Taxi.com Rejection #1

Okay, I'm gonna document my Taxi.com experiences via this blog, just as a useful guide to anyone else that might be thinking of using their services, I'm going to try and remain un-biased and actually link to the songs that I've submitted so you can make your own mind up about the feedback I receive from my submissions to them.

Since joining Taxi I've gone through all their listings, submitted a few songs that I thought were relevant and every couple of weeks I've gone through the new listings and done the same thing. I've just now had my first response, and it was a negative one, I submitted 3 songs for the following advert:

"ELECTRONICA SONGS - with vocals - of the 1990s - in the wide range of The Prodigy, Chemical Bros., Moby, etc., needed by a Music Publisher who has signed and placed tons of TAXI songs in various Film/TV projects. Original songs only that have a 1990s style and feel of the artists referenced are what's needed. Universal lyrics that can fit a number of film and TV scenes are what is being looked for here. Excellent vocal and instrumental performances are a must. Please submit one to three songs online or per CD, include lyrics. All submissions will be screened on a YES/NO BASIS - NO CRITIQUES FROM TAXI - and must be received no later than Monday, May 17 2010. TAXI #Y100517EL"

These were the songs:
Normal
Something You Forgot
Quiet Dreaming





They were all rejected on the basis of "Recording", I haven't had anymore feedback than that, as your feedback from Taxi just seems to be a form with some check boxes, which looks like this:



So, I went on the Taxi forum to get some more info and received some really good advice from other Taxi users and some suggestions on improving the recordings. I'll follow this advice and in the meantime, I'm gonna keep plugging away!

Hodge Plays Mario Kart

Okay, so a couple of weeks ago I watched the incredibly entertaining King of Kong documentary for the first time, after being recommended it by a friend. If you’ve never seen it, I’d highly recommend checking it out. It basically charts the progress of a Steve Wiebe who’s desperately trying to become the world greatest Donkey Kong player.

The whole thing got me thinking about my good friend Andrew Hodge and the fact that he often claims to be the world’s second greatest player of Super Mario Kart on the SNES, apparently he did an online search for the fastest lap times on Rainbow Road (The most difficult Mario Kart track) and he was about a second slower than the fastest lap time ever recorded.

Now, King of Kong heavily featured the website Twin Galaxies, who are the official score keepers for all things video game related are even recognised by The Guinness Book of World Records, so I logged on and looked up the fastest lap time for Rainbow Road, and told Hodge. Turns out that Hodge is quicker! Several seconds quicker in fact!

You can check out the video of Hodge smashing the world record here, and in dedication of this momentous achievement I’ve written a song in his honour simply titled Hodge Plays Mario Kart, which you can download here.

Joining Taxi.com

This year I've been pretty much flat out on the whole music thing, with an ultimate goal of turning my passion into something that can support me financially. So along with the constant song writing, recording, video blogging, podcasting, twittering and sending out CDs etc.. I've now decided to bite the bullet and join Taxi.com

I've had a few tunes used in independent productions in the past, its something I'd like to do more of, and Taxi claim to be-able to help with that. I've toyed with the idea of joining for a while now, I've spoken to a few members and received some fairly positive feedback overall, although there are a few negative forum posts out there too.

So, I've shelled out $300 (USA) for a years worth of their service, introduced myself in the Taxi forum and begun the process of submitting songs! It'll be interesting to see how it progresses. In the meantime I've actually learnt a fair bit about tv/film music placement from their online resources and I'm attempting to write some slightly more tv friendly tunes, and cutting back on the "naughty words" lyrically ;-)

Aidy.com