I have a passion for music. All genres. Since I was a little boy, I've had music in my life on a daily basis. I've played in many bands over the 35 years and 10 years ago I released my first CD of new age solo piano music. I've written Electronia, Dance, Soundtrack, Rock, Metal, New Age, Ambient and Jazz pieces. I play in a female-fronted classic rock band and am still working on a few side projects with my music.
In 2007, I joined a site called Broadjam. It allowed me to join a community where I was able to grow as an artist. Joining in on contests, making new friends, listening to some great indie artists on the site and submitting music for film and TV opportunities were all part of the fun. In 2012 I decided to cut back on expenses and do my own site, leaving Broadjam behind, but not the friendships that I built there.
Over the years since I had joined Broadjam, I shared music on my Facebook page from the artists who I had connected with. One day I did a massive share of over 40 songs from 40 artists. Soundcloud postings, ReverbNation profiles, YouTube videos and even the early version of the Broadjam player. People would listen to a few. Artists would always thank me, but I felt like it wasn't enough. So I would share the music whenever I could on my timeline.
In 2013, I was starved for one of my favorite genres; Progressive Rock. I found a few online shows and ended up hanging out in one particular show on Spreaker.com, one night, where they had a chat room. It was buzzing with listeners and even some of the artists that were on the show. So I introduced myself and started talking with some like minded individuals and made some new friends, some of whom were DJs that had their own shows. Things just clicked and I loved hanging out at these guys. Light Without Heat was the first one, featuring my new friend Stuffer White. WTAU Pea Ridge Nation was the second one, that featured Mike Sherrill cranking some heavy metal from independent artists. The third was House of Prog, featuring one of their many DJs; Tim Correll known as DJ Co-Rail. The fourth one was Don "Duck" Landes, who has his own 4 channel Internet radio station called Quackhouse Radio. Duck's station plays all sorts of bootleg concert material, old 20s, 30s and 40s blues, full blown bootleg concerts and killer soundscapes of a wide variety. We all had a great times together.
While talking with Stuffer and Mike one night in a Light Without Heat chat session, they said, "have you ever thought about doing a show?" I had to think about it. No, I really hadn't. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. I could do a show that features all my indie artist friends! I could do all the genres and start to attract some other artists that might want their music heard too. I didn't do a Spreaker.com show right away. I did some research first to see if I wanted to plop down money there or somewhere else. Plus I wanted to know if anyone would be remotely interested. The tipping point came one night when I was sharing some songs that I loved, on my timeline on Facebook and a couple of friends chimed in saying, "you need to do a radio show!" That was the last sign I needed.
I did a test run using a Spotify playlist and posting each song with a story behind it. Each one was posted to my Facebook timeline and folks started to comment on the songs they liked. I did one more test with the same method and again, they started to comment. So, that was enough of a "go for it!" for me. I signed up, set my show nights to Monday's at 8pm EST and aimed for 11-11-13. It was my first show and I was nervous, but in the end, I was hooked! The rest is history. The shows all reside in podcast back to the very first one. Over time I may archive some, but I will always leave that first show in podcast to remind me of the journey. I have many people to thank for their support and many artists to thank for allowing me to play their music. The list of artists on the show, are shared every week on the Facebook page. Information pertaining to the artist's Facebook page, website and various other music outlets, are put on the corresponding shows notes for everyone to see. I am also going to have a link on this site that I will update from time to time, with all of artist's information in one spot. Kind of a grand links page. I'll call it "Show Artists".
I will also be resurrecting a blog I used to write, where I reviewed albums from favorite bands and featured some of these very artists that I now play on the show. So kick back and watch this site grow and unfold as I keep Independent Share on the air and on MixCloud.com.
