Jody Whitesides

Author: Jody Whitesides

  • Iron Man 3 And Hero Unexpected

    Iron Man 3 And Hero Unexpected

    Iron Man 3

    Oh hell yeah. Today is the day that Iron Man 3 opens in theaters. As rockstars go, I’m an Iron Man geek. The first Iron Man is likely my favorite superhero movie of all time. Robert Downey Jr. has been the perfect choice for Tony Stark – no if’s and’s or but’s. The right amount of wit, sarcasm, narcissism, and fun = pure entertainment. Thus I decided to put my little cap on and mash up the video of the early trailers for Iron Man 3 and added Hero Unexpected as the soundtrack.

    Here’s my result:

    Why would I do such a thing?

    The answer is: for fun.

    However, there’s another reason, that reason is, I’ve had numerous industry friends tell me that Hero Unexpected would be perfect for superhero movies, but in particular it’s this movie they cite – you should have it in Iron Man. Mind you, it’s not for a lack of effort to get it in the movie(s). Well, for the first one it was. For the second one, the song did get into the hands of the music supervisor – who apparently really loved the song. For whatever reason the stars weren’t aligned for him to make use of it in Iron Man 2 and instead they opted to roll with AC/DC’s Highway To Hell.

    At some point I believe Hero Unexpected will make the jump to the big screen. Until then – enjoy this video mashup of Iron Man 3 (and some Iron Man 2) clips as edited to tell the story of Hero Unexpected. Share amongst your Marvel friends and fans as well.

    Iron Man 3

    *** UPDATE ***

    I wanted to reserve judgement on Iron Man 3. Mostly because between Iron Man and Iron Man 2 – my favorite was Iron Man. Having now seen Iron Man 3, I believe I have a new favorite with Iron Man 3. Holy shit, this movie had it all (with minimal flaws). Action, humor, and great visuals. I did see it in IMAX 3D, which is something I only do if I’m a real fan of the franchise – as I normally hate 3D effects. The only movie so far where I felt the 3D was done right and didn’t irritate my eyes and give me a headache was Prometheus. While the 3D effects in Iron Man 3 were really great, there were still elements of it that gave me a headache. This was a minimal issue. If you want my recommendation – GO. SEE. THIS. MOVIE.

  • Taking A Skiing Break At Deer Valley

    Taking A Skiing Break At Deer Valley

    Skiing At Deer Valley

    Every once in a while it’s a good idea to get outside and do something else other than what you do for your career. It’s a great way to recharge the batteries. One of my favorite ways is via skiing.

    Background

    For me, I grew up skiing. Initially I hated it. Hated it so much that I literally sidestepped down a very flat slope that today I’d never be able to ski, only because it’s to flat to get anywhere. From there I learned to ski, eventually started competing in traditional ski racing of: Slalom, Giant Slalom, and Downhill.

    Finally after a couple of years of traditional racing I grew bored with it. A year later I was asked to join a ragtag bunch of peeps that were into skiing moguls and voila, I became a freestyle skier. I got good. Really good. So became a competitive skier on the Freestyle circuit in the Intermountain West division. I started out as a combined skier doing Moguls, Aerials and Ballet. Ballet?!? Yes, they used to have a portion of freestyle skiing discipline that was Ballet. After a few years I was consistently making nationals and dropped ballet to concentrate on moguls and aerials. In my final year of competition I nearly made it to World Cup and the Olympics – missed it by >< that much – one place away. Ouch. I enjoyed it anyway. (Below is a picture of me flying high over some trees.)

    Jody Jumping Skiing

    The 2012-2013 ski season has come to a close, despite more snow falling well into spring. Here’s a little video of me skiing with some friends at the infamous Deer Valley ski resort in Park City Utah.

    Yes, I ski. I ski hard. I ski fast. I do it without a helmet! Enjoy a little spring skiing break.

    p.s. – I’m saddened by the news of the explosion at the Boston Marathon finish line. I actually had friends there and they’re ok – that’s a big plus.

  • In The Cat’s Den Talkin About Spotify

    In The Cat’s Den Talkin About Spotify

    In The Cat’s Den

    Last week I was in the AMR.fm studio with Johnny Cat for his show The Cat’s Den. We got off talking about a couple of the new things I’m working on at the moment. Shortly after a brief impromptu plug for the infamous Starbucks we got into a discussion about digital royalties and services such as Spotify, Pandora, et al. Especially in how it relates to what an artist really makes [smallest sound recording royalty I’ve gotten is: $0.0007].

    Digital Royalties

    One of the biggest things that so many people are unclear about in this day and age is how digital streaming services pay out royalties to the various people involved in music. As services like Pandora, Spotify, Deezer and more come under fire for paying tiny slices of cents to the creators, it really helps to find out how all of this breaks down.

    Sound Recording Royalty

    Specifically in this clip from the Cat’s Den I’m explaining the sound recording royalty that is paid to the owner of the master recording. Generally that is the record label or entity that put up the money for the artist to record their music. In the grand scheme of streaming royalties, this is the highest royalty in the pie. Other royalties include the writer’s royalty, the publisher’s royalty and the mechanical royalty.

    Other Royalties

    Since I didn’t go into the writer’s, publisher’s and mechanical royalty streams in the discussion, I’ll add a little about them here. By comparison, the sound recording royalty is the highest paid – despite it’s average of about $0.007 (that’s pretty tiny). Now imagine getting about 1/7th that amount and you’re understanding the portion that the other 3 tend to split up into. Meaning that the writer gets about $0.001 per stream. The publisher gets about $0.001 per stream. And the mechanical is about $0.001. To the Cat’s Den listeners it’s a bit of shock. To you the reader, it should be a shock. And that’s because these digital services are getting a discount on the royalty rate.

    AMR Cat's Den Radio

    Imagine putting in 100’s of hours into writing and recording a song that costs upwards of $1,000’s to get to the public, and then you’re return on investment is $0.001 a stream. That takes 100’s of millions of streams in order to get recouped and or to be able to make a living at all. With that information in your head, is it any wonder why musicians are unwilling to have services like Pandora lobbying congress for additional discounts on royalties?

    Enjoy this video snippet from the entire 2 hour interview. Audio of the entire interview will be added shortly elsewhere on the site.

    Stay tuned, more coming soon.

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