Canadian indie label drops CDs, goes all digital

It may be a bit early to pronounce the CD as today's equivalent of the eight-track, but this is yet another small story showing a piece of the overall fading fortunes of the Compact Disc.

Edmonton Journal story

Perhaps 2007 is the year the death of the CD hits its Tipping Point?

cn

Edmonton music venues continue to bite (the dust)

Earlier this year, I posted about how the death of Edmonton's Sidetrack Cafe was a sign of an unhealthy live music scene.

Today, more news about more Edmonton live venues closing up shop. (Edmonton Journal story is here)

The story is actually framed as our live scene getting a rare chance to celebrate some good news - the opening of a new live venue called Blackspot Cafe (I wish them luck, but I'd be lying if I didn't say they have a tough challenge ahead of them).

But the story also references the fact that the University of Alberta longtime live music venue, The Powerplant is closing shop. I've talked about this before, too, but I guess it's official now. Add to this the roof collapse of Urban Lounge (although calling this place a real live venue is debatable - do you love your Top 40 cover bands?) and the before-mentioned loss of the Sidetrack and you've got lots of symptoms pointing to something underneath it all that ain't a good news story for bands and music lovers, no matter how you try and look at it.

Blackspot, even if it does very well, can certainly not be expected to fill the sonic shoes abandoned by these other larger, established venues. (A Stony Plain Road location probably won't help things - I mean you'd hope that if you build something cool, people will come, but apparently U of A students couldn't be bothered to check out the 'Plant and it's on campus for God's sake). Good luck. You're really going to need it.

In the meantime, you can't help but wonder what's next?

cn

Feeding the obsession - synth pop by snail mail

I just received my copies of the new Erasure single I Could Fall In Love With You in the mail yesterday, which I ordered directly from their UK label Mute.

Most music nuts have one or two favourite artists that they become obsessive collectors of, whether it's Charlie Parker, Bob Dylan, the Clash or Human League. I mean you collect everything you can, right? ;-) But there's usually one or two that you get most excited about when you hear "new material" or "upcoming release" used in the same breath as their names. For me the Beatles is one, though I'm sure there won't be much in the way of new material from them. (The Anthology DVDs were very cool, though!)

The other one for me is Erasure. Of all bands that could be classified under the synth-pop tag, Erasure is the one I get the most excited over when a new album comes out. There are other excellent bands that put out music of more substantive, "serious" nature, but there's something about Vince Clarke's synth chops, combined with his and Andy Bell's ear for songwriting and arranging, that always strikes a major chord with me. The songs never tackle controversial topics, politics, or bleak subject matter, yet when I buy an album from a store or get one through the mail, I'm shaking like a kid on Christmas morning until I can put it in the stereo and hit play. My daughter was quite amused watching daddy dance around like a goof last night (though not dance like Andy Bell - it takes a special skill to dance that...flaming. Have you ever watched Erasure live?)

btw - The single is totally cool! The new Erasure album, Light at the End of the World, comes out May 22 in Canada (in theory...)

Got anyone you are a mad collector of, and do the dance of joy when you play a newly acquired piece the first time you play it?

cn

This is a Low...

For the last few weeks I've been working on a video for Low, one of the songs from our upcoming CD/MP3 collection/misc format release. Wow... who knew five minutes of Sims 2 video would take such a long time to "film". Instead of an afternoon of fun it's turned into a monster marathon of time, effort and frustration. Despite that it's been mostly enjoyable. I just hope the end product matches what's in my head.

A dumb tech problem solved, another dumb tech problem arises

I was doing some music track clean-up last weekend, when I tackled a tech problem in my own studio. A couple of weekends ago I went to lay down some real guitar tracks (or in Caffeine Sunday talk, "geets") when I discovered an unexpected problem. No sound from my Korg geet FX box, an AX10G (an amp simulator which sounds absolutely awesome, when it emits sound, but only has a two-digit LED numerical display for showing what's going on inside its head...)

So I sat down in my home studio, with Tracey Thorn's new single thumping away in the background, and started troubleshooting. Bad geet cable? No, the FX box still registered sound because the tuner function still worked fine. Bad cable from FX box to the mixer? Try a new cable. No sound. Funky mixer setting? Try different mixer inputs. No sound. Dead battery causing problems even though the box is using a DC adapter? New battery, unplug adapter. No sound. Etc etc etc......volume knob, different patches with the wah/volume pedal at different positions, try it without the battery.....still nothing.

Finally I saw the little arrow buttons that say "Master" between them. I tried the "arrow up" and the screen value changed from 0 to 1, then 2, 3, and so on. Magic. Sound. I smacked my head, breathed a sigh of relief and proceeded to record some music. Guitar parts for a couple of songs, some synth overdubs on a couple of others. Nice!

However, the old computer monitor I am using with the Mac Mini I use to record with began acting weird during the weekend. When it came on, it sounded like a vintage TV from the '60s or '70s. Once it was just black, and I had to turn it off, then turn it on in order for it to show the computer screen.

Well, tonight, the monitor is completely dead.

I wonder if any amount of troubleshooting will help, or if when it comes to 11-year-old CRT computer monitors, when this happens, I am just plain old screwed?

cn

Door opens on next gen iTunes - no DRM, higher quality files

CBC: EMI unlocks songs sold through Apple's iTunes

Yeeehaw!

It's only one label (but a big one) but it's the start of the next CD-killing wave from digital music distributors like iTunes.

I hope CD Baby is able to work out something similar with iTunes. Caffeine Sunday sells music online via iTunes (and other online services) through CD Baby, so here's hoping that by the time our new album is ready to release, people who want to buy it online can do so in higher-def and without Digital Rights Management.

cn