Up all night last night on the phone with our agent. We talked till 5:30 in the morning. He slightly drunk, me thoroughly exhausted. Universal music in New York has a keen interest but wants to see more scans (sales at retail). He met with them for almost three hours and called me to give the details. The good news is that every major label in America is watching and researching us now due to the undercurrent of buzz lately. The bad news is that its not enough to totally sell them on signing us and giving us the big money. None of them willing to sign us on the merit of our music alone. Which we both find frustrating as hell, especially now that we have completed the nothing is cohesive album, by far the purest thing we’ve ever created. We know that somewhere out there is someone who will want to take us on for purely the merit of our music. we just haven't found them yet.

In all honesty, I would much rather be signed purely on our music than on a “story” like sales or radio play. The former would be much more poetic and honest and pure. But the business does not work that way anymore. [this is why the radio and TV airwaves are so filled with crap lately; because the signings are now almost solely based on sales or some kind of breakthrough story rather than someone's gut reaction to an artists music. so they're here today and gone tomorrow and everyone keeps scratching their head asking ‘why aren't there any really awesome career artists out there anymore?’] But we are willing to go the distance either way. if they want a story we’ll give them one.

Lying in bed, half asleep, I listened to our agent ramble on about how he believes so wholeheartedly in Transcendence that he believes in nothing more strongly. Says he is willing to drop every other act on his roster if he has to in order to see this thing through for us. I love that. he's just totally committed and enthusiastic. Besides yet another rejection, (hey old Abe Lincoln, where ever you are, you hear that? I'm trailing close behind pal. Coming up fast.) Good week this week though. Radio promoters love us. Publicist loves us. We are receiving a lot of love and support now. The love is floating all over us. But just cant seem to shake the money out of the trees of these larger labels so it isn't such a constant struggle for us.

They say in interviews that they're in it for the music. But time and time again we’re told that we are going to have to have bigger sales at retail in order to sign on the dotted line. I understand. Everyone does these days. When the average investment in a major label act in order to break them nationally is 2 to 3 million, you gotta believe in what you're signing. I just wish we could find that one rep or vp who didn’t give a shit about sales for the time being, at our level, because its obvious we just don’t have the funds, and neither does our label, to push this thing into the big sales arena, and just signs us based on loving what we do. We have a great band right now. and we’re happy as hell doing what we’re doing. When we are together it feels like magic. I hope the upcoming documentary shows that a bit.

There are a lot of people right now in the industry that are so down on the major labels, talking about how bad it is and how much they suck, and how cool it is to be indie. But I don't agree. I've been indie for ten years now, on three different labels, and frankly its fucking hard. I know its hard out there all over in the biz these days. And yeah they're business people first and music lovers second. But you know, like anything else, music is a business. so thank God for them being that way. or no CDs would get released by anyone at all. And that would suck for all of us. but still...

Its not that I mind being on an independent label. Its not all bad. We gross over seven dollars for every cd sold compared to the less than one dollar that the major label artists receive. That’s a cool thing. So we’re liquid. But there's just not enough money to be made to promote the band or the cds enough to reach enough people to generate the big sales. That's the dilemma. What would you rather have? a thousand times 7 dollars, or a million times a dollar? I'll take the million please thank you. This weekend is a time of reflection for me. After last night’s conversation with our agent, i am even more dedicated to finding a way, the way, to reach more of our potential fans. You know if you have ten or a hundred or a thousand, that you have the potential to have ten thousand or a million if you could just reach them. If they could just know that you are out there. I know as a music fan myself that I'm totally that way. I always heard the name Sam Philips for example, but just had never heard her music. and then one day I did. and just instantly fell in love with it. I bought all her cds the next day. I was so glad as a fan to have discovered her. we already have that now. but its just on a smaller level than we want it to be on.

So as a business man I know that that's the m.o. at play here. that's the strategy. Reach as many people as you can in order to connect up with your potential fans/customers. But how? On this level? That's the question. I wasn't discouraged after his call last night. I was inspired. I fell asleep with a smile on my face. At least we know we’re getting close. At least we know what it is now. to all of the fans that we already have, thanks for buying. We’ll make more.

Last screening: Identity. Wow. You have to see this movie. I feel fucked up after watching it. What a trip.

Robert Palmer died. That guy is cool. He will be missed. His album sneaking sally through the alley is a classic. Riptide, another classic. Johnny cash died recently as well. Rock and roll takes its toll man. 

Man. On the phone all day. everyone you speak with has a different opinion and theory about what it takes to “make it” in the music business. and the fact still remains that most people who make it do so with a major label. Some do alright going indie. But not many. And of course “making it” is a very subjective term. 

The over all consensus is the same though. The music industry is falling. Falling, failing, struggling, however you want to put it. so major label signings are tough. And getting tougher. They want to sign artists with proven track records. Now this is a tough opinion to have since many popular acts today had no track record to speak of before they got signed. Think Norah Jones, John mayer, Pete yorn, dashboard. So if a rep likes your music, they're going to try their best to sign you either way. 

But still the no-sayers are constantly reminding everyone how hard it is and how you have to be basically already selling millions of copies of your music and “on tour” before they will even look at you. but recent signings prove other wise. Who knows? But what it does for me is it makes me ask this question. How can you “make it” in music independently. How can you sell millions or at least hundreds of thousands of Cds on your own? Without a major label behind you doing all their work? For me it has been a challenge that is inspiring. How many cds can a band sell on its own? Can you make a living? I mean a good living. A living worth making? This bullshit about artists having to struggle and not make any money, but the pop stars who can barely sing make millions. It’s the major cliché that in its own way is helping to destroy the industry. Check out fucktheindustry.org. [Its like a little mini-war against the industry. And the other side, “the public” claims to really love and appreciate the artists, but of course if they get their way, whether it be boycotting all purchases from major label artists, or being allowed to download music for free, the artists are going to lose out. Lets face it, for artists that have already made it, people like sting, u2, or puff diddy, etc, who cares. They’ve made their money. Sting has a fucking castle in Sienna for God sakes. But for the young up and comers, artists like me and my band, we’re still really dependent on album sales to make a living. And so are thousands of other artists who haven't made huge money yet. So yea for us this little battle isn't such a good thing. So go ahead and boycott and download and file share and burn cds all you want but bear in mind that yes you ARE affecting the livelihood of the artists. Period. 

Talked with the producer today. what a puss. he is telling me that you have to be on tour to be signed by a major label. I point him to about ten major label signings in the last two years all of them huge stars and none of them doing shit before they were signed. He's telling me he's talking to an attorney who knows everything. I tell him look attorneys talk out of their ass. That's what we pay them to do. Please don't listen to any fucking attorneys. The guy is just so wrong. He like everyone else is trying to nail down an industry in one sentence as if this one idea is IT. And there is no one idea in any industry. There are simply no rules bro. So relax. Were on the right track. The CD isn't even out yet and you’re already discouraged.

So I'm filling him in on everything going on with the record company and where we are with promoting the record. Basically we need about $50,000 to get the record out there to the people, between distribution and press and retail promo and radio promo, and now we have sold out of our first pressing so we need to make more, which is good but also sucks. So here we are in this position where the CD is barely out and in order to really do something we need to spend at least 15,000 dollars. 

A lot of people freaking out. But only because they don't know business. They know music. They make cds. They put them out meaning they give a copy to their parents and all their friends and they sell some at shows. And that's what they do. And they get stuck with thousands of cds sitting around their house. That's not putting out a CD. Our last album rise and shine sold thousands and thousands of copies and we still didn't make enough money from it to live. And really that's what this is all about. Us making a living from playing our music. From doing our art together. I dream about just being able to make music all the time. I have written some 850 maybe 860 songs in my life. That’s my thing. The lust of the next song. To me it is more than an art that I pursue vociferously. It is an addiction. To write songs. The whole concept. The whole adventure of it. I not only consider myself an expert at it. I also consider myself a huge fan of it and an addict. Songwriting and singing and producing albums, like movies, that's my life. That’s my passion. And I've been doing it since I was a little kid. And I have always made a moderate living at it. But not a good living. And the boys in the band. Most of them still live at home. So our goal is just to get to that next level where we can make music all the time and get paid really well at it.

Phone interview today with some guy named Andrew Beckett from Dallas, TX who is writing a new book on independent artists including upandcomers and some more notables like Johnny Cash or Aimee Mann who were once major artist s but who are now or once were indis. He thinks that independent music is on it's way to exploding now the way that independent film did a few years back. an interesting tat a tat. 

Tomorrow we are scheduled to perform at a peace rally. It may only be three of us on stage because some of the guys don't want to support a peace rally now that we are at war. I think that the general objection is that it appears that if you support peace or are against this invasion, not war, then you are un-American or supposedly don't support “our troops.” I am so thoroughly bored with responding to stupid ideas like this that I'm just not going to say anything. 

A lot of people are being pussies if you ask me. Voicing their opposition to the war but then not wanting to speak up in public about it. Now is the time when we need to stand up and voice our opposition the most. I understand the fear. I mean, God, who wants to wake up one day in prison or get the shit beat out of them or get killed or whatever. If the sixties taught us anything it taught us that the people speaking up did not matter too much here anymore like it once may have in pre-grassy-knoll-times and that if you did speak up too much you got pepper sprayed, shot at, beaten, battered, harassed, imprisoned, and of course killed. So yea I know how my bros are feeling. It's some scary shit. And the more this invasion/not war, drags on, the more pro-war people are starting to get around America. You can feel it in the air. Now that our own soldiers are getting killed, our people are getting more and more vigilant and jingoistic. Less open-minded. It's becoming more and more of an us against them mentality. Even though in the bigger picture of course it has nothing to do with us against them. It's a few men in our government against a few men in their government. But now thousands of innocent people are getting murdered all caught up in this thing. Us and the Iraqis are just people trying to get on with our day to day lives. 

But speaking up against these atrocities is something that if you do believe in you should just do. bite the bullet. Take the plunge. Stand up. And speak out. So tomorrow we go up as a band united, just not a full band perhaps. 

Fleshed out a great song called if your baby could. Can’t stop hearing it in my head. On such a roll these last two years. .

Later today we did a photo shoot for the www.ourmessagetotheworld.us site. Tried to do it front of the federal courthouse, but they had it all blocked off for security reasons. No pictures. So we chose another location. Eventually a security officer came up and made us stop there too. but we got some good shots.