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BIG ELK - “Growing Season” [Internet Package]
NEW AMERICAN FOLK MUSIC
Over Passover weekend, I recorded twelve demos of my songs with my good friend, Tim Byrne (I only work with people who have the same name as me!). The working title for this particular project has become “Growing Season,” on account of it being all about me trying to find my place as a singer, song-writer & performer. It is, in other words, me putting my money where my mouth is…
PUBLIC DOMAIN, FREE CULTURE
Staying true to the nature of the rest of my work online, I am releasing the whole thing for free into the wild as part of the Public Domain. You can download individual mp3 files of the tracks below, along with lyrics (and chords), and videos of me playing each song.
- “Bone Rattler” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “This Highway Life” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “The Old Oak Tree” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “Hotel Hell” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “I Let You Catch Me Lookin” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “Without Your Love” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “Now She’s Gone” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “The Lord Made Me A Drifter” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “Good Good Lies” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “Come Visit Us” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “Don’t Ask Why” [mp3] - [lyrics] - [video]
- “You & Me Baby” [mp3] - [lyrics]
DIRECT DOWNLOAD
Alternatively, you can download all the mp3s & lyrics along with some extras as a ZIP file or an RAR.
IP (INTERNET PACKAGE)
This is my first attempt at putting together what I’m calling an “IP” - as in LP or EP, except updated for the modern-era of how music distribution works. IP stands for “internet package” and is basically a bundle of files you can download and “install” into your life however you want, since they are in the Public Domain.
Since these songs are all in the Public Domain, this means you are not only welcome, but invited to find ways to rip me off, steal my stuff and get rich off me {See also: gift economy}. I’m happy to inspire people - one way or another, it doesn’t matter - and if you can figure out a way to benefit off what I’ve done, I encourage you to do it.
CALL FOR ENTRIES
Folk music, to me, has always been about real people sharing real life experiences with one another. Music flows naturally out of the passionate expression of life’s triumphs and failures. Towards that end, over the coming weeks, I’ll be performing and recording a variety of collaborative efforts with some amazing local Baltimore (just named “Best New Music Scene” by Rolling Stone magazine) musicians, ranging from spontaneously-recorded duets and one-shots to a full-length finished album with instrumentation and mastering.
In addition to that, I’d like to find ways to creatively explore the songs I’ve written with creative people (musicians, artists, videographers, etc) living in other locations. The internet, obviously, is the perfect means to work collaboratively, and to cross-pollinate and cross-promote cultural projects of all kinds.
So I’d like to invite other creators out there to take what I’ve done and run with it. In exchange, I will actively promote you and your work on my website which receives almost 3,000 unique visitors per day, and has great search rankings. If you’re a band or musician looking to get your name and work out there on the web, this could be an easy and fun way to do that, while participating in a folk music revival, of sorts.
Some basic ideas & guidelines for collaboration would be:
- Record alternate versions of these songs: add in vocal tracks, harmonies, instrumentation, additional lyrics, visuals - whatever you’re moved to do.
- Upload your results as (at least) an mp3 on your own or some publicly-accessible server or put it on a video site, like YouTube.
- Add in tags to identify you as an artist, as well as the name of the song and “Big Elk” and “public domain” - if you want to. (We can “intertwine our datawakes“)
- Send me an email with links to your finished product, along with a paragraph-long bio and links to your website or other projects you’re working on which you’d like me to promote in a permanent post on my website.
That’s basically it. I call it a Mutual Hype Alliance, and I’ve developed some wonderful friendships and creative partnerships that way. Oh, and I will want to include your alternate versions and collaborative efforts as part of Big Elk’s next Public Domain [IP] Release, of course.
If that sounds worthwhile to you, email me. Otherwise, you can still just download and enjoy my music and continue following-along in the adventure as I uncover by directly living some kind of classic drifter troubadour tradition, updated for the internet age.
April 26th, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Gift Economy:
The Hacker Milieu as Gift Culture
April 29th, 2008 at 9:29 am
That’s all very cool Tim!
Where are you quoting the above from? I’ve been reading “The Gift” by lewis hyde - it connects global gift cultures with the artist and how the artist integrates into a market economy.
Baltimore a music scene?!? How spiffy is that???
I highly recommend you and others check out Seattle’s Fleet Foxes … some unique sublime Folk there …
April 29th, 2008 at 9:48 am
Links are embedded above quotes
April 29th, 2008 at 10:50 am
Tim,
So you believe in a gift giving economy, which I don’t. I mjean gifts are great, but I don’t think you could base an economy on it in a complex society. So here is a thought expiriment for you:
You are a multi-talented person, so don’t take this hard. You give away everything for free. You make music and also write.
I told you before, that if you were to make your carnival culure stuff into a book, I would pay you 100 dollars for one. They are that good.
While I think you are a talented lyricist, I wouldn’t buy music from you.
But if you give everything away for free how can you tell which of your endavors is most valuable and more worth the investment of time and energy?
I think a money economy is way more efficient than a gift giving economy would be in giving people what they want and also in producing higher quality things.
Now this is a small sample composed of me. I tend to buyt more books than music anyway. But extrapolated onto a large scale I think it would mean a lot.
April 29th, 2008 at 10:53 am
Um, I’m not asking you to buy my music! I’m giving it away for free. So it doesn’t matter if you *wouldn’t* buy it, because you simply don’t have the opportunity to do so.
Awesome, but it’s in the Public Domain, so you or anyone else could make it into a book, and *you* could make $100 a pop on it, instead of giving me $100!
Oh, that’s an easy one: I listen to my heart and do whatever the spirit moves me to do!
April 29th, 2008 at 11:15 am
I think the idea of a gift economy is important, because it reminds people that we are/have a source inside us. We can make and create and put things out into the world, and there is no necessary reason for asking for anything in return. We can put more into what might otherwise be a closed, entropic system.
In an entirely gift-less economy, the emphasis is only on consuming, on people being/having an emptiness inside. Only in giving are we reminded that we are already whole.
And in connection with Ted’s other comment elsewhere on you looking like a preacher, well, that’s what preachers do. They put us back in touch with the source within.
April 29th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Well, I do think there is a certian genius behind giving away music on the internet and relating it to a gift economy.
The technology (which by the way was not produced in a gift economy) creates an abundance of music. This music can be copied millions of times without a reduction in quality.
But people still have to buy computers and mp3 players and musical instruments and they have to have the internet, which requires electricity and infra srtucture.
So there is an abundance of wealth that has been created and persists over time, due to the positive feedback loop activity of the time binding semantc curcuit of consciousness, which a lot of these oral pre-literate gift giving cultures don’t have, or didn’t have as well developed.
I guess I see a plac for gift giving, just like in the case of the millionaire philanthropy you mentioned. But I don’t see a gift giving economy working. “Economy” implies that its the main structure.
I also don’t see how a class of musicians could survive in a gift giving economy. They need to eat and wear clothes and what not. It seems like a gift giving economy is not good for specialization.
April 29th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
Another reason, too that stuff is so abundant in a gift economy with these primitive tribesmen is that they kept their population down with continual warfare. It turns out they weren’t as generous with the people over the hill that looked a little differnent and spoke another language and had a different culture.
One way they got past killing each other so much is by trading with them.
April 29th, 2008 at 1:58 pm
I just read that whole hacker article.
Here is a good line:
I think its useful to note that the author isn’t stating that a gift culture or gift economy works the best for everything.
Maybe there is a good application to music and writing on the internet and programming since they are creative endeavors and because of the internet and technology these industries are rapidly changing.
Still though people have to eat and programers can always join a start up and make a shit load of money. And then work on what ever open source project they believe in for free, once they are comfortable.
If the whole music industry became a way that no musician could make money at it, I don’t see that as being good. Same for writers.
April 29th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
You give away your ideas and opinions for free here and elsewhere!
April 29th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
So… I don’t get where you’re going with all of this. And I guess I just don’t understand what the big giant problem is that you have with gifts and giving away music for free.
I just bought a mandolin today, in fact. I didn’t run out expecting anyone to give it to me for free, though I do plan on using it to give away more music for free…
April 29th, 2008 at 7:24 pm
I don’t have a problem with people giving gifts. I am just wondering if its feasible to work towards a gift economy. Give away whatever you want. I’ve been studying capitalism and the free market lately.
April 29th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
You’re studying economics on the mostly free internet and giving away your findings for free. Just becasue your behavior hasn’t been studied, cataloged and named in an economic textbook as a certain type of economic behavior doesn’t mean it isn’t. You could be a revolutionary by just studying yourself. And it’s free!
April 29th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
or I could be full of shit.
May 2nd, 2008 at 12:42 am
[…] Tim Boucher, aka Big Elk, just released what he calls an IP (Internet Package) of all-new, nice clean demos of all his songs. His lyrics kick ass and his style is kinda old-timey mountain folk music meets the guy from the Moldy Peaches. I have it going in the background and I’m digging so far! It’s free to download so check it out (go for the ZIP, it includes lyrics and other goodies). Here’s my favorite track. It’s also in the public domain so if you like any of it, take it and do stuff with it (the songs are super coverable), or as he put it: “$$$ GET RICH OFF ME, PLEASE!!! $$$”. […]
May 4th, 2008 at 9:29 am
[…] Just happened across a really cool concept: the Guild of Scientific Troubadours. The basic premise is that you write songs which spread scientific knowledge on a person-to-person level, just like medieval troubadours would do with epic romances. And you’re supposed to write and record one song a month in order to “stay in the guild.” Oh, and also, they will post relevant songs by “guild members” to their site. See their URL for more details. Cool idea! (Very similar, incidentally, to my intentions behind the Big Elk Mountain Association - except without the science focus…) […]
May 9th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
[…] More details on my upcoming debut performance as “Big Elk”, a solo folk outfit, tomorrow morning can be found on the Umbrella Radio website - the people through whom I got this show. […]
May 13th, 2008 at 11:53 am
[…] BIG ELK - “Growing Season” [Internet Package] […]