Hello from Long Beach, California…the current mobile Sixthman office.  Yes, the picture to the left is my view as I write this.  And it is 70 degrees and sunny.  I love Long Beach already.

The beautiful weather and new location have got me thinking about my own vacation.  With cruise season coming to an end, we’re all antsy to take some time to relax.  At our last staff meeting, Andy demanded (yes, demanded) we all find a chunk of time in the near future to unwind from all of our cruising (that sounds strange…unwind from cruising?  Stay with me) and spend time with friends, significants, etc, and take a good vacation.  Who am I to argue?

So with that in mind, I need some suggestions.  I try to go somewhere new every year…three years ago I got to go to Europe; two years ago I went to San Fran and Napa; last year I went to New Orleans.  This year…I don’t know.  Maybe somewhere beachy?  Wherever it is has to have good food, wine, and scenery.  I like to go places where I know people so I don’t get sucked into the touristy things, and I’m not afraid to ask a friend to be my tour guide ☺  Cost should be moderate for two people, and we’d probably go in early August.  The top choices in my mind right now are San Diego/LA again (since I’m not really going to see it this trip) and Jersey shore/NYC (my sig. other has never been).  Though I could be easily swayed.

You guys travel a lot.  Any ideas of cool places to spend a week?

-LC

So…I did it.

I fought the urge, the talk, the publicity….I really did try.  But I caved.

No..I am not talking about wearing a mankini like John Mayer or anything illegal.  I didn’t buy anything out of the ordinary (unless you count the new bra..which pained me to purchase) or strange..or even really noteworthy.

I bought the book Twilight.

I did.

I have fought hard to not buy into the Edward vampire love thing that is going on in these books.  I haven’t seen the movie (which I have heard is a good thing), I know nothing of the story, I only know that my friends (all in their late 20′s and early 30′s) love these books.

Why?  Why did I give in?

It is a fair question.  I have no idea.

I really was just like…I need something new to read.  I am feeling the void of television these days and movies are all regurgitated versions of an older movie.

There is no more originality.  That is why I was scared of Twilight.  Look I love Harry Potter…all of the books.  I have read pretty much all of what Anne Rice could bring us.  So I am afraid that Stephanie Meyer is only going to be taking some of Anne, some of JK, and mixing it all together in a teenage love plot….and scariest of all…I am probably going to like it.

Liking it only means having to further complicate my life by then reading New Moon and whatever comes after that in the series of books.

I start reading with a excited hesitation.

I went to two places to even buy the book because I hate when publishers take a movie still or movie poster and make that the cover of a book.  The original cover looked nothing like that..so why change it?  So I sought out the original cover and found it…and bought it.

I am two pages in…nothing has happened yet.  I almost hope for a slow night at the bar I work at so I can read a little bit.

See it is happening already. Ugh..wanting to read.  Good lord.

What next?  Wanting to eat vegetables, taking my vitamin every morning, working out?  I won’t let this reading thing make me responsible or well rounded.  I promise.

-Kelly

As part of the weekly series here on the Sixthman Blog, we’ll be highlighting a Mayercraft Carrier artist every Monday afternoon from now until we set sail on on this floating musical fiesta on March 27th, 2009!  For those of you newbies, this will give you a chance to get to know some artists that you might not have heard.  Without further ado, let’s shine that spotlight on our last (but certainly not least) band, GUSTER!

Guster

I’m going to start with saying that I love Guster.  The band was formed back in the early 90′s at Tufts University in Massachusetts (GO RED SOX!).  Although this is their first Mayercraft Carrier, they’re no strangers to Sixthman Cruises; they were performers on Ships N’ Dip I and III.  We’re beyond excited to have them on Mayercraft Carrier 2, because they bring so much fun and excitement to the stage -  it’s impossible not to get caught up in their show.  If you miss their performances on the ship, you should be ashamed of yourself!

Here are a few of my favorite songs by them.

Great video: One Man Wrecking Machine.

Amsterdam (live):

Guster – Amsterdam (live)

One of their older songs: Barrel of  Gun

Barrel of a Gun

This was the voicemail I got last Thursday morning when I came in the office.

I wasn’t sure why he would be calling.  Maybe it was because the Eagles or Van Halen wanted to do a cruise?  Or maybe Jimmy Buffet or any of the other Superstar acts he manages were interested in doing a cruise with Sixthman?  I returned the voice mail and later that afternoon my phone rang again and when I picked up, the same voice from the night before said, “ I have Irving Azoff calling for you.”  I said hello and Irving asked how I was doing; we have met once and I was aware that he really liked our concept.  We chatted briefly and he said I only have a minute before my first “Earnings Call” with Wall Street regarding earnings for his company, Ticketmaster.

I asked what I could help him with and he said he just wanted to thank me for my blog I wrote a couple weeks ago.  He said he thought my position was dead on and he hoped he could convince everyone involved to feel the same way.  He then asked if I had any ideas on how we could put a cruise together for Neil Diamond.  I said we’d get our thoughts together and wished him luck with the merger.  His assistant stepped in and said it’s time for your next call so he said he’d look forward to hearing from me.

It was good to know that there is a common attitude shared by someone who can impact change, someone took the time to forward this blog to him, and he actually read it!

So thanks to whoever shared it with him.

Andy

Elvis Cruise!

Some of you may already know, but many of you may not. So, I am excited to say that Sixthman is going to be hosting our first ever Elvis Cruise in the fall of 2009! Not only am I super excited because of the energy and responses that we have already received, but it’s the first team I’ve been apart of since I started here at Sixthman about a month ago.

We are still in the planning process, and we are actively seeking ways to make this event one of Sixthman’s best. I never thought I would know so much about the King! Here are just a few interesting things I’ve learned already:

– Elvis had a twin brother who died at birth.

- Elvis’ voice range was over 8 octaves.

- He was the first performer ever to perform via satellite.

- He was a Capricorn.

- His comic book hero was Captain Marvel.

- His favorite drink was Pepsi.

- His favorite toothpaste was Colgate.

- His favorite actors were James Dean, Marlon Brando and George C. Scott.

- His favorite games were Monopoly, Scrabble and Yahtzee.

- His favorite aftershave was Brut.

- His favorite animal was a tiger.

- Elvis gets his first guitar in 1946. It cost $12.95 at the Tupelo Hardware Store.

- Elvis was a black belt in karate.

- Elvis received 3 Grammys in the Gospel category.

- His favorite Pie was lemon meringue.

- Out of all the movies he did his favorite was King Creole.

- When Elvis was a truck driver he earned $1.25 an hour.

If you haven’t heard about this cruise yet, check it out!

http://www.sixthman.net/theelviscruise/

-Mike

Well, now that I have my wits about me and now that it’s sunk in that I’m no longer in the islands but in rainy Atlanta instead, I shall wax poetic about Cayamo. Oh, Cayamo! What a rockin’ good time you were! I must say it was my best cruise yet. Due to the nature of my box office job, I rarely get to interact with our guests more than once on any given event. Given the unique tone of Cayamo, with so many performers playing every night, we managed to get a pretty sweet ticket trading scene going. So, lucky for me, the box office became a bit of a check in point for people looking to trade, simply pass on or mix up their ticketing experience. I even witnessed a few instantaneous trades right before my eyes!

More important than the tickets, it was the PEOPLE holding them that made the difference. I made some great connections. I heard some great stories. There are some hardcore music heads on this boat!  I have several hardcore music fans in my life and it was nice to interact with folks of a similar ilk. It brought my friends to mind. Most of them live in California and I don’t see them much. It was like I was transported magically into my scene, with my peeps, at a rippin’ music festival.

As you can imagine, pulling off an event like Cayamo (or Simple Man or The Rock Boat or…you get the picture) is no easy task. I always have to pre-condition myself with the “Now Carla, you’re not AT a music festival, you’re working one.” This helps keep me on the ground as the former and the latter are two completely different things altogether. Well, on Cayamo, I had moments. Through my new ticket trading, music loving friends, I enjoyed moments of feeling like a festie. It was glorious!

So here’s a Shout Out and a Thank You to you all. Keep on Truckin’!

-Carla

You may remember that I tried to be like my hero Steve “Stever” Kamb by taking a stab at “blow by blow” blogging while onboard The Cayamo two weeks ago. Now that we’re home my day to day life may not include afternoons laying on the beach or late night piano jams with Brandi Carlile and Vienna Teng, but I figured it was as good a time as any to practice my minute by minute updates for the next cruise. Here on land I cook my own meals, clean up after myself, my husband and two rambunctious dogs, and report to an office job every day that is not terribly more interesting than most people’s so I’ve taken some creative license and combined a couple of days worth of observations into one day in the life of a phone ninja.

7:59am It is unclear as to why I am having an underwater tea party with Biz Markie, my mother, and the guy who sells me candy at the Chevron down the street but the octopus with the monocle and the top hat looks untrustworthy so instead of leaving I pour another cup of tea. Out of nowhere that damned octopus begins beating me with his tentacles, I knew he looked sketchy . . . wait no, that’s just the Ripley dog. She’s smacking me in the face with her paw. Okay! Okay! I’m up! I’m awake.

8:10am Need. Coffee. Oh good, there’s still some left in the freezer. The bag is empty. I am going to kill Pat. What kind of person puts an empty bag of coffee in the freezer? No coffee? I’m going back to sleep for a quick power nap instead.

9:40am I’m finally on my way out of the house with a glass of orange juice in hand. I’ve just locked the door while balancing the OJ between my chin and chest when the whole damn glass dumps out all over my favorite t-shirt.

9:50am Changed out of my t-shirt with the unicorn on it and into one with a neon green bow printed across the front. It sort of matches my paisley hoodie. For the 100th time this year I make a mental note to stop dressing like a 14 year old girl before I turn 30.

10:02am Stopping by the kitchen on the way to my desk I thank the sweet baby Jesus for the invention of the Flavia coffee maker—delicious brown elixir out of a little foil pod and into my mouth in less than 1 minute. The Internet, the Pet Rock, the pacemaker, these are all great inventions, but nothing at this moment compares to the Flavia.

10:05am I get ready for my busy day by stealing a quick glimpse at the picture of the day at my favorite blog, www.failblog.org

12:30pm I spill Italian dressing on my jeans while eating lunch at my desk in between phone calls.

1:30pm Andy’s helping us out in the call center during our busy pre-sale season this week and I’m a little bit terrified of some of the things coming out of his mouth. The first time he helped us out he was introducing himself as “T-bone.” Now he’s answering the phone with “Welcome to Sixthman, home of the Simple Man Cruise,” and offering to meet people on the ship and “make some magic happen.” My fourth cup of coffee almost shoots out of my nose from laughing so hard.

3:30pm At this point I’m practically levitating over my office chair, I’ve had so much coffee. I take a break to go into the kitchen to get some water instead. How was I supposed to know that the Devil made a delivery? Three boxes of mini cupcakes have magically appeared on the kitchen counter. I actually think I might pass out from glee when I bite into one of chocolate ones and oreo cookie cream bursts out.

3:32pm I can’t revel in my cupcake shame alone, so I drop one of the devil-made delights onto May’s desk.

5:00pm I happen across an email in the customer service inbox addressed to “Joy Cheers Todaro.” May and Jana are finally vindicated. My use of the salutation, “cheers!” is getting a bit excessive. I make a mental note to come up with a new tagline ASAP.

6:20pm While wrapping up my day at work, my cell phone rings. Now, I pride myself in always telling the truth in my professional life but when it comes to my personal life I can be a bit of liar. The girl on the other end identifies herself as a student at my alma mater and asks if I would like to hear about some of the exciting things happening at our school. I tell her I would love to (a lie) but before she wastes her breath I have no money (unfortunately true). Fundraiser girl doesn’t sound surprised and asks if she could at least update my mailing address. I tell her that I’m eco-concious and would prefer that they not send printed materials to my house. I’m sort of proud of my inventive answer, but anyone who has seen my immense collection of magazine subscripitons and mail order catalogs will know that I just told a lie.

6:30pm On the way home I’m stuck behind a triple A tow truck and find myself wondering if people ever get AAA and AA mixed up.

8:45pm Pat is finally home from work. We make spicy shrimp fajitas for dinner and then we watch the newish Kevin Smith movie on-demand. In case you were wondering Zac and Miri Make a Porno is about as bad as it sounds.

11:45pm After discovering the Ronin dog has made a bed inside of my open suitcase, still unpacked from Cayamo, and kicking him out I turn out the lights and pass out in my own bed. Definitely my favorite part of being home, sleeping in my own bed.

The End.

Cheers! (still taking suggestions for a new salutation)

Joy

Steve and Lauren from Sixthman talk about their first phone calls with guests on the Elvis Cruise and their favorite performers on Cayamo 2009.  Next, they sit down and interview Cayamo artist Tift Merritt who then performs a song for the podcast.

 

 Sixthman Podcast #11 - Tift Merritt [22:59m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

You know that scene at the end the Matrix where Neo finally “gets it” and suddenly sees the world in binary code?  I had one of those moments this weekend when it comes to playing music, and it caused me to spend almost all of Saturday and Sunday inside my apartment at a piano.  Luckily it rained the ENTIRE TIME, which made me feel better about not leaving the house.

As a kid I took piano lessons for years, spending hours reading page after page of sheet music, playing each song a million times until I had it memorized.  If I wanted to learn a new song, I’d buy the sheet music, spend four weeks playing it until it would get stuck in my head.  If I forgot a song then I had no chance of recovering it unless I relearned it.

About three months ago, I borrowed a book from my roommate Evan (who is an amazing piano player himself) called “How to Play the Piano Despite Years of Lessons.“  Because I’ve been so busy over the past few months with work, I’ve only been reading a page here and there; on Friday I got to the good part of the book, where it explains the language of music and its structure.  If you have any aspirations of learning to play the piano, this book is beyond valuable.  Buy it.

Back to this weekend: I set out to learn a few songs on piano and guitar, because I haven’t played either one in a long time and Cayamo left me quite inspired.  Two songs I wanted to learn: “4th of July” by Stephen Kellogg & the Sixers (a song I can’t stop singing) and “Wagon Wheel” by the Old Crow Medicine Show (ever since A.P. from Oakhurst sang it in the casino on Cayamo).  I learned the the chords for both songs on guitar…and then I tried to play them on piano.  Once I got the chord transitions down and figured out what key to play them in, I had this profound realization that had previously escaped me for the first 24 years of my life:  learning the basic language of music is so much more important than learning to JUST read sheet music.

A light bulb went on in my head, and I spent the next six hours looking up songs I’ve always wanted to learn but couldn’t find sheet music for…within minutes I was learning some of my favorites.  I honestly felt like Neo, “seeing” and “hearing” music for the first time instead of just “reading” it.

To equate my discovery to an introductory Spanish class, I had spent YEARS learning individual words to build my vocabulary, and this weekend I finally learned the structure of the language; I can now carry on a basic conversation with somebody in another language.  (Does that analogy make sense for anybody else besides me?).  15 years after learning to play music, I’ve finally learned what it is.  I imagine this is what Ben Franklin felt like when he discovered electricity; we’ll let history decide which discovery is more significant.

The tips of my fingers are raw from playing too much guitar, the rest of my fingers are sore from playing too much piano, but I am grinning from ear to ear.  I haven’t been this excited about playing music in a long long time.  I think I’m most excited for my co-workers who no longer have to hear me playing the same eight songs on the piano over and over again.

Now I just need to learn how to sing…Anybody know the name of a good voice/singing teacher here in Atlanta?

-Steve

PS. that was a serious question.  I’d like to think there are things I can do to get better (and I can only go up from here!); that’d be more fun than having to buy my roommates ear plugs.

As part of the weekly series here on the Sixthman Blog, we’ll be highlighting a Mayercraft Carrier artist every Monday afternoon from now until we set sail on on this floating musical fiesta on March 27th, 2009!  For those of you newbies, this will give you a chance to get to know some artists that you might not have heard.  Without further ado, let’s shine that spotlight on two artists, Justin Nozuka and Matt Hires:

Justin Nozuka

Blending elements of neo-soul, folk, old-time blues and pop, Justin has the guts of Ray LaMontagne and the soul of Lauryn Hill. (which sounds good to me, I’m listening to Ray LaMontagne right now!)

Half Japanese, half American Justin Nozuka was born in New York and grew up in Toronto, Raised by a single mother, Justin was the sixth of seven children, where all four of his brothers are artists in some form. As a teen, he spun Motown, folk and hip-hop as he fleshed out his music skills learning guitar with his Mexican friends at boarding school.

Dang, can you say eclectic?  Here is the video for his song, “Mr. Therapy Man:”

Mr. Therapy Man

Matt Hires

On the surface, 22-year-old Florida native Matt Hires seems to be the epitome of the sunshine state: bare-footed, artistic, and coolly easy-going. But there’s a lot more to him than meets the eye. As a child, Matt was introduced to different musical genres by his father. It was Matt’s father that passed along his old, handmade acoustic guitar from 1977 to Matt when he was sixteen years old – the same guitar that Matt uses today. A homeschooler, Matt taught himself to play the guitar.

During high school, Matt gravitated towards the punk/hardcore scene, which is a far cry from his own introspectively powerful acoustic pop sound. Although he was a hockey player and enjoyed surfing and skateboarding, Matt was self-proclaimed nerd. “I collected tons of Star Wars toys as a young kid, made my own Star Wars movies with them that usually starred my pet hedgehog, Prickles, and wrote my own Star Wars stories – they were pretty bad,” Matt recalls of his early childhood. Though Matt might have outgrown his fascination with Star Wars toys, he never outgrew his love for music.

By the time he was seventeen years old, Matt wrote his first song, and began performing in public a year later. Soon thereafter, Matt and a few of his friends decided to start a band, Brer. They recorded two albums, The Sun Is Rising EP and Microwavable. “There were ups and downs, band members came and went, but overall it was a great time, and a great experience. We also evolved a lot musically over our fairly short existence, and I grew a lot as a songwriter and musician,” says Matt. Now, as a solo artist, Matt is poised to captivate audiences with his endearing personality, melodic sound, and undeniable talent.

Here’s a video of his live performance of “Honey:”

Matt Hires – Honey