Over the Easter weekend in 1975, my friend Bill Gray and I traveled to Ithaca, New York to interview guitarist/singer/songwriter Phil Keaggy. We had actually interviewed him over the phone earlier in the week, but due to a bit of technical incompetence on my part, the quality of the phone recording was indecipherable. Bill and I were both fans of the Scott Ross radio show (which aired Sunday mornings in Central Ohio on WNCI), and we had always been curious to see the church where Scott was a leader and Phil Keaggy and Ted Sandquist were involved in the music program. So we used the occasion of my technical bumbling to head to Ithaca, to visit and interview Phil at his home…with plans to attend Easter services on Sunday, before heading home.

The interview was a wonderful experience. Phil and his new wife, Bernadette, were extremely gracious…despite the fact that I was an awkward 17 years of age at the time. After the interview, Phil pulled out his guitar and shared with Bill and I the song he had just recorded for his Love Broke Thru album…As The Ruin Falls (a C.S. Lewis poem, set to Phil’s lovely composition…still a favorite to this day). Afterward, I shared with Phil that I had recently begun to write songs as well. He handed me his guitar and asked me to play one…so I played the most complex song I’d written to that point…which was Proverbs 4:20-23 set to a contemplative melody. I was pretty proud of the song, as I had used a lot of unfamiliar chords pulled from the back page of a book on guitar lessons…but after I was done and handed the guitar back to Phil, he ran thru all the chords effortlessly. Of course, I was stunned!

The next year, in 1976, I moved to the Pittsburgh, PA area for a few months to work in radio. First, at WPLW, a small and very conservative station. That didn’t last very long, as contemporary Christian music was a real stretch for them. But then I got a call from WPIT-FM (now WORD-FM) in Pittsburgh (you KNOW a station has been there for a long time when they have the first three letters of the city’s name in their call sign!), and they wanted to talk about adding some contemporary music to their very conservative format as well. So I began playing Christian music there in the afternoons…and apparently, with a few bumps along the way, that’s still the general format of the station today…35 years later!

I also was living with a family just north of Pittsburgh at the time…the Hanchericks (Lou, his wife Peggy, and their kids). Lou was the publisher of Harmony Magazine, which was one of the earliest publications dedicated exclusively to the emerging genre of Jesus Music (later known as Contemporary Christian Music (or CCM). I still had this Phil Keaggy interview, which had only aired once previously on local radio in central Ohio…so Lou decided to make it the cover story of the third issue of the magazine (spring 1976), and then the interview was completed in the following issue (I don’t have a copy of this one anymore).

I thought it might be fun to scan the cover, the table of contents and the 3-page interview and post them here (click on the thumbnails to see the full-size scans). I hope you enjoy it!

The fact that podcasters are often subject-matter experts doesn’t necessarily carry over into the actual process of producing the podcast audio. As a heavy-duty podcast listener, I can tell you that audio quality is often very poor…sometimes bordering on unlistenable. Wouldn’t it all be great if you could afford to outsource the audio production to a qualified audio engineer? But…that’s not the real world. So, while I am NOT an audio engineer, I did play one on TV. Well, that’s not exactly true. But I *was* employed as an audio engineer on more than one occasion…and my daily work as a professional voice talent *does* require me to record, edit and process my own audio. So I do know a little bit about what’s required. I’m sure there are better ways to do what I’m going to share with you here. Practice “safe audio” and consult your (audio) doctor before making life-altering changes. I’d also recommend that you contact Cliff Ravenscraft (The Podcast Answer Man) for more specific advice regarding equipment recommendations and the production process.

1. Recording: Get a decent-quality audio capture device. Halfway-decent microphones can be had for around a hundred bucks. Avoid using your laptop’s built-in microphone if at all possible. And when you get it, do NOT put your mouth right on top of it. If you can’t afford a “pop screen” (basically some panty hose stretched over a metal hoop), then angle the microphone off to the side a bit…at about 45 degrees from your mouth and talk PAST it…not toward it. Depending on the engineer…you’ll find recommendations from 6 to 18 inches from your mouth. Experiment with it and see what sounds best to your ears.

2. Recording Levels: Many podcasts consist mainly of interviews done over Skype. I’ve barely spent any time on Skype, so I don’t know how to tell you to do this…but keep in mind that the host and the guest should be at close to the same audio level as possible. Failing at this point makes EVERYTHING else harder from here on out. Do some testing. Your guest’s volume will vary…so learn ahead of time how to try to match your level to theirs (or vice versa).

3. Audio Processing: If your audio is clean and your levels are balanced, you probably don’t NEED to do a ton of work here…but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do any. Virtually EVERY home-produced podcast could benefit from a little of these:

• Normalization: If you weren’t able to control the levels when you did the original recording, you might find that they are simply too soft overall. Normalization can pull everything up into a decent range. This is the first step I use in processing.
• Noise Gate: Gating can knock out the “sound floor”…i.e., the background noise of the room. It can also soften soft sounds (like breaths) to the point where they become almost inaudible (this is a good thing). Getting a gate set properly will take some tweaking…but if you can get it right, you might find it really helps. If you’re in a really noisy environment, though, I’d skip this…prominent background noise dropping in and out is very distracting.
• Compression: Think about where your podcasts are being listened to. Much of the time in a car, thru a mono bluetooth headset or ear buds in a relatively noisy environment. Sometimes, sitting in front a computer with decent speakers and low background noise. Best practice would be to produce with the noisier environment in mind. What compression does is squeeze the natural dynamics of audio into a much narrower band of sound. This means the soft stuff gets louder, and the loud stuff gets a bit softer. As a result, the overall levels can be raised a bit without blowing out the listeners eardrums.
• Volume Adjust: After applying compression…if the compressor also serves an expander function, you’ll often need to adjust the volume back to within appropriate levels so as not to distort your final products. I find that cutting my compressed/expanded audio by 50% seems to do the trick. Your results may vary.

4. Delivery Format: We’d all like to sound like a million bucks, but to be realistic, bandwidth ain’t unlimited and neither is storage space on the iPod. Most non-music-oriented podcasts don’t need to be delivered in stereo at all….and should be using 32 or 64kbps mono. There’s no excuse to go higher than 128. That’s a mid-level music-quality audio format (so it’s overkill for most human voice/interview podcast formats).

5. Cleanup: There are many audio recording and editing programs out there. Personally, I use Sony’s Sound Forge. It’s far from perfect (and it’s expensive), but it works fine for recording and editing. I use Audacity for time compression. It seems to work a bit better than Sound Forge (although I detest its editing environment). Audacity is a free program, and well worth owning. You would be wise to learn to clean up your podcasts (or, if you are completely unfamiliar with the concept and don’t want to learn, paying someone a few bucks to do it for you). Listening thru will often reveal awkward pauses, “ummms” while you are thinking and just filling space, false starts to sentences, prominent mouth noises or electronic flukes that results in pops, click and short buzz bursts. Highlighting these and hitting Delete will make your podcast much easier to listen to, and will give you a more credible, professional sound overall.

6. Time Compression: If you’re a podcast or audio book listener, and given to heavy consumption of same…you may have found that using the iPods 2X feature is the best for you, since you can get a lot more info in much faster. However, you shouldn’t consider forcing that on everyone, lest you drive many away. Rather than chopping out breaths and squeezing, the best tool I’ve found is within Audacity. Select all your audio, then Effect >> Change Tempo. You will find that you can comfortably pitch your speed up in the range of 6-8% without causing additional stress to your listeners’ ears. It also has the indirect benefit of adding a tad bit more energy to your podcast…and many programs could benefit from a nudge in this direction.

7. Upgrade your profile: Once you’ve decided your really serious about this podcasting stuff, hire a professional voiceover talent to do an intro and outro for your show. No, it’s not cheap, but there’s a reason that every TV show you listen to has a professional voice to intro the host: it sounds CLASSIER. Make the script fairly generic, so that you don’t have to have it redone every time you tweak your format. And, if you end up with a commercial sponsor…unless they want your personal voice (which implies your personal endorsement of their product), hire that out as well. Unless you are a voiceover pro, you’re not going to sound as good as someone who is. And if you want to really protect the interests of your sponsor, you should make them sound as good as you can. You can find super-cheap voiceover talent at Fiverr.com. But I’ve only heard a couple voices there that I would consider professional quality. Your best bet would be to visit a site like Voiceover Superfriends, where you have several voices to choose from…folks who have been making their living for years doing this stuff are much more likely to deliver something you can be proud of.

So, there are a few tips for you. I hope you find them helpful. For “honest-to-God” audio engineers, please feel free to provide better options than those I’ve presented, or to correct anything I might not have gotten right. For anyone else who has learned lessons with improving the sound of their podcasts, feel free to share as well.

Well, this was a fun little find this evening!

I did a lot of tags for radio and TV commercials for (Time) Warner Cable back in the late Eighties and early Nineties. And when it came time for a regional/national TV campaign, TW wanted to stick with the same “sales voice” they’d been using for years.

I have never sought out the camera…but I’m enough of a ham that I didn’t turn down the opportunity (plus, it was a decent payday!). So, Warner’s Mike Kenny and I flew to the Twin Cities in the dead of winter and stayed at a very nice hotel attached to the Mall of America. And early in the morning, we showed up at a production studio to shoot my part in this very nicely-done commercial.

The concept for the commercial was that I was the pitch guy for an irresistable offer on cable TV…and one of the monks in a monastery was so overpowered by the INCREDIBLE OFFER that he nearly broke his vow of silence in attempting to take advantage of it.

I don’t remember a whole lot about the session (it’s only about 9 months shy of TWENTY YEARS AGO now…), but I do recall them dyeing my beard brown (because it naturally had a lot of red mixed in as well…by the way, this is NOT considered an issue today!) and having to do a bazillion takes. By the time we got back to Columbus later that day, I think the whole trip was less than 24 hours.

This was a great opportunity. I’m glad I found this again before the VHS tape decayed to dust!

Let me get this out of the way first…I REALLY like my Droid. I’ve had it since December of ’09, and it has served me well. GREAT video camera quality (5MP), wonderful voice-to-text speech input (I can take text notes via voice input while driving down the road and clean them up before posting one I get back home), FREE Google turn-by-turn navigation. There’s LOTS to love…but a few things (things which are critically important to me) which have turned out to be an ongoing disappoinment. This as been my SmartPhone Reality Show Dilemma for the past several months.

So today, I am out running errands this morning…and notice that the little “lightning bolt” symbol is not appearing over my battery icon…despite the fact that it’s plugged into the car charger. It’s plugged in at both ends…there’s no “play” in the connection to the charging/port…so, what gives? No problem…when I get home, I will plug it into the charging dock on my desk…and all will be well with the world.

Except…nothing changes when it takes its place in the dock. STILL no little lighting bolt. Two more micro-USB charger tests later…still nothing (and they are working fine to charge other devices.

OK…this is starting to get serious. Time to get drastic. Could it be a software issue?

So I reset the Droid to factory specs…and…NADA.

“Hello, Verizon?”

I checked out all my options…and discovered that I could pay $90 for a replacement Droid…or I could pay $200, wait an extra day and and have a new iPhone.

“But,” I say. “The iPhone has documented Bluetooth issues with the current release of the OS. IF it doesn’t work with my brand-new state-of-the-art Plantronics Voyager to Pro+ bluetooth headset..that’s gonna be a problem. Do I have a return window?”

“Yessir…14 days.”

“Good enough. And in terms of availability…can this ship tomorrow? I have less than 15% power remaining on the Droid…and I have a business to run here.”

“Wellllllll…most phones would ship today…but the iPhone requires 2-day delivery.”

“So…Saturday, then, right? Assuming I pay extra…you guys have done that before for me.”

“Yessir…but the the iPhone requires 2-day shipment and does not allow for Saturday delivery.”

“I see. And one last thing…I was waiting to upgrade the Droid or switch to the iPhone once HD video camera capability was added. And I haven’t had a chance to check the specs on the version of the iPhone model you are selling. Is it HD?”

“Let me see here…(pause)…yessir, it is.”

“Great…we have a deal.”

So $215 later, my iPhone will be arriving on Monday. And I’ll be selling off the unchargeable Droid on craigslist to someone who has Verizon, has existing smartphone insurance (or upgrades to it), and wants to pay the $90 replacement charge for a new original Motorola Droid.

Of course, I now have to pay for turn-by-turn navigation. Fortunately, there is a five dollar special when ordering it with the new iPhone.

And my commitment to Verizon has extended by another two years…which is fine…they are serving us well.

And…I’ve lost the ability to take verbal notes while driving (unless I want to record the voice…play it back and transcribe it later) until Apple gets it act together and builds that feature into their OS.

But I love the Mac…regret my move to PC 10 years ago…and consider this a possible first step back toward the Mac for my computing needs. Until now…in addition to the cost of the computer…the cost of crossgrading my software was completely prohibitive. But despite the fact that I have 50+ websites to manage…because of WordPress…most of my site design and maintenance is now done online anyway. I don’t need Dreamweaver…and that’s becoming true of more and more applications as the world moves “into the cloud”.

And, most of all…this move to the iPhone addresses my biggest frustration with the Droid: music and podcast management. I have spent countless hours (and many dollars) trying to equal the intuitiveness and functionality of iTunes on the Droid (ESPECIALY the podcast subscribing-and-handling functionality). Some people like to claim that it’s bloated software (and I don’t use it to buy audio books or music anymore…Amazon and Audible are much better quality and often cheaper options, thank you). But I am eager to drop all the pretender apps for such purposes on the Droid and get back to the real deal.

Until Monday, if you need to reach me for business or pleasure…please contact me via e-mail…as I have no functioning wireless phone.

Since I had previously done an audio version of some of those Chuck Norris facts, a friend recently suggested that I do the same for some of the new Sarah Palin facts…so if you enjoy that kind of humor (as I do), come have a listen. If you like it, please consider sharing it with a friend or social bookmarking it.

Also, I released an album of my original songs for kids a few years back under the name Chuck Brown & The Chuckleberries. As of today, I’ve decided to make the whole album available for free download. If you have young kids or know of some kids who love music, give it a listen. You’ll find all 13 free kids songs from the album… plus a never-heard-before BONUS song download called “Bunny Baby”.

Thanks…now back to your regular Saturday programming!

One of the great lessons I’ve had to learn over the years of doing business online is that of “standing in the stream”. In essence, what that means is that people are looking for stuff they want/need online…and they are going to search for it in whatever way makes the most sense to them. In the old-school model, you first needed to create a perception of need and then brand your product so that it was tied (in people’s minds) to your product as the solution. But, in the internet age, it’s backward…if you’ve got a product that meets a need, you find out what “they” (the peeps) are looking for already, and then you get out there and “stand in the stream” where they are already searching.

Since the Search Engines are the tool that most folks use to search, learning “where to stand” involves the study of keywords and keyphrases…and then using the content on your site, as well as the content of links coming into your site, to show the Search Engines that your site is the place where they should be to find their solution. Monitoring your position in the Search Engines allows you to see how well you’re placed within that stream…with the obvious goal being to be the first result on Page 1 of Google.

All this is fairly old news to internet marketing types. Also old news, but with new relevance, is that Google’s terms of service forbids the use of automated rank-checking tools. I didn’t know anything about this until a couple weeks ago…when I was BANNED by Google for using Aaron Wall’s delightful little Rank Checker tool (a Firefox plugin). And, yes….I’m aware that part of the key is to delay time between searches in order to emulate human searching. The simple fact is…Google has clamped down HARD on these tools…so they are no longer working well…or in some cases, working at all.

So, hey, you ask…what does it look like when you get banned by Google? Well, it’s bascially just a CAPTCHA screen that stands between you and Google’s search results pages. And it informs you that it looks like “your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application” and that you need to confirm that you’re human to continue using their service. However, the CAPTCHA is not always very readable by human eyes, in which case, you’re screwed. And, when things get really bad, you don’t even get the CAPTCHA…you’re just out of luck until you’re reinstated (I’ve only seen that one time). There’s no appeal process…no nothing.

Now, the interesting this is…once I discovered the problem…I completely stopped using automated rank checkers for about a week. Google apparently prefers that you use a standard browser to do ranking searches. OK…it’s a HUGE waste of time, but I can do that. So I switched my browser preferences to display 100 results at a time, and started using Firefox’s Find feature to search for my site rankings by hands. Guess what? I still keep getting banned. Now, that’s just WRONG. All I can assume is that my name/IP has been added to some sort of Rank-Checking Terrorist Watchlist somewhere.

But the larger question is this: If Google is going to go to all this trouble to shut down a normal webmaster function, WHY IN THE WORLD wouldn’t they provide a legitimate option for acquiring this ALREADY-PUBLICLY-AVAILABLE information? Isn’t this the same stupid logic that has earned the RIAA the reputation of “world’s worst business model”? Why don’t they Just MONETIZE it and offer it as a feature? It could be a premium add-on for Google Analytics or Google Webmaster Tools. Charge me $15-20 a month to monitor, say, 300 keywords across 50 web sites. Update them 3 times a day (if they can’t always be completely accurate up-to-the-minute…just trying to protect their server resources) and then everybody is happy, right?

Of course, I’m sure they have some defense about “potential for abuse”…since that seems to be their favorite excuse for everything they don’t do well or don’t want to deal with. But, really…this seems like a lost opportunity for additional income for them…and it’s really starting to get under my skin. BOTTOM LINE: When people WANT to comply with your policies as you’ve requested, but you provide no good options for doing so….something is wrong with your business model.

Happy 4th of July! Because the 3rd is my birthday, I’ve always had an odd attachment to this particular holiday. And yet, here it is once again. No fireworks for me this year. For once, I don’t have kids of the age where they need to be taken. I enjoy fireworks, but it’s too much of a chore to get where you need to be to see them best.

I received the picture at right via email this morning, and looked into it a little further. It’s of a field of flowers display created back in ’02 near Vandenburg AFB in Lompoc, CA. Something like 400 thousand flowers were used to create it. It’s very cool. More details and bigger pictures here.

No matter how you feel about the war in Iraq (I will admit, my feelings are more mixed than ever), my feelings aren’t mixed at all about the soliders who are there on our behalf. We are so ridiculously spoiled to live in this country and have the freedom we do. Even America’s worst domestic critics will tell you that there’s no place else on par with the US. I don’t have much patience for those who spend all their time hating our leaders…we created and we sustain the system that allows them to behave the way they do. When we demand better, we’ll get it. But that may never happen. So, we live with it.

But I am glad to be an American. It doesn’t make me better than anyone else in the world. But it’s my home, and I’m glad it is. I hope you take a moment to be grateful, too.

Dan Gray and I wrote a song some years back called “The Torch of Freedom Burns”. I wrote the music and these lyrics are his. If you’d like to listen to me sing on a rough MP3 demo while you click out the lyrics, click here:

The fireworks burst across the sky
Filling us with love and pride
We remember those who lived and died
Our liberty supplied
They were standing for our freedom
When they carried on the fight
And their love for our America fires our hearts tonite

CHORUS
And the children’s parents know that the torch of freedom burns
Fueled by love of heroes who never did return
On the shores of foreign lands
They carried on their shoulders
The fire that just grows stronger as America grows older
And the torch of freedom burns

For a land is truly free and thrives
And our way of liberty survives
With heroes in those troubled times
Who know freedom is the prize
So we stand for independence
As we carry on the fight
And the love for those who sacrificed fires our hearts tonite

CHORUS

So let freedom ring
Let the children sing
That america is still alive today
For the torch of freedom burns
Let the torch of freedom burn
Yes, the torch of freedom burns

I was driving down one of the main drags in Columbus (OH) last week, checking stuff out, as I am wont to do. I was waiting for the light at the intersection of Lane Avenue and North Star (a busy intersection) and noticed a sign stuck in the mulch. What caught my eye was the mention not only of Chris Spielman’s name, but also the web site ChrisSpielman.com. Why did this catch your eye, you ask? Well, hey…I’m really glad you asked that!

I was a fan of Spielman’s play as a linebacker at Ohio State in the 80s. NO ONE played harder than this guy did. He wasn’t the biggest and wasn’t the fastest…but he never stopped fighting to get to the ball…and when he arrived, you KNEW it. He went on to an All-Pro career with the Lions, and briefly with the Bills and the Browns. Eventually, he broke something in his neck and his career was done. In the midst of all that, however…his wife Stefanie was diagnosed with cancer. Chris took time off from football to be at home with her…supporting her. There was a famous picture of the two of them, bald, after he shaved his head in support during her chemo/radiation treatments. Nearly 10 years later, she seems to be well (although she’s had some relapses), and football is just a memory. They have raised a ton of money for cancer research. I admired his example a lot.

Chris has a radio show here in Columbus that I listen to frequently. Several years back, when I was just a “little bitty baby” web developer, I checked….and sure enough…ChrisSpielman.com was available. So I grabbed it and put up a little tribute site to the guy. I don’t know Chris…have never met him…but I just thought there should be a web presence of some sort for him. And yes, I own it to this day…so this banner was advertising my web site. Nice surprise!

Back Story: Earlier this year, I was contacted by the people helping him put on his first football camp this summer. They asked if I would put something on the site about it. I did…and that explains the signs…although I didn’t know they were coming. I also added info about Chris and Stefanie’s upcoming cruise to raise money for cancer research when asked by the folks at Travel Partners.

By the way, I was doing some voiceover work at Ozone Studios (a production house here in Columbus) yesterday…and when I walked in, I had to walk right past a photo shoot with Kirk Herbstreit, former OSU quarterback and current ESPN college football guru (and I mean “guru”…he really knows his stuff!). Kirk also has a radio show with Bruce Hooley on the same radio station that Chris does. I had seen Kirk once previously when he handed me my lunch one day at a Taco Bell drive-thru (long story), but hadn’t actually been in the same room with him before.

The guy is ridiculously good-looking…6’5″ and tanned as the day is long. Somehow, he got all the “looks” genes. The room had about 20 people in it…but it was obvious at a glance that there was just one person in the room who belonged in front of the camera. He’s an Adonis. You know how they say there are people that are so sexy, they can cause a member of the same gender to “switch teams”? Well, it’s rumored that Kirk has actually converted some WOMEN to sports fans…just so they can have an excuse to watch him on TV…talk about your miracles!

Hello to the handful of my friends who are likely to read this blog anytime soon. After several ill-considered attempts to launch topical blogs which I never had time to keep up with in the first place, I’m pleased to be back online with a newly-refined vision for why I blog: To share stuff I’m interested in or excited about. Doesn’t sound too complicated, does it? I can’t promise to break any news. While I tend to be an early adopter…I’m not often a first adopter…just because I don’t have enough time to keep up on what’s really important in the midst of the info-overloaded society where we find ourselves these days.

And yet…those of you who know me know that I enjoy sharing stuff. In fact, I can’t shut up about half of them. I have a moderately exciting and fairly interesting life filled with friends, experiences and passions. And yet, I’m pretty picky about things. I tend to be a bit dismissive of the stuff most people get excited about…because I believe we’ve been trained to like what we’re told to like. I have never been that kind of person (well, with the exception of American Idol…but at least I took three seasons to get into it!).

So the vision of my blog is to offer you a general unloading of whatever I find interesting at any given time. It will no doubt involve music, probably some technology, some things about the web and making money online (I’m now in my fourth year of that particular wild ride…) and also, the interesting stuff that my friends are doing. I am endlessly creative and hope to be so until the day I drop dead. I have already done an awful lot of cool things…and I have plans to launch several new ventures in coming months. This will be a good place to keep up on that stuff if it interests you. Thanks for checking out the blog!