Music

While riding the stationary bike yesterday I watched the most interesting documentary that I've seen in a while. It was part of PBS' Independent Lens series titled "HIP-HOP: Beyond Beats and Rhymes." The filmmaker Byron Hurt examines the issues of violence, misogyny, and homophobia in hip-hop and rap music. The musicians themselves tended to make the excuse that they were only responding to market demands, giving the people what they want...or at least giving the record executives what they will pay for. Its sort of a chicken or egg question since we know that marketing tends to shape public demand as much as public demand drives what content companies market.

Personally, I think this is great (video via Mark Elrod)...Harding U. students shaking their booties on stage with Robert Randolph & The Family Band, in violation of the school's ban on dancing. It's ridiculous to have concerts like this (funk/soul) on campus but then expect no one to dance. Reminds me of when James Lashlee and I danced on stage with Sonic Youth at the Cannery in Nashville in 1990. Lipscomb new nothing about it. It was our first mosh pit experience too. Also David Yow, lead singer for the opening band The Jesus Lizard, dropped trow on stage as was his custom.

Via Techcrunch, this looks interesting...Amie Street:

Amie Street, which launched in July, has a brilliant DRM-free music sales model. Bands upload music, which can then be downloaded for free by users. As songs become popular, the site starts to charge for it. They start at $0.01 and go up to $0.99. Users looking for popular new stuff go right to the more expensive songs.

Via TechCrunch, this looks interesting: Streampad. From the description on TechCrunch:

...a Web-based media player that gives users access to their digital music library from any computer. Similar to Songbird, it streams your personal library from the Internet but it runs completely inside any browser. Streampad is a free service. Users download a Java desktop application that stores the metadata from all MP3 and AC3 files (protected and unprotected) it finds on your computer, including those that come from iTunes. Then, when that same user logs into Streampad from another computer, they can listen to music streamed directly from their home computer.

I (Lisa) have really enjoyed Jack Johnson's music this year. Today I ran across the video to my favorite song "Taylor" ......definitely not what I expected . Ben Stiller is featured and really cracked me up. The next time I crank the song up in my minivan it won't be the same. Here's the video :