Musicadium Blog

FROM STEPHEN BARTLETT PRODUCTIONS

No one can deny that the industry is changing. As a young artist, there are more opportunities available to you now than ever before– but more competition and obstacles as well! Getting time off work and paying for recording can be hard, and sometimes a new idea you have AFTER recording can be your best….. and its another year or more before you can save up to lay down the idea!

Some artists benefit from recording a track at a time and releasing it to their fans (including Radiohead and Smashing Pumpkins!). Of course we still love EPs and Albums and think they are essential in an artist’s career, but maybe your fan base are demanding single tracks or you come up with that perfect radio song that just needs to be recorded. If that path sounds like you, Stephen Bartlett Productions has the perfect solution.

If you’re recording one track at a time with us in 2010, we give you the opportunity to save by recording your forth song absolutely free. That’s right, record three tracks with us at different times over the course of the year, and we’ll do the forth at no charge.

WHAT’S IN IT FOR YOU?
-Free studio time! Your forth track free represents a massive 25% discount on your studio booking. You don’t need to book a full album to work with one of Brisbane’s most respected producers.
-Not only do you save on recording costs, but recording your work spread out over the year gives you the opportunity to develop as a band. It allows you to create and innovate from song to song, giving you a better, fresher product as you release songs into the marketplace. It also gives you a greater chance at standing out from the pack, all the while building a catalogue that can be used for single sales, packaged together as collection or used as the perfect lead-in to an album or EP release.
-No more stress when you write your best song as soon as you finished recording!
-It spreads the cost and time out, making it easier for artists who still work or study, rather than demanding a few weeks straight focused on the recording.
-It also allows you to spend your entire time in the studio focused on the song at hand rather than diverting the energy between songs, ensuring the best outcome and least stress.

WHAT’S IN IT FOR US?

The Track 4 Free program allows us to work with you over a longer period of time. Your recordings will improve as your act is working longer and we have the opportunity to assist in that growth rather than simply working with you for a few weeks and waving goodbye. Our discount reflects the respect we have for working with quality artists over the long term.

So please feel free to contact us with any questions or to book in with your choice of producers, Stephen Bartlett or Michael Hardgrave.
Bookings- Stephen Green bookings@stephenbartlettproduction.com +61 (0) 412 321 368
www.stephenbartlettproduction.com

- Track 4 Free is only available on single track sessions booked after January 1, 2010
- You must register with SBP that you wish your session to be tallied for Track4Free when you book your session
- Your free track must be booked subject to studio availability
- Your free track session must not be longer than the average time taken on each of your first three track sessions
- Track 4 Free is only available on full priced sessions. Discounted sessions will not count towards your tally of sessions.
- Track 4 Free is only available on sessions produced by Stephen Bartlett or Michael Hardgrave

Peer Group and General Pants to launch ‘Major Label’

Peer Group Media, Australia’s leading brand entertainment agency, today announce their appointment with General Pants Co. The partnership will give birth to Major Label, a pioneering ’singles only’ record label wholly owned by General Pants Co. where the artist maintains ownership of copyright, has full creative control and receives 100% of the royalties through the sales of music through digital retail stores.

The concept behind Major Label is for the 700 strong General Pants Co. staff to act as talent scouts and publicists for the label. The staff will seek out the next hot Australian acts and submit them to the music blog housed on the General Pants Co. website. Jethro Lyons, brand manager, General Pants Co. said: “Major Label is about discovering up and coming hot new Australian acts and throwing them a lifeline.”

Each month three acts will be chosen and their single released through Major Label. The singles will be available for streaming on the General Pants Co. website and available to purchase through selected online retailers.

Adam Zammit, CEO of Peer Group Media said: “Major Label is the first of its kind in Australia and Peer Group Media are delighted to be involved in the creation and delivery of the campaign. Our proven expertise in creating engaging projects within the entertainment industry makes us a perfect fit for this campaign and we are looking forward to delivering really strong results.”

Peer Group Media will be responsible for managing the overall campaign, creative, PR and artist liaison. The initiative launches on 1st March 2010.

Musicadium is proud to be associated with Major Label and Peer Group Media and General Pants in distributing the artists discovered to digital outlets the world over.

Yesterday, Hundreds of Thousands of Australians tuned into Triple J to count down the Hottest 100 tracks of 2009.

news.com.au dissected the countdown and come up with the following interesting facts:

• 50 of the Hottest 100 artists were from indie labels, 44 from major record labels and 6 were unsigned.
• Only 27 of the Hottest 100 songs featured in the 2009 ARIA Top 100 singles chart
• 36 of the songs were from Australian artists, 29 from the UK, 23 from the United States.
• Mumford & Sons Hottest 100 #1 song, Little Lion Man, featured at just #87 on the 2009 ARIA Top 100 singles chart
• Not one of the Top 40 songs on the 2009 ARIA Top 100 singles chart featured on Triple J’s list.
• The first to make the cut was Hilltop Hoods Chase That Feeling, at #3 on the Hottest 100, #42 on the 2009 ARIA Top 100 singles chart
• Florence and the Machine and Muse charted the most number of times in Triple J’s Hottest 100, with 4 each, Temper Trap and Flight of The Conchords notched up 3
• Lisa Mitchell was the first Idol artist to ever feature in the Hottest 100 annual poll, charting at #7 with Coin Laundry

Some fun Musicadium-related Facts about the Hottest 100

• One of the 6 unsigned acts, Musicadium Artist Seth Sentry was one of them!
• 12 of the tracks in the 100 were by Artists who Musicadium has distributed (though not necessarily the tracks featured in the hottest 100) - Lisa Mitchell, The Temper Trap, Seth Sentry, Sarah Blasko, The Hilltop Hoods, Philadelphia Grand Jury, The Middle East and Washington.
• Flying in the face of the Hottest 100 of all Time poll, half of those 12 tracks were by female artists or contained female artists on vocals.
• Seth Sentry was one of a number of artists in the 100 who were Unearthed artists

Musicadium recently caught up with Husky Gawenda, lead singer and guitarist for Melbourne based band Husky. Mixing folk, blues, classical, pop and great melodies, this four-piece band are one to watch. Check them out at www.huskysongs.com.

1. You released your debut album “Quiet Little Rage” in September 2008, what have you been up to since then?

Since the release we’ve been playing in Melbourne and throughout Victoria and up and down the East Coast. I spent a lot of 2009 writing, at home in Melbourne and in various places by the sea, in the country, in the mountains - anywhere I could find to refresh the senses and get the imagination flowing. We have spent the last few months recording our new album, and released the first single, Dark Sea, with some shows up the East Coast towards the end of 2009. We are currently holed up in the studio finishing the record.

2. If you could play with any artist, dead or alive, who would it be and why?

It’s a difficult one to answer. I’m bad at making decisions at the best of times. I would probably have to say Leonard Cohen, because he’s been my biggest inspiration. I put him up there with the best song writers and the best poets of all time. Playing a gig with Ludwig Van Beethoven would be pretty interesting though!

3. You and fellow band member Gideon are cousins, what are the positives and negatives of working with a family member?

Well the obvious advantage is that there’s a love and trust between you, that is very hard to find, but so important in making music and working together so closely. We also have a lot in common, which is not necessarily the case with family members but is true in our case. The negatives haven’t really come up so far. So I’m not going to mention them for now and hope that we remain a rare case of perfect harmony!

4. You guys have scored a spot on the Laneway Festival Sideshow, what can audiences expect to see when you take the stage?

Yeah, we’re really looking forward to that one. We’re also doing the Queen Vic Night Market in February - it’s nice to have a couple of out door shows over summer. We work hard to really bring our songs to life on stage. Playing live is the essence of what we do and love. You can expect to see four guys digging deep and playing like there’s no tomorrow.

5. With your album release just around the corner, what can we expect from Husky in 2010?

We’ll finish recording the new album over the next couple of months. We’ll be releasing it mid year. Dark Sea is the first of a couple of singles we’re releasing. Then we’ll be spending a lot of time on the road, playing shows. I think that’s the plan for 2010 - Play lots of music!

Quiet Little Rage and Dark Sea are now available to purchase on . You can also find Husky on Myspace and Facebook.

This week, Musicadium team member Trent Moody has interviewed Brisbane indie-pop sextet and recent addition to the Musicadium Family, Ball Park Music.

Check them out on MySpace at http://www.myspace.com/musicfromtheballpark.

You’ve just released a new single Sea Strangers (I Don’t Really Know You), when’s the album coming out and what can we expect from it?

Sam Cromack: We’ve made plans to have a second EP released in late April/early May. I want people to have high expectations and I hope we deliver. We’re planning on five tracks and it will definitely be a more diverse release. We’ve sorted a few bouncy, poppy numbers - that’s come to be expected - but you can also look forward to some elaborate stuff, some wild stuff, some ambience and some melancholy.

Daniel Hanson: Our next release will be an EP that we plan to launch in mid-April, which will feature Sea Strangers, and 4 other tracks that we have been working on over the holiday period. The vibe of the record is mostly positive, with a few twists here and there that contribute to the bands developing sound. The songs will most likely all be hits, but that will be determined a little closer to the release date.

(This particular single was featured as the iTunes single of the week from the 19th January to the 26th.)

6 creative people in a band would be challenging at times, how do you deal with all that creativity when writing songs etc?

Sam Cromack: Sam just tells everyone what to do, and if they don’t obey they are made to prepare him a fresh, delicious meal followed by an hour-long foot massage.

Dean Hanson: We see six creative people in a band as an advantage. We all have quite contrasting taste in musical influence so when it comes to arranging our songs, everyone adds their own flavour to the tracks so to speak, obviously this comes together within reason so we don’t have heavy metal choruses in between folk versus. Often Sam will come up with the lyrics and basic structure to a song and we will build on that.

You have supported quite an impressive list of artists, who was your most memorable and why?

Sam Cromack: Touring with the Hungry Kids of Hungary was a blast, simply because we got to savour the good times over a series of shows. Their home gig at The Zoo was a particularly great gig. Also, I don’t think I’ll ever get sick of watching The Philly Jays: nice songs, nice beards, and instrument smashing.

Um, Jen’s house burnt down? Tell us some more about that.

Sam Cromack: Her younger sister Chloe left a tea-candle burning and the rest is history. I tried to drive through her street on the night it happened, but the roads were blocked and I was forced to take a different route. Sure enough, we received the disastrous phone call and learnt all the bad news. We lost about half our stash of EPs. But yeah, it’s no biggie.

Jennifer Boyce: My sister left a candle lit in her bedroom, which ended up burning the entire house down in about 15 minutes. It was only a few days after our first EP launch and all our CD’s were inside… they got nice and smoked/wet. So our number one advice is NO CANDLES IN THE HOUSE!! She also lost a couple of guitars and amps (as well as just most of her stuff in general). But lots of lovely people have chipped in to get some replacements. Oh and some more advice, have insurance!

Last but not least, what are the hopes and dreams for the future of Ball Park Music?

Sam Cromack: We want to play music, take all your monies and avoid real jobs for ever and ever, Amen.

Purchase Ball Park Music’s music on or follow them on Twitter at http://twitter.com/BallParkMusic!

This week, we are featuring Spearmint Fur’s cute and adorable and just a little bittersweet video for their track, Maybe.

From their MySpace:

Spearmint Fur’s music features smooth melodic vocals over melancholy, spacey and sometimes crashing guitars, and has been likened to bands such as Lush, Pixies, Drugstore, Cranberries, The Sundays, Cocteau Twins and Morrisey just to name a few. The name Spearmint Fur was inspired by an episode of the Canadian TV series Corner Gas. Spearmint Fur is singer songwriter Zadia Lenders, a multi instrumentalist who has been writing songs for many moons.

Check out Spearmint Fur at MySpace, Facebook or buy their album, Immune, at

This week’s featured artists describe themselves as being akin to monkeys in stylish 60’s threads. One thing we did notice at the musicadium office is their nostaglic 60’s rhythm and blues sound are bound to make us go ape! Musicadium’s own Sarah caught up with the The Frowning Clouds monkey man, Zak, to chat about turtlenecks, stripey shirts and a little music thrown in there for good measure.

When one first listens to the Frowning Clouds  there is definitely a nostalgic 60’s feel to the music. As a band, what is it about this era musically that appeals to you?

The girls.

This passion for the 60’s extends right down through to your threads, and reviewers have often commented on your turtleneck sweaters. What is it about turtlenecks that you love? Surely they get a bit hot at the summer festivals?

Yes we do love to dress as nice as possible, turtle necks being one of our favorites. Although, in summer we wear shirt’s and stripey t-shirts more often than not, turtle necks do bring the sweat glands into overdrive.

You’ve been playing a lot of festival gigs over the summer, including The Boroughs and Sandcastles. Do you prefer to play these larger events over smaller, more intimate gigs?

We enjoy playing both just the same, intimate gigs suit our music alot more though. Having said that, festivals are heaps of fun!

You’re playing on the Laneway bill this year – what can punters expect from your show? Who else are you looking forward to checking out?

Yeah we are lucky enough to have the pleasure of JJJ choosing us as Melbourne’s Unearthed winner to play laneway this year, it was quite a surprise ’cause the drummer and I had already bought tickets to go and then we got a call a few weeks later so I’ll have to sell my ticket to somebody. We are all REALLY REALLY looking forward to seeing The Black Lips and Daniel Johnstone.

Lovin’ You 7” has been released through Spanish label Monterrey Records. How did this come about?

We recorded the tracks nearly a year and half ago for a label called ‘Stained Circles’, but we were slack and never got the front cover finished or anything so in the time it took for us to get photos the label had spent all their money on the Jay Reatard anthology (R.I.P). So we had these 3 songs and nothing to do with them, when a friend of mine from Spain who’s in a group called ‘The Phantom Keys’ told us of a friends label who had just started up and wanted to put out a 7 inch. So I just sent him some photos and the songs through the mail and about 2 months later a got a large box filled with about 300 Frowning Clouds 45s.

What artists both nationally and internationally are you excited about at the moment?

I can’t speak for everyone but I’m really into The Black Lips, Thee Oh Sees, The Last Shaddow Puppets, and nationally, I have a friends band from Melbourne called ‘The Process’ and they are really really good.

Finally, what does 2010 hold for The Frowning Clouds?

2010 holds our debut album release, which will be next month, a Sydney tour in early Feb and hopefully if all goes well we COULD be going over to play a garage festival in spain and some shows around a few other european countries.

You can check out The Frowning Clouds through their MySpace or Facebook and their EP is available on

This week, we are featuring one of Brisbane’s newest and exciting acts - Felinedown.  They were one of the highlights of one of Musicadium’s live music showcases in 2009.

They are a fantastic, electro-and-rock outfit - check them out at http://www.myspace.com/felinedown.

To start with a typical question, what’s the story behind the name ‘Felinedown’?
In all honesty a computer offered this name suggestion during a temporary lapse in my ability to tackle the English language (thank you Spellcheck!;) – My lyrics are often inspired by turns of phrase so the play on words is relevant in many aspects. Also it hints I guess at the dark streak our songs tend to have while at the same time poking fun at those same assumptions…half our songs and half our personalities are definitely NOT depressed..more manic pop and sexy rock than shoegaze!

Your debut album mixes rock and electronica. What influenced you to tackle this intriguing sound?
Electronic music is I think for us the key to being endlessly creative; there are no limits to the sounds you can create and beats you can produce.  The Rock and Roll? – well that’s a given; it’s the reason we all found ourselves drawn to play music in the first place, Ashley has firm roots in punk rock but loves the challenge of blending that style with genres like drum & bass.  Glen, well he loves his industrial rock guitars but he also shares his B’day with Jimi Hendrix… need we say more?  Zac’s Indie Rock prowess allows him to fuse the rock and electronic pop elements of our music perfectly. Beau enjoys creating electronic soundscapes in real time which is helping with a more live jam type vibe. And I have been heavily influenced by artists from both Rock and Electronica; from Led Zeppelin to Bjork to the Sneakerpimps.

Is songwriting something that you have to sit down and work at or is it something that just spontaneously pops into your head?
Right now we are writing with our new line up and its changed the process a lot but its also made it much more exciting and reactive. We have more colours to paint with now. Sometimes a melody chases you around all day and at other times you have to really hunt for it with the other members of your band.

You guys are constantly credited for your live performances. What aspects of a gig make you guys pack up at the end of a night and think ‘yep, that was a great show’?
Live shows are such a funny beast. Nights your expecting to be amazing end up being hard work you have to push so hard the whole way through to pull the energy up and bring people in. But other nights when you least expect it the show becomes effortlessly electric and you find yourself beaming at each other like Cheshire Cats halfway through songs.. those are the nights that remind you why you wouldn’t want to do anything else with your life but create music together and connect with your audience. We love making people move so anytime we’ve had the crowd dancing is a great night by us and overrides any worries we might have had.  It makes for a sleepness night when you get home because your still buzzing from the show.

Your striking costumes, Brodie-Ann, definitely grab attention. Do you do any of the design or creation yourself?
Why thank you! As someone with a background in art, theatre and dance the visual aspect of our shows is really important to me. I want the ‘costumes’ to be an extension of the music and for the show to an experience not just another gig.  I do sketch a lot of the designs and concepts out myself and have made pieces for both myself and the guys. I have also been lucky enough to collaborate with local designers and artists such as Lindsay Rose Wilkins and Shilo Englebrecht on pieces for Felinedown. I hope the freedom we feel in the way we dress extends to our fans and that people will come to  know that anything goes at a Felinedown show…One can never have enough leather, feathers  or glitter can one?…

Finally what can we expect from the album coming up next year?
As I mentioned before we are now writing with the new line up and with a year of gigging really hard we have a better idea of what we want to bring to our shows and our sound. The songs are looking faster, more intense and well …fun! Our plan is to combine all the very best things about Felinedown with a stronger more driving beat; then add sexy Moog keys, new Slinky bass lines and hopefully we will be in the business of creating some of the most decadent lush rock electro tunes of 2010!

Felinedown’s Digital EP “FelineDOWNLOAD” (Geddit?) is available on and you can check out their tunes at MySpace.

Everything that you need to know about using Musicadium can be found at our Frequently Asked Questions section - however, there are some things that you may not have thought of or have forgotten about!

Claim your digital outlet Royalties at any time - no waiting for us to send you cheques!

Musicadium uses an online payment system via PayPal for you to pay us for the upload fees required to distribute to the outlets and we also use that system to pay you your royalties - which by the way, you can claim at any time after they have been made available in your account!

If you’ve been wondering “Hey, Musicadium never pays me my royalties!” or “I wonder if I have ever made any sales on iTunes?” - wonder no more.  The reason you’ve never heard from us is because you hold all the power! You can check any time.  The best time to check your account to see if you have made any sales is any time after the 15th of every month.  Some outlets pay Musicadium monthly, others quarterly.

You can check your royalties and request a payout of your royalties into your PayPal account at any time (provided you have more than $20.00 AUD in your account) by logging into your account at http://www.musicadium.com/members/login.

You can use Musicadium as a distribution point for a Digital Record Label

These days, it pays to be as savvy as possible in the Music Industry.  Which means that at least one person in your band probably has a pretty good handle on how to do most things for your band and is constantly learning. That person may even be you.

When it comes to putting out your Music (and possibly others) and releasing to the world, have you thought about about starting your own digital record label?

In terms of distributing music digitally, you could easily become a digital record label and use the endless number of online services to distribute and promote your acts - more importantly, you could use a Musicadium Manage Multiple Artists account to distribute numerous artists on your label. You can either create a new account at http://www.musicadium.com or email support@musicadium.com to request to have your account changed over to a Manage Multiple Artists account.

Example: Come up with the name of your record label. Sign up to Musicadium under a manage multiple artists account.  You are then able to add the releases of numerous artists and manage the accounts/royalties for each of these artists. Disseminate royalties to artists when we pay you!

We’ll leave whatever business model you wish to implement for your label up to you, but you could be helping to bring the other bands you love to the rest of the world’s attention! Everyone wins!

Musicadium can deliver your music to radio stations around Australia

Time and time again, we have seen that radio play can significantly influence the amount of digital sales made. That’s why it only makes sense that we help you out by making it easy to get your tunes there for public listening pleasure!

Musicadium has a contract with D-Star MPE - a digital delivery to Radio (not a radio plugger) service - to supply them with the latest and greatest tracks to play on their shows.

If you would like to know more about how this all works and the kind of packages we offer for this, check out http://www.musicadium.com/dstar-mpe.

We distribute video clips to iTunes

One of the topics written about at length in numerous blogs is that a great film clip is almost necessary these days.

But what do with that film clip once recorded? Rage? Video Hits? YouTube? iTunes?

We distribute film clips to iTunes - if you would like to know more about how to distribute these, shoot an email to info@musicadium.com.

We run showcase events (and we are looking to put on events in different places!)

3-4 times a year in Brisbane, we put on showcase events at BarSoma!

If you are a band distributed by Musicadium and would like to register your interest in playing at one of the showcase gigs we put on, shoot an email to Tim - tim@musicadium.com.

Are you in the music industry? a music fan? or a music maker?

Dates: Wednesday 24 February – Friday 26 February 2010

FUSE Festival is the longest running music industry conference and showcase festival of its type in Australia, taking place in Adelaide from the 24th-26th of February 2010. It features 3 days of seminars, talks, round table discussions and songwriting and management masterclasses with the industry’s leading professionals alongside two nights of FUSE LIVE gigs (EXPLODE! and IGNITION) jam-packed with the best in new music from across the nation.

FUSE LIVE kicks off with EXPLODE! on Wednesday 24th of February in Rymill Park showcasing more than 14 export ready acts on two stages in one compact-festival site! In 2009, over 1,000 music fans experienced a truly special night under the stars with the nations finest acts.

IGNITION, the open access showcase on Thursday the 25th of February, allows any acts registering the opportunity to perform live. Last year over 60 bands performed in 20 venues across the Adelaide CBD. Artists confirmed to perform at the FUSE Festival in 2010 include The Touch, and Vorn Doolette and (Musicadium Artists!) The Shiny Brights. Past performers include Pete Murray, Hilltop Hoods, The Audreys, Dappled Cities, Cloud Control and City Riots.

IGNITION Registrations are still open, so for your chance to play in front of some of the music industry’s leading professionals, as well as attend the Conference and associated networking events visit our Festival Gig listing on Sonicbids (open Jan 11th) or go to the FUSE FESTIVAL REGISTRATION PAGE.