Damn you.  I loved that old tree. Light it up at night, and play  a gig under it, under the stars….but the chance is gone.

Yeah yeah tell me something I don’t know right.

This morning I found this site called The Next Big Thing. It’s basically a real time stats tool, that compares an artists plays, comments, and fans across various social media sites, like Last FM, Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube.  Perfect for an artist, so they can work out where to focus their attention.

This would of course be easy if I didn’t have a name like Dave Anderson, and seemingly 4-5 accounts.

So instead I wanted to compare a few of my favourite singer/songwriters:

David Ford vs David Gray vs Damien Rice

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David Ford has just released his new album, Let The Hard Times Roll, and for those that need mass media to tell them what to like, then well you’ve probably never heard of him, and you probably never will.  Just looking at the Australian charts on itunes you can see how influenced and sheltered we are.

So if I could recommend one artist, just one, that I think is my favourite of all, then it would be David Ford. If there was one gig that blew all others out of the water, it was David Ford at the Hopetoun, in front of about 50 people.

We all have opinions I know, and I could explain to you at length over a beer just how amazing he is, but with Youtube I guess you can just see for yourself. So if you’ve come this far, I suggest you watch just two of these video’s.

The first is to hook you in. To see how brilliant one person can be with one loop pedal. The second is a stunning song from his new album.

My cunning plan is to help spread the Ford phenomen and hope with enough fans he will hopefully get out to Australia, before I have to fork out for a ticket to go and see him. Yes kids. It’s ok to like Muse and David Ford.

I’ve found a new hiding spot online to put my album. I say hiding spot, because there is just so much out there, quality stuff to, that just sits dormant waiting for somebody to open the draw, brush off the cobwebs and tune in.

This website is called thesixtyone.com

It’s an online radio basically, where you can listen to tunes for free.  Like most things I think it’s US based, and I haven’t figured out if I can sort by country, or even music from your city, because I think it would be good to find somebody local so I can go see them live.  i.e not on a computer machine.

The thing with this website that I like is that it has really big pretty pictures that go with the music, unlike Lastfm which has kind of small one’s. I like being able to picture a mood in a song, or in a band, which is something that iTunes doesn’t do. Makes me feel as though I kind of know them, or I kind of get what they are trying to convey.

I’m thinking we really need to return to the days where we envoke all the senses in a musical experience.  Not just shuffle it on your crappy, no screen ipod.

So I’ve put up some pictures to go with my songs. It’s kind of cool, but I guess if I had more time I’d play with the pictures and make them really special.

Here’s my new little hiding spot

A friend @richmondjw, pulled together his most influential albums, narrowing it down to 20 and sharing it on facebook. Looking at a blank A1 picture frame that I have, I thought brilliant concept. Trouble was the resolution of the album artwork I could get, vs the size of the frame meant I had more like a top 200 rather than 20. After a number of painstaking hours in photoshop I’ve managed to finish it off.

The larger sized albums are the more influential and incidently usually share a flashbulb memory to a particular time or moment in my life.  No album was spared, with one particular dodgy album making the grade, on the back of a song I still unfortunately remember all the words to.  Can you spot it?

Hype Machine is one of my favourite sites for discovering new music.  The website scours the interweb, and compiles a ‘real time’ ranking of what’s hot in music. Yep you no longer have to wait for the kids at Triple J to tell you wh’at’s hot.

Recently published on the site is  the Top 50 of 2009, with rankings for artists, albums and songs.  Not only is it a great resource, it looks damn cool and you can stream the music.

Anyway I thought you all might be keen to also discover another way to lose a few hours, and find yourself some new music.  I’m presently locked on Antler’s | Hospice.  Never really heard them before but I’m hooked.

Off you go. http://hypem.com/zeitgeist/2009/

Procrastination is a disease.

Any excuse to remove me from the real challenge at hand.  I’m like a drug addict jumping from one excuse to another as to why I can’t come clean, pick up the guitar, and start some recording.

I mean listen to how pathetic these excuses sound:

- It’s too hot in this room, I should wait till the evening when I’m in the mood.

- I shouldn’t really play too loudly in the evening hence I should wait till tomorrow.

- Maybe I should go buy some decent monitors, or upgrade my software, or waste further time on other technical insignificances.

- I got $45 credit with itunes still, perhaps there is some inspiration waiting for me deep beyond the pinks, lady gaga’s and michael bubble’s of the world.  By the way is it Boob-lay or Bubbles?  Can’t be bothered checking…but I think perhaps if he spelt his name Boob-lay he would gain a little more stret cred. From me anyway

- Cricket is on.  No TV in this room, how much is a digital TV tuner for my computer so I can record and watch the cricket? May be counter productive, but I guess you have to start being productive in some way before your counterproductive.

- Better check emails.  I’m programmed to do that despite not being at work.  It’s a nervous reflex.  Oh good another Nigerian has a million dollars…how do they get these sort of funds.

- I should change the strings on my guitar. No no, it’s character building…

- Best make another coffee and then right a blog post about how I’m struggling to come to terms with sitting still and recording a demo.

- Ok so what do I want this album to sound like…better surf my itunes catalogue for inspiration…oh wait I have $45 credit.  Go back to my earlier point.

Today my friends the buck stops here. What ever that means.  I’m going to put some demo’s down if it kills me (it may).   I love playing but I’m an impatient recording artist,as you can probably tell.

I’ve decided that this album is going to be created organically from my room up.  Rather than a studio down.  It’s kind of a symptom of not making enough (any) money last year to fund the record, and because maybe you’ll appreciate my faults just as much as my qualities.

Time starts now…just after I check the cricket score.

Ok folks I’m stuck.  I’ve picked up some cracking albums recently and I can’t for the life of me work out what to buy myself for xmas with my itunes vouchers.  Anyone got any suggestions?  Recent purchases include, David Gray, Sarah Blasko, Whitely, Renny Field, and Powderfinger.

Doesn’t have to be new, can be anything that you think is simply brilliant.  Help me out here…