An evening with SellaBand

 

London Calling line-up confirmed!

 

Maitreya, Bulletproof Messenger and Lucia Iman will join headliners Second Person at the next SellaBand In Concert, on June 5 at Gibson Guitar Studios. They will be joined by a later to be announced special guest. Collectively the Top 3 Artists in this competition attracted over 1,000 Believers so this line-up seems to be well deserved.

 

And so it became a close call after all. In the final 48 hours Maitreya challenged Bulletproof Messenger for the throne of the London Calling competition and Nearfield’s tireless attempts to sell their Blackboard CD in return for 1 Part on SellaBand, almost gave Lucia Iman a run for her money. On Koninginnedag (Queen’s Day) in the Netherlands, the appropriately named Radio Orange rose to fifth place on the London Calling chart, but their final attempt came too late to reach the final Top 3.

 

Something fishy

With the help of his online Team, Maitreya made the big jump in the final 30 minutes of the competition. And, for the record: SellaBand has been policing this race from start to finish, we have been watching things closely in our Admin and while there is no guarantee that all these hundreds of new Believers will become active community members, there is no reason to believe that there was something fishy going on.

 

Eclectic night

So, well done Maitreya, representing the ‘old school’ of SellaBand Artists, and congratulations and a warm welcome to SellaBand to Bulletproof Messenger and Lucia Iman. What a great way to enter the scene and rise to the occasion to quickly and determined. We will be in touch with all these artists in the next few days, to discuss their flight details, set lists, technical requirements etcetera. If one thing, it promises to be a very eclectic night at Gibson Guitar Studios.  

London Calling: Winners quotes!

Rodino indicated last week that he would be no longer competing and Nearfield ‘surrendered’ in the early hours of May 1, so there is no real need for official reactions from the people who didn’t make it to the final Top 3. Let’s focus on the three artists that will get to play in London and see what they have to say…

 

Maitreya

 

So, London Calling it is. Your first reaction, please...

"To quote one of my favorite Believers, "Holy Crap!" It was a lot of work, a lot of nerves and in the end a lot of fun!  My first reaction was OMG, we won!!!  My next reaction was, thank god it's over... now I'm kind of still and serene for the first time in a month!"

Apart from the hundreds of new Believers, what's the most valuable thing you've learned from this competition?

"There's No 'I' in Team! I'm sure people are interested in how we got our New Believers.  I had a massive amount of support right from the start from some very key people.  I made it very clear that I was interested in my Believers who had ideas to help me bring in New Believers, that was what the competition was all about and being an Old Skool SAB Artist, going outside the existing community was my only option. There were so many people working to help me in NZ, Australia and in the US. Tim & Beata, Baynons Bunch and A&S were a massive support in bringing in New Believers in Australasia. Logical One was simply incredible, she was coming up with an idea a day for bringing in New Believers and probably got me 50 or more.  Mandy spent a month without her husband Cubworld flying the maitreya flag and bringing in a whole bunch of Believers, while her man Jake helped me massively at my Birthday gig which was a great success.  Wyando was in the trenches yesterday bringing in some last minute support. The most intriguing part would be the final 15 minutes I guess... that was what you would call a highly success Full Rear Guard Action!  Here's the secret: I had Logical One in Sacramento, Mandy in Montana, Pebbles in New York and Alexx of Nearfield in Lisboa all ready with a bunch of Believers they had reserved for our Grand Finale!  That's why there was something like 60 Believers in 15 minutes!"

Are you relieved that this race is now over?

"That was a full on sprint!  But I'm still running for the 50K, that's the main goal of every artist and The Road Runner is no different. I want to thank all my Believers for bringing me this far and getting me to 'London Calling!' I am so excited to perform and can't wait to meet so many Believers who have been with me on this incredible journey.

Who would be your Believer of Choice?

"Well, we need to talk about that don't we … but it will have to be someone from my Team..."

 

Bulletproof Messenger

 

So, London Calling it is. Your first reaction, please…

“Amazing, this is a great opportunity for us and we are honored that so many people have come through to support us.”

Apart from the hundreds of new Believers, what's the most valuable thing you've learned from this competition?

“Well we have learned a lot of things from this competition. Most active Believers on this site are aware of the controversy we faced early on in the competition so from that I guess we learned that success comes at a price. However in the end it’s all about community spirit and support, made clear by the actions of some great Believers including the selfless EmpireofOne. We thank everyone for the support to the bitter end and hope to see you in London.”

Are you relieved that this race is now over?

“Are we relieved its over.... You have no idea.”

 

Lucia Iman


 

So, London Calling it is. Your first reaction, please...

“Wooo-hoooooo! I am going to London! All I can’t think now is; thank you, thank you! all my (new and old) friends for supporting my music on SellaBand. Can’t find anymore words...my brain-not-worky right now:)”

Apart from the hundreds of new Believers, what's the most valuable thing you've learned from this competition?

“Staying focused and keeping it light at the same time. Listening to the kind words of friends, and acknowledging all the efforts put forward from all corners of the world, keeps me inspired. This is what (has kept) and keeps me going...”

Are you relieved that this race is now over?

“Yes.

I am.

Very much so.

Good night.”

 

Competition Afterthoughts

The London Calling competition is now officially closed and if there is one thing we can be really happy about, it is the great community spirit that both Artists and Believers have shown us, once again.

Yes, in the end we did attract the 2,500 New Believers we desired and we were particularly impressed by the hard work that so many bands put in, but we also noticed some fierce criticism and disappointment in the ranks of some die-hard Believers. Point taken and the next time we will make sure that there will be equal chances for everybody to participate, both Artists and Believers. Next time, we hear you say? Yes, of course there will be more competitions on SellaBand. Say what you want, but the Charts pages have become the most popular section on SellaBand. And London Calling served another purposes too: it did bring a number of acts a lot closer to the goal of $50,000.

In fact it could be a matter of weeks before we launch the next competition. And it is very unlikely that it will evolve around 'voting' as some have suggested. That's what the likes of Idols and Garageband are for. This is SellaBand, a different concept with a very clear purpose: to attract fans and to raise a decent budget for your next recording. And to us it is not necessarily a bad thing if you only ‘Believe’ in one artist. While we indeed cherish the community spirit, every artist and has the right to regard the rise to $50,000 as an individual journey, a pact between you and your fans.

Whichever competition we may come up with in the (near) future, it will probably evolve around Parts and Budget. Not because we are after your money first and foremost, but because this is simply what SellaBand is all about. If you don't want to be part of that short term excitement, well just ignore it and concentrate on your greater goal. There's nothing wrong with that, just like there is nothing wrong with being competitive and ambitious at the same time. We take our hats off to Maitreya, Bulletproof Messenger and Lucia Iman even if it's going to cost us a small fortune to fly all of them over (and serve them free beers too...).

We won't deny that the past 4 weeks have been quite stressful to some and also brought out some negative vibes. But we still like to think that, just like us at SellaBand HQ, many people are really looking forward to June 5, when we hope to give the British and event that will make us all proud. 

Amsterdam, May 1, 2007

The SellaBand Team

 


 

Q + A

Second Person: reporting from the Studio

Six months ago we featured UK-act Second Person for the first time in the Tribune. Since then a lot has happened to Julia Johnson, Mark Maclaine and Alvaro Lopez. Right now the band are recording their SellaBand album, which is slated for a Summer release. As the creative juices are flowing like crazy, the band report from the studio and give us all the latest news and how they will prepare for their headlining slot at London Calling on June 5.

 

* All pictures in this article were taken by the bandmembers, whilst at work in the Studio 

 

So, how are things in Camp Second Person?

“Things are good here, we've been working extremely hard over the last couple of months getting everything ready for the final recording sessions – and it's been a lot of fun! When not in the studio we've been doing interviews and meeting with managers and other record industry people. Reaching the $50,000 caught us completely by surprise (especially making the last $17k in a single weekend!) as did the amount of interest from the press here. In the first couple of weeks we weren't able to pay much attention to the music as lots of people wanted to do interviews with us for TV, radio and most of the national newspapers - we'll never forget having to do four separate interviews for different BBC radio stations in a row. Amazing! From the e-mails we have received recently many people seem to be quite unhappy with the state of the music industry as it is, and they've been full of praise for the way SellaBand has helped us raise the money for our next CD. Things are going great for us - the music industry seems to be changing for the better and we're very proud to be part of it!”

 

How are the recordings coming along?

“We have approached this album in a slightly different way than most other bands would have - rather than recording drums first, then bass and working up to the vocals we have started with the vocals and worked down. The lyrics are the central part of the whole Second Person sound and therefore we decided to get those completely right before refining the drums and other instrumentation. The great thing about the price of recording technology nowadays is that if you are careful with what you buy and how you record, it's possible to almost get "studio quality" recordings (for certain instruments) at home. This means you don't have to worry about how much time it's taking - this is especially important on vocals - you can take the time to get it really right.

The first steps for us were to record rough versions of the tracks and then record Julia singing over the top of these. We finished the vocals a few weeks ago and are now making sure we've got everything ready for drum recording next week (from the 7th May). It's very exciting - we're recording in the old SARM East studios (now The London Recording Studios) where lots of great records have been made and is also the place where Queen did ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ as well as lots of other hits. We were originally just going to record drums there but when we went along and saw how much amazing equipment they have, including many vintage organs, pianos and synths: we decided to adjust the budget to fit in a few more days there. We use many of these instruments already but the ones we use are just samples from a CD and never sound as good as the real thing - hopefully we're investing a little more in making this record sound as good as it can be. The final stages of the album will be the mixing - this  is here everything comes together and we hopefully make it sound like a record. This will be done at ‘The Way’ Studios in North London which Tony [Platt] picked for its great sounding vintage Neve 8078 mixing desk. One thing we've been hoping to do for a while is a live Webcam broadcast from the Studio whilst we're mixing. This has now become a reality as we've got everything we need to make this happen. We feel that since our Believers funded the album they should at least be able to be a part of it with us. This would only be for about half an hour a day (to give us some space to work) but hopefully it'll be every day that we're in the mixing session - it will be nice to have everyone with us!”

 

You plan to do more than record 'just' some songs, don't you?

“For us, Second Person is not just a band but a full multi-media project. We have been working with some amazing directors and artists over the last couple of years, many of whom have become very successful. It made a lot of sense to get as many of them involved in this album as we could so we came up with a concept for a short animated film that would span the entire length of the album. More than a music video, this would have develop as the music develops and both would complement each other. We wrote the story a few months ago and it is now in full production. We're hoping to have the first "chapter" of this film ready for release with the album and then we'll be releasing the other four chapters throughout the rest of the year. We don't want to give too much away but the test animations we've been getting back recently have been fantastic.”

 

Any idea when the album will be released?

“If everything goes to plan, we should finish recording and mixing by the end of June. The great thing about the internet is that it is now possible to release the songs days later if we want to. We'd very much like to, so with fingers crossed, the plan is to have the full album ready for download at the end of June. The physical album should follow a couple of weeks later and the remaining videos will be released at regular intervals in the following months.”

What are your plans for after the CD is out there?

“Once the album is out our plan is to start touring and playing shows everywhere that will have us. We've had some offers to play some European Festivals over the summer, but sadly a lot of them conflicted with the recording and mixing of the album...really nice to be asked and we're looking forward to getting to play abroad again soon.”

 

Do you still visit SellaBand and watch what's going on?

“We're still completely addicted to the site...we check it every day as there is always something going on. Lately we've been having bets on who is coming to the London Show to play with us. We're looking forward to seeing the results!

Discovered any cool SellaBands lately?

“We keep an eye on Adam's Apples every week - and usually there are some great new bands in there (especially when his cat does the reviewing!). There are some great bands here that we've found recently, we'll not mention the ones that haven't been too active in the last few months but one we really like is AgentX. We heard Sellaband playing some of their stuff on the PA before our show in Amsterdam and have even been to see them play live here since. They've got a great feel and they're even better in person than on record. Other bands we like have also been on Sellaband a while and include Daniel Ward Murphy, Wildcat and Lola Perrin.”

 

What can we expect from you at the London Calling gig?

“We're still waiting for a few details to come through about the venue but we'd love to be able to have visuals projected like we did in Amsterdam. We do have a surprise lined up for the show too, it depends on whether we have time to make it happen - but it'll be very worth it if it does. We can't wait to get back up on stage again!”


Concert Tickets & More

Yes, we still have a number of tickets left for London Calling. Right now we are thinking very hard how to allocate them to our Artists and Believers. Because we've had so many requests for a pair of tickets, we feel it would be unfair to randomly give them away or to simply say: send us an e-mail and off you go. Anyway, unless you have a very convincing reason why should must and should get a pair of tickets, you'll have to wait until next week's Tribune for your chance to win the final 25 pair of tickets.

In the meantime, for all 25 True Believers, who have already secured themselves a pair of tickets, we hereby offer you the possibility to get a room at a hotel that is very close to the Gibson Guitar Studio. And, more importantly, it is quite close to the After Party venue as well... SellaBand staff and performing artists will all be staying at the St. Giles Hotel.

 

At www.stgiles.com you can check what the hotel and rooms look like. Not a posh 5 star hotel, but pretty decent nonetheless. We are holding a number of extra rooms for those of you who may be interested. Room rates are 85 pounds for a single room, 92 British pounds for double occupancy. If you want to make use of this offer, drop us an e-mail at ticket@sellaband.com with your full name. We will then register on your behalf and you will pay your bill upon your check out/departure.