And for theatre too

So, you know, we spend most of our time around here making fun sounds and mixes for all sorts of broadcast places. Web, TV, Film, Radio, and on and on, but every so often we get to break out and have some fun on things that will play back in interesting places. There's been plenty of crazy museums and even a traveling bus of shoe oddities, and now one such project had us making sounds of unknown demon type things for a local play by Sean McGrath. Rumor has it we scared the audience pretty good. Thanks Sean.

NIGHTFALL from Sean McGrath on Vimeo.

U2 360: I bought a ticket...

And was really expecting some form of a retirement tour. One last go around the park. High-fives, and some reminiscing about the good ol' times. That may be true, this might be their last tour. Honestly though, I felt great about paying the money to see the Irish blokes one last time. They are sort of a national treasure of rock music, and I jumped at the opportunity to go, fearing it may be my last. About a month before the date, news came that the show was postponed indefinitely on account that the lead singer hurt his back. "Of course", I thought. I should of went last tour, they have gotten old and too banged up. Thats that. Now, fast forward a whole year. The show was back on!

I hadn't done any research, nor read any reviews. I barely skipped over the greatest hits on the drive up. Even if I had, nothing could have prepared me for what I was about to experience. I took my seat and immediately thought two things. First, "Right this is a stadium tour". The second, "WTF is this alien looking stage in the middle of the stadium?" I'm old enough now that a fair amount of skepticism accompanies me wherever I go. Unfortunately, even on a beautiful Saturday evening about to hear some great music with a cold beer in my hand. By the bottom of that beer, the stress of getting there, and the claustrophobia of the droves of people sitting around me had wore off. Twilight had set in over the stadium and the band took the stage. I honestly felt relieved when I saw that Bono wasn't rolled out in a wheel-chair. Quite the contrary.

Over the next three hours, the spectacle before me reached out, grabbed my hand and pulled me through an experience like no other. The U2 360 tour isn't just the marque summer rock show of our time, its an experience that compresses the last quarter century of your life into one evening. As with their music, the live show has the ability of connecting to its audience on a person by person basis, even in a stadium packed to capacity. The technology you experience has no reference. Even Steve Jobs would say, "Whoa, did u see that?!". The music was performed flawlessly, with vigor and undulating passion. It felt as if they were a budding garage band trying to fight for the audience's heart one song at a time. And as always with U2, the message is positive and profound. It may have been the massive laser beam that shot out from the middle of the stage straight up into the night sky during "Where the Streets Have no Name", or the masses, all singing in unison and channeling some positive memory to that place at that time, but the vibe is inexplicably exalting. You feel awake, alive and connected. The U2 360 tour has an almost medicinal quality where you're soul feels heeled and restored. This was apparent as me and over sixty four thousand smiling people calmly and cooperatively left a single location that night to return to our families, homes, and lives… Ya, I think Bono's sunglasses are lame too, but you know, U2 are trying to make a difference and for that I say, "Good on ya."

Here Comes Joey!

Had the pleasure of working with the very talented Jelly Helm Studio on the "Here Comes Joey" video earlier this month. The Timbers asked Mr. Helm and co. to help create an opening video that would kick off their inaugural game at the newly renovated Jeldwin Park in downtown Portland on April 14th. With the help of Reed Harkness and Sarah Marcus from Grow Film Company, music by Mathew Carey and sound design help from yours truly, the video helped motivate the crowd and inspire the Timbers to a 4-2 win over the Chicago Fire! All in a torrential down pour, the entire game… My voice hasn't come back and my socks haven't dried yet! This is just another highlight from a stunning campaign for the Timbers and an all around great thing for the Rose City.

Portland Timbers - Here Comes Joey from Grow Film Company on Vimeo.

Clouds Over America

And, its about time! This month's unavailing of Amazon's "cloud-drive" is um, like kind of ah big deal. I for one am intrigued by the idea of keeping all of my media on one centralized server, that I can accessed from any device. Neat idea, however will all of America feel the same way? Americans like to own their media. They like to hold it, covet it, hang it up on their walls, facebook walls that is. This will again, be asking a lot of the boys and girls of America. However, when the fine people at Apple, Amazon, Target, etc. asked America, "hey, we'd like to sell you the same music you already own, at a much lower fidelity but you can have it really fast and on a different device. What say you?" America said, "duh, of course". So, who knows maybe this will take…

The boys and girls of Europe have embraced the cloud for a while now. Spotify has seen some use while progressive, dubious, self-promoting artist like Ash have even used the service for exclusive releases… Nothing new really. I guess I'm curious as to how Amazon beat Apple to the punch. Apple has acquired music streaming service Lala, as of early Dec 2010, so maybe they do have something up their sleeve after all. Apple with something up their sleeve!? Shocking (sarcasm). I guess I just want someone to figure all this out, make it easy for me. And when they say, "hey, we made it easier for you to get the music you already own. Its slightly less fidelity and it will cost you even more cheddar". I'll probably say, "duh, its about time".

Mmmmm the smell of solder...

Know that if you bad mouth our talkback mics we'll, well, upgrade them. Yup, the beloved D-104s have all been fancied up. Now the talent will clearly hear that joy in your voice as you ask for take 74 and you'll have a new fancy LED letting you know that you still have the button pushed while you wonder aloud if maybe you should have cast a woman rather than this man.

Long live the D-104.

More work done on The Regular Show

We had the pleasure of working on a couple of episodes of The Regular Show for J.G.Quintel and Cartoon Network, including this episode "Benson be gone". After one calamity too many at the park, Benson is demoted to work alongside Mordecai and Rigby. After he gets a taste of the duo's lifestyle, he too becomes a slacker and promptly gets fired. But when his substitute (Susan) turns out to be a demonic harridan Monster on making perfect duplicates of the other workers, it's up to Benson to save the day.

Mustafa impressed with our phones

Last week, Old Spice spokesbeef Isaiah Mustafa announced that a super fan, chosen presumably for his or her social media influence and/or flair, would gain exclusive access to the new Old Spice ad ahead of its public launch. On Thursday, Old Spice and the Wieden team selected Chris Gatewood, aka @chrisscross as super fan.

Gatewood received this phone call from Mustafa.

Gatewood has already released a sneak peekand is expected to release the full spot... soon.