Who would have thought?
With the lockdown in early 2020, who would have thought that even 18 months later there is still almost no live music? We are taking a look back at 12 months of the "stay safe sessions" which we started off in July 2020. In the meantime we have released an incredible 24 episodes and it seems like there is no end in sight. For us it's some light at the end of the tunnel because we can still do our favourite thing: discover new music, promote great music, and financially support the musicians while there are not many opportunies left to generate income as an artist these days.
episode #001 - Leeroy Stagger
We started off with Canadian roots rocker, Leeroy Stagger, who has become a great friend over the course of the many years, after we organised his first ever gigs in Germany back in November 2007. The song "Carol" was actually the song that turned me into a big time fan.
episode #024 - Dropkick
The latest episode, #024, was provided by the phenomenal Scottish power-pop band, Dropkick. Beautiful vocal harmonies, jangling guitars, a terrific song - what's not to like?
A look at the numbers
We are taking a look at the numbers of plays of the videos and check the top three in the charts in descending order:
#3
This project has been a lot of fun. For the first time we did a YouTube premiere on our YouTube channel (have you subscribed yet?) and we had to find a fitting time for fans from all over the world. So we decided to premiere the video at 9pm Melbourne, Australian Eastern Standard Time, which is 10am GMT and 11am CET. During our premiere round about 120 fans from all over the world joined in. That was a whole lot of fun and an incredible experience. The band? Icecream Hands, Australian power pop giants. Their song is mighty uplifting galore and if you are up for some good jokes, check out the introduction - we think it's hilarious.
1.000 views on YouTube, 500 views on instagram TV - within six months that's excellent.
#2
Country gold from Norway: back in the days, we only saw Malin Pettersen a couple of times (Ramblin' Roots Revue in High Wycombe/UK, Americana UK Festival in London/UK, and doing an instore at Rough Trade West in London/UK). She is always playing her heart out, is a fantastic songwriter with an amazing voice, and we hope to have her over at the festival or in our static roots presents series in the not too distant future.
1.600 views on YouTube, another 500 on instagram TV. Congratulations!
#1
We have one clear winner when it comes to the number of views and she is an unbelievable talent. We are so glad we contracted her so early as her career is going through the roof. With round about 20.500 views on YouTube and another 800 views on instagram tv she's saying "Oh, Jeremiah" from the top of the charts: Sierra Ferrell - Jeremiah
5.000 EUR in support of the musicians
We've invited artists to contribute videos to our stay safe sessions. Of course, we did not want to get the videos for free. We have been paying a license fee of 200 EUR per video so we were able to help out with generating a little income for the contributing artists. After 24 episodes in the series, we have given a total of round about 5.000 EUR and got some excellent music in return, made new connections, and hope to see these acts playing our shores soon.
A short analysis of funny moments
"stay home sessions" | "stay home stay shafe shessions" - the name is pretty hilarious
Whenever there is a new video in the mail, we are totally excited to see the results and it's actually quite funny how hard it is to correctly pronounce "Static Roots Festival's stay safe sessions". Check out these examples:
Sierra Ferrell - reading from the paper but not caring anyway - we can see it, Sierra! 😉
Evangeline Gentle - That laughing is so funny! We wonder how many takes they had to finally record the intro correctly 😉
Elles Bailey - trying not to look at the paper but doing it anyway. We think it's pretty hilarious. At the same time it's accurate - you could be half German, Elles 😉
Danny Michel - he really doesn't care at all what the series is called - so funny! 😉