#rob millis

[plungermusic]

It’s been ages coming, as Pan said to the actress ...

Rob Millis, session/sideman stalwart of the London scene and soi-disant “appalling liberal old hippie twat”, wears his heart (and several other body parts) on his sleeve in his long-planned, long-awaited debut release… and you can see from the cover how excited everyone is that he’s finally got it out!

Musically it’s heavily influenced by 60s American soul and R&B, and leavened with a large dollop of English irreverence (like many of the Brit bands of the late 60s / early 70s whose music was in deadly earnest but who didn’t take themselves too seriously). Politics and passion are the main themes as exemplified by opener For Want Of Love, a New Orleans-via-New Malden 60s soul lament for our times with fine Wurlitzer electric piano and smooth girly bvs, and the blues-tinged swinging political-philippic-cum-paean to his wife of That Thing Called You, which features nicely judged interjections from Mal Barclay’s guitar.

There are flashes of the Bonzos here and there, not least in Caution: Stoned Idiot At Work’s Stanshall-like take on a Band slow waltz, (whose jokey tale of cannabis-scuppered amour belies the complex chordal arrangements) and the very Neil Innes anti-Brexiteer broadside of The Swivel-Eyed, which again for all its acidic humour features a fine call-and-response with the backing singers, Jeff Savage’s measured harp solo, and an appropriately trenchant organ break. [Check out the video on YouTube for this, it’s a hoot...]

More humour appears in the Alan Price-meets-The Kinks (or X-rated Obla-di?) domestic ballad Dented Tins: a half time groove, with great fat brassy slide from James Beck, that encompasses “tinned food, cunnilingus-denial and vintage guitars…” A (slightly) more serious look at love comes in My Unrequited Flame, a Carole King-ish piano-led ballad to misplaced love-that-never-was: its conversational confessional is accompanied with lush girly bvs and tight, easy listening rhythm guitar and rich production to underline its earnest.

There’s further polish in Somebody Needs The Sack, another lament, this time for lost billions in the 2008 crisis with hints of Beatlesque psychedelia from reverbed guitars, mellotron and tricksy timings, and also featuring some excellent early-Preston organ from Rob.

Jokes and jibes take a back seat in two heartfelt numbers: Dear Friends is an organ-backed blues-doo-wop tribute to friends old and new who have buoyed him through these dark times, while Smile On is an unashamedly emotional tribute to his old West London musical sparring partner and chum Jules Fothergill. A slow Memphis soul-waltz sprinkled with tasteful ornamentation and double-guitar interplay from Mike Ross, great gospelly bvs, and a stonking Gregg-ish organ burst.

While Rob might not be a Brooker or an Allman in the vocal department, his heart (and spleen and everything else) pour out through his delivery - and he is no slouch on organ, piano (electric and non-), mellotron, clavinet, and on occasion even rhythm and bass guitars… and he has a crack bunch of musicians behind him (as well as those already named: John Gordon bass; Graham Walker drums; and combinations of Toni Fortune, Clarence Hunte, An'drusilla Mosley and Lauren Dove providing backing vocals.)

A record that’s as fun and provoking as the cover art (Parental Guidance - may offend the easily offended…) 

Available to download/stream now from here: https://robmillisuk.bandcamp.com/releases

Rob will be performing songs from the album at its launch at The Cavern Freehouse on Wednesday 10th August - free entry!

[suryaray-blog]

Another way to get paid for your content: Dynamo goes white label for creators

#SuryaRay #Surya Pivot alert: Dynamo, one of the first companies to make pay-to-play possible for independent creators, is taking a new approach. Beginning in January, according to founder Rob Millis, the Dynamo player will no longer be open to any creators wishing to charge users for their content — instead, the company will be refocusing on white label services for those in need of digital distribution. “Really, for us it’s about how the market doesn’t need a public option like Dynamo anymore — it makes more sense to go the private contract path,” Millis said via phone. “It’s been our best users and their needs who have driven this decision — our biggest users are people asking for more tailored develpment.” Dynamo will continue to support existing projects that earn at least $100 a month — those not generating sales and continuing to use Dynamo as an archival player will have to pay a monthly fee to continue doing so. Future customers will have to contract with the company to distribute via the Dynamo player. However, those contracts come with the options of broader services, such as iTunes distribution or custom app development. “You have professionals going to three different firms to get all these things, but we have enough expertise in these fields — we’d like to be a one stop shop,” Millis said. Founded in 2009, Dynamo was early to the pay-to-play business model — its proprietary player, beta-launched in May 2010, let creators set the pricing and terms for their content, with a 70/30 profit split. Some content was stripped by our security filters, but is should be possible for one of your Editors to embed the content for you. “Online revenue at that point was a 50 percent split with advertisers, with no real transparency,” Millis said. “Now, after being out for a few years, the market has a few options out there.” Those options include companies such as VHX and Chill, which have both in the last few months refocused on creating marketplaces for paid content. But while Millis mentioned being intrigued by them — “VHX and Chill have interesting things they’re doing with destination sites and introducing people to content” — the company he was really interested in seeing move further into the paid content space was Vimeo. “We’ve been waiting for them to get into this market for four years now,” he said. “If they take it seriously and move away from the tip jar beta testing approach, I’m much more confident about where Vimeo is in five years than Chill is in three years.” When asked if there were things he’d have done differently over the course of Dynamo’s development, Millis said that while he would have made the same decisions, he might have made them faster. He also mentioned that he “completely overestimated the foresight and innovation within Hollywood. It’s an industry and community that really wants to be more innovative but doesn’t know how to. It’s why Dynamo making changes, to help.” “You beat piracy by making content available easily at a reasonable price,” he added. “That’s something the big media companies haven’t figured out yet.” http://dlvr.it/2cGR8y @suryaray