Walken played at the Duke Of Windsor in Prahran in front of a pub with about fifty people in it, about twenty five of whom were friends of the band.
It wasn't my first performance of my own music in front of people, having played at an open mic night by myself playing very old Approximate music many years ago, and also very recently at the Duke with just Heath acoustic. But it was my first performance in front of everybody with a full band, and the first performance of a few new Walken songs to the masses.
I don't get a lot of opportunities to be nervous these days. I used to have a big problem with nerves. Before exams, before dates, before parties with a lot of people, before doing anything in front of anybody. I was damn nervous before the gig, but I've been a lot worse. I know our material off by heart and could easily do most of it half asleep, and the rest of the band knows it all pretty darn well by now.
Anyway, thanks massively to Jamie of the ASA (Australia Songwriters Association) for giving us the opportunity to play (and for letting me borrow his guitar amp). He really has gone right out of his way for us and the other bands involved with these Duke of Windsor 'Wax Lyrical' nights. Unfortunately these nights are now over for now and I'll be sad to see them go. We now have a lot of names of places that will put bands on. There are a lot of venues other than the 'known' venues like the Espy, Evenlyn, Corner etc. out there desperate for bands. We just have to look.
For those interested, we played the following setlist : Glory, Lego Woman, City Loop, In A Hitman's Brain, Monkey, You Could Be Happier, Lover's Lane, Right Again, With Me, Ego, Lucy.
Many of the above tracks can be found in demo form at Walken's official page. My only ask is that if you download and listen, please send us constructive comments, good and/or bad.
And David Golding wrote a reviewish of the gig. Many thanks go to him and all my other friends who came to give support. Massive thanks to Andrew Lee (future big director) for videoing the night for many years of amusement.
And now on to the news...
Competition : Alternate meanings for "DRM"? Email me!
Toshiba in Japan are joining the online music sales jam. Trialing a few (less than ten?) tracks in pretty much all the formats: Microsoft's Windows Media, IBM's Electronic Media Management System and Intertrust's system. Excellent that they're giving the users the choice. But this will also confuse 99.99% of users likely to download. Maybe they know they're only aiming at a few choice early adaptive unnetethics blinded geeks.
Clerks
It's funny, I've only seen Clerks once but I am desperate to get my hands on the Clerks Animated series DVD, available tomorrowish (20th Feb) in the US. Only two episodes of the six were ever shown on TV but this DVD has all six, with commentary and a lard-load of extras. Any only $20 US! Unlike the horrendously priced $31US for the Clerks SE double DVD (which I also want but and forcing myself not to afford for now).
Ebay
Ebay has been named the 'best' auction site in Australia, after Sold.com.au. This article explains that although Sold had more product, Ebay had twice as many completed auctions and sales.
It's pretty simple really. In order to have buyers you need lots of sellers, and in order for people to keep coming back you need a high turn over of product people are interested in. In order to have sellers you need a lot of buyers. Very chicken and egg but Ebay has been doing it for years.
I like Ebay, but I hate their pricing system. I would buy (if I ever won an auction) but I prefer to sell on newsgroups. You're not covered by insurance but you can make better deals, do trades etc. Anyone want any Metallica bootlegs and CD singles? Email me!
Napster
Napster announced it will annouce it's new technology to "control how often digital music files can be passed around among its more than 60 million users". They don't say how yet. Yawn. Hurry up and tell us how. This is ancient news!
I'm getting ultra pissed about the whole Napster issue. As fast as issues come and go on the net these days, this one is taking a bloody long time. Some may say that 'it's better to take longer so they get it right the first time' but any moron can see they're going to get it all completely wrong no matter what they do. By running the original Napster, they're listening to consumers wants. By building this new system, they're ignoring them. Although, it's quite definitely under duress.
Here's a recent Napster linkfest/discussion from Slashdot.
I like (although don't in the least agree with) this comment... "Why not just create MP3's from the CD's you already own, and avoid Napster entirely?"
Microsoft vs. The Consumer
Microsoft's grand plan to prevent piracy of audio/video content. From the actual file, to the player right down to the operating system to the sound drivers your system uses.
Internet Moving Image Archive
The Internet Moving Image Archive has a ton of free movies, mostly old stock images about the war, how to look after one's farm etc. but very interesting. One that caught my eye was a short doco on San Francisco pre-WWII. All files are in high quality MPEG so expect a 200-500Meg download. Cable users only.
I just tried to download a few files and they all failed for no good reason (ie. no timeout message, no toomanyusers message etc.). Major bummer.