Dickies is looking for eight of the best unsigned/independent bands in the country to compete in their inaugural Battle of the Bands. This monumental event will be held outdoors on Friday≈arch 20, 2009 at The Compound from 1-6pm in Austin, TX during SxSW. Submissions will be accepted via the Dickies Battle of the Bands website (http://dickiesupstart.com/) or by mail.

To qualify to compete for the $10,000 grand prize, all submissions must include an entry form, a photo of the band, and a 60-second video clip of the band playing original material. Runners-up will also be rewarded handsomely with Dickies gear.

Entries will be subject to careful review by a select panel of celebrity judges in the music industry, and only 8 bands will be hand picked for the final competition.

Deadline for submissions is February 23, 2009 11:59pm EST. Bands chosen to compete will be announced March 2, 2009 on http://dickiesupstart.com.

This could be your chance to share the stage with other talented, emerging bands while fighting for the $10,000 prize. Send your submissions now!

About Dickies
Founded in 1922, Dickies has worked its way up to become the largest work wear manufacturer in the world. Every Dickies garment, from work pants and work shirts to denim jeans, women’s work wear and kids’ school wear, stands for the quality, toughness, and pride that embodies the spirit of the American worker-traits mirrored in the rugged lifestyle that any independent / unsigned artist endures while grinding away to share their music with the masses.

The Dickies name has been built on strength and durability, qualities most bands will need as today’s music business becomes more of a struggle than ever. Don’t miss your chance to come out on top-enter the Battle of the Bands now!

LONDON, 27 January 2009, fring™ today announced the launch of the Last.fm music radio add-on, the first in a new series of groundbreaking developments designed to enable friends to share experiences, connect and enhance their communities together on fring’s award-winning mobile community and communication platform.

Millions of fringsters will now be able to launch fring’s specially mobile-optimised version of Last.fm inside the fring client, enabling them to tune and listen to streamed music radio channels, including their own Last.fm library, tag favourites or ban disliked tracks, view album artwork and take their Last.fm music account mobile.

But the real magic lies in fring’s ability to mash it’s existing social and communication capabilities into the Last.fm music experience; friends are able to view in real-time what each other are currently listening to, via a dynamic, media-rich friends list embedded into the Last.fm add-on. They can share the music experience together and connect with each other via fring’s inherent communication services such as instant messaging chat via Skype®, MSN® Messenger, GoogleTalk TM, Yahoo!TM, AIM® and ICQ®, from inside the Last.fm add-on experience.

And, in common with fring’s core functionality, the Last.fm add-on is able to run in the background, continuously serving new music tracks from Last.fm’s service and sensing changes in both the listening and presence status of friends to provide rich, real-time info and displays about your Last.fm community.

Commenting on the launch, Avi Shechter, fring co-founder & CEO said: “The launch of the Last.fm add-on from fring achieves several important goals. Firstly, it provides our users a rich, dynamic and compelling mobile internet experience, in this case based on music, and the opportunity for friends to share it in real-time with their friends. And secondly it represents the next stage in fring’s planned evolution – a centre of gravity shift from simply aggregating and providing mobile internet communication tools, towards providing a platform for friends to enjoy rich and dynamic mobile experiences together, with tools such as voice and instant messaging being just one part of the story.

“By combining Community, Experience and Communication in one unified offering, applied to a range of user interests, we are providing a compelling case for mobile internet in general and creating the potential for turning the mobile into the ultimate social device, capable of offering unique benefits, beyond what is even possible in the fixed PC environment.”

Based on this principle and fring’s belief in openness, fring’s API, released last year and available at http://developers.fring.com, provides the tools for any third party developer to create an add-on of its own.

The Last.fm add-on is the newest in a range of fring Experience projects currently in development, which include a number of third party-branded add-ons which will be brought to market during 2009.

It is the Grammy time of the year and VIBE magazine wants to help the association become versed with the aesthetic habits of younger hip-hop fans. Hip-hop first declared that the Grammys were out of touch back in 1989 when Will Smith, LL Cool J, and Salt N Pepa boycotted the show. After the creative and commercial breakthroughs of Slick Rick, MC Lyte, Big Daddy Kane, LL Cool J and Run DMC among others the show refused to include rap during the live telecast. And hip-hop has not been the only genre to criticize the awards show that started in 1958. Bono said when he was younger he called it “The Grannys” and writers have complained over the years about the best new artist picks and the scant recognition for jazz. Herbie Hancock’ s Grammy for River: The Joni Letters last year was the first time a jazz album won album of the year since 1964 when Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto earned the accolade for their Getz/Gilberto project. Jay-Z only recently started attending the ceremony and Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails industrial fame believes the Grammys only exist for self-validation. The independently successful rouge painted rap mavericks Insane Clown Posse told an interviewer that they could not buy a ticket from The Temptations to go to the show because their success undermines Grammy authority. VIBE magazine knew there was a divergence between what the fans wanted and the way The Recording Academy voted.
Ongoing online polls at Vibeverses.com and the readers’ responses to the main site and the print magazine revealed much different musical concerns than the academy’s choices. Their response to the arbitrary appraisals of hip-hop sparked the creation of the Vammys. Urban music fans can go the site and vote for the Best Mixtape DJ and Best Hook artist and enter a sweepstakes for prizes. Music editor Sean Fennessey wrote an article about the new poll for the February issue of VIBE with Kanye West on the cover. He answered a few questions about the Vammys but it is the readers’ reactions to the ballot that will be the most illuminating about the relationship between a large contingent of hip-hop fans and an institution that has been criticized for using outmoded methods to find the real stars.

How are Vibe readers different from the Grammy voters?

VIBE readers by definition are younger and more plugged into youth culture than most Grammy voters. The industry has a way of making people cynical but the unencumbered can go on instinct and respond to the music that soundtracks their life.

Will the Vammys help to make the Grammys more credible or do you think the Vammys will need to become its own entity?

I think it’s merely an alternative, a slight nudge. The Grammys are a historic institution and VIBE certainly respects that.

What do the Grammys need to do to become more relevant?

It’s merely a matter of paying more attention and examining young people’s taste a bit. Pop music has always been the den of the young and the Grammys should keep that in mind.

Vote Here

Do law and art mix?
What does stealing sound like?
Can you own a sound?

Announcing the Documentary Trailer Debut of COPYRIGHT CRIMINALS: click here to view

Filmmakers Benjamin Franzen and Kembrew McLeod proudly announce the debut of the trailer for Copyright Criminals: This Is a Sampling Sport, a new documentary about digital sampling’s head-on collision with copyright law.

This trailer debut will be followed by a national screening tour of cities, college campuses, and film festivals beginning in Spring 2009 and continuing through 2010.

Visit copyrightcriminals.com for screening dates (to be announced), locations, and to watch the trailer now.

Copyright Criminals features many of Hip Hop music’s celebrated figures — including Public Enemy, De La Soul, the Beastie Boys, and Digital Underground — as well as emerging artists from record labels Definitive Jux, Rhymesayers, Ninja Tune, and more. The documentary also provides an in-depth look at artists who have been sampled, such as James Brown’s former drummer Clyde Stubblefield, as well as commentary by another highly sampled musician, Funk legend George Clinton.

As artists find ever more inventive ways to insert old influences into new material, this documentary asks a critical question, on behalf of an entire creative community:
Can you own a sound?

Featuring:

Harry Allen
Matt Black
Jeff Chang
Chuck D
George Clinton
De La Soul
DJ Qbert
DJ Spooky
Eclectic Method
El-P
Eyedea & Abilities
Sage Francis
Bobbito Garcia
Miho Hatori
Mark Hosler
Don Joyce
Matmos
Richard McGuire
Mix Master Mike
Mr. Len
Pam the Funkstress
Prefuse 73
RJD2
Aesop Rock
Pete Rock
Scanner
Shock G
Hank Shocklee
Clyde Stubblefield
Saul Williams

For more information:

copyrightcriminals.com

facebook.com

email:
info@copyrightcriminals.com