Lifers, a documentary:

This summer I predominantly spent my time either filming behind a camera, or editing in front of a computer screen.  The reason for this was my MA Journalism postgraduate dissertation, and the final outcome was a twenty minute long documentary about the modern music industry, which I've decided to call Lifers.

I still cringe at the parts I feel are badly filmed or edited, but overall I'm fairly proud of how my first stab at documentary making turned out.  I was only brave enough to post it online yesterday, but I've already had lots of lovely comments and feedback from family, friends, colleagues and those who appeared in the film.  Matthew from Song, By Toad even wrote about Lifers on his blog today (you can read the post here) which makes me feel a teeny bit famous!

The documentary features Three Blind Wolves, Dan Willson of Withered Hand fame, Neil Pennycook (Supermoon/Meursault) and Tony Taylor (formerly X-Lion Tamer), as well as my industry experts (Nick Mitchell, Nicola Meighan and Matthew Young).  If you're a fan of the Scottish indie music scene, or just music in general, you will hopefully find the topic interesting - maybe even enough to watch the whole thing!

There is a fairly amusing (at least to me) 'making of' documentary still to come, which I'm in the process of editing right now, but in the mean time I hope you enjoy Lifers, if you can spare the time to give it a watch.  Rather than get all mushy about it again, I'll leave you with a heartfelt message from my past self, posted last night on my Facebook:

The Organ Grinder's Monkey album launch:

A few weeks ago, I brought your attention to the brilliant Edinburgh band Meursault, and their attempt to raise £3,000 on Kickstarter (read my original post here).  In the end, over £5,000 was pledged by fans and supporters of the group (an amazing result!) and this weekend they'll be on their way to Texas for the famous SXSW music festival.

In return for our pennies, Craig and I were jointly rewarded with a copy of the Organ Grinder's Monkey covers album Meursault recorded in just a few days, and a screen printed poster of the album's track listing.  I love the cute little monkey (designed by the talented Fiona Buckle) and we will definitely be framing our poster as a souvenir.

We also pledged for tickets to the album's live launch night, which took place last Saturday night at Penicuik Town Hall.  Meursault's fantastic line up of musicians played The Organ Grinder's Monkey from start to finish, and held the attention of their delighted audience for over two hours.  The full track listing of the album was kept secret until the night of the gig, which made collecting our album and poster on arrival very exciting!

I knew more covers on The Organ Grinder's Monkey than I initially thought I would, and was especially pleased to hear Meursault's take on one of my favourite Mountain Goats songs, No Children.  The gig had a truly happy atmosphere, and I felt lucky to be in on such a special and intimate performance.  When the band reappear on this side of the Atlantic, be sure to catch them live and see for yourself!

The music portion of SXSW will take place between the 11th and 16th of March, and Meursault will then tour around America.  You can see their Kickstarter page here for more information, or follow their progress on Facebook and Twitter.

The Organ Grinder's Monkey:

Source: here

Click here to pledge and help Meursault!

Everyone and their mother seems to be turning to Kickstarter for project funding these days, and who can really blame them?  The only problem is that with so many worthy causes (and some perhaps not so worthy) to choose from on that site, you may find yourself wondering which ones to invest your hard earned cash in.  You might even miss some really good projects (and rewards).

Some of you might remember my posts last year about the Vanilla Ink Kickstarter.  I was really pleased to see those guys make well over £1,000 more than their target amount, and achieve their dream of exhibiting at International Jewellery London.  Even though I couldn't contribute a lot to their cause money wise, I hope my posts helped to raise awareness and thus helped them on their journey in some small way.

So, here I am, showcasing another Kickstarter page and hoping that it will encourage even just a couple of lovely people to contribute and help a talented and very nice band get to where they want to go.  The (brilliant) video below, featuring Neil from Edinburgh band Meursault and Matthew from the group's label Song, By Toad Records will explain pretty much everything that you need to know about the Kickstarter, but let me sum it up quickly for you anyway.

Meursault are off to America in March to play at arts festival South By Southwest in Austin, Texas, as well as touring around the east coast while they are there.  Obviously, doing this costs a fair bit of money but - also obviously - the band want to reward you for helping them out.  

The result is a mini album entitled The Organ Grinder's Monkey (hence the weird name of this post) that contributing fans will get to help choose the tracklisting for, as a thank you.  Did I mention that the album will primarily feature covers?  Covers that could be chosen by YOU, personally.  Pretty cool, huh?

As is the norm with Kickstarter, the rewards become more weird and wonderful as they increase in price.  For £300, you will receive your own private gig at the venue of your choice, as well as a signed bumper pack of goodies (including the mini album, of course) and the band's eternal gratitude.  However, for a very reasonable fiver, you will secure yourself a ticket to a special launch gig in Edinburgh, and will probably receive a great deal of gratitude as well.  So, you see, there's something for everyone.

Source: here

As you can see from the above screenshot, Meursault are already well on their way to reaching their target of £3,000 before Friday 7th February, but any extra funds raised will help to make this debut American tour better for both the band and their fans.

And if you're reading this thinking: 'I've never heard of Meursault before, what even is that?' then get listening!  And, more importantly, get to a gig and see them live.  They are a band with such an eclectic sound and repertoire that I can't imagine anyone they wouldn't appeal to, on some level.  Also, I'm pretty confident that Neil Pennycook has one of the most powerful voices in the entire world.  It has to be heard in person to be believed, so go and see them.  But, first:

Click here to pledge and help Meursault!

Go get 'em, champs.