Skere9

Folks, I owe Chris Pendarvis a huge apology.  The creative genius behind Insanity Island is not just my cousin Doug Hayden, it’s also Chris!  He stated as much in a comment here at Skere9.com dated July 3, and of course he’s absolutely right.  I knew that already, I was just busy bragging about my cousin Doug, but Doug has always told me about Chris’ involvement as well, that’s never been a secret.  So – my apologies to Chris, it was never my intent to omit him, but I largely did up to now and the fault is all with me, not Doug – he’s always shared credits with Chris from the start.  I’ll be sure to do the same from now on!

As for the rest of the Skere9 universe – folks, I’ve been remiss, a lot has happened in the past few months, including:

• Jeff Krulik‘s premiere of his uber-hip documentary Led Zeppelin Played Here, along with fantastic screenings in the DC and New York City areas, including some prominent film festivals;
• Major developments with the work of Mark Joseph and Doonby;
• Todd Bauchspies‘ brilliantly outstanding performance at Paul Reed Smith‘s own PRS Experience event this fall, including intense audience reaction like I’ve never seen in a live show in my life;
• A great private dinner with Doc Scantlin and the lovely and charming Chou Chou, who wowed the patrons in the restaurant where we met just by being their with their 1937 Buick and all their charm, grace, and style;
• A new musical performance I just learned about that features the music of Eva Cassidy;
• Lots of developments in the iPod/wrist-watch industry created by Eric Migicovsky;
• A whirlwind of jazz festival performances and other activity in the world of Frank Russo;

… and that’s just a few items!  So stay tuned, I’ll catch up soon!  In the meantime – check out the latest from Insanity Island, just in time for Halloween!

 

For my money, the best voice in all of pop music today is the voice of Martina McBride.  Here’s a great video clip of her performing live on American Idol in 2007 when she introduced her song Anyway for the first time.  She’s better live in this clip that many recording artists are in the studio.

Toward the end of the song, McBride hits a crescendo and belts out a series of notes that are at full strength, starting at 3:09 and lasting until 3:25.  It’s brilliant songwriting and you can’t not be inspired by this song, but when you reflect on her stunning breath control and how she’s singing so long, so strong, without taking a breath, it’s even more striking.

There’s a little bonus in this clip, which is the brief chat after the song (at 3:44) with Ryan Seacrest and McBride’s daughter Emma, who is about 9 years old in this clip and really steals the show and is very cute and funny.   The reference to “Paula” in that chat is to American Idol judge Paula Abdul, who was known to find something nice to say about everyone, and the reason for the reference.

The entire clip is 4:44.

I recently saw the movie “Spinal Tap” for the first time in years, and maybe it was just me but it didn’t come across as funny as I remembered it.  But this one scene still definitely holds up, it’s a classic, one of the all time great scenes in film as far as I’m concerned, and most musicians I know love this scene and quite it often.

The Navy Chief noticed a new sailor and barked at him, “Get over here!  What’s your name sailor?”

“John”, the new seamen replied.

“Look, I don’t know what kind of bleeding-heart pansy crap they’re teaching sailors in boot camp these days, but I don’t call anyone by his first name”, the chief scowled.  “It breeds familiarity, and that leads to a breakdown in authority.  I refer to my sailors by their last names only:  Smith, Jones, Baker, whatever.  And you are to refer to me as ‘Chief’.  Do I make myself clear?”

“Aye, aye, Chief!”

“Now that we’ve got that straight, what’s your last name?”

The seamen sighed.  “Darling.  My name is John Darling, Chief.”

“Okay, John, here’s what I want you to do …”

We here at Skere9 are thinking seriously about adding Laina Walker to our gallery of stars.  Laina is the original Overly Attached Girlfriend, one of the funniest Internet memes out there.  Here are two examples of what I’m talking about:

Laina has reportedly  turned her Internet fame into a force for doing good by engaging in lots of fund-raising for worthy causes, and in the process building a huge fan base.  At the time of this writing, her Facebook page has gathered over 84,000 “likes”.

We found this great new video of hers, telling all her friends a very happy one year-anniversary:

Go Laina!