We’ve added a new feature to our Bombplates band site system.  Users can now embed their Youtube channel right into their site!  Now you can have your official videos feed directly to your official band page, and you don’t even have to go through the hassle of embedding each one individually!

We still have to enable the functionality on some of the sites, but it’ll be there soon!

Stay tuned for more sweet features coming up. In the meantime head on over bombplates.com to check it out.

Vomit Hat Steve is a Music Spazz and tops the charts in the “different” category. You can follow him @vomithatsteve.

In the studio, we have a whiteboard with a bunch of great ideas for topics to cover in the podcast. Thing is, that’s not really happening. I don’t know what Tanacea’s talking about during the podcast, but it sure isn’t the topics on the big white board.

So I’m gonna steal ‘em!

First of all a topic that quickly became an issue of great importance to me when I was on the “Screw it! We’re going on tour!” world tour last summer. Sleeping arrangements was one of many issues that we didn’t bother to research or plan, so we quickly figured out a variety of options that worked with varying levels of success.

Obviously, if you are willing and able to rent a hotel room every night, none of this has to apply to you, Mr. Moneypants. Does the record label pay for your caviar and Champagne too?

Option 1: Sleep in the van.
Depending on the size of your band, the size of your vehicle, and how much equipment you carry, this becomes more or less feasible. When the tour started, it was just me (5’8″) and my brother (5’9″) in a mini-van (5’7″ wide). This worked ok.
Then we picked up our bassist, who was about 7’15″. Dave and I could sleep reasonably comfortable in the back seat, but there was no way to get Gene situated. Hence, sleeping in the van became a kind of last resort. And considering how many other options there are out there, it should probably be any touring musician’s last resort too.
A couple tips for how to do this:

• Park in residential areas. They tend to be quieter and have an abundance of shade trees and a lack of meters.
• Get used to smelling bad. Unless your van has plumbing you’re not likely to get a shower for days (or weeks) at a time.
• Take turns driving and sleeping. I don’t know about you, but I can sleep a lot better in a moving vehicle than a parked one.  Even 15′ tall Gene slept pretty well when we were driving (Well… except for that time he had a nightmare that I drove the van off a mountain and woke up screaming…)

Option 2: Camping.
This can wind up being much more comfortable, but does require you to bring more equipment and puts you at more at the mercy of the elements.
A good camping setup is as comfortable as you make it, and a lot more roomy. It also gives you more privacy since not just anyone can peek in through the windows.

Option 3: Have a friend in town.
This is probably the best option. If you know some people in any given town, call them up (the sooner, the better; most people prefer some kind of warning), and ask if you can crash for a night or two.
Most people will be happy to put you up.

Option 4: Make some friends in town.
This is quite possibly the most interesting option. Talk to people at the show and see what kind of sleeping arrangements you can line up. Often some complete stranger will be excited to have a band crash at his/her place.

• Talk to the other bands. Quite likely, they’ve already made arrangements or have a lead on place.
• Talk to people after the show. Not only is this a great way to find the parties, it’s a good way to find that shower you so desperately need.
• There are several online tools that can help you bum a couch from a complete stranger. Couchsurfing.org is a massive, worldwide network of travellers and people who are willing to put up travelers for the night. It’s very cool. betterthanthevan.com is a similar concept, but specifically for musicians. It’s a much smaller community, but it looks promising.

And of course, if you do convince someone to let you borrow their couch, there’s some ettiquite that it never hurts to observe:

• Don’t be a nuisance. Just because you don’t have a day job, doesn’t mean your host doesn’t. Don’t keep your host awake with your loud music and partying all night long.
• Clean up after yourself. This is definitely one of those cases where you want to leave a place cleaner than you found it. Do the dishes; pick up the living room; and obviously, clean up your own stuff.
• Cook a meal. If you have any special skills or services that you can offer your host, offer them. Our bassist Gene actually cooks for a living when he’s not rocking out. Being able to offer a nice, home-cooked meal did much to endear us to hosts and potential hosts.

Obviously, the more you can prepare ahead of time, the better your odds with any of these strategies will be. Let your friends and family know your tour schedule as far ahead of time as possible. Build a positive reputation on couchsurfing.org by hosting a few people before your tour starts. Practice setting up, tearing down, and packing up your tents. Etc.
Whatever strategy you end up using, bring a sleeping bag along. Just because someone has a couch for you doesn’t mean that they’ll have sheets and blankets. I shouldn’t even need to mention towels, toothbrushes, and soap, but you probably don’t want to forget those either.

So now you have some ideas as to how to find places to sleep on the road. Obviously, experience is the best teacher. Hop in the van and figure this stuff out first hand. Have any other clever ideas for finding couches? Post them in the comments.

Next time: Feeding yourself while on tour OR “Pizza Hut is free after 3 AM.”

Vomit Hat Steve is a Music Spazz and tops the charts in the “different” category. You can follow him @vomithatsteve.

Stephen Smith

Oftentimes, as a musician, it will be important to share digital audio and other files with the people you’re working with. You may need to distribute marketing materials or transfer session tracks from one studio to another. There are a variety of technologies available to help you do this and just as many hosts who will provide the server backend for it: HTTP, FTP, if your studio really loves you: SCP, if you have more fans than bandwidth: BitTorrent, etc.

However, most likely you’re going to end up using File Transfer Protocol (FTP) or it’s more-secure counterpart SSH File Transfer Protocol (SFTP). Setting up and running your own FTP server is way beyond the scope of this post, so we’re going to talk about how to connect to someone else’s.

So someone just handed you a piece of paper with some gibberish on it and told you to upload the files to the FTP server. What now?

First you verify that you have all the information. You need three things before you can use an FTP server:
1. Server – What computer are you connecting to? This will either be a URL (such as ftp.example.com) or an IP address (like 123.45.67.89).
2. User name – What name will you type in when prompted to log in?
3. Password – What password will you type in when prompted to log in?
It’s also possible that the server is configured to allow anonymous access, which means you won’t need a username or password.

Next, you need an FTP client. Most operating systems come with one built-in, but sometimes these aren’t very good. If you find that your system’s built-in FTP client just isn’t working, try finding a 3rd party solution.

This is probably the most complicated part of using FTP. A good client can make all the difference between a pleasant and an excruciating experience. Investigate different FTP clients, and pick the one that seems to work best for your needs.

I’m a masochist who likes to think he’s smarter than everyone, so I personally mostly use a command-line FTP client (Either Linux’s ftp command, or Cygwin’s version of the same.) If you’re 1337 enough to do that, you might as well stop reading this. I have nothing to teach you.

The point of that aside was to inform you that I don’t really know which FTP client you should use. I’ve heard good things about Cyberduck for the Mac and Filezilla for the PC (and Mac too), but I have no experience with either.

Now to connect to the server:
First, you’ll boot up your client. Most clients have a text bar at the top (similar to the URL bar in Windows Explorer or your web browser). Connecting to the server is usually as simple as typing the name of the server in that bar. Sometimes, you’ll have to preface it with “ftp://”.

For example, if you’re connecting using Windows Explorer to connect to example.com’s FTP server, you would open any explorer window and type “ftp://example.com” (without the quotes) into the bar near the top.

If the server is anonymous, you’re done! You should now be able to view the folder the same way as any other folder on your computer and drag and drop folders between the two.
There is a caveat to this: It’s possible the server is set up with multiple access levels. If a password prompt comes up even though you’ve been told that the server is anonymous, you may have to do one of several things depending on configuration.
1. Type in a username. A lot of servers expect you to identify yourself in some way even if it doesn’t care who you are. Try typing in some username at random and connecting like that. You may also try “guest” and “anonymous”.
2. Cancel out of the prompt. It might be that the server or your client brings up a prompt even if it isn’t neccesary. Try canceling it and moving on.

It’s also worth noting that very few FTP servers allow anonymous write access.  This means that if you’re connecting this way, you will probably be able to download files that others have posted, but you will not be able to upload any of your own.

If the server isn’t anonymous, once you connect to the server initially, it will prompt you for a user name and password. Type in the user name and password that you were given, and you should be good to go. If it doesn’t work, try it again. Some servers are finickity and reject your first login attempt on general principles. Make sure you spell everything exactly the way you were told to. If you were given a username of the form user@example.com make sure to include the @example.com part; a lot of servers insist on that.

That’s it. A good administrator will make sure that the connection information you get for the server will be correct. Just type it in correctly, and you’ll be able to connect no problem.

And if in doubt, RTFM.