Monday, August 7, 2006

True Music Provides National Exposure for Local Bands

By Alan Cohen , Mike Orren

Updated 01:29 a.m., August 8, 2006

True Music is one of HDNet’s longest-running shows, having launched in 2002 under the name Rock On. A Budweiser sponsorship brought the new name. In each episode, host Katie Daryl interviews bands and shows video of live performances, all in HD format. This year, there is also an audio podcast of extended interviews from the vault.

HDNet describes the show like this:

HDNet promotional materials

Katie Daryl

Daryl sees the show as a promotional vehicle for up-and-coming bands, and is an energetic and enthusiastic cheerleader for the local scene in particular:

“[We] give this small band the opportunity by putting–somebody like Radiant next to David Gray. Kapow! Maybe David Gray’s manager will see this and give this band their break.”

“What we essentially want to do is we want to come out to your concert – and we’re going to film three of your songs (three original songs – no covers) and we want a 10 minute interview.”

“[We] give them footage to use–High definition, three camera, 24-track, mixed post audio-sweetened show.” Daryl says that bands are given a copy of the video that they can use on their websites, in presskits and as DVD bonuses – so long as they don’t directly sell those performances. The HDNet contracts we’ve seen don’t explicitly grant those rights, but their current promotional materials do.

Each episode of the show airs repeatedly on HDNet, and according to Daryl, the company “just started selling on Google and Amazon.” The Amazon DVDs show a release date of June 19, 2006. Several shows are available for sale on Google Video. Daryl also told us that "Jeff[Cuban] is working on overseas."

Daryl couldn’t quantify the reach of the show, as she says the network isn’t measured by Nielsen ratings. “We don’t have a grasp of how many viewers we have,” she said. “We can go by how many people have HD sets.” She also cited a recent statistic she had heard that there are as many HD-enabled sets as there are BlackBerries.

Reports surrounding Dan Rather’s recent move to the network said that there are just under 4 million total households nationwide receiving HDNet. HDNet is not currently carried on DFW provider Time Warner (formerly Comcast). The HD audience is certainly growing, but several of the bands we talked to remembered their taping as being for a "local cable-access show."

Even with its growth and national scope, the broadcast version of True Music has always been DFW-heavy. Daryl estimates that 35% of the nearly 450 acts on the show have been local. Daryl is moving to HDNet’s new Los Angeles office soon and says that while that may change the ratio a little, Dallas and Texas artists will still be disproportionately represented.

“I have a soft heart for Dallas,” she says.

Daryl says that the DVDs and Google video downloads are just the beginning. “Sorta like baby steps,” she says. “...Stuff is definitely in the works. Mark has a vision.”

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