NPR's Tiny Desk Concerts

Radio's great. You get to paint your own pictures and no place provides a broader canvas than NPR. But not too long ago I stumbled upon their Tiny Desk Concert and loved it. First of all, finding a venue for new music is not easy. The old independent radio stations are pretty much a thing of the past.

Into the breech steps NPR. And not only with music, but with video too. Like this one, featuring Lost in the Trees. NPR's concept: bring the performers into a corner of the office, move away the desks to create a little space and shoot it simply, focusing on the music. The resulting performance has a lovely, intimate quality. Watching it, you feel like you're one of the NPR staffers just out of frame, hanging out to listen. And the musical variety is broad and stimulating. You also have a front row view of the performers, you can feel their connection as they play together; see how they listen and play off each other. Really watch the creative process unfold as you listen to their work. Also, because it's an acoustic experience, there are no electronics for the performers to hide behind. And the video makes it clear, it's all about the music. The variety of performers mixes the old with the new. You can link to the series, which started in March of this year. The old ones are archived. A great, innovative use of video for a radio network. And something to brighten your work week.

The High Line - Why I Love New York 2

We walked the High Line a few weeks ago. It's like the boardwalk with the city playing the part of ocean. All around was the bustle of urban life ebbing and flowing 50 feet below. Yet above the fray we could relax, ponder, sit, observe, chat, view, read, photograph, admireand exclaim in the company of hundreds of fellow city surfers. All of this taking place from an aerial vantage point hovering above the flow. Surrounded by plantings and such elegance of design. Design that incorporates the remnants of its original mission: providing rail freight to the West Side's meat packing and industrial enterprises. And taking fanciful flight, with an amphitheater complete with viewing window of the street, benches that rise right out of the walkway like waves, wooden lounge seats that roll on tracks, and a plentitude of artifacts, all preserved in homage to its rail yard past. And an instant creator of community. Amazing outcome for a project slated for demolition.

These photos may give you a little of the flavor.Good Magazine's first issue featured a video about the High Line's history that is a great background piece. Andthe New York Times has a whole section on it in their archives, including slide shows, multimedia and a piece on the people who perform for the high line strollers.

The Underbelly Project - Why I love New York Pt 1

If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears, does it make a sound? If over 100 street artists create intriguing, original work that no one can see, is it there? How about work created in a secret underground location known only to the artists and a select few. A never finished subway station, long abandoned, then rediscovered and tagged with intriguing images, then abandoned to the stuff of urban legend. This is The Underbelly Project. And it models a vision right out of the work of William Gibson where part of the plot of the second book in his latest trilogy focuses on virtual art only visible to a select few.

In The Underbelly Project, an abandoned subway station in the bowels of New York City serves as the exhibit site. And an excellent article in the New York Times describes the event and how it came about. The exhibit celebrates the punk sensibility of street art. In another era, it would be the surrealist or the dada sensibility. You could say the process of making the art makes its own statement - it's Art for Art's sake.

So why am I writing about this? I like the sheer audacity that they did it. I like that two street artist/curators saw the opportunity and went for it. And that 100 artists saw the elegant irony of their vision and went for it, too. That they did it for the fun and exuberance of it. And then to be thrust instantly into the mists of urban legend. And the best work, as you'll see in the slide show and video that accompanies the article, conjures the mystery of the unseen and unknown. And in an almost perverse way, it celebrates the vibrancy of America's greatest city. A city where anything seems possible.

Natalie Tran

YouTube has introduced me to a number of people who've found their calling as video bloggers. My latest fascination is Australian Natalie Tran, who goes by the name Community Channel. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about her:

Natalie Tran is a digital media student and a second-generation Vietnamese Australian with more than 720,000 subscribers and more than 268 million views.

As of July 2010, there are 238 videos available on her YouTube channel and she's the most-subscribed of all-time in Australia and the 22nd-most subscribed of all-time on YouTube.

Here's Forbes. Yes, Forbes the business magazine:

Natalie Tran isn’t just some 22-year-old who lives in her parent’s house, makes look-at-me videos and posts them on YouTube for kicks.

OK, she is.

But her clips on Community Channel have also made her one of 10 global independent YouTube stars who have earned more than $100,000 in the past year.

She's funny, has a great sense of the absurd, talks about the daily flotsam and jetsum of her life with a wry sense of humor. And she brings in her cultural heritage to the mix, which gives her life commentary and observations all the more flavor. And every video ends with her responding to comments from her viewers. Making you feel like one of the Community Channel posse. Her self-effacing attitude makes the whole experience fun. And then you go on to screen the next one.

So she gets to share the world of Natalie with all her video viewers and get paid for it too. Not a bad gig.

Getting it Right

Bob James, aka The Mighty Copywriter, writes an informative and stimulating blog, Copy Points exploring issues around marketing, communications and the art of effective writing. I've read a number of his pieces with interest, and his latest touched a nerve. Entitled "Is it Real or is it Sominex" he talks about how advances in technology are enabling the budget-challenged corporation to produce "business casual video." In other words, a do-it-yourself approach to producing corporate video.

But the typical amateur, as Bob blogs, creates amateurish work:

"That's because technology—in the hands of amateurs—cannot compensate for amateurism. Cheap technology, moreover, only encourages amateurism to spread,like a plague."

Well, of course I agree. But there's another part of the story I'd like to talk about. Because, for me, the issue is not just about advances in technology reducing the professional's "advantage". Amateur work is usually amateurish for a reason. Because a professional in our business has the ability to understand where the audience is coming from. How they think and what they value. And professionals enjoy a creative expertise honed by years of crafting messages.

Too often, corporate communication from an insider's point of view is just that: written from the "insider" point of view. They don't see the company as others do, who live outside their corporate silo. Again, that's what the professional has to offer. We understand how to shape a message so it reaches people "where they live." And what I learned from all those years doing political media is this: how you frame the issue and ideas defines how people respond and understand what you are trying to say.

The essence of amateurism misses all of this. It is high on enthusiasm and energy, which is great and really connects, up to a point. And that, to be fair, is some of its appeal; as insider corporate communications are so often deadly and boring.

But that's usually where it ends. Amateurs lack the professional's dispassion and insight. They go for the obvious, lack subtlety, and rarely employ the power of well-chosen images and evocative music. And they are not phrase makers. I've watched one nationally-recognized political consultant routinely spend hours trying out different variations of a phrase until he found the most potent combination for his client. And I've seen how the media picks up that concept as their own and runs with it. Because he spends all that time and creative power to get it right. And that's the bottom line, really. Getting it right.

As they say, you can have it quick, cheap or good. Pick any two.

A Voice in the Wilderness

We are so visually oriented, but music is another way of sharing and perceiving and, I suspect, is universal to all cultures. Music offers a wide range of emotions and composers shape their sounds to create pictures in the mind. But where do they find inspiration? And how does one create a work of substance? Well, sometimes, you need to listen to the silence. For me, I often need to block out the "background noise" before I can find the inspiration I'm looking for. So I was very tuned into the story of contemporary American composer, Robert Kyr as broadcast recently on NPR. Kyr journeys to a remote monastery in New Mexico to seek the silence of the desert. And I found this story on he finds his muse very moving.

And if you'd like to explore his music further, here's a link to one of his CDs.

It's a Wrap

Introducing the Sniper Twins, two hiphop pals creating their own brand of viral videos for the corporate world. Barry Flanagan and Dax Martinez-Vargas, former high School buddies, attended the same film school and eventually found their way to MTV, making on air promos. But their claim to fame, such as it is, has come from doing the corporate video thing, only, doing it their way.

Their first big effort, "Computer Friends" (over 700,000 plays on Youtube) was a spec project they eventually "sold" to Seagate Technology. According to one article, "payment" was in the form of hard drives. Okay, but they clearly had a good time making the video and it's fun to watch them do a send up of office geekdom as they revel in the bits and bytes of their computer rap.

Their next effort, "Chocolate Shoppe," shows them rapping and prancing through a Hershey Chocolate Factory, plopping on their chairs doing the "chocolate drop." Sweet. And I suppose they got a lot of lettuce for their video praising the virtue of salads. And so it goes.

While I applaud their efforts, using the trappings of rap to brand a corporate image or market a product is, let's face it, a bit of a stretch. Although, given their enthusiasm, they almost pull it off. But the corporate thing gets lost in the funky egoism of their rap. It's hard to wag your finger around a coherent message and they wrap each video with the Sniper Twins logo. So dudes, what are you really branding?

I checked the Seagate Website to see how the video was being used and failed to find it. Oh well.

But kudos to them for taking the leap. And given the in-your-face flavor of new media, I'm sure we'll be hearing more from the Sniper Twins.

As a PS, check out the video they did for Reese's, Flippo's BIG Stunt. Perfect.