Good Day Google+ - Summer in the City

Hey everyone, I'm Chef Dennis Littley and welcome to Good Day Google Plus. It's really a good day on Google Plus today because we've got some entertainment coming your way. And like I said, my original intention of this show was for a variety show, and finally, slowly but surely, I'm starting to get some really good acts gracing the Good Day stage. And we've got one for you today, and that's Ars Nova coming to us from Grand Rapids, Michigan, and they're all set to play. How you guys doing today?

Doing good, Dennis, thanks.

Oh, it's really nice to have you here, and we're really excited to see you play and to hear your songs. So let me introduce the rest of my guests today, and we'll come back and get started. We have Christine DeGraaff, co-founder of Circlescope, coming to us from beautiful downtown Williamstown, New Jersey. How you doing?

Woodstown, New Jersey.

Woodstown, I'm sorry.

I'm doing good, and I've got a— I can switch back and forth. I'm here today representing Circuloscope, but also My Music Hangout.

And you've had Ars Nova on My Music Hangout already.

I have, I have, and it was one of our best shows, I'd say them, and we recently had the Aston Family, and those are my two highlights. I think they really worked out well. And we're hoping, well, we are planning to do a recap show of Ars Nova, I believe in 2 weeks, Chris?

Yeah, yep.

And we're excited about that, and then we'll have them back live again.

Woo-hoo!

Well, that'll be great. Everybody be tuning in for that presentation. And we have Christopher Howes joining us, and he is in Quebec today, just kind of vacationing a bit, right?

A little bit. We're up in sunny Château Montebello up in Quebec, about an hour from Ottawa, an hour from Montreal. It's a nice, nice little spot.

And how is it 104 up there? I just don't understand that.

I don't, I don't know. Well, it gets, I don't know, they never call for it. I mean, I looked on the Weather Channel this morning and it said something about, you know, 30 degrees or something, but then suddenly climbed up to like 40, which translates to about 104 Anyway, it's, yeah, it's a short day.

Hey, the Shanman is in the audience. Shannon, if you're around, I'm going to invite you in because I want you in here for this.

Yeah, bring Shannon in.

It's been so long since I've seen you, and Shannon's a DJ in Arizona. So I'm just putting you on the spot there, Shannon. If you're there, come on in and join us, and we're going to get this party started in a bit, and we'll come back and talk to each of our other guests about what they do on Google+ and things that they might have going on, but we're going to start with some great entertainment right off the bat, and we'll play— you're gonna play 3 songs for us, and we'll take a few questions in between. If any of you have any questions, there he is. Just leave your questions or comments in the comment bar, and we will get to them as soon as we can. So let's hope Shannon will join us. He should be there, and then we'll get started. So I don't know if anybody had a chance to watch some of Mia's shows earlier, but I was watching that, and Mia was at a horse barn outside of Colorado. It was pretty cool. She was talking about being with a— or the woman there was talking about the 1,200-pound animals and the size of the horses and the trust involved. And I had left a comment, that's even bigger than our typical NFL player.

There's Ryan.

Got a full house. Hey, Ryan.

Hello everyone, how's it going?

Great, glad to have you here. We're gonna kick off things with Ars Nova and then we'll get back and talk to everybody. And Shannon's in here too, join us. We're gonna have a party. So let's get this party started Google+ style with a live song from Ars Nova. So guys, whenever you're ready, the stage is yours.

Okay, it's studio mode on. You still got sound?

Great.

The song is called Tomorrow.

Every time you think you know, you're fooled again and again. There's no way that I'll remain, never know what's blowing in the wind. Everything is gonna change with the tidal wave in hand. So I'm taking every day in. No matter the way that it's gonna turn out to be, sit back and enjoy the ride. Anytime when I finally find that stuff working for my life, make my life work for me. Yay!

That was cool. Oh my God, what a great song. Now, who wrote that? You're the culprit. Okay. Excellent. You want to introduce everyone now that we've got a song out of the way and tell us who you got with you today?

Sure. I'm Chris Foote.

I'm Kit.

Rebecca Hobble.

I'm Cody Russell. I'm Brad.

I'm Dmitry.

Now, are you guys all from Michigan, or did you just meet here?

Oh, we've all lived in Grand Rapids for a decent amount of time. Kit's from Flint originally. She moved here a couple years back.

Yeah, I was born in Flint, but I've lived on this side of the state for most of my life.

I was born in Russia.

Right.

Okay, how long you been here, Dmitry?

Uh, most of my life, about 20 5 years.

Long enough. Yeah, so I know I've never been to Michigan, but I know when you do ask people, like sometimes you put up the hand and say, where are you, right? Is that right? That's kind of like in Jersey. I used to live in Jersey and it was always, yo, well, what exit? That's what they always asked us. You know, it was kind of a little misnomer. But well, that was really nice. I love that song. And what inspired that song, or how long ago did you write it?

I guess maybe about 5 years back, must have been. It's just basically a song about just making the best of any situation and going into new experiences with an open mind and positive attitude.

Very good. Well, I loved it. It was really cool. You know, I may be old, but I'm a child of the '60s, and we like music. So it doesn't matter what it is, pretty much. We're always up for music.

What have you guys been up to for the past couple months?

Well, mostly rehearsing, booking some shows. Last night we did an authorpalooza, it was called. It was a local author event with book signings and stuff. Got a few things booked now, just mostly getting prepared for them.

Awesome.

Cool.

All right, so you wouldn't like to play another song for us?

Sure.

Sure.

And what are you going to play?

This one is called "I'll Get By." It's one of the more recent songs I've written.

Sounds good.

Is it so hard to understand? Will I get by on my own when I'm all alone? Just bring it on, 'cause you know I can take it. And I'll keep right on. No matter what is to come, and I won't fold. No, not this time. Do what I must to get by. Take a look at your life. See what's working. Pick up all the pieces if it's broken. Just keep marching on.

On.

Taking everything, everything, everything Taking everything as it comes. I'll keep right—

Oh yeah!

That's a new one, huh?

Newer, yeah. Definitely one we didn't play on the other show.

Action!

Chef Dennis Littley— oh, we got a +1 from Ryan.

Definitely.

I've got some comments I could bring up, Chef.

Bring some up.

Somebody's watching on YouTube, Alyssia, she's here for Becca, she loves my Songbird hugs.

Aww, thank you.

And Tia Kelly says, "What? This is so cool." We've got Rain Dow in the house, "Little late, this looks awesome." Coach G. Moore, "Love it." DJ Rel, nice. Alyssa again, "Love to Rebecca, hearts, your number one fan." Okay, that was pretty cool.

And Shannon, what do you think?

I liked it. I liked it. Actually, that's more my speed of music these days, even though I work at a rock station off out of the studio, this is more my speed.

Excellent.

Not when I'm sweating though, you guys caught me at the worst possible time.

I'm so sorry for pulling you in like that, but I saw you were here and I haven't seen you in so long. First I thought maybe it was just one of those really cool tie-dyed kind of look shirts.

It is really, it's a hypercolor.

Yeah, then I realized it was a little wet saturated, but I So you're in Phoenix, so how hot is it today in Arizona?

You know, I got a message from Wade Harmon this morning, he's like, "Hey, come on my relationship marketing show." I was like, "I can't, I gotta go run before it hits like 110." And so it's not as bad, I guess, today, but when you add in a little bit of humidity from the monsoons, it just gets really, really just muggy. It's nothing like Florida, but it's just for me, when you're coming from dry heat to No, monsoon season, it's a torture on the body.

So it's not always dry heat over there in Arizona?

Between July and August, it's just muggy and gross. Clearly, clearly it's muggy and gross.

Yes, someone told me— Someone told me one time, they're like, oh, Arizona, it's a dry heat. And I went out there, and I'm like, yeah, but it's like 120 still. And it's like, my oven's dry as well, but I'm not going to stick my head in there.

Yeah, it gets really hot out here. It hasn't been as hot this summer as it was last summer when I think it did hit 122.

It was a bit warm. Actually, Florida has not been that bad this year so far, so I'm holding my breath. I know I keep saying I know it's coming, but so far it's the middle of July and it's no worse than New Jersey, that's for sure. And Ryan, thanks for coming on. How you doing? You're in New York, New Hampshire? I can never remember.

That's alright. Upstate New York, Albany area. And, uh, it is— as soon as it goes from being bitterly cold, it gets to about 80 degrees, and like you're walking through a swamp all the time. So the mugginess that— I don't feel sorry for you, Shannon, let me say that. That's our life that we live 24/7, is it's either freezing cold or it's completely muggy and hot and you're walking through like swamp.

Yeah, why don't we all move to San Francisco or something?

San Diego. I was thinking San Diego.

That's the one.

You're all welcome to come to Canada if you like.

It's hot there. Why would we? All the Google Plussers in the world, let's all move to San Diego together.

I would love to, because then I could say, eh, good day, Google+. But anyway, let's get back to our stars of the show, Ars Nova. We have loved the songs so far, and you're going to play another for us. And what are you playing now?

This one is— what are we doing? Trust Me. Trust Me.

Trust Me.

Trust Me.

OK. Oh, I love that one.

Don't look at me.

I would name another song.

Oh, wait a second.

Hold on.

Sorry, one moment.

That first note was just terribly off. It seems that the more you try, the more it falls. No chance to get it right, so you slip it up to another. The tired and the pain inside, it doesn't seem to work. But we will never stop, never give in. Sure, how you part with that last part, Everything that needs to be will be. Just trust me, heed what I say. Don't give up just 'cause things don't go your way. It's always, it's always gonna be just what you meant. You die in the bed that you made. No one ever said it'd be easy. And in the end, only you can choose whether you will win or lose the game. Surely, as the sun will rise, you'll open up your eyes and see again. Until Every day you do, I'm telling you, telling you, that we will never stop, never give up, show you how to apply, lend last drops of you to your heart. Everything that is to be will be, just trust me, heed what I say. Don't give up just 'cause things don't go your way. It's always, it's always gonna be just what you make. It's always gonna be just what you make. It's always gonna be just what you make.

Woo!

Woo-hoo!

Yeah!

That's one of my favorites.

That was great. I love that.

Good job.

Thank you very much.

Excellent, excellent. You know, and I have— I gotta say, I love that acoustic bass back there. I was a bass player for a while, and when they said acoustic bass, it was one of them big things.

Oh, a stand-up bass or an upright bass?

Yeah, nah, my hands were just way too small for that, but I love that one. That was cool. Very nice, very nice.

Thank you. Anna says she's surprised to hear that attic has such great acoustics.

I don't think it's just the attic, Anna. A lot more to do with that than the attic. So guys, how long have you been together?

Um, a year and a half or so, maybe. Me and Dmitry have played together for, I don't know, coming on 2 decades, probably.

And I've been playing with Chris for probably about 7 or 8 years now, and I've known Cody for about that same amount of time, maybe a little less, and been playing with him on and off too.

The girls are the latest additions.

Yes, we are.

Good addition.

Good addition, yeah.

We're actually cousins, can you tell?

Aww.

Hey, so can I ask you guys, um, who were you guys— I typically ask this of anyone that I interview in the music world. Who, who'd you guys really get influenced by growing up? Anyone?

For me, when I was growing up, I was into like grunge and Nirvana and stuff when I was a teenager. But when I was around 20, I started listening to mostly '60s stuff. And I'd say John Phillips from the Mamas and Papas is my biggest influence. Uh, John Lennon and Paul McCartney.

I think we all like—

cool.

Yeah, yeah, we're all big Beatles fans.

One Beatles— OK, so if there's one Beatles song that you had to listen to every day of your life, otherwise your girlfriend or spouse would have her collarbone broken somehow, which one would it be?

That's a tough question.

I couldn't pick one Beatles song. I like too many of them.

You've got to pick one or your spouse will have her collarbone broken.

Maybe "Someplace." Every day.

Oh, yes. Yes. They played that for me in the green room.

I love "All We Want." Yeah, because we can't play those live, but I would love to hear some of those sometimes in a private concert, that's for sure.

That's what we need to set up. We totally need to set up a private concert.

I've actually talked about this concept to bands here in Phoenix, but no one wants to do it. I think it's a really good idea.

Absolutely. Because I think the market is starting to open up for something like that.

And then for a private concert, you mean like very small venues, small grouping of people?

I think they mean not hang out on air.

Yeah, just— so 10 guests. I think if you have a Google Apps account, you could do 15 guests.

And you could also use some of the new medium they're using, have a private concert, and you could actually sell tickets that way too. And if you wanted to go that route, and you could give people that had paid for it the link to it to watch it live.

Actually, I mean, because we're talking about covers, and actually I recently did a Hangout with the Aston family, and they played a cover song, and it did not shut our stream down. So it is possible that we could do some covers. There's a whole thing with YouTube. It's like they don't tell you which songs they won't shut you down, but if you play the wrong one, you're done.

Yeah, don't want to go there. Don't want to piss off the YouTube gods. Everything go bye-bye. Well guys, it's been a pleasure having you on, and you're welcome to stay on with us if you'd like, but I know you probably have a lot to do too, so I'll leave it up to you. It's been great having you on, and you have an open invitation anytime you want to come on and play another song or two or whatever. Or maybe, Christine, maybe we could organize, you wanted to have them back on, I'd love to be part of that concert.

Absolutely, Chef.

Help with that, help promote it.

You're in. You're in.

Sounds good. Sounds good, because I really love my music. And oh, do you guys have an EP out or an album out?

No, actually we're going to be working on recording some stuff probably starting next week. We got some equipment coming so we can do some recordings here.

Yeah, so nowhere other than bootleg we can find your stuff?

There is, there's like a bunch of demos I've recorded throughout the years. Dimitri's on a lot of them. It's not the same lineup, but like on our ReverbNation page, and we have a SoundCloud page, you can find all those linked from our Google+ page. They're a little different nowadays though.

Okay, we'll get those links and we'll put them in the links of the show so people can find them. Too, that way they can go and get some of those songs. I'd love to throw them on my iPod if I could. I don't know if they download to that or not.

Yeah, you can download them all as MP3s on the ReverbNation page.

Very good.

Yeah, I'd love to add those to my assortment of tunes that I listen to. Very eclectic sounds. So, well, thanks again for coming on and absolutely loved it. And when you're getting ready to promote your album, anything I can do to help, I'll be very happy to. It's been a pleasure.

Thanks so much.

Maybe one day I'll get out to Michigan and I'll get to see you live.

Yeah, we'll get out there.

Good job, guys.

Yeah, very good job. Very good job.

Thanks, Ryan.

Thank you, Kristoph.

So let's get back to Good Day Google+ here a little bit and chat a bit. Ryan, you came in late and Anna Hoffman had left a message. She said you just had something— did you have an article out? Trying to find it, here it is on the Social Media Examiner.

Oh yeah, about turning Google Hangouts into podcast episodes.

And we've talked about that.

Yeah, yeah, basically I just outlined the process. I get asked a lot because I turn my Hangout into a podcast episode and I push it out through iTunes and all that kind of stuff. And I've just been asked so many times and then coincidentally Social Media Examiner asked me the same question, hey, can you write an article about how you do that?, so I did, and that came out yesterday, and it seems like it's helping a lot of people, which is cool, because it's super easy to do. It seems like such a complicated process, but to get, to get your Google Hangouts into iTunes as audio is really a pretty simple process. So, you know, and I encourage anyone who has a Google Hangout who just wants to capture that additional exposure from an iTunes audience, or Stitcher, or any of the places, I mean, not just iTunes, I just use that because 'cause it's the one people are most familiar with. But SoundCloud, I go out to SoundCloud, I love SoundCloud as well, it's a great resource for sharing audio content, so yes, that just came out.

Cool, congrats on that. Oh, here's a— I gotta throw this out, Adam Music said, "Nobody ever lists Weird Al as an influence." Definitely actually is, big Weird Al fan.

Yeah.

He's in France.

Gotta love it.

There was an article about Weird Al yesterday that I wanted to read where it said— I can't remember where it was, maybe it was, uh, I don't remember where it was from, but talked about how he was still staying relevant with the young crowd.

Really?

Yeah.

He just did a remake of Blurred Lines, eh? That went really well.

And didn't he also do like a remake of Royals?

Royals.

And that Happy song?

Tacky.

I'm tacky.

And a few years back he did that Eminem cover too.

That's right.

I think he just did something recently about social media and writing. I'm not sure. I saw something. I thought it was pretty lame.

Tell us how you really feel, Christine.

Don't pull any punches here.

No, it wasn't funny. Funny, like back in the day when he used to do things.

I always remember "My Bologna." That was one of my favorites. And there was a play on one, and I always sing the play version. I don't know if anyone ever saw— there was a song called "Psycho Killer," you know, Keskozay, that one. And there's a version called "Psycho Chickens." So Google it. You'll find it.

It's really funny.

Hey, hey, Ryan, uh, I wanted to go back to your podcast, um, your podcasting while you walk around in the kitchen.

Sorry, I'm doing daddy daycare today, so I'm— that was the reason I was 5 minutes late, is I was putting my kid down to sleep.

At least you're not covered in sweat, right, Ryan?

You say this like it's a bad thing.

I'm covered in baby puke. And you can't see that, I'm kind of strategically keeping it above the fold here.

Sorry.

I wanted to ask you, what are you using to edit all your podcasts with? Are you using Audacity or—

Yeah, I use Audacity. Yeah, so I basically, I bought some intro music from some site I can't remember the name of, and I do about 15 seconds of that as a lead-in. I do a quick recording straight into Audacity as like an intro to what the content is going to be. I have a little bumper, then I just put the— I upload the MP4 that I download right out of YouTube, and I put the whole thing together, and then export as an MP3 from Audacity. And the only thing I need to do that I didn't add in there is I just found a good tool for, it basically cleans up your audio, it removes background noise and levels everything out, and the name of it is escaping me, so I apologize for that, but that's an extra step I'm going to add because I don't do that currently, and sometimes the levels are a little different.

Right, now I know that for those who are on a budget when it comes to, you know, editing podcasts, Audacity is a really amazing tool to use, you know, and what you're talking about, I know, I know that from the version, from the perspective of Adobe Audition and all those plugins are actually included in Audition. So what you're talking, I had to do the same thing for my sister's podcast where I had to pull out the background audio and she had a problem, you guys probably experienced it with the microphones where there's like sometimes a crackling that comes over the Hangout. And, you know, and I tried to remove that, and you could get a little bit of it removed in Audition, but when it came to removing the background noise, man, it did an amazing job. So, but that's interesting about that one for Audacity, because people do ask me about what's a free program, and, you know, I would like to still give them the opportunity or the option to edit something like that with the same tools that are in Audition.

After the Hangout, I'll find it, and I'll share it on the event page, and I'll email it over to you, dude, because I just, for some reason, it's escaping me, and I just don't I don't have it on me right now, but the thing about Hangouts too is sometimes they get recorded really weird. In here, it will sound perfect. And then something— it almost like there's a natural— or I won't say a natural. It's almost like into Hangouts is built in a little bit of audio mixing. And sometimes that does not come through to the recording into YouTube. Because I'll get a very clear conversation in Hangouts, but then the recorded YouTube, or at least what's stripped off when the audio is stripped off YouTube and when the MP4 is turned into an MP3, you get maybe what the natural sound was from the microphone. I'm not an audio techie. I actually—

There was, you know, with Wendy, when she would record her family law podcast, and when she was, and I was doing a test on that, you know, I told her, I want you to do it in a couple different ways, you know, because all this is just really testing to make sure what the best process you can get out of it. And I had a recording in voice, and then I told her, record in studio mode, and I want to see how that works. And it came out, it came out great. It didn't come out the same quality like you're talking about, where it was, um, there's, like you said, there's a weird— it's just, it's not the same audio. Something happens, something gets processed in YouTube. But yeah, that was where that crackling was coming from in the microphone, and I don't know why it was doing that. So I just told her, just stick to voice. I don't want to cause she had 2 really great interviews and the whole interview was just crackling.

Yeah.

And it just sucked. And so I told her, well, just stay with voice.

Yeah.

It's kind of like you never— you're— every time I do it, I know that I'm rolling the dice. I haven't had a really bad experience yet. I've had some that are less— of less quality. I've had some that come crystal clear. So you kind of never know what you're going to get.

What—

despite what it sounds like in this. This would sound great and your recording can be weird, so.

Well, I listen to your podcast in the car. It sounds awesome. So, especially with that bass drum in the beginning of your podcast.

It's like boom, boom, boom.

The car's like thumping and I'm driving through my neighborhood and I'm thinking, boy, my neighbor is probably going to come steal my car.

I love that you thump that banjo music like it's an old-school gangster rap. That is amazing.

Totally is. They're like, what are you up to? And I go, At least he didn't walk off. He's listening to a podcast.

I'd like to lead mine in with, like, play that funky music, white boy. That would be awesome.

That would be awesome. Especially if you went no lyrics and just rocked the track on that one. That would be fantastic.

Shannon's like the coolest geek in the world. I actually would second that. Where's my +1 button?

I need that.

Oh, geez, thanks.

There's no stopping you now that you've got that +1 button.

Yeah, the Dustin Stout special.

I love it. But Christopher, you've been a little quiet there. Why don't you join in and talk to us? Your show that you did with Andrew and Ben— you're muted.

There we go. Yeah, the Social Media Hangout, we do it every Sunday at 3 o'clock. We started it back, oh, a few months ago anyway, and the intention of the show was to get, you know, some social media experts on there and talk about some of the relatable news, and it's been doing really well. We got Eric on there and Mark. I don't think we've had Ryan on yet, but I know Christine's been on, and You've been on, Chef? Yeah, it's a good time to sit around and just talk about some of the things that, you know, pick everyone else's brain. Because during the week we're all so busy. I mean, occasionally I'll get to talk to Mark, I'll talk to Eric, I talk to Andrew every day, but we don't actually get to sit down and just pick each other's brains on, you know, what's happened and stuff. So some really, really good stuff ends up coming out of those Sunday afternoons.

Has anything new or interesting been happening lately? Anything you wanted to share? Have you heard?

Uh, well, there's, uh, not really. I mean, there was the thing with LinkedIn with the profile picture. That was a big move. Pinterest is now adding the— I think it's called suggested pins or relatable. You know how Google has the related search where they give you searches related to the one that you just did? Well, Pinterest has introduced a way that if you're searching for a pin, it will give you related pins now as well. I think that just came out 2 days ago.

What do you think of the real names policy on Google+ not needing a real name anymore?

Already established now, you know, it doesn't make it so much of a big deal now, but I know when we first got on Google+ that was a big deal. A lot of people got caught using their business name on the profile and that caused some problems for people. So the 360 on it now, I don't know, I'm all right with it.

I think a lot of people think it's going to bring a lot of, you know, spammers, but I mean, people use fake names anyway, so—

My answer to that is, you're not even Christine DeGraaff.

Google+, the thing that's different with Google+ where they're using the fake name, let's say, those spammers and those questionable accounts that you're talking about, they don't last too long in Google+. They get blocked, they get— I mean, look at Andrew. Andrew ridicules people like that. He lives to ridicule accounts like that. It's sad, eh? But no, I mean, if somebody wants to use their pen name or fictitious name, as long as you're genuine, forthright, coming and honest on the platform, you know, it doesn't— I don't think it matters a whole bunch. You know, like a band, for example. The band would probably want to use their, you know, their band name on a, you know, on a page or a profile page. I mean, we've gone through the whole idea of, you know, which is better, using the profile page or using the brand page. Both have their benefits. But, you know, like I said, I don't think that there'll be any problem. The spammers and the trolls will be weaned out.

I don't know.

I think there's always the—

You're always going to have them. It's just a matter of Google, I think, controlling them.

I'm a fan of the block button.

I'm with you there. I have no problem reporting comment spammers and people who say nasty crap in comment streams. I have no qualms reporting those people. Absolutely not.

That's what I'm saying about the Google+ and being a different platform than like Twitter or Facebook or something. We started here a couple of years ago, and it was the marketers really that got on the platform, and we've sort of been able to sculpt the platform in the way the others should have been. You know, like the posting to, you know, the same post in multiple areas. We see that now, and we call people out on it. You know, it's— I think we've done— the influencers on this platform have done a really good job of creating a nice place to share your information and really build some great relationships, really good relationships, far better than any other platform.

That's interesting, Chris, because yesterday I was— I had a— last night I had a mastermind that I was meeting up with people on, and there was a guy was saying, yeah, just, just auto-post to everything. And I was like, what are you talking about? And he was like, yeah, and then beside— and also you just use Instagram to market, market your business. I was like, just use Instagram? Like, that's it? And I was like, man. And then I just thought to myself, well, I don't know if that's necessarily the worst thing, but like, I wouldn't put all my eggs in one basket, you know.

So he had "Guru" in the title of his—

I'm not gonna say anything because this is recorded.

I love when they come up to me. I'm going to a conference tonight. And I'll get those that come up to me in conferences and say, "Oh yeah, I can do a lot for your business. I'm a social media guru." And I'll go, "Do Google Plus." And they go, "Oh no, is that still around?

Or is that big?" You know, that's the buzz I see on places like on Facebook or other websites. People are like, "Google Plus, who uses that?" And obviously there's a core group of people that definitely have adopted it and use it really heavily and like the platform. I love social platform. I wish I used it more and I wish more of my friends used it in the same respect that they use Twitter or Facebook. But I do see a lot of buzz elsewhere on the net where it's like Google+ is like, "Oh, what's this little baby social network that no one's using?" And we all know definitely that that's not necessarily true, but that's what other people that don't use it like to say about it, it seems.

Haters, as they call them.

Hey, Chef, do you mind if I ask Arsenova here a question?

Go ahead.

I would love to know— maybe you guys have already talked about this, so excuse me if I missed it in the first 5 minutes— but I'd love to know some of the ways that you guys are using social media, or what platforms, or just how you're using it in any way to connect with your audience, and how you're growing an audience with these tools, even if it's not Google+, but something else. I'm just interested to know how you're— leveraging it?

We're mostly Google+ people as far as the band goes. All the— like any unique content we post goes to Google+ and then might get reshared somewhere else, but not always. Obviously things like this, Hangouts on Air, are pretty much the best way that I can imagine a band connecting with an audience worldwide.

Yeah, when I had them on My Music Hangout, I mean, The general feedback was that they were just blown away and felt a connection with Ars Nova. And it just was a different feeling than just watching a video. Definitely there was a connection there with the audience.

I thought it was super cool. I mean, this is the first time that I've seen a band play in a Hangout. Other than actually one time on yours, Christine, but it's the first time I've actually been in the in the feed here. And man, I thought it was super cool. I mean, one of the things I really love about this platform and interviewing people, talking to Shannon, talking to Christine, you know, getting to know everybody, Chris, it— you feel like you're right there with them. And I, you know, I felt like I was right there watching you guys like I was at a bar and listening to you guys play. And that, you know, that's a very unique thing. You know, and now you have a connection with all the people that are in the audience here, and I don't think you get that connection on other platforms.

So does Daddy Daycare allow loggers at all?

Actually, yes. I talked to the proprietor and luckily I got permission.

You guys are a band though, do you use MySpace at all still?

I have an old MySpace with a couple old tracks from when I barely knew how to play anything, but I don't really use it.

Our account's still active, I'm sure. We used it quite heavily. I did back in the day and we had something like 30,000 fans and 100,000 plays on there or something like that. And the page is still around, I'm sure, but I have not logged into it in several years.

See, that's the thing. I think so many people have these MySpace pages, like I still have one, and you just don't want to give it up because in the back of your mind you're thinking, "Someday it's coming back. Someday it's coming.

I'm gonna hold on to this." Well, it's not that I'm scared to give it up. I just haven't logged on. It's a thing of the past for me. I'll leave it on the internet You know, find it if you want for fun.

But they just used a ton of money updating the site. That's why I was wondering. I mean, it's really a lot prettier and sleeker. And I hadn't been on MySpace since I don't know when. And I went back on there when I saw it. But it looked— talk about a ghost town. That kind of looked like a ghost town.

It's mostly bands using it from what I hear these days.

Yeah.

See if your Zanga still works.

I like it. I go on there. I like it.

I remember I went on there, well, before they switched over, and I can't even count the number of eye rolls about my profile. I was like, I can't believe I just wrote that back then. I was like, I can't believe I said that back then. I was like, oh my God.

Oh, you make me want to go read it now.

Go ahead. Go ahead. Because you'll probably eye roll just as much.

That's funny. Well, we've been having a great show here. Thank everybody for all the input and for the great songs and everything.

Hey, Chef, can I ask a question to the band?

Sure.

I want to ask you guys, and it's not going to be a terribly hard question, I promise you this, okay? I want to ask you, what are you guys running? I'm kind of a dork when it comes to this stuff, so what are you guys running your audio through right now? Because it sounds amazing, your mix.

It's actually just a cheap condenser mic going through a mixer to get phantom power off it because the battery port's broken in there.

Gotcha.

There's some reverb on there from the mixer, and that's just straight into the computer.

That's awesome. That just sounds amazing.

You're using studio mode. Yes. Studio mode. We have a— we've discussed this at length in Chris wrote an article about it. We've watched a few Music Hangouts where they forgot to turn studio mode on, and it made a big difference.

Yeah, I think that sounds amazing. I mean, I can hear everything in my headphones. These aren't even my good headphones. I can hear stomach grumblings. I mean, that's how amazing the sound is. I get a dog barking. I mean, it just sounds amazing. I mean, everything from the bass, even in the back. I think— Dimitri is your name? I think it sounded like there were two guitars in the background. I mean, I just thought it sounded amazing.

It's actually plugged in running through an amp over here. It's just the volume is super low on it with some reverb on the guitar amp that he's playing.

Oh, okay.

Because I was like, wow, that sounds amazing. I thought there were two— I thought there was another musician off to the side.

You're not hiding anybody there, are you, Chris? It's just Dmitry's got fingers— his fingers are just that fast. That's all.

He's got an extra hand.

Extra— what would that be?

A Terminator hand.

Oh, wonderful. Well, you guys, you really have— it's been a pleasure having you on today and listening to your songs and having you come by for a chat. And again, anytime any of you just want to pop on to a Hangout, I do this every Friday.. You're always welcome on just to come on and talk to. You don't have to play anything or sing anything, just make some new friends. And that's the best part about this show. I always mention that, you know, I love when people come to watch it, and I'm happy that they do, but, you know, it's a good way just to catch up with friends, to make new friends, and introduce friends to each other. So it's a wonderful networking tool. So now you guys have made a bunch of new friends in different fields, so, you know, people that you normally wouldn't have seen otherwise. And that's the beauty of Google+. I love it.

Hey Christine, sorry I'm filled with questions today. Clearly I've been missing from Google+ and I have so many questions that I have to ask. Go ahead. When you were doing a lot of the stuff with My Music Hangouts, were the bands using studio mode a lot? They were using studio mode a lot. And so were you telling any of them, hey man, you should really try to use these as recordings maybe for MP3s or something like that? I mean, clearly Ryan has mastered the art of ripping podcasts. I mean, I don't think bands are far from even doing this. I mean, this is great exclusive content. So what would you recommend to bands?

Well, yeah, I had Ars Nova on, and we created individual songs from all of their— from the show. During a test session we recorded them and promoted it. When I first heard them, I didn't know, because it's original music, so I didn't know when the song was going to end. So they paused for a minute and I ended the broadcast. But yeah, they definitely— can we have them play one more, Chef?

Absolutely.

I have to hear everything.

You guys up for it? I didn't want to impose.

Oh, you have a new one?

Yeah. Well, it's actually one of Chris's olders. I was going to suggest it.

All right.

No.

Let me think.

See, you can hear those guitars are amazing.

I like Step to the Side. I like One of These Days. I like all of them.

Which one?

You want to play It's the End?

That'll be way too hard for me, man. Let's do One of These Days. All right, yeah, sure, we'll do One of These Days.

Kill my phone, please.

I'm gonna post the lyrics. Okay, I guess I need to take off these.

One of these days I'm gonna move so far, so far away. I'll find myself another place to stay. Pack my bags, get on a plane, fly away. I'll never come back this way again. went away forevermore. Leaving here today, I could tell you anything, but it'd only be a lie. Truth is that I'm bound to go, even though you're bound to cry. When I do, I know I'll choose to run. Leave all of my friends behind and all the things I've done. Don't believe I'm leaving till I'm gone.

Bravo!

Bravo!

Wow, that was great, guys.

Thanks.

Definitely, definitely a good day on Google+ for me. Thank you.

Yes, it is.

I'd love to hear all their songs with like really mic'd up. I think that would sound really awesome. Like, you're just using one condenser mic, which blows like Hashtag mind blown.

You mean more of like full band sound, full drum kit?

Yeah, man. I mean, I would love to hear a full mix, just everything, you know, because this is—

We usually play full electric. Well, I play acoustic, Dimitri usually plays electric. We usually play with a full kit, so this is a little different than our normal sound.

I know a guy, I have to go talk to him and see if we can use his space for a couple hours. I just haven't had the time to do that yet.

I just love the idea of a band when it comes to a promotion standpoint, when it comes to, you know, making a new album or maybe promoting for the new album or maybe doing like just, you know, how-to sessions or just jam sessions and doing it straight from a studio because the studio has all that equipment where you can just plug right into this mixing board and you can put a full mix out there and That to me is just an opportunity for exclusive content. I mean, in my opinion, I mean, that's what I think. But I just, I don't know, there's a resistance. I know there's a resistance to Google+ as we all know. I just don't know if people are willing to give that opportunity to something that is this amazing. I mean, for you guys to do it, I just think it's great. But, you know, there's a lot of resistance that I get from, you know, where I in the industry where I work, and people are just like, "No, I don't want to use that." And I'm thinking to myself, "You're crazy. You're crazy." So I think it's kudos to you to stay on the edge of what you are doing right now with Google+.

Absolutely.

And I've noticed there's so many other people out there using services that I'm like, "Why aren't you using like Google Hangouts instead of Snapchat?" Or, "Why aren't you using this or that?" Or, "You're using Skype? Did you know you can talk with up to 10 people on Google Hangouts. I don't know if it still costs money to do conference video calling on Skype, but—

Either way, I'm sure Hangouts is a preferable platform.

It's more streamlined, hopefully. Yeah, I mean, the application— I mean, I think the application for just a lot of Google products alone have blown my mind, especially whenever Google I/O happened a few weeks back, and then the watch came out, and then they were saying, oh yeah, now L will be in the car. And I just thought to myself, It's just going to be everywhere at this point. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a Google+ integration with that somewhere along the lines. I think it's huge.

We've all drank the Kool-Aid a whole lot.

We've been swigging it for quite a while now.

Oh man, I've got all flavors, I tell you.

The thing is, people ask me about the Google+ and as soon as I start, I get so excited about it that I end up stammering. I can't even say something fast enough.

My wife just shakes her head and walks away because she's heard me preach the gospel of Google many times.

My fiancé's hashtag is Google, Google, Google. Every time I say anything, I'll say, I was talking to Shannon, and he'll be like, Google, Google, Google. I'm like, hey, I was talking to Mia, Google, Google, Google.

He doesn't even listen Oh, mine is, oh, were you hanging out with your BFF? Who's pinging you now? That'd be a good song for you guys, Who's Pinging You Now?

Yeah, man, right around the Daria— playing something like a Daria Musk.

Yeah, Daria has a song, what, Plus One Me? That's cool.

Yeah, I got lucky. I made it into her Hangout. Couple nights ago on Wednesday and got to hear her do a few things live. She's really used Google+ very effectively.

Great for her.

That's great.

Well, my friends, we're coming to a close of Good Day Google+, and I thank you all for coming. I'm just going to run down the panel one more time. Chris, Arsenovo, are you guys playing anywhere in Michigan? Is there somewhere people can go see you if you're live?

Our next show, I think, is— I'm not sure the date. It's in August. I'll post about it on Google+ page. It's just outside of Grand Rapids in August, about halfway through August. I'll get the exact date and post that on our page.

OK, sounds good. I'll have to work on another concert with you here with Christine, too.

Well, on Thursday, July 31st, we're going to do a similar to what we did with the Astor and family, we're going to do a concert replaying just the music that we already aired and then a meet and greet afterwards. Chef, we'd love to have you and Chris and Shannon, if you guys would come in. And then, yeah, we're going to schedule another concert because they've got more music.

What time is that typically, Christine?

7 o'clock, I think.

Your time? Area Eastern?

Yes. On Thursday the 31st.

Okay.

And Christine, you have anything else coming up you'd like to talk about?

That's the next thing I have coming up. I may have something on the 30th with School of Rock. It's not for sure yet.

Okay, we'll keep an eye out for that though. Starting to do some really cool things with music on Google+. And Christopher, you got your show on Sunday. Anything else happening?

No, we're just focusing on that. We are talking about a couple other shows we wanted to get going, like the news show. We started doing the SMO TV. We started doing just a weekly recap of the news, you know, each social network we give the— you know, we're hoping to move that into maybe a 30-minute segment or something, but that's on the horizon.

Yeah.

I'm putting you in my news circle.

Pardon me?

I'm putting him in my news circle right now as we speak.

And Shannon, it's great to have you back with us on Google+. We have missed your presence.

Thanks, Jeff. I appreciate it. I was occupied for a few months, but it was all worth it.

I already yelled at him for leaving us.

I did not leave for any purpose other than the fact that it was all about a labor of love for my parents. So that's why I was missing.

But you're back now.

I am back, yeah.

We'll have to hang out and watch an Andy Lyons show together so we can giggle again.

I love it when grown men giggle together.

It was so funny, and we're like, did she say that? Did you really just say that?

I felt 16 years old with Chef. I was just like, this is awesome.

I love Andy, she is so good. But anyway, so again, Arznova, thank you, thank you. Thank you, it was nice having everybody. I look forward to seeing more great things from you. Friends, thanks for stopping by, and I am on my way to the Food and Wine Conference in Orlando to see a lot of— actually see people in the flesh, not just a Google Hangout, and see a lot of my friends that I've been talking to on Hangouts all along. Have a wonderful weekend, and we'll see See you soon.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Bye.