Category Archives: Music

My 2015 Songs of the Summer

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The last official day of summer is September 22nd, and as fall approaches, you reminisce on all the memories that you have collected over the last few months, and you realize another chapter of your life just ended.  For me, I had some life changing events occur, such as making a big move across the country, leaving the only life I have known on the east coast, and embarking on a new adventure at an amazing company in the dance industry in Los Angeles.  As I look back on all these changes, there is one thing that remands constant in my life; the music is never silent.

Flipping through Billboard Magazine, I noticed that most of the songs that slammed the charts over this summer don’t even touch my top ten favorites.  So, here are some of the songs that have been drowning out the constant noise of LA as I ride the train home.  They allow me go to my happy place where my world is whatever I want it to be.

Bea Miller – “Force of Nature” – This sixteen year old singer, signed to Disney’s Hollywood Records is starting to blow up the music scene.  Granted, she had some help from participating in the X Factor, but I think what really sets her apart from the other young singers is she doesn’t need the bells and whistles to have her voice shine.  The first time I heard her sing was an acoustic cover of “We Can’t Stop” with Boyce Avenue.  “Force of Nature” is basic.  It is basic in the good sense, that sometimes all you need is an acoustic guitar and a great voice.

Marianas Trench – “One Love” – Lead singer, Josh Ramsey never ceases to amaze me with his song writing abilities, his voice, and the harmonies of the men that make Marianas Trench.  “One Love” was recently released last week in anticipation of the release of their new album “Astoria.”  All the other songs that have been released as singles thus far have been a twist of sarcasm to the mainstream pop world.  “One Love” is a series of statements and questions that are constantly running through your mind.  Questioning your choices.  The affects of those choices:

“What if we could find a way to try to heal?
What if there’s no stopping us yet?
What if the one true love’s the only one that you get?
What if there was still a reason not to go?
What if there was still a little bit of hope?”

Seriously Josh Ramsey?!  I cannot understand why Marianas Trench is not lighting up the Billboard charts.  Society you need to get on this level ASAP.

Alessia Cara – “Here” – She has just broken into the Billboard 100.  I have been obsessed with song since May.  Granted, I didn’t feel that these lyrics fit my 20 year old self, but totally describes my almost 30 year old self.  Ice cream and my best friends sound like a better idea than a party:

“But honestly I’d rather be
Somewhere with my people we can kick it and just listen
To some music with the message (like we usually do)
And we’ll discuss our big dreams
How we plan to take over the planet”

Icona Pop – “Emergency” – I love the piano, the thing that sounds like a horn, but it definitely isn’t, and that constant rhythm line that carries the tune.  This song is catchy and will make you tap your foot and ultimately jump out of your seat and start dancing to that bass line.

Years and Years – “Shine” – This three piece British electronic group exploded when they released their single “King.”  Personally, I like “Shine” more as it gives an R&B side to the group and is highlighted with what they do best by mixing their synth machine and keyboard that makes their vocals glow.

5 Seconds of Summer – “She’s Kinda Hot” – I know this one has been on the charts and it is totally deserved.  As you have probably come to learn, I love the pop-punk and punk-rock scene.  I think it is epic that a band now is starting to bring back the sounds of Simple Plan, Green Day, My Chemical Romance, and Blink 182 to the radio, and new generation of youngsters.  Now, I am not saying 5 Seconds of Summer is any of these bands, but I love the loud guitars, the in your face and abrasive lyrics, and the encompassing drums that brings you into that full rock sound of not being able to hear when you take out your headphones.  I think this lyric sums up the scene that was big in late 90s and it is making a come back – “We are the kings and the queens of the new broken scene.”

Drumroll please…my all time favorite song of the summer is…

Sigala – “Easy Love” – This British DJ mixes The Jackson 5’s “ABC” and a full blown remix of popular songs, which gives you some easy listening, a pop of color, and a full on explosion of sound that makes it the perfect summer song.  It even gives you some cues on when to start clapping a long.  Also, the music video has two of my favorite things – danceable music and talented dancers.  So, here is my vote for the 2015 summer song anthem.

Queen, Freddie Mercury, and The Imprint of Bohemian Rhapsody

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Faultless sound of beauty, and ageless instrumentalists with a style that could never be replicated.  Queen will forever be a revolutionary group that changed history with their strong, powerful, and steady voices, their ability to write hit songs individually and as a group, and their support and protection they give one another as a group, individuals, and as artists is something to admire.

Queen was composed of Brian May (guitarist), Roger Taylor (drummer), John Deacon (bassist), and Freddie Mercury (pianist/ lead vocals). These four men became Queen in 1971.  In 1973, they were signed to EMI Records and Elektra Records.  In the same year, Queen released their debut album ‘Queen.’  Their debut album was hailed one of the most exciting developments ever in rock music.  It received a rave review from Rolling Stones Magazine that called them “…the first of a whole new wave of English rockers, and you’d best learn to love ’em now’ cause they’re here to stay. Regal bearings aside, Queen is a monster.”

In 1975, Queen released their second album ‘A Night at the Opera’, which was the album that brought us the classic Bohemian Rhapsody.  This unusual six minute suite was comprised of an intro, a ballad segment, an operatic passage, a hard rock part, and a reflective coda, but no chorus. May, Taylor, and Mercury sang their vocal parts ten to twelve hours a day.  A hard, fast, and strong dedication to a work that was fully penned by Mercury.  Brian May said, “Bohemian Rhapsody was Freddie’s baby…We just helped him bring it to life.”  It took three weeks to record, the opera parts took more than seventy hours to complete, and one hundred and eighty overdubs were needed to track the recording we hear today.  In an article in the New York Times the producer, Roy Thomas Baker said, “The thing that makes it most ageless is the fact that it didn’t confine to any given genre of music. It doesn’t compete with anything. It’s in a world of its own.”

The record label didn’t want to release Bohemian Rhapsody as a single unless it was shortened because they believed it wouldn’t be a hit.  The band collectively refused to shorten it because they felt it would change the work.  Can you seriously image shortening that song?  The radio DJs and listeners ended up making the song a hit and proving the record labels wrong.  British DJ Kenny Everett received a copy of the song and played it on Capital Radio.  Everett played the song fourteen times in two days due to audience demands.  I think Everett was right when he said, “…it could be a half an hour long, it’s going to be number one for centuries.”  Bohemian Rhapsody topped the United Kingdom (UK) charts for nine weeks and sold more than a million copies by 1976.  The song peaked at number nine in the United States (U.S.) in 1976, which is insanity to me!  It reached number one again in the UK in 1991 upon Mercury’s death and number two in the U.S. with the release of the film Wayne’s World.  In 2004 the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

Queen was full of artists that I haven’t seen in today’s industry.  They were a talented group of songwriters that all penned number one hits to their legacy.  They understood that taking a chance and truly opening yourself up to the world is a risk that can and will be rewarded if you are brave enough to let people see your vulnerable side.  Queen was inducted into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame in 2001, Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2003, UK Music Hall of Fame in 2004, and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2002.

I wonder what Queen would have created had Freddie Mercury not passed away in 1991.  His vocal talents extending from bass in low F to soprano in high F is rare.  His ability to pen hits like A Crazy Little Thing Called Love, Somebody to Love, Don’t Stop Me Now, We Are the Champions, and Bohemian Rhapsody leaves me in awe every time I hear them.  Mercury was the flash.  The theatrical entertainer that made the live shows an experience.  I know I’m a week late, but September 5th was Freddie Mercury’s birthday as well as the yearly tradition of ‘Freddie for a day.’  On this day, the Mercury Phoenix Trust celebrates the life of the legendary Freddie Mercury, and continues to support the ongoing mission of finding a cure for AIDS.  People dress up as Freddie all over the world to help raise funds on this day through sponsorships.  Let’s continue to remember the man and the legend on this day, and to never forget the work and artistry that these four men shared with the world through all that is Queen.

Road Trip Mixes are a Necessity

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dancing-in-a-car-waynes-worldI’m sorry for being such a slacker last week.  I literally didn’t post anything, but I promise I have a good reason…kinda.  I moved from Boston, Massachusetts to Los Angeles, California last week.  Plus everything that could go wrong went wrong.  My older brother got into a sever car accident where he was hit head on by another car.  Both cars were totaled.  My brother is still recovering.  He has some stress fractures in his face and his left hand has been bothering him since the accident, but he is getting stronger everyday.  Driving from Boston to Syracuse, New York my breaks came loose on the right side of my car where it was making this grinding noise so that was terrifying.  And finally, the Uhaul place gave us the wrong size truck.  Instead of the seventeen foot truck that we ordered they gave us a fourteen foot truck.  From what the Uhaul company explained you only put in a “request” for a truck, it does not guarantee you that size truck which I understood, but if you are going to give the customer a different size truck wouldn’t you give them a larger one?  Needless to say, all the stuff that my parents, brother, and I had did not fit so we had to rent a trailer, which made everyone have to drive by themselves.  Thank you Uhaul!

It took four days to get to sunny LA driving from sun up to sun down every day.  I never want to drive that much again.  I don’t think the experience of being in the car is bad, but when no one is in the car with you it can be pretty boring.  Knowing that I was going to be driving alone I made some epic playlists, but I could not play said playlists because my jack in my phone stopped working on the third day of the trip.  I seriously cannot make this up.  Luckily, I didn’t have to channel surf in the car to find a music station because I have Sirius XM, but listening to one station for twelve hours you get to know the music they play because just like normal radio stations they loop songs every four hours.  So, of course I was channel surfing between the 80s, 90s, and 00s stations for the last two days.

This brings me back to my point of the importance of road mixes or as we come to know them as playlists.  The problem with playlists if you iPod doesn’t want to work or cooperate you need a back up.  Granted most CDs hold maybe two hours of music which is pushing it, but it’s better to have multiple CDs with music you know you like rather than switching channels every time the “Macarena” comes on.  Here is my note to all of you road trippers out there.  Do not depend on your iPod or iPhone to get you through a long car ride.  You need to have some CD back ups of those epic playlists because if you don’t you won’t be able to scream “Hold on,” boy band dance to “I Want It That Way,” or bang you head to”Bohemian Rhapsody” to entertain yourself from boredom.  Instead you will have to guess with the radio on what the next song is, unable to skip if you don’t like it, and most importantly you can’t really plan your next dance move while driving.  These are the important things in life.

Individual Fundraising – How To Do It

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Nobody likes to talk about money, but there comes a time in everyone’s life where you need to start having those hard conversations.  Now, you can continue to avoid the dread ‘M’ word issue or you can deal with the fact that every facet of your life deals with money.  The sooner you become comfortable talking about it in everyday conversation the easier this talk is going to be.

Non-profits thrive and prosper on the development team.  This part of the organization is the area that brings in the money and makes all the wheels turn from production to education to everyday operations.  In my research to become more apart of the dance world in Los Angeles I have recently applied for a development position.  In my prep for not only furthering my career, but an overarching understanding of the arts world from commercial to nonprofits it is important to grasp knowledge and research what you still need to learn.  One of the components of this potential position includes individual fundraising, which I do not have experience in, but you have to start somewhere.  Granted I have an understanding of grant writing, fund reporting, fundraising efforts with the community, database maintenance and upkeep, and donor event planning, but I have never done anything directly with individual donors and major gifts.  So, I did what I do best which is research like a crazy person.

Started by talking with a woman who has been in the major gift and solicitation game for thirty years.  She told me that following the 10, 10, 80 rule is the most important rule.  Ten percent of funding are grants – foundations, government, corporate, ten percent are smaller funding donations from annual appeals and e-mail solicitations, but eighty percent are your major donors.  These donors need to be cultivated, courted, and become part of the company’s family.  Understanding this rule I came to the understanding that individual giving is the most important aspect in development.  Needless to say I have gained a tremendous respect for the employees that have taken on this intimidating and daunting task of approaching people for funding.

So my thought to maximizing an individual giving program is to first draw up a plan with short and long term goals that have deadlines attached to them.  For example, start by concentrating on the circles that surround the company.  Around the company you have the executives of the organization and board members.  I would want to uses these people to test the case of support to the leadership by developing the story of the company that could be presented to donors (i.e. mission, artistic work, education, community…etc).  Exciting and engaging the people that are associated with the organization so they (board and other leaders) will participate and are comfortable to participate and give one hundred percent to fundraising plan.

Once you have the leadership on board and the basic pitch it is time to get to know the database of the company.  What do your current donors have in common?  Are their relationships between the donors (i.e. friends, family, or board relation)?  Once you are able to separate your current donors into giving categories take a look at other organizations to see if their giving levels are the same or is their a potential for a higher donation that hasn’t been tapped.  Don’t solicit your donors the same.  Continue to target and ask for the right amount for the right type of area of the company to fund.  Continue to communicate to all donors through multiple channels – social media, mail, e-mail, and individualize calls and letters.

Next it is time to leverage the connections.  You know how I was talking about those circles around the organization?  Well the next circle would be friends, associates, and connections with VIPs of the company.  Enlist board support by getting their inner circle to get to know the organization by hosting a small event in a personal setting.  Educate, inform, and involve them.  Cultivate the relationship long-term.  Getting the donor to go from donation to investment in the organization is key.  You want these people to not only give money but believe strongly in the organization.  To do this you need to develop an investment opportunity, give the donor an opportunity to transform the organization or the community, and then you as the organization need to demonstrate that change.

Donor solicitation is a lot like dating.  First you get to know a person.  What are their interests?  How could their interest connect with the company’s interests?  If both of the parties (i.e. the individual and the company) interests can connect in a positive way you start a courtship with the donor.  Throughout the courtship you educate them about the company, find common interests, and get the donor to connect in a personal way.  From their comes the commitment (i.e. the proposal).  The asking for the funds from the donor and how their investment will be used.  Looking at solicitation like dating makes it a little less scary because it fits on a level that everyone can relate to in society.  The thing to remember is that money isn’t as scary to talk about it if you can find a common ground.

Songs & Artists that Shaped My High School Years

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GreenDayIt’s kind of funny to look back at your high school self where the smallest thing like getting a major pimple breakout could seem like the end of the world.  The fact that you felt that your parents couldn’t possibly understand because seriously they were never a teenager in your eyes.  The dramatics of a teen are hilarious to me now and I was not really a dramatic teenager, at least I didn’t think I was in the sense that everything was constantly the end of the world.  I did well in school, I was in dance classes in all of my free time, and the little free time I had I would hangout with my friends.

As a teenager I was really into pop-punk and punk-rock music.  Granted I also listened to a lot of pop music as well, like Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys, and N’SYNC, but I loved the thrashing beat of the drums, the bass pumping the song loudly into my stereo speakers, and the guitar solos the escalated the power of the song to a climax.  The early 2000s were a growth and comeback period for guitars.  You had artists like Blink 182, Simple Plan, Fountains of Wayne, Bowling for Soup, American Hi-Fi, and Green Day gain a huge following and popularity.

Simple Plan released their debut album in 2002-2003 called “No Pads, No Helmets…Just Balls.”  Firstly, the title of this album is amazing.  It explains all the thoughts that you think as a teenager.  Life is just one big dodgeball game and you are constantly getting pelted without padding.  I don’t know if that was their intention of the title of the album, but I remember laughing at the album cover art when I got the album where it just showed one giant out of control frat party.  This album sold over a million albums in the United States and over four million copies worldwide.  These kind of numbers are unheard of today with the changing of music industry, but these numbers really shows the popularity of this group.  This pure pop-punk record had four major hits from it – I’m Just A Kid, I’d Do Anything, Addicted, and Perfect.  Perfect is one of my favorite songs off this album.  It reminds us that parents have such a huge impact on a kid’s life.  What you do.  What you say.  It means everything to a kid.  How you think of them.  Your reactions to their successes and their failures as well as their goals and aspirations.  Even as an adult their opinion still matters.

All you late 1990 and early 2000 babies I am about to educate you.  Fountains of Wayne and Bowling for Soup are not the same artist!  Stacy’s Mom – RIAA Gold Certified and Grammy Nominated song was done by Fountains of Wayne.  For all you parents yes this song is majorly inappropriate, but what song has ever actually been appropriate from the punk genre?  Bowling for Soup catalog includes songs like 1985, Almost, and my personal favorite Girls All The Bad Guys Want.  Girls All the Bad Guys Want was released in 2002 and was Grammy Nominated for Best Pop Performance by a Group or Duo.  It still remains a staple in my life when I need a good lets jump around on my bed like five year old, or reminiscing on the days my college roommate and I would totally lose it when this song came on while we were studying.

Who could forget artists like Blink 182 with their fast talking, guitar pushing, and totally crazy lyrics in songs like The Rock Show or when they got super serious in others like Stay Together for the Kids or I Miss You.  Blink 182 hit a high commercial success from 1999 to 2004 and even though they have broken up (yet again) I’ll never forget my teenage obsession I came to have with songs like What’s My Age Again or All The Small Things.

The band of my high school school career has to be and will always be Green Day.  Now all you punk rock fans out there are going to say they didn’t come out in the early 2000s.  Yes, I know they came out with their break through album back in 1994 and formed in the late 1980s, but they finally received the nod they deserved from the public and the music industry in 2004 when they released the rock opera that is “American Idiot.”  It debuted on the Billboard Charts at #1 and was the first of their albums to reach number one.  It won the 2005 Grammy for Best Rock Album and it went on to become a Broadway hit.  Their is no way I could pick just one song from that album as my favorite, but if I had to chose Jesus of Suburbia takes my vote.  It is a nine minute song set in five part story of someone’s life spinning out of control, lost in having nothing to believe in, to care about.  You can hit that wall whether you are a teenager or an adult.  It just becomes easier as an adult knowing that it is not the end of the world when something doesn’t make sense.  Your failure is not what defines you.  It is how you stand back up from the fall that helps you find the boulevard you chose to be on.

“To live and not to breathe
Is to die in tragedy
To run, to run away
To find what you believe”
-Green Day (Jesus of Suburbia)

Click here for the perfect early 2000 punk-rock playlist.