So You're Not at SXSW 2013

Hey, friend. So it's time once again for half the country to funnel into Austin, Texas for the annual South By Southwest Festival. There will be show-hopping, elbow-rubbing, and sadly you won't be there. And you won't be able forget about your misfortune because of your Twitter feed. My God. Your Twitter feed.

But never fear! You can still enjoy some of SXSW from the comfort of your laptop. When life gives you lemons, find a high speed Internet connection. Here are a few ways you can keep up with the music portion of the festival from wherever you are.


+ NPR is streaming both audio and video March 13 and 14 straight from Stubbs and Auditorium Shores. The lineup is as follows:

Wednesday, March 13:

7:45 p.m CT - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

9:10 p.m CT - Waxahatchee

10 p.m. CT - Cafe Tacvba

10:40 p.m. CT - Youth Lagoon

11 p.m. CT - Yeah Yeah Yeahs

12 a.m. CT - Le1f

12:30 a.m. CT - Alt-J

Thursday, March 14:

5 p.m. CT - Jovanotti

6 p.m. CT - Bajofondo

7 p.m. CT - Molotov

8 p.m. CT - Cafe Tacvba

You can also check the NPR site for other streamed events, like Dave Grohl's keynote speech.

+ Both Paste Magazine and NPR are offering free samplers of SXSW music. Check out Paste's Stages on Sixth sampler from NoiseTrade, and NPR's Austin 100.

+ The festival itself is offering SXSWfm again this year, which is basically an online station where you can stream music from acts playing there this week. It's not live, but it's worth checking out. 

+ For any Nashvillians out there wondering why we can't have nice things, here's an in-depth article from the City Paper about Nashville's history with music festivals and if we might ever have one of our own. 

+ Wired's SXSW blog is a pretty cool mix of pictures, quotes and text posted in a Tumblr-esque fashion. So there's that.

+ Oh, and um... #SXSW

Paste Festival Sessions Available Through NoiseTrade

Here's a heads up on a compilation you'll want to grab from NoiseTrade when you get a chance. Paste Magazine released 15 songs recorded live by various artists through festival season. Among the standout tracks, there's "Like Janis," by Rodriguez, "Keys to Paradise" by Trampled by Turtles and possibly the saddest version of "So Well" by Dawes you've ever heard. No joke. Get ready to climb into bed and weep for the rest of the afternoon. But it's good! Anyway, it's a solid mix of songs. (Did I mention "A Good Girl's Hard to Find" by Preservation Hall Jazz Band?) Have at it. 

Cleaning House for the New Year

This post is going to be something of a catch all for a few things that I neglected to mention in 2012 and  will just stink to high Heaven a week from now.

+ New Years Eve music: I was going to do a whole post on it, but then I decided I didn't care enough. As far as I'm concerned, there are two songs about New Years– "What Are You Doing New Years Eve" and "The New Year" by Death Cab for Cutie. If there was ever a time of the year to be depressive, I think it's New Years.

+ Some Nights by fun.: A lot got by me this year while in grad school, including the sophomore album of band fun.While I heard the album's singles on the radio in passing, it wasn't until about a month ago that I heard the title track with seemingly new ears and flat out fell for the album. It's youthful and exuberant and lead singer Nate Reuss's voice is bananas. The whole thing is so perfectly stitched together, and most of all, thematically it really makes sense to me right now. That, I consider to be a gift from the musical gods. There are albums you like and albums to get. I also suspect that many feel that way about it. For me the love started with the opening lines of the title tracks, blasting though my headphones. The fullness of the sound is irresistible. More recently, "Stars," which pulls from other moments on the album (like the "come on"s from "Some Nights") and ties everything up so well, might just be my favorite track.   

+ The State of the Independent Musician by Paste Magazine:  Paste had a pretty interesting cover story a week ago by this name and I recommend it. Always good to step back and document.

+ Everyone's depressed: Well, not really. However, holy smokes did TMI's Most Depressing Christmas Songs of All Time get a lot of hits.

Anyway, I might tack on a few other things later, but for now that's all.

Paste Magazine: Signs of Hope

This is undoubtedly the happiest I've been writing a blog post in some time. After ceasing publication last September, Paste Magazine is back.

Meet Paste mPlayer, the digital incarnation of our beloved magazine. An email went out this morning announcing the launch and explaining what happens from here. In short, the good folks at Paste will produce a weekly magazine, a true multimedia product.

The interface is slick; Apple generation-friendly in terms of design, if you will. Songs (the Paste Music Sampler) and videos are integrated into articles, and most of all, Paste can once again return to the long-form features and essays that made it great and thereby fill the void created when it went away. (Ex. Listening to my life: Stereolab, North Carolina)

Personally, I'm more excited than I can express. When Paste stopped printing, I mourned the loss of a publication so strong and forward-thinking. I cringed to think that maybe magazines were doomed after all because if Paste couldn't do it, no one could. Today, with unbounded positivity, I say that in the rapidly-changing world of journalism and digital platforms, if anyone can make it work, it's Paste.

Here's a link to the FAQs page. It has details on subscriptions. Though, you should note that the paid model doesn't kick in until September, so there's time to scope it out. Also, issue No. 1 is live, so have at it.

One more thing: Viva la Paste Music Sampler, baby!

Paste Interviews The Avett Brothers

Photo from Paste

Recently, the folks at Paste Magazine caught up with the Avett Brothers at Hangout Festival in Gulf Shores, AL. There's a six-minute interview as well an acoustic version of "Slight Figure of Speech" from 2009's I and Love and You. While the Avett Brothers said they're working on a new LP, they didn't elaborate much, but that's okay. It's probably safe to say this band is zestier on stage than in an interview. Check the link above.

Paste Magazine - A Lament

Yesterday was not a happy day. I was in the newspaper office when when I saw three words come through on my Google Reader. Paste is Dead.

Editor Josh Jackson posted this bare bones announcement on the website. After struggling to keep their heads above water, the debt was just too much, even after the incredible "Save Paste" campaign last year. The economy has been too bad for too long.

As a loyal subscriber for the last five years, losing Paste feels like losing a good friend. It's hard to explain getting so attached to a magazine, but as a journalism major raised around the magazine industry with hopes of someday writing for a music magazine, this is a tough blow. But forget me. From a new media perspective, you couldn't find fault with a thing Paste has done, from producing multimedia content and diversifying revenue streams, to carving out a place in social media. They did everything that's supposed to save us. A year ago, I shuddered to think of Paste folding because I felt that if they couldn't survive there wasn't any hope left for magazines.

Paste was the reason I started this blog.

They will be greatly missed. Every issue was so intelligent, outstanding on every level-- the writing, the page design-- even from a tactile standpoint, the matte cover was perfect for the magazine's aesthetic. Of course, there were all the bands that I heard about first from the pages of Paste, or from their expertly curated sampler CDs.

In the end, I don't have enough words to fully articulate was a loss this is for music journalism, how sad I am, how much I will miss receiving the issue, or how sick I feel for all the folks who no longer have jobs. No one is guaranteed fairness, that doesn't make it sting any less.

Wavin' Flag : K'NAAN

Last April I had the good fortune of getting press passes to Vanderbilt University's Rites of Spring Music Festival. One of the first acts that performed on day one was K'NAAN, a former Somali refugee who currently does a breed of hip hop (sort of but not really) infused with his ethnic roots that's pretty refreshing.

By far the best song he did was an extended version of "Wavin' Flag" that recounted the murder of his best friends in Somalia and his arrival in the U.S. He captured the audience and held them. It really was a fine moment.

Paste Magazine is offering a free download of the song. Definitely give it a listen.

TMI Turns Two

Well, it seems that another year has gone by, and we're still here. In the past few months TMI had some pretty cool posts, if I don't say so myself. Here are a few highlights.

The Musically Inclined...

• Conference called with Death Cab for Cutie's Chris Walla (Vision article here)


• Found a cool band called Their Hearts Were Full Spring


• Saw Andrew Bird at Grimeys


• Joined the fight to save Paste Magazine


• Wrote about Grammy posters (You wouldn't believe the number of hits TMI got)
  
• Covered Rites of Spring


• Found a pocket of Jesus-friendly hip hop behind a coffee house


• Reviewed a ton of albums for Twisted Ear


• Made derisive remarks about Jack White

As you can see, it's been a good time and this next year, hopefully, will be even better. Thanks for reading and stay tuned, kids!

Peace,

Erin

Worth Mentioning... Maybe

Oh man, these guys were cool.

Let's play catch up. It'll be fun, I promise.

It's been a bit slow lately as you might have notcied, so I'm just throwing some news bits out there. Think snark and fact in bread crumb form.

- NME's editor Mike McNicholas resigned today. Perhaps he got tired of trying to prounounce the magazine's title? Actually he's jumping over to Top Gear after seven years at NME. I don't know why. Top Gear's editor position has been vacant since April, in which time, the staff has reverted to their savage, ape-like ways and prehistoric ferns have taken over the office appliances. Not really, but the imagery is good.

- Forgot to mention that Sugar Ray announced some time ago that they're working on a new album. Cue mixed emotions and 90s flashbacks. The album will be called Music for Cougars. Sounds... promising...

- The new Rob Thomas album, Cradlesong, is days away from release. Expect a review shortly there after.

- Jack White is probably doing something annoying.

- Got Paste's in between issue in the mail. The content continues to be excellent. Points for being so creative in saving themselves. Plus, the crossword is quite accessible.

- I'm working on a snazzy idea for TMI. It involves my iPod. Have fun with my vagueness.

Save Paste

A week or two ago, the latest issue of Paste Magazine arrived in my mailbox, featuring the Decemberists on the cover. Having been raised around the magazine industry, I took one look at the paper quality of the cover and the thinness of the spine and said to myself "oh, crap."

If there had been any hope left, turning to editor Josh Jackson's column killed that off quick. Paste, like so many other magazines, is seeing difficult times, financially. The economy sucks and the media world is in a kind of limbo that we've never quite seen before. Everyone likes to throw around the phrase "newspapers are dead." That may be true in a sense-- as in, newspapers as we know them today, are dying, but nothing's dead yet.

Magazines are in a bad situation, but they just don't get as much attention when they struggle and eventually shutter. I think that the same idea is true for them, magazines as they are now probably will not make it.

That's why Paste's hardships trouble me so. Here's a magazine that is doing everything that any halfway savvy, J school professor or student would be harping on in the world of new media. Paste has a great website, they have blogs, videos, audio clips, photos, multimedia out the wazoo, they're using social media platforms, they're keeping their content fresh between issues, they offer incentives to the readers, they've diversified revenue streams. Essentially, they are doing everything that I have been told will save those of us going into journalism.

There's so much unfairness in the situation. I'm loathe to suggest that anyone deserves anything, but in this case I feel justified in saying that Paste deserves to see the end of this recession. It deserves to survive and carry on far into the future, continuing life as a publication we can look to for how to do navigate these uncertain waters of new media and as a standard for top notch music journalism.

And in a bittersweet example of why Paste needs to stick around, look at the effort they are making to save themselves-- a direct appeal to the readers. Reaching out to their audience. If you care, you can take some ownership. Donate. Stick a banner on your blog. Sign up for Paste V.I.P. Do something. My journalism classes are filled with talk of engaging the audience, bringing down the massive wall between us and them, because people will not stand for it anymore. They want to be pulled in and have a stake, so here's Paste putting their fate into the hands of their readers.

Though it may not matter much in the big picture, I'll say that Paste was a large inspiration for starting The Musically Inclined and as a journalism major, if Paste goes down, I feel a little like there's no hope. They sit at the top of the heap in terms of quality on all levels. This magazine means a lot.

Please don't let it die. There's a sky scrapper on the column. Click it. Paste is still alive and it's manned by smart folks who are going to find a way out of this. Help them.