In no particular order:

1. City and Colour – Bring Me Your Love
2. Band of Gypsies – Band of Gypsies
3. Brian Vander Ark – Resurrection
4. Eric Clapton – Unplugged
5. James Taylor – Sweet Baby James
6. Pearl Jam – VS
7. Bob Dylan – Highway 61 Revisited
8. Ryan Adams – Gold
9. Led Zeppelin – IV
10. R.E.M. – Automatic for the People

• Doors 6:30 PM
• Get tickets for $7 here at Fusionshows.com
• First 100 people (21+) through the door get a free drink

Fusion Shows have put together summer tribute sets, and I’ll be playing a full set of REM!

All songs with Stuart Tucker on percussion

1. Intelligent Fool
2. I Just Want to Be Your Last
3. Drift Away (Dobie Gray cover)
4. Only the Rain Knows Why
5. Faster Than Slow
6. Damn Fine Day
7. Kalamazoo
8. Love & Be Proud
9. Empty Cup
10. I Will
11. Ohio (with Paul Federici) (Neil Young cover)
12. Made a Mess
13. Cecilia -> Mrs. Robinson (Simon & Garfunkle medley)
14. Julie’s Monster
15. 500 Miles (with Paul Federici) (Proclaimer’s cover)
16. Driftwood (with Paul Federici)
17. Wonderwall (will Paul Federici) (Oasis cover)
18. Love Birds

Paul Federici opening the show and performing on the crow's nest stage at the Raven Cafe

1. I Just Want to Be Your Last
2. I Will
3. Made a Mess (with Hannah Fralick)
4. Damn Fine Day (with Hannah Fralick)
5. Driftwood
6. 500 Miles (with Paul Federici and Cory Glover)

Photo credit: Natalie BurgL o R: Cory Glover, Paul Federici, Mike Vial

• 8 PM -12 PM
• No cover
• Solo acoustic

• 7-10 PM
• Solo acoustic
• No cover

Thursday, May 10 – Paul will be on Pam Rossi’s Show @ uDetroit.com (noon), MI – info
Thursday, May 10 – Cafe 1923, Hamtramck, MI (6:30 PM) – info
Friday, May 11 – Wrought Iron Grill, Owosso, MI (8 PM) – info
Saturday, May 12 – Rust Belt Market, Ferndale, MI (3:15 PM) – info
Saturday, May 12 – House Concert, Flint, MI (7 PM) – info
Sunday, May 13 – Raven Cafe – Port Huron, MI (6 PM) – info

Paul and I met last fall at Catherine North Studios when we were both working on projects with producer Michael Chambers. His first release is a beautiful arrangement of reflective themes with similarity of City and Colour. The songs with Kirk Starkey  on cello are captivating. (Kirk also played on my song “I Will.”)

I’m exciting to bring Paul here for his first musical appearance in Michigan. He’s one of those kind-hearted Canadians who you can become friends with after a 20 minute conversation, and it’s been a blessing to have friends across the Ambassador Bridge who are passionate about music and art.

Paul invited me to play at his CD Release show in St. Catherines in January! I survived a snow storm on the 402 making my commute a 9 hour drive to get there for a fun night of music. Fortunately, Paul should have better weather traveling to Michigan!

• 6:30 PM – 9 PM
• Playing an acoustic set of originals with Stuart Tucker on percussion
• Open act is Paul Federici (St. Catherines, Ontario)
• No cover, all ages

I’m touring the mitten with my friend Paul Federici, and we have a stop in Detroit on Thursday, May 10 after Paul’s podcast at uDetroit cafe that morning.

I feel so inspired about the story of how Graceland was recorded, how Paul and the producer just recorded jams and then took those ideas and wrote songs from them.

I also am inspired about how the story of the creation of Graceland emphasizes how “failure” can allow freedom (and time) for creativity!  Paul Simon describes how the commercial failure of Hearts and Bones allowed him to go off on a journey, since no one was really paying attention to him, and just create something new.

There are some powerful quotes from musicians in the movie that I’ve want to type out to remember them:

1. “The beast in the human is to tell yourself something is wrong when it’s right and something is right when it’s wrong.”
2. “Art shouldn’t instruct, it should invoke…”

Hope everyone is having a nice week.

Video here:

And here’s the full song:

Did you hear that music by Oliver Tank? It’s melodic, rhythmic, interesting, gorgeous.

The purpose of my writing today isn’t to talk about the important topic addressed in the video (I’d love to join that discussion elsewhere); instead, I want to talk about another set of rights that are indirectly ignored: The rights of the musician and composer.

You see, we don’t think about it, but that song that’s being used in the video is owned by someone. And I’m betting that someone got paid a nice, little sync fee to be used in that video!

Sync licensing for one-off works on the Internet is going to another way to get paid as a musician. Little companies that handle these type of licensing are starting to pop up.

I’m not talking about TV and film placements. I’m talking about smaller syncs. These placements for one off videos might pay $50, 100, 200 bucks, and they would not be for radio or film distrubtion. Musicians/composers/writers are now able to find opportunities for smaller monetizations, and not only chase the bigger placements (Grey’s Anatomy, feature films, pitching a song to say, Toby Keith).

If you read the comments of the song’s Youtube clip, one person mentioned, “This video placement has gotten Oliver Tank more exposure than a label could have…”

So true! Honestly, most people who watch that video won’t think about the song enough to look up who it composed it, but people like me who seek out music obsessively will. And guess what. Those are the people Oliver wants to attract!

Well, and more film makers willing to a pay sync fees.