Win A Signed Copy of Priscilla Ahn's New CD!

Priscilla Ahn's debut full length CD A Good Day has been out for a little over a month now, and the response has been great! Here are a few quotes from recent reviews:

“from her first breaths in ‘Dream,’ she possesses a presence that can’t be overlooked. It’s not just the startling clarity of her singing, but also the lovely and occasionally wry songwriting that’s bound to capture listeners’ attention and imaginations.” – NPR

“lithe, lovely folk-pop” – People

“a classic folk album for the iPod generation.” – Paste

In other good news, Priscilla has just announced her summer tour with her first headlining shows! That plus a few opening slots with both Willie Nelson and Amos Lee, as well as some summer festival slots. (She already hit the Targhee Fest alongside folk greats Emmylou Harris and Lyle Lovett, and will play the Folks Fest in Lyons in August. I'm going. SO EXCITED.) Tour dates are posted on her website and her MySpace. (MySpace seems to be more up to date, it has more dates filled in.)

If you are a regular reader, you know that I'm a big fan of Priscilla, and even got an exclusive email interview with her a few weeks back. Well, I'm happy to announce that for the first ever contest on this blog I've got a *signed* copy of A Good Day to give away!

There's just two little things you have to do to enter the contest:

1) Leave a comment on this post describing a good day for you. It can be one that actually happened, or one that you wish would happen. You can give me a nice big story or it can just be simple like - "A good day is when I get my paycheck." (I'm going to put all the names of the commenters in a hat and have my brother draw one, so you don't have to worry about your comment being the best one or something.)

2) Send an email to LyricalVenus at gmail dot com so I can contact you if you win! Even if you sign in with your email to comment, Blogger doesn't show me what it is, so this step is really important. If I don't have your email I'll have no way to get a hold of you and I'll have to give your signed Priscilla CD to someone else! How sad would you be if that happened? Just tell me the name you used to comment with, and don't worry, I won't use your email for anything else other than contacting you if you win.

So one more time - leave a comment about a good day AND send me an email. Simple right? The drawing will be on July 31st, so you have a week, but go ahead and do it now before you forget. If you've been reading for a while but haven't ever left a comment, today would be a good day to start! (oh man, pun not intended, but so good I had to leave it!)

And if you don't win, you can always download A Good Day on iTunes!



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Jessie Baylin's Firesight is Hot Stuff!

So the special guest on the Lyrical Venus Radio Hour this week will be Jessie Baylin! Recently off the 2008 Hotel Cafe Tour, Jessie is currently touring the country with Swedish folk-rocker Teitur and they will be appearing at the CSPS Legion Arts Center in Cedar Rapids on May 17th. Her new album Firesight is set to drop June 24th. Jessie's smooth vocals have been compared to melting vanilla ice cream, so it's sure to be a sweet treat!

Here's a little video of Jessie singing Contradicting Words live on Park City TV during the 2008 Sundance Film Festival:


Feed and email readers may need to come to the blog to see the video

More Jessie links:
Article and free download of Was I On Your Mind on Gibson.com

Jessie in Wikipedia

Nice interview with Jessie about the making of Firesight.

Can't wait till June 24th for Firesight? You can listen to a couple on Jessie's MySpace or download her EP Ember on right now to get you started!

Tune to KRUU-LP 100.1 FM in town or online at kruufm.com at 9am Central on Tuesday for the interview. I'll be starting off with a few songs by some of those musical mommies I mentioned in my previous post before she calls in.

And as always, if you hear the show, let me know what you think!

The Ditty Bops New Farm Tour Blog

As I mentioned earlier, The Ditty Bops are currently doing a tour of farms to help raise awareness and funds for farming. They started a fun new blog to track their travels.

Last year they rode their bikes across the country on tour to raise awareness for alternative forms of transportation. Here's a little recap of their 2006 tour:



Check out http://thedittybopsfarmtour.blogspot.com/ for updates of their 2007 adventure, complete with photos and YouTube clips of everything from farm tours to trying to remove a loose tooth from Abby's niece's mouth on stage. Oh yes, and singing, 'cuz those girls can sing!

Here's a few places you can have a listen, if they aren't stopping near your city.

http://www.myspace.com/dittybops
http://www.thedittybops.com
Moon Over the Freeway on iTunes.

Broccoli and Beats: The Ditty Bops Farm Tour

I found The Ditty Bops through a spontaneous MySpace click. I don't usually check out the featured stuff on the sign-in pages, but something about them caught my eye and I'm glad! Their perky, wacky, vintage sound makes me happy, and they are really intelligent, aware, creative, confident and conscientious human beings (the kind I like!) who find fun ways to deliver the messages they think are important.

For example, last year they did a bike tour across the country to promote alternate forms of transportation. I think their support vehicle was bio-fueled. I personally can't image riding a full day and then having the energy to do a concert afterwards. (back when I did RAGBRAI all I wanted to do at the end of the day was shower, eat and sleep! And that was only one week of riding!) The amusing blog chronicle of Abby and Amanda's ride is full of photos, videos, cartoons by the girls, food diaries and more.

This year they are making tour stops on farms from California to New York to help bring awareness to where our food comes from. Check their schedule to see if they have a stop near you!



More Ditty Links:


exclusive interview on YouTube



http://www.myspace.com/dittybops
http://www.thedittybops.com

Handful of Dates Tour

So I'm reading about Melissa Ferrick and how she is playing with Ani DiFranco for the "Handful of Dates Tour" this September and I'm thinking, "Oh bummer, with just a few dates it's probably just big cities." I click through to the info page and what do I see but

"Iowa City, IA - Hancher Auditorium"

staring back at me from the right hand column. WHOO-HOO!!

They are having a special pre-sale for fans - tickets go on sale 10 days before regular tickets for the rest of the public if you have the secret password.

Other cities included in September:
Buffalo, NY
Lorain, OH
Louisville, KY
Indianapolis, IN
Milwaukee, WN
Chicago, IL

If you're a lucky one who lives nearby - Congrats!

Traveling with Ember and Imogen

Two musicians I love are traveling these days. They both have blogs they update regularly that I find fascinating to read. Their little glimpses into other cultures make me want to get out and see them myself, but I guess it's pretty much the next best thing!

Ember Swift is about two months through a three month stay in Beijing where she is immersing herself in the language, culture and the music scene. She has a degree in East Asian Studies and had always planned to go to China "when the music thing died down", but when she realized that there was no dying down to the music, maybe she'd better make space to just go anyway, and see if she could find that place where music and the Mandarin language mix. Sounds like she's having a blast following her dream, and her writing is really descriptive, poetic and insightful. I love how she even takes pictures of/explains the toilets in the floor on occasion - one of those different culture things you wonder about but no one seems to explain, till now!

Imogen Heap is really trotting around the globe and staying in all sorts of exotic places while she writes material for her next album. I just discovered her somewhat recently, but apparently she kept a regular blog the last time she made an album too. Says it keeps her accountable and actually working. (I totally get that!) She takes pictures and also little video clips which is cool. Her brain works in such amazing ways, it pushes me to explore wacky possibilities.

Anyway, a really cool thing is that their traveling paths crossed somewhat in Beijing recently! Imogen ended up playing at a festival called the Midi Festival, and Ember was there to see the performance! They didn't actually meet or anything, but it was neat to make the connection after reading both their blogs. I ended up leaving a comment on Ember's blog directing her to Imogen's, but she couldn't read it because a lot of MySpace is blocked where she was. She wrote me back to ask if I could copy and paste the text in an email so I did! :)

I feel all like I've brushed with fame or something, and all proud of myself for figuring the link out.

Anyhoo, check it out for yourself if you wish!

Ember's experience:
http://tinyurl.com/ypu6vv

Imogen Heap's experience:
http://tinyurl.com/38n6g4