Lexi Music Awards press release

Howdy!

David McLean here - local guitarist & guitar instructor...and creator of the Lexington Music Awards. We're presenting the 2nd Annual Lexington Music Awards show on Sunday, January 31 at the historic Lyric Theatre!

The awards, unlike other awards shows across the country, don't just honor musicians, but the entire music community....with categories for best live venue, best DJ, best music store....best song, best vocalist....plus specialty categories like "community music award" and "lifetime achievement award" (over 30 categories in all).

As many of you recall from the first show, this event was to be hosted at a small venue here in Lexington with the assumption the first year we'd be lucky to put 50-75 people in the room, but that we'd demonstrate we could build a viable program and grow it from there.

The project quickly grew out of control (haha!), and we nearly sold out the Lyric Theatre back in February amid all that snow!

We're about to launch the nominations ballot, and official nominees should be announced by late November or early December.

I'd love to chat with you further about this event! Please feel free to contact me at this email address or call/text me at 859-420-2007.

Also, feel free to check in at the FB page or look at our blog. The new web-site will be on-line soon!

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1505077303105177/


http://lexingtonmusicawards.blogspot.com/


Thanx!

--
--
David M. McLean
Skinny Devil Music Lab
http://www.skinnydevil.com
859.420.2007

"....embrace your fear..."

EFF says "The Final Leaked TPP Text is All That We Feared"

From the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF):

"Today's release by Wikileaks of what is believed to be the current and essentially final version of the intellectual property (IP) chapter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) confirms our worst fears about the agreement, and dashes the few hopes that we held out that its most onerous provisions wouldn't survive to the end of the negotiations...."

Read it here.

LEXI Awards (the Lexington Music Awards)

"The LEXINGTON MUSIC AWARDS are designed to add cohesion and a true sense of community to the local & regional music scene; to help raise the "quality" bar; to educate artists and fans alike on what's going on in the whole music community; integrate Lexington into the wider (national) music scene; and much more."

supermodel Laura Kirkpatrick

The inaugural show will take place Sunday, February 22 at the historic Lyric Theatre in downtown Lexington, KY. The show features 30 categories in 4 broad sections (industry, style, performance, & special)....from best live venue & best music retailer to best guitarist & best vocalist to best country artist & best rock band to community service & lifetime achievement awards.

MCed by Kristen Pflum and Bill Meck .....with special guest presenters that include supermodel Laura Kirkpatrick  to Dan Wu (of Master Chef) to local DJ legend Max Corona....,with music performances by jazz legend Miles Osland, guitar wizard Ben Lacy, The Stick Men (featuring Tripp Bratton & David Farris), and more!

The organizer(s) have big plans, though starting locally. Keep up with plans, media (TV spots, radio interviews, newspaper stories, and more), and more for this year and beyond at the Lexington Music Awards.

My Own Life - Oliver Sacks on Learning He Has Terminal Cancer

A beautiful and beautifully written piece by a man facing his final days. From the NYT:

A MONTH ago, I felt that I was in good health, even robust health. At 81, I still swim a mile a day. But my luck has run out — a few weeks ago I learned that I have multiple metastases in the liver. Nine years ago it was discovered that I had a rare tumor of the eye, an ocular melanoma. Although the radiation and lasering to remove the tumor ultimately left me blind in that eye, only in very rare cases do such tumors metastasize. I am among the unlucky 2 percent.

I feel grateful that I have been granted nine years of good health and productivity since the original diagnosis, but now I am face to face with dying.....(see the rest at the link below)

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/19/opinion/oliver-sacks-on-learning-he-has-terminal-cancer.html

SD Magazine Publisher/Editor Releases Music Catalogue

Howdy, y'all! David McLean here, publisher & editor of Skinny Devil Magazine, as well as guitarist, guitar teacher, gun for hire, and all things musical. Today marks my 50th birthday. I wrote about it in my personal blog Skinny Devil Universe.

There, I mention that I have been, and continue to, release my life's catalogue of music (at least that which is release-able) all at only $1 per album. To celebrate my birthday, I released Aur'a-Sen's only studio album "Innova Mode" and volume 2 of my corporate work, "The Games".

I will also create a page for all the albums I've engineered, produced, or on which I've played. It will likely be an incomplete list, as I've lost most of the old studio notes from when I was working as a studio musician, an engineer, and a producer (note: I still produce and I still do studio work for hire), but it should still have quite a bit of music for anyone interested.

Music will be available via BandCamp, Reverbnation, CD Baby, Amazon, iTunes, the streaming/radio sites, and more. Must be my bid for digital immortality (haha!). But for now, you can see what's been released so far at my BANDCAMP page.

Hope y'all enjoy it!

Review: "The Life of Kid Grayson"

Barry Miller debut novel "The Life of Kid Grayson" is the best indie debut I've ever read.

Chock full of history and music, Barry brings the story to life with his expert use of the pen, weaving words into images, transporting the reader like few writers can really do. In the case of this book, through the backwoods of Kentucky to the jungles of Viet Nam, from the bright lights of Nashville to the long American highways....kills a man before his 18th year, fights side by side with his fellow soldiers, plays guitar from hollers to bar stages & backrooms, and has his share of run-ins with those on both sides of the law.

Music is woven through this novel like a living pulse. And our own cultural history.

This is a must-read for all music lovers AND book lovers.

Get it at Smashwords HERE.

(ed note: October 2014, you can download it FREE)

Diana Chittester "Find My Way Home"

Diana Chittester is a one woman music machine. With multiple albums to her credit and shows all over the eastern US (and Canada), she's been burning up the concert stage, the speakers, the ear-buds....and clawing her way to the top of the heap by shear force of her formidable musical will.

She's also been featured right here at Skinny Devil Magazine: both Guitar Gods and Guitar Gods: LIVE.

Now, she has released a new album. Her first that features her as she performs: One woman, one guitar, and no gimmicks.

The album is "Find My Way Home" (Fighting Chance Records), and on it, Diana is on fire!

Gregory: "...in a matter of days"

Completely unexpected turn from Gregory with his new release "...in a matter of days". No crunching guitars, soaring vocals, deep pondering lyrics, bone-crushing rhythms....

The new album is 9 songs that are primarily contemplative, introverted, and will likely transport the listener to lost inner worlds.

A mix of electronic and acoustic instruments, the shortest song clocks in at just under 5 minutes. The longest at over 14 minutes! With titles like "the sacrifice of pawns", "after the fall", and "the perfect emotion", this is a meditative collection that will not only sooth and transport, but also likely bring up images and poetic fragments from your mind.

GET IT.

"GUITAR GODS: George Lynch"

What do you say about George Lynch? The man is known as one of the finest rock guitarists in history, one of the most influential guitarists from the 1980s, the man who wrote (and performed) "Mr. Scary"! Guitar World Magazine lists him as #68 in the "100 Best Guitarists" poll and on their "100 Best Metal Guitarists" at #47, and he even ranks at #10 on Gibson Guitar's "Best Metal Guitarists" poll.

Mark Kendall (guitarist of Great White) claims Lynch was using tapping techniques prior to Eddie Van Halen, and his "signature" guitar & musical techniques are so specific that to use his slide vibrato or "gothic octave" or even just hitting that diminished lick over a pedal tone just make the rest of us sound like we're copping his style.

His work with Dokken in the 1980s (and for a reunion in the 90s) is incomparable. Lynch joined Dokken in 1983 and left in 1989, which exactly coincides with their commercial success, which includes over 10 millions albums sold, 3 platinum and one Gold album, and a Grammy nomination in 1989. The band made him an instant international star.

In 1990, after his departure from Dokken , he formed Lynch Mob and proceeded to release - from then to now - 10 albums with 4 top 40 charting singles.

In addition to these 2 major bands, Lynch has played for a wide array of other bands (his newest is KXM with dUg Pinnick of King's X and Ray Luzier of Korn - see our review of their video and album), released a dozen solo albums, and done studio work doing guest solos for others (from Tony MacAlpine's debut release in the 1987 to Raven Quinn's debut in 2010).

In addition to this, George - a long-time ESP Guitar endorsee - makes his own custom Mr. Scary Guitars; he is working on a documentary film; he has released instructional videos, done clinic tours, taught at the Rock-n-Roll Fantasy Camp, and appeared on countless covers of guitar magazines; has long had his own signature guitars for ESP and signature pick-ups with Seymor Duncan; and has designed his own high-nickel guitar string for Dean Markley.

Visit George on-line here.

I had a chance to talk to George recently. Check it out!

"Neuromancer" The Most Influential Book of Your Lifetime?

What? You haven't heard of "Neuromancer"? Yes, my friend, you have....

"Neuromancer", published in 1984 by then-unknown author William Gibson, came out of nowhere and immediately changed the face of science fiction. It was the first book to ever win the sci-fi "triple crown" (Nebula, Hugo, and PK Dick Awards) and defined the cyber-punk genre.

That would be enough of an accomplishment to revisit this book 30 years later. That would be enough to make anyone's career.

But it didn't stop there.