If this video doesn’t convince you of the power of virtual worlds as an expressive domain I don’t know what will.
As Hamlet reports on New World Notes:
“No matter what one tries to say about new-voice-on-the-block Skye Galaxy, hyperbole seems determined to slip in. I have yet to attend one of his shows without fighting impossible lag, for it hasn’t taken long for word to start spreading. But swimming through jam isn’t enough to put his fans off, because this voice might just be the most sublime to ever have hit the Second Life grid and, if he hasn’t made the big time before the next year is out, something is very wrong with this world.”
The video was merely a ‘capture’ of a concert in Second Life.
As a way for new talent to reach a global audience and to create rich and visual artefacts, virtual worlds offer an unparalleled opportunity to get a start on a career which could end up having an explosive trajectory across domains.
The video is a reminder, to me at least, of why I’m in Second Life in the first place. And a reminder as well why Linden Lab needs to DO SOMETHING to capitalize on music in particular – it truly is one of SL’s “killer apps” and it is woefully under-supported both technically and promotionally.
Music video never did anything to enhance my enjoyment of music. If anything, there were many songs that I held in poor regard thanks to the ridiculous or lame imagery painted by the artist or director.
This is a nice tune but the video and/or SL have nothing to do with making it so.
Dirk – sure, makes sense. But my point is actually less the video and more the fact that he had someplace to play before a ‘live audience’ in the first place.
Dusan, this is just one reason why I have my sights on Blue Mars. It shouldn’t be long before musicians will be able to hold massive concerts in-world there… something that SL’s current platform will never be able to do.
I’m not sure that avatar limits on sims is holding many performers back, Bettina. It’s rare that a performer will “fil lthe sim” these days.
But for those that do, yes, I’m looking forward to hearing about Blue Mars running some scaling tests for concerts.
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I agree with Dusan that LL has failed to promote/exploit/provide tools for music on the grid. I was thoroughly disgusted with Colossus’ evasions at SLCC on the Future Of Music panel.
However…
I am not a fan of Skye Galaxy.
But if he’s the great hope for all music on SL as some kind of phenom-ambassador, I’ll throw whatever support I can. (Just as long as I can do it with the Mute button on)
-ls/cm
Dusan, I understand and I agree that SL is sorely lacking in that regard.
Blue has been chatting up the residents at his office hours about how to improve this lately and I understand from those chats that Vivox is cooking up a little something.
Hopefully it will be a real time codec so that performers can stop relying on a stream which has a delay attached and they can be more interactive with the audience as things actually take place in the venue rather than commenting on them later when it may be less meaningful.
Broadcasting live music through chat is not new by any means and there are better venues in which to do that in real time with stereophonic sound.
Yahoo! had a very vibrant and active community at one time with sound quality that far surpassed most anything in SL (although some SL performers have set up wonderful streams).
Sadly the private music rooms in Yahoo! chat were closed because Yahoo! was accepting advertising deemed inappropriate for younger people.
Yahoo! rather than retool their policies and put a few people on the job to strengthen the communities that were flourishing, chose to take things to the extreme and close the chats down entirely.
This because, alongside the chatrooms where music and spoken word performances were taking place, there were also chatrooms designated for adult chat. And of course, everyone that engages in such activity is evil, wrong, misguided, felonious and stupid. So, it is best to just send those people away and kill off anything good along with it. And that is what they did.
Remind you of anything?
Although, I have not visited in ages, PalTalk often has famous musicians in to chat, perform and interact with audiences in greater numbers than are possible in Second Life Regions. The sound quality is excellent and they couple the experience with video, yet it has not proven itself to be a “killer app” for music even though it allows for a larger “live audience”.
The “killer app” for music is that field of musicians that possess true talent and a mastery of their instrument. Particles and textures and dance animations are fun, but ultimately it is the music that really counts.
I think it’s true that LL could do a lot more to spotlight SL music. Even so, considering the capacity and awareness factors that exist now, there is a disproportionately low number of SL people enjoying live music in-world when compared to other things that people like to do.
I hear some self-doubt from the community lately saying they aren’t doing enough, or even that the music isn’t good enough. There’s always room for improvement but I mostly disagree. It may very well be that the music audience just is-what-it-is considering the current format. Aside from the social interaction, SL music now is mostly a passive activity for audiences and musicians are asking people to stop what they are doing to come hear them. SL isn’t RL.
It seems to me like the thing that really grabs SL people are things where they are participating in creation. That could be building, building a business, roleplaying, etc. Some like to sneer at “Fashionistas”, but even they are creating something by combining clothes, shapes skins and such to express themselves through their avatar. Given that, I wonder what would happen if sl music were more of a co-creative experience?
There’s plenty of work to be done but if everything stayed the same, sl musicians will always be able to count on at least some audience. For some, that makes them happy and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. For others that feel like there’s much more potential in SL, working towards making their performances more collaborative with audiences just might be hook they’ve been waiting for.
Dusan, Willow Caldera wrote the Skye review, and the video’s by Toxic Menges, I can only take credit for editing it (albeit lightly, Willow’s a good writer!)
Thanks for linking to my vid Dusan, I agree that the music speaks for itself in this piece. There is a place for machinima to promote music and indeed any type of performance in Second Life.
If someone making a machinima to record a live gig or indeed do a music video within a virtual world for a performer who only performs virtually, and that results in someone deciding to try out virtual worlds, then reportage like this can only be a good thing.
There is only so many ways in which a film maker can record a live gig, either in the real world – I hope that the way I give images to great musical talent does them justice in some way.
This is why we need the showcase back on the secondlife.com homepage, and also why the music community need to push their craft from behind the walled gardens of virtual worlds. The people they play to are already fans – in order for music in ANY virtual world to grow, we need to get the message out that performers like this exist.
The music scene in Second Life should be one of the main thrusts of external marketing for Linden Lab
i worked with some who produced interative immersive 3d music videos back in 2001. I did some more in 2003. The mix of 3d rt media, IS one of the value adds that the music biz keeps missing…
What one has to ask is how blind can blind be when your cult hero “Cory O.” goes to BMI and theres NO by product of 3d/ or vr worlds tech offered as any “product/service change” …?
mainstream still waits… but of course it took a “rock band” to get the beatles digital;)
If one could fill a room with a few hundred a night and do 3 weekend shows…, one could make a living….
but it depends on what “cut” the “room owner” demands…..
I think live music needs as much support from the venue as from the public. I remember when Tribute Island was on the grid, the owner held a summer series–two to three hours split between live musical performances, and streamed music tailored around celebration of musical themes, or musicians themselves.
Some great SL musicians turned up to perform, and the island was frequently packed for their performances, which in turn generated interest in the island, which in turn resulted in repeat shows and more people spreading the word to come.
All of which was well and good, but on occasion, the stream dropped, due to lag or technical issues; lag was a problem; even by upping the sim limits to max avatars, there were folks who couldn’t come in.
While Blue Mars is still out of my personal reach, technologically speaking, it does seem as if many SL residents are at the least checking out the opportunities, if not leaving SL for it. And if the engine even works half as well as promised…that’s an increase in the avatar audience of 450 at the low end, and thousands at the high end.
If the point of the game is to increase the number of ears on your work–ears that may then later buy your work, if recorded–then more is better and SL can’t begin to compete.
If the point is to reinforce social connection and involve live performance in the process, then SL’s doing fine, but needs to consider more ‘off-site’ action for major concerts–the live performance at W stage, then ‘listening centers’ on X, Y, and Z sims where folks can ‘tune in’, so to speak, without further crowding the W stage.
I want to comment on a lot of various things here…
but I won’t.
Instead, I recommend checking out the years of piled up blog posts from SL musicians and performers. Crap Mariner’s blog, Grace’s blog, my blog, Slim Warrior’s various comments on forums, Zak Claxton’s blog, many others.
The music blogs regarding Second Life (and virtual worlds) cover many topics with many varied opinions in regards to music in Second Life.
Opinions are like Avatars… everyone’s got at least one, and most people have a lot.
PS, Hamlet, were you paid to post about Skye Galaxy? Since there was no disclosure, I’m assuming you or Willow weren’t. But someone doesn’t just pop into SL, and within 2 months, have a full on massive following, videos, press releases, etc without money buying it.
PPS, I’m mildly offended at the NWN title: “…Destined to Become Second Life’s First Breakout Popstar” …it’s as if the past 4 years of breakout performers were overlooked because someone woos the ladies with a Coldplay style melody and a cute avatar. Frogg & Jaycatt, Flaming Moe, Cylindrian Rudabaga, Slim Warrior, Zak Claxton, Max Kleene, The Poppinjays, Dexter Ihnen, Bluez Preacher Man, Winston Ackland, Von Johin and so many more… there are so many breakout music artists from SL history that made it. To me, its the dedication and commitment one puts into continuing to perform for the SL community that makes the SL performer… not a press kit and a bunch of ladies swooning.
I think Blue Mars has great potential. However, the way they’re able to support so many users is by downloading the world ahead of entering it. For myself, on a very very fast connection, this took 45 minutes to install 4 regions. If you need to spend 10 minutes installing the equivalent of a few sims as you move from ‘world to world’ will the waiting negate the effect of having the potential for more avatars? What I think will happen is that like the bar for content creation in Blue Mars it will also be raised for musicians – it won’t be sufficient for ‘unknowns’ to plug in their mics and perform – it will need to be a compelling enough draw (i.e. a ‘bigger name’) for people to want to spend the time downloading all that content before they can even get in.
I’m a big believer in Blue Mars – it’s a professional MMO developer platform, basically, where you can create your own world and not have to worry about hosting or ‘back-end stuff’. This does NOT, however, make it a de facto community nor one in which you’ll easily hop from world to world as the ecosystem builds out.
They have also not once met their stated deadlines for any kind of release and have so far been 6 – 12 months behind on what they originally estimated, which doesn’t instill tons of confidence, but it’s very early days.
Nice song and voice.
On avatar audience of 200 and more people together in one (small) space; world of warcraft, eve-online, lord of the rings online crumbles down to lag, (crashing servers) or a 1-fps dia show is my previous experience. (I guess a slow computer doesn’t help as well)
Wondering what virtual-enviroment scores best and/or is build around large crowds performance in the same area/town-square.
Where people can walk, talk/type. And have like there personal avatar style and cloths/equipment.
Metanomics has a nice solution to accommodating large audiences… I wonder if you know anybody involved with that show… Maybe they could help Skye Galaxy?
@ Blue Mars comments….
After performing in NINE virtual worlds… that’s right… NINE… only Active Worlds is the one that could accommodate a large capacity/attendance, not Blue Mars.
Second Life, if done right, can accommodate as many as wanted, as long as you’re willing to shell out the money for more sims. Longrange (aka members of Orbital) performed live in SL years ago, and used 12 sims. It worked.
I’m sorry, but I get frustrated, or annoyed, when they blame the platform, any platform for hurdles or limitations, that in essence are only perceptions. I’ve performed live in Second Life for close to four years now. I have also tried ALL of the other platforms to perform in. All I can say is: It’s not the platform causing the problems for music performance, and it’s not Linden Lab.
Music will never be the killer app in SL that was envisioned awhile back. Don’t get me wrong; it has every potential to be one of the biggest draws for SL or any virtual platform. But the vast majority of artists performing in SL are doing covers. Even artists like me who spend most of their shows doing originals throw in cover tunes from time to time. And the fact is that until there’s a clear cut policy on who will accept the culpability of these performances happening without anyone paying performance license fees to organizations like BMI and ASCAP, there’s no way in hell that Linden Lab will get behind music in a way that will pull new people into SL.
I love the SL music scene, which is why I’ve continued to be a part of it for three years of live performances on a regular basis. But people shouldn’t continue to kid themselves that things will go on forever in the way they have been. With the amount of songs by other artists being performed every single day (hundreds? thousands?), the actual licensing cost would be astronomical. Linden Lab will not pony up to pay that bill, and the artists and venues are already in a money-losing situation as it stands… they’re certainly not going to pay licensing fees themselves in addition to tier, stream rental, music equipment purchase and upkeep costs, and so on.
I think the best we can hope for is that it continues on the path it current has gone. A “breakout star” might end up being the worst thing possible for the SL music scene as a whole, as it will just call attention to the topics that have continued to be pushed under the rug. I don’t blame the platform for this: LL certainly didn’t envision this as being a challenge for them when they were developing SL. But you can’t have the cake (”music is a killer app!”) and eat it too. It’ll be interesting to see what happens when Linden’s hand is inevitable forced to the point they’ll need to make a policy statement or a TOS addendum about the legality of playing cover songs in SL. If you don’t think that will ever happen, I’ve got a L$1 bet that says you’re mistaken.