One of the things that I wrestle with the most is how to name the different projects that I'm working on and/or plan to work on at some point. I more or less refuse to fall "in line" with something that can really be branded, not because I'm stubborn but simply because my interest in music is fairly wide open. I do instrumental music and vocal music, pop music and experimental, ballads and harder rock, some electronic, and even light jazzy stuff. I'm pretty much all over the place.
So, how do you get fans when no one can ever get their head around what it is that you do? That's exactly the question that I can't seem to answer. Now, there are many artists out there who seem to do just fine with dabbling all over the place but then again they have a record label, promotions behind them, and so on. When you have none of that, you tend to try to give people music that you think they might enjoy, and when your sound is all over the place, it just ventures into weird territory when you say something like "...listen to this one...no, not that one..."
As it is, I'm fairly convinced that using the "...the Jazz Machine" name was a bad idea. Everyone automatically assumes and expects some jazz powerhouse playing and music, and then they hear me with my moody ambient instrumental stuff. It would be funny if it wasn't for the weird looks it sometimes garners.
Oh well. I guess if anyone has any bright ideas, feel free to float them my way. In the meantime, I finally got around to a first listen of one of my most anticipated albums of this year, the new Tears for Fears album "The Tipping Point". I'm fairly pleased overall and feel like 'they're back'. In particular, the song "Rivers of Mercy" knocked my socks off a bit and took me right back to the very first time I ever heard Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes". The whole thing brought a tear to my eye. Brilliant stuff on both accounts.
In other news, "(He Was) Some Kind of a Man" is finally nailed down and will probably be submitted for mastering at the end of this week. I must say that after hearing this revamped version quite a few times I may actually prefer it in the end. Why? I think the lack of the movie bits actually allows the listener to focus more on the actual song, and the new talkie bits, which aren't quite as overpowering, still have a quirky/funny aspect that makes me smile every time I hear it. So, it may have taken forever but I think it worked itself out in the end.
Today also brought the release of Toontrack's EZDrummer 3 software release. I opted in from the get go, simply because I use the software so much. I didn't have a ton of time to play with it but my first dabbles seemed positive. It looks like they put a lot more thought into how the product is organized, and that's good because the last version made my head spin sometimes and often left me mumbling obscenities under my breath. I also saw some new features that made me rather excited. I guess we'll see how it goes.
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