From: owner-alloy-digest@smoe.org (alloy-digest) To: alloy-digest@smoe.org Subject: alloy-digest V5 #20 Reply-To: alloy@smoe.org Sender: owner-alloy-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-alloy-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk X-To-Unsubscribe: Send mail to "alloy-digest-request@smoe.org" X-To-Unsubscribe: with "unsubscribe" as the body. alloy-digest Saturday, January 29 2000 Volume 05 : Number 020 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Alloy: Retrospectacle [Symposium1@aol.com] Alloy: Project B-Day Backgrounder and Links ["Stephen M. Tilson" Subject: Alloy: Project B-Day Backgrounder and Links Dear Alloy, Earlier, CRACKERS, leader of the BDay Pep Squad , asked some good questions about our ongoing Thomas Dolby tribute projects: > Now that "Bride Of Aliens Ate My Birthday Cake" (code named > "Project B-Day:Deja Vu") is behind us it's time to start > co-ordinating the work on Project B-Day:III > > Could someone post the URL for the Project B-Day III webpage > as well as the subscription information for the Project B-Day > mailing list (so we can discuss details of the Project B-Day > operation without them reaching the ears of a certain > Birthday Boy). Some of our newer members may be wondering, "What on the flat earth could he be talking about?" In answer to that here is a short background on Project B-Day. Project B-Day (hereinafter referred to as BDay) began as a concept fostered by the members of the now-disbanded "Tap Room", a BBS-like message board formerly contained within Thomas Dolby's official website dedicated to his art , The Flat Earth Society (FES). The FES is still going strong, but The Tap Room closed up shop getting on three years ago. Many of its members either already had a dual citizenship (Alloy and the FES) or migrated over here at the close and are still with us today. (I wonder how old Barliman is holding up?) And so, a couple of crackers from Canada, uh, I mean CRACKERS and another Canadian, Ian Gifford, brought the BDay idea to Alloy with great enthusiasm and can-do. The idea was to have the musically inclined members of The Flat Earth Society select and record a Thomas Dolby song, all of which would be compiled together and presented to Mr. Dolby for his birthday. Additional copies were produced for the contributors. The only way to get a copy was, and still is, to PARTICIPATE. More on this later. This very thing has been done for the past three years. Our first offering was called "Aliens Ate My Birthday Cake" (1997), and was released on cassette. CRACKERS and Ian produced. In 1998 we released "The Flattery Earth" on two CDs. Keith Stansell and I produced. Last year we remastered and re-released "Aliens Ate My Birthday Cake" on CD with some additions and changes, and called it "BRIDE OF Aliens Ate My Birthday Cake" (1999). Again, Keith and I produced. The latter two releases included the addition of "B-Sides": Original tunes from the contributors of a-side covers. > We should really start to pull together on Project B-Day III > now so that everything gets done on time. October comes much > sooner than you might think and the deadline comes even > sooner. > > And if anyone wants to organize Project B-Day spin-off projects > for those whose talents lie in areas other than music then > you'll want to subscribe to the Project B-Day mailing list too. CRACKERS is referring to the Alloy sub-list, DolbyDay. Around the time of production for The Flattery Earth it occurred to me that we should take our discussions about what is being done for Thomas' upcoming birthday off-list. This, to preserve the Alloy bandwidth and to keep the current BDay project(s) a surprise for Thomas. For a while I ran a private list through my email address and eventually that list found a home and a name. DolbyDay was born. DolbyDay is the place for all discussions of upcoming tribute projects. You won't hear anything about it, except for very general messages like this, on Alloy until all is said and done. If you would like to be involved, or just want to watch the action as our current project takes shape, you are invited to join the DolbyDay list. (see below) Subscription to the DolbyDay list will allow you access to our tribute-specific discussions, various related files such as pre-release versions of our work, and the sign-up lists for projects. I use the plural because our activities are not limited to music. Last year, in addition to the release of "BRIDE OF Aliens...", a group of DolbyDayers put together a clever website-as-birthday-tribute for Thomas. Another great idea which has yet to see fruition is the production of a book of Dolby-related artwork, stories, and poetry. I should also mention that there is an easy way for non-musicians to participate in the musical tribute. Each year we collect voice-only birthday greetings from our members for inclusion with the musical recordings as an audio birthday card. This qualifies as participation and puts the greeter on our distribution list for the recording. To wit, there are copyright limitations on what we can do. By our current agreement with Thomas' management, musical BDay tributes may only be distributed to participants. At last check, about half of the Alloy folk are also subscribed to DolbyDay, and about 77% of those were participants. And what splendid tributes they are! Visit the links below to hear most of our finished work in RealAudio, courtesy of Keith Stansell. LINK TO REALAUDIO FILES OF OUR PREVIOUS EFFORTS - ----------------------------------------------- Here's the link to "The Flattery Earth" http://Keith.Stansell.com/flattery.htm I couldn't find a link to "BRIDE OF Aliens...". Keith? Help us out here. Also the RealAudio files at the Flattery site are not working for me. Could you look into this as well, Keith? I've tried two different computers and two different browsers - no joy. :-( LINK TO DOLBYDAY - ---------------- http://www.egroups.com/group/dolbyday/info.html Submit your email address on this page, or write to me privately to gain full access to this list and related resources. To sum up, as far as discussion on Alloy is concerned AREA 51 RULES APPLY to the current BDay projects. (Birthday presents should be a surprise, yes?) We would love to have your participation, but the only way to stay abreast of and participate in the various projects we might (or might not ) be cooking up is to SUBSCRIBE TO DOLBYDAY. > And perhaps someone can make it a point to post the Project B-Day > III url on a regular basis so that newcomers to Alloy can get > filled in on what this Project B-Day thing is all about. Done. :-) I'll make a point to post this, or a similar backgrounder semi-regularly on Alloy to keep the faithful informed. Thanks for rattling my cage and getting the ball rolling, CRACKERS! Best wishes and Yours in AllThingsDolby(tm), Stephen "/\/\iles" Tilson - DolbyDay List Administriviator Stephen_Tilson@compuserve.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2000 08:34:07 -0700 From: "Keith Stansell" Subject: Re: Alloy: Project B-Day Backgrounder and Links - ----- Original Message ----- There may be some missing files on this page. I will dedicate my Saturday to creating new and improved versions of the web sites including Bride Of. I will post the links here on Saturday. - -Keith From: Stephen M. Tilson > Here's the link to "The Flattery Earth" > > http://Keith.Stansell.com/flattery.htm > > I couldn't find a link to "BRIDE OF Aliens...". Keith? Help us out > here. > > Also the RealAudio files at the Flattery site are not working for > me. Could you look into this as well, Keith? I've tried two > different computers and two different browsers - no joy. :-( > > LINK TO DOLBYDAY > ---------------- > http://www.egroups.com/group/dolbyday/info.html > > Submit your email address on this page, or write to me privately > to gain full access to this list and related resources. > > To sum up, as far as discussion on Alloy is concerned AREA 51 RULES > APPLY to the current BDay projects. (Birthday presents should be a > surprise, yes?) We would love to have your participation, but the > only way to stay abreast of and participate in the various projects > we might (or might not ) be cooking up is to SUBSCRIBE TO > DOLBYDAY. > > > And perhaps someone can make it a point to post the Project B-Day > > III url on a regular basis so that newcomers to Alloy can get > > filled in on what this Project B-Day thing is all about. > > Done. :-) I'll make a point to post this, or a similar backgrounder > semi-regularly on Alloy to keep the faithful informed. Thanks for > rattling my cage and getting the ball rolling, CRACKERS! > > Best wishes and > Yours in AllThingsDolby(tm), > Stephen "/\/\iles" Tilson - DolbyDay List Administriviator > Stephen_Tilson@compuserve.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2000 12:31:58 EST From: "Ian Gifford" Subject: Re: Alloy: FW: Your Rights Under Attack by Record Industry D'arcy, Thank you for the interesting post that you sent. Unfortunately I want to mention that I don't think that MP3.com has a leg to stand on. It would appear to me that they have gone a little too far. One thing that has recurred in your post and the forwards is "protection from the record companies" which makes the record companies sound like a Mafia organisation or something that is going to try to break our legs should we buy something that isn't distributed by them. This is untrue. I am very thankful for record companies myself, as if they didn't exist, all of that great music that helped to form my teenage years (when I built the largest part of my music collection) wouldn't have gotten to me. You know....The Cure, The Smiths, Thomas Dolby, The tragically Hip, The Beatles. WOW thank god for record companies right? As a musician, I have watched a few of my friends go through the games associated with "trying to make it big". I know stories that would make you sick. Some of them just didn't make the buzz that the Label thought they would make, and dropped them. One or two female friends who were incredible singer/songwriters were offered really good deals for a price (if you know what I mean). Obviously, as in every big corporation, there is corruption in the record industry. As a whole it is a good way for people with the ambition and talent to seek the recognition that they think they deserve. Now, if you look at a single CD and how much the artist makes on one of them and how much the record company makes, it looks way lopsided. In most situations, these artists aren't putting any money into their project. I don't think the Back streets and the Madonnas and the Janet's and the Bushes are complaining are they? It is a shame that the public embraces the tripe of acts like Britney Spears as much as they do (IMHO) but they do, hence, they reap the rewards. Personally, If I decided to record and distribute my music. I don't believe that I would take it to a record company. I just don't have the interest in taking my music to the global fray. I would much rather distribute it to my immediate community, mainly because that who my songs are written for and about. When I do decide to distribute my tunes I can go to any # of independant distributors to help me get it out a little further than my back yard, or I can go to my own website and ship out my own mp3's ( http://www.geocities.com/folkie4/songs_for_Y2K.html ) I have no fears of misuse of my music. I have put them up for free with the assumption that people may do what they will with them. Maybe I could have put "Open-Art" as a tag there, but I didn't. Anyway my point is that Record Companies have their place. MP3 dealers have their place. MP3.com (IMHO) has overstepped their boundaries and in the end it will be the artist that suffers. Ian ------------------------------ End of alloy-digest V5 #20 **************************