Concert List

The Live Music Scene in Austin Texas-There is more live music going on in Austin, Texas on any given night than there is in any other city in the world. That’s why the city has put a trademark on it’s slogan “Live Music Capital of the World.”

There are hundreds of live music venues in the city and its immediate environs. Many are situated in three main entertainment districts: Sixth Street/Red River, the Warehouse district and South Austin. Sixth Street/Red River is the famous sector in downtown Austin that is known around the world for it’s live music scene and often boisterous crowds that fill Sixth Street on the weekends when it is closed to traffic. The Warehouse district runs west from Congress Ave. along Fourth and Fifth Streets. That’s where Antone’s is located, the venue that USA Today has named the best blues club in the country. In South Austin, there are a number of clubs on South Congress, South First St. and South Lamar that offer up some of the best new and original music in town.

The road to its live music capital status began way back in the 1960’s when a spirit of eclecticism appeared with the hippies and anti-war protesters of that era. Inclusion was in and exclusion was out, no pun intended. With the 70’s, this eclectic spirit gave birth to a form of music that was often called progressive country. Joe Ely, along with co-Lubbockites Jimmy Dale Gilmore and Butch Hancock, brought this music down to Austin and hooked up with Marcia Ball and Delbert McClinton and cosmic cowboys like Jerry Jeff Walker, Michael Martin Murphy, Rusty Weir and Ray Wiley Hubbard. Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings came back from Nashville during that time to settle in Austin where they could take control of the production of their songs. A wild and powerful musical vortex formed that saw psychedelic rock and roll mix with straight out country and blues at venues such as the Armadillo World Headquarters, Threadgill’s, the Soap Creek Saloon and the Broken Spoke. It was cool to dig the psychedelic sound of the 13th Floor Elevators and the uncompromising country licks of Alvin Crow at the same time.

Then, in 1975, a 30-minute University of Texas music program was accepted by a number of PBS affiliate stations and Austin City Limits was launched and has become the longest running program in the history of PBS. It has propelled Austin to the forefront of the music industry’s consciousness in the US and around the world. That first program featured Willie Nelson, but has since put Texas music notables such as Marcia Ball, Lyle Lovett, Robert Earl Keen, Asleep at the Wheel and many, many others in the national and world spotlight.

In more recent years, the South by Southwest showcase every Spring that brings nearly 1500 musicians and musical acts to town to be seen and heard by industry executives and AR types, along with the Austin City Limits Festival in September, have kept the city on the national music map. In addition, dozens of other smaller festivals are held each year, as well as a number of nationally significant ones in the surrounding Hill Country such as the Kerrville Folk Festival and the Old Settlers Reunion in Buda, just south of town.

The Austin music scene has always been a free-wheeling, break-the-mold, think-out-of-the-box kind of affair. That early eclecticism lives on in the current scene, although some characteristics of the town’s soundscape seem to have become entrenched. Sixth Street/Red River attracts a younger, party animal type of crowd with it’s rock and roll, blues and punk scene. The Warehouse district caters to a bit older and more professional crowd in general. And South Austin retains the feel of Austin in the 70’s with its nouveau hippie coffeehouses and crowds and its preference for good singer/songwriters. Still, there are always exceptions to those general tendencies just about anywhere you go.

Austin remains a city where musical creativity and talent thrive and defy expectations. That can be experienced close up and personal in any number of live music venues on any given night.

Rap Music – History and Genres-Those who are young or relatively new to the HipHop culture don’t realize that Rap Music has many different genres:

East Coast: The East Coast, most notably New York City, was the genesis for rap music hitting the mainstream. Run-D.M.C. led the pack, with Rakim and Big Daddy Kane also breaking through to make rap emerge as a national phenomenon.

West Coast: While HipHop was cooking in the East, West Coast rap music gained national recognition in the mid-1980s with performers like Ice T and Too $hort.

Dirty South: While most of the music world’s attention focused on rap coming from New York and Los Angeles, HipHop artists in the South were turning to independent music labels to release their work. Geographically, the Dirty South genre encompassed places as diverse as Houston, Birmingham, and Miami, and was greatly influenced by Ghetto Mafia in the mid-1990s. Musically, Dirty South rap is known for is danceabilty and rhythmic delivery.

Gangsta Rap: Some say Gangsta Rap first emerged on the West Coast with N.W.A.’s “Straight Outta Compton” release, while others credit Ice T with taking Gangsta Rap to national acclaim. Characterized by lyrics glamorizing elements of a criminal lifestyle, violence, promiscuity, misogyny, and materialism, Gangsta Rap’s controversy came to a head with the murder of the West Coast Tupcac Shakur in 1996, and the subsequent murder of the East Coast’s The Notorious B.I.G. in 1997.

Pop Rap: Known for its widespread, mainstream appeal, Pop Rap’s first breakout star was LL Cool J. The Fresh Prince and MC Hammer quickly rose to the top of the Pop Rap scene and the music charts with lyrics that were less controversial than those of the Gangsta Rap genre, and thus were more likely to receive radio airplay.

Christian Rap: While HipHop was garnering a reputation for less than savory lyrics and artists for questionable activities, other artists were expressing their faith through HipHop. Christian Rap took off in the late 1980s and early 1990s with rap groups like P.I.D. and S.F.C.

Jazz Rap: Although Jazz Rap has never enjoyed mainstream commercial success, the genre often incorporates Afrocentric and political themes. Gang Starr and Gil Scott-Heron are often cited as two of the first Jazz rappers.

Conscious HipHop: Similar to Jazz Rap, Conscious HipHop has never enjoyed mass commercial success. With an emphasis on social issues, Conscious HipHop isn’t overtly political, but rather deals with issues such as poverty and religion.

Electro HipHop: A combination of dance music and rap, Electro HipHop first emerged in the 1980s on the West Coast from artists like Arabian Prince and Egyptian Lover. By the mid-1990s, Electro HipHop had pretty much run its course.

Live Music Is Not Dead-Around the pubs and clubs in the UK there are still many bands playing for only a few pounds to demanding audiences who simultaneously request Chuck Berry and the Arctic Monkeys. Keeping all these different people in the audience happy is never easy, but not impossible either. With good stage craft and clever of songs at a particular venue, a good band can make everyone happy.

The organisation of these bands is extraordinary. They must find like minded musicians that are committed. Then they must find somewhere to practice. This is not easy as most cannot do this at home. If you are fortunate to have a house big enough, it is unlikely you can get round the neighbours, as it is so loud! It cannot be turned down as everything must be as loud as the drums. A band usually hires a room to practice, at great cost to themselves.

A band must also spend literally thousands on equipment. PA, lighting, guitars, drums etc.

The next hurdle is transport. For some reason most drummers cannot drive! Cars are usually inadequate as you would need a fleet of about 5 for your gig, very expensive on the fuel, and impractical. Most bands have to hire or buy a van, again at great cost to themselves.
When they have finally rehearsed all there material over weeks or months, they are ready to play live. It is an exciting day, one of wonder, excitement and slight fear. You turn up to the venue to find one man and his dog. And that man is very drunk, wants to be your manager, and giving you all the benefit of his ‘wisdom’ in the music game! The landlord is also drunk, and you cannot work out if he likes you or not.

You get poorly paid, if you get paid at all, and return home usually out of pocket.

However the real rock heroes come back for more. They find the best venues, gain a reputation, and play at some great places. Sure they still have bad gigs, but the good ones make up for it. They make it look so easy, but it is not. One such band can be seen at http://www.thehalfmonty.tk

The Half Monty have had there share of ups and downs. They have been ripped of at gigs, played in the most dodgy venues, and heckled to death. But they are still here, bigger and better than ever having learnt from their early days.

So remember, when you see a local band advertised at a pub or club, go see them and support them. It is not easy for the lads and lasses. Perhaps buy them a beer after the performance if you really enjoyed it. , for these are the true heroes of rock.

Internet Music – Blessing or Curse?-I just learned that April 19, 2008 was Record Store Day, an opportunity to celebrate independent record stores. As record stores slowly vanish across the country, it is revealing that April 19 came and went with little fanfare. Perhaps, like me, the event was invisible to you, too. And I’m sorry I missed it, because I value the place of music stores in our culture. But it got me thinking about how music is accessed and sold these days.

I’m not fond of vinyl — I don’t miss the pops and clicks, or the way that dust balls would build up in front of the needle and cause the sound to crackle — but those large album sleeves allowed for some wonderfully inventive packaging back in the day that can’t be done with CDs. I remember the surprise of opening Alice Cooper’s School’s Out. The cover was the surface of one of those old grammar school desks and lifted up like the lid of the desk to reveal the interior. The record was nested inside a slinky pair of pink girl’s paper panties, which you had to slip off to play the record. Then there was Jethro Tull’s Thick As A Brick, packaged with a fictional small town paper, “The St. Cleve Chronicle.” It was a crafty satire of a provincial newspaper replete with articles, TV listings, advertisements, a crossword — even a lascivious connect-the-dots puzzle — all oozing with irony. It read like a novel, with the same characters reappearing in different sections.

The Internet offers a wonderful way to discover, sample and purchase music, no doubt about it. It’s a great improvement over the experience most of us have had of buying a new CD and finding out you only like two of the ten songs. And the Internet has really expanded the opportunity for independent artists to reach a wider audience than ever before. But in making snap judgments after listening to a snippet of music online, we also lose the ability of songs to grow on us. We’re like kids dazzled by neon crayons, and we risk passing over subtler but richer hues. There is the danger that music becomes less about artistry and more about commodity.

Another problem is the reduced audio quality of MP3s, a digital format whereby much of the original audio signal is discarded in order to compress the file size and facilitate digital storage, downloading and other transfers. We’ve sacrificed quality for convenience. I confess, though, I love being able to shuffle songs on my iPod. The unpredictability keeps the music fresh for me. But it’s not without a price.

As we increasingly rely on downloadable music, I worry about what we lose. I still like the experience of going to record stores: the physicality of the merchandise, the role of chance and being exposed to something accidentally. Erykah Badu has a marvelous music video of the song “Honey” from her recently released album. An anonymous customer (actually Erykah, but her face is never shown) browses vinyl in a record store, and different classic album covers come alive with images of Erykah. It’s a witty video that captures the magic of the experience. The video ends with a message scrolling across the bottom of the screen: “Support your local record store!!!!!” I couldn’t have said it better.

Listening to Music – How Do You Do It?-In the world of music, there are endless possibilities for creativity in production. But when it comes to sitting down and listening to your favorite artists, what is the best way to do it? Most people don’t think about it, but throughout the course of this article, you will obtain possible life-changing strategies to listen to your favorite music. There are 3 main methods for listening to music; perceptive listening, casual listening, and background listening. Each method will be outlined, and benefits will also be discussed. Now is the time to experiment with all of the ways you can listen to your music!

When in the state of perceptive listening, you are fully aware of your music; that is the lyrics, rhythm, all of the instruments and components of the track. This state may be difficult to achieve if you have never been a perceptive listener before. It is the most rewarding listening experience, clearing our mind of everything but the pure sound of music. We cannot achieve this state if there are other thoughts racing through our head; your mind must be completely blank, letting the music take you away. How do you know when you are in a perceptive listening state? You will become unaware of your environment (closing your eyes is strongly recommended), focusing on nothing in your life but the music going through your head. Your mood will be directed by the type of music you are listening to, and some will experience a state of Euphoria. When in perceptive listening mode, always aim to be in a Euphoric state, as it will make the music that much more enjoyable. This can lead to becoming more relaxed, having less stress, and an overall improvement in life. If you haven’t given perceptive listening a try, do it right after you finish this article. What have you got to lose?

We spend a lot of time in the Casual listening mode, which is the line right between Perceptive and Background listening. You are fully aware of the lyrics/rhythm, and auditory elements are comprehended. We are usually performing some task that distracts us from the full perceptive state, so euphoria cannot be experienced. When listening casually, our mind only donates part of its attention to the music, so only part of us is affected while listening. Our mood does change along with the music, but it is generally a weaker feeling than perceptive listening. While we listen to music casually for a long period of time, our subconscious processes the information, and songs have a tendency to get stuck in our heads. Unfortunately, you cannot be fully immersed in the music, and that takes away a key element of enjoyment. Since we spend so much time casually listening to music, we think this is the most involving method of listening. Practice perceptive listening, and you will see the vast difference.

Sometimes, we have so many mind-numbing tasks to do, hitting the play button is the only way to keep our sanity. This is called background listening, and it helps us get through our challenging days. Casual listening is very common among teenagers who study for tests, and generally people who listen to music while working with their minds. This is when we are in the weakest state of music perception, and auditory elements aren’t usually comprehended. You can get so caught up in a task that you forget any music is playing. Because our mind is focused on so many things, our mood will be least affected by music. Obviously, this isn’t how music was intended to be listened to. So what benefits does this bring? Lets look at Johnny: Johnny is studying for his math test, and he is really struggling on a concept. He puts on his headphones on low volume background listening to help him relax, and suddenly he is able to comprehend his math problems. On the day of the test, he can actually play back the song in his head, then his subconscious will recall his studying, and that helps him recall the important math concepts. Johnny gets an A on his test….So you see where this is going; background listening affects the subconscious mind, which leads us to the final point. Memory. As shown in Johnny’s case, memory can be improved by listening to music in the background. So what are you for? Listen to more background music, improve your memory!

Perceptive Listening, Casual Listening, and Background Listening. Each one has its pros and cons. When possible, try all 3 techniques, and see which one you like the most. If you haven’t experienced the thrill of perceptive listening, you have to try it soon. If you haven’t relaxed to some casual listening, you might want to give it a shot. Some people, however, aren’t able to have music in the background while working. You know who you are. Give these techniques a shot, you never know what kind of amazing improvements could come about in your life. It’s the little things that can make a big difference. Rediscover your music, rediscover the way you listen to it!

Music and You-Music is always the part of our lives ever since the stone age.

There are many types of instruments which make their own sounds as well as certain pieces of junk. The stringed section allows one to make sound by using the strings like on guitars, and violins. The strings are tightened at a certain length for notes high and low. Wind instruments, such as wood and brass, make soft sounds and loud sounds with air flow and valves to control the notes. Symbols and bells of all kinds and sizes can be heard when tapped on and drums are the same way but with beating sounds. Computers and simple objects have their own sounds which can be used for music.

Many famous names today and in history dedicated their lives for music and wrote a lot of famous numbers that are forever remembered in all fountains of information. As known, tribal music came first with primitive drums and other simple instruments. Classical was next in line with more sophisticated instruments making it loud and lively. After classical, many kinds came to existence like early rock and roll, modern rock, and hip hop. There is reggae, jazz, rhythm and blues, barber shop style singing, and cultural music. Many people who love music so much that they may want to make a career out of it to be famous and/or just for fun.

It keeps us entertained even if we feel down in the dumps. A lot of kinds of music were invented from many cultures around the world past and present. Voices and instruments make this activity come to life in many ways.

Music – Voice of the Soul-Shakespeare has well said “If music be the food of soul, then play on”. Surely, music puts a balm on all your worries and it sooths and relaxes your mind. And music has been regarded as the voice of the soul too. From generations and centuries, music has given enough entertainment to the mankind. Come to the contemporary times and you would witness a sort of revolution in the music industry. Owing to the popular trends like cinema and Internet, there is an emergence of a lot of genres like pop music, jazz, country, Blues, rock and so on. And the Internet is flooded with a plethora of online music websites that have added a new dimension in the popularity of music.

These online music stores are employing new strategies in order to attract more and more users towards them. This includes affiliating with the various social networking sites and offering competitive prices to the users, thereby baiting them for good. Other methods that these online players employ could be giving away a few albums or songs for free as a start up initiative to increase the traffic and clientèle, in terms of music downloads. It can also offer some great incentives to the early buyers.

There is another way to popularise the online music by giving a referral incentive to anyone who refer his/her acquaintances to a particular website. By such means you can buy music on a discount, else you win some freebies or loyalty points for your next purchase… Then, these websites also trust viral marketing to propagate their music store amidst the netizens. Also there are certain websites that sell DRM free MP3s and thus they can be used on any music player very conveniently.

You might have come across a few websites which would not charge anything for listening music but as soon as you try downloading these tracks, they would start charging money on it. But there are many free and legal music download sites have cropped up too, and they have found their target customers as well. So, you can work out on both the options. Thus, the voice of your soul (music) has become a famous business which is catching up like a wildfire along with the other online businesses and is also minting good money out of it.

Online Music – Choice of Youth-They say that music never betrays the heart that loves it. True indeed, music has always made our lives better and it has soothed our senses since time immemorial. The 21st century has seen a revolution in the form of computers that have proved to be instrumental in making our lives better and much convenient as compared to the others. And most definitely it has changed the way you listen to your music.

Contemporary times have witnessed a tremendous upsurge in the Internet marketing which has made music really popular amongst the music freaks all around the world. The users can now listen to the music through the Internet. There are several websites that deal with providing the online music to the music lovers. With an increase in the stiff competition and many players going online, several lucrative offers have cropped up in the recent past. Now the user is free to download the music of his choice, from a particular website, which is purely legalised. So, all of your famous and lesser known tracks are getting revamped in the online arena. All you have to do is to download them at the earliest.

Remember all those overtly insignificant songs that were once anthems for you? If you think that those have been withered away in an eternal limbo, you can easily find all of them lingering in the cyberspace. It certainly ejaculates our senses, even to think about discovering those long lost tracks. In fact, the Internet has particularly been helpful in reviving all the long lost numbers, back in action and going popular all over again.

You could easily download these tracks into your mobile phones and MP3 music players and listen to them whenever you feel like. So, you could easily pep up your life with the music of your choice. Secondly, these websites also give you a lot of exciting offers and cashbacks for your downloads. Therefore it adds on to the profitability of your deals and makes them look more attractive.

So, don’t miss your chance of finding the best online music… because the Internet is surely going to make you find your kind of music!

Online Music – Simply The Best-Music without any doubt can be termed as food for life. It surely has lots of advantages and is a healer of many discomforts. It also is a great motivator. A good song and music can fill the soldiers with vigor and enthusiasm to take on the might of the enemy and overcome the most trying circumstances.

Music also sets up the mood for any occasion. A good number can make everyone dance to its tunes. A good music can enliven an evening. Similarly a prayer accompanied by light music can make the entire occasion turn very solemn.

Music, it can be said, is for every occasion and is everywhere. The wind flowing or the water trickling down from mountain in the form of a stream also carry their own distinctive music with them. Similar is the case with a cuckoo that so moistens the entire atmosphere in its melancholic voice or that of the leaves that so breathes life into a dull atmosphere with its flutter in the wind.

This passion for good music is also being understood and encased by mobile manufacturers who install such features that allow people to download songs and music of their choice from Internet in addition to the already programmed music in the gadget.

Internet has grown in a very big way over the years and has truly become one popular stop for music lovers across the world. As Internet casts its net far and wide, online music has also gained popularity throughout the world. The main reason for the popularity of online music is the fact that one gets an access to the music of entire world cutting across the barriers of language, culture and country.

The music of entire world is scattered in front of you and you just have to choose whether you want to download mp3 songs of the latest Hollywood movies or the hits of an era gone by. The best thing about online music is the fact that one can free download music of one’s choice. No wonder then that online music is one of the most happening things in the world today.

Choosing the Best Online Music Service-Okay, it’s time for me to finally say goodbye to my portable disc player, and join the online and portable music revolution. Okay, the revolution isn’t so new any more, nor is my computer, but as I wade through the sea of options for how to download music, listen to and buy online tracks, I grow more eager to get my feet wet and eventually suit up to take the plunge. But I happen to be a bit more practical than that. So, I’ve spent a considerable amount of time over the last few weeks trying to determine what’s best for my lifestyle, my wallet and my computer.

First thing I realized when searching all of the music services is that things seemed to work a lot smoother with a broadband connection (and most services seem to point that out from the get go). Just like my CD Walkman, the time had come for me to lose my ancient dial-up connection to the online experience. It actually turned out to work in my favor as my cable company gave me a good deal on high-speed, and also threw in a discount on my existing costs for cable TV.

Now that I was “connected” at an acceptable speed to the Web, I had to determine, what I was trying to get out of the online music experience. After some intense melodious soul searching, I realized that the only thing the separated me from the perpetually hip is perhaps the types of music I was searching for, and the amount of time I wanted to spend online searching for music.

The guy who sits next to me has a 60 GB iPod, and is complaining that it is almost full. That’s over seven thousand songs. I don’t know that I would even live long enough to listen to that many songs. My needs were simpler. I had an MP3 player still in the box from two Christmas’ ago, and it promised to hold over 500 songs. That would be perfect for me, at least in the short term.

Next, what was I looking for in my new online music experience? Did I want to listen to music on my PC, in my car or on my MP3 player? Yes to all three. Did I want to listen to the radio while I was on my PC? Again, yes. Did I want to trade music with others online in a peer-to-peer Napster-like environment? Eh, that one scared me a little, and I decided that opening up my files to strangers made me feel dirt, so I put that one on hold.

My next stop in determining how I would “music online” was price. I searched dozens of sites and services, but narrowed my sights to three of the big guys: AOL Music Now, iTunes and Rhapsody Music Service (provided by Real Networks).

I already had AOL, so I signed up for their Music Now product for $8.99/month (that’s in addition to their monthly fee as an ISP). I was able to download songs, listen to them while “offline” and burn them to CD or move them over to my MP3 player for an additional fee per song. That seemed to be standard across most of the services. Music Now was a follow up to the original AOL Music Net, which I actually liked better because it ran locally on machine and the new Web-based Music Now takes much longer. AOL also has a partnership with iTunes, so you can be on AOL, but iTunes will launch and then you’re actually in the iTunes application. It’s confusing. If I want to move my downloaded songs to my MP3 player, the monthly fee jumps to $14.95 per month, and if I want to put them on a CD, I pay and additional 99 cents per track. This is too much money for me. I typically buy one or two CD’s a month, and that would be cheaper than this online service. Not to mention you have to be an existing AOL member (more money per month) in order to even use the product. I’m passing on AOL Music Now.

On to iTunes. Okay, so there is no monthly fee for iTunes. Love that. And I can purchase songs for 99 cents per track. Love that too. But wait. I don’t have an iPod, and iTunes has songs in their proprietary MP4 format. Ugh. The cheapest iPod out there is around $99 (so much for no monthly fee), and it’s not the model I would select. I like my MP3 player. If I already had an iPod, this may be the route I would go, but Apple tends be very inflexible, and I hate to be tied to one provider, player and format. There is also a limit to how you can share the songs on your home network. I feel like even though I own the song, I’m being watched on what I do with it. Good bye big brother.

Rhapsody Music Service from Real Networks. So far they are the least expensive. $9.99 per month and that’s with unlimited access to over 1.3 million songs. I do have to have pay the additional 99 cent fee if I want to burn to CD or transfer to my MP3, but that is the industry standard for paying the artists, and the monthly fee is five dollars less per month than AOL. The music comes over in the more widely supported MP3 format and the songs are mine to rip transfer or share with my other computers on my home network. Like the other two, I can listen to live radio on my pc, but I like the freedom I get with Rhapsody Music Service. I’m not being watched, and the music is mine.

Now that I know how to download music and have chosen Rhapsody Music Service, I’m on my way to joining the new world of portable digital music. I’ve already burned several CD’s for my car, albeit with an older man’s twist on today’s favorites, and transferred those same songs over to my little antiquated MP3 player for those long weekend walks.