Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Podcast for Final
Music in San Jose? Yes, Really!
Final Script
60 SECONDS
SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA GOT A MUSICAL SHOT IN THE
ARM THIS PAST WEEK DURING THE FIRST LEFT COAST
LIVE MUSIC FESTIVAL. THE FIVE DAY EVENT, ORGAN-
IZED BY LOCAL MUSICANS AND MUSIC ENTHUSIASTS,
FEATURED OVER EIGHTY BANDS IN DOZENS OF VENUES
SPREAD THROUGHOUT DOWNTOWN SAN JOSE. THE
ORGANIZERS SOUGHT TO CHANGE THE WAY THE
SILICON VALLEY MUSIC SCENE IS PERCEIVED, AS WELL
AS HOW IT VIEWS ITSELF.
LOCAL MUSICIAN MARK HEAPS OF THE BAND POINT
THREE KNOWS THE SCENE WELL, HAVING PLAYED
AROUND THE BAY AREA SINCE TWO THOUSAND ONE.
HE SAYS THAT THE KEY TO BEING SUCCESSFUL IS
CONSTANT NETWORKING AND SUPPORTING LOCAL
ARTISTS, WHO IN TURN WILL SUPPORT OTHER ARTISTS.
THE FESTIVAL AIMS TO CONNECT MUSICIANS WITH
VENUES, EVEN ONES THAT PREVIOUSLY MAY NOT HAVE
FEATURED LIVE MUSIC. THE HOPE IS THAT BY HAVING A
LARGE ENOUGH EVENT WITH ENOUGH PUBLICITY,
PEOPLE WILL TURN OUT TO SEE LOCAL ACTS PERFORM.
HEAPS SAYS THAT PEOPLE IN THE BAY AREA ARE
DISTRACTED BY ALL THE TECHNOLOGY AVAILABLE
TO THEM, BUT THAT THEY CAN BE SWAYED BY A
MEMORABLE ACT.
OF THE FESTIVAL, HE SAYS, HE LOVED SEEING ALL
THE PEOPLE WALKING THE STREETS TO SEE THE BANDS
THAT WERE PLAYING. AND THAT WAS THE POINT.
(- 60 -)
Final Magazine Article
(Point 3's Mark Heaps)
San Jose, California is known for a number of things: wealth, technology, and weather. One thing that it isn’t particularly known for? Music. The Silicon Valley, for all of its amenities and perks, loses out to more glitzy, glamorous San Francisco in that department. Not that there aren’t plenty of bands in San Jose. It's just that it isn't easy to really make it here.
May, 2009’s “Left Coast Live” brought the music: over 80 local and regional bands played throughout the San Jose downtown area in dozens of venues, turning what is often a subdued night scene into a lively bash of creativity, expression and noise.
The festival was organized by a real cross-section of musicians and music lovers frustrated at the lack of a cohesive movement in the San Jose area. They held a series of meetings over the last few years, coming together to motivate and mobilize local musicians and connect them with venues, both extant and new. The result was this year's Left Coast Live, a step in the right direction.
One of the bands featured was Point 3, a local rock act fronted by Mark Heaps, who had labored long and hard to chase his dream in San Jose. He knows the musical climate here, and the uphill climb to rise to prominence. He says, “It's actually a really amazing scene that is unfortunately surrounded by a social type that finds music fairly disposable.” Heaps characterizes the area as being distracted by its technology, saying that, “people are less interested in the act of seeking out new music by going to live shows, when they can just download music.”
Even so, the music scene in San Jose is one that is close-knit, and can be quite competitive, perhaps because of the dynamics involved. Heaps recalls networking extensively with people, attending many shows and putting his name out there with people already playing. He says that reputation is “everything in a small scene” but that success can be found “if you've got something to offer and you do something that is positively remembered.”
Left Coast Live is not the final destination for San Jose’s music scene. What it represents is a new take, hopefully an invigorating shot in the arm that will convince restaurant and bar owners that live music can bring in people. It hopes also to send a message to bands that there are places to play. Heaps says that “it's going to take a few years for it to reach its true potential. But considering we've done nothing like this in 5 or more years, I'll take whatever we can get.”
Maybe there will be somebody else there with a new band, trying to get his attention.
Topical Post #3
In times of war, speech (and the press in general) is usually more limited by government. That's a given, though with the state of information technologies, more cats are leaving their bags than ever before.
What concerns me the most is the practice of one party stifling speech that another disagrees with. One of the strong points of a Free Society is the aspect of debate. Without contentious speech, there is a limitation on dissent, and without dissent, you end up with a totalitarian state.
There are a number of ranking Democrats in US Congress who favor the re-instation of the ironically-named Fairness Doctrine. The Fairness Doctrine essentially forced anyone with a broadcast license to present both sides of contentious issues. First off, since when does the government fully run all content of privately-owned radio stations?
Another issue lies in the recent banning of "controversial" radio host Michael "Savage" Weiner, who was put on a list og people "banned" from the U.K. Really? They have other people who have been terrorists who have been let back in, and Savage has never advocated violence. And yet he was on a list with true terrorists, murderers, and Neo-Nazis.
Of course, the backlash has been huge. Recent polls in Britian have shown eighty percent of Brits oppose the ban.
The issue is not the content of the speech, but the right of people to hold and advocate views that others don't agree on. Old-school liberals used to say, "I disagree with your speech, but I will defend your right to say it." What happened to that viewpoint?
