Just as promised, I've made the "Open Strings" demo available as a free download on my website. Follow this link to download it!

I thought I would share this headline with you in an upcoming podcast episode, but by the time it's done this may be old news so I'll talk about it here.

Both Megatunes locations (Calgary and Edmonton) will be closing on August 31st. They have been seeing a marked decline in sales since 2004. All inventory will be sold at a reduced price until their closing.

Megatunes was a strong advocate for local artists and musicians, so it is sad to see it go. Of course, record stores are quickly becoming a thing of the past, and it can't be easy to survive in the new digital age.

The Calgary Jazz festival was also cancelled earlier this year. I certainly hope these aren't the first of many unfortunate headlines (in Calgary and the music industry at large) to come.

Not only did I get to go to Vulcan Fest as press, I also had the chance to perform on the side stage! What an incredible blessing to have been able to document and capture the entire event on my digital camera and perform alongside some of Calgary's top indie bands! Keith and I will be talking more about that on the next episode of the podcast.

You may have noticed that I've started uploading some photos to Flickr as well. There's a limit to how many I can upload in a month, but I will get them all up there eventually. Additionally, I might put a link up to some of Keith's photos once he's done editing. I was simply there to document the event, so I'm sure his photos will be far more artistic than mine. You can always visit Skrastins Photographic to view some of his work.

I referred to this in the latest podcast episode, but it has been confirmed that I will be going to Vulcan Fest this Saturday! I wasn't sure if it was going to work with my schedule, but it's looking like I should be able to swing it. Naturally, Keith and I will both be reporting on the festival for the August show. It would have been awesome if we had a portable digital recorder for this event, but alas, we don't. I will still be uploading photos to Flickr though, so keep checking back for that. If you're coming, we'll see you there!

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