So there are plenty of people for some strange reason stalking this blog. COMMENT ALREADY! Start some conversation. The only people who seem to want to converse are spam bots that want to talk about cialis or other enhancement drugs. I spend a good chunk of time deleting these spam posts.. about 50ish a day, just a pain in my ass, so I added the captcha field to the comments. I know… everyone HATES captcha, but this one is very basic, but just in case, here’s a picture that tells you EXACTLY how to do it.

This was my first experience with an AIM Interview, I did this together with my boss, but he pretty much was my typist and everything came out of my request, though I’m sure based on the interview, no one would be surprised.

beehindkelyseyes: I KNOW, I’M NOMINATED FOR 2 GRAMMY’S

beehindkelyseyes: haha probably not, but i’m happy to be nominated so i’ll take that

beehindkelyseyes:

beehindkelyseyes: haha, yeah, hopefully people like the music …that’s always good

beehindkelyseyes: i’ve heard of him

beehindkelyseyes: yes, he’s cute

beehindkelyseyes: pretty much

BrendanInMusic:

beehindkelyseyes: way to go brendan! i love you more now

BrendanInMusic:

BrendanInMusic:

beehindkelyseyes: oh, lord. i have no idea what that’s about? but i’m glad it’s over, haha

beehindkelyseyes: no, i don’t believe in those. i figure that’s just setting myself up to fail, haha

beehindkelyseyes:

beehindkelyseyes: how did you know?! i am going into flamenco dancing, it’s awesome you should try it …okay, no i’m not. i’m working on the 3rd album right now while touring the rest of the world with “breakaway”, that keeps me pretty busy for now

beehindkelyseyes: right on, thank y’all so much! i’m gonna go to soundcheck and hopefully kick butt tonight for the show, later

beehindkelyseyes: haha, will do …we hang out all the time

When I was at AOL Music I did a series of “AIM Interviews” over AIM with some pretty awesome (and some kinda awesome) people. Popping up my interview with Elliott Yamin since Idol season has begun! Enjoy.BrendanInMusic Hey Elliott, what’s goin’ on? 
AsongForElliott: just chillin @ my crib 
BrendanInMusic nice, thanks for taking the time to chat with us today… 
BrendanInMusic where is your crib?? 
AsongForElliott: I’d tell u…but then I’d have to make u sleep w the fishies! 
BrendanInMusic hahaha, we don’t want that  
AsongForElliott: jk…in LA 
BrendanInMusic nice 
BrendanInMusic so you’ve been pretty busy latey, congrats on the release of your CD 
BrendanInMusic what types of things are you doing for the release?? 
AsongForElliott: uh…let’s see…well i was in the big apple on release day w my band…we did Regis and Kelly, TRL, a Virgin in-store in Times Sqr…and an FYE in-store in upstate NY 
AsongForElliott: and it’s pretty much been go, go, go ever since… 
AsongForElliott: just got back home after a month long radio promo tour, as my single ‘wait for you’ is starting to blow up 
BrendanInMusic that’s a whole lot of stuff! was anything particularly surreal about it? 
AsongForElliott: are you kidding?…this whole shebang is still surreal!…but i actually feel like I’ve finally found my niche!…this is where i belong, and i’m doing what god made me to do! 
AsongForElliott: the only surprising thing is i never realized how hard of a schedule i would have to juggle!…but i think I’m starting to finally get the hang of it 
BrendanInMusic awesome 
BrendanInMusic well people seem to be really liking the music too, which I’m sure is the best part 
AsongForElliott: hands down the best part! 
AsongForElliott: actually the most surreal/gratifying thing about this is to actually put all the work into writing and recording a song… 
AsongForElliott: then go out and perform it on stage….and people actually know the words and are singing along to what I created 
BrendanInMusic what is the best crowd you’ve had so far? 
AsongForElliott: well, post-Idol?…probably when i did my first solo gig @ the Virginia state fair back in October after the tour 
AsongForElliott: hometown crowds are the best! 
BrendanInMusic awesome 
BrendanInMusic so how long did it take you to put this album together? 
AsongForElliott: probably about 3-4 months…but that was only bc i was in and out of LA where i did the bulk of my recording… 
AsongForElliott: had a lots of different things on my plate @ the time, so it was hard to get a good solid 2 wks in a row in the studio 
BrendanInMusic i bet! 
BrendanInMusic Did you take into account anything you heard from ‘Idol’ when recording? 
AsongForElliott: oh definitely!…i learned how to eternalize a song, make it my own, and really perform the hell out of it! 
AsongForElliott: so i always carry that w/ me walking into the recording booth…u have 2 b a storyteller, and be able 2 evoke as much emotion out of the listener as possible 
BrendanInMusic what story do you think this album tells? 
AsongForElliott: well…we haven’t even sctratched the surface yet!…haha!…im trying to hone my skills everyday… 
AsongForElliott: i want to become a much better writer…get a lil deeper, u know?…but the album, is a lot like yours truly…it’s honest, genuine, loving, and fun! 
BrendanInMusic very cool 
BrendanInMusic you released a “teaser” song‘movin on’ which had a great response, what made you release ‘wait for you’ as your first official single? 
AsongForElliott: i think initially we weren’t necessarily going to rely on radio to help drive the record…but then when i went to NY to ‘wait for you’… 
AsongForElliott: i think we knew we had dope, radio friendly producers…delivering a smash hit!…i think it was sort of unanimous 
BrendanInMusic so who were all of the heavy hitters in the studio with you? 
AsongForElliott: lets see…DJ Lethal, Tony Reyes, Ollie and Erin Goldstein, Ely Rise, Derek Bramble, Mike Mangini, Marshall Altman, Taj Jackson, Stargate, Josh Freeze, my cousin Josh Abraham 
BrendanInMusic no Timbaland? lol 
AsongForElliott: haha!…i’m hoping…maybe next album??…we gotta hook up our VA connection 
BrendanInMusic definitely! 
BrendanInMusic so what are fans who don’t have the record yet in store for? 
AsongForElliott: i’d say a good butt whoopin once i find out which fans don’t have it yet…hahaha! 
BrendanInMusic uh oh, anyone reading this who doesn’t have it best run out now… 
AsongForElliott: jk…i’d just say a whole lotta soul…not too much over-singing or over-production…just honest, good music! 
BrendanInMusic Did you feel like you had something to prove with this album? 
AsongForElliott: well, i def have to prove my true artistry….and i love that feeling…there’s always potential to reach, and room for improvement…the fact is, i’m hungry for it! 
AsongForElliott: i totally understand that coming out the gate, there’s a certain stigma attatched to being a cast-off from american idol…i get it 
AsongForElliott: but w/o that experience, i wouldn’t have been prepared for everything i’m doing now…i feel blessed to have made it as far as i did on the show and gain the exposure…now, we’re just onto the next chapter 
BrendanInMusic very cool, do you watch the current season of idol right now? 
AsongForElliott: i don’t man!…i wish i had time to…i saw the 1st couple top 24 episodes…that’s about it 
BrendanInMusic do you miss it or are you kinda glad it’s behind you? 
AsongForElliott: i dont miss IT perse….what i really miss are the people!…i miss the comraderie we shared among the contestants…and i miss all the people behind the scenes there too 
AsongForElliott: i made friends w/ everybody from security, to our stage mgrs, coordinators, music directors and stage coach…just everybody…i miss those guys! 
BrendanInMusic that’s awesome  
BrendanInMusic i know we look forward to seeing much more of you in the future 
AsongForElliott: thanx man…i look forward to being real busy in the future! 
BrendanInMusic so what IS next for you? 
AsongForElliott: well let’s see…my tour tour kicks off in ATL @ The Loft on May 15th…i’ll be on tour for over a month doing clubs and small theatres…then i’m going on vacation for about a week… 
AsongForElliott: then we’ll probably hit the dust bowl circuit over the summer and plan for a bigger tour…check out all of my dates on myspace andetrainstation.com
BrendanInMusic well, good luck! 
BrendanInMusic thanks again for chatting with us 
AsongForElliott: thanx for your time…and good luck to u as well my friend! 
BrendanInMusic thanks have a good one!

That’s wicked awesome.

Posted via. Gizmodo

Ok, I’m a nerd, and I admit it…about SOME things. This week we have out font/typography week in our Visual Aesthetics class, so I had put together this image with my favorite fonts. Just sharing.

I am still flying high getting an A for my first Masters class! WOO! One week left until my Visual Aesthetics class starts so decided to play around with my class webspace landing page, felt anything was better than the “Click here to enter blog” text. Tell me what ya think!

http://thegrimaldi.quicm.net/

So, Miley Cyrus’ Twitter departure is pretty much the most talked about thing on the blogosphere and in entertainment news. This is news? Who cares. How has some tween’s Twitter become so important to anyone. How has Miley Cyrus become this phenom where this is even relevant to the universe?  Twitter is the IT thing, and social networking interactions by celebs tend to dominate news, it is really where we are going, but to spend so much time focusing on a 17 year old’s Tweets drives me insane! Stop the madness, how did we let this social media have so much power over everything!?!?!?!

Oh and thankfully she created a rap to explain her departure… PHEW… hopefully we can all understand…

I need to be in charge of more designs… I’m not a graphic designer but someone needs to help these people…Don’t women get papsmears not poopsmears? G-ROSS

Just sayin’…

At Kelly’s show last night in CT, which I am a complete idiot for letting it go way past my radar (what is happening to me)… she did a cover of Alanis’ “That I Would Be Good,” one of my favorite Alanis songs, and of course was awesome Kelly style.

I am not sure what’s going on with all these pop kids covering Alanis lately? Beyonce, the shocker of Britney and now my Kelly! I am liking this trend… Alanis… come on, you can be relevant! DO IT! Watch and love…

Anyone who knows me knows that my attention span isn’t quite the longest. I get bored with the way things look all the time. My house has gone through about 5 rebirths in a year an a half so I am not surprised that this is my 4th personal blog theme, and I just updated my school blog them, but I am going really cheesy and working with the seasons… expect a Christmas one up the day after Thanksgiving! Check out the school blog…

Whoever says that any press is good press obviously doesn’t pay much attention to the technology age. This picture has been floating around this past weekend of an ad/headline board at a college sports game. Instead of scrolling scores, shout outs or ads, a Windows crash message was displayed. I’m not saying that Windows is the worst system, but it pretty much is. Mac Lovers Unite!

Yup, you read right! I have begun grad school. I am enrolled in the Masters of Science in Interactive Communications at Quinnipiac University. Here’s where YOU come in. I have to keep a blog separate of this. VISIT IT…COMMENT…Make me look good!!! Thanks xo

The link: http://thegrimaldi.quicm.net/blog

This morning I had the dreaded dental cleaning. While I hate dentists (sorry… it’s not personal) and the whole process, I have a new dentist and his office is completely state of the art. The facility is geothermal and solar powered, the office looks like a page out of a home designers BEST OF book, and patients have the luxury of listening to satellite radio, watching movies, or using AppleTV to watch TV shows or even better surf on YouTube. On my first visit 3 months ago, I clearly opted for my favorite, AppleTV and immediately signed into my YouTube account so I could watch some of my favorite clips I had saved, most of them being videos from ‘Chelsea Lately.’

Upon my return today, I was instantly handed the AppleTV remote when I sat down. What I didn’t expect was that I was STILL SIGNED IN! For three months, anyone who watched YouTube was watching through my personal account! I am glad to say there was nothing embarrassing where I would feel the need to switch dentists and never show my face there again, but what I DID find interesting was clicking on the viewing history tab. While I saw all the videos I had watched over the last while, it was filled with 3 months of dental patients viewing records. Music videos from Michael Jackson to Miley Cyrus, Hunting, Skateboarding clips and many more random random videos I definitely did not watch. While I felt completely cyber-violated, I thought it was a very very interesting little spyglass into the online habits of people I don’t even know. There were videos I would never have known existed in MY recently viewed videos. This explains why the “Eating Pig Heads?!” video was populating my Recommended Videos section on a daily basis.

On top of this, though I am happy to spread the word of my favorite videos, playlists, and even my own productions from my YouTube Channel, I realized that I have no idea how many people decided to experience the videos that they saw viewed or created by me. This also made me realize that this is really what social media is all about. Granted this wasn’t QUITE the way I would like to share, and I made sure to clear my history so the Miley Cyrus fan did not taint my YouTube persona, this was a crazy way to explore how people are actually exploring social media sites like YouTube.

Last week an old college friend sent me a link to a Time Magazine Article she felt I would particularly be interested in. She was 100% correct. I am heavily interested in corporate branding, and I have a clear geek powered love of fonts.While I got my 2010 Ikea Catalog, I hadn’t even had a chance to open it up, but I ran quickly to grab it as soon as I finished the article. I felt I was crazy for being angered by Ikea’s decision to drop their visual voice, the font that they use on all of their promotional items, all of their ads, all of their catalogs, and I am sure many many places, to use the boring, overused and under-professional font Verdana.

I have always had a hate relationship with that font, I think it’s boring, oddly spaced, and just looks very blah. I was shocked that a company that is focused on the trendy look took a huge step back by doing this. Their PR spokeswoman claims that it is more cost effective to use this as it is adaptable to more languages, which really if you are a giant company like Ikea, you should be able to have your font converted to any language you would like. Many people have commented that this just sounds like the “cheap way out.”

I was surprised that this change even made it to an article in Time Magazine, as if I would be one of the few crazy people who this really bothered, but much to my surprise this lit up the online social world. Within days there were thousands of Tweets out against the change, and there is even a new petition online to stop Ikea from using Verdana which at the moment I type is just shy of 4,000 signatures! Even my go-to blog on corporate branding and design BrandNew, better late than never, finally had a post up where one commenter suggests “Why Not Comic Sans,” which in the design world is one of the most frowned upon element.

I realize this is pretty small in the spectrum of the world, and all other things I COULD be focusing my attention on, but I have to say… BAD MOVE Ikea…BAD.

Links:
Time Magazine Article
Online Petition Against Ikea’s Verdana Use
BrandNew’s Coverage

Yikes. In two seconds that treeslopous is about to have 3 tasty egg rolls!

This apparently was some old school Chelsea bits, but may be one of the funniest ones I have ever seen. I would kill to have Chelsea chaperon my dates!!!

In honor of last night’s concert, here’s a video (not from the concert itself) of Kris doing a cover of Matchbox 20′s “Bright Lights” which is one of my FAVORITE Matchbox 20 songs. Its a random choice but it’s pretty damn awesome.

1. ANYTHING Michael Jackson including his family unless Janet somehow makes an amazing comeback.
2. ANYTHING Michael Jackson’s Doctor
3. ANYTHING of the 1/2 Asian from Joke & Kate + their unnecessary amount of spawn
4. New Moon, Twilight, or anything else vampire
5. Samantha Ronson or anyone who has touched or seen her coslopus (sorry to her gyno.. just collateral damage)
6. ANYTHING Amy Winehouse
7. ANYTHING about the Kelis & NAS breakup
8. Comicon

Thank you. If there are any inappropriate topics I missed or things you feel should be discussed, please leave them in the comment section… I have a whopping 6 comments on my entire blog so obviously I expect about 1 in my dreams on this post.

In February, comScore numbers showed that AOL Music remained the top online destination for music lovers, while also hitting an all time high in Unique Visitors (20.7 million) and an all time high in Page Views with 452 million (also a #1 rank in the category). They also ranked #1 in visits (68 million). AOL Music’s success can be traced directly to Vice President/Editor in Chief, Bill Crandall, and his agile team of music and editorial professionals.

BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH

How may people make up the AOL music team? Perhaps breakdown the key members and

some of their more important functions?

BLAH BLAH BLAH,,,Brendan Grimaldi, a rare weapon in that he’s an industry professional who is passionate about pop music, handle our artist relations to ensure we get the contact to begin with.

I saw this first one when I was traveling and definitely made a fool of myself in the airport laughing my ass off, pretty damn loud. It wasn’t on TV for obvious reasons but it’s funny as hell, thank you Durex:

Yeah my brain may stay in the gutter, but this one will NEVER EVER EVER get old:

So before I had any idea who this commercial was for, and LONG before I even worked for the company, I saw this and thought it was one of THE most clever ads, definitely one of my top favorites of all time. Travelers “re-attaching” lucky rabbits feet to their original owner:

I love watching people suffer:

Somethings like this, NEVER gets old:

Swearing ALSO never gets old:

I don’t know if this was actually REAL, but I remember seeing it way back when and I thought it was comic genius: