings later in the process.

Jump up a peg

This is a cool and easy trick to get just the right amount of string… After you have inserted the ball end of the low E string into the bridge and reinforced it with the bridge pin, take your low E string and pull it past the peg for the A string. Now, crimp it around the A string peg. Bingo–the string will now be the perfect length–you won’t have too much or too little string when you go to wind the string on the peg.

Crimp It

Important: make sure that the string goes on the inside of the peg and not toward the outside. Your guitar was constructed so that the strings set on the nut and extend up to the inside of the pegs.

Strings Toward The Inside

Then, wind the string so that it wraps under the crimped string through the peg. So, as you wind, the string should move from the top to the base of the peg.

Wound on Inside

Repeat the process for the rest of the strings. With both the D and G strings, just pull the string up to the top of the headstock and crimp.

Crimp at Headstock

Work from the outside in from the high E to the D string and your golden.

Golden

Hope that helps… Sometimes, it is nice just taking a moment to appreciate the old guitar–polish, restring, and reinvent. And, today was restringing day at my place…

Cheers

I’m headed up to my favorite town square this weekend in Georgetown for two nights of music at His and Her Treasures: Friday and Saturday, 7-10PM. They have an awesome patio where everyone will be enjoying fine cigars and a variety of wines (and I researched it to make sure–the plural of wine is wines).

Georgetown is as close as you can get to a Norman Rockwell painting. The town square is anchored by a beautiful courthouse with a massive copper/bronze woman holding the scales of justice adorning the top. Around the square, there are interesting boutique shops and upscale restaurants. On first Fridays, you can hear music floating out into the streets as people stroll and window shop. It is the kind of place a musician loves–you can play classical guitar on Monday, Jazz on Wednesday, and Modern on Friday and Saturday.

Not far from the square, there are some of the raddest little houses–many of them on the historical register. I have been keeping my eye on one house in particular. I have a running affirmation going on in the back of my mind that the universe will some how make it possible to make it mine. The house was built in 1970 and it is the perfect size–you know, a 3 bears kind of thing. It has been rehabbed inside, but just enough to give it some modern flavor without losing its original character. And, it is about a 5 minute walk to the square–so, I could just grab my guitar and walk to shows. That would be cool…like some kind of musician physical fitness program…

Another cool thing, the owner of His and Her Treasures invited me up to meet her friend Kinky Friedman in the beginning of March. I’m really looking forward to that night… I mean he toured with Dylan and hangs out with Willie:-)

Cheers

I would like to thank attorney Tony Alvarado and his business entrepreneurship class for having me out today to speak about Intellectual Property for the Entrepreneur. I had a great time talking about patents and the handling of other intellectual property assets for start-up businesses. The students even gave me some cool gifts–a SEU ball cap and a nice speaker certificate that I will have to put in a frame.

There were a lot of great questions from students. We even covered the waterfront with interesting topics from mash-up artists like Girl Talk to naked licensing. Additionally, the St. Edwards Campus in Austin is absolutely beautiful. I wish I would have known about this hidden gem when I was considering which college to attend. Anyway, to all the creative students in the class, go change the world with cool new inventions and innovative businesses!

Cheers

My good friend Eric Yoder has launched his new site alongside the opening of his fantastic new studio in Chicago. Eric has worked with some of the best in the music business: Etta James, Lauryn Hill, Moby, R. Kelly, Celine Dion…the list goes on…the walls are filled with records showcasing his handiwork. Moreover, Eric has put together an incredible team of Producers, Engineers, Musicians, and Staff that really make the studio world class.

I have known Eric for years now and we have had the good fortune of working together on records and in live settings. Additionally, I was in Chicago checking everything out in January of 2010. My mind was blown by the new digs. Then, I had a blast tracking some new music for Julia Kay on the big board and cranking it on the playback in the studio A. Good times…

Eric and I are working together to further develop his already massive music library. I look forward to hearing from all of the Horse-drawn clients out there. And, if you haven’t checked out his new site, here it is: www.horse-drawnproductions.com.

HDP

This weekend is going to be great…

Look for a bunch of new tracks coming up in the licensing library…

Cheers,

3B

Besides all of the fantastic music that was going on all over Austin with a couple thousand bands (I was not able to see them all), there were some really great talks inside about the crazy business of music. And, no matter how hard we try, we eventually bump into the reality of what is going on with the business.

Anyway, musician folklore reminds us that the pillars who have come before us have also dealt with these issues. Like the statement commonly attributed to Chuck Berry, who supposedly had to have a check in hand before any performance went down and was rumored to have frequently said during the transaction, “No business, no show.” I’m with Chuck on this one…

First, I want to report back about the general consensus regarding music licensing: the pay is down, but there are more opportunities. So, on the aggregate, that is good news. More places for folks to place their music. Or, as Chuck would interpret this: more shows, more business.

Next, I want to delve into the topic of free downloads and piracy. I always find it easier to convert intellectual property issues into real property issues.

If you were a carpenter, and you made a table, and then someone took it from your shop and didn’t pay you for it, would you be mad at them?

What if they just walked by your shop window and sketched the entire table into a blueprint, and then you saw the exact table from the design that you created on the IDEA-KEA showroom floor and in their online shop, except instead of being called YOUR-FRIGGIN’-TABLE, it is called the MALM-ALLMINE…

Would you be mad if you saw three of your laboriously handcrafted table legs on another table, and another carpenter was trying to pass that table off entirely as their work?

Hmmm…it is never as fun with real property…

Here are some cool pics from the big, big show…

Conference Center

Solo Gigs Rock...

Street Scene

Crowding Streets

Punky-B Spotted

Valiant Effort

Charlie Parker Played the Driskill

Horse-Drawn Productions

Is That A Liger?

Street Harp...cool

Day or Night...Music Kept Playing!