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Last weekend, we descended upon Maida Vale studios with a dozen or so very talented bands and artists for the Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing Weekender. For each act, we've put three session tracks online so you can listen in full, as well as photos of them recording in the legendary studios.

Over the next few weeks, our local radio shows around the country will be broadcasting tracks from the Maida Vale Weekender. If you tune in to 1Xtra this coming Sunday, you'll hear Twin B, Ace & Vis, Sarah Jane and Ras Kwame picking out their favourite tracks from the sessions as part of the Ö÷²¥´óÐãGrown season.

On Wednesday, Huw Stephens played his choice of session tracks, giving MidiMidis' Nemesis a spin, as well as Violet Violet's fierce track, For the Young and the Fresh Boned.

Huw's third pick, the newly-crowned Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing Tip of the Week, was Louise Golbey with her gorgeously stripped-down acoustic version of Same Old, Same Old.Ìý This was the track which earned Louise a slot on our Glastonbury festival bill in 2009 after she uploaded it to us and caught Ras Kwame's attention. Here's Huw with the full session track:

Louise has recorded a track with Example and is also working with Dizzee Rascal's protégées Newham Generals. Her How It Is EP is out now, with production from and by Mercury Music Prize nominee, .


Listen to two more songs from Louise Golbey's session or hear all of the acts recorded at our Maida Vale Weekender.

How, when, where and why was the label set up?
The three brains behind the label (James, Sam and Caz) have been running club nights as Oh! Inverted World for over two years now at the Old Queens Head, Madame Jojo's and Hoxton Bar and Kitchen in London.

A few months ago a young man called played their night, and they were so blown away by his performance that they decided to have a go at releasing a record.

Where did the label's name come from?
James: "We spent waaay too long trying to come up with a name, so we decided to 'borrow' the name from someone else. We all love The Shins, so in homage to them we named ourselves after their amazing first album 'Oh, Inverted World'.

What's the ethos of the label and which artists are on it?
As a label they've only just started out, but Oh! Inverted World hopes to support artists they really love. Their club night has the same aim and is probably most well known for supporting alt-folk acts such as Goldheart Assembly, , and She Keeps Bees.

On their roster so far there's Tristram - whose debut EP Someone Told Me A Poem is out this week - and then something completely different from Sheffield rockers , who release a double-A side in April.

Any releases/gigs coming up?
March 18th, Old Queens Head, London: Oh, Inverted World night with , and a secret (shh) show from Goldheart Assembly,.

March 24th, Notting Hill Arts Club, London: The Violet May @ Death Disco.

If the label could sign any artist past or present, who would it be?
James: The Shins is the obvious choice. We'd also love Arcade Fire, , Deerhunter, Pixies, TV on The Radio...etc etc...

What's the favourite office snack at the label?
Mangos, chocolate hobnobs, and almost anything dipped in hot sauce.

If the label were an animal what would it be and why?
James: A crepuscular animal (like a rabbit or mouse) would be good as they're out at night. Failing that, squirrel monkeys. We're not entirely sure why!

Links

Oh! Inverted World blog -

O!IW on Twitter -

Download this week's Huw Stephens podcast to hear tracks from The Violet May and Tristram.

Welcome to part two of our run of weekly 'Long Reports'. If you missed the first one, you can still listen to it here. We talked all about managers (what they do, how to get one etc) and I wrote a really hilarious introduction, which I won't reiterate here.

Instead, let's get into this week's report. We're talking about booking agents: what is a booking agent? How do bands find one? That sort of thing. We spoke to Chris Myhill from and got loads of stellar advice from the likes of The Blackout, Bright Light Bright Light, Kids in Glass Houses and Pulled Apart By Horses.

Plus, we'll give you some advice on booking your own shows - for instance, don't drive from London to Glasgow and back for a £30 fee, don't believe a promoter who offers to post you a cheque; the regular stuff.

One thing I will reiterate is that these reports are just a very brief look at a very big subject, so do check out the advice section of this website for more wise words from agents Naomi Palmer (Toddla T) and Emma Banks (Creative Artists Agency).

Jen Long is Broadcast Assistant for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing in Wales with Bethan Elfyn.

Previously: The Long Report - Part 1: Managers

Sometimes simple is best, while simple and free is the best of all.

As more and more musicians come to realise the ideal band website is in fact a blog, the importance of ping becomes ever greater. Not (in this case) the kind of ping used for testing network connection speeds, but the sort that lets everyone know your blog has been updated.

Pingomatic.com is a single simple web page that allows you to ping 23 major aggregators (from and to the likes of and ) in seconds. It's provided by the foundation, works with blogs on every possible platform and - yes - it is completely free to use.

Bloggers! Bookmark the page and use it every time you publish a new post: is my latest Website of the Week.

Tom Robinson presents Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing - Fresh on the Net on Ö÷²¥´óÐã 6 Music

This week's Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing Tip of the Week comes from a chap named Stephen Black from Cardiff - better known as Sweet Baboo - with a track named I'm A Dancer.

To date, Stephen has released two albums on his own DIY label, : The Mighty Baboo in 2008 and the follow-up, Hello Wave, in 2009.

This, however, is a brand new track from Sweet Baboo's as yet unreleased third album.

Here's Huw Stephens to tell you more about the track:

Links

If Hospital Records brought drum and bass to the masses and is the Don, then this week's label is very much the new kid on the block, but still part of the Hospital family.

While D&B comes in and out of fashion in the mainstream, is an outlet for even newer and fresher beats and the producers on the roster are constantly making fresh new D&B, as championed by Bailey on 1Xtra and Fab and Groove on Radio 1!

How, when, where and why was the label set up?
was launched in September 2006 as an off-shoot of . Hospital were receiving sacks full of demos from up-and-coming artists from all over the world, but their release schedule was already packed with the likes of Danny Byrd and High Contrast. They felt a new label could give these new artists the exposure they deserved.

Where did the label's name come from?
As the twisted younger sister of Hospital Records with an eye for emerging talent, it made sense to expand the brand with yet more medical terminology.

What's the ethos of the label and which artists are on it?
Med School was set up to release exciting new music that other labels weren't adventurous enough to put out, and to provide a platform for new artists to flourish. Artists on the roster include:

• : An ice-cool 20-year-old from Saint-Petersburg in Russia who mixes drum and bass with heavy techno ambience.
• : Breakbeat enthusiast from Helsinki in Finland
• : Manchester-based dubstep/two-step producer
• : Another hot talent from Russia, with tougher bass and beats.

Any releases/gigs coming up?
A new artist compilation, New Blood 010, is coming out on 15 March. It's drum and bass all the way, but with a real mix of deep atmospheric tracks and stripped down dancefloor vibes. Also in the pipeline is a new Bop remix EP, featuring re-workings of tracks from his debut album Clear Your Mind, which came out last summer.

If the label could sign any artist past or present, who would it be?
Squarepusher or Aphex Twin. Med School say they like artists that can carve a niche for themselves whilst managing to walk a tightrope between lots of different genres.

What's the favourite office snack at the label?
Ashley from the label says, "Marmite flavour cereal bars have been causing quite a stir here recently! Otherwise it's got to be macaroni cheese."

If the label were an animal what would it be and why?
A mole, because they're kings of the underground!

Links

Did you know there are nearly 40 local Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing radio shows based all over the UK?

Broadcast every week on the Ö÷²¥´óÐã's English Local Radio networks, as well as on Radio 1 in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, they are dedicated to unearthing talented local bands and musicians and giving them valuable exposure.

Whenever you upload music to us, your tracks will automatically reach the producers and presenters of the show closest to where you live. When the time comes to pick the acts for our festival stages over the summer, every show team has its say, putting forward the artists they want to champion from their region.

Each show is supported by its own Ö÷²¥´óÐã Online index page, where you can find out which artists have been played recently, what's coming up on the show, and what's happening on the music scene in your local area. You'll find links to every site on our shows page, but here's a quick round-up of local news highlights:

In , a has been announced, where local acts including and will perform, with a headline set from Nerina Pallot. Help Haiti CI takes place on Sunday 28th February at Fort Regent.Ìý

On 5 March, are celebrating their second birthday with a . Newcomers and will play live as well as Kent favourites Tom Williams & The Boat and Elephants. The latter also feature in a filmed for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Kent by Ravensbourne College.

In , folk troubadours Louis Barabbas & the Bedlam Six celebrated the glory of love on Valentine's Day by for free via . Meanwhile, at Ö÷²¥´óÐã Manchester Introducing's monthly live night at the Ruby Lounge, spoke about their music and for the cameras.

spoke to about being chosen to record a session at Maida Vale as part of our Weekender this month. The duo also played at a recent party hosted by .

Finally, Tim Bearder at has been in touch to tell us about something very special they've been working on to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the show. Local acts have come together to lovingly recreate the classic Radiohead album, The Bends (itself fifteen years old in March).

Their reinterpretation of the album - titled - opens with Stornoway's cover of Planet Telex, which has already been played by Rob Da Bank on Radio 1 and Lauren Laverne on 6 Music. The album is due to be released on 4 March on iTunes, with proceeds going to Children In Need.

If you're reading this right now, then I'm hoping you're a new band, DJ, artist or whatever. If you've been working in the music industry for the last ten years then you're not going to need to listen to the below report, it's pretty basic stuff. But that's the point. It's the stuff that no one really tells you when you start out. The stuff it takes two years and twice as many mistakes to learn. Things like never trusting a manager who only has a Yahoo! email address, and never signing a contract with your mate's Dad just because he once was a roadie for Steely Dan. Hopefully it'll be of some use.

Over the next four weeks, Ill be giving you an insight into a variety of different parts of the music industry which might affect you as a new act. We'll be looking at publishing, booking agents and PR/plugging, but this week we're starting with management.

I spoke to Alex Bean, former manager of Marina and The Diamonds and gathered advice from UK bands like Pulled Apart By Horses, Kids in Glass Houses, Los Campesinos! and many more.

Bear in mind while you listen that this is just a very brief guide. There's a lot more to finding and working with a manger than we can fit into fifteen minutes but hopefully this will give you a good place to start. If you want to know more, check out the videos and articles in the Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing advice pages.

Jen Long is Broadcast Assistant for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing in Wales with Bethan Elfyn.

Climbing atop the Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing podium to claim their Tip of the Week medal this week are Dry The River, with their track, No Rest.

No Rest was the final track played on Huw Stephens' 9pm Radio 1 show on Wednesday, and it'll feature on some of our family of shows around the country for the next seven days.

Here's Huw to introduce the full track:

Dry The River are a quintet from London, fronted by medical student Peter Liddle. Although they've only been together since August officially, they've already supported Port O'Brien at London's . They count gospel, Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes and Paul Simon as influences.

Links

Back in 2008, we set up residence at Maida Vale studios for a weekend and invited a dozen very excited new artists to record a session. The acts were chosen from throughout the UK by our local and regional shows, and their tracks were played out on air in the weeks following their session.

It was a fantastic experience for the bands, and there was a great atmosphere down at Maida Vale. Here are some of the highlights from the 2008 Weekender:

This month, we're doing it all again, with a fresh bunch of acts (fourteen this time... two louder!). After much deliberation and chin scratching, our panel has invited the following acts to come on down to the legendary Maida Vale studios:

• (Staffordshire)
  
• Louise GolbeyÌý (London / 1Xtra)
  
• Ìý (Pontypridd)
  
• Ìý (London / 1Xtra)
• Ìý (Reading)
  
• Ìý (Manchester)
  
• Ìý (London)
• Ìý (Hull)
  
• Ìý (Norfolk)
  
• Ìý (Edinburgh/London)
• Ìý (Wiltshire)
  
• (London / Asian Network)
• Ìý (Nottingham)
  
• Ìý (London / 1Xtra)

We'll be recording in Maida Vale (where Bing Crosby made his last ever recording) and (where countless amazing sessions were recorded for John Peel's show). Each act will get to record three songs, and their tracks will be broadcast across our radio shows. We'll also put photos and audio streams here on the site, so keep an eye out for those in the next couple of weeks.

You can read more about the acts taking part in this year's Weekender, or listen to them on our .

This amazing album by Kelpe arrived recently, and blew me away. It's interesting, groovy and delicate, heavy and beautiful too.

So, I wanted to find out about the label behind the album, and it turns out they've been going for a while, sowing the electronic seeds of grooviness everywhere they go!

How, when, where and why was the label set up?
was set up by Jonathan Saul Kane and from the ashes of , an eclectic London record label that ran during the 80s and 90s.

They wanted to make a more focused label, so in 1995 DC Recordings was born.

Where did the name come from?
DC Recordings is from the name Depth Charge, one of J Saul Kane's musical aliases.

What's the ethos of the label and which artists are on it?
The label is home to seriously funky retro-futurist electro acts like i, and , DC's aim is to release interesting records where the artists don't have to fit to trends too much. They like to cut their own groove!

If the label could sign any artist past or present, who would it be?
George Clinton, as he mixes a wide variety of music but he always puts his own individual stamp on it.

What's the favourite office snack at the label?
DC say answering this would cause a fight!

If the label were an animal what would it be and why?
Easy - a squirrel. They like nuts.

Links

Don't miss the Huw Stephens podcast this week to hear tracks by Arcadion and Kelpe.

Skins Music Supervisor sounds like a dream job - how did you land the role?
KH: I found out about the job through my brother who used to work on Skins. I went for an interview and met the producer John Griffen and Alex Hancock (the previous music supervisor) and it went from there really.

What does the job entail on an average day?
KH: On an average day, I listen to lots of music, talk with the editors and watch particular scenes and then gather music for them. I also have a twitter account which I look at every day and take recommendations.

How can an unsigned band get their music featured on Skins?
KH: We have set a new platform up, with which allows unsigned bands to that go through me personally. Then if they're good enough and work we can put them on the show. So much good music gets sent in that doesn't fit in the show, though, so this platform allows us to help release tracks through AWAL, so we can do something with all the good music that come in.

Are you still looking for music to use in series 4?
KH: Were just about finished on the music for the current series.

Are there any styles of music that you're looking for in particular right now?
KH: The good thing about Skins music is it's very eclectic, we can use all different genres.

Do you have any specific advice for artists/bands who are just starting out?
KH: People often contact me through Twitter or Facebook with MySpace links, I can't speak for other music supervisors, but I do pay attention when people contact me with their music. So I suppose, my advice would be to find people in a position who can do things with your music and hound them.

Links

(the T&Cs say uploads will be accepted until 19th February 2010, so get in there quick!)Ìý Update: the E4 team are no for series 4 of Skins.

is a minisite within , whose creators were interviewed on the Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing Blog at the beginning of January.

The Indie Maximum Exposure 100 is an entire subsection created by a team of industry experts - plus artists making a fulltime living from music - and it offers, as the name suggests, a hundred nuggets of valuable advice that every recording artist would do well to consider.Ìý

Every headline is followed by an explanatory blog and appropriate onward links. Whether it's , , or the site provides a comprehensive tool chest of creative promotional ideas - ranging from the fiendishly cunning to the blindingly obvious. That's why, by quite some margin, is my Website of the Week.

Read our interview with Andrew Dubber and Bruce Warila from MusicThinkTank.com.

Listen to Tom Robinson on Ö÷²¥´óÐã 6 Music

Every week, Huw Stephens and his Radio 1 team choose the most exciting, most inspiring new song they've heard in the past seven days and bestow on it the title Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing Tip of the Week.

The chosen track is recommended to every local Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing shows around the country, many of whom will then give it a spin on air in the following week, along with a nice little endorsement from Huw himself about why the song is so darn fantastic.

It could be a tune that has been uploaded to us, one that's been getting a lot of love locally on the Ö÷²¥´óÐã, or just something brilliantly out of the blue that Huw is championing.

Either way, we think these are tracks which deserve to reach more people. So, in addition to this great airplay exposure, we figured it would be a good idea to start sharing the Tip of the Week on this blog.

So, without further ado, here's Huw with this week's chosen track.

The Lost Levels - Training ()

The Lost Levels hail from Norwich and released Training as a single yesterday.

If you like what you hear, check them out on their February mini tour of Northampton, Nottingham, London, Brighton, Norwich, Bristol and Ipswich.

Here's the video for Training, which the band made with :

Links

This week's label continues to push brilliant guitar pop to the masses, sometimes bubbling over with bands like Guillemots and , and newly signed band, Race Horses.

How, when, where and why was the label set up?
The label was first set up by Darrin Robson, in the back room of a record shop in a small town on the outskirts of Belfast. Darrin formed the label to release vinyl EPs by his favourite bands. The first batch of releases included Television Personalities, Sultans Of Ping F.C., The Blue Aeroplanes and Ash.

Where did the name come from?
was originally the name of the record shop which Darrin ran before the label started.

What's the ethos of the label and which artists are on it?
Darrin says it's amazing to discover new, exciting bands and artists and Fantastic Plastic aims to promote them to a wider audience. On their current roster are: Race Horses (former session guests of ours), Luke Haines (of Auteurs fame), plus Bearsuit and , who are both currently recording new albums.

Any releases/gigs coming up?
Race Horses have this week just released their debut album "Goodbye Falkenburg". They are about to go on their first ever tour, supporting FanFarlo, with dates in Bristol, Birmingham, Leeds, London, Brighton and Aberystwyth.

Also in the pipeline is a new single Love Letter To London from Luke Haines' current album, 21st Century Man.

If the label could sign any artist past or present, who would it be?
The Smiths. Because they were genius.

What's the favourite office snack at the label?
It's got to be crisps - Darrin's a big fan of cheese and onion.

If the label were an animal what would it be and why?
It would be a rabbit - they have the BEST ears!

Links

Launched late in 2008, offers an alternative means for artists, labels and media to publish and promote music from one single place, offering public and private URLs for your tracks, playlists, widgets, statistics and more.

Based in Switzerland, Paris and New York, Fairtilizer describes itself as a 'Do It Yourself Music Club' and combines the licensing, publishing and selling opportunities of sites like with the easy customisation of access offered by the likes of .

Music discovery and rating options are available for music fans and consumers, and in its relatively short existence, Fairtilizer has managed to drum up a substantial following.

Their embeddable music widget can be used by bands and fans alike across all blogging platforms and social networking sites.

For example, here's a player created by Sheffield's :

I think the site offers the best combination of attractiveness and functionality I've seen for a while, which is why is my Website of the Week.

Tom Robinson presents Ö÷²¥´óÐã Introducing - Fresh on the Net on Ö÷²¥´óÐã 6 Music on Sunday and Monday nights.

Read Tom's previous Websites of the Week.