Why pay some smug superstar DJ 5k to remix your track when you can crowd source something better for free? SoundCloud posted a super detailed explaination on how to do it using their pretty service. Sometimes I post things on Wire to the Ear solely so I can remember, find and use the info later… this is one of those posts.

“Your remix group will be where people submit their finished remixes. It’s quick, free and easy to create a group: add a logo, background info and let people know if you want the submissions to be downloadable or not.” – SoundCloud.com

To check out the full instructions click here: 5+1 Easy Steps To Set Up Your Remix Competition With SoundCloud

I’m on SoundCloud: soundcloud.com/thingstocome

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The 2010 NAMM (National Association of Music Merchants) starts today at the very large Anaheim Convention Center. It’s one of the largest shows of it’s kind only rivaled by Musikmesse. Noise nerd and gear junkies are going to hear about a lot of new tasty music equipment over the next few days.

“Despite severe regulations on the permissible noise level, sound level meters carried by NAMM personnel routinely exceed the 85 dBA maximum throughout most of the main exhibit hall, simply from the constant background noise.” – Wikipedia

Here’s some links to help you keep up with everything that’s going on:

The official NAMM homepage and Twitter feed:
http://www.namm.org/
http://twitter.com/namm

Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAMM

Coverage…

CreateDigitalMusic:
http://namm.noisepages.com/

SonicState:
http://www.sonicstate.com/news/shows.cfm?show=wnamm10

Harmony-Central:
http://namm.harmony-central.com/WNAMM10

When the smoke clears I will post my 2010 Wire to the Ear NAMM picks! Enjoy the show and let me know what you think is hot.

photo credit: annethelibrarian

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I took this photo near Madison Square Park yesterday while waiting for the bus home. I wonder if these advertisements actually work. I guess I should have pulled the paper up a bit to expose the contact info. In NYC there are often a groups of Hip Hop artists on corners that try and put their CDs in your hands. If you take one they follow you and ask for a few bucks for it. I think a better way to make money on the street is to actually play music and have a few things for sale on the spot. I remember seeing a story about a guy in LA who had some techno gear selling a few CDs an hour at $20 each. If your looking for some free hipster subway music in Brooklyn hang out in the Bedford Ave L train stop on Friday night. I do try and throw a buck into a guitar case every now and then.

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My boss at Energy Management Solutions never procrastinates. Anytime I think of an idea he hands me the phone and tells me to do it. I’ve never met anyone quite like that. I like to get things done but I’d say I do my share of fiddling and pondering. Sometimes when you sit down to make a song it’s way too easy to procrastinate. You have a playground of sounds and tools you can play with. Heck it all starts with a loop. A loop! Better stop listening to loops and get to the arrangement.

“Procrastination is making a cup of tea.” – John Kelly

via Laughing Squid

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BandCamp is a one of the nicer services musicians can use to sell their music. A clean interface, great PayPal integration and stats are all on the table. They have just released an update to the service which allows you to sell physical merchandise along with your digital download. The new best feature is the inventory tracking. Say you have 100 records to sell each time someone buys one the number drops. What has my thinking is all the left over stock I have of old releases. Fifty here, ten there, I can see BandCamp a good place to sell these. You can see a BandCamp page I set up for Arrivers (the first release on my record label released in 1996) here: http://arrivers.bandcamp.com/

“Starting today, you can sell both your physical merchandise and your digital music from Bandcamp, and better yet, you can sell them together. So, for example, you can easily create a vinyl, poster and download package, give your fans the digital files immediately, and then ship out their merchandise.” – blog.bandcamp.com

For more info: bandcamp.com

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Read above. I live by that and so should you. The price you accept is the price your worth. This is how you must price your work. Got it? Click the image to download a wallpaper so you remember.

via greyscalegorilla

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We all know Ikea furniture can be hacked into useful recording studio stands, etc.. The Ikea Jerker desk is one example. I’ve seen countless bedroom studios (especially in Europe) using the Jerker. Here’s a link to check out a “how to hack a Jerker for the studio”: How to Build A Studio Desk For Music Production.

If you need to turn a corner of a modern living room into a mini studio you may want to check out the Ikea Benno television stand. It features three tiers long enough for 36 keys, drum machines, jars of patch cords and has a cable hiding mechanism in the back. Benno is $69.99.

For more info: ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/30104478

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I use Google services all day. I live in Gmail and Google Docs. We all know the dark music search sites. You know the ones with a simple input box and lots of spammy adverts (SkreemR, Seeqpod, Songza, Wuzam, beeMP3). Those search sites led you to a place to download the song. Although less illegal “feeling” than say Napster or Limewire they served the same function. Google announced it will be finally be incorporating a proper music search and audio player into it’s regular search page. Yes we all know how to record whatever streams through our computer but I still buy music. I buy it because it’s right and also because it’s way more convenient. Partners in this new Google plan include imeem, lala, MySpace, Pandora, Rhapsody, EMI, Sony Music, Universal and Warner. Of course that won’t give us search access to every song in the world ever created but it’s a start. We still have our dark sites and forums to troll if needed.

“Our new music search feature makes it easy to find music. Just search for an artist, album, song or even a few lyrics to get song previews from our partners.” – Google

Will Google’s new initiative change the music buying landscape? Is this any competition to iTunes?

For more info: www.google.com/landing/music/

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I am pleased to let know that this weekend I moved Wire to the Ear from shared hosting at iPower to a Managed VPS (Virtual Private Server) at Wiredtree. The move will most certainly improve downtime especially when the site gets hit with high traffic. The next step will be to install WP Super Cache and improve performance. Thanks for being patient if you visited the site and it was down.

photo credit: torkildr

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I hate spam but I still want a good deal from time to time. I’ve created a few secret Twitter accounts where I follow topics I don’t want polluting my main Twitter account’s stream. One secret account is full of stores and affiliate link sites trying to sell stuff. Two examples are Woot (http://twitter.com/woot) and Amazon MP3 Deals (http://twitter.com/Amazonmp3). Today I realized the main U.S. music retailers all have Twitter accounts too. Sam Ash seems to be offering some interesting stuff via it’s Twitter site:

“Call 1-800-4SAMASH TODAY to receive a free set of Samson StudioDock 3i Studio Monitors with your purchase of over $299!!” – @samashdirect

I was hoping to find Analougehaven, NovaMusik, BigCityMusic or RobotSpeak but a quick search didn’t reveal any Twitter pages for them. If I am wrong let me know. Leave any other pro-audio shopping slash Twitter pages in the comments too please.

http://twitter.com/samashdirect
http://twitter.com/sweetwatersound
http://twitter.com/Guitarcenter

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