On Lip-Synching


Sorry to jump in here, but what was going to be a comment turned into a missive.

Lip-synching contests (see Jaina's post below) might sound absolutely dorky, but I've watched some public access programming lately (I know, PA TV -- the height of cool) where high schoolers were going wild over it. They were cheering in the auditorium like it was American Idol meets High School Musical. I will try to figure out what school was doing it and find out what strategies contributed to the success. Our first Amped Lib interview, maybe?

This kind of event would have to skirt that fine line that says "It's so nerdy, it's hip," methinks.

Plus, you could have a big educational display and handouts on lip-synching through the ages -- highlighting books on how music videos are made (Gasp!! They mouth the words??) or articles about this fine list of shamed singers. An exhibit with various news sources on Milli Vanilli and Ashlee Simpson . . . fun topic!

Oh man, I'm definitely going to use this theme for my IL demo searches this quarter.

To be continued?

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I add my eternal thanks to Pop Goes the Library. Apparently, neither focus nor discipline nor careful editing are required to acheive genius status these days. ;)

And "cool girl on the bus," I ain't. (Don't you love it how nobody was popular in high school when asked later?) My glasses were too thick. My brother is a smart jock and my sister is a high school senior with mad art skillz, though, so maybe I get rub-off points.

Fine Duds:

Want your own Rock Star Librarian shirt? Sophie Brookover reveals how hers was crafted.


Web 2.0:

Mashable! email alerts notified me about NextCat, a “MySpace for . . . actors, musicians, producers and make-up artists (to) help them to grow their social circles.” Pete Cashmore sees a bright future for this niche social site, so your aspiring entertainment mogul patrons may be interested in this alternative to “MyCrack”, as the students like to call the beast.

He notes:
“(The) service does have one feature that could make it useful to the target demographic: users can add their booking information and contact details, making it more like LinkedIn for (out of work?) actors and musicians.”


Music Ref Copyright News:

I heard about a new Gracenote service from Librarian in Black. (And a kind colleague – thanks Melissa!) The company is going to start offering legal transcripts of lyrics for a fee. We can assume that this will pave the way for lawsuits against all those “free” lyric websites. (Which are often spyware factories.)

It will also change the way we help those patrons looking for help finding lyrics. I’d love to hear some ideas about the impact in the comments.

Arstechnica has an article about it . . .


MySpace Musician Rights:

Apparently there’s been a reversal on the MySpace terms of agreement issue that Jaina had mentioned in a previous post.

Boingboing states:

“MySpace has revised its terms so that musicians who upload to the site retain control of their works, and MySpace/NewsCorp/Fox can't sell those songs without contracting with the musicians.”

Belated but huge thank you to Alternative Teen Services for linking to our website a few days ago!

Apologies if the quality/frequency of our posts plummets toward the end of this week.

Jaina and I are practicing what we preach. She’s heading up the High Strung Rock & Roll library tour appearance in the Twin Cities. I’m, um, going to the show. And we’re finishing up our article for Beyond the Circulation Desk. We’ll give more details on the release of the book if the editor actually accepts our extended blithering.

Great ‘future of music’ article in Sound and Vision

Snips --

“We are clearly shifting to a digital-delivery environment, but it will take a little while to get there,” says Thomas Hesse, president of Global Digital Business at Sony BMG Music Entertainment. “But it’s realistic to assume that in five years, we’ll be in the realm of 50% digital distribution.”

Ari Hest: “If you asked me a couple of years ago, I would have said it would take another decade, but I don’t think so anymore. It’s becoming more frequent for everybody I know to get their music from iTunes and avoid CDs altogether.”

What does this say for the future of library CD collections? Can we stay abreast of the music format waves?

Here’s a REMIX article that probably especially appeals to YA boys. (It involves studio construction and wall demolition.)

And lastly -- only because pressured -- a link to my Pandora station. Check out the list of bands to see how cool it’s SUPPOSED to be. It kept getting stuck on particular genres this morning – so if it gives you a morning full of fiddle music or beats-and-rhymes – know that a refresh will probably give you a completely different sound.

10 Final Love Notes about Pandora
(until the next compelling phase)

1. They play the explicit versions of songs!
So be careful if listening at work or referring to YA patrons. I haven’t run into any foul language, sticking to my Celtic rock, though.
2. Pandora’s sound quality seems much higher than Launchcast to me -- 128Kbps streams, requiring broadband. Pandora also requires that your computer can handle Flash.
3. The subscription version and the free version are exactly the same services, except that the free version has ads. This doesn’t mean the noisy, abrupt audio ads though – as far as I can tell. Print ads only, looks like.
4. You can learn about a genre by entering one artist, early Black Eyed Peas, for instance. Say we use, Bridging the Gap, the song “Original,” -- a song from my college years. Pandora offers up these artists:
Bow Wow
Nick Cannon
Brooke Vale
So why do these songs resemble the first one? Click on the artists and you see something like:
r&b influences
east coast rap influences
electronica influences
a deep voice
chill rhymin'
clean lyrics
use of tonal harmonies
melodic part writing
rhythmic clapping
a bumpin' kick sound
a synth bass riff
smooth synth textures
a dry recording sound
radio friendly stylings
prevalent use of groove
lyrics by a respected rap artist
production by a famous producer
You might suddenly hear the songs in a whole new light: how the Pandora ‘experts’ heard them. It’s not just “that rap music” anymore – it’s a series of parts, the sum of which is greater, etc.
5. They haven’t tackled classical or world music . . . yet. The Q&A says they aren’t quite sure how to go about it at this point.
6. They claim to have 400,000 songs from over 20,000 artists – “the big record labels, the indies and the musicians recording and self-publishing . . .”
7. Your musician patrons can submit their own albums for review and possible inclusion/promotion. (Details are in the Q&A)
8. Pandora apparently works really well for holiday music. If you are into that . . .
9. The Q&A also has helpful tips for adding Pandora to your blog or website. As stations, feeds, etc.
10. Like us, they seek to educate! You might have questions like this:
Q: What is "syncopation"? "Vamping"? "Major/minor key tonality"? "Chromatic harmony"? “Acoustic instrumentation"? "Electric instrumentation"? "Experimental sounds"? “Orchestral arranging"? "Basic rock song structure"? "Meandering melodic phrasing"? "East coast rap roots"? "West coast rap roots"? "Old school roots"? "Southern rap roots"? "Gangsta rap attitude"? "Downtempo influence"? "Trance roots"? "Trip-hop roots"? "G-funk synth line"? "Chopped & screwed production” "Vinyl ambience"? "Headnodic beats"? "Use of sing-jaying"? "Wet/dry recording sound"? "House roots"? "IDM influences"?

That’s right. The answers are in Pandora’s Q&A. Just think of how cool you can be with your jargon now!

Pandora Vs. LaunchCast
(By request . . .)

This service comparison was performed meticulously and scientifically . . . ok, so I just listened for 15 minutes each while cataloging today. But the results may offer insight for the average frenzied blue collar librarian.

I created a radio station for Great Big Sea, my favorite band – a Celtic-pub-song-folk-shanty group.

Pandora recognized the band right away, offering up so
me alternatives that were “cheeky and college friendly” with “mixed acoustic and electric instrumentation” and “interweaving vocal harmony.” These they peppered with my favorite selections from a variety of Great Big Sea’s albums.

(Honestly – it’s like they knooow me – the first they played was first GBS song that I ever heard, then the song I sing to my friend in the Navy . . . . Spooky.)

Pandora plays songs from the original band every fourth selection or so. Then, you can click on the artist to figure out why they played it, add new artists to mix up the tonality, or enter specific songs to focus on a certain style.

Launchcast, on the other hand – first, offered up some commercials. Then, Audioslave. O.K.

“A bit of a stretch, but Pandora had selected Audioslave for me before – on other stations,” I tell myself. We’ll give it the benefit of the doubt.

And then up pops Fergie. Of the Black Eyed Peas, Charlie Brown and Quentin Tarantino fame. Say what? Launchcast seems to think its purpose is promoting the latest payola’d artist on the block – the artists we could turn to any top 100 radio station for – instead of new-to-me artists in the Celtic rock genre.

If I've unfairly judged it, feel free to let me know in the comments. I'm going to do "10 Things You Didn't Know about Pandora" tomorrow, and then move onto a different topic. I promise. Maybe even pick up a magazine, like Jaina does.

Busy day. Three words.

Hip hop violinist. (If you've heard a violin on a hip hop album, it's probably Miri Ben-Ari.)
Ok, ten more words:
She's classically trained, versatile and has a collaborative solo album.

Pandora Is for Lovers . . .
(of Listening Advisory)

This might be self-indulgent, but I'm gonna wax prosaic on the beauty of Pandora for a touch. Jaina mentioned it in the last post, but I want to give it it's own segment, because it deserves it.

Think of Pandora as automatic "reader's advisory" for music. You can show customers how to cross-reference albums they like with our library catalog, just like they would with a reader's advisory database.

How to use it:
1. Go to Pandora.com.
2. Work with the helpful Flash tutorial to get started. (Free with registration - it's very easy.)
3. Create personalized "radio stations" centered around artists you already love.
4. Listen.
5. Rate the music "thumbs up", "thumbs down", etc. to fine tune.
6. See whether the album is available in the library catalog.

(The service automatically connects to Amazon and a few other purchasing options, as well.)

Members of the Music Genome Project have analyzed songs according to dozens of qualities like: tempo, style, key, etc., and the results are surprisingly useful. I find several fun new artists every time I listen.

From Wikipedia: "Since the algorithm selects songs on the basis of musical features, rather than artist popularity or record sales, many users have lauded Pandora for its ability to 'recommend' unfamiliar songs that fit a user's preferences."

Like many resources -- you really have to just play around with it to appreciate the cool-factor.

A Spoonful of Music Helps the Literature Go Down

P.S. (Pre-script) Did you know teens sit farther back from the screen? Today's larger font is dedicated to this article.

Alrighty -- real quick -- time for two of my favorite pairings between music and literature:

1. Songs Inspired By Literature (from the Artists for Literacy Project)

Two fantastic CDs so far. There's some great educational tools on the website. NPR did a story on the editor, with a conversation archived for streaming audio. "Last Temptation of Odysseus" = my favorite song of all time! It's what the repeat button was made for. It would also make a FANT-abu-LASTIC pairing with the "pulp covers for classic books" feature that Slate did a few months ago. Hehehehehe. I'm a dork.

2. Hip Hop Reader

Newly discovered as of today -- so I haven't had the chance to explore it completely. But the site interface starts with a bang. Love it. Also love the mission:

"WWW.HipHopReader.com is an interactive website created to increas and enhance the reading habits, Internet usage, and civic engagement of urban high school students."

Anybody know any history on this project? I found it through a del.i.cious account -- so thanks goes out to "vhuang."

This next one doesn't get a number because it's not concerned with literature, per say. I'll give it a tilde.

~ The Turnaround Game

"The Turnaround Game (www.theturnaroundgame.com) asks the players to develop a winning proposal to save an ailing record company called BigNoizz. The interactive game introduces students not only to the music industry, but also to the wider experience of the business world - specifically, that of the CPA." (Free registration required.)

This site = VIDEO GAMES + MUSIC BIZ. Woot.
Very snarky. Very Flash. Very fun. Not that I played it at work. Much.

I found it through an article in Ebsco Regional Business, actually. (Librarians repreSENT.) It would take paragraphs to cite it properly, since I emailed the article to myself from a different library's database. (No wonder those students complain.) But here's the short version:

Journal Record Staff. "American Institute of Certified Public Accountants produces new
online game." Daily Record, The (Kansas City, MO); 01/10/2006

Regional Note!

J Isaac's new album release: Welcome 2 the Planet is coming up soon!! Is it August 9th? Correct me on that if I'm wrong. I'm hearing the big release promoted all over Twin Cities hip hop stations. If the hype is any indicator, this will be a big deal among the teen crowd.

Why not order a few extra copies? Make a display. Friend his MySpace account with yours. Show that libraries have an ear to the ground, a finger to the pulse of teen interests. :)

Those outside of the Twin Cities. I'm sure you have your own 'big event' regional music releases coming up. Especially as the underground/indie hip hop scene is making a resurgence. Check out label websites! Your teens may have some good leads.

Where do soft drink companies go when they want to attract teens?

Where everybody *ahem, libraries* should go . . .
Hip and happening MUSIC.

I keep hearing ads for Pepsi Smoosh on hip hop and top-whatever radio stations.
Here's the site --

No immediate library purpose. Just savvy marketing. Well, there's some quick collection development or display ideas, I suppose. A speedy visual synopsis of who's HOTT.

Think about your other venues that want teens. Clothing stores . . . night-life draws . . . TV commercials . . .
They pump the jams.

And check out something else! The website is loud, bold, cool -- without frying any retinas. I've noticed that a tragic number of teen library websites are turning to 70's neon for their inspiration. If four minutes of looking at your teen website and you feel like you just spent an equivalent amount of time on the newly Depp-licious Pirates of the Carribean ride -- you may want to teach them the value of a formal usability test.

Get "Down With" the "Hip Hop" Vernacular:

When I "scoop you in my coupe" and you are "sipping on deuce-zeros", how and/or what are you drinking?

A) Water. That is, H-"to-the-duece-to-the"-Oh. "Yo."

B) From tall cans.

C) "Crunk" juice.

D) Ok s-"izzle."

Hint: