Bell Mobility's HSPA network brings Internet Radio to the next level

This week marked a turning point for Internet radio - at least in Canada - with the launch of Bell Mobility's HSPA wireless network and the Bell Mobility iPhone. What does this have to do with Internet Radio you ask? In short, everything: As I have repeatedly stated in the past, the biggest obstacle preventing Internet Radio from becoming the de facto radio medium can be summed up by this simple fact: Until people can listen to high quality Internet radio streams uninterrupted in their car when commuting, it will continue to play second fiddle to terrestrial and satellite radio.

Reliability is what's been missing up... until now.

Radio geeks like myself all know that for some time you have been able to listen to Internet radio in your car, even before 3g networks were rolled out. True enough, it has been possible (for at least 5 years now) to listen to Internet radio on the go. But until the 3g networks were launched, you had to listen to a low AM quality stream. Then when the 3g networks were launched it did become possible to listen at high quality - indistinguishable from a CD in sound quality - but with the major caveat that streams tended to drop frequently enough to make the listening experience a bit frustrating, some days worse than others. I myself used to take the bus to work and enjoyed listening to Internet radio, but I always found it annoying when the stream would drop. Some days I would be constantly hitting the reconnect button before giving up and switching back to my iPod music library.

The reason for this is simple: while the Rogers/Fido 3G network was technically capable of supporting high quality streams, it was basically "redlining" the minimum required bandwidth. It's a bit like driving a moped on the freeway: Yes you might legally be able to hit the lower speed limit, but you don't have much room to maneuver if you're being tailgated by bus.

The remedy for this problem is obvious to any iPhone user: Get the cellular network to work as fast as a WiFi hotspot, which almost never drops streams. Listening to Internet radio through WiFi is fantastic, but the second I switch to Rogers/Fido 3G reliability becomes an issue due to the bandwidth requirements.

However, from a carriers perspective there is no easy fix as this requires a tremendous investment to upgrade the network. Bell Mobility has done just this: Upgraded to a shiny new HSPA network that is orders of magnitude faster than the Rogers/Fido network. Fortunately, Bell has also managed to strike a deal with Apple to sell the iPhone which means they've got all bases covered.

Admittedly, as a Rogers customer I can't help but feel that Bell's success leaves me feeling a little envious. Such is life.

So how do I know so much about Bell's new network if I'm a Rogers customer? Full disclosure: I have worked with Bell in the past as an external contractor, and still maintain a professional relationship with the company. As a kind gesture they presented me some preliminary results indicating quite convincingly that Bell's network is orders of magnitude faster than Rogers.

I asked if someone could perform the ultimate Internet radio litmus test which is to tune into a high quality Internet radio station and drive around the city to see how frequently the Internet radio stream was being dropped: Bell vs. Rogers/Fido. While they didn't have time to put together a formal study, they did do some ad hoc tests, and shared the results with me. Apparently the Rogers network dropped the stream "several times" whereas the same stream (Radio Nigel at 128 kbps through QuickTime) never dropped on the Bell network, during a 45 minute driving excursion through various parts of the Greater Toronto Area.

If these claims are true (and I have no reason to doubt these guys), this would indicate Bell has crossed a significant threshold for Internet radio listeners. From what it appears, users on the Bell HSPA network should be able to listen to Internet radio uninterrupted whenever they get into their car and drive to and from work. Not only is this more enjoyable - it's safer! The less I'm likely to fiddle with my iPhone to reconnect to streams, the less likely I am to be distracted and get into an accident. I am optimistic that these claims will be proven out through more testing, not to mention customer testimonials.

That said, I encourage my readers to find out for themselves.

Going ahead, I have asked Bell if they could provide controlled tests to better quantify:
1. How reliable is streaming 128 kbps streams through the iPhone 3G and 3Gs, respectively?
2. How long on average does it take to connect to a 128 kbps when tuning in on the iPhone 3G and 3Gs, respectively?

It's still the first week of their launch, but from what I've seen I'm beginning to believe that the HSPA network has upped the ante for Internet radio, and quite possibly laid the infrastructure making it possible to lift Internet radio out of the realm of geeks, and truly democratize the medium.

Exciting times! Stay TUN3D...

INTERVIEW: Cyr3n and Dekker Deyer on the newly launched 8Bit FM

Video games have been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. My earliest memories are when I was 6 or 7 and my parents took us up to a family resort in The Muskokas called Cleveland's House. In the main lodge they had a table-top version of Space Invaders. Back then my weekly allowance was a quarter a week, but my dad always treated me to a game after dinner every night. It was a nice way to end a long summer's day.

Later, I discovered the Atari 2600 (liked it), the Intellivision (loved it), and the ColecoVision (determined I needed it to "complete me" and never stopped asking for it till I got one for Christmas). Later I moved over to an Apple IIc, and then a few years later a Sega Master System which my parents bought me as a goal reward for losing weight as a teenager (well, it got me there, and back again). I then pretty much stuck with PC games till about 2 years ago when I bought a Nintendo Wii - mainly out of curiousity about its new controls. I also had a few GameBoys, and play games on my iPhone occassionally. At one point in my life I was probably something of a "hardcore" gamer and would construct maps of dungeons for games like The Bard's Tale using pencil and some graph paper. I have fond memories of playing Smurf, Q*bert, Buck Rogers Planet of Zoom, and BC II: Grog's Revenge with Jamie and Jeff for the Coleco. Great memories playing Shark-Shark, Frog Bog, Utopia, and Bump 'n' Jump for the Intellivision with my buddy Aaron. I always loved those text adventures like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and Bureaucracy (anyone remember Miser for the PET), and later all those Sierra "Quest" games - wish people would make more games like these. I loved all those "shrimp kid" games like Wonder Boy and Kid Niki for the Apple II, and was possibly addicted to Phantasy Star (the SMS swan song). In my twenties when I lived in Copenhagen, a favourite Sunday passtime was smoking cigarettes, drinking coffee, and playing Command & Conquer: Red Alert in the various net cafes around the city, followed up by a few rounds of Unreal, and a little BomberMan. These days I mainly play Mario Kart Wii, and consider myself a basic simpleton in the gaming world - but I kind of get a kick out of 8 year old kids passionately advising me on which character I should use in games like Super Smash Bros. Brawl. (Ike is where it's at apparently).

Why am I telling you this? Well, an e-mail came across my desk last week for a new station called 8bit FM - the new brainchild of producer/director couple Dekker Deyer and Cyr3n (Julia Howe). In short, if you - like me - see video games as a part of the social fabric, then this is our soundtrack. While I must pay respect to stations like All-Games Radio, and Slay Radio: Stations which play [among other things] music from video games; 8Bit FM is distinguished in that it plays both retro video game video game music but also music borne out of the culture of game music. I've been listening for over a week now and in summary I would say that its rotations are very tightly and professional programmed - but will need to work expanding it's playlist. If you were to pipe 8bit FM at a party for a slightly geekey Gen-X/Y crowd, I'm certain it would be well received.

In spite of 8bit FM's retro name and inspiration, there's something futuristic about the stream. I am so very fortunate to have Cyr3n and Dekker participate in this interview.

Q1 Neil: Dekker I know a little about your backround from your Wikipedia page, but for the benefit of our readers, what is your career background? Is it true your parents were travelling puppeteers? What was that like?

A1 Dekker: Ha! Well, I don't actually get asked about that much. It was fun. I was very young, and an only child. My mother would tell me the puppets were my brothers and sisters. They were very large. It was... eerie, but just part of growing up in an artistic family.

Q2 Neil: Julia (Cyr3n), what's your background? How did 8bit FM get started?

A2 Cyr3n: 8Bit//FM is probably a closer match to what I do in my day-to-day than Dekker's bag! =D I've been an independant game developer and gamer for years. My first major project was "Rubies of Eventide" mmorpg where my role was scoring original background music. Simultaneously, I was running a terminal-mode BBS system for Cyber Warrior Inc's Internet Service Provider, known as Cyberwar ISP to the '201' folks. Since then, I've worked as a Game Producer on 2 other mmorpg titles, and am now the Community Manager for Vogster Entertainment's larger than life PC game title "CrimeCraft".


Q3 Neil: 8bit FM feels like a new concept - something more than just retro video game music. For example, some segues between tracks have a punchy anime quality. Occasionally I hear some dude who sounds like Dennis Hopper (from Blue Velvet after inhaling nitrous oxide) say "This is MC Frontalot you're listening to 8bit fm." Different. I like it!. How would you describe 8bit FM's concept and vision?

A3 Dekker: MC Frontalot is amazing! It's about artists like him. It's about artists like BitShifter and Glomag. I was appearing at an anime convention where these guys were performing and I was blown away. I'd seen MC Frontalot at a private party for G4 a year earlier and a comedian I worked with on a show named Kimmy Gatewood had made a documentary about him even before that. When I saw him performing with these lunatics playing music on Gameboys I was hooked. That's when I knew that the game music, the chiptunes, and the nerdcore hip-hop could work together in a lineup.

Chiptune artists have become the breakout stars of the station. Chip music is this generation's punk rock. It's people using these low-tech tools to make amazing sounds. At a chiptune show you can feel this thick magnetic energy. We needed to bring this to as large an audience as possible.

A3 Cyr3n: Dekker's summed it up pretty well but I'd just like to add that as a gamer girl, the crowd this music draws is very nonjudgemental. It's all about coming out of the game closet and having fun with people who share a common hobby with you without awkward introductions. One thing that stands out about chiptune events in particular is the lack of "chicken-hawks" and creepy dudes looking to hook up with drunken co-eds. You don't have that element here. Everyone's primarily here to support their friends, dance, and have a good time!


Q4 Neil: You refer to a "nerdcore" as a type of music on your site. What is nerdcore, and who are the major players?

A4 Dekker: Nerdcore is just another flavor of hip-hop. It speaks to people who love sci-fi, comics, video games, anime... it crosses so many themes... but it's about a lifestyle. Most people probably heard nerdcore for the first time on Adult Swim's show Sealab 2021. MC Chris was working at Williams Street and started laying down tracks about things that were insane at the time, like Star Wars characters. He got the genre a lot of exposure, but there are so many artists doing it. It's real. It's from the heart. This doesn't speak to a subculture, it speaks to the mainstream, they just might not realize it yet. There's even a concert, Nerdapalooza, happening in Orlando this year.

A4 Cyr3n: What can I say... "Nerdcore" is like the cooler hipper younger brother of "Filk" that got all the good genes! There have been mainstream artists in the past who've peppered their works with encrypted nerdy lines, brief homages to their favorite video games and comic book heros. But that doesn't make them nerdcore. To qualify, one has to be part of that cadre of hip-hop artists who are openly rhyming about geeky topics, have a history of doing so, and self-identifying themselves as "nerds". The power players who are getting the most requests on our station are MC Frontalot, MC Chris, MC Hawking, and Optimus Rhyme.


Q5 Neil: I've heard of bands like the "The Minibosses", and travelling orchestras like "Video Games Live" and "Play! A Video Game Symphony". Do you see these as one-off gimicks, or are we seeing a growing proliferation of bands reinterpreting classic video game music?

A5 Dekker: Actually, I got an email from Tommy Tallarico the other day. He's a certified bad @$$ and one of the composers behind Video Games Live. He's been really supportive. Bands like The OneUps have also really embraced the outlet, and I'm glad that we're able to help open up a new venue for this kind of stuff. I don't think it's about "video game music" as some kind of a genre, I think it's all MUSIC which just happens to be composed for games. Games gave us new sounds. It wasn't just guitars. It was strange and we grew up on it. As the games became more complex so did the music we played them to. That evolution is hard-wired into everyone that played Nintendo as a kid. It's about hearing elements of the familiar and using that as a launching pad to something even more exotic.

A5 Cyr3n: Oh yea, I think its here to stay. Why is it that weird though.. Considering music from other origins get remixed and played by cover bands? Maybe people are looking at it as a gimmick because its "game" music and not generally accepted as music for music's sake? As a person with a musical background I don't find game music getting redone as orchestral or chiptunes as weird. Bards will always find a way to make music no matter what the medium =)

I guess what's striking people on the outside of this movement as strange is how connected people are to their video games. But it's not that hard to imagine when the average RPG game can take longer to complete than reading a book. Compared to other forms of entertainment like a movie or a play, you're interacting with a game not just passively observing it. So all things considered, a classic game tune from your past can summon massive feelings of nostalgia. One's associative memory has strong somatic-markers linking childhood with classic video games... especially for our 25+ crowd.


Q6 Neil: I discovered this addictive remix of the Super Mario pipe music - a track called "Super Mario Bros (RAC Mix)". I couldn't find anywhere to buy it. Where do you get this stuff from? Is it possible to buy?

A6 Dekker: It's tough! We have people scrubbing the internet looking for these remixes and new artists. It's still kind of an underground scene. Some of the soundtracks and remixes are available as Japanese imports. In Japan it's been common practice to sell the music of a particular game, especially if it's a series, in record stores for decades. A feature that we're trying to add is a way to track down these albums for purchase and we're going to roll that out as soon as it's ready.

A6 Cyr3n: We're getting new artists into the request catalogue as quickly as our monkey-fingers can handle! Some of our artists are published with fans, others are emerging from the underground scene with their own style. It's a welcome challenge from our end to serve the needs of artists on both sides of the spectrum. Our primary goal with 8Bit FM is to give artists more exposure and help generate numbers self-publishers can work with.


Q7 Neil: Getting back to the original composers (most of whom I assume are Japanese), who are the titans? Do you have any favourites?

A7 Dekker: I'm going to go out on a limb and say Kōji Kondō. His compositions have proven to be so versatile while maintaining an iconic sound. Super Mario Brothers, Legend of Zelda, Pilot Wings, Star Fox... his sound is haunting. You can play it with a heavy beat, you can orchestrate it... you can rip it apart and chunk it back together and it still sounds like Kōji Kondō. There's an album we've been playing as nerdcore called The Ocarnia of Rhyme which features artists like Snoop Dog. It uses samples from Legend of Zelda games almost exclusively. It's a perfect example of Kondō's modular music.

A7 Cyr3n: Growing up in Japan, my favorite video game composers hands down are Koichi Sugiyama (Dragon Quest series) and Yasunori Mitsuda (Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross). They take their craft very seriously and really know how to match the mood of their music to their games' visuals. I think the Japanese game studios put a great importance in the quality of sound and music .. moreso than other studios in that era. These days its undeniable how music and sound are key in establishing real emotional value in video games.


Q8 Neil: A common question that comes up in video game circles is whether or not a video game will ever be art in the same way a movie or book is. I go back and forth on this one. How do you see video games in this regard?

A8 Cyr3n: There are many genres of video games these days and some are easier to promote as 'art' than others for different reasons. Games are multidisciplinary endeavors and I don't think the merits of their art department alone can define whether a game is aesthetic or artful. I think the best litmus test is what the game's output is in terms of end user experience. Like all art, its in the eye of the beholder.


Q9 Neil: Is there an 8bit FM theme song/anthem? If not, then what would it be?

A9 Dekker: We're not playing favorites! This is why we have the Top 20! All requests weigh into the Top 20, so make sure you request the tracks you like to hear. Right now Antenna by New York chiptune artist Bitshifter is in the top slot.

A9 Cyr3n: 8Bit//FM is trully the sum of its ever evolving parts! Like the music we play, everything is in motion.


Q10 Neil: Dekker, Julia: Thanks so much for doing this TUN3R interview. What's in store for the future of 8bit.fm? Dekker, Julia, I know you've got a ton of irons in the fire? What else are you working on?

A10 Dekker: I'm gearing up to shoot a horror movie this summer, which I can't talk about yet. But after that I'm slated to shoot a series a created with actor Phil Morris called Emissary. It's a gritty super hero show that has other great guys involved like Aaron Douglas from Battlestar Galactica and Brian Thompson, one of the scariest (and funniest) actors I've had the pleasure to meet.

A10 Cyr3n: I'm primarily working on CrimeCraft, which is now taking closed-beta applications. Anyone who wants to play a totally new genre PC game should head on over to crimecraft.com and fill that bad boy out! For Mnemosyne, we just released a new client for "Rubies of Eventide" with some snazzy new content and "Tentacle Grape" is doing purty well for being a hentai soda brand (probably because we're the ONLY hentai soda brand) but I nerdgress.. 8BIT//FM is poised to make a huge splash this year and we intend to promote the hell out of it! The party calendar on 8bitfm.com is looking ram-jammed with events this Summer so that's definately a destination to bookmark.

Thank you for taking the time to interview us! It's a pleasure being part of the Tun3r network and we look forward to watching the chiptune and nerdcore genres grow with your listeners' support.

-cyr3n

INTERVIEW: Television Columnist Rick McGinnis on TV, Radio, Newspapers, and the Future of The Media Establishment

For anyone who knows me, I've always been a fan of public transit. Whenever I travel to a new city I always make a point to check out their subway or commuter train. We're also a one-car family. So needless to say I rely on public transit for my daily commute.

Starting about 10 years ago, a free daily showed up called "The Metro", which was distributed around most Toronto subway stations. I must admit at first I avoided the paper as I saw it as an affront to quality journalism

(this was before Fox News, so my concerns seem quaint now). One day, after looking at the same subway ad for the zillionth time, I decided I needed to divert my attention and reluctantly picked up a copy that was lying next to me. The paper is in tabloid form and is clearly designed to be consumed in a single commuter trip. Most news articles are presented as "snacks" rather than a "meals". Nevertheless, The Metro does employ some writers who clearly take pride in their work and strive to create something that people actually look forward to reading.

Rick McGinnis exemplifies this. His television column - "The Idiot Box", rebranded, "Intellivision" - was not only my favourite Metro column, but also one of my favourite columns in general (up there with Roger Ebert's writing). His droll sense of humour grounded in humility was coupled with a sincere interest in the medium of television. These qualities really made his columns resonate in the post Pulp Fiction/Simpsons era. Rick spoke to the modern audience: The audience that can both appreciate pop culture on the surface non-ironically, but also enjoys peeling back the facade to dissect the underlying mechanics and manipulations. While for some this may seem to blur the line between "laughing at" and "laughing with", I feel this approach is actually more egalitarian and inclusive in its nature.

Two months ago when Rick's column stopped appearing in The Metro, I at first thought he was just on vacation. Then after a couple weeks went by I got worried and Googled his name. That's when I found his blog "Life With Father" and discovered that he was "downsized" due to the recession. I must admit, it was one of the most surreal media experience I've ever had. I had been reading his column for all these years in paper form, and now with barely missing a beat, I was continuing to read Rick's daily musings through my iPhone... still on the bus to my office in east Scarborough.

It occurred to me then, that Rick might have some time for a TUN3R interview. While many of us are familiar with Rick's take on television, I thought this would be a good opportunity to explore his music and radio side. Enter Mr. McGinnis...

Q1 Neil: Rick, thanks very much for taking some time for this interview! To get things started, how long had you been writing the television column in The Metro? What was the best part of the job? The worst?

A1 Rick: I wrote the column for just over four years - 500 daily columns as Tube Talk, the original name of the column when I took it over, then 523 as Idiot Box, the name I came up with, and the one I always preferred. At some point last year our publisher and new editor decided that they wanted to change the name, claiming that they thought Idiot Box "insulted the readers." Frankly, I always assumed that everybody would guess that the idiot was the guy writing the column, but you really can't do much for the irony-challenged. They held an internal contest at the office for someone to come up with a new name, and Intellivision won, but before we could use it, the lawyers started fretting about infringement with whoever owns Coleco's trademarks, so it was slightly changed to Intellevision, which is a pretty bad pun any way you look at it. I wrote 136 columns under the name before I got laid off, along with all of the other reporters at the paper.

I guess that was the worst part of the job - working hard on turning an afterthought column into something worth reading, dealing with people who didn't really get it, building up a readership and then getting canned. There's no positive spin you can put on that kind of experience. Apart from that, I guess it was the increasingly tight word counts - 375 per column on average by the end - though any good journalist should consider that a challenge, I suppose. It made me a tighter, more concise writer, I'm sure, though I'm quickly squandering that skill with the blog, which lets me write at New Yorker magazine lengths.

The best thing was having to analyze, over a long period of time, my relationship with television, which had always been a big part of my life, even though I really didn't watch if for about 15 years - roughly from when I started college to the point in my mid-30s when my wife moved in with me. I watched a lot - A LOT - of television when I was a kid, and to some degree my conception of TV remained locked in place in the late '70s, when the big three networks were still unquestionably the industry monoliths, though cable was starting up, and all these small, local, specialty players were starting to nip at their heels.

Obviously a lot had changed by the time I started writing the column in early 2004, and I had to get up to speed pretty quickly. I started with the usual prejudices - reality TV was bad, a successful show had to pull pre-cable network numbers in the multiple millions, TV was an inferior medium to the movies - and had them all swept away in quick succession. It was, really, an exciting time to be writing about TV.

Q2 Neil: In your blog "Life with Father", you argue that there is no such thing as a Golden Age of Television, or rather today is the Golden Age. Do you think the same applies to music and radio?

A2 Rick: I think there have been patently more exciting, interesting eras for movies, music, maybe even books - definitely newspapers and magazine journalism - but TV has actually always been in the process of getting better. Of all these media, it's the one whose fate is tied most closely to technological progress, and all the technologies relevant to television have been surging ahead over the decades since it was invented, which has only widened the possibilities for what TV can accomplish.

Everything from broadcast quality to the sets and recievers themselves, not to mention the internet explosion and digital file-sharing, has made TV better, more integral to the way we live, in a way that movies, for instance, can't quite match. Everyone in the movie industry complains that the time constraints - the 2-3 hours maximum that a mainstream audience will tolerate sitting still to watch a film - necessarily reduce the scope of what they can do with story and character, but now that TV looks as good as the movies, the distinction between the two has been made irrelevant.

The way people consume TV also gives it an edge. Until recently, movies were an event - you had to go somewhere to enjoy them, and you paid to rent your seat for the duration of the program, with extra cash paid for food and drink. You watch TV at home, in a space you own, with your own food, and a bathroom without lineups that's as clean as you want it to be. The atmosphere is far more comfortable, so it's not surprising that people will spend a whole weekend at home devouring, say, a season of 24 - something they'd never really think to do with movies, which in any case are still limited by the duration and economics of the theatrical experience.

Of course, home video has taken film out of the theatrical venue, but it's too late - actors have realized that, if they can get on a series that really clicks, they can have the luxury of an audience, a longer character arc than they could dream of with a film, and something like a steady paycheque. In the long run, I can imagine the distinction between movies and TV blurring and ultimately dissolving - there's just no good reason that it wouldn't.

If it seems like the golden age of radio and music has passed, it's probably because circumstances have changed in the way we've consumed both of those. The golden age of radio as a technology was probably in the '30s and '40s, when it was the fastest and most modern of communications technologies, but its cultural golden age probably came later, when AM top 40 radio was literally an expression of the tastes of the baby boomers who made top 40 - and the music industry - wildly profitable.

It's a simple matter of demographics - any medium that serves such a huge, largely homogenous group will appear vital and timely. The Beatles are still the most famous group in the world because, for at least a decade or more, they were the favorite group of the majority of a huge demographic bulge. Even today, they're the gold standard for success for a musical group, though it's almost impossible that another group will ever duplicate their influence or impact.

I actually think that's a good thing. Any cultural phenomenon so overwhelming is a bit scary to me - like a demagogue, or a political movement. The balkanization of musical taste has been hell for the musical industry, but I think it's made the proverbial thousand flowers bloom. Ten years ago I would have thought that every band would be making music on laptops today, but the music scene is full of young bands playing acoustic instruments in the most arcane combinations, singing multipart harmonies. The irony, of course, is that all this creativity playing to small but loyal audiences is happening past the far fringes of commercial radio, which has come to rely on formats like talk, or that muzak-like "hit radio" formula that's so general it actually appeals to no one in particular.

Q3 Neil: Are there lessons from the current trials and tribulations of the television industry that could be applied to the music industry and/or the radio industry? Were the television networks even to blame for their own decline?

A3 Rick: Oh, they were certainly to blame. They were able to guess that digital video files were as easily copied and shared as music files, and they've tried to avoid repeating the mistakes the music industry made by ignoring the changes for too long, then trying to litigate them into submission after it was far, far too late. But what they didn't quite see was how the broadcast TV model - which hasn't appreciably changed since the creation of commercial radio in the '20s and '30s - was becoming utterly irrelevant to their viewers. It isn't 1936 or 1956 anymore - people don't rush home to park themselves in front of the Stromberg Carlson or the DuMont to catch the latest Rudy Vallee with Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy, or I Love Lucy.

The PVR was the mp3 player of this transformation, and it caught on because people wanted convenience, and they got it in a technology that refined what VCRs and cassette tapes had offered, but in a far less sophisticated user experience. I just don't think the broadcast TV model has any life left in it, and the sooner the industry gets it the better.

The sooner they move from the scheduled broadcast model to the marketplace one the better for everyone. For instance, by June of this year the first leaks of the fall's TV pilots will start hitting the file-sharing networks, either put out there surreptitiously by the shows' producers to build buzz, or by people from all the points in the production chain - PR assistants, interns, staff at editing, duping and mastering facilities - who can get their hands on a screener DVD and slip it into their computer and out onto the net. I had the pilots for Life On Mars and True Blood weeks and months before they aired, and for the life of me I couldn't understand why the networks were waiting to air these shows when they had them in the can already.

No one thinks the strictly delineated fall TV season makes sense anymore, but it persists regardless, mostly because it's hard to get the industry to break from their stasis. It's partly laziness, partly fear, and partly the unwillingness of any single competitor to break out and do something new while everyone else nervously strains at the starting blocks, unwilling to try something that might fail, or might work spectacularly, or at least become something that works with some refinement forged by the market.

Q4 Neil: On a related note, do you believe that now that big media giants are beginning to crumble that we're seeing or going to see an increase in quantity, but a decline in quality?

A4 Rick: Not at all. Smaller players like AMC have produced shows as good or better than their competitors, and as long as you can spot talent - and get it to come up with an idea that doesn't, for instance, require you to build ancient Rome on a studio lot in Italy - you can make a show that people will want to watch. Digital technology has made cinematic sci-fi possible on TV, but TV's strength has always been attracting young, hungry talent willing to work long and hard to make their name, right from the early days of TV when New York was producing intense chamber dramas in tiny studios with all these Broadway and method names, or budding talents like Paddy Chayefsky and John Frankenheimer.

Frankly, I can't see why someone can't make a really compelling show with a consumer video camera, freeware video editing software and a YouTube account. It's certainly been anticipated for a few years now, though the fact that it hasn't happened doesn't mean it won't.

And besides, as the big media players start shedding staff and productions, they'll be freeing up people who - if they're at all serious about what they want to do - will want to do it wherever they can, and not just under the umbrella of a big, lumbering - and frequently interfering - media conglomerate's production arm.

Q5 Neil: A bit off topic for radio, but I have to ask. What ever happenedto the sitcom? It seems like a pinnacle was reached with Seinfeld, and we've never been able to reclaim that high ground. Is there a reason why this once popular genre seems to be stagnant?

A5 Rick: The genre just got tired. I assume you're talking about the 3-camera, "live" audience and laugh track sitcom. Don't forget that they still make them, and that one of them - Two And A Half Men - is still one of the most popular shows on network TV, even if it gets no critical love. There's definitely nothing now like the "golden age" of the sitcom - roughly the '70s, with shows like Mary Tyler Moore, Bob Newhart, Barney Miller and - though I'm not a fan - Norman Lear's shows.

It was a long, slow decline for the genre after that, at the end of which Seinfeld was a freakish little renaissance all on its own, mostly because it was such an ironic, knowing take on the sitcom, and one that assumed that the audience was perfectly aware of the traditional sitcom's inherent flaws, which Seinfeld both spoofed and defied. But it was a death blow to the genre, I think, and good riddance.

Q6 Neil: Getting back on topic. Growing up, what radio stations did you listen to? What kind of music were you into? How have your tastes changed?

A6 Rick: I grew up with this sort of schizophrenic radio experience as a kid - my brother and sister had CHUM AM and the top 40 music of the '60s, and my mom's was devoted to CHFI, which was on a total MOR "Music of your life" format, playing everything from James Last and Andre Kostelanetz to Sinatra and Tony Bennett and old big band swing and light classical. I still listen to most of that stuff today - well, maybe not the Last and Kostelanetz.

And then in the '70s I discovered my own taste - prog and FM album rock at first on CHUM FM, then punk and new wave on CKLN, which was broadcasting out of Brampton then, I think. Punk rock was really my music - the first music that I really owned, and wasn't passed down to me by my mom or siblings. I loved it - still do - but I quickly learned that most of it was wildly uncommercial stuff that even an FM maverick station like CKLN wouldn't play. If you wanted to listen to punk rock, you either made a lot of money and collected every record you could find, or you traded tapes with friends - or made friends with people who had the huge collections. If only we'd had file-sharing back then!

In fact, the single largest iTunes playlist I have is my punk rock one - over 20GB, and growing all the time. Almost everything on it was recorded between 1976 and 1982, and it's the soundtrack of my youth, albeit idealized, as if I'd grown up all over the U.S. and Europe, and picked up hundreds of singles a week in every record shop I'd find. I listen to a lot of music - jazz, old blues, prog rock, indie, ethnic (not "world") music. I have gigabytes of '60s garage music; are you aware how many little bands in the U.S. were printing nasty little singles on tiny little regional labels between 1965 and '68? The Beatles might have made a lot of people pick up guitars, but most of then ended up sounding like the Seeds, or ? and the Mysterians.

It was this kind of connoisseurship and packrat collecting that made writing about music the most natural choice when I left school, and I did that for years, until I burned out. I used to think it was unique, but there were obviously a lot more people who hoarded music and created their own radio stations using mix tapes and trading, creating a need for custom music experiences in the absence of the technology that would make it possible. Basically, I've been waiting for an iPod all my life (though I actually prefer the Zune.)

Q7 Neil: Have you ever listened to Internet DJ-mixed radio (e.g. Radio Paradise) or custom radio (e.g. Last.fm, Pandora, Jango)? Where does most of the music you listen to come from?

A7 Rick: I used to listen to the channels on Live365, and we have an XM satellite radio in the kitchen, where the family is together most of the time, but most of my music is downloaded, from iTunes, band and record label online stores, or file-sharing sites for obscure and out-of-print stuff, and I hear about new things - current bands or obscure old music - from mp3 blogs, which are the greatest thing out there for a music fan, as far as I'm concerned.

I discovered great new bands - Fleet Foxes, My Mourning Jacket, The Black Keys - thanks to mp3 blogs, most of whom got the tracks from the bands, as previews for albums, with permission to make them available for promo. When you find an mp3 blog run by someone whose taste you trust - something like Sound Bites, SirensSound, The Unblinking Ear or Milk Milk Lemonade - it's as good, or better, than reading Rolling Stone or Creem or Spin or Maximum Rock and Roll back in the day.

Tivoli loaned me one of their PAL internet radios to review last year, and we had it in the kitchen. It was great - the selection of stations was better than decent, there was a lot of variety, and the sound was fantastic. I love internet radio, but its lack or portability compared to, say, a plain old car radio would be a big drawback for most people and their radio habits. It's a technology issue, though, not a content one. People want more variety and choice in what they can listen to, and that need's being addressed very creatively - the technology will follow, I'm sure.

Q8 Neil: Recently, CBC Radio 2 has undergone a transformation from a mainly Classical Music station, to a station that plays a more eclectic music - sometimes indie pop music. Traditional CBC Radio 2 listeners got angry and felt that the programming consists of music that is "ephemeral" (note to readers: CBC Radio 2 also launched 4 Internet streams, one of which is classical, so it's only the FM broadcast that's been impacted.) My question isn't so much whether or not CBC made the right decision - although I'm interested in your opinion on that - but do you think the Canadian government, or any government have an obligation to intervene and shape culture? What should the government's role be in this regard?

A8 Rick: Government should get out of the culture business as much as possible. There's really no other way for me to answer this question. I think that the CBC is in a great position right now to get out of the business of competing with commercial television networks like CTV and Global - and the U.S. networks that they share the dial with, and compete pointlessly with for audiences.

I agree with Colby Cosh, a columnist at the National Post, who wrote a few weeks ago that the CBC should get off the airwaves and go online. Newsworld might make sense as a bare-bones news channel that commissions some original content but mostly licences news and documentary programming from other English-speaking countries, but a CBC that tries to pretend it's a player in the same league as CTV - or ABC or NBC - is an expensive joke. I think TV programming will go online eventually, so why can't we enhance our national prestige by leading the way?

I actually think CBC Radio is in more viable, but I think they should pare down to one, very basic national station focused on news, weather, and the most politically neutral current affairs programing possible. It sounds unexciting, but providing the country with the most utilitarian radio service imaginable is the essence of their mission. The rest of their programming - all the music and arts and cultural chat show stuff - should go into internet radio channels and podcasts.

I used to work in a record store classical music department back in the '80s, when classical music aficionados were replacing their LPs with CDs, after which the classical market collapsed. It's a niche musical interest, and it's most economically served by small, local broadcasters in cities, not a national, publicly funded radio network.

Basically, I just don't think you can legislate culture, or fund an audience into existence. We've been doing it for years, and there's never been any kind of unqualified success story; the movie industry has been an exercise in producing films for the smallest possible audiences, and CanCon regulations in music have become completely irrelevant in the internet age. We have to grow up, and the first thing we have to do is shed these old, counterproductive habits and assumptions about building culture, which barely made sense forty years ago, and have become anachronisms today.

Q9 Neil: Obligatory question: If you could have had a theme song for your Metro television column, what would it have been? Actually, make that two: One for "Idiot Box" and one for "Intellivision".

A9 Rick: No question - T.V. Eye by the Stooges: "I got a TV. You got a TV. We all got TVs. Big fucking deal." Words to live by. In a more sophisticated mood, "TV Is The Thing" by Dinah Washington.


Q10 Neil: Apart from typical freelance work, do you have any larger or personal projects in the works?


A10 Rick: I'm trying to get a couple of book projects going, and I have the usual unfinished novel in my desk drawer. Newspapers certainly aren't hiring these days, so whatever freelancing I do will likely be more online than anything else, which I'm actually excited about. Most of my reading happens online, so I can't see why I shouldn't be working there. It's a strange, anxious time in my business right now, though - no one knows where things are going, and I'm thinking that the fewer assumptions I have, the better.

TUN3R's Top 10 Pop Hooks in Rotation from 2008

One of the things I'm always on the lookout for is the next addictive Pop Hook. Pop Hook's by their nature tend to be ephemeral and can be annoying after a while. I once heard a story that George Harrison wrote the song "I've got my mind set on you" to prove that it's trivial to write an addictive Pop Hook. Harrison actually never wrote the song (it was written by Rudy Clark), but to me, that's like Albert Einstein saying that science is easy if you just give it a shot. But I sort of get Harrison's point. What I will say is this: in the same way that Tom Hanks and Brad Pitt tend to have access to better scripts than say Christian Slater, many big pop stars tend to have access to better Pop Hooks than your average performer. But there's something Darwinian about Top 40 charts which allows so many unknowns to appear, and in fact I would say that the Top 40 depends on an unending stream of "One Hit Wonders" to consistently engage listeners.

Although I'm not a Musicologist by training, I reckon that the first person who could regularly crank out Top 40 Pop Hooks was Johann Sebastian Bach. In an interview in Wired magazine, Brian Eno put forth the argument that "structured" music was necessary during the baroque and classical eras because you might only be able to attend a live performance once in a lifetime and would want to get your money's worth. He went on to point out that Jazz music was only possible through the invention of the phonograph because it was possible to listen to the same piece of music several times over, and thus begin to appreciate its nuance. To prove his point, he placed a tape recorder at a busy urban intersection and recorded 20 minutes of audio. He listened to the tape at least 50 times and noticed that what previously sounded random began to sound structured. It's cool stuff, but today I'm here to talk about Pop Hooks, and lay out my list.

What makes a great Pop Hook? I don't think there are any hard and fast rules, but I'll list a few basic criteria:

1. You should derive enjoyment the first, second, or third time listening to the song.
   
2. You should be able to listen to it at least 50 times before growing sick of it.
3. Young children should also be able to appreciate the melody.
4. There should be some aspect that is unique and distinguished to the Hook. Many Pop Hooks sound recycled from previous songs, and are already spent by the first listen.
   
5. Often a Pop Hook benefits from a unique dovetailing of the singer's voice with the melody. As such, Pop Hook's can even emerge from unlikely sources like Ozzy Osborne. You can't separate "Crazy Train"s melody from Ozzy's voice. To do so would surely undermine its Pop Hook.
6. The Pop Hook is in a way modular, and can be easily repurposed into other genres, such as: uptempo dance music. You'll often hear baroque and classical melodies repurposed into modern dance and hip hop songs.
7. In rare circumstances, lyrics and the story behind them can drive a Pop Hook.
   

If you're hunting for Pop Hook's, a good place to go is the Dance Hit stations. Stations that stand out for me are: Energy 98, iPartyRadio, Maxxima, and Lolliradio Dance. If you're more into alternative music, an excellent station is Pig Radio which really stands on its own, but Soma's Indie Pop Rocks! ain't bad either. And I would be remiss not to mention both Luxuria and Soma's Illinois Street Lounge which live in a parallel Pop Hook universe. But this is only a tiny smattering of picks, and many other similarly excellent stations are out there which I haven't listed (but feel free to ask me).

Without further ado I present to you my picks for Top 10 Pop Hooks in rotation from 2008:

Ten: Because I Love you (September)
What is it about Scandinavian singers and world class Pop Hooks, I'll never know. Actually, having lived in Copenhagen for 3 years, I do have some theories which I'll blog about another time. In this department, honourable mention should go to Lucky by Lucky Twice which would be on this list if there was enough room, but there's not. Better luck next time Lucky Twice.

Nine: Just Dance (Lady GaGa & Colby O'Donis)
This is probably the most recognizable song on this list, and some of you may be sick of hearing this song by now. Sure it's been overplayed, but I still enjoy it. While many songs with great Pop Hooks struggle to fill time between the Hook, this song never feels like it's killing any time. It's what I admire about great bands like The Beatles, The Pixies, Nirvana, and The Strokes.

Eight: The Longest Road (Morgan Page remixed by Daedmus)
There's a line in the movie "The Blues Brothers" where Belushi and Akyroyd arrive at a bar they are scheduled to play at. They ask the owner what kind of music they normally play. She responds by saying: "We play both kinds of music: Country and Western." It's a joke, but I've always wondered if there is an element of truth to it. Is there such a thing as "Western music" that is distinct from "Country Music". I dunno. But if there was, I would peg The Longest Road as one of the best "Western" songs I've ever heard. In fact the very first time I heard this song on the radio, I paused and thought "Wow! That's a very cool sound I haven't quite heard before." I once drove from San Francisco to Toronto, and this song reminds me of driving through the stretches through Nevada and Utah.

Seven: 4 AM (Kaskade)
As anyone who knows me, Blade Runner is one of my favourite movies of all time. The soundtrack by Vangelis is untouchable. As Moby described it:

The contrast makes it: a relentlessly gritty film with this ethereal music on top of it. Without the music, the movie would have been good. But with the music, it was close to perfect.

While I hesitate to compare Kaskade to Vangelis, there is something very Blade Runner-esque about 4 AM that appeals to me. In fact, if you were to replace the end credit song of Blade Runner with this one (perhaps in some new Full/Alternate/Fan/Directors Cut), I wouldn't take offence.

Six: The One (Sharam & Daniel Bedingfield)
Award goes to The One for the least time wasted to get to the Pop Hook. What is it about male falsetto singers and Pop Hooks? I once saw a movie called Farinelli about a Castrato singer (of the same name). That's right, there was a time where people would sacrifice having children to achieve the perfect voice. We don't have Castrati singers anymore, and the best grown men can do is a falsetto voice. There may be some hope for us Castrati deprived listeners. I recently read that researchers in Turkey have located a puberty gene, and there are actually rare instances of people who can never hit puberty. Hey, where there's crisis there's opportunity.

Five: Sensual (PhonJaxx)
If you enjoy listening to music while having sex, you may appreciate this song.

Four: Underneath (Alanis Morissette - remixed by Morgan Page)
One of the more substantial songs on this list. Alanis has one of those incredibly versatile voices that has its own ability to generate Pop Hooks. Morgan Page's remix nicely re-frames the wonderful Hooks in this richly textured song.

Three: What You Got (Colby O'Donis featuring Akon)
This song is grounded in its narrative and lyrics. From a pure melody perspective there are better songs on this list, but what this song illustrates to me at least, is that the Pop Hook can often transcend melody if it is well supported by the right lyrics. In some ways written poetry pre-dates the musical Pop Hook, and while I'm sure my friends would tease me for saying this - there is some decent poetry in this song.

Two: Your Love Still Haunts Me (Joseph remixed by DJ Bam Bam)
This song is State-of-the-Art for 2008. If you asked me to define what a State-of-the-Art song for 2008 sounds like, I would play Your Love Still Haunts Me. Apologies for the useless circular definition. This song will put you in your own Starship.

One: You You You (James Kakande - remixed by Alex Gaudino)
This song came out in 2006, but is still in rotation on some stations - and rightfully so. It's one of my favourite songs of all time. There is something perfectly effortless, playful, and sentimental about this song that it can often bring a tear of joy to my eye. There are a few perfect songs out there. This is one them.

Looking over this list I've probably missed a lot of big name Pop Hookers. Where's Madonna, Katy Perry, Britney Spears, Timbaland, Justin Timberlake, and Beyonce Knowles you ask? I like a lot of this stuff too, but it tends to get overplayed to the point where I'm burned out. But I also find that they tend to be more risk averse and will write songs that are enjoyable after the first or second listen, but burn out after 10-15 listens.

So what's in store for TUN3R in 2009? That would be our iPhone app.

Stay TUN3D.

Interview: ErrorFM's Eric Howey discusses the past present and future of collaborative radio

A while back I interviewed a deejay (Manny) from a station called Nekkid Radio. What intrigued me about Nekkid Radio was the fact that they are distributed all over the world across hemispheres and continants, and yet manage to keep the music flowing as well any terrestrial station. To whit - Manny referred to Nekkid as "a global party". Since then I've encountered other stations that have also adopted this model. ErrorFM is one of those stations.

Listening to ErrorFM is like listening to a well funded terrestrial station. The imaging is great, the deejays sound like pros, and there is a decent amount of talk programming. While a lot of people strictly want music, I quite enjoy the context a good DJ provides to the music experience.

But what are the limits of this model. Is it the way of the future, or a temporal niche. In this interview with Eric Howey from ErrorFM, I hope to shed some light on the matter.


Q1 Neil: Eric, thanks very much for taking part in this interview. How did ErrorFM get its start? What's the back story?

A1 Eric: Neil, it's a pleasure to be here. Thank you for your interest in ErrorFM. We are quite proud of the station we have built. ErrorFM is a listener-controlled radio station based in the UK. It was originally a small shoutcast server run by Emohawk of External Error, streaming off his own pc. He used to broadcast a selection of whatever music was found cluttering up his hard drive. Today, it has turned into a fully-operational 24/7 Live radio station, with all kinds of DJ's all over the world. As Manny from Nekkid said, "a global party" is the best way to describe us.

Q2 Neil: What music does ErrorFM mainly play? What is your average listener profile?

A2 Eric: ErrorFM has two channels that are totally different from each other. Channel 1 began in 2002, a free for all where hosts log in and broadcast whatever they like. There were no rules, and no restrictions. We created channel 2 because we wanted a place listeners can listen if they don't like what they hear on ch1, and to experiment.

We decided to play indie pop/AAA music in the summer of 2007. We created a programming design out of all of the songs we enjoyed listening to. We narrowed down the list by looking up the Wikipedia page of all the artists we collectively believed made up the core of the format. We have 6 ch2 Music Directors, from other countries all over the world looking for music for ch2. We built clock patterns & experiment with specific programming, targeted to the young adult and their parent. You can call it a Daddy & Daughter station. The format is called indie pop/AAA to reference what we believe is the next progression in rock radio, but the format has no specific catchy name or reference. It's closely related to New AAA.

Q3 Neil: I like the fact that you've got a decent amount of talk programming. Can you tell me about some of the shows you've got in this regard?

A3 Eric: Our talk shows are what radio used to be. They empower the broadcaster to say whatever they want, speak what's on their mind. A lot of our talk shows are very opinionated and some are just flat out silly. The Friday Shot Day Show is a show that features a bunch of guys drinking the strangest concoctions of alcohol while talking about showbiz. Tilted Talk radio is a talk show about life, culture and every day stupidity with blunt opinions and political incorrectness. It's talk that actually interests people and isn't controlled by a program director on a power trip. We also encourage an interactive radio experience by utilizing our chat room. If you ever want to talk with the DJ's, more than likely you will find them in the chat room. If you haven't checked out the chat room yet, you're missing a huge part of the true ErrorFM experience.

Q4 Neil: Where are all your DJs and personalities logging in from? How do you manage this.

A4 Eric: Using a combination of standard software and custom built applications; we make the technical management possible for DJ's to broadcast from all over the world. We have put years of development into this process and created a solution that works for us. Our DJ's also find our custom system easy to use and manageable on their end.


Q5 Neil: Can anyone participate as a DJ for ErrorFM? What do you look for in new applicants?

A5 Eric: Absolutely! Our DJ staff is located from all around the world. We have DJ's ranging from the United States, to Europe, to far east Asia. We look for applicants who have a passion for music or radio and have the creative spark that brings a unique experience to our listeners. Experience is not required but creativeness is. Anyone who would like to apply as a DJ for us can visit http://www.errorfm.com/apply.htm and fill out our application.

Q6 Neil: Is ErrorFM as a commercial venture, a not-for-profit, or something in between? If it's not commercial, do you see this model as being a viable commercial alternative to the current mode of running a radio station?

A6 Eric: As of now we are a listener supported station. We have considered going commercial but we are finding it difficult to figure out an approach that won't interfere with our feel. We really frown on having commercials on air. I feel we could go commercial if we can still cater to the small artist; we also strongly feel that we should continue our "free for all" channel 1 broadcasting. If we could find advertisers that would be interested in this kind of programming, then I don't see we couldn't switch to a commercialized model.

Q7 Neil: Once of concerns about the collaborative model is that it tends to be DJ-centric. For example, there is a dearth of kids music stations on the Internet. I have two young children who would love a station that plays Raffi and The Backyardigans, but don't know many people interested in actually playing that stuff. Forgetting about ErrorFM - do you see the collaborative model as viable for all types of formats, or only certain formats?

A7 Eric: A format is only as collaborative as the program director will make it. Our Director of Programming Barry Funkhouser works in the commercial radio industry and he knows where it has gone terribly wrong. Its technology restricts it from being able to broadcast that kind of programming without having a major listener tune out. Web radio makes this possible by offering channels that can vary in programming to accommodate this. This goes more along the lines of our channel 1 model. We can have certain DJ's that play Raffi and if certain listeners do not like it, they can switch to another channel without leaving the station.

Q8 Neil: Is there an ErrorFM theme song? If not, what would it be?

A8 Eric: Well for years our transitional DJ music has been Sofa Surfers – Sofa Rockers the Richard Dorfmeister remix. I suppose this qualifies as a theme song. Why not break tradition.

Q9 Neil: What are the future plans for ErrorFM?

A9 Eric: Honestly, we have no idea! ErrorFM has been an experiment since its first day of broadcast and as of now we are still in those stages. We know that we want to be a supporter of independent music and artists, but we are still figuring out a strategy to make a business out of it. As an independent artist, I feel that it is way too hard for us to get any airplay. I would like to change that.

2008 Webcaster Settlement Act / The Payola Paradox / My advice to Webcasters

CNET News just reported that the 2008 Webcaster Settlement Act has passed. I'll be honest with you, my knowledge of this Act is scant, other than the basic gist of it. In fact, I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I hadn't even heard of it until today. I checked Wikipedia and couldn't find any info on it. Googling "webcaster settlement act" turned up a number of results for news stories, such as the CNET story. There are also results for a 2002 Webcaster Settlement Act, which I'm presuming is different from the 2008 Settlement Act. I occasionally check in with Kurt Hanson's Radio and Internet Newsletter (RAIN), and Radio World Online, and don't recall any mention of this bill in the last few weeks (admittedly I don't check these sites every day). I also read a number radio blogs, and no mention there either. I'm not implying anything conspiracy-like. Rather, I'm amazed how quickly this thing has gone from virtually unknown to congressional sign-off. But let me explain why I think this is...

In essence (and this is all based on my reading of the CNET article) the Act allows for webcasters to negotiate directly with copyright holders (read RIAA), and negotiate lower royalties than what are stipulated by the Copyright Royalty Board's decision. So what does this all mean, and why did this new Settlement Act pass through so quickly when the Internet Radio Equality Act stalled?

My guess is that Tim Westergren (founder of Pandora) convinced RIAA that it was making them more money than it was costing them. Namely, Pandora (like many other webcasters), sells music through it site. While I have no idea what kind of margin Pandora gets for each sale, I do know that most of that money goes back to RIAA's major labels. While the overall amount of cash going back to the labels might be less than what RIAA could have got had they received the original CRB rated royalty, it's still an overall net profit for RIAA's labels. Therefore, if Pandora were to shutter its service, the music industry would effectively be "cutting off their nose to spite their face". I suspect this is why Pandora has restricted its service to US customers only. I suspect this is why Pandora has been publicly threatening to shut down its service.

I will get back to the Settlement Act in just a minute, but want to discuss a related piece of news first. Namely, a couple weeks ago Wired reported that Adman Doug Perslson proposed a business model around Payola. Wired's journalist (Eliot Van Buskirk) did a good job at explaining the background and the idea, but was ultimately dismissive of the concept. My take on payola? It's now both inherent and irrelevant to radio. This sounds like a paradox, but let me explain. Payola as you may know is the illegal practice of paying off stations to force their deejays to play music so as to boost the music's sales. The reason it failed listeners is that the music wasn't always what deejays wanted to play, and by extension what listeners were counting on the deejays to play for them. Now things are different. Because of affiliate programs (like the iTunes affiliate program), anyone and everyone is in a position to "sell" music. Remember all those innocent mix tapes you made as a teenager for your friends. Back then it was all about making a cool tape that you were hoping your friends would appreciate, or that you could turn them on to new music. Now all you need to do is fill out a form or two and get paid for doing just that. Does this mean you would create a tape that would sell better? Take some time to think about this. I think you'll realize that you would make the same recommendations since your objective (unless you're some kind of sadist) is to turn your friend on to new music that you think they would like. Not only do you know your friends and family better than anyone else, but you also influence them the most too. Take me for example. My friend James (who's blogged here before) turned me on to tons of music, and never saw a cent from any of this. While I doubt he would have got rich off me, he was always a guy I looked to. For a non-conformist, and skeptic of capitalism, James probably made more money for the music industry through his recommendations than anyone else I know. If he were to be paid after-the-fact with no pressure on his decisions before-the-fact, I doubt he would have changed his behaviour much, apart from possibly recommending even more music.

So what's my advice for webcasters? My advice is (if you haven't done so already) to sign up for one or more affiliate/associate programs (e.g. iTunes, Amazon.com), and remind listeners that if they like the track they're hearing they should buy it from your site to keep the station going. For now, streams are not the same as a custom radio application like Pandora or Last.fm, so it's harder to be sure that your recommendation results in a purchase from your site (hence my skepticism that webcasters are out of the woods yet). This is why it's important to remind people of where they should go to make their purchase if they like the song. It will be these numbers which will be your strongest argument if it ever comes to negotiation with the labels.

The good news is that the message is finally hitting home that Internet radio is making the labels money and not taking away. Common sense prevails!

Stay TUN3D.

Interview: Athena Reich Shares an Artists's Perspective on The Business of Art

I've known Athena since I was in high school (or maybe it was middle school). She was friends with my sister but unlike other friends my sister brought over, Athena always stood out. Back then I knew Athena as a "free spirit" who was passionate about all things artistic: Singing, writing, dancing, acting, and even painting. But at that age it's sometimes hard to tell apart those that talk about going off and becoming an artist, and those that actually do, and succeed. I even know someone who was on Degrassi Junior/High during the same period. And although he's still working in the film industry, he's no longer in front of the camera. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Choosing art as a career path is incredibly risky. But if you were to choose the arts as a career path, you'd do a lot worse than to follow in Athena's footsteps. Here are but a few small lessons I've learned from Athena:

1. Move to New York City and start showing up to auditions.
2. Always keep writing and other acts of creativity going. Keep releasing stuff and booking gigs.
3. Nurture all of your talents.
4. Learn how to market your abilities.
5. Look for other opportunities your talents can be used to earn a living (e.g. teaching).
   

Because it's rare to find such a savvy artist, I thought I'd take this opportunity to learn more about "The Business of Art" (to use an expression borrowed from another great Canadian artist, Tegan & Sara)...

Q1 Neil: Thanks for taking the time for this interview! Last time we spoke you were recovering from surgery to remove polyps on your throat. You're not supposed to sing. I know you've got a lot of other talents to fall back on, but this sounds rough. How are you coping with this? What's the prognosis?

A1 Athena: I got hit with a really bad bout of bronchitis last spring and there might have been some pneumonia mixed in with it. The doctors are guessing that the virus damaged a nerve in one of my vocal chords and partially paralyzed it. Or, it is possible that I was born with a partially paralyzed vocal chord, and never noticed it until now, although that scenario is less likely. At the time, I was also teaching a lot (music & theater), auditioning constantly (musical theater), and recording my 5^th CD on the weekends. Partially paralyzed vocal chord + extensive use = polyp.

A polyp is a little bump, caused by a blood vessel bursting. Luckily, mine was small, and stuck out from the vocal chord, so it was easily removable. I went to the best doctors in the city, who specialize in working with professional singers. The surgeon removed the polyp with laser surgery, using the latest technology. I went through speech therapy afterwards. All in all, I couldn't talk, off and on, for 3 months. It was really challenging to live life as a mute!

couldn't sing, write songs, or audition. I couldn't even talk when I went to the grocery store, or to my lover at night. So I typed a whole bunch and started drawing constantly. I took life drawing classes and created oil pastel portraits in the middle of the night when all my pent up fears and frustrations would surface.

Visual art was my first love, before I discovered performing at age 9. I always thought I would come back to it, when I was ready to calm down a bit. Well, this was a forced slowing down!

I ended up having one of the "quickest recoveries ever" (as quoted by my speech therapist), and am now back to singing, auditioning, and talking as much as ever. There is no evidence that I had any surgery on my vocal chord. Even the doctor was surprised that there was absolutely no scaring, only 2 weeks after surgery. I still have partial paralysis on my vocal chord, as that is not something you can heal with surgery. The doctors say it might go away over time, or it might stay, but that it doesn't really matter. "The proof is in the pudding", they say. If I can sing, talk, and belt out a tune as much as I could before (which I can), then I am golden. Apparently, lots of professional singers (opera, rock, musical theater etc), have funky things like partial paralysis. All it really means is that I have to continue to take good care of myself.

It's a good life lesson, in the end. I am taking Pilates classes, and maintaining a healthier lifestyle, with less stress and more fruits & vegetables. I've become a better singer, and voice teacher, with all that I have learned. And I am still drawing. I have even begun selling my work!

Q2 Neil: Your background is diverse and quite robust. Napoleon Dynamite famously said people need "skills" to be successful. You're flush in this department. How would you describe your "skills", and what talent gave you your first big break?

A2 Athena: Acting, Singing, Writing, Performing, Business, and Teaching are some of my strongest talents. I think my secret is that I am also talented at learning. I can quickly pick up new skills. For example, I just started learning tap and am having a ball! Maybe it's because I'm a Gemini that I constantly crave new creative outlets.

What gave me my first break was acting. I was intensely devoted to it as a child and got my first agent at age 12. I quickly began performing in TV, Films, Commercials & Theater. Sometimes I worry that I might be spreading myself too thin, by nurturing my visual talents at the same time that I'm auditioning, releasing my 5th CD, and taking up Tap. But, they say "Follow Your Bliss". And I am so happy when I just let myself create, learn, and express as I please.

Q3 Neil: I've asked you about royalties in the past, and part of your income is being supported through royalties as a writer. Is this system working for you? Is there any way in which you would change it?

A3 Athena: Honestly, I'm not making that much money through royalties. There have been times when I performed on commercial radio or TV and never saw a cent. But then every now and then I get a check and I have no idea why. I think all in all it's a pretty good system. It would be great if we could start making royalties off Internet radio. Although that won't happen until Internet radio starts making money, I imagine.

Q4 Neil: As for music itself, with the Internet it would appear that many smaller artists are now able to get a toehold and launch a successful career, whereas before they couldn't get beyond a local "scene". Is this how you see it?

A4 Athena: Yes, we do have the tools to launch ourselves into cyberland more than ever now. But there is a plethora of talent, and now that anyone can create a CD or YouTube Video, it's more difficult for the average consumer to really support any one artist. Although anyone can gather hundreds, or even thousands of fans on MySpace, it does not mean those fans will translate into dollars. And now, more than ever, the most successful artists are those who have millions of dollars in publicity behind them. In the 70's A & R reps used to actually go to clubs, scouting for original talent. Today, labels are very conservative, and mainly sign artists who fit into their cookie cutter molds for success.

For example, I have a friend who got a major record deal. He was a model and dancer. He told them, quite bluntly, that he can't sing. They said they didn't care, that they could teach him how to sing. He had a marketable look and body, so he got the deal. Now, on the other hand, the Regina Spektors and Arcade Fires of the world are still getting signed, so how do you add them into the equation? Basically, it's the luck factor. Most original talent is not getting signed, but every now and then, the golden rays of "being discovered" shine down on an original soul and give them a break. How do you increase your chances of getting a 'break'? Build fans, create a cyberpresence, perform live, audition, do what you love, take care of yourself, don't give up, and leave the rest up to fate. You might get a big break, you might get a series of small breaks, but if you stick with it, I believe good things come to those who are talented and work hard.

Q5 Neil: When I last saw you perform at "Not My Dog" in Toronto, you joked that it was the gig that Facebook built. I agree, but I also thought it was one of the coziest performances I've ever attended. There was a convivial mood in the room that night that was palpable. To what extent does Facebook and MySpace help nurture your audience?

A5 Athena: Facebook helped me reconnect with friends and acquaintances I had lost touch with over the years. That night was my first gig in Toronto in over a year, and since that time, I had joined facebook. Toronto is my home town, and I've been living in New York City for the past 8 years. That night was one of those rare nights where everyone showed up and most people were connected to each other in some way. It was a completely magical night. Not every gig is as magical, and I sense that people are losing their lust for facebook, just as the addiction to MySpace has slowed down. I wonder what the next networking buzz will be?

Q6 Neil: You're the NYC correspondent for Toronto's ProudFM 103.9, and have worked in their studios. What's it like working for a radio station? What does your job entail?

A6 Athena: I report on gay life & culture in New York City. I phone in, a couple times a month, and talk about the arts, night life, and queer scene in New York City. I got the gig because I had emailed them, and asked if they would be interested in interviewing me, in promotion for my upcoming performance at "Not My Dog". The interview went great, and I emailed them afterwards to suggest that I become their NY correspondent. They thought it was a great idea. So basically, I got the job because I gave them the idea for the job. If I were to give advice to newbie artists, I would say use your creative faculties when promoting yourself. Create your own work. Create your own visibility.

Q7 Neil: Radio used to be (and still is according to recent stats from Jupiter Research) a major means teens discover new music. I think radio's role is shifting though. How do you see radio?

A7 Athena: I think that it's very hip to discover new music on YouTube or MySpace. Radio does expose teens to new music, but the underground Indie scene is very alive and prominent in their lives as well.

Q8 Neil: Your music is very personal and emotional, so this is perhaps a tough question. Is there a single song you've written (or heard) that best captures the essence of Athena Reich?

A8 Athena: That is a tough question. My first instinct is to say that that's an impossible question to answer, as my essence is wildly diverse in feeling, expression, and genre. But.. if I had to pick one song, I think it would be "White Bandages". It starts out tentative and sad, and builds to a passionate cry for survival, amidst a sea of destruction and self hatred. A lot of my songs express a struggling spirit, determined to thrive in the throws of adversity.

Q9 Neil: What's on your horizon?

A9 Athena: My 5^th CD will be released in the next few months. I will promote the CD by touring, creating YouTube Videos, and getting it out to important people in the industry, like Film & TV Music Directors, agents, etc. I also have some exciting auditions coming up. I will continue to draw and sell my work. I will continue to take care of myself, follow my bliss, and create art for the love of it, despite adversity.