If you’ve ever purchased one of those musician instructional videos you’ll find the latest DVD from SNL cast member Fred Armison especially hilarious.

One of the most memorable shows of my musical career was playing the Fillmore auditorium in San Francisco. I was playing with The Strangers at the time and we were just popular enough to land the middle slot between Spike 1000 and the Mother Hips. The show took place during the first week of the venue’s grand re-opening and the show was meant to symbolize the Fillmore’s commitment to up and coming Bay Area talent. The reason I’m posting this is because someone let me know that the concert poster is selling for $48 on Wolfgang’s Vault.

If you were an underage New Wave fan living in the Northwest during the early 1980’s chances are you caught Theater of Sheep at the Starry Night, Satyricon or even a school dance. While the band never broke nationally they ended up being an influence on the emerging Seattle grunge scene (their music can be heard in the documentary Kurt & Courtney) and an important part of Portland’s music history. After all these years they finally released a compilation album which is available via their MySpace page.

Initially I was depressed about Monday’s FCC ruling to allow mega-media companies to own even more media properties. But after thinking about it for a moment I realize that this is just another nail in the coffin for mainstream media. The more things consolidate the more power underground outlets will have to be an alternate point of view. Still…I have a hard time seeing how the FCC could let this happen.

Originally posted on CMJ:

FCC Overturns Cross-Ownership Ban
2007-12-18 16:38:42.687,
Story by: Rachael Darmanin
Earlier today, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) overturned a 32-year-old ban that prohibited broadcasters in the nation’s 20 largest media markets from owning a newspaper. Despite intense pressure from Capitol Hill to delay the decision, Republican FCC Chairman Kevin Martin cast the deciding vote, after two other Republicans voted for the ruling and two Democrats voted against it. The cross-ownership ban was approved by the FCC in 1975 to help diversify viewpoints, at the time noting that “it is unrealistic to expect true diversity from a commonly owned station-newspaper combination.” Today’s accepted proposal should benefit publishing goliaths like Tribune Company.

Those in favor of the lift argued that it will mark a greater liberalization of media ownership rules, and that in today’s world, it “strikes a balance” between new media and the protection of competition, according to Martin. Those against the overturn, however, claimed it will create new ownership loopholes instead of closing them, and will decrease the number of local news gatherers and producers.

“In the final analysis, the real winners today are business that are in many cases quite healthy, and the real losers are going to be all of us who depend on the news media to learn what’s happening in our communities and to keep an eye on local government,” said Democrat FCC member Michael Copps.

No information has been provided on the specific markets the ruling will effect, although according to Martin, the majority of them will consist of “grandfather” waivers—those that existed prior to the 1975 ban—with the others allowing for new newspaper-broadcast combinations.

Wow.

Ahhh capitalism. Got to love it sometimes. As reported by engadget today both Wal-Mart and Amazon are putting a little more squeeze on the record companies to offer DRM-free MP3 downloads. For those not in the know, digital music supplied by major music labels contains a Digital-Rights-Management code, DRM, which restricts what can be done with the file (ie what devices you can play the file on, how long you can keep the file and how many times the file can by copied or burned to a CD). DRM is a nightmare for Wal-Mart and Amazon who have both launched their own online MP3 sites (plus it’s harder for them to push MP3 players and accessories if some MP3’s work on certain devices while others don’t). While Amazon and Wal-Mart’s efforts are far from altruistic the consumer ultimately benefits by have a file they do anything they want with. Of course on the bigger scheme it also means that music, as a commodity, will be worth less thus affecting musicians. But I think this is a short term loss for a long term gain.