united divas is a nonprofit organization with a mission to empower women to be artistic leaders, professionals, innovators, and role models for both aspiring and practicing artists.
among many other initiatives the organization also offers scholarships to aspiring female artists and creatives, and every month they choose a different featured “diva” to spotlight to their community. i never thought i’d be thrilled to be called a diva, but i’m not only thrilled but also honored to have been chosen as a united divas’ diva of the month!
after months of work on street scene 2007, the festival kicked off last night with muse headlining. these photos were taken from what the industry refers to, technically, as the “poser decks.” (i’m 100% serious; should you happen to ever find yourself there, you now know what you will have become). it’s a pretty epic view though, and kind of endemic of a marketer’s perspective in a sense. this is pretty much the view you have to maintain throughout the whole process of marketing a festival, so it’s a pretty fitting vantage point from which to finally see it come to fruition.
among the many highlight moments was getting to see panic! at the disco perform i write sins not tragedies live, which is a song that still manages to elicit excitement every time i hear the track’s opening pizzicato notes since its music video not only features lucent dossier, but it’s also the reason behind how lucent ended up going on tour with panic! in 06–the precursor to their “nothing rhymes with circus” tour.
oh, and i’d like to give a little shoutout othe folks at imeem, for running our battle of the bands contest–which is actually always one of my favorite parts of a music festival promotion strategy. the winning band was monte battalion, but there were so many genuinely talented musicians and bands that participated in the contest, it was actually really hard to chose. imeem should be really proud of the caliber of the creative community they’ve got.
following on the heels of the previous post musing about the acceleration of cultural evolution, i thought it might be a good idea offer some kind of more concrete context for the process of how culture gets created. this video has been circulating for a few years at this point, but for anyone not familiar with it, it’s a fascinating breakdown (badum-ching!) of the impact of the “amen break”–a 6-second long drum sample from 1969 that can, in a strictly technical sense be held accountable for the musical evolution of hip hop, along with the spawning of a number of other subcultures.
(it’s a bit long but the video never changes, so don’t feel compelled to watch the whole thing. feel free to just listen to the audio.)
