PEOPLE ARE AMAZING

One thing I have learned is that biting my tongue and keeping my opinions to myself when people are unethical, and disgusting is not the answer.  If no one says anything they are allowed to continue.  A good friend of mine taught me that.  Thank you Sis.  When Mankind first made the remark about me and referred to me in the way that he did in one of my previous posts, we were talking about it.  About how soooo many people will discuss him behind his back always in whispers, yet no one is ever strong enough to say anything.  I decided that I was not going to be one that hid or had to continually bite my tongue when something was seriously wrong.  Many will dislike me for this...but there is a belief that if what you say and do can not be put on the front page of the New York Times, you should not be saying or doing it...especially in the written word.  I have a pet peeve and it is people that use people and they do so through deception.  So I will voice my opinions as I believe that SL is filled with so many people that do things solely with their heart, yet they become used to further one or two people's personal agendas.

The other day, I was speaking to someone, regarding the group meeting in that I had written about before.  I knew there was always an agenda behind anything this person did but I had not figured out what it was.  Then it hit me.  I maybe completely wrong in this way of thinking, but here is my thought process.  When I first started BS's, we opened in a big way that drew attention.  Mankind Tracer approached me to get me to see how the Cover Charge System would be so good for everyone around.  I will be honest and say that I fell for it.  By the time the actual meeting took place on my venue for venue owners to get them to buy into the Cover Charge System, I realized that I would never do that with my venue.  At the time performers that were regular with me, questioned a great deal and I truly had to take a public stance stating that BS's would not be a Cover Charge System but that I would always seek out ways to help the performers and the venues always keeping music free in SL.

During the original meeting at my venue almost a yer and a half ago, i and a couple of other venue owners distinctly remember Mankind saying that he would offer his cover charge system free to them but that later he would sell them.  Now here we are again, at the last group meeting and he is once again pushing the Cover Charge System and angry with me because I repeated the same opinion.  I could not figure out an agenda...then the other day in that conversation with another group owner it hit me.  The push for the Cover Charge System again.  Is it about lining one or two people's pockets with lindens as they attempt to sell the CCS?  hmmmmmm makes one wonder.

Tomorrow I will tell how at least one person has a way to keep their groups in such high numbers.....talk about innovative ideas.

Learning that it works

I realize that two blogs in one day is a bit much, but the earlier one regarding the venues was due out a couple of days ago and I have been under the weather, it was started and never completed.  I apologize for that.


Today I had the pleasure of attending a meeting with another type of group in the arts.  Though the meeting had everything to do with something I am working on for RFL and nothing to do with live music in SL, the meeting itself made me realize that they are doing what we have only talked about doing.

With the call to come together as a communtiy, many including myself support a voted in type body that has the ability to speak for the community as a whole.  What would give them that right is that the community as a whole actually voted on who they would see represent them.  There has been arguments by some that it is not neeeded, I beg to differ.  Today I had the benefit of learning of a part of the arts community that does just that.  I was thoroughly impressed.  It brought that community together as a team.  They also have Lindens involved. but the organization and structure and fairness of it all was so very impressive.  They do not need a group owner....The team work involved was amazing.  The last time I checked some things have never changed that includes the quote "There is no I in team" 


I have ideas as I know others do as well in ways to help the music community come together as a whole, without the attitude that if you don't like it you can leave as the community should embrace every single performer, venue owner, and manager.  Everyone has different opinions on the way things should or should not be done to increase exposure to SL music.  When one thinks of the hundreds/thousands that are involved in the music community, a group of 60 or 70 or even 100 is nothing.  So just maybe the way actually falls into listening to all, and finding the many different ways that we can work together to increase exposure.  I, myself, would love to hear from you and hear what you think would be great ways to expand our exposure, and if you have thought of a way to do that.  It is only in hearing from all of us, that something can truly be done. 

We can nit pick about the small things and taking on LL, but the answers don't lie in that.  The answers, in my opinion lie in increasing exposure. More exposure leads to larger followings, more traffic, better for the performer and the venue.  So lets hear your ideas.  We all have them, some are louder than others with their opinions, but we all do have them.  Lets see what we as a community come up with.

SL Music Venues and Thank you

I know I said I was going to talk about live music venues and the very special people that run them; but first I wanted to address something else.  So many have contacted me through both facebook and inworld, iin regards to the post about the meeting.  Some of you wanted more information on the meeting, it sounds like you missed the notices or minutes and I will send you copies of the minutes...at the same time many of you wanted to know who had the audacity to say that about me.  Most of you know me well enough to know that if asked, I don't lie, I just bluntly state the truth.  I know that upon learning that answer many of you have been shocked and appalled, but also gave me 100% support and for that I thank you each of you soooo very much.  The compassion you show me is so very touching and means such a great deal.

Now on to these wonderful things called live music venues and the people that run them.  I would like to clarify that I do not personally know of one live music venue that does this for any type of profit.  Every venue is built with an idea and a love of music.  A love so strong that they want to share it with the rest of the world.  Behind every venue is a story a passion.  Some that come to mind off the top of my head.  Titanic and Mara Menges.  this build is truly one of the most authentic and beautiful dedications to the Titanic.  Mara herself is an expert on the Titanic and when you talk to her, her passion and love for what she does clearly shines through.  Along with a beautiful build and passion she is one of the most compassionate people I have had the pleasure of meeting when it comes to her guests.
Other absolutely wonderful venues come to mind, the work that has gone into the Key West venue.  It truly makes you feel as if you are on a resort in the keys.  In rl the Florida Keys is my favorite place for pure r & r, I truly appreciate this venue.  Key West is known for having some of SL's best performers appear there on a regular basis.  Guthries is one that I consider a mainstay of sl, and the perfect place to tp into in the morning to enjoy with coffee and great folk music Guthries is where I have heard some of the best in sl and originally met my friend Russell, a great SL performer.  Dottie works hard to ensure that there is always great music playing and a welcoming atmosphere.  Taking a trip back in time to those of us that remember these days is Woodstock...think tye die...psychedelic and you have Woodstock.  This is a venue that is wonderful when it comes to taking up a cause to help others, performers are always outstanding.  Nantucket, Romantica, Molasky's, Jades, The Drunken Drow,the list goes on and one.


Whenever I think about the different venues I always think of Sherie's Gaslight.  It was the Gaslight that I attended my first sl live music event at.  This venue holds a special place in my heart as it it is where my introduction to SL music began.  Nantucket is a venue that nestled in a beautiful setting, and a favorite of mine to visit.  Gwampa Loma, though one of my best friends, also is one that I have watched have so much fun  build and maintain his venues, he has, I believe 4 right now, with one of them being a large 4 sim venue.  the list of mainstay venues, as well as the new ones that are coming upon the music scene, is amazing.  The other day I tp'd into the venue on the US Army sim.  Though, I did not see the venue directly, I talked in quite some length to one of the people that helped to maintain things on the sim.  I was thoroughly impressed.  Though I had read about this sim through Google Alerts and knew its value for those that are serving overseas, actually seeing it brought the reality of it home and how much that sim alone can help many of the deployed servicemen from the states. 

There is no way I could possibly list all of the venue owners.  Take the time the next time you are on the venues and seek out the owners.  Talk to them, you will hear the passion for what they do and how much sheer pleasure they receive from being able to be in a position to offer you a place to hear sine wonderful performers.  Live music venue owners are truly a special breed when you hear their passion and think of the love of music and sharing that music, that they dig deep into their pockets to be able to bring this to you.

On a more positive note

Yesterday I gave some strong opinions, but today I wanted to talk about what makes the SL music community so wonderful in my eyes.  Theis may be a virtual world that we live in in Second Life, at the same time the music community is very much reality based.  I have had the benefit of meeting some very wonderful people, People that truly care about the world around them.  Tears have come to my eyes on many occassions with the loyalty and support that I have seen pour out of this community.  I think back to a time when venues were having a difficult time, asked to choose between a cover charge system and continuing to work with musicians in other ways, I watched musicians pick up their tip jars saying support the venue as they take care of us, I have seen performers step up and offer venue owners free shows to help out when venue owners were having a difficult time, I have watched one that touched my heart immensely as I wasn't looking for a handout, but to be able to pay him within a day or two, offer to do a completely free performance....giggles I had to stalk him across the grid to tip high to make up the difference....I have watched them perform no matter what was going on their lives, seen them come together over the tragic loss of others in the community, work together to do wonders for Haiti when they had the earthquake...at that time my own venue manager was going through the pain of losing loved ones in Haiti and logged in once only to leave in tears as she witnessed the outpouring of support from the community.  Mind you, this is just a small portion of the community that I work with and see.....I know it goes on throughout the music community.  These are the people make up this community.  Such a very caring group of people.  Many times I thought about the headaches and the drain on the wallet to keep a venue running.....then one of these awesome performers does something that is so caring and compassionate, that it makes all of it so worthwhile. 

Never once through all of that did I even touch on the talent.  One of the best things about being a venue owner is able to find new talent and be able to put them in around seasoned professionals that have large followings, offering the new talent the opportunity to gain more exposure.  One of my favorite memories is another performer (Thank you Yip) iming me to hurry and drop a stream and just listen.  I had to tp home to do so; when I did, the most haunting, enthralling voice and musician streamed in.  I spent more lindens tipping his profile and by the end of it all Skye Galaxy had booked his first sl performance at BS's.  Since then I have had the opportunity to hear many other new talents to SL, Samm Qendra comes to mind as a voice that will take you to the heavens.  Yesterday, for the first time I listened to Automatic Quandry, though I only caught the end of his show, I was blown away by the talent and the sound.....laughs, he will be appearing at BS's starting next Friday night right before CraigLyons Writer.  Craig.....wow this guy holds a spot in my heart.  Craig has to truly be one performer that is always seeking ways to expose virtual music and reality.  At the same time, he has a heart of gold and is such a giving individual.  Someday, I will meet this man in person and give him the largest hug.  He is loaded with talent, making a mark for himself in his career, yet never forgets his friends in SL.  His holiday tour and bringing in another real life performer was absolutely amazing. 

The list of performers that I truly admire and love could go on for days....I am sure you will hear more about each of them as the days go on.  But I did want to let you know that after all I said yesterday, the community as a whole is one to be truly embraced.  Not all performers, in fact very few have the attitude that was expressed by the performer that I mentioned yesterday.  If the community was truly like that, I would have left a long time ago.  In reality this is a very supportive community.  Giggles...maybe tomorrow I will talk about some of the wonderful venues and venue owners I have had the privilege of knowing.

Today's thoughts

When I got up this morning, I had every intention of talking about how I became more involved in the SL Music Community as a whole....instead a couple of people brought things to mind that took my thoughts in other directions.  I am a firm believer in the Music Community becoming united and working toward things that help all the different avenues of the music community, the managers, the performers and the venues.  With that thought in mind recently a musician and his manager started a group that was supposed to do this.  At least it was the initial impression that I was given.  Many that I had spoken to about attending and joining in had their doubts as this performer always seemed to have his own agenda and ways that would benefit him...not necessarily the community as a whole.  But people change, so I thought I would watch and see.  What I did see was a community that was coming together but wanted equal representation and structure.  These, in my opinion are very good things.  The initial meeting was held in voice....unfortunately there were no real minutes kept and the only way that anyone could make heads or tails of it was to listen to both the chat logs and the local chat at the same time.  There were some things that after the meeting bothered me, the first being that the owner of the group and I discussed the meeting and through it, he made a great deal of fun of one of the speakers.  I, in turn, commented that though long winded the points the speaker made were very good ones.  Other things that came up were the fact that some people had submitted their opinions of the meeting both good and parts that needed improvement.  I thought this was great, it encourages people to think and helps to build up a conversation between people.  These are great tools for bringing a community together, keeping in mind that everyone will not agree all the time but the fact that it is being discussed is in itself great.  Instead, I saw that person get slammed for voicing their opinion.  This in turn prompted another venue owner to jump to her defense, tell the group off and walk away.  Watching the owner of that group go into another and start name calling and mudslinging, truly made me rethink the professionalism involved.  And the actual agenda behind the owner's motives for this group.  His past history had always been about him and I was seeing that some horses never change their spots.  Yet I bit my tongue hoping that the first meeting truly made eyes open and see the need of what the community was calling for.  Before the second meeting came to being, a conversation was shared with me.  A conversation that stated very pointedly that though the group may have delegates the owners since it is their group, will veto anything that they personally do not agree with.  Side note---people tend to forget that though they can not copy past im's in SL per TOS---copying and pasting them outside of SL is not in violation of anything. 

I still kept my opinions to myself waiting until the second meeting to give the owners a chance to address them.  The second meeting came along and I had promised to give my opinions after that.  It was good to see that a Linden was there and addressed as many issues as he was able.  Thank you Brett Linden for caring.  The owners did address the board of directors versus delegate issues, I did directly ask about the veto issue.  The owners did not appear to have great communication between them as one denied it ever being said, and the other stating that it was said in response to a hypothetical situation.  After a great deal of back and forth another person finally stated it clearer to the owners and to their credit they did state that they would not veto something the delegates as whole wanted.  Other major subjects that were brought up were, who would choose the delegates....again a great deal of back and forth....and I have yet to have a clear cut answer as to how who decides who is a delegate and who is not.  Due to the lack of clear cut direction, I tend to think that it is based on friendships and if they agree with the owner's agenda.  Speaking of which, some of that agenda may have surfaced, as one of the owners took the meeting completely away from the meeting's agenda and decided to discuss the cover charge system.  I disagree with this system as I refuse to ever charge people to hear music on my venue.  I did make a statement to that effect.  I will touch base on the response to that statement later in this blog. It may be one of the few times that I actually cut and paste a conversation as I was so thoroughly disgusted by it.  And I believe that true colors should be shown.   But I am branching....back to the meeting.  The owners seemed to take more of a defensive stand than anything else, yet giving nothing concrete to go on.  If anything, I did hear the owner be blatently rude to many of the same community that they are supposed to be uniting.  One instance that comes to mind was a performer stating that they are used to attending meetings yet nothing being done.....the owner then told the performer that if she felt that way she was welcome to leave.  A wise leader would have responded with that she was right and that is the very thing that we are trying to change, with her help it can be done.  By the way the performer did leave.  The meeting ended with some things being accomplished, the first being that Brett Linden did offer his help in any way that he could within his power.  The second being that we were all aware that the owners would not veto the delegates choices.  There was no date given for a third meeting.

Later that day, the owner decided to vent about the meeting, not seeing where he was being rude.  No it was not directly to me, at the same time though even gave permission for his conversation to be copied and pasted.  I saw the conversation and he had targeted me because I said that BS's would not be a cover charge venue....and then stated that it was not my words but my "tone"  and that I was (please keep in mind this is not a word that I ever use and think it is truly the most disgusting thing a person can refer to a woman as)  
"Tak Still for example... "I
 "I'll NEVER use the cover charge blah blah blah"
 SO true to form
 the WAY she speaks is so.. for lack of a better word.. CUNTY!!!!
 shes most welom to her opinion, but GOD man!!"

Through this conversation I  saw a very demeaning attitude to those that may have passion in their voices, or that feel strongly about something.  I did not copy and paste the entire conversation for a reason....this blog is long now....it would have been twice as long.  I mulled it over for a few days, and decided that I could not give an objective opinion because I felt so insulted and disgusted by this man.  What I do see is a very  hypocritical approach to the very people that he wants to bring together...instead causing more descent than anything. 

At the same time there are those that stay in the group with their own agenda and are using the group to get their foot in the door.  I can not do this as it is extremely unethical in my opinion.  This blog was not meant to bring about the negative aspects only, and I promise there is much more good in SL music than than there is bad.  Overall the people involved are some of the most caring people I have ever met, and the amount of talent in SL is endless.    Some of my very best friends come from the Music community and it reaches into RL as well.  So please do not allow my negative take on this one small aspect to not allow you to see the beauty in SL Music.  Also keep in mind that these are my opinions and not necessarily those of anyone else.

Wow thinking back

I remember the first SL live music event like it was yesterday.  A friend took me to see Damian Carbenell.  I thought seeing Damian was the best thing in the world.  I noticed that the audience was friendly and welcoming as well.  To me this was like a breath of fresh air after visiting so many clubs and finding that many are rather cliquish.  At the time, I was also wondering where in SL I actually fit in.  I knew it wasn't the role playing, I am too clutzy to be a builder...after seeing Damian and talking with a couple of people about the possibilities, the idea of BS's was born.  SL became fun as the finding the land, laying out a venue, lining up opening day entertainment, hiring staff all went into effect.  Never one to do things on a small scale, I knew opening day had yo be huge.  With the preopening party scheduled for July 3rd, 2009 and the Grand Opening for July 4th we had two full days of some of the very best performers in SL.  Opening day though long and tiring was worth every second of it.  Many of those same performers still play weekly at BS's and have long since become close friends both in and out of SL as well as mentors to me in many aspects.  They are still the people I ask when I have an idea and need an objective opinion.

Since that day, many have come and gone through BS's, but I would be remiss if I did not take a moment to thank the following performers and their management teams for their support and friendship, as well as allowing BS's to always bring their talents to the venue since the day we opened our doors--Russell Eponym, Max Kleene, Taunter Goodnight, Damian Carbenell.

Welcome

Welcome to my blog.  Here you will be able to keep up with the line up of performers at BS's "Bring a Friend & Stay Awhile" Live Music Venue and Amusement Park.  I will also post things that I see occurring in the SL music community and my thoughts on them.  Please keep in mind that they are my thoughts, yet in many cases another point of view that just maybe will cause you to see things in a different manner than you already were.