That said, when Project M first started a thread showed up on the Daily Page Forum and that was the first I had heard of it. This was my first response.

“First off, I had to sit through the logo for every video – phhhttt. And there was no “stop loading” button on the player so my meager 1 1/2 meg broadband and I had to sit through the “judges” who seem to know nothing about music. Consequently it took almost an hour to go through all the videos. Couldn’t you guys have just done mp3s or maybe had an alternative site with just the audio?

Contests like this are the reason songwriters/musicians need A & R people and producers – to tell them that while they may have a modicum of talent this might not be the hit song you think it is.

MMM is all about the hook. None of these songs had hooks or, really any time to develop one. “Bread Lady” maybe but not a great song.His talent was slide guitar. The promoter guy actually mentioned a hook but a chorus is not a “hook” necessarily.

Best guy – piano dude. I watched him twice.

Johnathan Suttin doesn’t understand blues. Great. What’s he doing working a radio station? The promoter guy didn’t like the chorus in the “Matter of Time” song.” That was as close to a hook as anyone got.

Oh great. A whiny chick doing a whiny song about being a groupie. If this were the Apollo the giant shepherd’s crook would be out after the first line. The guy with the Strat? How did he even get a second listen?

I stopped Mike Droho in the first 5 seconds.

I really like Triple M as an occasional listen but this is ill conceived coming from a staion that’s supposed to be “world class rock” and “all about the music.”

Let’s ask Bob. ‘Hey. Bobby. Can you pare down that ‘Tangled Up in Blue’ song to two minutes?’”

And when one of the forons suggested I lighten up this was my response.

“Sorry. After almost forty years of being a semi-pro musician I can be a little acerbic when it comes to the challenges involving the business of music. It just looks like MMM is trying to make radio relevant by using the web video/American Idol thing and I’m ok with that. It just took forever to go through all the contestant videos and it irked me considering the challenge of the original post and her reply to eastsidetom.

Here’s a challenge for the contestants – break out a stop watch and write a song in two minutes.

Here’s one for Triple M – take Brown Eyed Girl off the playlist and pick something from one of Van Morrison’s other thirty-odd albums to play once in a while.”

Because of it’s unfriendliness to anybody who doesn’t have huge bandwidth streaming capabilities (me, for example), I only went back once and that was for the Old Style jingle. Absolutely the best was the guy who played the slide guitar. He really had it nailed and the judges seemed to agree. I don’t know which one he was.

It’s almost like they didn’t want any real talent to try out for the show. Plus, I think you are right on target with your assessment of the prizes. It cost Triple M almost nothing to do this contest and if less than thirty people signed up to try out, they and the winner got what the deserve I guess. $980 divided by 28 is a neat $35 a play. Whose pocket does it go in to?

Regarding your Project M article: You said “Wha???” only one time and I found myself saying it over and over again as I (intermittently) listened to the contest unfold. I did follow one of your links to the WMMM page… and I’m sure I will watch one or two of those videos someday soon… but it was Jonathan Suttin’s bio that made me chuckle. To the question “CD’s I’d have if I was stranded on a desert island:” he says “Robinson Caruso Instructional CD”. I find it comical that he is evaluating a group of writers while being unable to differentiate between real-life opera singers and 400 year old fictional characters.

Thanks Rick! The Madison Music Scene (whatever that is) owes you big time for this one.

Thomas Burns