Tag Archives: music

My Song ‘Tauntauns to Glory’ Made the Pegasus Award ‘Brainstorming Poll’

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I have no idea who suggested it, but I appreciate whomever-it-was putting what is arguably my most popular song up for consideration during the “brainstorming” phase of the Pegasus Award cycle.

Pegasus Award Logo

This does not mean that the song has been officially nominated, because the Pegasus Awards operate in three parts: first, the brainstorming; second, the nominating; and finally, the voting.

The nominating phase is open now, and folks may nominate up to five artists/songs per category:

  • Best Writer/Composer
  • Best Performer
  • Best Filk Song
  • Best Classic Filk Song — songs must be at least 10 years old to be considered “classic”
  • Best Adapted Song
  • Best Song of Passage — for which “Tauntauns to Glory” was suggested

As the main site says, “Anyone with an interest in Filking or Filk music can place a nomination and/or vote.” To nominate, use the handy nomination form. If you need ideas on what you might nominate, check out all the results of the Brainstorming Poll.

Nominations must be submitted by 12:01 a.m. PDT, 31 July 2014 — meaning, the first minute after July 30th ends (on the West coast).

Again, thank you to whoever suggested me and my song for the award!

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For STAR WARS Day, Here’s a Song

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And a live rendition, no less, performed as part of a podcast!

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(Tauntaun Rider Silhouette by Aaron Hynninen, a.k.a. azza1070, at azza1070.spreadshirt.com. Used by permission.)

This past Monday I was one of Samuel Montgomery-Blinn’s guests on a special “North Carolina Speculative Fiction” edition of Carolina Book Beat. Lex Wilson and I held down the first hour of the show, in which I performed a live version of “Tauntauns to Glory.”

You can read more about the podcast on this page, or listen at this link: Carolina Book Beat: Gray Rinehart, Lex Wilson, and Jen McConnel. “Tauntauns to Glory” gets introduced around the 17:30 mark.

And, of course, “May the Fourth be with you.”

___

P.S. To close out, here’s a shameless plug for the album that includes “Tauntauns to Glory.” Get it at Truths and Lies and Make-Believe. Tell your friends!

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I’m Going to be on the Radio

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Today — Monday April 28th — I will be one of the guests on a special “North Carolina Speculative Fiction” edition of Carolina Book Beat.

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(Image from http://carolinabookbeat.com/.)

I suspect we will talk about submissions and stories and such, and chances are good that there will be music of some sort involved ….

The show will air at 10 a.m., and is a special 2-hour installment. Tune in to WCOM at 103.5 FM!

If you don’t live in the Research Triangle area, you can listen to the webcast at www.wcomfm.org. And I believe you can pick up the podcast here if you want to listen to it at your leisure.

Should be fun!

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Look What Came in the Mail

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While I was in Richmond for RavenCon, a package came to the house …

Another Romulan Ale Bumper Stickers

Of course, the intent had been to have the bumper stickers in time to take to the convention. Timing is everything!

Nevertheless, RavenCon went well — but I’ve always enjoyed that convention, whether I’ve attended as a fan or as a guest.

So, who wants a bumper sticker?

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Happy Independent Record Store Day

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Today — April 19th, 2014 — is an international celebration of independent music stores.


(Independent Record Store Day logo.)

At the Independent Record Store Day website, you can search for the indy record store nearest to you.

Oh, and this isn’t as much of a self-serving post as you might think, since it’s highly unlikely that you will find my CD in any record store. Not that they couldn’t order it, mind you — and if you asked them to, that would be ultra cool — but as a matter of course, they won’t be carrying my music.

But don’t let that stop you! Find an independent record store near you, and go check them out!

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On My Last Day at NCSU-IES, Here’s a Song

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Today is my last day on the Industrial Extension Service staff, and it seemed appropriate to mark the day with the first “workplace ‘filk'” I wrote there, simply entitled “The I-E-S Song.”

I started in January 2008 as primarily the speechwriter for the Executive Director, and I filled my time between speeches with other — primarily marketing-related — writing and editing assignments. But along the way I had the opportunity to do a few unique and interesting things:

  • Planned the logistics for the statewide “Manufacturing Makes It Real” Tour in 2010 (which became the still-extant MMIR Network)
  • Got some of the “Made in North Carolina” products we collected into the NC Museum of History
  • Helped start the short-lived NC Aerospace Initiative in 2009-10
  • Produced the “Manufacturing Minute” series of videos in 2012-13

And along the way I wrote a few songs: “The I-E-S Song” in 2008; “The Economic Recovery Blues” and “Oh, How I Hate Groupwise” in 2009; “The 1B4NC Song,” “We Know Manufacturing Makes It Real” in 2010; “If You Want to Get Better” and “The Old, Old Days of Industry” in 2011; and “Dirty, Sexy Manufacturing” in 2012.

Note that none of my work-related songs made it onto my album, Truths and Lies and Make-Believe. The audience for my music is already pretty small, but the audience for workplace songs in particular is tiny.

Anyway, I wrote a little rhyme to mark my departure, too.

It’s been fun
I had a good run
And now I’m done.

Fare thee (or, fare me) well.

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Nominate the Baen Free Radio Hour!

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As the “Best Related Work” for the Hugo Awards, that is.

(FULL DISCLOSURE: I’m a Contributing Editor for Baen Books and have been on the Baen Free Radio Hour podcast. But so what? It’s related to science fiction and fantasy, so go ahead and nominate it!)

You have other choices, too, of course, if you’re nominating for the Hugos — but the good thing is that you can nominate more than one thing!

For instance, you could nominate the Monster Hunter International Employee’s Handbook and Role-Playing Game. That was a very successful Kickstarter project run by Steven Long. And if you hew to a rather expansive definition of “related work,” you could always nominate a certain science-fiction-and-fantasy-related album.

But whatever you do, do it soon! The nomination deadline is coming up fast.

___

P.S. This post was all about the “Best Related Work” category, but I’ll just add that I also have a novelette you could nominate if you have an empty slot in that category. “What is a Warrior Without His Wounds?” was in the July 2013 issue of Asimov’s. I can even e-mail you a copy if you like. GWR

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Ever Heard of the Logan Awards?

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Do you like comedy music? Would you like to nominate a funny song for an award?

Logan Award Robot Cat Statuette
(The “Robot Cat” statuette, designed by artist Jamie Noguchi in honor of Logan Whitehurst’s song “Robot Cat.”)

The Logan White­hurst Memo­r­ial Awards for Excel­lence in Com­edy Music are pre­sented by The Funny Music Project. The Awards will be selected by a jury and presented at “FuMPFest 2014” in Chicago, hosted by Dr. Demento.

The FuMP has presented the Logan Awards since 2011 for

  • Out­stand­ing Orig­i­nal Com­edy Song
  • Out­stand­ing Par­ody Song
  • Out­stand­ing Com­edy Music Video

If you want to nominate a song released in 2013 for the 4th Annual Logan Awards, use this handy nomination form. You can also see what songs have already been nominated.

The web site doesn’t say when the nominations will close, so nominate while you can — early and often!

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Frank Zappa, “Weird Al” Yankovich, and Me

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Now THERE’S a headline I never thought I’d write, and I get to do it courtesy of Dr. Demento!

Weird Al and Dr. Demento
(“Weird Al” Yankovich and Dr. Demento. Photo by Genevieve, from Flickr under Creative Commons.)

I felt as if I was levitating when I learned that two — not one, but TWO — of my songs had been played on The Dr. Demento Show since the beginning of the year. (Sure, since then other things have brought me down, but when I think about this it still puts a smile on my face.)

“Another Romulan Ale” seems like an appropriate song for New Year’s, and Dr. Demento played it on his first show of 2014. And, sure enough, Frank Zappa and “Weird Al” Yankovich were on the playlist — along with Cheech & Chong and Bob Dylan. Quite a group!

Then on the 1st of March the Dr. did a show focusing on music related to science fiction:

This week Dr Demento presents The History of Science Fiction in Song…from “Stardrek” and “Banned from Argo” to “Tauntauns to Glory” in 80 minutes…plus “We Won’t Give ‘Em Sex,” “Winestoned Plowboy,” “There’s a Baby On the Plane”, more.

Folks familiar with science fiction and fantasy music (a.k.a. “filk”) know that “Banned from Argo” is arguably the most famous filk song of all time. So it’s one thing for Dr. Demento to decide to play “Tauntauns to Glory,” but for him to list it in the show description in the same breath as “Banned from Argo” … that took this whole experience over the line into surrealism, even before I realized I was on the playlist again with “Weird Al,” this time plus Devo, Nat “King” Cole, Frank Hayes, and Leslie Fish.

So, yeah, good times!

If you like “Romulan Ale” or “Tauntauns” or some of the other songs from Truths and Lies and Make-Believe, and think Dr. Demento should play more of them, he has a song request form you can fill out. That would be cool, or I’d be much obliged if you would post a review on Amazon or iTunes or CD Baby or elsewhere. That would be awesome!

Meanwhile, as the Dr. would say, stay “deeeee-mented”!

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