
This past Friday, over huevos rancheros at a Culver City diner, the Examiner sat down and spoke with Mark Olson in the early afternoon before his gig later that night at McCabe’s.. Rather than rehash Olson’s history with the Jayhawks, and Creekdippers, which is well documented elsewhere on the internet, we spoke at length about touring, his new album, […]
The Rescues- the sum is greater than the parts

When listening to a live set of songs by musicians, there’s always a balance between continuity and variety in order to be coherent but not monotonous. Though too frequently it seems, many musicians move around a few notes and change lyrics but play a number of songs in a row all with the same tempo, […]
Kari Kimmel discusses licensing

The business model for the music industry has changed quite a bit over the past 10 years. With record sales dramatically down, labels now recoup their production and promotional investments in artists through merchandise sales, endorsement deals, licensing, and touring in addition to record sales. Since only a younger demographic primarily buys music, music has become […]
The Koffeehouse story of serving Los Angeles great music

From all over the country and world, musicians come to Los Angeles because this is where so much of the music business in the world is done. Unfortunately though, unless performers are already established, Los Angeles is a difficult place to launch a music career. Since the talent level is so high, the competition is […]
Corky James discusses session work and writing pop music

Why does so much ‘pop’ music sound so similar? A recent discussion with Corky James helped answer that question. Before answering this question, here’s some brief background on Corky. As noted on Corky’s website, he was born in Virginia into a household of musical parents. Thus Corky was immersed in music from as far back as he […]
The Office’s Creed Bratton discusses his music

Last Saturday night at the Hotel Cafe, The 3DVB’s fronted by Creed Bratton on vocals and rhythm guitar played a tight, fun, enthusiastic set of songs from their newly released LP “Bounce Back.” Though currently best known for his role in the hit television show The Office, Bratton’s history in the music industry goes back to the […]