Top 20 Renaissance Festival CDs on CDBaby for 2006 Q1

Every now and then I compile a list of the most-popular CDs bought through our Renaissance Festival CD store on CDBaby. These are the Top 20 most-popular CDs from Renaissance Festival music groups from January through March of 2006.

Due to the nature of Marc Gunn being the show host and a member of the Brobdingnagian Bards, it is highly weighted towards his groups, but not entirely.

1. On the Drift by Bedlam Bards
   
2. Irish Drinking Songs For Cat Lovers by Marc Gunn & The Dubliners' Tabby Cats
3. Songs of Ireland by Brobdingnagian Bards
4. A Faire To Remember by Brobdingnagian Bards
5. A Celtic Renaissance Wedding by Brobdingnagian Bards
6. Brobdingnagian Fairy Tales by Brobdingnagian Bards
7. Memories of Middle Earth by Brobdingnagian Bards
8. The Circle by various artists
9. Digital Flashbacks by Celtic Stone
10. Songs of the Muse by Brobdingnagian Bards
11. Soul of a Harper by Marc Gunn
12. Christmas in Brobdingnag, Vol 1 by Brobdingnagian Bards
13. Here's to the Men by The Merry Wives of Windsor
14. Pawn to King Four by Queen's Gambit
15. Liver Let Die by Poxy Boggards
16. Hey! Nunnie! Nunnie! by Hey Nunnie Nunnie!
17. Court Is Now in Session by Seelie Court
18. Our Revels Now Begin by The Merry Wives of Windsor
19. The Lost Boys by The Lost Boys
20. Loud by The Wicked Tinkers

This list was compiled for the Renaissance Festival Podcast to highlight Renaissance Festival music groups and entertainment.

Since this list features seven CDs by the Brobdingnagian Bards, I decided to only feature the most-popular CD from each music group in an article on the Renaissance Festival Podcast entitled, Top 10 Renaissance Festival CDs on CDBaby for 2006. This article will be updated each Quarter.

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Bard Marc Gunn is an Irisn and Scottish folk singer with strange a affinity for Celtic ballads, drinking songs and cats. He hosts five podcasts including the Renaissance Festival Podcast and the Irish & Celtic Music Podcast. He also publishes several ezines including the Celtic MP3s Music Magazine and the Bards Crier Music Marketing and Promotion Tips Ezine. He is best know as the lead singer and autoharper for the Celtic MP3 supergroup, the Brobdingnagian Bards.

Top 14 Websites for Free Music Blog of March 2006

Every now and then it's nice to find out how people find me. March being the big St. Patrick's Day holiday for the Irish, I'd expect to find a lot of people searching for Celtic music. Lo and behold, that's a lot of it. And of course, there's the free music downloads... Yes, a LOT of people were looking for Irish free music downloads... and general free music downloads in March.

• Irish Song Lyrics & Folk Music Inspiration
• St Patrick's Day - Free Music Downloads
• Kazaa's Free Music Downloads
• Irish Pub Songs Recorded Live
• Celtic Irish Song Lyrics
• Archos Gmini 400 Review
• Avenue Q - Gut Busting Funny Music
• Free Classical Music Downloads Guaranteed!
• The Scotsman Song
• Star Wars MP3
• Firefly's Ballad of Jayne Parody
• How to Record a Music Podcast
• Top 5 Free Music Download Websites
• St. Patrick's Day Songs

I gotta say. Of those, Avenue Q, the Star Wars MP3, oh and How to Record a Music Podcast are my faves.

The Kings of Celtic Music

i was reading an article by the always inspirational Seth Godin about being King of your industry. For a long time, I've fought to be the King of Celtic Music. Online, I'm not doing a bad job. I own several top websites for Celtic music, led by the Celtic MP3s Music Magazine. All of my websites lead back to Marc Gunn and the Brobdingnagian Bards.

But I guess more appropriately, I've only dominated the Celtic MP3 genre. Ceolas and CelticMusic.com still top the search terms for 'Celtic music'. And while a search for things Celtic will eventually end up with one of my websites, my band is still a small player in the vast domain of Celtic music. Insignificant in the grand scheme of things. Which means, I need to do more. I can't casually act like a king to "bark orders, wear crowns, eat at banquets and behead their critics". Instead, I have to fight like a peasant to survive and thrive.

Then again, I'm not sure I'd ever WANT to act like a king. Most who dominate an industry are pretentious and often assume they are greater than they actually are. That can only lead to Revolution.

God save the Peasants!

Great Music on Myspace

I wanted to take a moment to recognize some of the great music and enterainment on Myspace. Each group is well worth exploring over and over. So check 'em out.

• Brobdingnagian Bards
  
• Onya
• Graywolf
• Ande Rasmussen
• Fiffin Market
  
• Gilli Moon
• The Irish Brothers
• Brother
• The Bloody Irish Boys
• Leperkhanz
• Marc Gunn
  

And if you missed my Bards Crier Music Marketing and Promotion Ezine, you missed out!

Problems with the Archos Gmini 400 and One-Year Later Review

I used to be the greatest advocate of the Archos Gmini 400. Now I am just disappointed in it.

In December 2004, I bought an Archos Gmini 400 from Amazon.com. With shipping and stuff, I paid a good $400+ for it. I bought it because it had a lot of great features: music, video, 20GB hard drive, picture management, and a full wav recording feature.

Please take a minute to note my RAVE Review of the Archos Gmini 400.

I also mentioned the powerful combination it served when you combined the Archos Gmini 400 with the Canon Powershot Camera.

I loved it.

But I got confess, it hasn't all been gravy. In fact, one month (January 2005) after I bought the machine, the hard drive crashed on me and I sent it to Archos to be fixed free of charge. But I was still glowing with love for this device when I got it back in March.

I am a musician. So one of the main reasons for picking this model was that I could record live shows with a machine that had no moveable parts. I wanted to record WAVs. Good quality recordings.

There is a problem with digital audio recording and the Archos Gmini 400. If you want to record using the internal mic, there is a revving sound that comes just about every minute when the hard drive runs.

To record using the line-in, you need an adaptor. I used the Archos Gmini 400 about a dozen times before the adaptor or the machine itself crapped out using the adaptor. So now the whole recording aspect is done.

The Archos Gmini 400 also has video problems. Namely, you have to convert the video to a specific format or else it won't work it all. Consequently, I've watched VERY FEW videos on it.

At the base level, the Archos Gmini 400 is an MP3 Player. And playing MP3s should be an easy task. However, MP3 Playing Problems seems to be how my player got screwed up in the first place. I was listening to MP3s fine one minute. Then the Gmini 400 shut down and asked to be reformatted.

So today, I finally called Archos tech support. They asked what was wrong. We tested a few things. Ultimately, they said, it needs to be mailed in to be fixed.

But here's the kicker. It will cost $120 to get fixed!

Well, at this point and time I've lost faith in the company. Yes, most everyone who buys an Archos immediately raves about it. But what about us who've only had it for a year and in that pathetically short period of time now have to pay $120 to get it fixed because the hard drive was a piece of crap!

Is there an alternative? If there is I don't know what it is. All I do know is that a one-year warranty is not long enough for the Archos Gmini 400, and if their other products are as faulty, then Archos isn't all it is cracked up to be.

Podsafe Celtic Music

In a few weeks, I plan to publish an episode of the Irish & Celtic Music Podcast where I will just play music from the Podsafe Music Network. It's not the best-designed website for finding podsafe music. That's why I decided to write this article. I want to point out some of the podsafe Celtic music groups on the Podsafe Music Network.

• Brobdingnagian Bards
• Marc Gunn
• James Connolly
• Mary's Bards
• Danny Fong Extraordinaire
• Leanne Bugat
• Murder the Stout
• The Bloody Irish Boys

Sadly, that's all I found. So... if there's someone I missed, let me know. Hopefully, the show will update their search engine to better reach more in the future. But that's all she wrote for now.

Slainte!
- Marc Gunn

Celtic Music Awards Winners of 2005

#10 Great Big Sea

"Captain Kidd"
Great Big Sea
from The Hard & Easy

#9 Blaggards

"Bog Songs"
Blaggards
from Standards

#8 Dervish

Dervish

#7 Dropkick Murphys

Dropkick Murphys

#6 Charm City Saints

"Never Go Home Again"
Charm City Saints
from Never Go Home Again (EP)

#5 Flogging Molly

"Factory Girls" with Lucinda Williams
Flogging Molly
from Within A Mile of Home

"The Orange and The Green"
Brobdingnagian Bards
from Brobdingnagian Fairy Tales

#4 Amadan

"Johnny Cope/Green Groves of Erin"
Amadan
from Hell-Bent 4 Victory

#3 Fardaxu

"El Pericote"
Fardaxu
from Revolucion Celta

"Gwydion's Song to Lleu"
Emerald Rose
from Archives of Ages to Come

#2 The Elders

"Moore St. Girls"
The Elders
from American Wake

Next time music from Niamh Parsons, Sarah Dinan, and Heather Dale in a special feature on Celtic women. Find out more about the podcast at http://www.celticmusicpodcast.com/

#1 The Bloody Irish Boys
"Drunk Tonight"
The Bloody Irish Boys, http://www.thebloodyirishboys.com/
from Drunk Rock

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Marc Gunn is an Irish and Scottish folk singer with a strange affinity for Celtic ballads, drinking songs and cats. He is the lead singer for the Brobdingnagian Bards. He is also Celtic music podcaster and promoters as well as publisher of Celtic MP3s Music Magazine.