Today’s indie bands can do a better job than NyQuil putting listeners to sleep. Of course there are exceptions like the Cincinnati band SeaBird. If you asked them what their hopes are, Seabird would say, “To be approachable, and to write songs that people can rely on.” Bottom line, they want to connect with their audience. Plus, the band gives you more than one song which seems to be an impossible feat in this celebrity obsessed culture. The band just released their full-length ‘Til We See The Shore’ via Credential/EMI. Listen to the tracks Rescue, Stronger, and Let Me Go On.

Next Shows:

Aug 15  Purple Door Festival          Lewisberry, Pennsylvania
Aug 17  Illinois State Fair             Springfield, Illinois
Aug 19  Maumee Indoor Theater    Toledo, Ohio

Producer Jerry Finn Off Life Support: Jerry Finn has been taken off life support after suffering a massive brain hemorrhage last month according to Billboard. Finn has worked with AFI, Green Day, Bad Religion, Sparta, Blink 182 and the Offspring. “At this time the hemorrhage has done massive damage to his body which will leave him severely disabled and in need of acute care for the rest of his life. We know Jerry wouldn’t want to live like this in a vegetative state.”

A New Jonas Brothers? Germany’s Tokio Hotel could be the metal version of the Jonas Brothers. Although their music is far from metal and their U.S. sales aren’t making a blip on the radar screen, they are enjoying near sold out shows. In fact, their recent appearance at New Jersey’s Starland Ballroom was in such demand that the tweens were camping out the night before hoping to get a glimpse of the gender-bending frontman.

Signings: Solo female artist Lights has signed to Warner Brothers. She dwells in Toronto and made some demos in her bedroom building a following on myspace and other social networking sites. Check her out in our December New Music Column.

New Music: Listen to Moving On and Gone by My Jeremiah. For fans of Ben Folds Five and Jason Mraz. The album was produced by Jeff Schneeweis(Hawthorne Heights, Brighten) and Matt Goldman(Copeland, Cartel, The Morning Light) and will be released on Fabtone in Japan this November.

Another KOAR favorite Shannon Nicole has posted a new track on her myspace called Domino. This happens to be our favorite.

Facebook #1 Globally: Facebook has overtaken MySpace in worldwide audience growth according to Business Week. “The site is the top global social network, according to figures released by comscore on Aug. 12. Of Facebook’s 132 million users, nearly 63% are outside North America.”

This Week Sales:

Kid Rock ‘Rock N Roll Jesus’ – 90,310k
Trapt ‘Only Throught The Pain – 24,579k
Hawthorne Heights ‘Fragile Future’ – 20,482k

Rubin Joins Social Networking Site: The MOG Music Network is announcing that music producer Rick Rubin will join its board, and will take an active role in the development of MOG. Mog is a social networking site where users can set up personal pages with their musical interests.

Learn From The Best: Motley Crue and Guitar Center have teamed up to present giving one unknown band a chance to get signed on Eleven Seven Music, a management deal with 10th Street, and the opening slot on the next Motley Crue tour. Click here for more info.

Signings: Pop punk band The Friday Night Boys have signed to Fueled By Ramen. Check them out in our January Recommended Listening Column.

New Stream: The new Staind record can be streamed here. The band has had an impressive career selling over 15 million albums worldwide. The new record ‘Illusion Of Progress’ will be released August 19.

YouTube Makes Changes To Audio Compression: Youtube sound quality is horrific and thankfully they are making changes. “Recent modifications have ensured that every video uploaded to YouTube retains its original audio levels,” a Google spokesperson told Wired this week.

Pop rock band Shorelines End is from Dallas, Texas. For fans of Switchfoot, Lifehouse, and Vertical Horizon. The band is set to record more songs in late August. Our favorite tracks include Surface and More Then You Know.

Next Shows:

Aug 15 The Warehouse    Abilene, Texas
Aug 17 Rock For Caitlan Greenville, Texas
Aug 17 Narah Hookah    Arlington, Texas

Rolling Stone Mag Shrinks In Size: Rolling Stone Mag is going through a rough period. Rolling Stone is one of the mags that stood out in newstands because of its size, but on Oct. 30 the mag will adopt the standard size used by all but a few magazines. Rolling Stone has paid circulation in the United States of more than 1.4 million, the highest in its history, but its single-copy sales have fallen from 189,000 in 1999, to 132,000 last year. “Along with the change in size, Rolling Stone will switch to heavier, glossy paper and sleeker page designs, and it will be glued rather than stapled — “perfect bound” instead of “saddle stitched,” in magazine lingo — giving it a flat spine rather than a tapered edge.”

Say No To iTunes? We have been saying that Kid Rocks latest sales numbers is the summer story. The success of Kid Rock’s summer hit ‘All Summer Long’ are convincing some music execs to change promotion strategy. It’s definitely interesting that he’s the only artist that’s not available on iTunes with a monster hit right now, and we’re seeing that kind of a growth,” says Livia Tortella, general manager of Atlantic, who acknowledges that the company is considering keeping other artists’ singles off iTunes in hopes of building album sales. “It’s certainly spurring a lot of debate in our company.”

Kid Rock says,”It’s funny, I have a shitload of stock in Apple — I think it’s one of the greatest companies in America,” he says. “But it’s just not very American to me when Apple tells you how they want to sell your product and tell you what it’s worth.”

Recommended Listening: Listen to Johnny Boy and New Day by
Deep Insight. The band hails from Finland and has self released two full length albums. In the summer 2005 the band´s single Hurricane Season (our favorite) reached number one position in the Finnish official top ten and stayed on the list over two months. The third album ‘One Minute Too Late’ was released in Finland in 2006, and the single New Day was went straight to number #1. The band is currently working on a new album.

The Disney Machine: Another teen queen could be following in the footsteps of Miley and the Jonas Brothers. Her name is Demo Lovato, she will soon be starring in a new Disney Channel Original Series called Welcome to Mollywood that begins production in September 2008 and she is currently on tour with the Jonas Brothers.

Katy Perry Ties Beatle Record: Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl” has tied the Beatles “I Want To Hold Your Hand” to become the longest-running No. 1 in the rock era for the singer’s Capitol Records label. What does this really mean? Absolutely nothing.