So now I am debating whether I can marry those two topics within one blog.  It might actually be worth a try.

Sooo, maybe this is a new beginning!

I just thought that I should write something so nobody thinks I am dead.  Had the chance to go to one of the STS9 shows in Athens a couple of weeks ago.  It was a real fun night with a lot of dancing.  Here are some pictures that I took.  Unfortunately I had to skip the Bassnectar aftershow party the next night.-

Oh, I love lights!!!

Spotlights on Zach Velmer (drums) and Jeffree Lerner (Percussions).

And some more crazy lights and digital art behind the stage (Japan memories are coming back)!

If you do plan to ride the coat-tails of a larger or more popular band then they will do the tour planning and most likely your input will have little influence.  In this particular case I would start out by contacting more well-known bands in your specific genre and inquiring about whether they are considering future plans to tour Japan.  It will be advantageous to try team up as soon as possible with any one of these bands planning such a tour.  You might also find already published future tours in online music calendars (with my focus on jam bands I would check Jambase or Relix).  Furthermore active bands which have already been to Japan might be inclined to go back, so they will be another important target for your search.  Once you find the band which you are going to tour with, it will be crucial to learn about your responsibilities through thorough communication with them.

If, however, you wish to extend your tour past the time of your partnership tour or want to try your luck as a solo act or if you are planning to book your gigs as an independent band for the length of the tour then this chapter is designed to help you.

At this point it will be helpful to start networking with anybody who has connections to Japan.  Contact people who work in the Department of Japanese Studies and Language at a university near you and try to talk with them. You can also establish a connection with the embassy of your country in Japan.  There might be cultural projects that are already in progress that might be willing to include your musical group.  Again, bands that have already been to Japan, even though you might not want to tour with them, will have great advice and possibly contacts that you can benefit from.  You might want to ask them for the promoters they worked with in Japan and then introduce yourself to these people.

As I mentioned earlier, Mars Mushrooms toured with a number of Japanese jam bands.  They were introduced to us through our German friend Tjark who was already familiar with many of the musicians in the Japanese jam band environment.  Understanding our goal and recognizing our inexperience in communicating with the Japanese, Tjark made the first contact with several members from different bands.  During his meetings with these musicians he told them of our idea of organizing a tour in Japan and often he made it possible for me to talk directly with them.  Oftentimes if you write and unsolicited e-mail and especially if you write it in English, you will not receive a reply.  For those of you who have not found someone like Tjark making those initial contacts will not be quite as simple.  My advice if you are attempting to contact Japanese bands or individual night clubs is to go to MySpace.  This site offers an easy way to make contact with people from other bands.  Unfortunately MySpace has not gained the same importance and popularity in Japan as it has in the U.S. and you will notice that some websites show that the owners have not logged on for quite awhile.  Yet, these same websites will usually include the names of other bands and allow you to find more Japanese bands in your genre.  Many times these websites provide links to the official homepages of other bands.  Disappointingly though, many of the Japanese Bands’ homepages you visit will not have been translated to a language that you understand and you will just have to find a translator or circle back to MySpace and try again.  One way to show your goodwill on MySpace is to put the bands you are trying to contact in your top-friends list once they have “accepted your friendship” (I hate the MySpace designations).  For a start I suggest going to the Mars Mushrooms MySpace page where you can find a number of friend links to Japanese jam bands.  I have also published a list of active Japanese jam bands in an older post here on this blog that will help you with your first contacts.

Before your first communication remember what I told you earlier about the conventions of polite conversations, or refresh your memory by reading again the chapters on polite conversation (I and II). If you are serious about establishing a contact that just may help you attain your goal then keep your first introductory exchange pleasant, complementary and general.  Remember that a relationship and trust building comes before business with the Japanese people.  Make sure that you do not tear down the house when you are trying to open the door!  Whenever I contacted a Japanese person who didn’t know me, I was complimentary about their willingness to speak with me and then I described our goal of setting up a tour to Japan.  I asked their opinion about obstacles we might encounter and found that this helped initiate a dialog between us.

Once you have found and established relationships with your counterparts you can start proposing mutual gigs.  On your first tour you pretty much have to go with what these bands offer you.  Leave it for later to talk about details or even your payment.  Of course you cannot just travel to Japan, hoping that someone will pay you something.  You should make sure to know what conditions you are both agreeing too.  Still, I would leave that for a later conversation.  When the band you have contacted does make you an offer you can politely ask for the conditions that your band members would need to agree to as a part of working together.  The good thing about that is that the Japanese culture is built so strongly on trust you can almost be sure that people will treat you fairly.  We had a lot of good experiences in our dealings with the Japanese Bands on our tour.  Some of the organizers that had promised us a certain fixed payment gave us envelopes that had more money in them than we expected, just because the clubs had made more.  After this tour, I do rate the Japanese people highly on their standards of integrity.  This honesty impresses me even more since with all the cultural differences and the language barrier we would have had not much of a clue how to renegotiate if someone would have tried to cheat on us.

The New York Times has published a story about a study by Swedish and Danish researchers.  Supposedly there is a link between coffee and a lower dementia risk.  I like it!  Though I have to say that I prefer a Two Shot Latte made from the Espresso my mom sent me!

And for those of you who don’t like coffee:  I recommend “Tea“!

Sometimes problems just disappear.  The Langerado Music Festival has been cancelled for this year “due to sluggish ticket sales.“  In this case it is sad!  Especially because it seems like it is the first bigger festival that fell victim to the depression.

Unfortunatelly Bonnaroo is not during spring break.  With Phish and many other bands this festival has a killer line-up.  Concerning Langerado, now I do not have to debate whether it is worth to spend the money!  All Spring Break options are open again.

He gave me a list of words focussing on the important vocabulary for organizing a Japan-tour.  We started with simple sentences in present tense that start with “I” or “we”.

“Watashi ha Christoph Hoffmann desu.”

Well, to be honest I knew that sentence already before mars mushrooms went to Japan.  I don’t have my notes here right now, but he taught me a lot more sentences similar to that.  You see, I am excited!  I’ll pretty soon start bothering my Japanese friends with pathetic Japanese sentences.  I hope they’ll appreciate it.

If you have any experience with the studying of Japanese, feel free to share!

Japanese jam bands

Big Frog

CRO-MAGNON

Dachambo

Eric Mandala & The Tribe

Fly (I could not find their myspace page or website)

Freaky Machine

goma

Majestic Circus

Meltone (does not seem to exist anymore)

mgova

Muff

Razoku

Sardine Head

Wild Flowers

Other Japanese bands

cutsigh

blissed

boottondel

Marble Sheep

Shiina Ringo (She is a Japanese superstar.  I don’t know why, but I kind of like her.  This might not be her official myspage page)

Light show provider

The people from Overheads are an incredible nice bunch.  They will turn your concert into a psychedelic experience of the special sort.  Very good light shows!

Overheads

When Marty Winsch, Corey Smith’s manager sent me this email I asked him if I could share it here.  It just sounded to interesting to rot in my inbox:

Christoph,

Thanks for dropping me a line.  We owe you a sincere bit of gratitude for the lift.  I couldn’t help but think when I saw your BLOG that this is a great example of how things have evolved with Corey and his music. Most recently, those who have been making a career out of the “business of music” have gone to great lengths and spent so much in time and financial resources into the idea of promoting the idea of value supported by scarcity that they managed to forget somewhere along the way how key the individual artist was/is to the long term viability of the business.  The biz has done a fine job leveraging fear, control, and sky high infrastructure into a deeper and deeper intrusion into the very fragile and evermore exposed egos of the artist.  Business is business.  I get that.  However, how many of today’s and tomorrow’s potential heroes are we willing to sacrifice so that the biz can continue to support the antiquated physical and professional infrastructure?  Those at the top understand that change is here and more change is to come.  I also know that those at the top look at this like war.  Nothing is easy.  Things happen gradually when change is eminent and along the way there will be losses.  Fine.  With regard to those artists who make the conscious decision to sign deals with organizations that are out of touch… they deserve what they get for looking for an easy way out and for coming to the party unprepared.  Bottom line though is that physical shelf space is shrinking, is never coming back, but that the overall marketplace is opening up on line.  Those who think that we need filters are wrong.  The Internet and the people who consume music are the filter.  The filters will evolve, but they need to evolve organically and outside of the more traditional purveyors of content.  Gone, for now, are the days of multi-platinum albums partly because of how fragmented the marketplace has become, but mostly because of how substandard music has been.  I am confident that the numbers will be back though, but not before the overall level and quality of artistry is greatly improved.  It is time again to shift focus and look at the quality of the core and not so much on the systems that surround and support the core.

The reality is that things won’t REALLY change until the artist realizes that being true to one’s own self is THE only way to happiness… regardless of how the industry decides to define success.  An artist must also understand that the “business of music” needs artists to continue buy into their systems of measurement and that this dependence allows those in charge to morph more slowly into the inevitable.  The industry has been allowed to survive for years because ego continues to lead the way when it comes to the decisions that artists makes with regard to their “options” and artistic output.  Breaking this chain will take time and work, and until we get there artistic output will continue to be compromised for the good of bottom lines and release schedules.  We have to continue to try to break the cycle so that artists can be free to be artists again.  We need the artists to know that it is OK to just be artists and not artists, and business owners.  We need for those who have been charged with the responsibility and calling to guide the artist to be mentors and to continue to remind that artists that success should be based on a personal level, not by some historically significant method of measurement.  We need to remind the Artist that seeking alignment with people with passion and belief, not companies with access to market share, is the key.  The industry has done a good job convincing the artist that process is king.  The reality is that the artist’s relationship with life on the purest level is king and understanding this is the only sure way that the artist will realize any sort of REAL personal satisfaction from their craft… and their art.  The industry would much rather have the artist look their way for answers and it is human nature for us all to look for the easy way out.  Painting the bitch up though so the next time the soul will look for paint instead of inside to the experiences it learned along the way is not the answer.  We need to break the cycle.  We need to get back on track and tell the artists that it is OK to be an artist again and to stop looking for paint instead of writing a better song.  Artists need that.  We all need that and it will be absolutely required if we are REALLY interested in being moved by the true artists into and beyond the near future.

Thanks again for being so generous with your time and efforts.  Corey is well worth it!!!

Best regards,

Martin W. Winsch

Mountain Entertainment, Inc.

It’s late at night at the guitar shop.  Keller finally is alone;  his boss left him telling him to lock the door after he was done checking and tuning the new instruments.  Keller loves this time, when it’s just him and all the instrument in the shop.   It feels peaceful and somewhat unreal.  The hollow bodies of the instruments that pick up the tiniest noise and carry it on for several seconds give the shop a sense of infiniteness.  Keller picks up this huge 12-string guitar, a Guild that he loves so much.  He starts playing one of his favorite tunes when his eyes spotting the pile of loop stations he has to unpack tomorrow suddenly light up.

He records a four bar riff with the Guild, hits loop!  It needs some more rhythm, so he records a second loop with the small drum machine that his boss keeps for people who want to try a guitar.  He hits loop!  The groove needs bass, which he adds with the bodiless electric upright bass that is slowly gathering dust in the corner of the shop.  He hits loop again!  He adds percussions, hits loop, adds a little bit of whistling, hits loop, and starts to sing on top of all of this.

At this point sound engineer Keller Williams realizes that he is not alone, but on stage at the Georgia Theatre in Athens, GA with a sold out crowd of probably 800 college kids.   He is rocking the party.  The people know his songs and sing along or collectively dance with their hands up in the air.  He does not say much during the whole performance, but his sunny appearance infects the whole Theatre.  The choir reaches its climax during the cover versions of Steve Miller Band’s “Joker” and Stone Temple Pilots’ “Plush”.  I liked the stage setup which was looking like a cozy guitar store with dozens of guitars hanging from the wall.  It reminds me of BTM-Guitars in Nürnberg where I once worked (if you ever get a chance to visit that shop, don’t miss out on this).  That was different from any other stage setup I have seen so far!  The instruments hanging on the wall are not just there for show effect, Keller randomly picks up different guitars during the show.

The concert goes on for more than two hours.  Keller comes back for only one encore, but it’s another kicker.  Again he records and loops a number of instruments.  But this time no guitar is involved anymore.  Just crazy percussions! This Keller Williams show on January 24th, 2009 at the Georgia Theatre in Athens, a Christmas present for me, gets a 9 on a scale of 10!

Steve Miller Band “The Joker” performed by Keller Williams [the whole show]

[Keller Williams @ myspace]

[Keller Williams own homepage]