Direct Andy Grammer's Music Video On Vevo

Ever wanted to direct a music video? With the help of Interlude and S-Curve, Vevo is giving you the chance with Andy Grammar's new song “Keep Your Head Up”. Go to Vevo.com and check out the video, which let's you direct the flow by selecting, on the fly, which scenes come next.
Hit play and the video starts with Andy walking down an alley singing. After a few seconds, two options appear on the screen and you select whether Andy will bump into some boxes or get dumped by bikers. Choose quickly, because you only have a few seconds. Like the choose-your-own adventure books you used to read, each choice sets off a different story line. One story line includes a cameo by Dwight from the Office. And like a choose-your-own adventure book, you will probably want to see every outcome, watching the video over and over until the song is stuck in your head. They even let you choose whether to end the song a cappella or with the full band.
Like Guitar Hero and Glee, the video for “Keep Your Head Up” is another great example of the increasing crossover between video, music and games in the modern consumer media age. This crossover leads to greater engagement as sight, sound and decision-making processes are all taken over. Greater engagement leads to more ad revenue opportunities.

For starters, most people watch the video (and thus the ads) several times. Because they are focusing on the video and expecting to take an action, they are more likely to read ads that pop up. But imagine if you can use a similar technology to integrate ads into the video. What if I could click on Andy's T-shirt and buy it, or enter the online store of a poster he walks by?
Tracking the choices of consumers is valuable information for film makers and video sites who can see what works best, what compels a user to pick one option over another, and whether there is a correlation between position of choice on screen and choice made. We can figure out, for example, that ads placed on the right side of a screen will get the most attention.

The interactive music video is a collaboration between technology company Interlude, record label S-Curve, and music video distribution hub Vevo. Interlude, an Israeli company founded by popular musician Yoni Block, develops the platform that enables video makers to add this extra layer of engagement. There are other companies that offer a similar technology, but Interlude is unique in that if offers an interactive experience that is seamless: the content doesn't pause as it waits for you to make your decision. S-Curve is a record label founded by former Columbia Records president Steve Greenburg. A small company focused heavily on innovation, S-Curve discovers and fosters new music-related technologies then uses them with their artists. They often take an equity stake in the technology companies to help them crack into a crowded music industry.

Interactive videos are certainly enjoyable, but detractors argue it's not cost effective. First look technology never is. The model needs to be proven, then the market responds with more companies eager to capitalize on higher revenue margins, which should lead to cheaper production costs. Still, big bands who can afford to should look more closely into interactive videos, like Arcade Fire did when creating their Google-assisted HTML-5 music video experience The Wilderness Downtown.
In case you're wondering which official video will be released to other content channels like television and Metacafe, Vevo is tracking which “routes” made through the video are the most popular and plan to release this version as “Official”.

Dalton Caldwell of imeem vs. David Hyman of MOG on the Viability of Music Startups

Everyone wants a music startup. After all, somebody needs to fix the industry, it's hard to discover new music and we're all experts in our own way. Plus, it just makes you seem cool. But are music startups viable businesses in today's turbulent music industry?

Dalton Caldwell, founder/ex-CEO of imeem, says no. Digital music, he argues, is nearly impossible to monetize in any number of formats: Tools for artists don't work because artists have no money to spend; Selling music is tough because you're competing directly against iTunes, Amazon and soon Google; ad-supported music doesn't generate enough revenue to meet monthly minimum licensing payments; subscription-services take enormous amounts of upfront investments and time to develop the necessary licensing agreements.

David Hyman, CEO of premium music service MOG sees things differently and points to success stories like Winamp, Pandora, and Guitar Hero to prove music products sell in a variety of formats. Hyman agrees that providing music content is a small-margin business, but the market is massive and music consumption is at an all time high. He describes how MOG has evolved from a site providing tools to music bloggers, to a music network providing ad sale resources, to its current subscription music service. The implication that Hyman is making is that success in the constantly changing music industry requires adaptability.

Imeem only ever tried to be an ad-supported music service. Caldwell himself admits that attracting traffic is easy when you offer free premium music to consumers. Imeem's 21 million monthly unique visitors in 2008 said nothing of its viability as a business. Even with a $24 million annual run rate, imeem could not keep up with the monthly minimum licensing fees and they failed to adapt their business model until it was too late. Dalton is aware of this and says he was in the process of implementing a new strategy to offer broadly available, legal APIs for others to build upon when the company was forced into a fire sale of its assets late last year.

MOG, on the other hand, didn't rely on music content to build a viable business and has only recently, and carefully, entered the subscription music business. MOG started by providing tools to music bloggers. This morphed into the fastest growing music network, providing ad sale resources to over 1,300 blogs and music sites, reaching over 35M monthly uniques. Only after years of digital music experience and a revenue cushion from ad sales, did MOG make the leap to digital music distribution.

As to Caldwell's other points, I have to disagree. Artists don't have money to pay for artist tools? Protools has shown that artists will pay steep prices if they believe it will help them realize their dreams of “making it”. Tunecore has done very well charging users $20 to put their music on iTunes - $20 for the sense of accomplishment that your music is selling on the shelves next to Arcade Fire and Broken Bells. As to quarterly margins being impossible to meet, MOG says they have realistic quarterly margins that they have consistently hit. And although subscription services have yet to prove profitable in the long term, Hyman points out that the nature of subscription services is changing and they can now be incorporated and tied into established billing relationships like phone bills, car payments and cable television.

The music industry is tough, but there are plenty of passionate entrepreneurs and artists who have made their careers out of it. Perhaps if you had asked Caldwell a few years ago about the viability of music startups, when imeem had a $24 million yearly revenue run rate and had just acquired SNOCAP, he might have had a different answer.

The Fresh, Untapped Potential of The Southsiders

I love stumbling across great live music, especially in a foreign country. At the George Payne Irish Bar in Barcelona, I was thoroughly entertained with the popular sound of Rebekah Lavelle and David Schamroth from The Southsiders. The vocal/guitar duo delighted the crowd with a myriad of neatly exercised covers. David proved to be more than competent on the guitar, anchoring a library of well known melodies with steady rhythmic undertones, but Rebekah stole the show with her precise and fluid voice, and a passion that burned bright in the limelight.


Though loaded with talent and charismatic on stage, the young duo have yet to develop the business of their music. They write original music, but stick to covers on stage to meet bar scene demand. They have a MySpace page, but not much interaction with their fan base and almost no active social media strategy. But they have the tools to succeed and with the right management and a good distribution plan, this promising duo should be able to convert an evening passion into a modest secondary income, and possibly more.

I caught up with them backstage for an impromptu interview, which is hard to make out over the clutter of a very packed bar. I've included the transcript of our conversation below the video.




Where are you from?

David: I'm from Belgium, Brussels.

Rebekah: I'm from Dublin.

How long have you been playing together?

Rebekah: 6 months, since April.

How did you guys meet?

Rebekah: Believe it or not we stumbled across each other at work. He was looking for a singer and I was looking for a guitarist, and here we are.

You guys played one of my favorite songs of all time tonight, High and Dry by Radiohead. Is there a special reason for that or was that just filler?

Rebekah: It's a great song and Radiohead is a great band. We generate all of our songs together based on [feedback] from people, and that is a personal favorite.

David: Same here. I play piano as well and it's one of my favorites to play.

What's your schedule like? How often do you play?

Rebekah: 2-3 times per week. We work full time in Marketing, but on the weekends and on Thursdays as well, in different bars.

David: We're going to start playing weddings as well.

So you guys work full time?

David: Well maybe one day we'll get lucky and quit our jobs to do music full time.

Rebekah, When did you start singing?

Rebekah: It must have been when I was nine. I was in theater and various music groups, so I was doing an awful lot of singing. I had done some of my own recordings because my uncle has an editing studio, so he allowed me to go in and record a lot of my songs. Then I was in Australia 2 years before this and I sang in a rock band. I moved to Barcelona nearly a year ago and wanted to do more.

David: I started playing the piano when I was 6 and then I started to play guitar in a Beatles cover band.

What are you guys doing in Barcelona?

Rebekah: Who wouldn't want to be in Barcelona! We had an office in Dublin, but our head office is in Barcelona and I had the option to stay in Dublin or move to Barcelona. It seemed like a great opportunity.

David: We've got the beach, women, it's a great city.

Do you ever sing in Spanish?

David: We'll be singing in Spanish later tonight.

Do you play original songs?

David: We have a couple. When we play in bars they request cover songs, but we're thinking of dropping a couple of originals in there.

Do you write music together or is it one or the other?

Rebekah: I've been writing a lot of the music, but we plan to [write together]. We've only been together for a short period.

Do you sell your music on iTunes or Amazon?

David: Not yet, but maybe with your help we will.

Do you guys have a fan base where your fans can congregate and learn where you will play next?

Rebekah: The MySpace page is the best place right now, but its only been online for a few weeks. Before that we would just give the name of the band and they check the pub website to see where we are at the time, or they add us on Facebook as their friends.

Who are your biggest influences?

David: I love the Beatles, Radiohead, the Police, a little bit of Jack Johnson.

Rebekah: The oldies, 80's rock music, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, and at the moment I love Lady Gaga, though she is a bit extreme.

If you could open for any band, who would it be?

David: We'd love to open for Kings of Leon.

Check out Rebekah and David from the Southsiders at http://www.myspace.com/thesouthsidersrock

Atomic Tom Puts on a Surprise Iphone Performance

A couple of guys performing their song with iPhones on the subway. I love this for so many reasons. What better way to achieve an intimate experience with your audience then to sit next to them and brighten a dull part of their days. The video captures the sentiment and I can't help but "toss some coins into the guitar case" and buy their single, which they smartly link to in the video. At a time when music networks like MySpace are making music discovery their primary strategy, these guys forgo the middle man and bring the discovery directly to the audience. Playing the song on their iPhones is both memorable and practical - much easier to carry around phones than guitars and drums. There is a viral marketing component (which succeeded in part to TechCrunch's coverage). They may even get themselves featured in an Apple commercial. If the band Atomic Tom 'makes it', they may look back to this day as the turning point.