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Mike Bankhead

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One year of podcasting 

logo for the You Could Be My Aramis podcast - a microphone with the name of the podcast and Mike's official logo

 

I started having conversations for my podcast in December 2021. The last episode I released in 2022 was number 74.  Considering I started off with an "Episode ½" on 31st December, that's a total of 75 episodes over the last year.  

What have I enjoyed about having a podcast?  The best part is the conversations.  First of all, this is a way for me to do what my doctor instructed me to do.  Last year in November/December, I was in a pretty dark place from a mental health standpoint... darker than normal.  My doctor said that one of the things I should do is to have a meaningful conversation every day with someone who is NOT my wife.  Now, in the last few months, I've been awfully lax in getting my daily meaningful conversation in.  (If anyone wants to help with that, I'll take volunteers.)  That said, every time I record a conversation for the podcast, that totally counts. Second, it turns out that people are awfully interesting if you let them talk about something they are passionate about.  Just taking a moment to listen to people and ask appropriate questions is pretty cool.  Third, sometimes I feel like this is a useful endeavor for the community. I really miss Gem City Podcast and the fine work they did. I especially looked forward to the Wednesday episodes featuring a local musician or band. Now that they're gone, there's an empty space in the Dayton area for someone to talk to local musicians about their work. I've been making an attempt at filling that space, and hope that eventually, listeners will come to look forward to my conversations with Dayton artists the way I looked forward to Izzy Rock's conversations.

Of course, there are parts of the process I don't like.  Sometimes, the tools I use fail. I recorded a great conversation with Paul Monnin of Age Nowhere, and somehow the sound ended up completely distorted and garbled. If you listen really hard, you can figure out what is being said, but it sounds awful and grating, and I wouldn't foist that upon anyone. Also, editing the podcast... that's not so much fun. One might not realize how many times things like "uh", "um", "like", and "you know" are said during conversations, but there is a level at which using those terms over and over becomes distracting, so I tend to prune them out of conversations.  That's incredibly time-consuming.  After editing, I usually do another listen in order to glean ideas to write the Show Notes.  There was a time when I would consistently use time stamps in the Show Notes to mark highlights of the conversation.. that's even MORE time-consuming, so I haven't done that in awhile.  Hey, as a podcast listener, is that something you'd like to see more often?  I don't even really know whether putting in that extra work is adding value or not.  I've thought about hiring someone to handle that work for me, but I'm pretty sure I can't fairly pay the going rate for that work at the moment, so I'll keep on doing it myself.  At least that's another skill I can put on a resumé, right?

Of the 75 episodes, 30 of them include women.  That should be 50 percent of the episodes, and I didn't quite get there, so I'll try to do better in 2023.

 

 

Here are what I think are the most notable episodes of the last year:

 

The longest episode

The longest episode is also the most recent episode, number 74, featuring Juliet Fromholt and Taylor Ruckle. We're talking about our favorite albums from 2022, and the duration is one hour and forty-five minutes.

 

The most popular episode

More people listened to my Episode 7 conversation with Tod Weidner than any of my other episodes. It's clear that he means a great deal to the music community here in Dayton.  This one went up way back in February 2022, so it's about time I have him back to nerd out on songwriting and music some more.

 

The most important episode

You might think differently, but for me, the most important episode is number 30, with Brian "Z" Zisook. He is the cofounder and Senior Vice President of Operations at Audiomack. He's a professional journalist who now is now an executive helping to run a music streaming service. 

In his own words: This isn't a company created by and of silicon valley based tech bros... this company was founded by and employs a lot of creatives who come from backgrounds in the fine arts... these are people who understand the plight of the aspiring creative...

This episode is important for musicians who release music.  If you are one of these people, you should pay attention to how truly passionate Z is about music and the people who make it. He wants to see us succeed. He and the team over at Audiomack are building their platform in ways that allow listeners to directly support us financially. That's not the case with the other streaming services, where we are only a source of content. Z wants people to hear us. Educating us on how the business works and helping us to improve are also very important to him, and he is often handing out useful advice for free on his Twitter account.

This episode is important for music listeners.  The folks at Audiomack work on their algorithm to ensure that it serves you the music YOU want to hear, as opposed to giving heavy priority to whatever the most popular major-label song of the moment is due to labels having a stake in the service. Audiomack World is an excellent source of discovery, consistently providing editorial recommendations from actual real humans. If you are a listener who values the people who create the music you listen to, recognize it as hard work, and believe that one should generally be paid for one's work, Audiomack has a way for you to directly support an artist you believe in, if you choose to do so.

This episode also contains a direct message from me to my fellow musicians in Dayton.  Sure, I don't think anyone really paid attention to it, but I meant it at the time and I still mean it.  If you would like to know what that is, well, listen to this one.

 

The interesting stranger who I'd love to have a beer with episode

An excellent multi-national band called Jenny and the Mexicats were going to stop at Levitt Pavilion here in Dayton for a concert. I really wanted to see this show, but I was going to be out of town. I volunteer at Levitt Pavilion, and thought that I might be able to help to promote the show a little bit.  When I contacted the band, bassist Icho Van responded, and our conversation in English is Episode 52.

Icho has an interesting life story. He's a hard worker, doing the tasks that would normally be handled by a band's manager. He's out there living his dreams, playing music he believes in, touring the world, and finding delicious things to eat everywhere. His band has had the privilege of playing an NPR Tiny Desk show. Despite all of his success, he's quite normal. Icho is easy to talk to, friendly, and cool.  (Part of this might be because he plays bass.)  I'd love to grab a beer with him, and maybe watch a game where his beloved Buffalo Bills are playing.

 

El episodio con el desconocido con quién me gustaría tomar una chela

Una banda excelente llamada Jenny and the Mexicats tenía planeada dar un concierto aquí en Dayton, Ohio.  En su gira, iban a tocar en el Levitt Pavilion, y la entrada fue gratis. Quería mucho asistir a este concierto, pero tenía que viajar fuera de la ciudad. Sirvo de vez en cuando como voluntario en Levitt Pavilion, y pensé que por lo menos podía ayudar con promocionar el concierto un poco.  Cuando escribí al grupo, fue el bajista Icho Van quién me dio respuesta, y nuestra charla en español se halla en Episodio 51.

Icho tiene una historia bien interesante. Trabaja muy duro.  Hace las tareas que normalmente haría el gerente de una banda. Este señor está viviendo sus sueños, tocando una música feliz y energética, haciendo giras alrededor del mundo, y decubriendo bastantes comidas muy sabrosas. Tiene mucho éxito, y un nivel de fama, sobre todo en México. No obstante, es completamente normal. Icho es amable, muy buena en conversación, y uno se siente muy a gusto con él. (Sin lugar a dudas, una razón por eso es que toca el bajo.) Me encantaría tomar una o dos cervezas juntos, y quizás mirar un partido de fútbol.

 

The episode that changed my life

Even though Episode 9 aired in February, the conversation actually took place in December 2021.  My guest was Becca Wonka, a delightful and effervescent French musician who lives in Los Angeles. We talked for nearly three hours.  Yes, only one of those three hours was actually recorded for the podcast.  We hit it off.  The conversation meandered back and forth from French to English.  If you listen to the episode, I estimate that 70% of it is in French, but I put time markers in the show notes so you can skip around to the parts you are likely to understand. 

This is probably not a surprise to you, but it is extremely difficult to make a living as an independent musician.  It's not impossible, but there's a long path and a lot of work to get there. I am not remotely close to profitable as a musician yet.  When Becca and I had this conversation, I had recently left my corporate job.  Shortly after our conversation, her lovely husband introduced me to his industry, the business of adaptation. To shorten what would otherwise be a long story, that's now my gig that actually pays.  I owe a debt to Nico as a mentor that I will never be able to repay.  I owe the same debt to Becca for recognizing that this line of work is something that I can do, and for recommending me to her husband.

A great deal of the mental health progress I have made over the past year is attributable to being much MUCH less stressed out by work.  By no means am I "cured" or "well" - and I likely never will be - but I am in a better place now, and even occasionally feel slightly optimistic.

 

La conversation qui a changé ma vie

Bien qu'episode 9 est sortie en février 2022, la conversation entre Becca Wonka et moi avait lieu en Décembre 2021. Elle est française, d'origine nantaise, et habite maintenant à Los Angeles. Becca a une passion profonde pour la musique, et elle parle avec joie et enthousiasme. On a bavardé pendant trois heures, dont une heure est enregistré pour le podcast. Si vous en écoutiez, vous allez trouver aux "show notes"que j'ai mis quelques indices pour dire quand on a parlé en français et quand on a parlé en anglais.

J'imagine que vous savez déjà que c'est extrèmement difficile gagner la vie comme musicien independent aux Etats-Unis. C'est pas impossible, mais on doit bosser beaucoup et il faut être très patient. Je ne gagne pas encore ma vie comme musicien. Quand j'ai bavardé avec Becca, je venais de quitter un boulot d'entreprise. Quelques jours après qu'on a parlé, le mari de Becca m'a parlé pour m'inviter à apprendre le business d'adaptation. Actuellement, c'est ça ce que je fais pour ètre payé. Je dois un dette envers Nico que jamais je pourrais lui payer, et c'est pareil avec Becca pour comprendre que je puisse faire ce type de travaille et me recommander à son mari.

 

*****

No matter how long you've been listening to my podcast - whether a year, a month, a week, or a day - thank you very much for choosing to spend some time listening to me talk to interesting people. I sincerely hope that you have enjoyed sitting in on my conversations, and warmly invite you to keep on listening.  If you have something you are passionate about and would like to talk about it, contact me, and you could totally be a guest. 

In 2023, I'm planning to release a new music project that I poured so much of myself into, and when I start promoting it, I'll have podcast conversations with the wonderful and talented people who collaborated on this project with me. I can't wait for you to meet them and all of the other individuals who I'll be speaking with.

12/30/2022

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in depression, being broken, true stories, Dayton, art, bass, bassists, French, artists, podcast, Spanish, Gem City Podcast, Audiomack, algorithm, Brian Zisook, Icho Van, español, français

Review of my Music Writing Exercise experience 

I'm not a journalist or professional writer, but I like to write, so my blog is a way to scratch that particular itch. To some extent, my Twitter feed also serves this purpose. I learned this year of a music writing exercise that is conveniently called "Music Writing Exercise", and is represented by the #MWE hashtag on Twitter. The idea is to listen to one album every day that you have never listened to before, then write some thoughts on it... but the thoughts need to be the length of exactly one tweet.  Now, I started the challenge a few days late, which required listening to multiple albums on some days this month, but I just now finished the Music Writing Exercise. I'd like to share with you the albums I listened to, and my thoughts on them, as written on Twitter.  Who knows, you might find something you like.

I'd link to all of these albums, but it would take me FOREVER to look up all of the appropriate links to websites and such, and besides, you know how to use Google, right? 

 

 

  • #MWE1. Yep, late getting started. Ben Decca's 2021 album Dévotion is my first exposure to Makossa music. The songs in Ben's native language (I assume Douala), well, I don't understand, but dig the music. Some latin-sounding flavors, great vocals & harmonies, grooving bass.

Ben Decca - Dévotion

  • #MWE2. Carolyn Shulman's Grenadine & Kerosene, which came out in 2021. The title track is excellent. There are a couple of songs that lean a little close to country for my tastes, but overall, solid lyrics & well performed musically. Go get this one.
  • #MWE3. Yes, still behind. California outfit The Sometimes Island has a new EP out called Beverly & Barbara. It's got a creative take an a 70s song, along with some tasty indie pop. Not too saccharine for me, care paid to songcraft and instrumental choices to properly deliver melody.

The Sometimes Island - Beverly & Barbara

  • #MWE4. Willie Nelson's ...And Then I Wrote. Well, it's noticeably derivative, with blues & gospel/soul music filtered through his vocal approach. Simple lyrics, going for obvious rhymes. Piano sprinkles are lovely, background singers lovely, album reminiscent of elevator music.
  • #MWE5. Melissa Carper gives us a live tracked album with Daddy's Country Gold. A unique voice, & an interesting take on a mix of some very old types of music. Yes, the word "country" is in the title, but there are other sounds here, notably strong jazz influence. I think I dig.
  • #MWE6. The Late Great Townes Van Zandt. "Great" is doing heavy lifting, as I disagree. My favorite song is "Snow Don't Fall", followed by "Poncho & Lefty", but there isn't much going on musically and the songs here don't speak to me. The strings are nice when they show up.
  • #MWE7. Music City USA, by Charlie Crockett. I don't like this one. I think I liked three songs, maybe. I'm beginning to think that this genre might not be my thing.
  • #MWE8. Still way behind schedule. I never heard anything from Betty Davis, and her recent death caused me to go check out her work. Her self-titled debut is funky, sultry, and will make you want to get up and dance.

Betty Davis - Betty Davis

  • #MWE9. This is the first Zola Jesus album, The Spoils. Vocals mixed low & ALSO sound like they have a ton of reverb, which makes them sound distant & mostly unintelligible. There are some catchy instrumental hooks, & tasty shoegaze sounds, but I won't come back to this one.
  • #MWE10. Back to Betty Davis for this one, her second album. It's just as funky and sultry and full of attitude as the first one.
  • #MWE11. Shame on me for taking so long to get around to listening to a Bad Brains album front to back. This is their debut & it is chaotic & fast & loud, except for when they branch off into reggae, & then right back in to furious punk. As good as advertised.
  • #MWE12. Adria Kain, When Flowers Bloom. An R&B album featuring what sounds like mostly in-the-box production, which really isn't my thing. I like "Melt Into You" best here, and the album is not bad, just not all that memorable. Really good vocals though.
  • #MWE13. Jay Wheeler's latest El Amor y Yo. Good vocals. Heavy use of pitch correction for artistic reasons. I'm old, it's not my thing. Interesting variety of Spanish language urban music. Plenty of nice grooves, and one can dance to most of it.
  • #MWE14. Wiki tells me that this Ricky Nelson album is rock and roll. It sounds like the kind of thing you would hear on an oldies station, the songs are quite slow, and use rudimentary chord progressions. The perfect soundtrack to a movie set in the 50s, but not for much else.

Ricky Nelson - Ricky Sings Again

  • #MWE15. More Betty Davis, more funk on Nasty Gal. Interesting how this sounds like the era it is from, but still somehow fresh. It's good. A song called "F.U.N.K." on it has Betty name dropping a bunch of her musical contemporaries, and I wonder if she was the first to do that.
  • #MWE16. Introduced to Nija here on Twitter by @djboothEIC.  Lots of emotion carried in the lyrics on these tracks, notably for me "Rare" & "You Don't Love Her". That said, I think modern R&B with in-the-box production & heavily pitch shifted vocals isn't for me. That's ok.
  • #MWE17. Revival, Rissi Palmer. I've followed @RissiPalmer #onhere for awhile, & finally got around to listening. This is as soulful as you'd expect given the album name, also meanders around country & americana sounds. Excellent album. Hello Hammond B3 on stompin' title track!

Rissi Palmer - Revival

  • #MWE18. Hard Won by Lizzie No has lovely songs. Lizzie plays harp. HARP!!! Lizzie also plays guitar. Folk music here, well recorded. I dig it.
  • #MWE19. I listened to this because Paul Monnin told me to. Other than the bass on "Do Right Woman", including a couple of sweet fills, I don't like it. Sorry, Paul. (Ok, I guess I dig the way the different vocals are panned as well.)

The Flying Burrito Brothers - The Gilded Palace of Sin

  • #MWE20. Fellow Midwesterners Urge Overkill are back. Say "oui" to this album. If you remember and like this band, you'll like this album. If not, you might still like it, I certainly do. I dig Nash Kato's voice. The songwriting is good.

Urge Overkill - Oui

  • #MWE21. I discovered Joslyn & The Sweet Compression because they are stopping by Dayton on tour. I have a ticket. Solid album here. Funky, with some characteristics of that classic 70s Dayton sound. Soulful. Dig it very much.
  • #MWE22. Bubblegum, by Mark Lanegan. I really should have gotten to this earlier. Great songs. Having PJ Harvey on a couple of them certainly doesn't hurt. Mark's voice sounds broken in and familiar like old leather. Solid rock and roll album.
  • #MWE23. Spoon's latest album is Lucifer on the Sofa, and is the first Spoon album I have listened to in its entirety. What took me so long? This is a rather solid rock album. I think my favorite song is "Satellite", but that may change with future listens.
  • #MWE24. Built To Spill's album Keep It Like A Secret came out in 1999. I like all of this. Some of the guitar work is a bit more meandering than most of what I listen to, but the hooks are good, and there is some big rock and roll sound when there needs to be.
  • #MWE25. Kären McCormick's EP Retro. It's pop country, not my thing at all. Well produced and executed, sure. Here's hoping more artists/songwriters of color bust through that glass ceiling in the Nashville part of the industry though.

Kären McCormick -Retro

  • #MWE26. heard Momma's new single, which sounds exactly like Veruca Salt to me, so I went to check out their older work. That's not quite the feeling you get on Two Of Me, their 2020 album, it's much more subdued. That said, it's perfectly fine, but I'm ready for the next one.
  • #MWE27. Eddie Vedder's latest solo album, Earthling, is much better than I expected, containing a variety of styles, sonic textures, and approaches to song construction. I need a few more listens before I throw too many superlatives at it, but my first take is it's quite solid.
  • #MWE28. Pollen, the 2021 album from Superbloom, is my favorite album out of all the ones I listened to this month. It sounds like 90s rock, and I mean that as a compliment. I will probably be listening to this over and over and over again.

Superbloom - Pollen

 

*****************************************************************************

This was an enjoyable exercise. I listened to several albums that I otherwise might not have listened to at all, or might have taken awhile to get around to. There ended up being a reasonably diverse group of genres represented, though it could be argued that I need more hip hop or pop music in this February collection.  Maybe I'll concentrate a bit harder on those areas next year.  (Though it could be said that discovering a new-to-me genre in Makossa more than makes up for that.) Yes, I definitely plan to do this exercise again.

02/28/2022

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in songwriting, albums, true stories, vocal harmonies, Spanish, Carolyn Shulman, MWE, Ben Decca, melissa carper, the sometimes island, Rissi Palmer, Nija, Jay Wheeler, Betty Davis, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Zola Jesus, Kären McCormick, Spoon, Urge Overkill, Built to Spill, Superbloom

Songwriting Story - Baile Conmigo 

I had this bass line in D major around for awhile.  It was fun enough to play through that it deserved to have a song written around it, even though I don't generally write in major keys.  The bass line best lent itself to Latin-influenced music... cumbia, salsa, rumba, merengue, bachata... something like that... the problem is that I don't know how to write any of that music.  Where would I begin?

I began with research.  I listened to a handful of songs from each of the above mentioned genres.  This part of the process probably deserved a lot more time than I dedicated to it... but it was a decent start.  Next, I asked a few friends who I know listened to Latin music if they could tell me more about it.  That didn't work.  The general answer there was that they have it around to dance to, but they couldn't really tell me anything about it.  (Note to self:  do NOT ask non-musicians about music.)  On to the Internet!

For some reason, salsa became the genre of choice here.  Any article or commentary I could find online about salsa music history and structure, well, I devoured it.  I learned that the traditional structure for this genre doesn't even remotely resemble the way that I understand songwriting... then decided that if I attempted to be "authentic" and write a salsa song by traditional structure without truly understanding it, well, that's not very authentic at all, is it?  The solution?  I ended up writing a pop/rock song in the normal pop/rock tradition, but with Latin influences.  Of course, the lyrics had to be in Spanish, there was never any doubt about that.

The result is "Baile Conmigo".  Here are the lyrics.

Baile conmigo 
Baile conmigo 

Oye hermosa 
Pareces muy sola 
Charlar contigo 
No hay quien osa 

¿Por qué? 
¿Por qué? 

Oye hermosa 
Tanta guapeza 
Hace una persona 
Muy muy nerviosa 

No soy metido 
Te hablo, te pido 
Te hablo, te pido 
Baile conmigo

 

This is what the artwork for it looks like.

As usual with my songs, I had a several very talented folks help out with this recording.  Here are the song credits:

Mike Bankhead - bass, piano, vocals 
Khrys Blank - claves, shakers, all sorts of percussion 
Brian Hoeflich - drums 
Phillip Bradley-Hutchinson - trumpet 
Erich Reith - congas, all sorts of percussion 
Rich Reuter - guitar 

Produced by Patrick Himes & Mike Bankhead 

Engineered & Mixed by Patrick Himes at Reel Love Recording Company, Dayton, Ohio

***

Percussive power couple Khrys and Erich were kind enough to do their usual moving and shaking all over the recording, supporting Brian Hoeflich's steady drumming.  (I asked him if he could give me a salsa beat, and he gave me a salsa beat.)  Phillip Bradley-Hutchinson's trumpet is a perfect addition.  Rich Reuter deftly brings lead guitar licks that sing ever so smoothly over all of it.  Finally, as usual, Patrick Himes and engineering and mixing skills present the best version of my work... and he didn't even blink when the indie rock guy showed up with a decidedly non-indie rock song.

This song was recorded amongst the songs that ended up on Anxious Inventions & Fictions, but doesn't really fit in with those songs, so it stands on its own as a single.

You'll be able to listen to "Baile Conmigo" this Friday April 2nd.  It will be available right here on my website, and also over on my Bandcamp page. You'll be able to download on Bandcamp for "pay what you wish" pricing, even if what you wish happens to be zero.  If you do decide to offer some small measure of compensation for the download on Bandcamp, well, since April 2nd is Bandcamp Friday, 100% of all funds will come straight to me, as the kind folks at Bandcamp are waiving their customary fees that day.

 

03/25/2021

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in news, songwriting, liner notes, true stories, recording, Brian Hoeflich, bass, piano, Patrick Himes, Baile Conmigo, Spanish, salsa, trumpet, Rich Reuter, Khrys Blank, Erich Reith, Phillip Bradley-Hutchinson

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