Month / October, 2004

Thanks to The New, New Podcast Review

“The New, New Podcast Review”:http://podcastreviews.net/archives/2004/10/_podcast_review_1.html has reviewed the podcast and let me just say that I am chuffed to have been reviewed!

Podcast Review: Tracks Up The Tree

Format: Radio show
Content: Music and talk
Rating: 4 Stars
What I’m going to do: listen
Typical Length: varies; 30 – 40 minutes

Funtime Ben provides us with some really sweet music at Up The Tree. Out of all the music podcasts I’ve listened to, this is the first one that has played music that I universally liked, and that’s great! To top it all off, he’s trying to avoid a lawsuit, and he’s settled on a really interesting approach. He’s playing only music that can be downloaded form artists web-sites whole, with the logic that if the artists are making it available for download then it must be OK to repackage it. Seems logical to me, but then {I Am Not A Lawyer}. I hope he does well with it.

One thing he does that might be a concern is that he posts links to the music on the site, which would probably be OK – I mean he’s trying to get people to go to the artists’ sites and to give them credit. However he also links directly to the mp3 files, allowing the user to download them directly. Very convenient for his podience, but it places all of the bandwidth cost on the artist’s web-site with none of the benefits, and I can see why some folks might not appreciate that.

For the most part, Ben mixes up a good sound. He’s working out some details, but he’s got some decent intro and outro and has been playing with some underscoring, which is definitely good. His mix between music level and speech level could use a little work – I have to turn up his speech portions and then turn down the music when it comes on.

Ben has a lot of good stuff to say, but often rambles on and is a little repetitive – I think that’ll improve as he continues.

Many thanks to Kinrowan for spending his time and energy reviewing sites.

Kicking Monday in the Balls

p=. !http://www.upthetree.com/images/podcast.gif!:http://tracks.upthetree.com/TUTT-2004-10-25.mp3

Played on todays show:

# “It’s Not Safe”:http://www.gentlemanreg.com/html/releases.html – “Gentleman Reg”:http://www.gentlemanreg.com/ – Darby & Joan (Released Oct 23 2004 [“Three Gut Records”:http://www.threegutrecords.com])
# “Woman at the Well”:http://www.pastemusic.com/ – “Sufjan Stevens”:http://www.sufjan.com/ – “Paste Music”:http://www.pastemusic.com/
# “Straight Street”:http://www.roughtradeamerica.com/template.asp?PageID=AV – “The Fiery Furnaces”:http://www.thefieryfurnaces.com/ – Blueberry Boat
# “David Bowie I’ve loved you since I was six”:http://www.brianjonestownmassacre.com/mp3.php – “The Brian Jonestown Massacre”:http://www.brianjonestownmassacre.com/ – Take It from the Man!

Mentioned:

* “IKEA – Important Safety Information”:http://www.ikea-usa.com/
* “Free Rant Music”:http://www.freeplaymusic.com/
* “Upcoming.org”:http://upcoming.org/
* “MT-enclosures”:http://brandon.fuller.name/archives/hacks/mtenclosures/
* “Evil Genius Chronicles”:http://www.evilgeniuschronicles.org/
* “Jeff Buckley”:http://www.jeffbuckley.com/
* “Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan”:http://nusrat.com/

Mr. Dabolina and the RIAA

p=. !http://www.upthetree.com/images/podcast.gif!:http://tracks.upthetree.com/TUTT-2004-10-20.mp3

*On the Show:*

* “Logitech Premium USB Headset 300”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000095ISH/upthetree-20/
* “Public Domain Music 4U”:http://www.mp34u.com/
* “Cocaine”:http://www.mp34u.com/songCard.php?posting=1024&by=results
* “Mistadobalina”:http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?playlistId=148964&selectedItemId=148962 – Del Tha Funkee Homosapien – I Wish My Brother George Was Here
* “Tofu Hut”:http://tofuhut.blogspot.com/
* “The Shins”:http://www.darkcoupon.com/ play a song inspired by “Goose Stepping”:http://slate.msn.com/id/2077384/

Living the Vida Loca

Alright! Well we are now full swing into the podcasting thing her at Up the Tree with my new radio show Tracks Up the Tree. Although I have run into a few problems along the way, I am committed to making this thing work out. I am planning on a new show tonight with a new USB headset I bought to make my life easier.

However, there will be a few changes, namely the music. A few people, in a few circles, have commented about putting copywritten material in these Podcast. The consensus has been it is definitely not legal and does break copyright. This is a major blow to the show which strives to bring to your ears things you may not have heard before. I know you are probably saying “but Funtime Ben, aren’t you advertising for bands by playing their music?” or even “but Funtime Ben the quality of your recordings is below the quality file traders use, how could they lump you in with those people?”

The answer is, unless you are a lawyer and would like to defend me for free, this technology is so new that nobody knows how to classify it yet. Neither do I. As I will go into greater detail tonight, the format for this show will change, but hopefully I can bypass the RIAA thing with a little poetic license on _tracks._ We shall have to see.

The other good news is that my 2 Podcast episodes have been downloaded to the tune of 4 Gigs worth of bandwidth. which is very cool considering it’s only been up for a little over a week.

TUTT 2: Tough Columbus Monday

Today’s show comes live after a long day at work, even though it was a holiday. Go figure.

Music played:

  1. Television – Robyn Hitchcock – 6:22
  2. Bernie’s Tune – Curley Hamner & Milt Buckner – Ultra-Lounge – 5:05
  3. Teach Me Tiger – April Stevens – 2:23
  4. Sprout and the Bean – Joanna Newsom – The Milk-Eyed Mender – 4:33

TUTT 1: Ground Control To Major Tom

Without further ado, here is the first show (hopefully of many) of Tracks Up the Tree my podcast about music, technology, news, and meaningless banter.

I e-mailed Adam Curry to see if they want to use my little iPodder guy for the iPodder.org logo. FINGERS CROSSED!

On todays show:

Music played:

  1. Alive With Pleasure – Viva Voce – 4:31
  2. Bank – Midwest Product – World Series of Love – 4:36
  3. Une Année Sans Lumiere – The Arcade Fire – Funeral – 3:41
  4. Cherrystones – Eugene McDaniels – Outlaw – 3:06
  5. I’d Rather Dance With You (Radio Mix) – Kings of Convenience – I’d Rather Dance With You – EP – 3:28
  6. Cars Can’t – Wilco – Exclusive – 3:33
  7. Rebels Rule – Iron Virgin – Velvet Tinmine – 3:13
  8. Hold On, Slow Down, First Instant, Last Report – Earlimart – 4:07
  9. Twilight – Elliott Smith – From A Basement On The Hill – 4:29
  10. Chicken Payback – The Bees – Free The Bees – 3:14

ironvirgin.jpg

IRON VIRGIN!

Thanks for downloading me and keep on listening! And as always please feel free to tell me I’m full of shit.

Cabirdseat Oct is out!

Download your copy today and start your membership into the indie underground. As usual the mix is free and leaves nothing to be desired.

“Download it today!”:http://www.catbirdseat.org/catbirdseat/plist.html from “CatBirdSeat”:http://www.chapocahn.com/catbirdseat/ if you know what’s good for you.

SURPRISES
Who knew Erlimart would would be such a good band, albeit VERY similar to Elliott Smith. The only band I know here is The Arcade Fire who are amazing.

My reputation Precedes Me

IMG_1077.jpg

If you have been reading my site for a while, you might remember the switch from StudioM11 where my site was called Fun Time Tree House to this address UptheTree.com. This transition was an attempt to start over and discover anew what my site could become. This, as you may have concluded, was a crock of shit. The only person writing on this site is me, so if I move, my baggage moves too.

Last night, on freak chance, I came across an invite to the “Photobloggers2”:http://www.rion.nu/nyc2/ event that was happening at the Apple store down in SoHo. Photoblogging is one of the new forms blogging has taken in recent years, comprising people who post photographs instead of conventional text entries. I had been interested in the photolog format, but couldn’t keep the inertia of my own photolog together in order stay afloat.

The presentation was very interesting. I realized that photologers have three very different camps on photography there are:

* The Gear Heads – Technophiles and Dorks
* The Photographers – Can wax philosophical about a wide angle lens indefinitely
* The Snapshotters – People who couldn’t care less what camera they have as long as it takes pictures

The cross overs were really interesting, none more so than Eliot Shepard, who I pegged as a photographer who’s entire presentation was about the piece of software he wrote to handle his photographs. Eliot’s site “Slower.net”:http://slower.net is one of the few websites I check daily and consider him to be one of the most talented photographers in New York.

Later at the after party I approached Eliot and we spoke about his photographs and his presentation. I was completely floored. He was really friendly and opened up about his photography. It was then as I was saying goodnight, that he pulled over his now fiance “KDunk”:http://www.morethandonuts.blogspot.com/ and said

bq. “hey this guys from park slope too. what’s your site’s name?”
“up the tree?”
I could tell from their expressions that they had no idea about my site.
“I used to have a weblog called, ” I said “Fun Time Tree House.”
Both of their faces lit up.
“Funtime Ben! It is you.”

Now, I’m not saying that *Up the Tree* doesn’t rock, but I think it’s about damn time I put my leather jacket back on and revive my namesake Funtime Ben. Hell I called my site up the tree to reference my old site, I just never realized that the name had such clout!