45 Sound Blog

Well it's been a busy 2012 so far for the 45 Sound team. This is an idea which was floating around in my head one year ago, the team came together for the first time six months ago, and we finally had our website ready for a soft launch on February 1st.

Let me fill you in on a little secret... We have been testing our technology with sample videos since our prototype came to life just in time for the Hard Working Class Heroes festival here in Dublin last October. Since then we have uploaded hundreds of test videos to our website while we worked hard at making it better for you people. Here's the funny thing - every time we see a new video has been uploaded to 45sound.com and is being processed by our servers, we can't wait to watch and listen to how it turned out. We're still thrilled every single time our baby works it's magic and turns out great-sounding fan-shot videos.

We won't be officially launching 45 Sound until March 14th at SXSW so we're taking things slowly until then, but it has still been amazing for us to see the videos starting to go up on the site and music fans around the world enjoying them. We only have a small number of shows up on the site at the moment, but we have already got some really cool videos. Here are a few of them I thought you might enjoy!

 

And So I Watch You From Afar 

Their second album 'Gangs' has been nominated for the Meteor Choice Music Award for Best Irish Album 2011, they just won Best Irish Act at the 2011 Irish Festival Awards and Best Live Band at the Northern Irish Music Awards 2011, and they're also my personal favorite band. When these guys announced a few months back that they were off to tour Russia, Ukraine and Belarus in February 2012, we knew that would be the deadline for our soft launch. And after some very long days and nights of fixing, changing and testing our system, we just about made it! After the band had played their first show of the tour in Moscow on February 2nd, it was an incredible feeling to be sitting 3,000km away in 45 Sound HQ in Dublin and see the fan videos from it going up on the site. 

Here's a fan favourite from that night, 'Set Guitars To Kill'

The next night And So I Watch You From Afar played Club Arktika in St. Petersburg. I think this fan video is a perfect example of why we think we're doing something pretty damn cool with 45 Sound. It's filmed from the middle of the crowd and captures the raw energy of ASIWYFA's live show, but with perfect and consistent audio that's great to listen to.

 

Kíla

On a calm but cold Dublin night just two day's before Christmas, Kíla played the first ever show under the amazing new roof canopy in Meeting House Square, Temple Bar. Kíla's music is a captivating blend of Irish traditonal and many other musical styles from around the world, and their loyal fans pay homage to them each year at their legendary Christmas shows. Watch, listen and enjoy!  

 

 

Le Galaxie

First Fortnight is an Irish arts-based mental health awareness festival which takes place in the first two weeks of every year. It's a great idea run by a voluntary committee of wonderful people and a festival 45 Sound hope to lend our support to when it comes around again in January 2013. To close their 2012 festival, First Fortnight put together a great night of live music on Saturday January 14th in the heart of Dublin. The Button Factory was filled to capacity and the final set of the night was from synth & guitar warlords Le Galaxie. This is the same band that played one of the best sets of the 2010 Electric Picnic festival despite being on-stage at 1.30pm, so unsurprisingly they made the most of their 1am slot this time... 

This first video was filmed from the front of the crowd with a Canon DSLR camera. The stage was quite dark and backlit, so parts of this one seem a bit more like an artistic piece than a live music video. I think the driving beat and synth melodies make it work really well though, a good example of how fans can use 45 Sound to make creative and unusual videos. 

 

And the final video of this highlights roundup is Le Galaxie playing 'You Feel The Fire', the same song as the second half of the first Le Galaxie video, except this time filmed from the stage by talented music photographer Kieran Frost. It compliments the first video nicely I think. Kieran is well-known in the Irish music scene for his great concert photos, so hopefully he'll be uploading a few more videos from on & around the stage to 45sound.com before long!

 

That's all we have for you right now, but with the great shows we have lined up I'll be back soon with another installment of highlights. Until then keep an eye out for more blog posts, we have many stories to tell you...

Cathal

CEO 45 Sound