INDIE NEWS BEAT August 16, 2006 Edition

Posted by radiogetswild on 2006-09-11 15:02:01 (2697 views)

* MusicDish Partners With "Save Our Sounds" To Help Preserve America's Recorded Heritage
* Miko Marks Wins Showdown Competition
* Mashed Buddha Taps MusicDish Network For Saturated Marketing Campaign
* Globally Acclaimed Dj-Producer Paul Van Dyk Will Host New Weekly Sirius Satellite Radio Show
* AirSpun To Launch Music Industry's First Web-Based Radio Airtime Booking System
* Big Fish Media Announces New Content Acquisition Deals
* Web 2.0 Agency, ROKKAN, Breaks Through With BreakThru Radio
* Roots Music Report Announces Recipients Of Its 2006 Radio Stations Of The Year Award

MusicDish Partners With "Save Our Sounds" To Help Preserve America's Recorded Heritage

Just imagine it... thousands of rare and one-of-a-kind recordings of American folklife from around the country... including songs, stories, poems, speeches... from coal miners to ex-slaves, from presidents to gypsies, from Blues to Native American ceremonial songs... all... slowly... deteriorating ...

MusicDish, an Internet music magazine publisher and artist marketing/development firm, is pleased to announce that it is joining forces with the American Folklife Center to support the preservation of America's wonderful musical heritage. MusicDish will feature recordings and other music-related documents, selected by the American Folklife Center, that are threatened by deterioration. The selected recordings and documents will be presented through MusicDish.com as well as its syndication network, representing the breadth of the music community, to raise awareness of their historical value and help raise funds to help preserve the featured recordings and documents.

"America's rich musical heritage is under threat of disappearing right before our eyes, all the while that we possess the technology to save it," noted MusicDish founder Eric de Fontenay. "As a member of the music industry, we fell it is our duty to inform and empower the broader community to safeguard this treasure for future generations of musicians and listeners."

"We know that our readers will want to become partners with MusicDish in helping to preserve the wonderful musical heritage that we all share," commented MusicDish Editor-in-Chief Anne Freeman. "We are very excited about this partnership!"

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Miko Marks Wins Showdown Competition

Mirrome Records recording artist, Miko Marks has won the local level of the Colgate Country Showdown in her home state of California. She goes on to compete at the state level on August 13 at the San Mateo County Fair.

This is the 25th Anniversary of the Colgate Country Showdown, which has grown into the largest country music talent search in America with over 450 local radio stations participating, 50,000 artists competing annually and over $300,000 in cash prizes awarded throughout the 4-level competition. Nearly every major country music entertainer of the past 2 decades has participated in the Showdown.

Just a few weeks later, Marks will perform 2 shows daily at the Black Family Reunion Celebration on the National Mall in Washington, DC., September 9 and 10. The celebration is a two-day cultural event that is recognized as the largest, most significant family event in the nation, attracting more than 500,000 people each year. In the late 1980's, the black family was under attack in the media. In response to significant negative projections of a "disappearing" and "disintegrating" black family, Dorothy I. Height, Chair of the National Council of Negro Women, developed an idea for a positive culturally based event that would celebrate African Americans' historic strengths and traditional values. The festival celebrates the enduring strengths and traditional values of the African American family.

On the heels of her debut album, Freeway Bound, Miko has appeared at CMA MusicFest, opened for Warner Records artist, Ray Scott and has toured nationally as a featured performer with the Bill Pickett Invitational Rodeo. With the release of her 3rd single, "Mama", Marks has released her first music video, featuring R & B songstress, Erykah Badu, in the title role.

The video is being promoted by Visual Image Marketing of Nashville, TN and may be viewed at several online video sources including cmt.com, vh1.com, bet.com, mtv.com and on Miko's site at www.mikomarks.com

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Mashed Buddha Taps MusicDish Network For Saturated Marketing Campaign

MusicDish, an Internet music magazine publisher and artist marketing/development firm, announced the addition of Massachussets-based electronica act Mashed Buddha to the MusicDish Network roster. A mixture of downtempo grooves, hypnotic electronica melodies, and jungle beats, Mashed Buddha's drum&bass debut "Subdue Your Mind" () is an unexpected foray for creator & keyboard player John Corda who has performed jazz, funk, and rock for the last decade.

"John Corda set about to craft jungle and drum&bass beats and rhythms as the backdrop to an electrifying ambient and symphonic journey," noted Smother.net. "The result is a compelling and inspiring joint that works its way into your head analyzing your Zen status and applying a bit of a karmic good rub on your soul."

Mashed Buddha joins an eclectic roster of artists on MusicDish Network's marketing/artist development program, including Jazz chanteuse Mellani Day, African American Country artist Miko Marks and Astrella Celeste, daughter of the 'British Bob Dylan' Donovan. MusicDish Network will conduct an extensive saturated marketing campaign in support of "Subdue Your Mind", combining PR/brand development, syndicated marketing and online street teaming. In addition, Mashed Buddha will be aggressively pushed on social networking sites such as MySpace, YouTube and TagWorld (to name a few), while conducting a viral distribution campaign of selected tracks and videos on major file sharing networks such as eDonkey.

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Globally Acclaimed Dj-Producer Paul Van Dyk Will Host New Weekly Sirius Satellite Radio Show

One of the world's premiere DJs and a GRAMMY nominated producer, Paul van Dyk, will launch his own weekly show on SIRIUS Satellite Radio, called Paul van Dyk's Vonyc Sessions, on August 31. On August 25, SIRIUS will also broadcast concerts by van Dyk from New York's Central Park.

Paul van Dyk, a native of Germany, is currently ranked the world's No. 1 DJ by DJ Magazine. His new SIRIUS show, Paul van Dyk's Vonyc Sessions, will launch on August 31 and will be heard each Thursday from 6 pm to 8 pm ET on SIRIUS' commercial-free trance and progressive house music channel, Area 33 (channel 33). Each week's program will be re-broadcast on Saturdays from 8 to 10 pm ET, and Tuesdays from 12 midnight to 2 am ET.

On August 25, SIRIUS will broadcast van Dyk's concerts taking place August 18 and 19 in Central Park, New York City, as part of a special ten-hour broadcast on Area 33, Paul van Dyk Live at Central Park NYC. van Dyk's Central Park shows will be special live performances using laptop computers, studio software and real-time remixing, enhanced with additional keyboards, sequencers and a drummer.

Said van Dyk, "I am thrilled to be joining SIRIUS Satellite Radio and Area 33. Broadcasting my live appearance at Central Park is the perfect way to kick off this new endeavor and I'm excited to have the SIRIUS listeners enjoy such an exciting event."

Paul van Dyk received a GRAMMY nomination for Best Dance/Electronic Album for his 2003 original album Reflections. Top-charting singles van Dyk has produced include "Nothing But You," "Crush," "Connected" and "The Other Side." Earlier this year, he won four International Dance Music Awards (IDMAs) for his latest compilation The Politics of Dancing 2 at the Winter Music Conference in Miami.

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AirSpun To Launch Music Industry's First Web-Based Radio Airtime Booking System

AirSpun, Inc., a Silicon Valley start-up with an e-commerce approach to marketing digital music through commercial radio promotion, announced plans to launch www.airspun.com in an effort to democratize the music hitmaking process and provide independent artists with unprecedented power over their creative futures. AirSpun.com features a patent-pending online airtime booking system for affordable commercial radio exposure along with promotional opportunities that give independent recording artists a chance to sell their music directly to a global fan base. At launch, the company is offering commercial airtime in Nashville, San Jose/San Francisco, Seattle, and Austin on select Clear Channel Communications and Entercom network radio stations.

AirSpun proposes to rock the foundations of the music business by allowing every original recording artist?with or without a record deal?an affordable way to be heard on commercial radio.

"The internet has done a great job of leveling the distribution playing field for bands and artists, but so far, no one has used the power of the internet to democratize music marketing and promotion," explains AirSpun Founder Heidi Elgaard. "AirSpun is well-positioned to fill a void for a new generation of digitally-savvy independent recording artists, as well as radio stations seeking financially viable ways to support them."

AirSpun is currently working with its radio station affiliates to offer reasonably-priced 60-second spots for AirSpun's Artist Showcases. Each spot features a brief announcement of the song and band/artist name, followed by about 45 seconds of the showcased song, and a required AirSpun end-tag asking listeners to visit the airspun.com site to find the featured artist and vote or provide feedback on the music.

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Big Fish Media Announces New Content Acquisition Deals

Big Fish Media, a leading digital distributor of independent music labels, today announces the acquisition of several strategic content distribution agreements. Under the terms of these agreements, Big Fish Media will distribute these labels to all major online music stores and mobile services.

Highlighting these recent deals are:

1) Laughing Hyena Records: Laughing Hyena Records is the home for dozens of great, blue-collar comedy from such great performers such as Ron White (featured in the Blue Collar Comedy tour), Larry Reeb ("Uncle Lar'"), The Unknown Comic ("The Gong Show") and Ollie Joe Prater.

2) Valentino Production Music: In addition to being one of the leading production music and sound effects providers for hundreds of feature film and television shows, Valentino also has the entire catalog of famed, disco-era star, Walter Murphy. He is perhaps most famous for his hit song "A Fifth of Beethoven" which was featured in the eponymous film "Saturday Night Fever" is one of three albums represented by Big Fish Media.

3) Spirit Voyage Records: One of the most successful Yoga, Healing and New Age labels, Spirit Voyage has a worldwide iimpact in the Yoga community. With hundreds of albums in its catalog, Big Fish Media has just released the first group of nearly 50 CDs.

4) Hip-Hop/R&B Artist "Ahmir" - His new single, "Welcome To My Party" is climbing the charts at Billboard. BFM has this release along with two other EPs.

5) Imperativa Records' new release "Epicon" by Globus represents a breakthrough in pop music. Currently in the top 20 of iTunes UK pop albums, "Epicon" is a ground breaking album.

6) Caravan Records: This is a new label from well-known indie label Hollywood Music Center/PEKO Records. Their first two releases "Essential Bellydance" and "Naked Rhythm" are critical hits and making the circuits on both the world and dance genres.

"Here at Big Fish Media, we strive to bring only the best labels and the finest music to our digital music services. We feel that these new labels are consistent with that philosophy and we are extremely proud to be associated with such top-notch content providers, " co-founder Steven Weber says. He adds, ""we consider ourselves to be an extension of the traditional A&R function to ensure that only marketable content ends up in our catalog."

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Web 2.0 Agency, ROKKAN, Breaks Through With BreakThru Radio

Leading independent interactive agency ROKKAN has collaborated with BreakThru Radio to create a revolutionary Web 2.0 website, using technologies such as AJAX (XHTML, CSS, XML, JavaScript, XMLHttpRequest) and Flash, that offers a feature rich and enhanced interactive experience.

The term Web 2.0 refers to the ongoing transition of the Web from a collection of Websites with static content and endless page loads to Websites with richness and responsiveness typically associated with desktop applications. Web 2.0 technologies are one of the primary factors in the recent surge of sites offering blogs, podcasts, wikis, and social networking. These sites have created a more dynamic Web that encourages flexibility for users, eliminates static content, and offers increased support of multimedia functions.

As part of the new Web 2.0 trend, ROKKAN has created a ground-breaking multimedia Website for BreakThru Radio, a company that is committed to providing an outlet for talented independent artists to be heard.

"People come to our Website for a real radio experience without repetitive playlists and for DJs who are musicologists offering independent music that they can't get anywhere else," says Cal Rifkin, President of BreakThru Radio, "working with ROKKAN to create a new site using Web 2.0 technologies has given us the ability to offer features to our users that can't be found anywhere else."

The innovative new Website, www.breakthruradio.com, allows users to watch videos, listen to music, and search the Website without missing a beat, literally. "We used AJAX technologies to develop functionality that wasn't possible before," says Jim Blackwelder, Director of Technology at ROKKAN. "Now, no matter where you click, the site's most important feature - streaming media - isn't interrupted. We are able to offer a continuous audio / video stream while users browse the site without using HTML frames or an annoying pop-up window." Web 2.0 Rich Internet Applications and AJAX technologies allows the browser to continuously request content from the server without the traditional HTTP server request and page reload. The Website also features Yahoo! Maps Web Services and Action Script Flash API allowing users to track concerts and bands around the globe.

"It's encouraging to see businesses and production quality sites starting to request feature rich Web 2.0 applications - and there's no reason not to - the technology is sound, the cost is minimal, and the opportunities are abundant," says Blackwelder.

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Roots Music Report Announces Recipients Of Its 2006 Radio Stations Of The Year Award

Roots Music Report is pleased to announce its selections for radio stations of the year. Recipients were selected by staff of RMR after carefully listening to the programming first hand and were selected based on their format and variety of music played. This year's list of honors signifies the first acknowledgements in what is planned to be an annual event.

The award serves to recognize the stations commitment to and support of its roots based genre. "These stations seem to give all artist a chance to be heard," says RMR owner/operator Robert Bartosh."They are all consistent reporting stations to our charts and contribute immensely to the roots music movement."

Designated honors for 2006 were presented to the following stations:

Bluegrass - WTCR - Huntington, West Virginia
Roots/Americana - KRVL - Kerville, Texas
Roots/Rock - XCountry - Satellite
True Country - KMCO - McAlester, Oklahoma
Western Swing - KBEC - Waxahachie, Texas
Folk - KCLC - St. Charles, Missouri
Blues - Blues Deluxe - Arlington, Texas
Jazz - WFDU - Teaneck, New Jersey

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