Show 481 Monday 27 August

Watch today's show at YouTube or BlipTV.

Hi, I’m Sarah. Welcome to The Daily English Show.

Today’s guest is Josh. You may know him as AdviceToMyClones.
And today’s show is very exciting because this is the first time I have interviewed someone that I have never actually met. Well, we’ve met online – but not actually in person.
So I just sent him the questions and he answered them on video and then sent me the video.
Josh is a musician and he’s really good. At least I think so. You should check out his music ... especially this one, I think, is excellent. And it’s great for studying English because you can read along.
My first question for Josh was: Why do you put videos on YouTube?

:44
I think the interactivity is really the main thing that has really hooked me in. There’s lots of little reasons, ah, behind all the, the individual videos and all that kind of stuff. But, um, really just the people ah, that you can meet and talk to and interact with and communicate with over YouTube is the strength of the whole system.

STICK NEWS

Kia Ora, this is Stick News. Greece has declared a state of emergency. More than 60 people have died in the last three days in forest fires.

Wikipedia says Greece is regarded as the cradle of western civilization.
It is also the birthplace of democracy, Western philosophy, the Olympic Games, Western literature, political science, major scientific principles and drama.
Right now Greece is also famous for its forest fires.
Since June, there have been over 3,000 forest fires in Greece.
And 72 people have died.
According to CNN, the Greece government has said some of fires may have been caused by arson. But environmental experts have expressed skepticism.
The Greek Prime Minister declared a state of emergency.

And that was Stick News for Monday the 27th of August.
Kia Ora.

conversations with sarah
#296 What is your dream with music?

Step 1: Repeat Sarah’s lines.
Step 2: Read Sarah’s lines and talk to Josh.

Sarah How long have you been playing the guitar?

Josh About 12 years. I played piano before that. Ah, I bought a guitar at a pawn shop in Iowa, ah, while I was visiting relatives. And beat the heck out of my fingers learning to play guitar on this beat up ah, used guitar. Um, but it was well worth it. I no longer have that guitar which was rather viscous to play. Um, but I love, love, love the guitars I have now. It’s very hard for me to go a couple of days without playing them. In fact, if I walk by them and see them, I’m always tempted to pick them up and just start playing. So, occasionally makes me late for things I shouldn’t be late for.

Sarah How long does it usually take to write a song?

3:44

Josh That really varies. Ahh, usually, I’m going to guess about two hours. That’d be about how long it takes from start to finish. And that can be spread out over one night, or a week, or months sometimes. I’ve had songs that I’ve been working on for years and just they didn’t quite come together yet. But I’ll keep at it.

Sarah What is your dream with music?

4:02

Josh Um, I think my number one dream is just to get better at it. Ah, song writing’s definitely my favorite part of the whole process.
So any time I can figure out a way to, you know, wind a melody through ah, chord changes in some new way, is always, ah, spectacular for, for me to do. I just love that part of it. Um, but it would be nice to get better at the instruments or to get better at singing would actually really make me very, very happy, if I could somehow figure out how to do that.

Sarah Are you a full-time musician? If not, would you like to be?

Josh Ah, I’m not a full-time musician and I would love to be. Ah, music is the most fun thing I have ah, found to spend my time doing. And so if I could do it all the time, you’d better believe I would do it.

Sarah Do you also perform live?

Josh I used to. I have not performed live in quite a while. Ah, but now that some of my friends here in Los Angeles have figured out what I’m up to with the YouTube music stuff, they are definitely putting the pressure on to do a live performance. So I’m pretty sure I’ll do it. I’m pretty shy about getting started with that stuff. But ah, I’ll do it. And you can believe that I’ll take my camera along with me. So if you start seeing videos on the channel with me, it looks like I’m in a coffee shop or something, I’ve finally got the courage up to ah, to do some more live shows.

Sarah How different is the feedback you get performing live and the feedback you get on YouTube?

5:17

Josh Ah, yeah, it’s actually, the actual feedback you get is very similar, it’s just the, ah, rate you get it back at. Ah, when you’re performing live, you know, if you do something, do a vocal section that’s really great, or you do a wrong note on the guitar, like the feedback you get’s right then and there. You can, you know, watch the reaction of the audience and know right away how it’s working out.
Um, and sometimes that’s good because you can play into the stuff that the specific audience like. Like every audience is different because everybody likes different things. So, you can use that sometimes to improve the show. Um, YouTube, a little different in that you go ahead and record a performance and then you just put it out there. Um, so you’re still going to get the feedback. But the feedback might come a day later, it might come a week later, months later. Um, and it might even be more detailed because the people can go back and watch it a couple of times and tell you: “Hey, you know, first time through I liked this, second and third time through, actually this part of it stood out more to me.” Ah, stuff like that. So, both different, but both very useful.

Sarah Have you ever sold your music? If not, would you like to?

6:17

Josh I’ve never actually sold my music. I did help a local artist ah, produce her CD. So I did a lot of song writing and got to work in a studio and that kind of stuff. It was really fun. I didn’t actually make any money on it, so ... I would like to though, so I’ll let you know if I work out a way to do that.

Sarah What kind of effect has the feedback from YouTube had on your music?

6:36

Josh That’s um, that’s a really good question. The ... feedback for me overall has been positive. Now, not all my feedback in itself has been positive, but the effect has been. Um, I’ve definitely gotten criticism and that kind of stuff. And at this point I actually like the criticism. Because it helps you really quickly pinpoint stuff that’s working and not working. Um, but just having ah, enough videos up where I can go back through and say, OK, well in this video I got some comments saying they like the vocals and on this video they like the intro. And stuff like that, you can kind of, you can kind of decide, well OK this is stuff that’s really working and if I want to continue these other parts of the music, I’m going to have to really, you know, put a lot of effort into making it something that, that people ah, enjoy a little bit more.

Sarah How do you think YouTube is changing the music industry?

7:20

Josh Ah, I would say, it definitely is. But that at this point, it’s, it’s kind of slow in the changes it’s making. But I don’t see that being slow for very much longer. Ah, and I think a lot of that’s because the music industry just hasn’t figured out how to really harness the power of YouTube. Like the interactivity, which is really what they are going to need to do.
Um, but I have seen that it’s definitely helping out independent artists. Um, because it’s a very cost effective way to ah, connect with the fan base. Ah, most of the people that ah, listen to my music ... are in places that I would probably would never play to um, any other way than to just have a video up on YouTube. Ah, geographically, they’re, they’re all over the place, and I just wouldn’t have any way to reach them without YouTube. Um, so it’s definitely helping out in that respect. Ah, and I’ve seen some artists who are really pushing the limit on what you can do with it, where they will ah – and these are, these are big name artists – they will, ah, basically do a video log to their fans saying: “Hey, here’s a new song, ah, I want to play it for you guys first. And what I would really like for you guys to do is to maybe cover my song, or to lip-sync my song, something like that, and send me back a video.”
And, ah, you know, of course the fans, love ... to do anything like that. So, when the video responses come back, some of the artists will even take those video responses and turn them into like a music video of their fans actually performing their songs - which is a ridiculously good idea. And ah, you know, send that back out to the fans and say: “Here’s something, you know, that I can, I can do for you guys, because I liked what you guys did for me.”
So, stuff like that, I think is really, the kind of stuff that the music industry’s going to have to, to dig into to ... to, to really, to really, use like what YouTube can do for their artists, stuff like that. But as far as for independent people, it’s, it’s amazing. It’s just, it’s a great, great, great, tool for finding people who like what you do.

links

today's news

today's STICK NEWS pictures

music

show start, cws start, qa start
artist: Matthew Tyas
album: Music for the movies vol1
tracks: Superheros, Intellectuel, Three ways to run away
from: Oloron Sainte-Marie, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site

qa bgm
artist: San Sebastian
track: mellow
artist site

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