Val Halla – My Journey to Rock N Roll Heaven

Ok, so I’m at Launch Music Conference in Pennsylvania right now.  Its a great conference put on and so far the panels have been great.  Its a lot smaller than something like SXSW so you actually have packed showcases and get a lot of attention.  The panels are more intimate and involved AND engaging.

However, i’m not just trying to blow smoke up Launch’s ass here, and so I have to admit the last panel I saw REALLY pissed me off.  I’m am so sick and tired of hearing this “Screw labels.  Labels will be dead in 5 years” attitude.   

NO THEY WON’T. And stop telling the kids that.  There is something to be said for a crashing industry, and the fact that physical CD sales have been on a downward spiral and will continue so.  Basically there is just a lot less overall to go around.  And yes, the major labels are getting hit hard.  Are they going anywhere? Absolutely not.

Major labels still have catalogued albums.  The old school stuff that we love so much.  People will continue to buy because of nostalgia.  Because the music meant something.  Its the major’s saving grace right now.

But though they are taking a much smaller piece of the pie overall, they have their sites aimed on more AS WE SPEAK.

I know for a fact they have digital divisions set up just for emerging technology.  Just strictly to find ways to monetize in the new market. And they will.  While these panelists sit here and tell kids to “screw labels” “you don’t need one…do it yourself”  EXCUSE ME?  Is that kid you just said that to going to walk up to the major cell phone carriers in the United States and say “Hey when you guys start providing subscription based music platforms for mobile, can you put my band on there? We’ve sold 120 copies of our album in our home town.”

They’re going to go GET THE HELL OUTTA HERE, that is if the kid even ever made it past security to get into an office and actually speak to someone about it.  Which they wouldn’t.  Its just stupid.  telling these kids to do it themselves. These are not business men and women. They are musicians.  They don’t have years of experience, contacts, business knowledge, business politics on their side. Are you kidding me?  Get real DIY dudes.   

DIY up to a point is great. You can kick start your career instantly if you go about it the right way, work your but off, yah you can achieve acceptable success in a world where it might not have been possible ten years ago. But why is that everyone’s focus??? to barely scrape by?   Isn’t rock n roll based on the idea that you have something worth saying, and something equally worth hearing?  Why not set your goals hire. Say , “Hey there is a company that has way more experience, knowledge, and most of all, resources (contacts and money), than I do.  I think I should aim to work with a company like that. ”   Yes you give up a little bit to work with a company, but what happened to two heads are better than one?  As Will Ferrell said on SNL in a famous Robert Goulet impersonation “You wouldn’t hire a clown to fix a leak in the john”

It just doesn’t make sense that these people are telling these kids to forget about the people who know this industry inside and out.  Aim high. Aim your sites on people who can do what you cannot.  And don’t be ashamed to admit you can’t do it yourself.  You are supposed to. You’re a musician.  You’re not a college business grad, with a minor in advertising.  or whatever.  Its just B.S.  straight up.  Do what you can with what you can, and when the right people come along to build your team, BUILD IT. And dont stop building. Aim high.  

Work together. This is not a war. we are not at war with labels.  Just find the right ones. Find the right people.  Its not us against them.  This is the INDUSTRY.  Its not the music MAN.  Its an industry and if you use all facets you will fair much better than doing EVERYTHING ON YOUR OWN.  Its common sense.

If someone makes money off you, but together you are each making more money than you would without each other, what exactly is wrong with that?

And all this B.S. about “oh look what Radiohead did, look at Trent Reznor”  YES THEY ARE BOTH DOING AWESOME THINGS WITHOUT A LABEL>  AND ITS GREAT>  AND TRENT IS ONE OF THE MOST INVENTIVE AND CREATIVE AND FORWARD THINKING PEOPLE OUT THERE AND I ADMIRE HIM FOR THAT……BUT DON’T FORGET FOR ONE SECOND THAT BOTH THOSE ACTS STARTED ON MAJORS, BUILT THEIR FAN BASES ON MAJORS, AND THEN HAD THE OPTION TO LEAVE. 

You think you can just jump in the game tomorrow, and have the success that NIN or Radiohead has had in the next year just from DIY and giving your album out for free like them?  HELL NO.  Sure give you album out for free. Its great promotion.  But don’t wonder why you can’t sustain yourself a year or two down the line, because after you did all that fan base building, you refused to sign with a company that could have taken your career to the next level and helped it blossom.  AND VALIDATED all the work you did on your own to get there.

Aim high.  Don’t be afraid to work with others, just work with the RIGHT people.  Educate yourself, but don’t do it alllll yourself.  I’m so sick of this B.S. of “screw the labels.”  No screw you buddy.

Don’t listen kids.  Work hard. Work together.  Accomplish amazing things and feats.

Aim High.

Hey guys,

so I started this email, and stupid reverbnation lost what I wrote.  Its easier for me to organize a mailing list through these guys, but don’t worry, You will still get the same authentic rambling emails on my part!  

I was going through the mailing list itself, and who was on it.  What a trip down memory lane!  I have had so many of you work with me, support me, and give me advice over the years, it is crazy to see a list of names who have helped me to grow to where I am now.  Some of you have never actually received an email from me before, as you just recently signed up.  Well let me tell you, they are never short of LONG. haha.

I’ll cut right to the chase.  NEW SONGS FINALLY!  

You can download The Bad Girl Touch (which many of you may have heard already but this way you can actually keep the download), as well as two brand new songs “Coming Home” and “Stay”.  These songs were just finished tonight.  

All three songs were recorded in Nashville in the last 6 months.  The Bad Girl Touch was produced by Todd Woolsey, and Mixed by Paul Jenkins.  Coming Home and Stay were produced and recorded by Bob Funk.  All three songs were mastered by Vancouverite Aalo Guha. A HUGE thank you goes out to all four of these hard working gentlemen.  Every single one of them worked their butt off, and did WAY MORE than they had to, to make sure these songs came out great.  

Here is the link for your free download!  They are zipped into a file together, are mp3′s so shouldn’t take long to download!

http://www.sendspace.com/file/n35al7

Please let me know what you think, even if you think its the worst thing you’ve ever heard. Everyone needs to stay humble.  :)   And PLEASE share them with whomever you like.  At this point it will only benefit me for more people to become listeners!

This is a very exciting time for me.  I’ve finally come to that point where I’m ready to hand over the reigns to somebody/a company for parts of my career I just can’t do alone anymore.  Most of you know what a control freak I am (which i am ever apologetic for, though i can’t stop, and YOU CAN’T MAKE ME!!!!  lol.)  But it has basically come to the point where i can’t be booking all these shows, negotiating on my own behalf, keep up to date on internet marketing and running my own campaigns, and still be writing and playing and being the musician too.  It is all getting to be a lot.  And thankfully I have people interested in helping.  So i would be a fool to turn the offer down!

So right now its a matter of figuring out who and what will be the best approach and putting that ever important team together.  I expect within the next month or so to have a good grasp on that, and hopefully will have great news to share with you all by that time!  Hooray!

I’ve been going crazy!! Was in Toronto, Austin, and Las Vegas in the last three weeks, and now off to Pennsylvania, Baltimore, Los Angeles, and Vancouver in the following three weeks! 

Here is a pic from Austin, Tx where i played the Red Gorilla Festival during SXSW.

 And here is a pic from the show I did in Las Vegas at the Billboard Mobile Entertainment Live day at CTIA.  (NOTE: Rob Thomas was on stage a few hours before me strictly to talk about music going to mobile phones.  Yet for some reason, all he had to say was “my record label really just handles that” and then went on to discuss his new solo album coming out.  HA!  Not to mention by the time I went on to play, everyone had already been bombarded by NOTHING BUT Rob Thomas music all day inbetween conference panels.  They just put his new songs on repeat and didn’t play anything but ROB THOMAS allllll daaaayyyyyy.  I think that really helped me in the end though… it was one of those “hooray, anything but more rob thomas” moments! lol )

 (photo by Fredwill Hernandez)

I can’t remember what else I was going to write.  I guess just a big thank you to everyone.  I’ll keep you posted on the situation.  AND if you are in Lancaster, PA. or Baltimore, Los Angeles, or Vancouver, please check the tour schedule or check back to it, and find out when i’m in town, and then holler at me and let’s HAAANNNNGGGGG.

-From your friend,

Val Halla

http://blog.valhallaonline.com

myspace.com/myspacemusicvalhalla

P.S.
Oh one final thing. I have a friend putting on a fundraiser in Vancouver for victims of the Australian Forest Fires. He is looking for anyone at this point who can help out, for planning, organizing, or musicians or DJs who would like to contribute performances to the event. WakeUpVancouver is also highly involved in the promotion of local music, so check them out regardless!

Wake Up Vancouver on facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#/note.php?note_id=66709889554&ref=mf

On myspace:
http://www.myspace.com/wakeupvancouver

If you are interested in helping out or performing:
PLEASE SEND US:
- YOUR NAME
- CONTACT INFORMATION: phone number, business (where we can contact you)
- WHAT TEAM YOU WOULD LIKE TO VOLUNTEER FOR
- SPONSOR INFO
- AND ANY ADDITIONAL INFORMATION THAT MAY BE OF USE TO US

To —->

Interested in?

(Fashion/Designer/Clothing Lines): please email Clo at rodeorooster@hotmail.com

(Music/DJ/Promotions/Concert): please email Ashton at wakeupvanbc@yahoo.ca

(Music/Entertainment Sponsors/Photography and more): please email wakeupvanbc@yahoo.ca

Hey All.  Just on my way to work.  Will write more about my Las Vegas experience at CTIA last week, very soon! For now here are some pics from the show I played at the Unconference portion of the Billboard Mobile Entertainment Live day at CTIA.  GoMoNews put a mean open forum discussion, where I learned for the first time of barcode technology for mobile phones and promotion and advertising. Might sound kind of boring, but I assure you it is not!  Explain more later…

Well i just got back from Vegas yesterday, and I have to say it lived up to its name of Sin City. THere was a lot going on, some of which I knew how to handle, and some of which I didn’t. But as what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, i can at least say that i’ve come away from the experience with some wisdom. One thing for sure being never take a Red Eye flight on a saturday night out of Vegas! After being there a week, my body was actually shutting down. I had a swollen eyes even though I had not bumped them nor had anyone hit me. It was as if my body was physically closing my eyes for me since my mind refused to let it happen. My muscles hurt like i had run a marathon. I walked through the airport like a las vegas zombie. Staring down the new arrivals like the fresh meat they were. “you too will become one of us” i thought. All things considered…I SURVIVED!  And yes, there will be some vegas songs that came of this trip.  They are in their infancy now, but will grow into their adult versions over the next month or so I’m sure.

I now have two weeks before I take off again, to Pennsylvania, then to Baltimore, then to LA for two weeks. I may even end up in Vancouver at the end of all that, before getting back to Nashville sometime mid may. So its recovery time, and prep time once again. I’m listening to final mixes tonight of two new songs I will be releasing by the end of the week.  If you aren’t on my mailing list yet, please go to the home page www.valhallaonline.com and sign up.  I am going to be sending these songs to those people on the mailing list only.  Otherwise they will be available for streaming on Myspace.  But the mailing list will receive the downloadable versions.

I wrote this article while is Las Vegas about a company called Slot Music. They are trying to market the CD all over again, disguised as a micro SD chip. I interviewed some reps of this company after a stiff martini and a corona, and they still managed to make my blood boil.

So

HERE

is the fury I unleashed on them the next day, once I had regained my wits about me.

I saw Library Voices, a Regina band, tear it up in Toronto last night.  First they played El Mocambo and won over a jaded rock indie crowd.  Subtle leg wiggling soon turned into to full on clapping, shouting, and groovin’ to the shout-along celebratory choruses.  They ended their set with a cover of Neil Young’s “Unknown Legend”, with everyone singing loud chorusing harmonies, and a front of stage beat down of what I believe was the floor Tom.

I have to say, those kids from Regina did such a great job winning over that Toronto crowd, and giving it their all (kudos to all band members for not only “breaking” one, but POURING out a sweat), that they actually made me well up with pride and tears came to my eyes!

I expect to see great things in the future for that band, and I expect they will be and already are, great influences in the Regina, Sask. music scene.

Hella Props to Library Voices!

This is my first article for GoMoNews, about Vancouver company Mobify.me

http://www.gomonews.com/mobify-m/

See Article posted here, on Billboard.com

Ok, so basically I have been holding off making regular entries on here because I really wanted to get this Blog formatted in a cool way, and looking awesome for everyone before I started directing people here.  BUT ALAS, a “blogging for dummies”, “wordpress for dummies” and “the huffington post” intensive study later, I am exhausted and not yet ready to properly execute the changes I would like.  

I leave for Toronto, for CMW in 4 days and I don’t think i will have time to get the Blog organized before going.  So I’ve decided the posting must begin regardless!

This Blog is going to focus on my music career, and what I’m going through in the middle of this digital/mobile/music revolution, as a SO FAR (fingers crossed for the promise of the future) unsigned artist.

It’s getting very crazy in this world.  I’m sleeping very little, I’m on the computer very much, and the more time on the computer I spend, the more pissed off I get I’m not practicing guitar, or writing, or singing. So that in turn seems to actually be working to MAKE me sit down and do those things everyday.  So maybe this is going to work out after all.

I will be in Austin, TX for SXSW right after CMW.  

There are two new songs on the way and I will post a link to them here next week as soon as they are ready!

I have a new skateboard, and the weather is GREAT in Nashville.  Aside from how insanely busy I have been lately, and how I have seen virtually  NO ONE (I am spending most of my days recording and working on the two new songs with Producer Bob Funk, and then returning home to lock myself away in my room and play music and type on the computer – writing songs, learning Classic Rock tablatures, booking shows, booking flights, organizing my “web content” and trying to say hello to people on facebook here and again…you know “socializing” hhaha),  I am actually RIDICULOUSLY happy.

I’m finally focusing on music in as many hours a day as most people do a 9 to 5 job.  I am working my ass off to take the reigns in my career instead of waiting around for someone to do it for me like I did for a very long time.  I think I expected talent to help a lot more than its probably actually going to . hahaha.  Honestly, if talent were the key, half of the people down here in Nashville would be signed. But sadly, they are not.  So I can either sit around and fuss over it, or get my ass in gear and TAKE IT TO THE STREETS (enter doobie brothers music).

I have much more info to divulge, and many more specifics to get into, but I just wanted to stake my claim on here and say, YES I AM DOING THIS BLOG FO REALZ STARTING TODAY….like an American Astronaut putting a flag up on the moon, I’m staking a claim! (I am getting closer to learning the Star Spangled Banner because I have already been to 4 NHL games this season)

So please feel free to check back whenever you like.  I will be updating at least once a day, no matter if it is a large or  small entry.

I’ll leave you with a little bit from an interview with Terry McBride (he is the CEO of Nettwerk Music which is based in Vancouver and is label home to many well known artists, such as Sarah McLachlan).  This will help you understand how crazy things actually are in this industry right now. There is a revolution going on in music that is as big as any other that has happened.  It is not as cool or romantic as the 60′s or 70′s and it doesn’t have the angst of the 90′s Grunge movement, but it is a relevant and industry altering revolution no less.  This will not only change the way we receive music, but the music itself. The rules of music making, and the rules of music listening. The rules of being a music fan, and the way we get to experience being a music fan.  Basically, EVERYTHING is about to change as we know it.

I hate to say it, because it is void of all beauty and majesty RIGHT NOW (though watch and great things musically are on the horizon), but this is Woodstock 2.0 (feel free to exercise your gag reflex now if you couldn’t stand to hear that term).

My dream has always been Rock & Roll. I don’t want to be an “indie artist”, I don’t want to be a “pop artist”. I want to be a rock star.  I want to play GOOD music, that affects people, that serenades their lives, that gives them a time and a place to document, and lets them go back there whenever they hear that song again. I want to play a loud distorted guitar and blow people’s ears off, then I want to slow it down and bring out the acoustics, and fill the room with ambience and give people shivers up their arms, and have some kind of holy rock gods coming down to tickle your neck experience with an audience full of people.  I want to drive around the country side, Canada, the US, Mexico, all over and see all the people there, and talk to them, and view life through the eyes of many. I want to see Europe one day and maybe even Asia (Culture shock gives me anxiety, and that’s why the “maybe” for Asia…cause I am afraid of the unknown sometimes haha). I want to go hang with the Australians and the New Zealanders, where THEY live and not just in Vancouver always!

I want to fucking rock.  Its what makes me happy.  And 5 years ago if I was at the stage i’m at now in my career, about to venture out into this musical world with all my ducks in a row, they probably would have beat the rock n roll right out of me, dressed me up in some kind Genie in a Bottle outfit, and poked me with a Cattle Prod till I could move like Christina.

But today is a new day friends.  And the rock star can live once more.  Stay with me, and I’ll prove it!  Rock & Roll has just been reborn!  It is 2009, and the Internet and open sourced software programmers just saved the world from forever becoming a manifestation of a Don McLean lyric.

And I leave you with the words of music industry prophet (haha) Terry McBride (from rollogrady.com):

R&G: You recently spoke about cloud-based servers, mobile applications and smartphones being the future of the music business.

Terry: What’s happened in the last ten years is kind of moot. The next 18 months will determine the future of the music business. It’s a situation where the turnover on phones by the average consumer – now I’m being generous here – is every two years. It’s probably shorter. The smartphones that are starting to dominate the marketplace are specific platforms now open to applications that are being developed outside of the R&D departments of all of the various carriers. Apple, when they opened up their App Store, I think they sold, what, 150 million apps in maybe 9 months. It stunned the world, and Apple is a small player. They might be a noisy player, but they’re a small player within the mobile space. Research In Motion launches their store this month, Nokia is launching Ovi in April and Google has already launched their Android site. You’re going to see millions of applications come onto the marketplace. You’re going to see social filtering of the really good ones, and what’s going to be in there are applications that change the behavioral habits of how you consume music. The need to download music will no longer exist. If anything, it will be a hassle. You’ll have smartphones that can probably handle two to three hundred songs. That’s a gradual download; you’re actually not streaming it. It’s actually on your phone but it’s pulled from some sort of server, whether it’s your own server or a cloud server. To make all of these applications work, you have to have really good metadata, which means that business has to focus its efforts on really good metadata. Rich metadata is going to work with all of these applications. You’re going to see digital maids, digital valets. You’re going to see applications for maybe five bucks a month where you can access all the music that you want, how you want it, when you want it, imported to any device. So why would you want to download? Why would you want to go online to try to find it for free? Besides, something you find free might not work with these smartphone apps. Five bucks is no big deal to have unlimited access. That’s where everything’s going. All of the current arguments and debates are moot. I would even say that the ticker has now started on when the iPod goes away. I think Apple saw that.

R&G: So their primary focus will be to promote the iPhone?

Terry: They’ve been pushing the iPhone more than anything, and when they opened up their App Store, their intuitions were proven right. It is the App Store that has driven iPhone sales.

R&G: Do you think the major labels will sign off on these applications?

Terry: I don’t think they have any choice in the matter. It’s really just a subscription model, but it’s the application. A subscription model has never worked to date because it’s always been a hassle. It only works on your laptop, you can’t port it between devices, and it’s always streaming and always a pain in the ass. Last.fm and Pandora have been nice, but transferring that around has been really difficult. The applications coming with these smartphones will change all that and make it a hassle not to use them. Downloading will seem like a hassle two years from now. It will be like, ‘Download something? Are you nuts? Here, I can instantly access it. Watch, I’ll just type it in and my valet will go find it for me.’