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On August 28th, Belmont Blvd will play host to an unprecedented student concert event. On The Blvd will feature 21 of Belmont University’s best musical acts performing in four venues situated around the street, plus a special guest performer courtesy of our excellent sponsor, BMI!
Below is the poster for the event, complete with the acts that will be performing. If you have any further questions about the event, please don’t hesitate to contact us at ontheblvd09@gmail.com!
Hope to see you there!
Curb College Student Leadership Council
Just a quick little update on what’s going on so y’all know the blog isn’t defunct or anything. We’ve been backed up for the past month trying to sort through all of the reviews we’ve been requested to write, some administrative things, and, of course, the final stretch of school. This semester has sort of been our “CEMBlog Beta” period, and there have been very few people on the staff to keep things running smoothly; however, the Student Leadership Council will be expanding the blog’s team significantly for next semester, so things can only get better! We promise we’ll catch up on our promised posts for next year, so thanks a bunch for your patience until then!
And as always, if you have any feedback for the blog going into next year, please feel free to comment with it. We read everything y’all say here and it’s taken very seriously! Thanks, and have a great summer!
1. Please welcome the newest additions to our Band Directory:
Evan P. Donohue
The Maticals
Darla Farmer
2. And speaking of Darla Farmer, the acclaimed band (winner of last year’s Best Student Album Curbie for Rewiring the Electric Forest) will be performing a concert in the Neely Dining Hall at 7 PM this Sunday. Go to that!
The following is our first Editors’ Choice post. We’ll use this feature from time to time to spotlight our favorite Belmont musical discoveries. Please note that, in accordance with our standard policy, we will not feature any acts unless they first contact us indicating their consent to be featured on CEMBlog.
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In a pose which was clearly not intended for blogs but made it onto one anyway. Left: Jake Thomas. Right: Miles Lowenfield.
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Classic Belmont: You live down the hall from someone for an entire year before you ever discover that the person is kind of a musical prodigy. It’s the story of countless campus acquaintanceships come and gone before, and now it’s the story of Miles Lowenfield and me. This is how it goes:
Once upon a time, on Maddox Hall Floor 3, I knew Miles as the enigmatic roommate of a friend and collaborator of mine. I use the word “enigmatic” because Miles was often absent from the dorm for extended periods of time – early on, we dubbed him the “Hall Ghost” – and although I could tell he was a nice guy from the few proper conversations we had, I can’t rightly say I ever got to know the man.
I did hear things, though – occasional, unusually listenable acoustic balladry – muffled though it was by that signature Maddox cinder block – and rumors of a knack for lyrics that I frankly found somewhat surprising, given that the person in question didn’t even seem to have much to say most of the time. Read the rest of this entry »
1. Best Job Ever is this coming Saturday, and you’ll definitely want to check it out. I’ll get one of the chief organizers on here soon to hype it up more extensively, but you can find out the basics at the Best Job Ever website.
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2. The Best of the Best Showcase, coming up on Saturday, April 25th, has also launched a website for itself, and I have to say that this one is especially snazzy. There’s a beautiful tribute page to Donna Hilley (this year’s special honoree), and you can even download press shots of your favorite Best of the Best artist. Talk about hype!
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3. We’ve added a number of acts recently to our Band Directory, many of whom will have music of theirs reviewed here in coming days. Say hello to:
- Greg Bates
- Jameson Elder
- EX NIHILO
- Faith in Shadows
- FUTURE
- Robert Gay
- Lindsay George
- Madison Hardy
- John Shaw Group
- Kopecky Family Band
- Jordan Kyle
- Cheryl Luquire
- W.C. Marion
- Blake Aaron Mundell
- Jason Nix
- The Opposed
- The Stick No Bills
And you could be next! We’re just an e-mail away…
Yup, that’s right. The annual CEMB Awards (or as I like to call them, “Curbies”) are coming up, and you can vote for them right here.
The CEMB Awards allow students to celebrate what they consider the cream of the crop in many areas of the Belmont music/music business community, including:
- Full-Time Faculty
- Adjunct Faculty
- Internship Companies
- Showcases
- Student Artists (Bands & Solo)
- Student Albums
- Curb Cafe Shows
The results of the vote will be revealed at the Awards Show on March 25th at 7:00pm in the Curb Café, which promises to be a very fun time indeed. If you’ve got opinions, there’s simply no better way to make them heard in the community – besides commenting on CEMBlog, of course! (Or, you know, sending us an e-mail saying you want to write for it. Hint hint). Remember that you’ve only got one vote per IP Address, though, so use it well!
While you’re at it, feel free to voice your support for a particular artist, teacher or event in the comments section of this post so that people have more of an idea of who to vote for. That would be especially helpful for those write-in categories!
For example, I’m gunning for Evan P. Donohue to take Best Album for Look Bleak. What about you?
Welcome to CEMBlog, Belmont University’s official student-run music and music business blog! On behalf of the Student Leadership Council (SLC), I’d like to thank you for stopping by to see our fine bloggy wares. We hope you won’t be disapppointed.
First things first, though: why are we here?
This blog was conceived with lots of shining ideals in mind, but the main one is unity. We all know Belmont is well-noted for its music/music business community and the incredible concentration of talent therein, but up until now there has never been an organized way to keep track of everything the individual members of that community have been up to. CEMBlog aims to change that.
Of course, the thing about being community-centered is that this blog’s value will be entirely what you make of it. If you add your bands to the Directory, read and comment on posts, and send us music to review, CEMBlog will be a fun and informative web-hub that provides focus and feedback to Belmont’s music/music business community. If not, the blog will be boring and lame, and you will miss out on an awesome opportunity to network (it happens on the Internet now, don’tcha know) and publicize your music to a big audience of your peers (who might be important someday) and who knows who else!
So, you get the idea. Get involved. Love the CEMBlog and the CEMBlog will love you back. Pretty straightforward.
Now, a more specific run-down of what you can expect and why it will all be so great for you:
- We’ll write about your music! Which is pretty cool, considering we’re not you or your mom, right? We’re very interested in getting students excited (and opinionated) about everything their peers are working on, so if you direct us to an album, EP, or even just new MySpace tracks you’ve got, we’ll write about it in some capacity – guaranteed. We do have standards and will be selective in which music we dedicate full reviews to, but we promise to be fair and reign in our Belmont-snobbery once we start writing. For further information on this feature, please see our Reviews page.
- We’ll write about your concerts! Yep. But you gotta let us know about ‘em. See the Events page for further details.
- We’ll keep you updated on CEMB events! So there’s no excuse for not attending enough Insider’s Views or Writer’s Nights or not voting in the annual CEMB Awards anymore!
- We’ll answer your questions! So ask them.
- We’ll give you a place to complain about stuff! What, so you didn’t enjoy that one Showcase or Insider’s View? Well, here’s the place to let the powers-that-be know why!
Of course, that last point brings us to another point: our Comment Policy. Now, I am an ardent believer in free speech and feel that constructive criticism is key to improving anything, and that’s why CEMBlog is dedicated to providing an open forum for students and whoever else to express themselves honestly. That said, please bear in mind the following two guidelines:
1. Keep it clean. Profanity of any kind will not be tolerated. This is a school-sponsored blog and all.
2. Speak respectfully. We encourage active discussion on topics and realize this may lead to potentially heated arguments or criticisms, but please keep your remarks grounded in a basic sense of respect – i.e., no name-calling or outright antagonizing of other readers or people mentioned in the posts. Recognize that this is a public blog and anyone could end up reading what you write.
Violation of either guideline will result in the offending comment being deleted by an administrator, usually alongside a friendly “hey, [such-and-such violation] is why your comment isn’t there anymore, punk.” This measure is not intended to censor or discourage active discussion, but rather to facilitate an environment where any reader can feel comfortable expressing his or her opinion. This is a happy place.
Well, I think that about wraps up everything I had to say. Look out for posts in the very near future, send us your music to review, and don’t forget to add your MySpace or website to our Band Directory! And please, if you like what you see here, say hello in the comments. Ditto if you have questions or suggestions – let’s just get the ice-breaking over with now so we can start the fun part, y’know?
Once again, on behalf of SLC, I’d like to thank you for stopping by CEMBlog. We’re happy to be serving you.
- Dan Milliken, Editor
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