JPF Home Page Forums General Messages Brian Austin Whitney Blog Monday, May 22nd, 2006

Hi Folks,

We were going through some of the videos that have come in last night and I finally had time to check out the offering from multi award nominee Collide. This is an interesting story because the band, which previously had comprised of Statik and kaRIN, two artists who met at an industrial music club back in the early 90's and decided they wanted to make music that they loved together regardless of whether the industry paid attention or not. Remember when people used to do that sort of thing?

Anyway, you can read their bio and check out their website anytime at http://www.collide.net so I am not going to go into a lot of depth about all of that. But I do want to say that as an indie artist DVD package, it may be the single finest project I have seen. It's really what most artists should be doing, regardless of the genre of music. Now since they're a sort of dark, gothic industrial/alternative "small pebble" band (you have to see their interview to get that reference) it won't be everyone's taste. But the creativity and care that went into the project and the music and the overall content of this DVD package rivals anything I've seen come from a major label with a zillion dollar budget. (In fact, I am going to email them to find out what sort of budget they really had for it.. even though it looks fabulous, they're still totally independent).

What you get is a beautifully lit, amazingly ambient live stage show at the El Rey theater in Hollywood which was only their 9th show (more about that in a minute) they ever did live, a collection of their videos to date (3 song with 2 versions of 1 of them), some additional live performances from other shows, and some behind the scenes interviews with the band's founders talking about who they are. These interviews are totally spontaneous (which is good and bad, as I was dying to ask deeper questions, but it did leave me more interested in them than I was at the start, and I was already a fan of them) little interviews in studio and what looks like a park bench at night as well as some last second backstage moments with the band before the El Rey show. It left me feeling like I knew the band, and was hanging with them, but it still left them mysterious and interesting at the same time. I think sometimes artist go too far in exposing their skin to take all the mystique away and that's not always a good thing. In the case of collide, they gave you a look behind the magic but didn't ruin the magic completely in the process.

They were working with an obvious pro who did their two videos including 2004 nominee "Son of a Preacher Man" which was surreal and industrial masterpiece in my opinion, which unfortunately our judges overlooked in the final video awards voting. (It finished out of the top 6.. oh well.. proof that my personal favorites DON'T always win JPF awards).

If every CD by major and indie artists contained this level of quality bonus material, CD piracy would have a run for it's money. The director behind it is so good that I want to contact him to see if he's available (and affordable) to shoot our next awards show. (Note to self to contact Collide and ask them). Most CD releases that include extras throw in some mediocre live footage or maybe a video or short documentary etc. Major artists such as U2 can afford to have full length movies released about them (and good ones at that). But for an indie artist to put something this cool together should be a watermark for other indies in any genre (even a country artist could take the concepts/presentation and raise their own efforts and style to match its quality). I've seen better individual pieces of this project, but none that covered all the basis so well.

And most interesting to me is that this was a studio only project until last year. Just a guy mostly using keyboards in his studio and a girl writing lyrics and doing vocals for them who didn't even live in the same state at the time. They released multiple albums, but always paid close attention to things like photos and album graphics so that their project appeared to be just as "big time" as anything you'd find on a record store shelf. We have tons of internet collaborators out there who feel like they're not a live band doing regular gigs and so they'll never be successful as artists. These guys proved you can do it not only outside the major labels, but outside the typical indie pathway as well. And once they decided to do live shows, they came out looking as seasoned as the band "The Cure" when I last saw them live and that band had a zillion shows under their belt. They hired a full band and it's obvious the care they took in not only finding great musicians, but essentially "casting" the band so that when you see them, they are as interesting visually as they are musically. What a savvy demonstration of understanding that a live show is about ENTERTAINING the audience, not just playing music well for an audience. I was very impressed top to bottom!

Instead of finding excuses as to why they couldn't compete with majors outside of the label system.. they just not only did it, but in many cases, did it better. Very inspiring!

It reminded me of 2 other examples that opened my eyes. One is Zak Morgan, who has won 2 Children's album awards with JPF and was also nominated for a Grammy last time out. He also makes sure that graphically, his product is better than the major labels. If you doubt this, check out his website (also outstanding) and look at the album cover art of his two releases. www.zakmorgan.com is the site. Amazing isn't it? He does spend some money to hire one of the best graphic artists in the world, but I bet that in the end, that investment has paid for itself 10 or even 100 times over via additional sales and additional interest in his work and credibility at the point of sale. Another thing it made me think of is our own regular message board participant Jody Whitesides www.jodywhitesides.com and his recent video for his song "Falling In." The video has a bit of a reminiscent look and gimmick as the MTV video staple "Take On Me" by the group Aha. BUT (and it's a huge one) Jody did this video on a very indie artist budget of $680.00. To even be mentioned in the same breath as one of the most innovative videos made for a microscopic budget is impressive. Sure, it's a simpler version, but it leaves the viewer feeling impressed and entertained, which most videos (especially indie ones) fail miserably to do. In the interest of full disclosure, Jody did have help from his own world class graphics person, his dad, who did all the art work you see during the video. But it's an example of working with what you have and getting something amazing from it. We all have hidden resources we don't use to their potential!

In the case of all 3, Collide, Zak Morgan and Jody Whitesides, their presentations made you MORE interested in the artists and their music. All 3 presented themselves on the same level as anything the "industry" is producing, and in some cases surpassed it. If you're an indie artist, these guys are the level of creativity and quality you need to reach and try to surpass. If you fall short, then how can you expect your work to reach the top? It's the same thing we say to songwriters, if you aren't writing BETTER songs than what's on the radio (not simply "as good") then you don't really have anything to complain about when you're being ignored. I feel like none of these 3 will be ignored in the very crowed indie world.

So what are you doing to reach or surpass the levels of these 3 fellow JPF award nominees?

Brian

[This message has been edited by Brian Austin Whitney (edited 05-22-2006).]

Wow, I'm flattered!

To be mentioned and thought of that way is really quite exciting. I didn't realize I was setting some sort of bar. Though I always do attempt to make something that I can be proud of. For me, I've been fortunate to have an amazingly talented Artist for a father - it's come in handy on this album. And to have a friend like Byron who is working his ass off to become a force to be reckoned with in Video and eventually Feature Film. I think he'll get there in style.

I'm not aware of Collide, but I am friends with Zak and he takes great pride in his creations and gives tons of credit where credit is due. That is a great thing.

I hope you all get a chance to set a bar in this field of life.

Jody

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Music That Makes Your Soul Happy!
www.jodywhitesides.com

Well, I think it's important to show folks that within and reasonable budget and with indie artist resources, you (as in all our peers, not Jody) should be doing at least as well as these 3 peers. Don't settle for lower standards because you think you have an excuse. I could throw in another example while I am thinking of it. Our 2004 Country album award winner Melody Guy spent a whopping $400 dollars on her winning album. It was against competition that had budgets approaching major label artists. Certainly sonically it wasn't even close to a match to those other albums. She was never going to have the money to ever try to compete. So she instead competed with what she DID have.. talent. She simply out wrote and out sang the competition. Even with simplistic demo song quality recordings (hell.. less than that if you consider most of the songwriters around here spend 400 dollars on 1 average sounding country demo) she still found a way to compete because she's a brilliant songwriter and has a voice that draws you in to every song. You gotta use what you have and you need to display that even if you don't have massive cash and massive media control, you can still use the things that make you worthy as an artist, you creativity, passion and sheer talent, to rise above the noise. You can't accept that because you have some disadvantages that you'll just be satisfied with falling well short of what it takes to be noticed and what it takes to connect with fans. You just have to be smarter and simply not accept mediocrity. Sure, it may take a while to work your way up.. all these artists have been working a lot time.. but I hope that some of you have a light bulb go off and think "hey.. I can elevate my game as well.." Hopefully some of you out there are even saying "hell, I can do better than these guys!!!!" and in many cases that will be true if you put your mind to it. But clearly, these guys have DONE it.. so I hope more of you get motivated to DO it too!

Brian

[This message has been edited by Brian Austin Whitney (edited 05-22-2006).]

Wow!! Zak's site is lovely and fun - great graphics. Jody's site is impressive too.

I don't think I'm at the level of these creative folks... but I did do the artwork for my album

http://www.theshysinger.com/pix/WaitingforBus-99K.jpg

thank you for telling us about this!! I'm totally inspired and encouraged.

I look forward to reading your blogs every day,
cheers
Vikki

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Vikki Flawith, Canadian Singer/Songwriter & Voice Teacher
www.vikkiflawith.com
Vikki on MySpace
www.theshysinger.com
The Shy Singer-Songwriter's Blog
Hummingbird's Wise Bird's Blog
Album: 'Waiting for the Bus'