Hi all,

I would like to draw your attention to our ‘fan cover’ section. You can find it via the multimedia link on the front page. They are all interesting in various ways… I’m sure you will find something you like/hate. My favorites, at the moment, are Eddi Readers sublime “Wild Mountainside” , “Iceberg” by Beckalina and a recently received gem by The Goodbye Notes from Australia.  A waltz time rendition of “Weightlifting” that is just beautiful. I love the instrumentation… double bass, brushes on the drums, acoustic guitars and a wonderful singer (and an appearance by a Gecko on the first chorus that is strangely fitting). check it out and let me know what you think…

love,

John

now that frank, john and paul have left martha’s vineyard, where do the recordings stand?  they left for the vineyard in cold, clear weather on january 21.  they had recorded the backing tracks for 14 songs in new york during november-december and hoped to finish overdubs and vocals on the vineyard. 

the band spent their time camped out at producer andy chase’s house, near the highest point on martha’s vineyard, with carly simon’s home also in the neighborhood!  the home doesn’t have a built-in studio, so andy and ruddy (production assistant) rigged a recording area and adjoining control room, complete with an ocean view. 

as frank said in his blog entry, he got sick on the vineyard and was unable to sing for a few days.  good thing he didn’t get steaming before going out to martha’s vineyard, or it could have been much worse!  for the sessions, one of the first decisions they made was that “the abba song” (working title) wasn’t ready for the album.  they hadn’t written complete lyrics for the song and decided to leave it behind.  they’ll hopefully be able to use the recorded backing track at a later date, once they write some suitable lyrics.

while frank was recovering, john and paul recorded various guitar and other instrumental overdubs and everyone continued to work on lyrics for a few unfinished songs.  one of the songs giving them trouble is “the jimmy webb song.”  they had written some lyrics for the original demo recording and rehearsals, but when the song was recorded in new york, it ended up a bit different and the lyrics no longer fit the song’s vibe.  they were also working on bits of “people”, “i hung my harp upon the willows”, “i wish you’d met her” and “down and out in new york city.”

after 10 days (returning to cape cod in a torrential downpour), they managed to finish all of the instrumental overdubs as well as the vocals for nine songs.  the four songs where vocals still need to be recorded are “astronomy”, “i just don’t know how”, “i wish you’d met her” (lyrics still unfinished) and “the jimmy webb song” (lyrics still unfinished).  one song, “down and out in new york city” was recorded a couple of different ways.  the band had an initial version and melody, then andy came up with an idea for a new melody, for which john wrote new lyrics and frank re-recorded the vocals.  the versions of the song are quite different and the band is going to wait until the mixing is complete to see which version, if either, will end up on the album.  

the next step is for the lyrics to be completed by the time frank returns to new york around mid-march to record the vocals for the four remaining songs.  john and paul may be there to lend moral support.  the album mixing was originally scheduled for february/march, but will now be pushed out a bit, probably sometime after march.  the band still needs to secure a record deal, so the album release date is still very much up in the air.   

as you can see from the band’s blog entries, they’re very excited about the songs for “album #5″ and want to be careful, making sure they license it to someone who will treat the album and the band the way they deserve…instead of being taken advantage of (by the way, they have written another song about their experiences in new york city and were thinking about recording it now, but are going to keep it in reserve for the time being).  although it has been almost 3 1/2 years since the release of weightlifting, which was released eight years after a happy pocket, what’s a few more months between friends?  

Hi all…We are days away from leaving Marthas Vineyard and finishing our recording. Our days and nights here have been filled with beautiful sunrises, blood red moons,  ocean views, crystal clear night skies, snowstorms, wild deer and rabbits… and our songs floating through the air … songs that appeared here, songs born at home, songs that became clearer here… the silence and beautiful isolation of this place has been great for the general muse.Last night, during singing breaks, we moongazed with the telescope, watched the fishing boat lights out near the horizon, and eventually watched the sun rise as we harmonised…. All the while sipping on hot cocktails… and thus..

My recipe for this blog is for an “Engine”. A Marthas Vineyard cocktail created by Rudyard Lee Cullers in early 2008. Take a half glass of hot herbal lemon tea (remove teabag), add half spoon of honey, add some apple and pear slices soaked overnight in Quantreau, a decent measure of Canadian Whisky.  Stir and sip slowly through the night, singing until the sunrises over the Atlantic……….. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

John x

hi everyone,

just a wee update on what we’re up to.

since monday, we’ve been staying at a beautiful house on the island of martha’s vineyard, just off the cape cod coast.  ridiculous i know, but true.  and stranger still, it seems to suit us!   andy (producer) and ruddy (engineer) have rigged up a studio for us, where we’ve been polishing off the songs for the album - a bit of guitar here, some keyboard business there and a lot of singing.  we’re going to get some photos to you, just as soon as we get our camera shit together.  meanwhile, the 5th trashcan album is taking shape.  naturally, as the singer, i am falling ill every day with some bug or other and feeling very sheepish about it but despite these self-indulgences, work is being done; carbon is being pressed into diamond.  we’ve got 13 songs recorded (i could list them, they’re that close to being finished, but i’ll hold off for now) and well, it’s just a really wonderful record.  hopefully everyone who hears it will fall in love with it and to it.

recipe for really good eggnog, from my sister barbara:

whip 6 eggs, two at a time until light, add 3 pints of milk and 0.75 cup of sugar (no, i don’t know what a cup is either) and mix until sugar dissolves.  put a quarter-pint of rum and the same of scottish whisky and american bourbon into a measuring jug, add the three-quarters of a pint of hard booze gradually and stir it into the mixture.  in a separate bowl, whisk a pint of heavy cream until it’s thick (but not stiff) and mix that into the whole shebang.  let it chill in the fridge till very cold and serve in a cold glass with a sprinkle of nutmeg.  takes about 10 minutes if you have a food mixer, and it’s DELICIOUS!  if i’ve forgotten anything, i’ll update this recipe.  and let me know if anyone tries it.

lots of love to you all,

frank xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Well…. here we are in 2008… so glad you made it. How was our 2007 ? Low key is one way to put it. After the previous few years of touring the U.S.A., Australia, Japan, Ireland and the U.K. with our ‘Weightlifting’ masterpiece, we needed some time at home to recharge the batteries, rejoin our families and get back to normality. Most of the year was spent at home in Scotland. Writing was done, one new song was released on the “Ballads Of The Book” album, a concert was broadcast on Australian TV, and three shows were played. Those are the bare facts… between the lines our musical journey continued apace in a small rehearsal room behind the Bay Horse Tavern in Shawlands, Glasgow. We grew into a six piece band. Davy Hughes could not join the fold due to family/work commitments. Grant Wilson ( A friend from Kilmarnock who has played with us at various times over the years when Davy could not make it ) picked up the bass. Stevie Mulhearn (A friend from Troon who also played with us a few times in the past) joined us on the keyboards.

The room was made comfortable with coffee machine, ashtrays, kettle, cups and atmospheric lighting. We would congregate most weeks and jam the latest songs that were written or just jam whatever riff/chords/feel that the mood brought. Some days were hungover, some days were paraletic, some days were straight… the music was always evocative. We had decided to change our working habits and being ‘in the moment’ seemed to be the answer. No slaving over guitar parts or working out exact arrangements of songs. The groove became king. If the ‘feel’ was good then we were happy boys.

After a Spring and Summer of this lovely behaviour, we decided to leave the room, (Autumn had kicked in and dampness arrived), and head to New York to record. Paul got married and the party of the season was had in the Hunting Lodge, Kilmarnock….just across the road from our old Shabby Road studios. Pauls best man was Jody Stoddart, and old Kilmarnock friend and the finest guitar slinger in the west. Paul had the inspired idea of asking him to join us on our New York recording sessions. So six became seven and the air fares increased… but so did the good times. We finished 2007 in the best of moods…. 3 weeks in Glasgows finest son… New York City. The results of our trip will be released sometime in 2008. It is our finest record so far… the songs are top of the range, the band is rockin’ …. 2008 looks like it will be ours. All the best to you and yours, we shall see you on the road somewhere soon.

Love,

John xxxxxxx

the spinART story an interesting one. here are a few more details around this:

what i have heard is that, as of sometime around april 2007, jeff price was “no longer associated with spinART” (see earlier blog entry). as recently as november 2007, he “doesn’t know where things are at” with spinART. strange.

the lawyer handling spinART’s affairs (who coincidentally (or not?) happens to be from newton, ma, jeff’s hometown) says that spinART went out of business in april, 2007. in july 2007, under the lawyer’s administration, spinART sold all of its assets to raise funds for creditors. he goes on to say that spinART’s financial records were “quite a mess” and “with the help of spinART’s principals” (which presumably includes jeff price and his partner joel morowitz), he “put together the best list he could of creditors and amounts owed.” shortly afterwards, a distribution was made to creditors, with unsecured creditors receiving pennies on the dollar.

it’s a sad story. no one wants to see anyone go out of business and lose their shirt…their investment…their reputation. but hold on a second - it wasn’t spinART that lost their shirt and investment - it was anyone associated with them - the artists, distributors and publishers. as i blogged earlier, jeff price is off with his new company, tunecore - i can’t say i’ve talked to him, but he seems to be doing just fine. his reputation appears to be intact. for example, the new issue (#61) of the big takeover has a short take on tunecore and refers to jeff as a “forward-thinking entrepreneur”, discusses how tunecore “empowers artists” and quotes jeff stating that “tunecore is an enabler that allows artists to succeed under any terms they want”…blah blah blah.

hey, that’s a great idea to enable artists, it’s just too bad that this philosophy apparently didn’t exist at spinART. here are some terms that i’d want as an artist:

1. have my label fulfill stated contractual terms, which includes,

2. providing royalty statements within 90 days of each 6 month period ended june 30 and december 31 (item 6 in the contract, by the way), and

3. paying the artist the balance due under the royalty statement as of those same time periods (also item 6)

4. label to pay the music publishers for mechanical licenses so the artist doesn’t end up unrecouped with the publisher (item 9)

5. label to pay the artist for synchronization licenses (so when the artist’s music is used on tv and the production company pays the label for that usage, the artist receives its contractual share)

6. label to pay the artist for merchandise sold to the label

7. label to pay the artist for proceeds of merchandise the label collects on the artist’s behalf

8. label to buy computers and phones that work - it would be incredibly bad luck for computers to consistently not receive e-mail and have hard drive crashes and for phones to consistently “not receive” voicemails

9. don’t stall, be evasive or lie

are those outrageous demands? i wouldn’t think so, it just seems like good business to me.

back to the liquidation process for a minute. you’d probably expect that even if your records are “a mess,” if the company’s owners are involved, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect them to come up with a relatively complete list of creditors. if you were a record label, where would you start? i think your artist roster is a good place. maybe look at who their publishers are. but somehow, spinART managed to leave some artists and publishers off their creditor list. i could see if you hadn’t heard from an artist in a couple of years…but if you’ve consistently received e-mails, voicemails and legal notices of breach of contract and contract termination, i think you’d probably remember that when coming up with the list of creditors. the mind boggles at just how this happened - i mean, it couldn’t have been intentional, could it?

what makes this more confusing is to this day, companies like itunes, amazon.com and spinART’s distributor continue to sell spinART product. i’m not entirely clear on whether they should be able to do this if spinART is out of business. hypothetically, if spinART was served with a notice of termination for breach of contract, then it is legally obligated to return original artwork and inventory. in the meantime, i don’t know where the proceeds of any sales end up, but you can be sure not in the bank accounts of spinART’s artists.

now if i could just get a hold of more details or e-mails…

Okay, let’s clear up the confusion here. We have, indeed, been recording our new L.P. At Stratosphere Sound in New York City, to be exact. We couldn’t really mention it before because of the silly rules of a grant we applied for (didnae get it). Andy Chase is producing and Rudyard Lee Cullers, engineering (they mixed Weightlifting and we’ve wanted to do a whole album with them ever since). These guys are just amazing. They created an incredibly productive atmosphere, not to mention all the beautiful sounds and smart ideas. And we had our pick of about forty vintage guitars! Grant Wilson did his best bubbling bass and Stevie Mulhearn was surrounded by banks of keyboards-all he was missing was a pointy hat and cape. Also along for the ride was old Kilmarnock friend and expert guitarer Jody Stoddart, who proved to be invaluable. We didn’t really rehearse any songs before we went, concentrating on just having fun jamming instead - the idea being to capture the excitement of playing something for the first time. From the first day, it was obvious that we were onto something special - the sessions were a dream. We just went in and played live all day and night for about a week, and stopped when we’d done fourteen songs. The next stage is in Martha’s Vineyard in January, where we will do some overdubs and singing. We are very excited (and a little bit surprised) by all of this, especially as we were royally ripped off by that con man Jeff Price and his band of thieves at Spinart (I’m sure someone will tell that tale here eventually). But we are used to rising above such bullshit, and we will prevail! Hooray!

Happy holidays everybody, and we’ll see you next year!

Love,

Paul Livingston

word on the street is that spinART records has gone out of business and filed for bankruptcy. i wish i knew when that became official, because it’s a very sad day in this world, one that should be marked on the calendar and never forgotten.

spinART had a reputation for signing up-and-coming bands as well as bands that were tired of, or unable, to play the major label game. not only did spinART claim to provide great support to their artists, but they strived to treat them fairly - not just as business partners, but like they were family. of course some artists may have been more like a brother, while others were like the red-headed stepchild, but family nonetheless. what family is there that doesn’t have favorites?

but if spinART couldn’t succeed in the music industry these days, then i really think no one can. if spinART’s business model couldn’t provide them with enough capital to survive, then no model will work; it really should have been quite lucrative for them.

so on this sad day, i wipe away my tears and wish jeff price (founder of spinART) the best of luck. it looks like he’s landed on his feet and was able to walk away from the spinart debacle unscathed.

at his new endeavor, tunecore, (founded in november 2005), jeff aims to:

revolutionize the way artists are able to get the money generated from the sale of their music by eliminating payment or royalty “periods” and allowing them to take their money when they want it, the moment it becomes available, and

deliver all the money from around the world owed to our artists, including money they might not have otherwise collected due to copyright laws, international tariffs or regulations of other countries, and

enable an artist to make money doing what they love

noble goals, all about making sure the artists are actually compensated for their work. i wonder if tunecore can exploit some tricks of the trade jeff learned from his days at spinART.

something else i noticed in an article from january 2006, jeff explains his thoughts behind tunecore. he commented that “Labels and aggregators pay out your money in “royalty periods”. For example, they will pay you every three months and send your money only after they have taken their 9% - 50% cut.”

hmm…that actually sounds like a good deal compared to some others that i’ve heard of. better to get paid every three months after having 9%-50% taken out, rather than not getting paid at all.

jeff also says that creating tunecore “is also my rant against these companies screwing over artists. It was time to do something about it.”

well bravo jeff, i commend you and i agree. i also hate record companies that screw over artists and i think it’s time to do something about it.

let’s see what happens.

We are off to New York City soon to record our next album. In tribute to the city and to set the mood for our visit, here are some of my favourite New York inspired moments

The Strokes/Jack White “New York City Cops”

“Taxi” title sequence

The Sex Pistols “New York”

A scene from the fantastic “Fisher King”

Georgie Gershwin and Woody Allen

Stephen Fretwell “New York”

Chelsea Hotel Documentary

The big fella.

“Kojak” title sequence

“On The Town”

My favourite NY subway song, ” The Ride ” by Joan As Policewoman.

We will be recording our very own New York inspired song in these upcoming sessions. All our magical songs cannot wait to escape into the world via the beautiful city. Wish us luck, friends.

John