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Let's build something together.
Director of Digital Production at Goodby, Silverstein and Partners, Carey Head has spearheaded, produced and bled cutting-edge digital work for clients such as Hyundai, Doritos, GE, Adobe, HP, Nintendo, Specialized, Saturn, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, Comcast, Haagen Dazs, Ace Hardware, Emerald Nuts, Chevrolet, TD Ameritrade and more.
Carey's work has won awards for Cannes Cyber Lions, AICP, Clios, New York Festivals, One Show, FITC, Creative Review, FWA, London International Awards, Webby's, Art Director's Club, Future Marketing Awards, HOW Interactive and Flash Forward. In addition, in 2009, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners won Digital Agency of the Year at the Cyber Lions in Cannes, Interactive Agency of the Year at the One Show Interactive and even ranked #1 in the world in Interactive according to the Gunn Report.
Carey has led the growth, development and management of the digital production department at Goodby, Silverstein & Partners from a small, ragtag team of 4 to its current, flourishing state of 60+ between two offices (San Francisco and Detroit). This eclectic group is comprised of Digital Production (IC, AP, IP, SP, EP), User Experience, Flash Development, SEO/SEM, Creative Technology, Ad Operations and Digital Training. In addition, Carey continues to strategically influence cross-functionally on agency organization and operations.
Prior to joining Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, Carey worked for several OEM musical instrument brands, creating brand identities, as well as authoring, building and distributing content for online publications. In previous lives, Carey has been a copywriter, a web developer, a music magazine columnist and new business director.
When not dreaming about emerging technology, new media and vintage music gear, Carey can be found perusing his favorite haunts around the Mission District in San Francisco or playing with his band, Pollux.
“Art is not born in a vacuum. You need external stimuli to change and grow.” – Matthew Inman, 2013 SXSWi keynote speaker.
As the SXSW conference has grown tremendously over the years, and 2013 marked the 20th year of SXSW, this felt like the right mantra for all of us that continue to go to this insanely busy conference that is equal parts inspiration and exhaustion. I went for 6 days this year (maybe a tad long) and those of you that have been to SXSW before know that being in Austin for thus conference is somewhat similar to going to a bachelor party in Las Vegas over a weekend (minus the obligatory strip clubs and body shots. Or not). Regardless, here are some things that I found interesting and noteworthy:
Bre Pettis unveils the new Makerbot digitizer:
Bre gave the 2013 SXSWi opening keynote. It seemed appropriate given the massive wave of popularity 3D printing has had over the last year. What started as excitement over the average consumer being able to “print” (yes, Bryan, it is actually “printing”) their own iPhone case or coffee cup has evolved into clients including Ford, Natural History Museum’s and, even, NASA. The new Replicator 2 looks pretty glorious (even at around $2,200) and now Makerbot is further democratizing the need to create 3D models to feed into your printer with their unveiling at SX of the Digitizer. The Digitizer prototype looked like a lo-fi turntable scanner (it is) featuring a webcam connected to two lasers that scans in objects about the size of a garden gnome. This means you no longer have to rely on Thingiverse or Autodesk’s 123DCreature to find models of things to print. As my buddy Jonathan said, this could have crazy implications on IP. I’m just excited about being able to print the damn earbuds or remote that I keep losing time and again. You can sign up to learn more about the Digitizer here - http://store.makerbot.com/digitizer.html
Art, Copy & Code:
Ben Malbon and Aman Govil gave an inspired presentation around Google’s collaborative project called Art, Copy & Code (http://www.artcopycode.com/#/) . This was a bit of a sequel from last year’s now infamous Project Re-brief where Google revisited iconic advertising from the 1960′s and then re-imagined it in the form of display advertising. Google now has several ongoing projects housed under this inspirational tentpole as a way to demonstrate how code is now as inherent to creative expression as is well-crafted design and a few carefully chosen words. The musician side of me loved the concept around “Jam with Chrome” (http://www.jamwithchrome.com/) where people can play music together (with loops and samples) anywhere they are online.
The biggest wow (and WTF?) moment here was when Google unveiled “The Talking Shoe” (http://www.artcopycode.com/#/project/0).
The shoe connects to your phone via Bluetooth and then uses a gyroscope and other things to translate your movement into commentary via speakers in the shoe. This commentary can be shared online (G+) if the user wants to. So now your shoe can keep you (and those within earshot) company on your commute, run, etc. Is this something you’d want? It was funny to see in person as Aman jogged around stage. Clearly there’s a gimmick factor to this (who would want their shoes to speak to them? OK, maybe if you’re super lonely) but it’s interesting to see where connecting the physical to the digital (or “phygital” as Google likes to call it) can go. I’ll hold out for my talking toothbrush.
One thousand stars (http://workshop.chromeexperiments.com/stars/ ) was another really interesting Chrome experiment that they touched on. It uses data and imagery from NASA to create an interactive map of over 100,000 starts in our galaxy. A richly executed way to use an enormous amount of data for an interesting visual experience. Great sound design in this one too.
Matthew Inman keynote:
Matthew Inman is an artist and best-selling author behind the comedic cartoon website, http://theoatmeal.com/. While he runs a very popular site, he is likely best known for his two now infamous crowd funding efforts. In the first one, a separate website called Funnyjunk.com was mining Matthew’s site and apparently plagiarizing his comics for their own. Matt found out and publicly asked his fan base what to do about it. Word spread and Funnyjunk.com eventually took his work down from their site but not before suing him for $20,000 for defaming the good name of their business. Inman then responded by setting up an indiegogo effort to raise $20,000 not for Funnyjunk.com but for a charity called “Operation BearLove Good. Cancer Bad” in which he all money raised would go to the National Wildlife Federation and the American Cancer Society. Matt added that if enough money was raised, he would take a photo with the cash and then send that photograph along with “a cartoon of Funnyjunk’s mother seducing a Kodiak bear” to FunnyJunk.” The effort raised $220,024.00. Here are the pictures that he sent:
Clearly, Matt quickly realized that there is power in using his notoriety to galvanize people to get behind a good cause. The most recent crowd funding effort he took on was for Wardenclyffe. Wardenclyffe was Nikola Tesla’s final laboratory located in Shoreham, New York. Tesla lost funding for it in 1917 and the tower was demolished. A huge Tesla enthusiast, Matt didn’t want to see this land go to a retail chain so he started another Indiegogo effort to raise enough money to open the United State’s very first (seriously, the first?) Nikola Tesla museum. He needed $850,000 to save the land. He raised 1.4M in just under two weeks. This is enough to purchase the land but look out for another crowdfunded campaign to build the actual museum.
Matthew’s main insight as to why these two crowd funding efforts worked so well were that these campaigns weren’t about perks or products, they were about writing a perceived wrong. People are less interested in spending $25 to acquire something than they are to stand behind something. Food for thought.
Matt’s final lessons on crowd funding initiatives:
1) Be wary of perks. No one wants to have to make 500,000 t-shirts.
2) Keep the campaign short and sweet.
3) Don’t feel obligated to make a video.
4) People want to right a wrong or fund a positive initiative more than buy a watch.
My Pete Cashmore moment:
On my flight from JFK to Austin Bergstrom airport, in the middle seat next to me sat a well-dressed, chatty internet-y dude. He was quite amiable and we started chatting about SXSW before the flight took off. Turned out that he worked for Mashable, a well-known and successful advertising/publishing platform we’ve been looking to work our way into for a bit. So we chatted through some partnership ideas with some of our clients and he had me wondering why we hadn’t done this before. After we talked about the role a Head of Production has at an agency, I asked him what he did for Mashable to which he softly muttered, “Oh…founder and CEO.” I stammered something to the effect of, “Oh! Wow! I’m sure that’s a very…important job.” He shrugged and said “I’m sure yours is more fun.” Somehow I doubt that.
Some great bands that I saw:
Parlotones
http://www.theparlotones.net
One part Radiohead, one part The Killers (and a wee bit of Snow Patrol), these guys are from South Africa but currently located in L.A. They make pretty radio friendly rock and put on a great show.
Gift of Gab from Blackilicious
http://giftstribution.blogspot.com/
Gift of Gab did a special set at the Sabertooth/Passion Pictures party that made everyone grateful that they trekked across town. Just a dude and his DJ. Felt like there were 3 of him on stage.
Astronautilis
http://astronautalis.com/
Saw these guys open for The Black Angels. Kind of an aggressive white dude hip hop thing. While that feels like it’s been done 100 times before (and badly) this vocalist’s energy and delivery was palpable. Midway through their set the guitarist broke a string which prompted this guy to do a 5 minute completely freestyle rant on SXSW that destroyed everyone. Brilliant stuff.
The Black Angels
http://theblackangels.com/
I saw TBA open for Queens of the Stone Age a few years back at La Zona Rosa in Austin. This year they played the Elias Arts music showcase. You’re hard pressed to find them playing smallish venues anymore so this was a treat. They did an hour and a half psychedelic, face melting rock show. I stood 3 feet in front of the lead guitarist the whole show. My ears are still ringing.
The Joy Formidable
http://www.thejoyformidable.com/
This Welsh trio played the SXSWi closing music party at Stubb’s BBQ. I knew nothing of them before but I’ve since bought two of their records. They put on a blistering rock set and might be the loudest 3 piece since Nirvana. OK, maybe not but it was an incredible show.
Deadmau5
http://www.deadmau5.com/
I don’t entirely get why people love this so much but I’ll admit that it was pretty intoxicating. That could also have been the vodka.
Apps that were quite popular during the conference:
Vine
https://vine.co/
Witness the dawn of the 6 second commercial. Even if you don’t use the app at all, follow the auteur genius of Adam Goldberg’s vines.
Groupme
https://groupme.com/
Just like it sounds, a group texting tool.
Snapchat
http://www.snapchat.com/
I’ve heard this is more teen focused but it’s actually great fun for sending images/videos to friends. Media is seen once and then gone forever.
New product launches:
Roku 3
http://www.roku.com/meet-roku
Debuted to little fanfare but it looks great for a set top box. OK, I already ordered one.
Samsung
http://www.samsung.com/in/promotions/galaxycamera/
Samsung debuted their new line of Smart cameras that are WiFi connected with touch screens. Users can upload straight to instagram and so on. Seems like they’re trying to cannibalize the best iPhone/Android photo-centric features with smartphones and capitalize on them. Curious if this will have much impact on the market.
Vinyl Recorder:
http://vinylrecorder.com/index-e.html
While the website leaves a lot to be desired, this steampunk-esque vinyl recorder was quite eye-catching on the trade show floor. The DIY nature of it is pretty great. It just uses your average Technics SL1200 as the base with the recorder machined on top of it. Apparently these Techncics TT’s are preferred due to the direct drive and tank-like construction. Now you can make bad records at home too!
Digital Touch Systems:
http://www.digitaltouchsystems.com/
These guys make interactive touch screen tables a la Microsoft Surface except that they’re fully customizable, can scale to practically any size and have a much better price point. N
Palm Top Theater:
In the “why do we need this?” category comes the Palm Top Theater. This add on to your iPhone turns your phone into a personal 3D theatre. I’m not entirely sure why or where you would do this but I’ll admit that the effect is a bit like the old hologram effect from Star Wars, which makes it desirable enough. Media must be converted to their proprietary format so unfortunately you can’t just load Star Wars onto your iPhone for the ultimate nerdgasm moment. However, you can use their editing software to convert/create things on your own.
Brands:
Overall, it didn’t seem that brands were as overtly embedded with everything as they were last year. There was no really big product launch this year, whereas Nike launched Fuel Band last year and prior years saw Apple launching things at the same time. However, Doritos brought back its Jacked stage (a 6 story interactive vending machine) again featuring old school 90′s legends Public Enemy, Ice Cube and LL Cool J. It looked pretty incredible.
To paraphrase Matt Inman again, “Art is not born in a vacuum” and SXSW has enough to inspire and exhaust any patron, no matter what they’re looking for. If you’re already thinking about going next year, don’t think, just do it. And here are some pointers on how to plan for it - http://www.trustcollective.com/2013/02/27/carey-head/
Cheers.
Project Description:
We got a chance to work with Mayor Ed Lee in an effort to rally all Bay Area sports fans to bring Super Bowl 50 or 51 to San Francisco. To do so, we leveraged a newly designed SF-specific logo and the #sfsuperbowl hashtag to use as currency and spark/track the conversation across all ubiquitous social media outlets. Then we created a scoreboard themed site to act as an aggregator for all mentions of our hashtag to keep showing the greater communities support. The site was 100% homegrown and works seamlessly across desktop, tablet and mobile devices. We’ve only just launched the site but hope to keep the conversation and support going to “Bring the Bowl to the Bay.”
Features:
HTML, CSS, API integration with Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, G+
This Thursday evening, Slim’s is putting on a very unique show with 6 great local artists. It is going to be an eclectic night of music ranging from Rock (Bang Bang, The Comet Empire & Pollux) to Electronica (The Beautiful Machines) to Hip Hop (The Bayonics) to something beyond simple genre classification (Edison). Add to that the fact that it is a free show and this is a night that you definitely won’t want to miss.
Doors are at 6:30pm and Pollux takes the stage at 8pm sharp!
Thursday, August 23rd
Silm’s
333 11th st.
San Francisco, CA 94103
415-255-0333
http://www.slimspresents.com/events/2012-08-23/slims-shadey-featuring-bayonics/
1 – Bang Bang http://www.facebook.com/bangbangband
2 – Pollux http://www.facebook.com/Polluxmusic
3 – The Beautiful Machines http://www.facebook.com/BeautifulMachines
4 – The Comet Empire http://www.reverbnation.com/thecometempire
5 – Edison http://soundcloud.com/edison
6 – The Bayonics http://www.bayonics.com/
Doors: 6:30pm
Music: 7:00pm
Cover: FREE!
To create a series of awe-inspiring original Sonic firsts, we partnered with extreme sports stars, robotics experts and tech masterminds. We started by showing off the Sonic from all angles while the car was free-falling from 14,000 ft.
LetsDoThis.com/skydive
All Sonic firsts generated content for both digital advertising and online films. On New Year’s Eve, Sonic took over Times Square, reminding people to get in some firsts in the coming year.
This masthead let people free-fall with the Sonic, changing camera angles on the fly, seeing the car drop from the point of view of five skydivers.
Two days later, the song from Sonic’s Super Bowl spot, “We Are Young”, hit #1 on iTunes, going from #38 to #1 in 48 hours.
LetsDoThis.com/anthem
LetsDoThis.com, the blog of Sonic’s firsts, invited people to do their own firsts for a chance to win a Sonic. You could also download an app to post proof of your first times as they happened.
Exhausted yet? Me too.
You can see this in all of its crazy glory at LetsDoThis.com
Client:
Golden Gate National Parks Conservatory
Project Description:
The Golden Gate Bridge celebrated its 75th anniversary this year. To celebrate this majestic beauty, we created an experience along with Google and The Famous Group , that would allow anyone to share their favorite bridge(s) around the world by literally adding them to the Golden Gate Bridge. Contributors could then share out via their social sphere to spur on friends and family to join the cause. Currently, the Band of Bridges spans over 11 million feet with over 1,600 bridges added making it, easily, the longest crowdsourced bridge in history.
Features:
HTML, Javascript, Maps API
Awards:
FWA, Cannes shortlist and more…
Client:
Audubon
Project Description:
The National Audubon Society asked us to introduce birding to a new generation as something relevant and, in their words, “cool.”So we took birding online, releasing thousands of beautifully rendered 3-D birds on the Internet for fledgling birders to spot. Birding the Net was a month-long online scavenger hunt and social media game that spanned over 200 websites and blogs, creating both obsessive behavior (missing sleep, skipping work) and camaraderie, with newly minted birders planning to go out birding together in the real world.
Features:
CGI, HTML, Flash, Bookmarkets, Screensavers and more…
Awards:
One Show, Clios, AICP.
SXSWi has grown a lot since I started going. In 2006 it felt like a bunch of fledgling, techy nerds trying to build relationships over just a few jam-packed days of panels, networking events and concerts. Actually, it is still exactly that but x100. And with more hipster mustaches. In all seriousness, this conference is really where technology and marketing converge and brands, partners and consumers want to be at that party. Hence the x100 thing.
There is such a massive amount of amazing panels, events and shows happening simultaneously that you really have to pick your battles. Here are just a few highlights of my South By trip in 4 different categories (Technology, Music, Brands and Inspiration).
Technology:
(Mobile)
Highlight:
http://highlig.ht/about.html
Social awareness apps are making a big stride right now. Sonar, Highlight and more were being used and talked about a lot. Highlight is kind of interesting. It uses Facebook connect to send you push notifications about your FB friends that are around you as well as others that it thinks you might like (based on friends of friends, interests, etc). While this sounds good in theory as you can keep in touch (via proximity) with your friends, it also makes recommendations on who you might like that is around you. A bit creepy and big brother to me but I’ll keep playing with it. FYI, the logo will give you double vision.
Other ambient awareness apps that were noteworthy:
Glancee:
http://www.glancee.com/
Banjo:
http://ban.jo/
Kismet:
http://getkismet.com/beta
Re: mobile, to no one’s surprise, Instagram, Twitter, Foursquare and Facebook were among the most ubiquitous apps used to promote everyone’s individual experience. The new kid on the block, Pinterest, got a lot of chatter going as well. Oh Path and Pinterest both launched their API’s for SXSW. Good timing. TED has an API now as well. It will be interesting to see what people will do with all of their content.
(Discovery)
LittleBits:
http://littlebits.cc/
I love these things. I was lucky enough to see the founder, Ayah Bdeir, give a TED talk about LittleBits. Basically, these are legos on steroids. In short, they are intuitive little magnetic blocks that snap together to create interesting prototypes. Each bit has a simple and unique function (light, sound, etc) and they snap together to make larger circuits. This is all meant to demystify technology by putting the power of engineers in anyone’s hands. I’ve already ordered the “Starter Kit” for myself. Anyone is welcome to check it out when it comes in next week.
Aurasma/Marvel:
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/11/marvel-augmented-reality/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxMZ1QMpeUo
While there are several nice tablet-based comic book apps out there (including Marvel), nothing replaces the experience of reading an actual comic book. Marvel knows this simple truth and is capitalizing on it by finding new ways to make their printed pages interactive. For SXSW, Marvel debuted their partnership with Aurasma to bring marker less AR experiences to your Marvel app. No AR markers. Just pure image based recognition that culminates in DVD-esque extras like flying 3D Marvel characters, videos, animations, etc. I’ll take it.
Micro Tiles:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lm12BV-phCk
http://www.christiedigital.com/en-us/business/visual-solutions/new-projectors/Pages/Christies-Stunning-Digital-Signage-Display-Poised-to-Captivate-Visitors-at-IDS-2012.aspx
I saw some micro tiles on the trade show floor. While these aren’t entirely new, these are scalable building blocks for interactive installations. Sure, they can employ motion tracking to showcase their interactivity but they are also now gesture sensitive. High performance and durable, they can be configured into practically any shape.
Music:
The Marching Teeth:
http://www.marchingteeth.com/
http://www.myspace.com/marchingteeth
The Marching Teeth is a Brooklyn based Metal band reminiscent of Clutch, Orange Goblin and Kyuss. If you don’t know any of those bands, don’t worry, they’re good. I saw The Marching Teeth play a blistering set in a portable, open trailer in a dirt parking lot at JMueller BBQ as part of the “Heavy Metal BBQ” that Transistor Studios put on. When you combine a hot, muggy day, cheap, cold beer, brisket sandwiches the size of a loaf of bread and 6 hairy, loud metal bands, well, that my friends, is is a clear recipe for awesomeness. Interesting fact – Damon Meena from Transistor Studios is the lead singer and bass player of The Marching Teeth. If you like metal, you will like this.
Galaxy Express:
http://www.myspace.com/galaxyrocknroll
I caught these guys at the Trophy Room on 6th St. while I watched an old colleague take a spin on the ol’ mechanical bull there. I’m not sure which was more impressive. Galaxy Express is apparently the biggest band to come from Hongdae, North Korea. They’re a 3-piece, self-described psychedelic rock band in the vein of Led Zeppelin and The Black Angels. They actually did a cover of Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song that made created quite a crowd in the bar and on the street. I will say this, when Galaxy Express started playing, no one was watching the girls riding the bull anymore.
Fidlar:
http://fidlar.bandcamp.com/
http://fidlar.tumblr.com/
Fidlar is a punk band from SoCal. They’re all pretty young but have a great pedigree, which is to say that the guitarist and drummers father is Greg Kuehn, keyboardist from famed Long Beack, CA punk band TSOL. ”Wait for the Man” is a personal favorite. They’re already signed and will be huge in the punk rock scene. Interesting side note, Greg also owns a music production company and would love to work with us. Check them out here - http://www.peligromusic.com/.
Howler:
http://www.howlerband.com/
Howler played the JWT party. They’re indie rock a la The Strokes, The Hives and bands like that. They’re just younger and better looking. Great sound and style though. I was drooling over their vintage gear and syrupy-thick, reverb-ed out sound. Tasty stuff.
Rob Garza/Thievery Corporation:
http://www.thieverycorporation.com/
Rob Garza from Thievery Corporation threw down an amazing set at Kingdom. This was a joint party thrown by Chnl http://chnl.it/. Chnl is another site that aggregates your social interests online. It hasn’t quite launched yet, so it will be interesting to see how this differentiates itself from Pinterest, FB and so on. Regardless, the event was great and Rob put on amazing set. See him and/or Thievery live if you get a chance.
Brands:
Nike:
http://www.nike.com/fuelband/
Nike recently released the FuelBand. It’s a bit like Fitbit but a bit more stylish. It is your basic pedometer and calorie counter but adds in a clock and accumulates “Fuel” points for you. They had an entire outdoor experience devoted to the FuelBand as well as a pop up store which was one of 3 places in the world that you could purchase it. Those who purchased FuelBands at SXSW also got priority access to Nike’s private events all week. This was an interesting and effective way to push the already incredible sales of the FuelBand.
American Express:
http://mashable.com/2012/03/13/jay-z-sxsw-concert-american-express/
Amex put on an (apparently) amazing show with Jay Z at Austin City Limits. While this sounds PR worthy alone, the only way to get “tickets”was to sync your Amex card to Twitter. They live streamed the whole event for those (like me) that couldn’t get a ticket in time. Like Nike, giving priority access to their customer base via was extremely successful.
Google:
http://www.projectrebrief.com/
Google took four of the most iconic American ad campaigns from the 60′s and 70′s and re-imagined them today as digital display ads. The brands featured were Alka-Seltzer, Avis, Coke and Volvo. Google even partnered with the original creative teams and had them work alongside them to re-imagine how these campaigns would live today. Clive Bar hosted several presentations by Google in the pouring rain to debut a lot of this collaboration. Inspired, moving and innovative.
Inspiration:
Baratunde Thurston:
http://www.baratunde.com/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/10/baratunde-thurston-sxsw-comedy-technology_n_1337012.html
Baratunde is a self-described politically-active, technology-loving comedian from the future. He recently published a book called “How to be Black” and he currently serves as Director of Digital for The Onion. Yes, The Onion. So, yeah, he’s a pretty funny dude. His keynote was a thoughtful and funny rant on technology’s evolving role on furthering satire around the globe. HuffPo had a nice wrap up of it.
Ray Kurzwell:
http://www.kurzweilai.net/
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2012/03/12/ray_kurzweil_at_sxsw_on_sentient_computing_robot_revolts_and_life_extension_.html
Ray Kurzweill is an American inventor, author and scientist. Moreover, he’s a mad genius. He is largely responsible for everything from inventing Watson, the Jeopardy-playing computer to creating the first musical synthesizers that accurately duplicated the sound of real instruments to properly forecasting future advances in technology. There is a quick wrap up of the main points from his keynote above.
Ayah Bdeir:
As I mentioned before, Ayah is the creator of LittleBits (http://littlebits.cc/). Here is a nice video that explains what LittleBits are - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ITIng-ksQg. In essence, they are an open source kit of pre-assambled circuits that easily snap together with tiny magnets. Pretty impressive way to prototype electronics. Ayah is now a TED fellow and gives inspired speeches around the globe on demystifying technology via simple prototyping.
DJ Spooky:
http://www.djspooky.com/
Yes, DJ Spooky is a well-known DJ. He’s also known as Paul D. Miller, a conceptual artist, writer and composer. He has had work featured in the Whitney in NYC and the Warhol museum in PA, among others. He was at TED mostly talking about his new book The Book of Ice, a contemplative look at the only uninhabited continent on the planet that belongs to no single country and has no government. He peppered this with stories of his career in music and his unique approach to composing/programming music for his albums. He capped it off with a live demonstration of his DJ Spooky iTunes music app featuring a live performance from one of the Austin symphony’s own violinists. Technical difficulties withstanding, it was pretty cool.
One final thing I that was immediately apparent is how far and wide the GSP family really extends. I’m sure there were many other alumni in attendance (and certainly some I’m forgetting to mention here) but I was lucky enough to catch up and spend a bit of time with -
Margaret McLaughlin
Larry Corwin
Bryan Houlette
Franny Rhodes
Danielle Thornton
Sosia Bert
Peter Albrycht
Derek Richmond
Mike Geiger
Jeff Benjamin
Peter Scanlon
Ricardo Landim
Kelsie Van Deman
Hartley Rusen
Tanya LaSieur
Christine O’Donnell
Sharman Ordoyne
Brittany Hawkins
It is really special to be able to see these people and how they’ve grown in new and interesting ways. The value in preserving your relationships with old coworkers and friends cannot be underscored enough.
So, that’s the most I could brain dump. I hope you get to attend next year. There is so much to see, hear and do. It really is a special event to be a part of.
Cheers.
My soon-to-be married good buddy Kevin Weber just landed a full-time gig with his buddy Steve Massey. Kevin is a fantastic musician and audio engineer of his own right. Steve and his partner Todd are both mad genius software engineers that also happen to be alumni of Digidesign (makers of ProTools). Together, this team will dominate the audio plugin world.
Massey plugins are already used in thousands of records that you have been listening to for years.
Massey Plugins, Inc.
