Musings

The How, What, and Why of HRC at the GRAMMYs

by hardrockchick [about 1 month, 6 days ago.]

I was sitting in my room at my parent’s house in Texas writing this review at about 2am when an email popped up from someone from the Recording Academy. She said she wanted to speak with me about my site and a program they are putting together for the 52nd Annual GRAMMYs. My thought: they want me to post about press releases or something.

I didn’t get home to SF until Monday, so I decided to call after work. That’s when I learned that somehow my little site had been not only discovered but selected among other rock blogs to be a community blogger for the rock genre for the GRAMMYs. This basically meant that I would write a 400 word piece in reaction to the nominations, then a 2009 recap for the genre, and then reactions to the winners. It’s not paid, but in exchange for doing this, I get a ticket to the GRAMMYs (travel not included). I was really humbled by this, and immediately said that I’d be happy to participate.

Let’s go ahead and get this part out of the way: don’t I realize that the GRAMMYs are out of touch and the awards don’t go to who deserves them, especially in the rock genre? Yes, I realize this. In my real life job, I work on a franchise that has a lot of nostalgic love for it, but currently struggles for relevancy. My job is to be the voice of the consumer, to try to massage the brand into something people will love again. So it was second nature for me to come on board for a program that was built around an effort to make the GRAMMYs more relevant. I was to be the voice of the rock and metal fan on GRAMMY.com, and I couldn’t be happier about that.

However, this essentially meant that I had to put some of my rock ‘cred’ on the line. Not that I have a big following or anything, but as soon as I started mentioning working with the GRAMMYs, I felt a bit of a backlash. ‘Don’t you know the grammies suck’…’ugh nickelback’…..’U2 blah’…etc., etc. I’m a diplomatic person. I can deal with it. On the other hand, people in my life who always ignored what I do took a sudden interest in my site. It was really interesting that once I got ‘recognized’ by the GRAMMYs that suddenly I wasn’t screwing around going to concerts…I was a writer.

Soon after I initially agreed to do this, I was approached about covering the Alternative genre as well. No problem- I’m the girl who blips Behemoth and Depeche Mode within an hour of each other. A little while later, I got an email about the possibility of attending another event before the GRAMMYs, where the honoree for Person of the Year would be Neil Young. The press release had what felt like 100 amazing musicians on the list to attend. Of course I’ll come down early for that! Then there started to be mumblings of other stuff that might happen, one thing being a little bit of camera work for the GRAMMY site since the person working on it ‘liked my look’. I would basically be on the red carpet and might comment about rock related things I see. No problem. I believe it was during this conversation that I was told of the hesitation to have me be the rock blogger because of my ‘edgy’ content…..yes, I say the F word a lot and I have a hankerin’ for the devil’s music.

As I wrote my nominations pieces, and my year in review pieces (Alternative was HARD), my opportunities with this project were growing. I still wasn’t sure if everything was really going to happen, but I figured that it would be an interesting way to potentially grow my readership, a networking opportunity, and a nice bullet point for the resume.

It’s Sunday before the GRAMMYs. I’ve now decided to take two days off work (one full day and two half days to be precise- I worked Thursday morning before leaving and then Monday afternoon when I returned), I would be paying for four nights of hotel, but would be at several different events that I would never be able to get into on my own. I got a note to please call about some more opportunities. This is when that little bit of camera work potentially became a substantial amount as they needed an extra person to help them do interviews on the red carpet before the GRAMMYs. I said I was willing to do it. When someone gives me an opportunity like that, I always think about how I would feel if I didn’t do it first. I couldn’t pass it up. Plus, I love doing interviews.

There was a point last summer when it was suggested to me that I should start doing more video on my site. I looked at Metal Sanaz or Full Metal Jackie as an example. Normally I can’t shoot video at my interviews because I’m a solo operation. This would be my chance to explore that area more.

Well this led to calls from the director, who was definitely vetting me for the role, looking at a youtube interview I’d done and asking me about my comfort level in front of the camera. I’m fine in front of a camera, I have interview experience, I know my rock stuff- I felt good about it. This evolved into them wanting me to fly down earlier (which I couldn’t) and extended my role to 5 hours on the red carpet and then a quick introduction of my ‘character’ on Friday before the afternoon event. My character? OK…

By the time I got to the production meeting on Thursday when I arrived, I started to fully understand what was happening. GRAMMY Live wasn’t just an occasional clip posted on the site, they were streaming live content starting Friday afternoon and pretty much going nonstop until Sunday night. What I had positioned in my mind as an interviewer role was really a co-host role; I would be working with a professional vlogger and a semi-professional vlogger who works for the Recording Academy. So I’m in a control room, being given extra batteries for my phone, which would be dialed into a conference line and I’d have an earbud in my ear telling me when we were live, and then I’d also have a phone videocamera with a mic running down my arm. Somehow roaming phone videocamera work was added to my responsibilities on Friday evening and Saturday.

Suddenly I’m overwhelmed. I think I’ve overpromised myself, misrepresented myself, and the pressure was intense. ‘This is your chance to be a star’. I don’t want to be a star….I just want to write cool stuff and interview cool people. I’m starting to freak out, but I get an email with a list of people I’m scheduled to interview on Sunday- Phoenix, Kings on Leon, Green Day, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Jay-Z????….and then I get another email saying Jared Leto is going to be at the Social Media Rock Star Summit on Friday. On one hand I’m fearing screwing up on camera, letting people down, and generally feeling uneasy; but on the other, I would love to talk to these people and I can tell this is an opportunity of a lifetime! I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so torn. But I rolled with it.

Friday wasn’t exactly a disaster, but I don’t think I have a future in TV. The two hosts with experience took over, and I was just the little third wheel that occasionally chimed in. I forgot that hosts are supposed to repeat things and keep it light….I just like to think in facts and questions. The streaming tech wasn’t working, I couldn’t tell when we were live or not, communication between the control room and my conference line earbud thing was lacking, and it was just pretty chaotic. It ended up that I didn’t get to interview any of the social media people because the professional got to them first.

I didn’t feel too good about it when I left, and it didn’t help when I got an email saying ‘we’ll be in touch’ about my participation the rest of the weekend while covering the Person of the Year event. This led to a martini in the hotel bar and making some unsuspecting stranger my therapist for an hour.

So in the span of 5 days, I went from fly on the wall observer during GRAMMY week, to co-host of GRAMMY live, back to fly on the wall community blogger. It was an interesting rollercoaster ride that ultimately worked out. Plus, I found out on Sunday that my change in participation was due to some other extraneous factors (maybe they were just being nice).

Upon my return, people asked me if I had fun and who I met. I felt like I let people down when I told them I didn’t really meet anyone, and I’m not sure I would describe it as fun. However, I wouldn’t change a single thing about my experience. To me, fun is a great show by a band I love in one of my local venues with my friends. I knew this wouldn’t be like that. This was a learning experience, an opportunity to be at events in conjunction with music’s biggest night that I would never be able to get into on my own.

What effect has this had on HRC? Only time will tell- I’ve seen a little bump in traffic and a good increase of new followers on twitter and fans on facebook. But really that $1000 I spent traveling for GRAMMY week got me an experience that I won’t ever forget. I was part of a social media experiment that may have had some impact on the ratings increase the GRAMMYs saw this year. And the ultimate test of any experience is to ask myself if I would do it again. The answer is yes.

GRAMMY swag:

HRC’s GRAMMY Posts:
Reactions to the Rock Nominations
Reactions to the Alternative Nominations
It Was a Rockin’ 2009
2009 in Alt-Rock
Cue the Music
Social Media Rock Star Summit
Person of the Year
Special Merit Awards
Pre-Tel GRAMMY Awards
The 52nd Annual GRAMMY Awards
Reactions to Rock Winners
Reactions to Alternative Winner

Genre(s): GRAMMY rock/metal/alternative community blogger pieces, Musings

3431Comments (0)2010-02-07+00%3A17%3A24hardrockchick

Contemporary Live Music Photography

by hardrockchick [about 2 months, 26 days ago.]

‘A picture’s worth a thousand words’.

As a writer, this phrase always makes me a little sad…..but it is often true. Think of some of the iconic live shots of bands. They always convey not only the moment, but the personality of the band, and even the sentiment of the era.

The way that concert photography occurs nowadays both excites and upsets me.

For the professionals- meaning those in the photo pits with passes and fancy cameras- the experience often seems overwrought with rules. After having a few photo passes under my belt, even with my low end point and shoot, I can tell you that the three song limit that most bands have is highly unfortunate. In fact, when I’m in the crowd, I often won’t even start taking pictures until the photo pit is cleared. Everyone ends up with similar pictures, and all of those pictures are of the band in the same squeaky clean positions. When the pit is cleared is when most of the real magic starts to happen. The band has a sheen of sweat by then, and they’ve gotten a feel for the crowd. The photographers miss the middle, the end, and the encore. That’s a lot of moments left uncaptured.

But it’s the fan photography that I am even more torn about. Everyone has a digital camera and a camera phone. And I certainly take pictures for my site, and twitpics with my phone. But there needs to be limits. I am always mindful of my camera- I take a picture, then put it away, then maybe take another, and put it away again. But many concert goers have turned into the paparazzi. The crowds have become a sea of cameras; musicians are now staring at cell phones more than fan’s smiling faces. And sometimes as a fan I have to stare through someone’s camera to see the show. And the quality of the majority of content produced by this- on flickr, youtube, and the like- is really low quality. Bad audio, blurry pictures….it’s really quite unflattering. However, if it were between this and nothing….I’d take the low quality ones. When I miss a show or am researching a band, and can’t find anything on them, it’s heartbreaking! When the NIN/JA tour started earlier this year, I ‘watched’ part of the first show via someone’s cell phone videos in real time- a blurry piece of crap with extremely distorted audio that made me so excited it’s not even funny.

What would happen in an ideal world? I’m not really sure, but it seems like things could use a little change. Discuss amongst yourselves.

Other opinions:

Lefsetz- Empowering the Audience

Music Industry Bows to Point and Shoot Cameras

Genre(s): Musings

2819Comments (0)Contemporary+Live+Music+Photography2009-12-18+08%3A10%3A31hardrockchick

HRC’s Musings: Coming Soon

by hardrockchick [about 5 months, 21 days ago.]

Quite a few people have asked me what I’m going to do now that the NIN shows are over.

The immediate answer is ‘I don’t have a clue’. A lot of HRC’s real estate went to NIN news and shows. It feels sad all on its own, and it makes me sadder when people feel sad for me for ‘my loss’. Which in the scheme of life, isn’t a big deal; but when you’re trying to make it as a writer and your muse checks out, it kinda is.

So, what can you expect to fill the gaping hole that NIN has left in HRC?

There are other bands to follow. From my experiences following NIN, Manson, The Faint, and the Mayhem Fest, I’ve determined a plan of action for tours that I love. In research geek speak, it’s a ‘longitudinal study’, where the reviews will check in at the beginning, middle, and end of the tour. There’s something about those first couple shows, where everything is new and the kinks are being worked out; to the middle, where their rhythm has been hit and they are in the thick of it; to the end, where they are exhausted, sentimental, and laying it all on the line.

I will be doing this with the Mastoklok (Mastodon / Dethklok) tour starting next week in Portland, picking back up in Texas in November, and then the end back in California. I’m doing a couple Rob Zombie dates. Other bands that I will be following in the near future are Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Tool (well, hopefully), and Behemoth. I’m also hoping to do some international travel around a tour, to check out how things work in other parts of the world.

It’s interesting to follow a band other than NIN- there are little to no communities for most bands. It makes it tricky to travel around as a single girl , attending shows by myself in foreign venues. That’s one of the things I’ll miss most about my NIN shows. Even if I didn’t like some of the NIN fans, at least I knew them….

I’m also going to be working on writing pieces regarding several topics that keep bouncing around in my head. These may or may not include:

-Tour do’s and don’ts from a fan’s perspective
-Twitter and musicians
-The groupie vs. the band-aide vs. the fan debate
-Band merch…what’s missing.
-Music blogging….so what
-Live music photography- the pros vs. the amateurs
-The venue can make it or break it
-MySpace isn’t dead
-The virtual groupie
-Side projects
-Music memorabilia
-The X Factor: what exactly is it?
-YouTube and concert footage: the good and the bad

I’m also trying to figure out how I want to approach interviews in the future, as well as a few ways to grow HRC by partnering with some other sites.

To be continued….

Genre(s): Musings

2800Comments (2)HRC%27s+Musings%3A+Coming+Soon2009-09-24+18%3A30%3A22hardrockchick

The Actor turned Musician…another look

by hardrockchick [about 1 year, 1 month ago.]

I’ve blogged about this before…and now there’s a whole new breed of mostly WTF actors trying to be singers.

So we’ll start with a good one- I was sent this youtube link, and the PR person never even name dropped who it is- so I watched it and was like, “isn’t that the guy from The Notebook?”

Dead Man’s Bones/Ryan Gosling

Different….unexpected. They call it ‘Indie Goth Rock’.

And then here is the big bad what-is-he-thinking: Joaquin Phoenix. We loved you as Johnny Cash, in Gladiator, even in Parenthood! Why are you doing this? I really hope this is some form of method acting…

Announcing his retirement from acting:

And now he’s trying to do hip hop (and falling off stage)?

This must be for a some kind of mockumentary. Please.

And I would be amiss if I didn’t mention current stalker bait, Edward Cullen…er, Robert Pattinson, and his foray into singer/songwriterdom. If he puts out a record, it’ll sell like hotcakes and raise a whole generation of girls with dubious musical taste (albeit, better than Britney).

And lest I forget Scarlett Johansson’s mind boggling album of Tom Waits covers.

Well, who knows- maybe if I were a successful actress, I would go partially mad and record an album of NIN covers. ROFL.

Genre(s): Musings, Rockin' Videos

1503Comments (0)2009-01-20+06%3A02%3A03hardrockchick

Is it 1988 all over again?

by hardrockchick [about 1 year, 5 months ago.]

1988: NKOTB releases Hangin’ Tough

2008: NKOTB releases The Block. Seriously.

1988: AC/DC releases Blow Up Your Radio

2008: AC/DC releases Black Ice

1988: Metallica releases …And Justice For All

2008: Metallica releases Death Magnetic

1988: Guns ‘n Roses releases Lies

2008: Gun ‘n Roses releases Chinese Democracy

Yes, just like Black Ice will be a Walmart exclusive, Chinese Democracy is ‘almost real enough it’s not a rumor’ scheduled to be released on November 25th exclusively at Best Buy. Welcome to the new marketing scheme aimed towards bands popular before the digital age- store exclusives. Whoop-di-do.

I’m not going to hold my breath, but it just might be real this time. Especially with the Rock Band exclusive, and that blogger who got arrested, I guess I should get ready for my first Dr. Pepper in 10 years.

Genre(s): Musings

1092Comments (0)Is+it+1988+all+over+again%3F2008-10-15+05%3A08%3A12hardrockchick

The San Francisco Music Scene

by hardrockchick [about 1 year, 5 months ago.]

SF Weekly recently posted an article about the neo-psych/rock scene in SF. But, really, the article makes the point that I often make: SF lacks a scene.

I go to a lot of shows. Like, a whole lot. And the genres I cover fall mostly under the rock umbrella. But there is no place I can go where everybody knows my name. Granted, I do have the unique ability to blend into the crowd, but if I have a 3 show week, all rock bands, I can easily be at Bottom of the Hill, then Great American Music Hall, and then The Fillmore. There’s no go-to place, no bouncer nod, no bartender-doesn’t-need-to-ask-what-my-drink-is-anymore business. I can’t decide on a random night when I don’t have plans that I can go to Slim’s and see a good rock band. They have as many metal shows as punk shows as hip hop. There isn’t a common thread. And, no, hipster does not count, Rickshaw Stop.

Another reason the city lacks a scene is that there are no starving artists in San Francisco. It just can’t happen. It’s too expensive for an up and coming band to make it living in this city. They have to move overseas to East Bay, which has it’s own crop of clubs, not to mention a nearby college town. So either the band has to hold down normal day jobs (total creativity kill), or they have to tack on a trust fund baby member as a sugar daddy (how uninspiring). A struggling artist often breeds a brilliant artist…you’ve heard the Cinderella stories.

The residency issue that the SF Weekly article brings up is also a good point. Out of town bands often come and plop down at The Fillmore for a stint of shows. Rarely do any local bands do this. It’s like the city is afraid to promote its own bands too much, for fear of overshadowing the touring acts. I don’t understand what the whole diversification is doing for our venues. Do they really believe that we only go to the one that is closest to where we live or something? Like I wouldn’t go drive across town to Bimbo’s to see Honeycut, so let’s put them at Bottom of the Hill next week so that I’ll be able to go. I think it actually would lend to the band’s credibility if they could consistently play a venue that supported a genre. Perhaps I just always dreamed of having a Pamela Des Barres at The Whiskey thing, or like Legs McNeil at CBGB’s. I aim high.

Don’t get me wrong, we get great live music here. If we didn’t, HardRockChick wouldn’t exist and you’d all be so sad. But it always feels like it’s missing something.

Genre(s): Musings

1080Comments (3)The+San+Francisco+Music+Scene2008-10-14+08%3A08%3A54hardrockchick

Is rock music losing its cool?

by hardrockchick [about 1 year, 6 months ago.]

Hannah Montana leads a double life- where she is a ‘rock star’ in one of them. Millions of preteen girls declare their desire to be rock stars while listening to Hannah Montana’s incredibly poppy tunes.

The Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame 2008 inductees include Madonna to keep company with the likes of Van Halen, The Doors and Jimi Hendrix. Several dead rock stars roll over in their graves.

Mosh pits form at every concert from Slayer (real) to Justice (kind of uncalled for). Let’s not even talk about throwing devil horns at Jack Johnson.

And Rolling Stone frequently puts people like Britney on their covers. Ugh.

Is rock music losing its cool? Yeah, it is. Rock has been bastardized to the generic levels of Kleenex, Rollerblades, and Ziploc bags. This is why I have to be the Hard Rock Chick instead of just a rock chick.

And the most unexpected thing might save the term- videogames. Rock Band and Guitar Hero, whose track lists include mostly real rock music, have entered the homes of millions of uneducated individuals, teaching them what rock is with every button push.

Long live headbanging.

Genre(s): Musings

871Comments (0)Is+rock+music+losing+its+cool%3F2008-08-31+22%3A02%3A12hardrockchick

What if you can’t remember the best show you ever went to?

by hardrockchick [about 1 year, 6 months ago.]

I was a not so sweet 16 years old. It was summer in Texas, and somehow, my parents agreed to let me go see White Zombie and Pantera. Hell, they even bought me general admission tickets since I didn’t have a credit card. I honestly don’t know how I finagled this, as my attempts to see NIN and Manson were thwarted at around the same time. Perhaps it’s because Pantera was from Dallas, and Rob Zombie wears a cowboy hat.

My best friend and I went on a random weekday evening, with some of the ‘hottest’ guys from our small town in tow. We drove an hour plus to San Antonio, to a dingy venue called Freeman Coliseum.

I remember that the opening band was called Eye Hate God. Then I’m pretty sure it went White Zombie, then Pantera. I’m pretty sure I was standing in the middle of the floor, getting jostled around by the mosh pit while my crazy girlfriend kept getting in the thick of it. I’m pretty sure they played ‘Thunder Kiss ‘65′. I’m pretty sure I fell in lust with the guitarist, and I know I got my first guitar pick out of it (it is pink). I’m pretty sure that I thought Sean was the coolest chick in the world. I’m pretty sure my guy friends were crowd surfing and kept having to walk around to where I was when they were pulled over the barrier. I’m pretty sure that Pantera was awesome, but I think the only song I remember was ‘Planet Caravan‘, and that’s not good. I definitely don’t remember Dimebag, and that makes me sad.

How can one of the most important shows I ever saw also be one I barely remember? The one that set the tone for my constant quest for the next best show…the one that made me realize that perhaps I didn’t want to be in the band, but rather with the band…the one that whet my appetite for collecting concert memorabilia?

Ludicrous.

I’d blame it on age, but this still happens to me. Seeing Trent Reznor at Bridge School or Manson at The Warfield are blurs of bliss that I somehow managed to write about. But to really remember what it was like, I cannot. Perhaps one really goes into a zone, on another plane in the brain that becomes inaccessible once the event is over. Or maybe I drank too much.

The point is, I maybe not remember every detail, but I’ll never forget that I was there.

Genre(s): Musings

829Comments (0)2008-08-19+03%3A58%3A11hardrockchick

Where have all the posters gone?

by hardrockchick [about 1 year, 12 months ago.]

Ummm…hellloooo?!?!?!? Where’s my poster? I’m paying more for tickets, dammit.

Imagine my surprise when, a few weeks into living here, I go to The Fillmore, and on the way out they give me a poster. Then I remember all of this great poster art that I have seen over the years coming from The Fillmore, Warfield, and Winterland, never realizing that it was free.

And then they kept giving and giving and now they take it away. That’s it- the absence of my free posters signals that the economy is definitely in trouble.

Genre(s): Musings

554Comments (0)Where+have+all+the+posters+gone%3F2008-03-19+05%3A56%3A17hardrockchick