Some recent shots

This will now be my photo blog

So I just got back from 6 months in New Zealand and I kind of got used to blogging about stuff while I was there. Since my life is back to being regular again, it's not so exciting. Therefore I'm going to use this blog as my photo blog. I'll post interesting personal photos as well as outtakes from Daily Illini assignments and such.

Another strange dream

This was part of a longer dream that I mostly don’t remember, but this is the end: John F Kennedy was giving a speech about the transition from gas power to electricity and he said, “How are we going to find our way in the dark? The same way we always have- with a flame!” The crowd cheered as he lit a gas lamp with a plastic cigarette lighter. The thing exploded and turned into the entire building he was in exploding also.

Monster Trucks

So I went to the Monster Truck show at Assembly Hall in Champaign over the weekend. It was fun for like the first 3 times they ran over the cars/while I was still drunk. Surprisingly, it was sobering instead of some kind of laugh riot. To quote Ben, "I'd rather pay a 10 dollar hooker to give me AIDS than go to monster trucks again." They did the same stupid crap over and over again and probably half of the show was just set up. The worst thing was these idiot announcer guys talking the whole time. Who gives a shit about anything you have to say? Answer: no one. I came to see stuff get smashed and blown up- not only did that in itself turn out repetitive and pointless, but I had to sit and listen to people talk about for about half the time. I guess what I'm trying to say is if you're ever thinking to yourself, "Hey let's go see a monster truck show... that would be epic," instead just punch yourself in the face and then take a nap instead.

Being in a College Band

It's something that I wish everyone could experience- playing in a band. My band, The Phonographs, formed in high school and although we still play sometimes, we're really not a actively functional group. Playing a gig gave me a very unique feeling; unlike performing in speech or theatre in high school, I was never nervous for a gig with my band. It's pure enjoyment. At least this was my experience.

Snake Bite Tuesday, founded over the summer of 2006, is a student band currently playing on the U of I campus. The band consists of lead singer Nich Palcovic, guitarist Carl Radosevich, guitarist Brandon Shaver, drummer Scott Greuel, and bassist Brian McCormick. "Basically we just like to rock out and have fun," said Radosevich.

I took these photos at one of the bands rehersals on Monday, January 15, 2007 while doing a feech for the Daily Illini. Sitting in on their practice reminded me what it was like being in a band. It's a lot of fun and sometimes you even get paid for it.


Snake Bite Tuesday will be performing next:

Tuesday, Jan. 30th @ White Horse, 9pm | Friday, Feb. 2nd @ Bar Louie, 9pm

Note: none of these are the picture that was published in the DI. This post and this blog is my own work and not affiliated with the Daily Illini.

Emerging Artists and Online Social Networking

Not very long ago in the music world, if you wanted professional sounding recordings you had to go to a professional studio to get them. And if you wanted to distribute your music to fans- tapes and CDs sold or given out directly at a performance was the only way. Or if you wanted to publicize one of your shows, you’d hand out fliers on the street. Today, however, with the advent of more powerful personal computers, audio recording software and recording devices, it is much easier and much cheaper than ever before to produce quality recordings right out of the home. It is in this state that many aspiring artists and bands across the country find themselves in today. Active, computer literate musicians benefit from a wide range of online resources to help distribute and promote their music on a scale never before imaginable to local and aspiring artists. At the same time it is transforming the music industry, or at least how bands and record executives look at it, in several different ways.

For bands hoping to break into the big time music business, there have always been inherent challenges. Traditionally, bands would have to either sell or give away CDs of their music at shows as their only means of distribution. Now, thanks to the Internet, bands can simply give out their web address or a CD with the web address printed on the CD. No longer do fans have to physically copy demo CDs of these new bands in order to pass on to friends- the music is instantly accessible to anyone with an internet connection. The Internet enhances the power of word-of-mouth music promotion immensely.

The Internet is full of outlets for anyone to output their own content and actually be heard. People post and distribute blogs, pictures, music, and videos online. This online mediascape is self perpetuating and viral in that the consumers are providing the channel of distribution. Producer, distributor, consumer are all blended together- there are no set channels someone has to go through to get a message out. If the content is worth the attention, if it is interesting or entertaining, the producer needs only to post their content online and it will spread organically. All content can be accesses almost immediately with a high-speed Internet connection, thereby erasing all special and time boundaries for anyone’s “published” content. Online social networking sites take advantage of this aspect of the Internet by giving users a space to represent themselves online and put a face to any content each user produces or consumes. Through these sites today’s aspiring bands and musicians can connect to their audiences in ways never before possible; Myspace.com, Facebook.com, and Last.fm are three major social networking sites that make this phenomenon possible.

Myspace.com, founded in 2003 by Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe, is the most popular social networking site on the Internet and according to a November 17, 2006 article from Rolling Stone Magazine, “MySpace has become the fourth-highest-trafficked Web site [in the United States] (after Yahoo!, eBay and MSN), with 35 million members...” Bands can create profiles (or their fans can create profiles for them) that allow individual users to become ‘friends’ with the band. Bands can also become ‘friends’ with other bands. It is interesting that this kind of personal connection can only be found online, however contrived this connection may be, the fact remains that it is a connection- I don’t know anywhere else I can find a generally accepted document that states I am friends with someone. Fans can post messages on the bands message board and feel like they are actually communicating with the band itself. Official web pages for bands can have great content, feel, and tone to them, however a web page is a description… an information source. With a MySpace account fans can feel like they are communicating and interacting directly with the band because their page looks just like theirs- it’s all the same format with the same constraints.

In addition to the personal connection fans get with MySpace, it is just a great way to distribute information. Bands can post songs for either streaming or download, based on whatever privacy settings the band deems appropriate. Up-to-date show information is also easily displayed. A MySpace page serves the same function as a web site, except reduced to a basic form that is not only informational, but also shared and connected with all the people that consider themselves fans of the band. It is a phenomenal tool for any band or musician- big or small. While popular acts use MySpace pages as a tool within a larger promotion strategy provided to them by their record company or other public relations mechanism, aspiring bands largely use MySpace as their sole means of distribution of information and media. The great part is that no matter the size of the band, they pages that look almost exactly the same with essentially the same capabilities. According to a September 2, 2006 Business News article, MySpace will soon allow registered bands to directly sell downloads of their music through their MySpace pages. "A band in Iowa can now reach out to fans in Los Angeles," MySpace President Chris DeWolfe said.

Facebook.com, the second most popular social networking site, does not allow bands to have profiles but it provides a great vehicle for “word of mouth” style online promotion and tagging. Users can tag their favorite bands in their profiles and when one of these tags is clicked, the user can automatically see how many other people like that band as well. Going off of this idea of social tagging, users can create fan groups on the site that both serve as another type of tag, showing that they are in fact a fan of the band, as well as a forum for discussion about the band. In addition to creating groups and giving tagged band endorsements in user profiles Facebook provides a means for users to message each other. Users can send both private messages to other users, and public messages via a users “wall.” If your friend leaves you a wall message that says, “Hey, check out this new band I’ve been listening to…” all of a sudden anyone that looks at your wall from then on is exposed to that message.

Probably the most useful function on Facebook.com for aspiring bands, or hit bands, are the Facebook events. Anyone can create an event- it has a specific time, place, etc. They are basically online fliers, however, because of the interface they exist in they’re not perceived as annoying. Friends invite friends to events- the event invitations are seen as welcoming and unobtrusive. If an aspiring band wants to get out awareness about a show all they have to do is create an event on Facebook and invite their friends. Their friends can then invite their friends- it’s like chain mail that happens naturally. The best part is that each flier comes with a personal recommendation implicitly built into it. If some guy hands you a flier for some bands show, who cares? But if it’s your friend that handed you the flier, then there is value already attached to it, you might actually want to take a look. Facebook events provide a frame of reference that paper handbills for a show can never provide.

Last.fm is a web site that solely focuses on social music tagging. User profiles consist almost entirely of a catalogue of their listening habits. Users have to download a small piece of software that records any song the user listens to on their computers music player, such as iTunes or Windows Media Player, and uploads that information to the site. The web site will then generate music recommendations based on the users listening history. This allows the user to get personalized recommendations on new music and find other people with similar musical taste to themselves. The site uses a Wiki system that allows users to update information about each artist. The main benefit of this site is that as fans of a band simply listen to their music on their computers that they have bought, been given, or downloaded Last.fm records that and other users can see that these people with similar musical interests have been listening to that band. This is the greatest example of the hyper-word-of-mouth promotion effect that social networking sites have.
With Last.fm users don’t even have to actively do anything to spread the word about a band. Whatever a user listens to is recorded and from there can gain momentum.


Artists can also create accounts and put songs up for users to listen to, again either allowing downloading or only streaming. Like the system MySpace is planning to allow artists to directly sell music through the site, Last.fm provides a link to Amazon.com through which an artist could potentially set up an account to sell their music through. Last.fm also offers promotional tools to help spread the word about registered artists. Users have to pay for these additional services, like banner ads and inserting your uploaded music into selected Last.fm radio streams. These ads and increased online radio plays are highly focused within the Last.fm community and would be excellent marketing tools for bands wanting to gain more exposure and fans than the basic community based service the site provides free.

This outpouring of self-perpetuated online music marketing is having profound effects on the traditional music industry. These social networking sites, however, are not a death sentence for the record companies. After years of playing catch-up, on the heels of file sharing sites and the iPod, record companies are starting to integrate the utility of the Internet into their strategies. Using MySpace to promote artists is probably the best illustration of the trend of “viral marketing,” where a sales message is passed on through existing social networks by consumers. According to a May 2006 article in London newspaper, The Guardian, “… you find the music business letting the media believe what it wants to about the "bottom-up" Internet - and hiding the top-down PR at which record companies have excelled for decades.” Artists like Lilly Allen, who have highly frequented MySpace pages, often gain media attention as being an online phenomenon when in fact that MySpace was used as a tool by her existing record company to promote her music. Using MySpace to break new talent at a record company is a great tool used in conjunction with other promotion and public relations efforts, but the site is not limited to new artists. Well known artists use MySpace and others to stay on top of their game, releasing special content to fans via these web pages. According to the previously cited Rolling Stones article, “Foo Fighters offered a podcast on the making of their latest album, In Your Honor; Weezer and Nine Inch Nails have streamed new music before its release; Coldplay uploaded exclusive footage from their tour of Japan…”

As the Public Relations Manager for Star Course, the University of Illinois student run concert production and promotion organization, I used Facebook.com to publicize an upcoming concert for the band Guster. I sent messages to administrators of Guster fan groups and asked them to mass message all the members of the groups with a short blurb about the concert and ticket purchasing information. Also we created a Facebook event group and staff members are encouraged to invite friends. We have used the Facebook events and groups to promote shows all year long because the messages penetrate the intended audience, the messages can spread virally, and because Facebook users at the University of Illinois are our target market.

So, while online social networking sites are not a sure way to skyrocket a new independent bands success, they do allow bands and aspiring musicians to build and maintain a fan base with incredible ease at basically no cost. I use MySpace and Last.fm to distribute music for my band, The Phonographs. We don’t get to play together very much since the lead guitar player and myself live in Champaign, while our drummer lives in Rock Island, IL. I use MySpace and Last.fm to put up tracks we’ve recorded and share them with my friends. I don’t really do much ‘promoting’ with the sites but without them I’d have no way of letting my friends hear our songs. According fellow MySpace user, Andy Wicklund he uses MySpace because it is, “A free place to post music- a public forum with millions of potential viewers.” Wicklund uses MySpace.com to promote his band, The Detroit Free Press, as well as post recordings of his experimental solo projects. When asked how he would be affected if he or his band couldn’t use MySpace anymore, Wicklund responded, “It would kind of ruin our band because the success of our songs encourages us to get back together whenever we can.” He also uses Facebook to distribute event information when his band has a concert.

This digital literacy that members of my generation grew up with and into allows us to disseminate and consume information on a much further reaching and instantaneous level than any generation previously. One of the best attributes of social networking sites as a vehicle for aspiring musicians to reach their fans is that no hard programming skill is required. All that is required to upload music, send out digital fliers, create profiles, send messages, or update show and contact information is knowledge of how to interact with a web browser. Self-promoting musicians in the early to mid 1990’s during the start of the Internet boom had to know web programming in order to make themselves web pages. As for sending out fliers online, artists could build E-mail lists of fans at shows, but E-mail provides no mechanism for acquiring new fans, at least not on the scale provided by MySpace, Facebook, or Last.fm. It is this skill set of digital and web fluency that empowers today’s up and coming musicians.

The new Internet phenomenon of social networking and tagging is greatly beneficial to aspiring artists. Although it probably won’t land you a record deal, it is a great way to build and maintain a relationship with a growing number of fans. Sites like MySpace.com, Facebook.com, and Last.fm are transforming the ways in which people find out about and listen to new music. “Despite the music industry’s exhaustive efforts, the Internet remains the best place to discover new music,” says Aidin Vaziri of The San Francisco Chronicle. Social networking sites provide a democratic medium in that bands both large and small use the same resources. Small bands communicate with a small amount of fans and large bands communicate with a large number of fans, but the concept is the same. As we move forward into this new digital era, whether you choose to define it that way or not, our ability to create, share, consume, and comment on a vast new array of individually produced media is growing every day. It is important for everyone, both young and old, to take advantage of the potential these sites, and the ones they precede have to offer- not for fear of being left in the dust, but simply for what can be gained by using them. And if you’re going to start a band (something I highly recommend) why not throw up a MySpace page- you might find out that you have more fans than you think.

A few thoughts

So I figured I'd throw up some pictures on here. Also I saw this great band tonight, Tally Hall. They're an amazing band that I believe is going to be big one day. I wish I had brought my camera. I really need to just bring it with me everywhere I go. Also, I'm a lazy piece of crap and generally displeased with my lack of creative output because I watch TV and drink instead. But anyway, here are some photos.

Brew Pubs

So over thanksgiving break, having recently turned 21, I spent a lot of time in 2 glorious brew pubs of the Quad Cities. Surprisingly, we have an amazing selection of bars and microbreweries. It's amazing. So after coming home, I "went out for a beer" at Bent River Brewing Company in downtown Moline, IL several times, and also made a trip to The Blue Cat Brew Pub in downtown Rock Island, IL. They both were a real good time- great atmosphere (not dumb college kids drinking until they puke and grinding all over everything) and great hand crafted beers.

I bought a growler (a half gallon glass jug of beer) from Bent River for 11 bucks that you can bring in a refill for 7 each time. I filled it up twice- once with the interesting sweet potato ale, and to take back to Chambana, the oatmeal stout. Also, a favorite I had at the Blue Cat was the Belgian Strong Ale- it's 10% alc. so they serve it to you in like a sweet 12 oz cogniac glass instead of the traditional pint.
So on the drive back I realize that Champaign-Urbana has no such place. To my knowledge there is no microbrewery in the area. That is both disappointing and surprising given the college town beer drinking culture, and no, I'm not talking about some bros hanging out and killing a 30 pack playing beer pong. The other kind of beer drinking, the casual kind.
According to an October 4th News-Gazette article downtown Champaign bar owner Chris Knight is considering opening one up. I really think there is a market for this kind of place. As people get older they get tired of the same old college drinking routine- I mean don't get me wrong, that kind of drinking has its place. Who doesn't love a good game of flippy cup (I played last night) or beer pong. But the point of the matter is, that kind of stuff isn't entertaining every time I want to drink. Sometimes I'd like to just go sit down in a nice, more relaxed microbrewery atmosphere. There's just something about being in the same place that the beer is actually created, that makes the atmosphere different.
So in conclusion, I'd like to see a microbrewery open up in downtown Champaign or Urbana. I think there is a huge market for it especially with professors and graduate students... or just anyone looking for a pint of a unique, freshly brewed ale or lager.

But what schedule to choose?

Some batshit insane dream i had

I had a dream that Alan and I were walking through the new Daily Illini building with Brian Johnson (U of I Photojournalism Professor) and like my parents and a bunch of other people. At one point he stopped and started saying just to me and Alan, that he was concerned about what was going to happen to the photojournalism program when he goes up into space next week. He was about to break down emotionally when my dad came up to us very awkwardly and started pitching a movie idea about like sea monsters and a submarine or something. He had a flow chart and all these diagrams about how the movie would work. I told him that this wasn’t the best time and that we were talking about important lab stuff and that he should go talk to mom for a little bit or something. He just kept going with the movie pitch though. It was really awkward at first but then we all realized that he was just trying to make us all laugh via his zany and improbable movie idea and then we all had a good laugh about it. Then we walked into another area of the building and some guy started revealing these snakes and weird gremlin like things out of baskets. He would take the lid off of a basket and the thing would hiss and then he’d pucker his lips and the thing would give him a kiss and go back into the basket. I thought to myself that this was a bad idea and that I could see a horror movie starting this way. Then this weird queen gremlin thing descended from the ceiling and the lighting went all red and fog machines went off or something. Then everyone was afraid and such and the queen gremlin walked off with Brian Johnson and handed him a semi-cute baby gremlin. I had the feeling that he had betrayed us all, but only to save the little gremlins from being eaten by the queen.

Untitled

I never post. So I thought to myself: self, why not post? But then I remembered shortly after this thought, that I am, in fact, mostly void of things to talk about in any such posting. The end.

One of my favorite things about being home is being able to make myself delicious food instead of the Bromley Hall dining staff serving me fried shit and wattery mashed potatoes every day. Yesterday I made some angel hair with sauteed chicken, garlic, and tomatoes, and it was glorious. I might try and make my own pasta from scratch sometime before I go back to school, also I got at the grocery store the ingredients to make my own alfredo sauch which should be pretty awesome. Anyway, I'm going to go eat dinner now. Take that Bromley Hall...

I made some more banners- I posted this one. We'll see how I like it, maybe ill change it later.

So I made a banner for the blog- its kinda crappy right now, but I just wanted to do it and then make it better later... enjoy

General Bullshit

I'm sitting in the multimedia lab in Greg Hall, working my lab assistant job and it's prety slow going so I thought I'd update the ole blogger. The semester is almost over, which is crazy since it seems like it just started. I snowed this week- I like the novelty of snow for like the first two days of winter and then its downhill from there; the cold weather is a bitch. Anyway, on the lighter side of things Steve Hall, my advertising professor decided to cancel work for the rest of the semester by giving us like 80,000 extra credit points and free quiz credit. Heh... so thats pretty sweet. Also I guess my Stat final is optional, our grades will just get calculated in different ways if we take it or don't. If I don't take it then the 3 tests from the semester are the only grades- I've gotten 94's on the first two and as long as I get an 82 or above on the third one then I'm home free for an A in the class. So really I'm only going to have one final during finals week- Econ, which is on the last Saturday before break. It kinda sucks cuz I have to stay in Champaign for way longer than I need to, but on the other hand I'm just going to hang out and do a whole lot of nothing so that should be pretty fun. I started putting together a resume for the general purpose of having one so thats fun. Also, I wanted to play Age of Empires II this morning but I couldn't find the disc so that kind of saddened me, oh well... I can't think of anything else right now to type. Good night and good luck...

St. Louis/My Birthday

So this weekend Alex and I visited Megan at Wash U in St. Louis. It was pretty sweet. We got in around 9:15 on Friday night and we went out and got some food. Afterwords we chilled in her room and played some games and hung out and such. We were kinda tired so we went to bed. Their dorms are in suites with a common room in each- they are really nice. Also the food in their dining hall plans is amazing compared to Bromley Hall... ugh. On Saturday (my birthday- I'm 20 now) we got up and went to the Zoo in the morning with Megan and her roomate. We brought a picnic lunch and ate it there. So that was cute. Then we went to the Galleria- this huge mall. We hung out at Megans dorm for awhile and then Megan had to work at 6:30 so Alex and I went to the loop and I got some presents for Garrett's birthday. It's a pretty sweet area with lots of cool stores and places to eat and such. After Megan got off work, we went out to eat to this good Italian place with Megan, her roomate, and one of her suitemates. We picked up some cake and then went back to Megan's. We ate the cake and watched a movie and then hung out for awhile. It was a pretty sweet birthday- and it seemed like a far more adult-like birthday then I've ever had before... zany. On Sunday we slept in and then went to brunch with Megan before we drove back. It was a very nice weekend. Now I'm waiting around until the mail room opens up in Bromley so I can get my present from Mom and Dad...
So all in all... happy birthday to me...

Next semester's schedule:



It has been confirmed that I have at long last registered for classes without a lot of heartbreak and cursing. Everything went along as planned. I decided to skip stat lecture to so I could register as soon as possible. Good thing I did since there were only 5 available spots in Advertising 412 before 1 pm and at 1:05 after I had registered and checked, there were no spots. Horay for the glory of skipping class.

Update- the initial registration went smoothly, but I guess the multimedia class I was hoping to get into later is full now, so I took another class instead. Luckily the replacement class was one I also wanted to take so thats good.
I really haven't written in this for a long time...

Anyway, Alex and I are going to St. Louis this weekend to visit Megan. Yay. That should be pretty sweet.

On with the rock...

I updated my blog.

I'm back at school now and since I'm applying to work at the Daily Illini as a photographer I'm going to now put some more photo journalism oriented pictures that involve people in them on here for the benefit of anyone from that fine organization who happens to look at this to see my past work.

Today I slept really late. I went to Lincoln Park to play another one of Joey's reality show game creations he likes to torture people with. This was "The Mole" and we competed for up to $25 with 8 people including the mole. We played a crapload of games and took all these quizes to see who would get eliminated. I won and it was glorious. Alex was the sneakin mole. It took like freakin 7 hours or some ungodly amount of time but it was worth it since I won. I suppose thats about it. I go to school in less than a week. That is amazing. I can't wait.

So this weekend Alan came to the Quad Cities. It was a good time. We partied at Bergers on friday and walked back to my house at 4 am. Saturday we went downtown davenport and such to river music experience and to the figge art museum opening. We chilled at Theos for awhile as well. It was a good weekend and I got some pretty nice pictures.

So I haven't updated in a long time. Here are some pics from last weekend when I went to visit Alan in Chitown. Enjoy...