Inhale deeply.
Ok.
Prime Circle are coming to South Africa.
Exhale.

...along with alt rock trophy-bearers Korn (cool site), Good Charlotte, 'Best UK Live Act' Kaiser Chiefs (hey, they even mentioned something about pigeons!), vocal superman Chris Cornell and some band called Muse or whatever.

Now: a buddy of mine who manages Cape Town alt rockers Southpaw and is planning to get the band on the bill for the March 24th concert comes up to me yesterday in our frightfully boring office space.

"Would you let them play for free?" I asked.
"Definitely! With that kind of exposure, for sure," he answered with a grin.

The debate is ongoing: For R600 a ticket, can Big Concerts afford to throw the local acts a bone when festival newbies like Southpaw are gonna fight to offer quality music for free anyway? I, personally, sympathise with bands forced to organise their own flights and costs out of pocket.

But moreso with an industry that is somehow expected to compete on a first-world level. Especially when organisers - ordinary people like you and me - get caught in the crossfire from cookie-soft 19-year-olds expecting their boyfriend's band to 'just get paid.' This is a 13-year-old country, after all.

But we're getting there. And by that, I mean keep an eye on Overtone.co.za. Smiles and coffee.

Today's cooing:

Listened to the new Amon Tobin yesterday - The Foley Room. Somewhere between having your neural pathways play hide-and-seek and an outdoor tea and vodka party where everyone's knocking over the cast iron chairs.

• hooked up with Dan Caleb last night: the guy's working at the biggest studio in Cape Town. He also wrote this amazing African song for this chick he wants to bang. She's keen. Asked him to help out with The Kuleshov Effect.
  
• The Springboks parade through the city today! RAAAAAAHRRRRR!!!!!

Man. It's all about me today, I'm afraid. Two awesome nights, and a chance to catch up, finally!

Let's do this anti-retro-circum-chronologically. Last night: Balkanology. Wicked idea, to catch the upper niche by throwing the whackest party this side of Novi Sad. Everything was weird.

Thursday night: Coffee Bean. Got off the stage, stood in the middle of everyone and did my show there. Much better. Did a recently revamped A Man Appeared and Burn, and it was something totally different to the usual singalong copycat stuff. Fresh, even to me, and I got the idea that it was, once again, the beginning of something new. Awesome feeling actually doing what you mean to do.

So with this new passion, I tackle the small, open mike gigs. Looking forward to it.

The news of the century (and possibly a happy tipping point for digital rights-managed music producers) is that iTunes has buckled under market pressure by reducing copyright-free tracks to below a dollar. Yaaay!

More important than the 30c per track that buyers will now save is letting the popularity of the music speak for itself, rather than being regurgitated and forcefed to an ignorant, hungry audience. Pigeons, I tell you.

It's about time that a price war put the strings back on the guitar of the consumer. Hey, even if we don't buy that many mp3s online down here in Cape Town, we are feeling the sting of being burdened with an industry that is disproportionately scarce in supporting upcoming creatives.

But boo-&$*#ing-hoo. Let the games begin!

Today's links:
iTunes - AmazonMP3



Today's cooing:

Three-hour meeting with the Key Watermelon last night regarding the future of the SA Music industry. Let's just say, as before, that wheels are turning. Also ran into Toby2Shoes at this new place in Stocks called Jamaican Me Crazy (and found out that his brother plays flute in Freshlyground). New live music venue?

Holding thumbs for a pair of passes to Balkanology -- got in touch with Ma'or and stuck up some press. Hey, this pigeon stopped paying for parties a while ago.

On Saturday, I interviewed Kidofdoom and The Beams and man, I gotta say, I wanna promote these upcoming two bands honestly and openly.

Gushfest aside, the SA indietronic/dance-rock act of the moment -- four-piece vocal-free synth rockers Kidofdoom -- made the Armchair an unrecognisable event venue with a well rehearsed and thoroughly enjoyed set and a superb, travelling lighting setup (Peter) that kept cameras going.

Seriously, there was an atmosphere of awe. Someone said earlier, "I haven't seen Facebook invites, I haven't seen posters. This is all word of mouth, dude."

The tendency I've noticed is for SA music to be self-congratulatory. But (finally meeting) and chatting to Unit.R's hypothetical frontman (and regular poster on TheMuso) Goran for some of the show was refreshingly informative. His take?

"I love this band. They've branded themselves with the hip crowd and gone with it." (that's a quote from the bottom of the bottle, but you get the idea.)

Hip crowd indeed. The word, people over 25, is 8-bit/disco-rock. That's the scene, that's the trend, that's the theme for the now two-year-old Sovereign Academy and the growing legion of pin-adorning, post-Fischerspooner candy-stripers. Think disco with a rock fungus growing under its armpits.

There is waaaaay too much going through this pedantic pigeon's mind to try and express right now, so expect a gentle shiatsu of throwbacks to the 2007 Sovereign Academy Cape Town Tour over the next few days. Congrats to Dom and the crew for organising, Carlo for his stellar work behind the sound desk and Major Tom for making the mission in slippers, tweed pants and crutches.


Today's links:

• Check out the complete rundown from the pre-show media "conference", if you can call it that.
• super-inspired by the ruthless journalism expressed by 24.com's entertainment writer Zane Henry on Rocking the Daisies

Today's cooing:

• DJ Sassquatch: what a nice guy. Check out his take on the scene in my first-time video interview with a local musician

Well, the party I single-handedly organised last night was nothing amazing. The venue looked amazing, but the turnout was less than I had hoped for or expected, but hey! I wanted to bang that drum and by heaven, I banged it. Of course, having a DJ and a full drum kit flanking you on the stage is another way for a feller like me to get high, naturally...

Thanks once again to John Yarnold and Jon Henwood (BKS) for keeping time. John, John and Jon. Flippin' hell.

So, I'm at a bit of a crossroads now. Every organiser I've spoken to says that the job is a flippin' mission, and not worth it. But there's something magic in this air, and I think with a bit of a business plan and some dedicated friends, there's nothing stopping us from putting some of these ideas into form.

That's all that everything is about, really.

Today's bragging:

• got a date to record some violin parts for a sound producer called Katherine on Monday at Cape Audio College. Last time I was there, I made her cry.
• got DJ Sassquatch to agree to an interview. Siiiick...
• got a brilliant idea for the Kidofdoom interview ahead of their Saturday album release, but sshhhhh....