Perhaps the answer lies inside the question!

Actually, I do have Twitter, Facebook and MySpace pages. Somewhere. Just search for ‘JCHMusic’.

The reason I never paid it much mind is because there are all these ideas about building a following on social media in order to leverage a record deal or otherwise gain fame and fortune. That sounds great, but after doing this now for many years, that just ain’t a strategy that’s gonna work for an artist such as meself.

There are two kinds of stores in the world: supermarkets and shops. The supermarket has a broad appeal. It needs to attract as many people as possible. If you’re a young band and want to get signed, you best
be a bloody SAFEWAY… not that your content has to be watered down, but you have to have pretensions of broad appeal.

If you’re a shop, you have no such pretensions. You recognise that what you do is a niche market, whether it be replacement parts for Alfa Romeos, Vintage Sauterne Wines, or ‘Progressive Rock’.

To […]

Here ya go…

A catalog of rants on the gear I use and make, including the studio are here.
Specific Instruments Used On Albums
Studio Details

But can we talk? Can we talk?

Jeez man, not another rant?

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: it really doesn’t make that much difference for what I do. Yeah, maybe it makes a difference for the true ‘virtuosi’, but frankly, I’ve always had to be a ‘ham and egger’ switching between so many instruments on so many gigs that I guess I just learned to make do with whatever was about. The funny thing is that, I have gone through periods ‘where only the best will do’. And the interesting thing is that I always ended up gravitating back to the el-cheapo-s. They’re just more comfy. And, at the end of the day, I realized that I sound pretty much the same no matter what I play. What does seem to matter to me, with my wee tiny little hands, is […]

That’s an excellent question.

And the short answer is: When you’re young, you go where the money is. And the slightly longer answer is: Hey I love all the music I’ve ever gotten to play professionally. But we all have to follow our heart. Some of the most difficult conversations I have ever had have occurred over the past few years from totally well-meaning friends and prior associates begging me to wake up and smell the smooth jazz. It’s really hard when your friends look at you like, ‘Hey brother. Stop wasting your time on all that astral/prog crap and get back to making some real music. You know, like you used to.’ They mean well. You know who you are. 😀

When you click on Live365 or Pandora (please do!) you’re really clicking on good old fashioned radio…

Sites like these have two models: they either come with advertising (visual with sites like Pandora, or in terms of traditional commercials in the ‘free’ version of Live365). They often come with a ‘no commercials’ version which is supported by user-subscriptions. I neither model does the artist ‘pay to play’. I establish relationships with the DJs and they make the decisions as to what to play. If they dig what I’m doing, I get rotation on their stations. This is how it should be.

A Quick Political Announcement To Help Save Internet Radio!

Last year, there was a ruling last March 5th by the Copyright Ruling Board (CRB) that would have forced Internet radio station royalty payments to triple.Their reasoning was to bring internet royalty payment ‘in line with terrestrial radio.’ If put into effect, this decision would have put pretty much all internet radio stations immediately out of business. Thankfully, a coalition of broadcasters, listeners […]

This is actually a huge issue. The short answer? It’s the fair amount for me.

Background: You’re probably referring to the fact that most commercial CDs list for 16.95 or something like that. However, when you come right down to it, by the time that Warner Bros., the trucking company, the warehouses and the Wal-mart size record store get paid, the artist is typically left with something like $1.65 per CD. Really. That’s the reason you hear so many anecdotal horror stories about musicians going broke after selling 2 million copies. Part of it is the nature of the beast: if you’re, say a rap star, the first thing you might do is get some bling and an ‘entourage’ going. And sure that wastes a ton of cash keeping up the ‘image’. But the fact is, it’s easy to not see how little the typical artist gets from record sales. And tours get so extravagant that these are often losing propositions (ever wonder how some of those guys can afford all […]