In 1999, Jim Carrey portrayed his idol Andy Kaufman in “Man on the Moon.” For twenty years, the behind-the-scenes footage has been withheld…intil now. Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond – With a Very Special, Contractually Obligated Mention of Tony Clifton premieres November 17th, only on Netflix.
Bold New Social-First Series SIDES* Breaks Boundaries with New Voices and New Ways to Share
Do vending machines for the morning after pill promote risky sex? Do emojis make texting better, or worse? #Activism vs #Slacktivism? Bell Media Studios, in partnership with DAIS, ventures into uncharted territory tackling questions important to youth, with the brand-new, social media-first series SIDES*.
The first series of its kind from a Canadian broadcaster, each episode streams live around the world on Twitter @Sides on Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT, featuring a rotating panel of six teen hosts exploring and debating topics important to them and the series’ social media audience.
From political upheaval and leading news stories, to entertainment scandals and life advice, their dynamic and candid conversations allow viewers to listen, learn, and react using the hashtag #MySide. Fans worldwide can continue to engage with SIDES*, and watch clips and additional content 24/7 on Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, and Facebook.
SIDES* has found early success with its first-ever live stream on October 11 reaching more than 45,000 viewers, with live viewership up by a massive 400% during last night’s episode garnered more than half a million impressions on additional clips and videos posted across all social media platforms throughout the week.
Following the live broadcast, a one-hour episode of SIDES* joins Much’s revamped lineup of topical, millennial-focused programming on Saturdays at 9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT. TV episodes highlight the debates from that week’s social broadcast, while also incorporating what viewers had to say through tweets, comments, and videos posted using the #MySide hashtag. Each episode also includes host rants and other videos from the cast and guests on additional topics that are important to them.
SOCAN First To Use Cloud-Based Technology For Real-time Electronic Music Royalty Tracking
SOCAN today announced it has partnered with Pioneer DJ Corporation of Japan to become the first music rights organization in North America to use direct metadata extraction technology, KUVO, to identify electronic dance music performances automatically and seamlessly in nightclubs and other electronic music venues.
The Pioneer-KUVO device is being provided voluntarily to nightclubs, beginning with the Toronto area, as an additional aspect of their SOCAN music license agreement. Once installed, the KUVO device easily plugs into a DJ’s mixing board, capturing metadata from the music, which is then collected and relayed to SOCAN to tabulate and distribute royalties more accurately to the copyright holders of the music.
Simply put, KUVO helps to ensure that the correct owners of music used in nightclubs are compensated accurately from the music licenses already being paid. There are no additional costs, expectations or maintenance required from electronic music venues that voluntarily adopt the easily-installed system.
“For years we’ve been dissatisfied with the system in place, knowing that not all licenses we pay are getting in to the hands of artists behind the music played in our venues and at our events,” said Joel Smye, owner of CODA nightclub in downtown Toronto, one of the largest and most successful electronic music venues in Canada and the first to adopt the technology. “Now, through technology, the use of a simple device will ensure that the music licenses that we pay and have always paid will go to the right people.”
The initiative is championed by the Association for Electronic Music (AFEM) in support of its global campaign “Get Played, Get Paid,” that seeks to ensure dance music creators are accurately compensated for the use of their work.
“Everyone wants to be paid fairly for their music, and I hope that clubs and festivals will be eager to use technology to help ensure that the right people get their fair share of the legal music licenses that they already pay. Props to SOCAN for using the latest technology of KUVO to be even more accurate and transparent for music creators like me,” said dance music DJ, producer, and SOCAN member, Richie Hawtin, who recently collaborated with KUVO through his own music-recognition platform, RADR.DJ.
SOCAN is the first music rights organization in North America to adopt such technology, and other performing rights organizations around the world have seen improved accuracy in their identification and distribution of royalties to electronic music rights holders.
“DJs spin more music in one show than the vast majority of other live musical performances, but it’s nearly impossible for them to submit accurate set lists of music for shows that they perform,” said Vice President of SOCAN’s Distribution department, Kit Wheeler. “Pioneer-KUVO technology addresses this problem and enables SOCAN to capture even more musical performances in real time and more accurately. Our partnership with Pioneer and KUVO is a great step forward in getting our more than 150,000 members fairly paid for their work.”
“We’re delighted that SOCAN will use metadata from KUVO and we hope that other PROs in North America will see how accurate the service is and come aboard,” said Pioneer DJ’s General Manager, Mark Grotefeld. “It’s a huge territory and currently there’s a lot of the money paid by the venues in license fees that isn’t finding its way to the artists who deserve it. KUVO can help solve that problem and reward those who produce the music played by DJs.”
Nightclubs are required by law to pay licenses to SOCAN and other music rights organizations for the blanket use of music that they use for their business. Without technology like KUVO, matching license payments with the correct music rights holders would be done manually and can be an onerous task for either the DJ or the nightclub. Music creators depend on royalties to sustain and build their career.
As a result of KUVO technology being implemented first at the CODA nightclub, royalties from the use of electronic music by DJs will begin flowing to SOCAN members and international rights holders as of November 2017.
Rush’s A Farewell To Kings Gets Expanded Edition, Out December 1
On December 1, Anthem/ole label group/UMe continues the Rush 40th anniversary album celebrations with lavish new expanded editions of the band’s landmark album A Farewell To Kings.
A Farewell to Kings, Rush’s fifth studio album, was originally released in 1977 and played a major role in establishing Rush as an internationally popular and respected band. A Farewell to Kings also introduced the trio’s first successful radio hit “Closer To The Heart,” album tracks “A Farewell To Kings,” “Madrigal,” “Cinderella Man,” as well as enduring fan favorites with “Xanadu” and “Cygnus X-1.”
This incredible offering comes in four formats, encompassing the Abbey Road Mastering Studios 2015 remastered edition of the album for the first time on CD; a complete Rush concert recorded in February 1978 at London’s Hammersmith Odeon, newly mixed by longtime Rush engineer and original A Farewell to Kings producer Terry Brown from the multi-track live tapes; and an instrumental studio outtake of the spacey sound effects the band has creatively titled “Cygnus X-2 performances including a complete “2112” suite, “Lakeside Park,” a drum solo and “Closer To The Heart.” The Blu-ray Audio disc contains a brand new 5.1 surround mix of the album by four-time GRAMMY nominated surround sound producer Steven Wilson, along with three original 1977 promo videos from a newly found 2-inch quad video master significantly improving the video quality for “Closer To The Heart.” An elaborate new 40th anniversary cover treatment was created by longtime Rush creative director Hugh Syme, as well as a new piece of artwork created for each of the album’s six songs, and an extensive 12,000-word liner notes by GRAMMY®-winning rock historian Rob Bowman.
The 40th anniversary release also includes four newly-recorded cover versions of songs from the original album:
1. Xanadu by Dream Theater
2. Closer to the Heart by Big Wreck
3. Cinderella Man by The Trews
4. Madrigal by Alain Johannes (Queens of the Stone Age, Chris Cornell etc.)
The four distinct configurations of A Farewell to Kings – 40th Anniversary will be available in formats of (1) Super Deluxe Edition, (2) three-CD Deluxe Edition, (3) four-LP Deluxe Edition and (4) the Deluxe Digital Edition.
Further information about all configurations is available here and the full track listing available here.
Additionally, on November 24, Anthem/ole label group/UMe will release a 7″ vinyl single for Record Store Day’s annual Black Friday event, featuring the beloved A Farewell to Kings hits “Closer to the Heart” and “Madrigal” with a custom large-hole adapter and new artwork by Hugh Syme.
The incredible new rendition of “Closer to the Heart” covered by Big Wreck will be serviced to Canadian rock radio in support of the Record Store Day 7 inch and 40th anniversary releases.
In his liner notes, Bowman describes A Farewell to Kings as “the beginning of Chapter Two” for Rush. “No longer was the majority of the record dominated by the sound of a power trio. A more mature Rush now embraced a wider sound palette using synthesizers, Taurus bass pedals, classical guitar, tubular bells, temple blocks and orchestral bells to create greater contrast and color within their compositions. Yet, when desired, Rush continued to deploy the intensity, ferocity and power that they were justifiably known for.”
Rush – bassist/keyboardist/vocalist Geddy Lee, guitarist Alex Lifeson and drummer/lyricist Neil Peart – has won a large and passionate worldwide fan base for its unique, adventurous approach, which combines sterling musicianship, complex compositions and distinctive lyrical flights drawing upon science-fiction motifs and esoteric philosophical concepts. The band has sold more than 25 million albums in the U.S. alone, with worldwide sales estimated at 45 million, and has been awarded 24 Gold, 14 Platinum, and three multi-platinum albums. Rush has received seven GRAMMY nominations, won 9 JUNO Awards and were honoured with the Allan Waters Humanitarian Award in 2015. The Canadian rock icons were also inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013 and Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2015.
Photo Gallery: The Tragically Hip at Budweiser Gardens April 19, 2015
“I ponder the endlessness of the stars…”
(all photos by Mini’s Memories)
Music Festival “Kidnaps” A Fan For Special One-On-One Concert With Bon Ivor
Well, here’s an idea. A one-one concert.
It was in October, 2016, in Berlin, during Michelberger Music where between each show of the festival, they ‘kidnapped’ a person in the audience, which we were taking to a secret room where an artist was waiting. The artist was Bon Ivor.
Smithsonian Launches Kickstarter For Massive Hip-Hop Box Set
As a musical, cultural and social force of the last 40 years, hip-hop is taking its place in the Smithsonian — an institution devoted to preserving and documenting our nation’s heritage.
That’s why the National Museum of African American History and Culture is partnering with their GRAMMY Award-winning record label, Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, to create the Smithsonian Anthology of Hip-Hop and Rap — a cultural statement told through music, text and powerful visuals. And they’ve launched a Kickstarter campaign, too.
This will be the third major anthology produced by Smithsonian Folkways Recordings that tells the story of a defining era of music “of, by and for the people,” following the Anthology of American Folk Music and Jazz: The Smithsonian Anthology. It will also serve as an extension of the objects and stories of hip-hop already displayed in the galleries of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, offering perspective on the African American experience and its impact on American culture. The Anthology will be a tool for education as it explores hip-hop’s evolution and global influence.
Creating something this ambitious is not easy. The Smithsonian Anthology of Hip-Hop and Rap will be the first collection of its kind to include music from all the major labels as well as dozens of independent record labels.
The Smithsonian Anthology of Hip-Hop and Rap will illustrate different social and political trends within the genre, such as police brutality, feminism, and Afrocentrism. It will explore these themes through music from old school pioneers like the Sugarhill Gang and Roxanne Shanté to artists of today like Kanye West and Nicki Minaj — and four decades’ worth of essential names in between.
The Anthology was developed by the Smithsonian in collaboration with an advisory board comprised of members of the hip-hop community including artists Chuck D, MC Lyte, Questlove and 9th Wonder; industry veterans Bill Adler and Bill Stephney; author, journalist and music critic Jeff Chang; and university scholars and authors Adam Bradley (University of Colorado, Boulder), Cheryl Keyes (UCLA) and Mark Anthony Neal (Duke).
Jimmy Kimmel’s Interview with David Letterman
David Letterman talks about giving Conan O’Brien a horse, his new Netflix show, being honored for the Mark Twain Prize, reveals what he misses most about late-night and tells stories about life after his show.
Photo Gallery: I Prevail with We Came As Romans, The Word Alive and Escape The Fate at Niagara Falls’ Rapids Theatre
All photos taken by Mini’s Memories. You can contact her at minismemories@hotmail.com
Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams” Is Covered By Computers
Eurythmics’ 1981 hit Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) as played by old floppy discs and computer parts. To be honest, it sounds like a weedy remix I would have done back on my Casino back in the day, so I’m all for this!