LAUNCH brings together two aspects of the music industry for one exciting weekend in beautiful historic Downtown Lancaster, PA for the seventh straight year. The Festival showcases nearly 200 artists from all over the country, representing a variety musical styles – from rock to folk, from pop to punk, from country to funk all performing in a three block radius for fans during one electric weekend. Today, we discussed the conference with creator & founder Jeremy Weiss.
What sparked the idea for the Launch Music Conference?
I had a co-creator for the first five years and we met at a few small conferences where we were panelists. We were really impressed with some of them and were talking about all the different things that really made it special. The developing artists, their enthusiasm, the opportunities they were given, hooking with some colleagues, meeting new people as a participant in the conference – comparing notes after having been to South by Southwest after a few decades a few times, CMJ, etc. and we started talking about my town of Lancaster. So there was a site visit, checked it out, saw that there were over 80 independent art galleries, tons of restaurants, music venues – everything was five to seven minute walk. Lancaster has a really good geographic advantage. We have gotten nearly every premier act from every genre of music because of our positioning between major markets like Phily, DC, Boston, New York, Baltimre. So it seemed like the right thing to do. Went to mayor’s office and they were really into it. We rented a facility and went for it.
How many artists are expected to attend?
We have hundreds and hundreds that submitted to perform. We can’t place them all obviously but we will have 184 unique performances with over 175 artists performing. What we do that I am pretty sure is the only festival of its size in the country that does so is anyone who submits is granted a badge to attend the full conference portion and most of the festival for free. That is due to a little bit of altruism and knowing that artists need advice – they are typically broke. We want to give them every opportunity to meet and communicate with our panelists and professionals. We want them to network with each other and maybe learn a few things. As long as we can keep the support from the sponsors in the community up we will be able to do that moving forward. We will probably have over three hundred artists attending. CONTINUE READING
Retro indie artist Boh Doran just premiered her new video Rainbow. The stop-action video was directed by Titantic Sinclair who has also worked with Børns, Mars Argo, among others. She worked with Jon Kaplan (New Politics, Ingrid Michaelson, A Great Big World) and Ethan Mentzer (The Click 5). Her solo debut EP will be released later this year on Big Stuff Records. She has received praise from Radar Online, Glamour Magazine, Blackbook Magazine, Huffington Post, Knox Road Blog among others.
Contact: brandon@clarkentlaw.com
Indie folk singer/songwriter Austin Plaine has signed to Razor & Tie. Austin headed to Nashville where he teamed up with WeVolve Music and worked on his debut release. After a successful Noisetrade campaign the self-titled album was released last March. He had a placement in a Mastercard commercial followed by an independent radio campaign. His music is influenced by Bob Dylan, Bright Eyes, Elliott Smith, and Ryan Adams. Check out the tracks from his latest album here.
Contact: BCMcLane@aol.com
Buzz Track: Allt kommer Bli Bra
Swedish indie act Marigold released a new album Allt kommer bli bra. They have performed several festivals including SXSW, The Oatly Break-Fest in London, the Peace & Love festival in Sweden, and have several big shows lined up this summer. The band is influenced by bands such as Supertramp and the more contemporary MGMT all the way to ABBA and Fleetwood Mac. The first single Allt kommer bli bra was released and soon thereafter, the band signed with the legendary Swedish record label Telegram, who decided to give the song an extra push. The song, about fundamental values, future optimism, ambition, love and nostalgia, went right onto the playlists of the music press. When Musikguiden, a national radio show, listed the best song that spring, Allt kommer bli bra was given an honorable place. Festivalrykten.se termed the song as “excessive pop for lists and a large audience” and the song was circling both Swedish and German radio.
Contact: contact@marigold.nu
Indie act Melville has released a new track Heart that will come off their upcoming album. Melville’s first EP, Maquette, was recorded at Type Foundry Studios with Adam Selzer (M. Ward, The Decemberists, Peter Buck of R.E.M., She & Him) and has garnered radio play on Portland stations like KINK, KNRK and KZME. The Deli Magazine says this ““With an anything but shallow rock sound, Melville mixes layered electric guitars in unique and often beautiful ways, taking a break from a driving song line up to bring moving instrumental rock moments…”. The new single Heart was recently featured at halftime in front of 15,000 people at the 3/28 Portland Trailblazers game. The band is currently in the studio with Gregg Williams (The Dandy Warhols, Sheryl Crow, etc) working on the follow-up to Maquette. This is an artist to watch.
Contact: booking@melvilletheband.com
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