5-4-Fri: Kickstarter

My pal, Jean, is a Jim Bianco friend and fan. So she recommended to me that I help Jimbo bootstrap his next album. Huh?

Turns out there is a site called Kickstarter. It bills itself as "a new way to fund and follow creativity." According to the site:

Kickstarter is the largest funding platform for creative projects in the world. Every month, tens of thousands of amazing people pledge millions of dollars to projects from the worlds of music, film, art, technology, design, food, publishing and other creative fields.

Herz how it works. I went onto Kickstarter and, lo and behold, Jim Bianco was indeed asking for money from average folks like me to produce his new album. He'd retain all rights and, in exchange, I'd get a copy of the album. If I gave more, he'd give me bonus songs, a personal note, a phone call, a private concert, officiate at my wedding, etc. I decided that--as awesome as a houseparty after my wedding featuring Jim and the band would be--I should stick to the somewhat less stratospheric $35 contribution. Even if I had not already planned to give money to support Jean's support of a new social media tool for supporting art, the hee-larious launch video would have absolutely compelled me to give.

Well, today a package arrived from Team Bianco with five things packed into it along with a bunch of gold glitter:

1. Loudmouth - the new album. Nice work, all. I am glad that my reward for contributing was a good CD and not just a good feeling. I'll load it onto iTunes, where it will keep Jim's "Well Within Reason" digital company.

2. Free Download of Bonus Song - This didn't really work and the song, which I was to download from Jim's Web site, only made it halfway to my computer.

3. Live at the Hotel Cafe - a live version of the album plus some other tunes. A welcome addition.

4. Sticker - In case I want to be one of those guys with more than one bumper sticker on their car. It's a nice sticker, but it's no producer credit, knowwhatImsayinJim?

5. "Sinner" Button - For me to wear to church during Lent. Nice touch.

All this came with a personal note from Jim that said, and I quote, "Dear iClipse--You rock. Hard." Whch shows you how nice Jim is. And how little he actually knows about my own chubby middle manager, mid-life crisis, singer song-writer, indie-style music or the decidedly unrocking (2 Acoustic Guitars + a Bass) = (WALL OF FOLK) formula produced by my band, B-minus.

In the end Jim raised $31,500 from 346 people. Kind of amazing. I am really glad I did it. (But I could have done without the glitter, which is taking forever to clean up.)

PS - Jim sometimes has a kind of Tom Waits growl. He also wears hats. But, I like this album more than some of Tom's. Oh, and you'll like "But I Still Want You" by Jim Bianco; now playing on iTunes.