Did These Famous Musicians Steal Their Hit Songs?

We stumbled across an incredible blog post from the folks over at Cracked.com. Written by Mohammed Shariff, the article analyzes seven artists who practiced “legitimate theft” of music including:

• Green Day
• Oasis
• Radiohead
• The Beatles
• The Strokes
• John Williams
• Madonna

Can you blame these artists? If you research the topic long enough you could easily find other songs that have been “stolen” over the years. Madonna is on the list above…but the circle continues with Lady Gaga “stealing” from Madonna with “Born this Way” (see the video comparison below). What other artists can you identify with similar songs and melodies? Read the rest of the article here: http://www.cracked.com/article_19848_7-famous-musicians-who-stole-some-their-biggest-hits.html.

-LAMA Staff

Addicted to “Moogle”

If you access the google doodle today, don’t plan on getting much done. The fully functional multitrack synth is up now in honor of Robert Moog’s 78th birthday. The Les Paul doodle was excellent but this may take the cake.

Visit google.com and see for yourself!

-LAMA Staff

Conan O’Brien’s Mike Merritt Visits LA Music Academy

Mike Merritt, bassist for Conan’s “The Basic Cable Band” visited LA Music Academy for a two-hour master class with the school’s bass players. Guess one of those perks for studying music in Los Angeles is having access to high-caliber musicians like Mike! 🙂 He performed charts from the show, discussed his gear and various aspects of playing for Conan’s band. The students were thrilled following the class. Visit the video section of LAMA’s official Facebook page to see and hear more: http://facebook.com/LAmusicacademy.

-LAMA Staff

Jody Fisher Guitar Video Quick Tip: “Walking Bass”

Jody Fisher grew up studying guitar with his uncle, jazz guitarist Sid Fisher, who had spent many years as an RCA recording artist. Jody has published over twenty instructional books about jazz guitar with Alfred Publishing, Workshop Arts Publications, and Mel Bay Publications. Four of his books have appeared in the Smithsonian Institute’s Folkways Exhibition in Washington, DC. Jody has also written for most of the major guitar magazines, including Guitar Player, Just Jazz Guitar and Finger Style Guitar.  Check out www.jodyfisher.com for more information.

In this video, LA Music Academy Guitar Department Chair Jody Fisher offers this quick tip “Walking Bass”:

For more great videos, tips and highlights from LA Music Academy alumni and instructors, subscribe to our YouTube channel here: http://youtube.com/LAmusicacademy

-LAMA Staff

5 Tips: Find a Music School Community That’s Right For You

These students are thrilled to finish their final projects at L.A. Music Academy College of Music

You’re looking for the right music school and have narrowed down your list. What do you factor into your decision? Location? Tuition? Faculty? What about the community of instrumentalists, producers and instructors you’ll be engaging with daily during your school life? Since your ideal community isn’t as tangible as the gear in your practice room, let’s discuss five ways to gauge the community at your future music school:

1) Take a Tour (duh)
The best way to get a vibe for your future school is to visit the campus. Check out the classrooms, practice labs and studios…where you might hang out in between classes. Watch how the students and teachers interact with each other. How are you greeted by staff? If you can’t visit, see if they have a virtual tour or check out the school’s Facebook page (more on that below).

2) Open House

Open houses are a music school tour on steroids and another great way to get a feel for the community. At the Q&A session, ask a school official about the student community in particular and any events. If they seem caught off guard by the question, you might be suspicious. At a LAMA open house, you hear about social gatherings, faculty and visiting artist performances, concerts and much more!

3) Check out Facebook

We live in a social media world playing a great role in the lives of today’s professional musicians and producers. Check out your potential school’s public social networks. See if the school and students are posting on the wall, photo albums and the events pages. Look for student performances, vocal showcases, drum hangs and themed parties.

4) Lurk on Twitter

Use Twitter to discover more about your future music school’s community. Follow the school and check out the chatter. Look up alumni and see what they’re up to. Gauge the “temperature” of what others have to say. You might be surprised at what you find out but don’t believe everything you hear. That’s why you always need to do some fact-checking 🙂

5) Ask a Student

Ever heard the phrase “straight from the horse’s mouth”? It means cut through everything and just go to the most direct source – the students! When you are on an open house, touring or on Twitter and Facebook, ask some students about the school! You should get some pretty honest answers!

What are some other techniques you would use to gauge the community at your future school?

-LAMA

Top 5 Guitar Pedal Demo Videos

If you don’t remember trying to buy guitar pedals in the 80s and 90s (or weren’t even born yet), let’s refresh your memory: First you would grab your favorite guitar magazine and then read about how amazing each new pedal sounded. Next you’d go down to your local music store and hope that they just so happened to carry the particular one you wanted so you could try it out for a few minutes. Golly, such hard times for musicians! Enter YouTube…where anyone can check out virtually any instrument by watching the video demo about it. Guitarists! We’ve gathered a few great guitar pedal demos here…what do you think — make you want to buy one? Have you seen any others we should definitely watch? Let us know in the comments below.

1) Way Huge “Swollen Pickle Fuzz”

2) Analog Man “Chorus”

3) MXR Carbon Copy Delay pedal demo M-169

4) Real McCoy Custom RMC6 Wheels of Fire Wah

5) Electro Harmonix Micro Synth

-LAMA Staff

Timothy Bailey, Jr. Talks Los Angeles, Lalah Hathaway

Timothy Bailey, Jr. talks about why he decided to study bass performance at Los Angeles Music Academy College of Music, what it’s like playing bass for Lalah Hathaway and advice for students looking for the right music school:

-LAMA Staff