Mark Groves' Weblog: Music

John Butler Trio US Tour

Sat, 14 Apr 2007 20:21:15 GMT

Grand National, the latest John Butler Trio album must be doing great in the US. It was just announced that JBT will be doing a full US tour starting next month in Baltimore. I already have our tickets to the Seattle show. Although this is where I wish we still lived in Denver, it would be cool to see JBT at Red Rocks.

USA GRAND NATIONAL TOUR
5/22/07 Sonar Baltimore, MD
5/23/07 9:30 Club Washington, DC
5/24/07 Webster Hall New York, NY
5/27/07 Jam on the River Philadelphia, PA
5/30/07 Phoenix Concert Theatre Toronto, ON
5/31/07 St. Andrews Hall Detroit, MI
6/1/07 Headliner’s Louisville, KY
6/2/07 Riviera Theatre Chicago, IL
6/3/07 The Vogue Theatre Indianapolis, IN
6/5/07 TBA
6/6/07 Eagles Club Milwaukee, WI
6/7/07 First Avenue Minneapolis, MN
6/9/07 Wakarusa Festival Lawrence, KS
6/12/07 House of Blues Dallas, TX
6/13/07 La Zona Rosa Austin, TX
6/14/07 Warehouse Live Houston, TX
6/15/07 Revolution Music Room Little Rock, AR
6/17/07 Bonnaroo Festival Manchester, TN
6/20/07 4th & B Theater San Diego, CA
6/22/07 Wiltern Los Angeles, CA
6/23/07 Fillmore San Francisco, CA
6/24/07 Fillmore San Francisco, CA
6/26/07 Crystal Ballroom Portland, OR
6/27/07 The Moore Theatre Seattle, WA
6/28/07 TBA
6/30/07 Red Rocks Denver, CO
7/1/07 Taos Solar Music Festival Taos, NM

John Butler Trio - Live

Fri, 02 Mar 2007 17:37:24 GMT

WOW, what a concert. Val and I were lucky enough to get tickets to John Butler's concert last night at The Triple Door in Seattle. For those that do not know the John Butler Trio, you are really missing out, they are this great band from Down Under. The best way I can describe their music is a mix between Blues, Funk, Reggae, Folk, World music.

If you have any interest at all in the above types of music I would highly suggest you check them out. I have been listening to JBT for a couple years now, I happen to stumble upon them in searching for new artists a couple years back, and really dug John Butler's guitar playing, and to see it live was way more then I expected. To see in person him play a 12 string acoustic, and the combination of sounds he is able to produce really makes their songs even more enjoyable.

The Triple Door was a killer place to see a show like this, it is a intimate dinner style theater, I believe it only seats 300 people, with full service kitchen and wait staff. The sound system was great, and with no seat more the 35 paces from the stage there is not a bad seat in the house.

Check out Grand National releasing some time around the end of March.

Talking about Microsoft planning music subscription service | CNET News.com

Thu, 09 Jun 2005 20:33:43 GMT

Not a big surprise to me, Microsoft had to enter the subscription arena to add justification to the model. What I think is the most interesting part of this article is that Microsoft is working with the record industry to allow people to transfer their "license" from iTunes over to Microsoft. This I would assume would open the door to be able to transfer my licenses from one subscription service to another. So if I wanted to move from Yahoo to Microsoft, or to Napster that would not require me to re-download the music files.

If Microsoft is successful in getting these licenses transfer from iTunes, Apple could be in for some competition. The players from Dell, Creative and others are being to compete with iPods, right now Apple has people locked in, this would open the door for people to try other devices.

Quote

Microsoft planning music subscription service | CNET News.com

Yahoo Unlimited and Dell DJ 30 Update

Tue, 07 Jun 2005 19:01:54 GMT

A few weeks ago Yahoo launched it's new unlimited music service. I decided to jump on board and sign up for the service, and get a new Dell DJ Music Player. I decided to go with the 30GB model. My wife can't understand why I need 30GB of music, but I easily filled my 20 first gen Dell DJ, so for the price it really was not a big deal to go with the 30GB model. The new player is great, it does not have a ton of bells and whistles, but that's fine with me, I just want to be able to carry a ton of music and that's about it, don't need radio, or photos.

As far as Yahoo Unlimited, it is a ok service, now it still in in beta, but there are a few quirky things. First of all you need Yahoo's Music Engine client, at first I was not very happy about this, but it turns out not to be a bad music player. Although I am not switching from Windows Media Player 10 anytime soon. It is pretty easy within YME to download tracks, and find music. So far there are still some new albums that are missing from the service, including Dave Matthews Band's newest album and the Coldplay album released today. But they do have the newest NIN album and new Audioslave album, so I'm not sure what the details are, but I'm sure it has to do with deals with each label. So far I have downloaded and transferred to my media player over 350 tracks, not bad for $4.95 per month.

I have see some weird things with the whole DRM (digital rights management) and Yahoo. I connect my Dell DJ to my work computer to stream music from it so I can listen at work. I use software from Red Chair Software called Duebox to make this happen. Duebox works fine, the issue is when it gets to a music file from Yahoo Unlimited it WMP needs to go and acquire the license to be able to play that file. It seems that connection times out when talking with Yahoo. I have traded emails with Yahoo's support and in the end ended up with an email that basically said, thanks for you feedback, we use it to improve our beta software. So I have found a workaround, if I copy the files in question over to my work machine, play them in the Yahoo Media Engine once, it acquires the license, and from that point on no issue. This really seams like an issue on Yahoo's side, and I am sure they will fix it soon.

Could Yahoo Beat Apple

Wed, 11 May 2005 15:44:59 GMT

Well it's official, Yahoo has entered the music selling business in a big way. I've really never been a Yahoo user, but it's hard to deny their popularity. They just opened, in beta, their new music store. I heard about this the other day an was not really impressed until I found out how they were lowering the price. First of all they have $.79 downloads, but more important they have reduced the price of subscription based music to $4.99/month based on a yearly subscription, or $6.99/month if you want month to month access. Compared to Napster and Rhapsody who both have that service for $14.95/ month, the subscription based model is looking more attractive.

Check it out at http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited/

Now you will have to have a Janus supported media player, which I don't have yet, but based on this I am thinking about. A list of devices can be found at Plays for Sure. Also I know Dell's Gen 2 media players support it with a driver update, but for what ever reason they never get any love on the Plays for Sure website.

Still working on Free iPod

Thu, 10 Feb 2005 01:59:50 GMT

I have gotten 4 referrals already on the free ipod offer, by using http://ipodrelay.blogspot.com/, only one has completed their requirement so far, need 5 to get my ipod. The requirements are pretty easy, I actually signed up for Blockbuster Online, something I wanted anyways. There are several other offers, that you can sign up for, and just cancel the program with no charge.

If anyone wants to sign up directly without using the relay, please use my referral number 14778301

Update: Have 3 of the 5 referrals needed, getting closer.

There is Hope for a AIC reunion

Wed, 09 Feb 2005 01:12:32 GMT

Looks like there is a slight glimmer of hope for Alice in Chains to get back together. At least at the start it will be for a benefit to help tsunami victims.

Hopefully we can get some new material out of them in the future. AIC is still one of my favorite bands.

Now this kids actually does Rock

Sat, 22 Jan 2005 15:18:07 GMT

Trey Tosh, is 13 years old, and I think Stevie Ray would be proud. Of course he is not the first young blues guitarist, so we will have to see how he does as he gets older, burn out has a way of attaching itself to these guys.