It's a new week, which means it's time for a new installment of Bobble Tiki's South Sound music news and notes column. Without further ado, let's get rolling. ...

Bobble Tiki loves few things in life as much as inventing new words - especially words created out of two words that already exist, or turning nouns into adjectives. Bobble Tiki thinks it's hella fun, and he's pretty damn good at it. Few people realize this, but Bobble Tiki was the first island themed souvenir in the world to "journal," or use the term "fembot" (Bobble Tiki doesn't care what you say, The Bionic Woman television show!).

Naturally, then, you can imagine Bobble Tiki's excitement upon receiving a resent email from Daniel Blue and the boys in Motopony. The subject line: "Motopony crowdsources vinyl release."

Oh yeah. Talk about a double whammy.

First, some background on "crowdsourcing."

From the always reliable Wikipedia:

Crowdsourcing is a neologistic compound of "crowd" and "outsourcing" for the act of outsourcing tasks, traditionally performed by an employee or contractor to a large group of people or community (a crowd), through an open call.

For example, the public may be invited to develop a new technology, carry out a design task (also known as community-based design^[1] and distributed participatory design), refine or carry out the steps of an algorithm (see human-based computation), or help capture, systematize or analyze large amounts of data (see also citizen science).

The term has become popular with businesses, authors, and journalists as shorthand for the trend of leveraging the mass collaboration enabled by Web 2.0 technologies to achieve business goals. However, both the term and its underlying business models have attracted controversy and criticisms.

So how does this relate to Motopony's ambitions for a vinyl release?

Well, basically, it's not exactly as techno-crazy as it may sound. Through incentives and personalized interaction with their fan base, Motopony is raising money, through pledges, to pay for the vinyl release of a planned summer E.P.

Here's the official scoop:

Hello esteemed and dignified members of the free press:
 
For the release of their upcoming summer EP entitled "Wait For Me," Motopony has decided to take a unique route by partnering with KickStarter.com. Using KickStarter's crowdsource platform, Motopony is raising the additional funds required to release a limited edition vinyl version of their EP. To attract pledges, the band has created a six-tier reward system, ranging from digital downloads to personalized original songs. We need your help getting the word out to reach our pledge goal in the next 39 days.
 
For more information on the project and Motopony, head on over to KickStarter.
Also, the "Wait For Me" EP Artwork is here.
 
Love,
DB+MP

Now you know.

In music news that hits a bit closer to home (yeah, since DB moved, Bobble Tiki can say such things), Tacoma's Bandolier debuted a new singer last weekend at the Squeak and Squawk music festival fundraiser at The New Frontier. Her name is Kristin, and Bandolier's Lino Fernandez was kind enough to provide Bobble Tiki with a few specifics.

"We found her on craigslist. She's a junior at SPU," Fernandez says of his band's new singer. "She has an amazing voice and plays the ukulele. We just need to nail down permanent drummer and we're set."

Finally this week, and inspired (partially, at least) by the latest installment of drummer Geoff Reading's Wednesday Reading column, Bobble Tiki thought he'd pass on to the South Sound news about Reading's former bandmates from Top Heavy Crush. As the Weekly Volcano has mentioned in the past, Kevin and Andy Day, the brotherly force behind THC and Gift (nostalgia alert!), are working out the kinks on a new band, soon to debut in Tacoma.

In fact ...

Bobble Tiki recently learned that the Day Brothers new band, which hasn't officially announced a name yet, will open the Hell's Belles show at Hell's Kitchen on June 4. Even without having heard the new band's sound, Bobble Tiki feels comfortable recommending it for a number of reasons - not the least of which is the Kevin and Andy, musically speaking, rarely disappoint - and these guys have proven time and time again they know the power of a perfectly levied, crunchy guitar riff and emotionally plumbing songwriting.

Don't expect the reinvention of the wheel, but do expect something worth checking out.

See you next week.