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WE ARE THE FALLEN “TEAR THE WORLD DOWN”, THE NEW SINGLE FROM WE ARE THE FALLEN TO DEBUT OCTOBER 12th, 2010 WE ARE THE FALLEN Features “American Idol” Finalist Carly Smithson and Former Members of the Legendary [ ... ] + Full Story	ERIC CLAPTON TO RELEASE 19th SOLO ALBUM CLAPTON ERIC CLAPTON TO RELEASE 19th SOLO ALBUM CLAPTON ON SEPTEMBER 28, 2010 FROM REPRISE RECORDS Guitar icon and three time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Eric Clapton announced today that he will rele [ ... ] + Full Story
SEAL to Release New Album SEAL 6: COMMITMENT, on September 28 SEAL Re-Teams with Legendary Producer David Foster Internationally acclaimed vocalist and songwriter Seal will release his sixth studio album, Seal 6: Commitment, in the U.S. on September 28th on Repri [ ... ] + Full Story	EOTO, MiMOSA and MartyParty Unite for 11 Day Tour The west coast is about to experience its first bass driven earthquake as three of the nation's top live electro, dubstep and glitch and producers join together for their first combined tour. The 11-d [ ... ] + Full Story
Other Articles Jordan Okrend Forges Distinct Sound With NEW EP “NEW DAY” NORTH AMERICAN TOUR BEGINS AUG 6th

Welcome to CrankIt Magazine!

How To Build Your Own Coffin

Written by By Scott Nicholson

   Blood and nails, that's all you need.

   Larry ran his hand over the wood. Smooth as a baby's ass and a mother's tit. He'd planed the cherry himself, by hand, not with one of those machines. Sure, he'd caught a few splinters, but that was the blood part of this business.

   And what were a few calluses? Skin turned to dust just as surely as brain and bone did. And your heart probably crumbled faster than any of it. The meat didn't matter. What mattered was how you walked off the stage. That's what they remembered. And Larry McMasters was going to go out in style.

   He dipped his brush into the shellac and lifted it to the lamplight. The thick, golden material hung from the brush like honey. If he sealed the wood, it would keep underground for a few months longer, maybe even a year. Would that be honest, though? Wouldn't that be putting just another layer between him and his return to the dirt?

2010 AMERICANA MUSIC FESTIVAL ARTISTS ANNOUNCED

First 20 Artists Selected to Perform include
Hayes Carll, Exene Cervenka, Charlie Louvin and Raul Malo

Festival and Conference Set for September 8-11, 2010

Texas Troubadour Hayes Carll, punk legend Exene Cervenka, country music icon Charlie Louvin and the peerless Raul Malo are among the first artists selected to perform at the Americana Music Association's upcoming 2010 AMERICANA MUSIC FESTIVAL, slated for Wednesday, September 8 through Saturday, September 11. The event will feature nearly 100 different musical performances over four days at five of Nashville's live music venues.

Bop Skizzum

Bop Skizzum's New EP Push Now Available

Looking for a new album that inspires you to get up and get down? The 2010 Bop Skizzum release Push is now available on-line and ready for mass consumption. This short and sweet EP is pumping with ballsy rock adrenaline, singable hooks and danceable beats. It's a tasty cocktail of musical mojo that somehow manages to be both squeaky clean and grimy, laced with an addictive honey-pop sensibility that will cause it to linger in your rotation and make you crave more of what this delicious funk trio is dishing out.

Since it's founding more than ten years ago Bop Skizzum has always taken pleasure in concocting songs that enable you to blow off some steam by getting on the floor and burning it up. Screaming horn lines, block-rocking beats, and lyrics squarely stamped with Marvin Gaye's "Sexual Healing" seal of approval all point to one thing: Bop Skizzum's mission is to make you dance.

Comprised of Andy "ROK" Guerrero, Serafin Sanchez, Erin Jo Harris, and a rotating cast of the best musicians known to science, Bop Skizzum is all about making booty-shaking music in accordance with the founding fathers and mothers of funk. From the sweat-inducing grooves of James Brown and Sly and the Family Stone, the visionary jazz-soaked R&B of Stevie Wonder, the explosive pop of Prince and Michael Jackson, to the modern retro soul of Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings and Janelle Monáe. Bop Skizzum is following in these big footsteps to get your motor running any and every way it knows how.

4 Troops: Singing For The Soldiers

The members of 4 Troops first made a name for themselves while in the military, singing pop and country songs for soldiers overseas in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now that they're all out of the service, they're also singing for veterans, as well as recording an album. The proceeds will go to veterans' charity groups such as the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

They're about to begin a tour of military bases around the U.S., but first, they stopped by NPR's studios to talk to Weekend Edition Sunday guest host Jacki Lyden about their project.

Read the rest of the storyfrom NPR here.

Beat of a Different Drummer

Take a local legend, a misfit childhood, and a Civil War re-enactment, add water, and you get my new novel Drummer Boy.

The idea for the novel had been germinating for some time, originally called “The Jangling Hole” after a legend here in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Because the peaks were so rugged and remote, deserters from both sides of the Civil War often hid out in the caves. Since they had no dog in the fight, they often camped together, being careful not to have campfires or otherwise give away their position.

According to legend, you can still hear the jangle or clink of their tools and mess kits inside the caves, often with a spooky echo. Ghosts are more fun when kids are involved, so I created a group of three friends who investigate the legend. The boys are loosely based on my own childhood, at least as far as the alienation and the sense of being an outsider. One of the boys is grappling with the idea of being gay, which adds its own special torments. His one dream is to be a drummer boy in his father’s Civil War re-enactment troop, but the father is distant and suspicious.