homes, apartments and Pandora

I haven’t been blogging lately.  I’ve been busy.  Moving.  It feels so good to have sold that house and be out of it I can’t even tell you.   Everyday I talk to someone else who’s losing their house or short-selling.  It’s just crazy out there.

I’m loving apartment living.  I considered getting (buying) a new place – a condo or townhouse – for a few weeks.  Went crazy looking at listings and getting excited.  There’s a lot of bargains out there.

Then my air conditioning went out.  I called the apartment management.  Someone was over to fix it within a few hours.  No charge of course.

It made me re-visit the thought of buying again.  Well, what if my refrigerator breaks?  Plumbing, air conditioning, etc…….   No.  I think I’m done home-owning for awhile.  That’s just where I’m at today,

Meantime, I just went to the Pandora site and submitted my music for consideration for inclusion.  (Submission #23).  They say right in the FAQs they get a ton of submissions and don’t accept a lot of indies, but ya gotta try, right?

 

 

 

Submission #23.

SOLD THE HOUSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok.  So I haven’t blogged in awhile.  And I left all 3 of you who may’ve been following my “50 Submissions Marketing Campaign” high and dry.  But I’m no slacker.  I’ve been busy.

Yep.  We sold the house.  Twice actually.  The first time for the fun roller coaster ride (not) of selling, jumping through 1000 hoops and then the buyer backing out for some lame ass reason even he didn’t believe.  But the second time, for real!  We closed escrow last week.

Then while all this was going on, for the first two weeks of August I was doing my one-woman show at the Herberger.   It went great and we shot some great video which I’ll post when it’s ready.

So, like I said, been busy.

I can’t begin to tell you how good it feels to be out of the weight of that house!   I’ll be jumping back on the album marketing horse again in the very near future.  There’s still have a ways to go to make it to 50.

 

 

 

 

 

Bringin’ out the big guns

Apologies for the “ammo” talk, but I’m going to “bite the bullet” and hire Mi2N to do an internet marketing campaign.  My original intention was to do this all for free, but the cost for the Mi2N campaign is surprisingly reasonable, and their PR reach for the price makes my little “50 Submission” campaign look like “[expelling water] in the wind.”

But hey, my “50 Submission” campaign brought me to this place (and I still have a bunch more to do), so the way I look at it is, I’m now taking one of my earlier submissions geometric:)

Let’s see where this all goes.

Submission #20  PRFree Release Service
Submission #21   PR.Com
Submission #22  Mi2N (for marketing campaign this time)

Scary and Weird out there

It’s getting scary and weird out there.  A lot of my formerly comfortable friends are having serious financial concerns.  Everyone I talk to.

We just lowered the price (again) today so we can give away  sell this house.  The limbo stick has finally gotten as far down as it can go without chopping off a nose or two, so either it sells at this price or  we have to come up with another plan.

I’m thankful for the little things right now, which in the scheme of things, are pretty big things.  1) My house mortgage is not underwater.
2) My house is not underwater.  Apparently in some states, houses are.
3)  I’m self-employed.  Not the richest kid on the block, but as I found myself remarking to another self-employed friend today, there’s always somewhere/someway to make 50 bucks.   Everyday I’m hearing about people losing good jobs, and then can’t find another.

Ok.  Here’s the weird news.  In China last week, apparently a “mirage” of a city with mountains and buildings appeared in the fog.    Is this for real?  What’s going on out there?

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Ahwatukee Restaurant Closings

My friend and fellow Ahwatukee resident, GM called me last night and asked if I wanted to meet him for a drink at a favorite local watering hole, “Rock Bottom”, which was closing.  This was their last night open.

Rock Bottom is a chain and as far as I know, other locations were still open, but ours was closing.  I haven’t been a big Rock Bottom patron, but GM has, and he said he was feeling a little sentimental about it.  So we met at Rock Bottom and it was actually pretty crowded and I said “Wow – this doesn’t look like a recession here.”

GM said he had also come here the night before and it was crowded and he said something like that to the waitress and she said, “if it was always like this, they wouldn’t be closing.”

GM likes beer and Rock Bottom has a pretty big selection of home-brews, but it took  GM about 4 different requests till he finally got to one they still had.  Apparently they were just letting everything run out.  We also only got our 2nd choice for appetizers, (out of the asiago cheese dip), the firecracker shrimp, which I thought was a little too sweet and bready.

GM told me about another local restaurant that had just closed it’s doors last week; a Chinese restaurant I used to go to with my family and has been a local fixture for over 20 years.  GM also shared with me something interesting he had learned about the Chinese restaurant’s closing.

Apparently, patrons who had used credit cards there during the final days were now getting charges run up on their credit cards for over $400.  This had happened to enough people that now the police were getting involved.  I don’t know the whole story of course, but if someone trying to eek out a few extra bucks via 11th hour fraud, how could anyone think they could get away with that?!  Desperate times, desperate people.

GM said he used to really like the “Volcano Grill”, which closed here a few years ago.  I remember that place even before it became Volcano Grill.  I think it was called “PJs” or something like that.  I just remember it was a pretty great restaurant and the first place we discovered, that we really liked, shortly after we had moved to Arizona.

My then 4-year-old son wanted to order the rattlesnake.  I don’t remember whether we got it for him or not, but I understand it tastes like chicken.

Music Industry News Network

is a place where you definitely need to send your press release for anything industry-related.  I submitted mine today and they put it right up.

When I went to the TAXI conference last November I played one of my songs for a radio promoter and I said “I wonder if you could tell me what genre this is” and he said “That’s easy.  You’re “Adult Album Alternative.”    Then he offered when my new CD was done, if I sent it to him he’d let me know which song was the most likely radio hit.  So I sent an e-mail inquiry out to him today.

I submitted a press release to Alt Press  (“Features reviews, news, and features for fans of alternative, indie, ska, electronic, dub, industrial, punk, techno, underground, rock, …”)

The Music Connection site was working today, so I registered as a member.  It’s free, but you have to be a member before you can submit a CD for review, and it can take 24 hours before your membership goes through, but then I’ll be able to submit there.

Submissions #15-#19

The upside of a root canal

I went back to my dentist this morning to get the crown. He began discussing with the hygienist to just give me a topical and I’m like, “Wait a minute there! If you’re going to be drilling, etc. I want the serious stuff!!!”

Then the dentist reminded me, I had had a root canal on that tooth – the nerves removed! I shouldn’t feel anything.

He was right. Wow. I sat in that chair for almost 2 hours getting drilled on and didn’t feel a thing!

I can still think of at least 100 things I would’ve rather been doing, but at least it didn’t hurt and I didn’t have to walk around with half my face numb for half the day.

Submissions #9-#14

I got a little derailed with all the dental excitement last week, but found myself with a lot of time today staring out my office window waiting for the real estate agent to arrive with prospective buyers.  He gave me a 4-hour window, and we’re in the bottom of the 3rd.

I had wanted to get in more rehearsal time today than I did, but didn’t want to be caught in the middle of singing or dancing around when the realtor and clients showed up at the door.  Usually they knock, but sometimes they don’t.

Anyway, today’s submissions:

#9   Pitchfork - a top music blog
#10 Coast to Coast Radio with George Noory - my favorite radio show.  They even have a Sunday evening show for emerging artists.  I think my songs “That Was Before the World Changed” or “Ghosts” would be perfect.
#11  All Music Guide  - a popular blog and guide to new releases
#12 KCRW  - a top radio station (regular & internet) based out of Los Angeles.  They also do the popular indy music show, “Morning Becomes Eclectic”
#13  NPR All Songs Considered : “The place to discover new music”
#14 The Krush 92.5: radio station with blog in San Luis Obispo, California’s Central Coast.  I tour through there and one my contacts recommended it as a good place to submit.

Good News! A Root Canal!

So last month I went to my dentist for a routine appointment and my hygienist gave me an A+, but then when my dentist went to take a look, he discovered a crack in one of my teeth.  He told me I would need to make another appointment to come in for a crown.

So on Tuesday I went in to get my crown, and after being there for about a 1/2 hour through numbing and drilling, he said, “Uh oh.  There’s something here we hadn’t anticipated.”

(Don’t you love it when doctors says stuff like that?)

He said that when he drilled in to take out the old filling to replace it with a crown, he saw the root was exposed, so I would need to go to an endodontist to have it cleaned out before he could crown it.  So his office called a local endodontist and said I could come right over.

As I was preparing to leave the office, the receptionist said, “Give us a call after you get your root canal so we can reschedule your crown.”

WHAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!?  No one had said anything about a root canal!  I flew into a panic, didn’t know what to do.  Was there an alternative?

After stressing and driving around like a crazy person for about an hour, I rescheduled the appointment for Friday morning and went home to do some research, and freak out a little more.

I found out the only alternative is sometimes you can seal off the root, and then cap it.  Other than that, the only alternative is to remove the tooth, to prevent infection.

My dentist called me later in the day, concerned why I didn’t take the appointment they had set up for me.  I said, “You didn’t tell me ‘root canal’.”  He said yeah, sometimes when they use that word people go into a panic.  (oh really?)

I said “I wasn’t ready.  I needed to do some research first.  How about the option of sealing off the root, and then capping over that?”

He said, “That’s what was done the first time, and the filling was put over that. But I wouldn’t recommend that again, if it were my tooth.  Besides, I’ve already begun the root canal process by removing the pulp from the tooth.”

I asked, “Does the pulp ever grow back?”

He said, “No.”

So this morning, I went to the endodontist for the root canal.  Before he started the procedure, he said “I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to do this.  There’s a crack in the tooth and I’ll have to see how deep the crack goes.  If it’s too deep, we can’t do the root canal because there would be too much risk for infection getting in.  So if that’s the case, we’ll have to send you to an oral surgeon to have the tooth extracted  (i.e. ripped out of your head).

About an hour into the process, he gave me the good news, “The crack’s not that bad. We’re going to do the root canal!”

YAY!  Break out the champagne!

It’s all relative, isn’t it?

(btw – it wasn’t that bad.  Only 2 parts hurt; the numbing needle in the roof of my mouth, and the bill)

Submitting to Magazines for Reviews

I sent out CDs to two magazine’s today to hopefully get some reviews:

PASTE MAGAZINE (Submission #7): magazine with alternative and indie music reviews and news, and
PERFORMER MAGAZINE (Submission #8): The largest musicians’ trade publication in the United States. It features reviews and interviews with the best unsigned performers.

There’s a site that’s been recommended to me called “ReviewYou.Com” that I checked out and if you pay them $40.00, you get 3 reviews.  I put that one on the backburner as a last resort.  I’ve never paid for a review, but if I ever have to, it’s good to know it’s there.

Update:  Jango Radio‘s been playing my song, “Phoenix” all week and the stats say it’s most popular with females ages 35-44 who are also fans of “Creedance Clearwater Revival.”