Featured Artist

The Cardboard Crowns are a mighty clash of ska-beat, reggae, punk-rock, and community service, all wrapped up in swirling frenzy of cardboard. Powered by the angst brought out by social injustice, and a particularly strange zest for life. Checkout the video to see how they use Anytune. The Cardboard Crowns were the winners of the 2013 edition of the LiVE 88.5 Big Money Shot competition. The band laid down a high energy set from start to finish, led by the antics of their firecracker drummer. I’m not sure how the rest of the band didn’t have to carry him off the stage at the end of their set. The band’s energy was infectious, as were their tunes. I liked what I heard, and I definitely want to hear more than the short 20 minute set that I was treated to.

Steve Gordon lives in the U.K., has been playing guitar for over 40 years and is still going strong. Steve was originally going to buy a trumpet but he couldn't afford one so he bought a guitar instead. Lucky for The Diamonds, a band he joined in the sixties that started as a skiffle group. Steve remembers the Diamonds appearing with and backing many big sixites stars including the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. They have had several TV appearances and played at some very cool venues including Wembley Stadium, the Cavern Club Liverpool and Royal Albert Hall. His influences include Hank Marvin, Dave Goldberg Richie Blackmore, Eric Clapton, Big Jim Sullivan, James Brown, P J Proby, and Elvis. Steve has a had an envied career playing guitar for Dusty Springfield, Dell Shannon, Bobby Vee, Big Dee Irvin and P J Proby. He has also jammed with greats such as Richie Blackmore and Jimmy Hendrix and his old friend of many years Nashville Guitarist Ray Flacke, with whom he regularly does battle via Googletalk. He has had a chance to use a lot of equipment over the years including Blackstar Amplification, Marshall, Music Man, Mesa Boogie MK1, Fender, Rivera Sedona amps. He even had custom amps from Vox-Jennings Musical Instruments and a custom guitar from Patrick Eggle Guitars. His latest acquisitions include a PRS Johnny Highland Guitar, Fender Strat Powered by Roland and a Roland GR-55 Guitar Synth. Nothing has excited Steve more than the prospect of exploring the GR-55. Steve took some time off from playing professionally to concentrate on his family and to help other young musicians. "There is always a price to pay when dedicating ones life to music and I would [...]

Gary Mulholland is a professional musician and educator from the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia. He started playing saxophone at age 10 in a school instrumental music programme and 30-odd years later, music has taken him all around the world and provided many awesome opportunities. 2013 marks Gary’s 21st year in music education. He has been teaching saxophone and clarinet at All Saints Anglican School on the Gold Coast for the past 4 years. Gary was appointed Head of Bands in 2011, responsible for overseeing brass, woodwind and percussion at the school. He has also worked in several other well-regarded Queensland schools where music education has been a major part of the schools' curriculum and school life. Gary admits saxophone is his first-love and primary instrument. However, he also plays virtual instruments nearly as much these days with the AKAI EWI4000S and the Yamaha WX5 wind controllers. He uses an Apple MacBook Pro for all his audio and synthesis requirements, with MainStage being his performance platform. Gary is married to “one outstanding lady”, Kim for 21 years and has one daughter, Tiahna, who is 16 years old. Who are your influences? You can’t be a sax player and not been influenced at some stage of your career by the sax icons Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Michael Brecker and David Sanborn. However, my primary influences over the past 15 years have been Eric Marienthal, Gerald Albright, Dave Koz and Steve Tavaglione….these guys are simply brilliant. Having mentioned the cats above, I really need to mention a bunch of other players to whom I listen all the time: Jeff Kashiwa, Michael Lington, Boney James, Mindi Abair, Jeff Coffin, Jan Garbarek, Eric Darius, Brandon Fields, Ernie Watts, Euge [...]

Phil is originally from Saint John, New Brunswick where he started playing piano and picked up the bass guitar in junior high. He co-founded Soundcheck Rehearsal Studios in Ottawa, Canada to offer musicians a comfortable and pleasant environment to practice, create new music, or just jam with fellow musician. Phil is now looking forward to getting back to creating and playing music again. Anytune caught up with Phil at Soundcheck to show him the latest version of Anytune and feature him on the first video instalment of Anytune's Featured Artist Spotlight. Check out the video and get a new appreciation of Geddy Lee watching Phil use Anytune to help learn a few seconds of YYZ. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYzHLks5p8w What does music mean to you? Music gives me everything from an emotional outlet, a way to practice discipline and build skills and a means of expression. I play bass, piano, guitar and I try to sing. Making sound is a beautiful thing, but interestingly, music is even more about listening than about making sound. That’s an important thing for me to remember and take into other aspects of life. Influences: Jaco Pastorius, Pat Metheny, Tool, Foo Fighters, Ryan P. Long What challenges do you face related to music? Finding time to practice at the moment. When I do have time, my biggest challenge is practicing what I really need to practice. There are so many fun things to play. Does Anytune help? Anytune can help make some of the necessary practice material more fun by bringing success and progress more rapidly. Phil Rushworth's Tools for 'Me Time' What projects are you working on now? Soundcheck Rehearsal Studios- Chris Lepage and myself built this out [...]

Born and educated in the UK, Kit was a professional Classical Ballet dancer for 20 years. He worked in various countries around the world including Portugal, France, Switzerland, UK, S. Africa, Australia. He retired when hw was 37 and took up a teaching career and moved to Sydney, Australia where he have lived the next 25 years. 8 years ago he became an examiner for the Royal Academy of Dance, London and now – as well as teaching – travels extensively, both Nationally and Internationally. Tell us a bit about your history with music. I learned the piano 'on and off' from the age of 6 to 15, but was never very good - I never practised! In the 50’s, it was a luxury to have a record player, so the only music I got to hear was on the radio or on a 'reel to reel' tape recorder my parents used at parties - one of those strange events that adults did in that period, where one played music and danced strange things called 'Knees up Mother Brown', the 'Hoky Coky' and the 'Conga'. At 12, I was given a transistor radio by a rich relation, so I avidly listened to Radio Luxembourg, Radio London and Radio Capitol, all playing the latest 'pop' music. The Beatles, Stones, Four Seasons, The Byrds, etc. The latter two were illegal radio stations and had to broadcast from a boat in the North Sea. When my parents became a bit more affluent they lashed out and bought a 'Stereogram'. By this time, I was well into my dance training so got to hear plenty of music and joined the local library, I could only rent out classical music [...]