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Top 20 Countdown – Bleh

InspirationThe other day I was flipping through the cable TV channels and settled on a Top 20 Music Countdown show.  I was so underwhelmed!

After watching this countdown show for about an hour (I didn’t last the full two hours), it made me start to wonder what was so mediocre about it.

Then it hit me, I wasn’t entertained.  The music, the videos, the try-too-hard-to-make-a-cool-video camera angles were so uninspiring.  The passion didn’t come through from the artists.  I couldn’t help but comparing the videos to the over sensationalized local news “stories.”  You know them well, you watch them every evening.  The local-beat reporter spends around 60 seconds on a bit.  They stretch a 10 second statement of the actual news fact into a superfluous series of one-liners and sound bites.  Worse, the video is almost always a series of 3 second clips.  Watch it next time, on each new camera angle count to the three!  These music videos were the same way.  Lame.

Most of you that know me understand that I’m not a ranting type of guy; I don’t care for politics, controversy, and especially cynicism.  Who am I to say what is “wrong with the world today” or even just the music industry?  But I want to tell you what I witnessed on StreetJelly in the past six months that blows away pop culture music.  Nothing speaks better through music than the passion of a live and intimate performance.

Yes, I am very biased toward SJ.  But it’s true, I’ve never been able to experience so much love in music since we launched the website last fall.  I actually feel sorry for the mainstream consumer being fed their formulaic music videos.  They are really missing out on the art of music.

~Frankie, the Founder (a.k.a. King) of StreetJelly

What would you change if you made a music video today?

Singer Songwriter Contest – Tips and Suggestions

Attention Artists! Submit your ORIGINAL song to the StreetJelly “Singer Songwriter Contest” for a chance at prizes, industry recognition, and the opportunity to present your song to publishers. Create a video of yourself performing your original song, and the StreetJelly community will vote on the winners.

Music Contest WinnerHello Ladies and Jellymen, Frankie here!  You all know we’re having the songwriter’s contest.  Let me tell you a little more how we’re handling the submissions, what the judges are looking for, and what to expect from viewer voting.

We have a panel of six judges.  They include musicians, music teachers, music industry experts, and …well, me!  The judges will be picking ten finalists.  The StreetJelly community will then get to vote for their favorite from the ten finalists.

The judges will all be using a form rating sheet to assign points to various categories.  We’ll use these scores to fairly and consistently rank the Top 10.  Here are the categories:

  • Structure – Segments, components, length, and arrangement.  (10 points)
  • Melody – Is it pleasing to the ear?  (10 points)
  • Dynamic – The use of musical rise, fall, sustain, staccato to bring the listener “somewhere.”  (10 points)
  • Lyrics – meaningful words that make you think.  (10 points)
  • The Hook – Is it stuck in your head later?  (10 points)
  • Rhythm and Rhyme Scheme – The groove, the phrasing, the poetics and the feel of the song.  (10 points)
  • Overall Likability – This is the subjective feeling for the judge.  How well do you like it.  (40 points)

So when you submit your original songs, or anytime you write a song, keep all this in mind.  But you already know this.  Let me make a suggestion about the videos.  It’s perfectly fine to submit us a video you already have on YouTube.  (Btw, we want your link to your YouTube channel so you get the benefit of all the new viewer counts.)  Feel free, however, to make a new video and talk a little before and / or after your performance about the song.  You will make a better impression about your song by explaining the lyrics, the story behind it, the day you wrote it, whatever.

This is a great tip not only for the contest, but anytime you upload an original song video to YouTube.  Unless you have the fan-base of The Bieb, chances are few people will find your video and watch it for its merit.  But some people will find and watch the video out of curiosity.  You have a short opportunity to make a lasting impression about your song.

We all like art more when we make a connection with an artist.  Think about it, how many times have you watched a DVD movie that was only average?  But after you watched all the behind-the-scene extras and actor interviews that come with the DVD; you somehow liked the movie more.  Same thing works with music.  We like songs better when we like the musician.  Even taking 10 or 15 seconds to introduce yourself and your song makes a favorable impression on the viewer (and judges).  Makes them feel welcomed.

Ok, you get the idea:  being personable will help in the judging round, AND it will really help in the voting round.  The viewers and fans on StreetJelly will vote most exclusively by likability.  I hate to say a lot of this sounds like marketing, but it is.  However, marketing is a big part in becoming a successful singer songwriter!  Best of luck to everyone entering the contest, we can’t wait to hear …and see, all your songs.

 

Fix Crackle Bubble Noise with Older Version of Flash

Support Topic:  Sound Issues, Install older version of Adobe Flash

Scenario:  Viewers are saying there is a cracking or bubbling distortion in your sound, and you have Adobe Flash 11.7 installed.

Discovery: We’ve found that some musicians produce a crackling or bubbling digital distortion when using a dynamic type mic. These are usually the traditional music store microphones.  Musicians may not be aware of the distortion unless they are told by the viewers or listen closely from the StreetJelly test_broadcast page. The problem seems to have started with the latest version of Flash 11.7. It doesn’t work well with older sound/microphone drivers. The distortion was fixed by a number of our musicians by installing an older version of Flash.  Version 10.3 is a good version to use.

Note: DO NOT USE Flash versions prior 10.3.  They are incompatible with StreetJelly.

Before you get started: Check your version of flash.
http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/find-version-flash-player.html

Uninstall Flash 11.7:
http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/uninstall-flash-player-windows.html

Download and Install Archived version of Flash:  Choose Flash 10.3
http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/archived-flash-player-versions.html

Direct link to Flash 10.3:
http://download.macromedia.com/pub/flashplayer/installers/archive/fp_10.3.183.90_archive.zip
This zip file contains all the different versions of Flash 10.3. You will run the .exe file for your specific computer (Win, Mac, Linux, etc). Instructions are included in the README.TXT file.

Final Thoughts: With an older version of Flash, remember not to automatically choose to upgrade to the latest version of Flash. Adobe will most likely popup notifications for a later version. Just ignore those.

Still have questions? Ask them below, or contact us at support@streetjelly.com.

Book Review: Jarimi Hugaerm by Clifton Printy

Special guest blog by Kurt Van Hook from Vermont, USA.  Kurt reviews the science fiction novel by our very own StreetJelly blues guitarist Clifton Printy.

“By the light of the purple sciant orb” A review of Jarimi Hugaerm by Clifton Printy

Jarimi HugaermClifton Printy’s energetic noir phantasmagoria, the winner of this year’s Street Jelly Fiction Award, crackles with original ideas.

The title refers to a young prisoner of war, who finds himself possessed of boatloads of magical power, or sciant, which may or may not allow him to bed (scare off) a beautiful, super-model-slash-witch, and save (destroy) the world in the process.

Following an unexplained underground event, a trio of doomed immortals emerges from their subterranean crypt to find out what’s been doing on the surface for the last millennium. The reader is then taken on a whirlwind tour of nightmarish dungeons, cult circles and herb farms.

Without giving too much away, let this reviewer simply suggest that the ending roughly parallels one that would emerge should, let’s say, there were to be a head on collision between cars driven by the lead characters of Pynchon’s “Gravity’s Rainbow” , Wallace’s “Infinite Jest” and Heller’s “Catch-22”. Then, imagine that the survivors of that horrific crash were to somehow pilot a plane to a deserted island and were soon joined by the cast and crew of “Game of Thrones”. After a marathon, double-elimination bocce tournament, and a tequila fueled, all-night, blow-out of a party celebrating the bocce champion, everybody suddenly stops  what they are doing at precisely 7:00am and quietly reflect with gratitude on all that has transpired in the past year. Everybody, that is, except the guy who plays Robb Stark, who is still blindly pissed off and angry that his character was killed off at the fucking “red” fucking “wedding”.

Jarimi Hugaerm is required reading for all denizens of the Jelly Street. Be put on notice, SJ’ers, you will be tested.  Available on amazon.com.

Record your Performance while Streaming

Special guest blog by Tom Rule from Macon, GA.
Tom Rule

Tom Rule

StreetJelly is, of course, all about live performances. The user agreement even has a requirement to never use a recorded performance when streaming. But it says nothing about performing live AND recording the live performance! […….and even Frankie said it was OK!]

After getting a few StreetJelly performances under my belt, I began wondering if I could do just that – record a performance at the same time it’s being streamed on StreetJelly. I have a website of my own over at http://www.tomrule.info where things are for sale, and I thought a video might make a useful marketing tool [youtube, anyone?].

My parents would probably like a copy as well! They did pay for all those piano lessons……

This is one of those things that might be useful to know that (A) it CAN be done, and (B) HOW it can be done….at least on a Mac. [If you run Windows, see below!]

So the idea is to have ONE webcam streaming live out to StreetJelly AND have the computer taking the SAME audio and video streams and saving it to a movie on the computer – which you can then ship up to youtube, burn to a disk, email to distant relatives, or use the video to scare off small rodents and annoy your neighbors.

QUICK NOTE ON MY SETUP

I’m a keyboardist AND an audio guy, so it really doesn’t work for me to put up a mic when streaming – I get MUCH better audio running the keyboard into the computer. I’ll use a mic to talk to the audience – it and the keyboard audio feed into a little Mackie mixer, which plugs into the audio interface [an old M-audio Firewire Audiophile]. I’m using an iMac that is a couple of years old…..so it is NOT the “latest greatest”.

I’m using a Logitech webcam, although this would also work with the builtin iSight camera.

HERE’S HOW

You’re going to use your web browser and Quicktime Player.

1. Surf over to StreetJelly and setup your broadcast as normal. You can go ahead and start broadcasting, or just keep it on the test screen for now – it doesn’t matter.

2. Fire up Quicktime Player – it’s in the Applications folder.

3. in QT Player, select File–>New Movie Recording.

4. In my case it automatically selected the webcam. If it doesn’t, then click the triangle in the bottom area of the window and select the correct video and audio sources.

There are some other settings there as well … quality levels, where to save the file, etc. If you don’t know what something does do a test and see what happens.

5. Click record.

That’s it!

6. When done, click the record button again to stop recording, and then stop the broadcast. My version of QT Player will actually upload to youtube from within the application – so the performance can be on Youtube pretty quickly after it is completed!

WINDOWS?

From some cursory research it appears that there are a couple of programs that will allow this same thing to occur on Windows. You can either get a program [ManyCam is one] that creates a “virtual camera”….i.e. you select the “virtual camera” in the settings in Flash and whatever program you are using to record [your webcam probably came with some recording software].

In this scenario Camera talks to Cam Software [i.e. ManyCam] which then splits the video/audio out to StreetJelly AND your recording software.

It is also possible that you have an app like Quicktime Player that will work in a similar fashion as on the Mac – where you just fire it up, select the camera, and it works.

There are waaaaaay too many variations of Windows to even begin writing about it – my suggestion is to try something and see if it works. Just another piece of technology magic that allows us to create in our living rooms/studios/barns/wherever!

Thanks Tom!  Do forget, everyone, put your YouTube channel in your StreetJelly artist profile so we can all get a link to your videos.  ~frankie

Caution: StreetJelly Flies are Biting

JellyflyCaution: You may have been bitten by the StreetJelly Fly?Jellyfly

StreetJelly FlyHow has StreetJelly changed your music listening, daily habits?  I’ll start…

I was listening to music on my headphones, a Grateful Dead ‘tube, and when a song was over…  I reached for my mouse to clap with smileys!  There are no clappy’s on YouTube. LOL  ~frankie

Almost everynight when I say bye on Facebook chat, I keep instictively go looking for a waving smiley to say bye.  ~merv

Musicians I love always come on when I’m cooking dinner.
Frankie gets a lot of burnt meals now. ~martina

Got StreetJelly Syndrome symptoms? Add them below…

Haggis Videos

King HaggisHere are all three videos of Clifton, Frankie, and Merv slopping their way through the Haggis Eating Challenge.  It all started months ago with a dare to eat haggis, a Scottish dish of mushed lamb guts, live on StreetJelly.  It’s quite silly, and a bit gross.  Enjoy.

 

Part One – Clifton (Ode to Haggis)

 

Part Two – Frankie (raw from the can)

 

Part Three – Merv (plus montage)

Random Token Winners

New Feature: Random Token Winners

SJ Winners CupWe’ve added a new fun feature on StreetJelly.  Every time someone tips a musician, they have a chance to win back Free Tokens!  Yes, every tip is run through our Jelly Randomizer Engine to determine if that viewer wins free tokens.  The more tokens one tips, and the more often one tips, the better chances to win.  It’s simple – tip the musician and we give away tokens.

When a viewer wins tokens, they will see this pink message popup in the chat window.  The winning tokens will be added to their account.

Screenshot Winner Message

The Jelly Randomizer Engine will continually run different winning amounts, odds of winning, special promotion nights, etc.  You never know what you may win.  So check in with the site often, follow the Facebook page, and ask the folks on the site what’s new.

 

You’ve been Volunteered into the Jelly Army

You’ve been volunteered into the Jelly Welcome Army!

Uncle Jelly SamWhen I was in the Army, I was often “hey you’d,” as we would say.  “Hey you, you just volunteered yourself to stay tonight and clean out the 1st Sergeant’s office.”   Of course, I was thinking more like, “hey whaaaaaat?”  As time goes by and the more things change, well, the more things stay the same.  Hey You, you’ve been volunteered to be part of the Jelly Welcome Army!  (Don’t worry, I clean my own office.  Ok, that’s not true, but it gets cleaned somehow.)

As StreetJelly grows everyday, a warm welcome to new users and artists into the Jelly Nation goes such a long way.  So all my Jelly Friends, please take these few steps whenever you see a new musician or viewer on the site.

 

New Viewers

  • Say “Hello” and “Welcome to StreetJelly” whenever you encounter a new user.
  • Help new users understand some of the crazy words we use in Jelly Land with a brief explanation.
  • Same thing with Smileys, explain any not-so-obvious meanings.  For example, new users have no idea what the fly means the first time they see it.  Add a quick note like “(listening only)” so they understand.

New Artists (first time performing)

  • Say “Hello” and “Welcome to StreetJelly.”
  • Give them feedback on their sound. But please don’t overwhelm them with too much tech talk.  They may be new to webcam and USB mic technology, so you don’t want to scare them off.  If their sound is at least decent, tell them “we can tweak it later when you get more comfortable on the site.”
  • Explain any features on the site they many not understand like tokens, Rocker Pins (badges), play lists, etc.
  • Take a moment to scroll down and read the artist’s profile.  You’ll be surprised how interesting some of them are and it may help you strike up a conversation with the musician.
  • Keep the chat conversation focused on the musician. This is kind of a tricky one, but important.  A brand new musician performing on the site is probably a bit uncomfortable or nervous with this new format.  It’s not that easy to keep up with chat messages, respond, talk, play, remember chords / lyrics, and so on.  It can be overwhelming to new artists if the chat is inundated with tons of unrelated messages, personal conversations, and zillions of smileys.

The key to being part of the Jelly Welcome Army is to remember how you first experienced StreetJelly in the early days.  I know we all have fun on the site now, go a bit nuts with smileys, and joke some really bad whoppers.  But remember that a musician’s performance is like an invitation into their living room.  We wouldn’t want to be invited in someone’s house and ignore their presence.

I hope we’ve been able to give everyone (as much as humanly possible) a warm welcome when they found StreetJelly.  Now it’s your turn to return the same welcome to all the new people.  Pay it forward and many thanks, Jelly Friends!
~frankie

Any other tips how to welcome new viewers and musicians?