1. John and Yoko on the end of an era. The Smith Tapes is an archive containing hundreds of long-lost interviews with the cultural figures that defined the end of the ’60s. The creators just announced that Collection 2 is now live on iTunes, featuring never-before-heard interviews with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda, Jim Morrison, Dick Gregory, and more.

    John and Yoko on the end of an era.

    The Smith Tapes is an archive containing hundreds of long-lost interviews with the cultural figures that defined the end of the ’60s.

    The creators just announced that Collection 2 is now live on iTunes, featuring never-before-heard interviews with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda, Jim Morrison, Dick Gregory, and more.

    View on Kickstarter
  2. People Get Ready. Music legend Lester Chambers fronted his own hit band, performed with artists ranging from Miles Davis to Jimi Hendrix, and found his music in more than 100 films, TV shows, and commericals — all while barely making a dime. After nearly 30 years, he finally saw his first royalty check in 1994, for just a few hundred bucks. He now lives on just $1,200 a month, despite half a century of musical achievement. Chambers is currently working with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian to produce a new album via Kickstarter and spread the word about the financial struggles of black artists in the music industry. Head over to Reddit right now for an AMA with Chambers himself.

    People Get Ready.

    Music legend Lester Chambers fronted his own hit band, performed with artists ranging from Miles Davis to Jimi Hendrix, and found his music in more than 100 films, TV shows, and commericals — all while barely making a dime.

    After nearly 30 years, he finally saw his first royalty check in 1994, for just a few hundred bucks. He now lives on just $1,200 a month, despite half a century of musical achievement.

    Chambers is currently working with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian to produce a new album via Kickstarter and spread the word about the financial struggles of black artists in the music industry. Head over to Reddit right now for an AMA with Chambers himself.

  3. Interview: Stephen Elliott’s movie-making addiction. Stephen Elliott is the author of seven books and founding editor of The Rumpus, an online journal of cultural commentary. He’s also the director of About Cherry, his first film, which debuted at this year’s Berlin Film Festival.  For Elliott, a veteran cinephile, making a movie proved to be addictive. However, his raw subject matter, unsentimental approach to sexuality and violence, and pitch-black sense of humor resonate far more strongly among his legion of devotees than within the traditional film business. So he built a Kickstarter project for his latest endeavor: An adaptation of his award-winning 2004 novel, Happy Baby. We met up with Elliott deep within the internet to discuss his new project, film addiction, Kickstarter collaborators, and the continuing positive influence of Dave Eggers. Kickstarter: Hi Stephen, how’s it going? Stephen: Good! I’d say great, but I don’t know what that looks like :) Kickstarter is stressful. Kickstarter: We keep discovering that it’s more or less a full-time job compressed into 30 days… Stephen: I’m feeling that. We’re doing it in 35 days because of Thanksgiving. Kickstarter: Gotta make time for the stuffing and the food coma. Stephen: :) Kickstarter: So you just made About Cherry this year. Ready for all the stress and aggravation again so soon? Or was that experience really positive? Stephen: Do you edit out smiley faces? Kickstarter: We will make them larger. Stephen: The experience of making About Cherry was really positive. But I learned some things about how I want to make movies, as I continue making them. We had good investors on that movie but there was a certain pressure to tell a traditional story. I felt obligated to make the investors back their money. And we did. All the investors made a bit of money on that movie. But I don’t want to have to think about that. I’ve never approached writing books like that, or starting the literary site The Rumpus. But the actual making of the movie, production, pre-production, editing, was just about the best time of my life. Making movies is addictive. Kickstarter: Is it more satisfying than your literary work? Or just different? Stephen: It’s very similar. Creatively, during production you’re always on, which is as much fun as a creative person can have. You’re creative all day long. Editing a movie is very much like writing a book. There’s no real time limit, you just go over it, tinkering endlessly. There was a little pressure on About Cherry to finish editing so we could apply to festivals. This time I’m going to edit the movie myself, with feedback from Kickstarter backers, and take as long as it takes. We won’t apply to festivals until the movie is done. Which is how I do my books. I never pitch books. I write them, then I try to publish them. Kickstarter: So far, so good! What are you hoping to get out of your Kickstarter backers? Other than their hard-earned scratch? Stephen: I honestly believe in investors as collaborators. Everybody that works on a movie is a collaborator, and the better you harness that creative energy the better the project is going to be. So we designed most of our rewards to draw the backers deeper into the project. The first thing they get is the script. Hollywood can be very secretive about scripts, but we’ll put it right out there. Then we’ll ask them to choose finalists for some of the parts using Let It Cast. My favorite thing is that they will be our test audience. Often, when you’re editing a movie, you screen the movie for a test audience. We’re going to host a screening of the movie online, before it’s finished, for our backers. There will be a chatroom, and each participant will be given a survey to fill out. It won’t be like they can just watch it anytime. They’ll have to log in at a certain time and they all watch it together. That’s about as much creative input as you could have. As the director, I’ll still have final cut. I’ve taught writing workshops and the thing about writing workshops is you don’t use all of the criticism. You develop a filter that enables you to shift through criticism and find the ideas that work best for the story you’re trying to tell. It’s completely unique to each individual. Criticism that works for me is different from what works for you, but we’re all responsible for maintaining our own filters. That’s why I look at criticism as such a positive thing and why I’m excited about the screenings. Not because I’ll take every piece of advice offered but because I know enough of it will be helpful and really good and open the movie up in ways I wouldn’t have imagined on my own. Kickstarter: Thinking about the directions the film might take, is it strange to re-engage with work you wrote almost a decade ago? What’s changed — for you and for Happy Baby? Stephen: It’s a whole new project. I actually didn’t think Happy Baby could be adapted. I’d tried a bunch of times and failed. Then in June I went for a drink with Dave Eggers and I was saying I wanted to do another movie and he suggested Happy Baby. He edited the book and it was originally published by his publishing house, McSweeney’s. I told him it couldn’t be done and he said, Just do this, then this, then that. In the morning I started following his advice, because he really is an amazing editor, though I didn’t believe him this time. Sure enough the movie just opened up. I had a first draft done in three days. It wasn’t very good but I knew it would be a movie. It ends up being a different story though. And when we cast it it will change and become a different story from the one it is now. And when we edit it, it will again become something entirely different. Kickstarter: Is there a dream Theo for the film? Stephen: Ha! There are a few different actors that could take the character entirely different directions. But I think if I named one I would be jinxing the project. There are some really well known actors already on board to act in the movie, but I haven’t received permission from all of them yet to mention them on the Kickstarter page. Which is actually a result of hurricane Sandy. They’re busy with more important things. Kickstarter: We’ll keep it between us! Wait, no we won’t… Stephen: :) James Urbaniak is in to play Mr. Gracie. So that’s one person we can name. Alex Karpovsky, from Girls, has a small role. Kickstarter: My turn: :) One last question — and many thanks for taking the time! Stephen: My pleasure. Kickstarter: A lot of your work carefully balances humor and darkness, but Happy Baby is even darker than most. Were you concerned about depicting horrors that your readers are left to imagine? Did the subject matter influence your decision to launch a Kickstarter project rather than seek traditional movie investors? Stephen: Interesting. It is true that I didn’t want to have to convince anybody that this was a project with mass appeal. Hopefully, this will be a movie that’s unlike any other movie. I didn’t want to promise anyone would make their money back. I wanted investors who were invested in making the best movie possible. As long as that’s our goal I think everything will work out.

    Interview: Stephen Elliott’s movie-making addiction.

    Stephen Elliott is the author of seven books and founding editor of The Rumpus, an online journal of cultural commentary. He’s also the director of About Cherry, his first film, which debuted at this year’s Berlin Film Festival. 

    For Elliott, a veteran cinephile, making a movie proved to be addictive. However, his raw subject matter, unsentimental approach to sexuality and violence, and pitch-black sense of humor resonate far more strongly among his legion of devotees than within the traditional film business. So he built a Kickstarter project for his latest endeavor: An adaptation of his award-winning 2004 novel, Happy Baby.

    We met up with Elliott deep within the internet to discuss his new project, film addiction, Kickstarter collaborators, and the continuing positive influence of Dave Eggers.

    Kickstarter: Hi Stephen, how’s it going?

    Stephen: Good! I’d say great, but I don’t know what that looks like :)

    Kickstarter is stressful.

    Kickstarter: We keep discovering that it’s more or less a full-time job compressed into 30 days…

    Stephen: I’m feeling that. We’re doing it in 35 days because of Thanksgiving.

    Kickstarter: Gotta make time for the stuffing and the food coma.

    Stephen: :)

    Kickstarter: So you just made About Cherry this year. Ready for all the stress and aggravation again so soon? Or was that experience really positive?

    Stephen: Do you edit out smiley faces?

    Kickstarter: We will make them larger.

    Stephen: The experience of making About Cherry was really positive. But I learned some things about how I want to make movies, as I continue making them.

    We had good investors on that movie but there was a certain pressure to tell a traditional story. I felt obligated to make the investors back their money. And we did. All the investors made a bit of money on that movie.

    But I don’t want to have to think about that. I’ve never approached writing books like that, or starting the literary site The Rumpus.

    But the actual making of the movie, production, pre-production, editing, was just about the best time of my life. Making movies is addictive.

    Kickstarter: Is it more satisfying than your literary work? Or just different?

    Stephen: It’s very similar. Creatively, during production you’re always on, which is as much fun as a creative person can have. You’re creative all day long. Editing a movie is very much like writing a book. There’s no real time limit, you just go over it, tinkering endlessly. There was a little pressure on About Cherry to finish editing so we could apply to festivals. This time I’m going to edit the movie myself, with feedback from Kickstarter backers, and take as long as it takes. We won’t apply to festivals until the movie is done.

    Which is how I do my books. I never pitch books. I write them, then I try to publish them.

    Kickstarter: So far, so good!

    What are you hoping to get out of your Kickstarter backers? Other than their hard-earned scratch?

    Stephen: I honestly believe in investors as collaborators. Everybody that works on a movie is a collaborator, and the better you harness that creative energy the better the project is going to be. So we designed most of our rewards to draw the backers deeper into the project. The first thing they get is the script. Hollywood can be very secretive about scripts, but we’ll put it right out there. Then we’ll ask them to choose finalists for some of the parts using Let It Cast.

    My favorite thing is that they will be our test audience.

    Often, when you’re editing a movie, you screen the movie for a test audience. We’re going to host a screening of the movie online, before it’s finished, for our backers. There will be a chatroom, and each participant will be given a survey to fill out.

    It won’t be like they can just watch it anytime. They’ll have to log in at a certain time and they all watch it together. That’s about as much creative input as you could have.

    As the director, I’ll still have final cut. I’ve taught writing workshops and the thing about writing workshops is you don’t use all of the criticism. You develop a filter that enables you to shift through criticism and find the ideas that work best for the story you’re trying to tell. It’s completely unique to each individual. Criticism that works for me is different from what works for you, but we’re all responsible for maintaining our own filters. That’s why I look at criticism as such a positive thing and why I’m excited about the screenings. Not because I’ll take every piece of advice offered but because I know enough of it will be helpful and really good and open the movie up in ways I wouldn’t have imagined on my own.

    Kickstarter: Thinking about the directions the film might take, is it strange to re-engage with work you wrote almost a decade ago? What’s changed — for you and for Happy Baby?

    Stephen: It’s a whole new project. I actually didn’t think Happy Baby could be adapted. I’d tried a bunch of times and failed. Then in June I went for a drink with Dave Eggers and I was saying I wanted to do another movie and he suggested Happy Baby. He edited the book and it was originally published by his publishing house, McSweeney’s. I told him it couldn’t be done and he said, Just do this, then this, then that. In the morning I started following his advice, because he really is an amazing editor, though I didn’t believe him this time. Sure enough the movie just opened up. I had a first draft done in three days. It wasn’t very good but I knew it would be a movie.

    It ends up being a different story though. And when we cast it it will change and become a different story from the one it is now.

    And when we edit it, it will again become something entirely different.

    Kickstarter: Is there a dream Theo for the film?

    Stephen: Ha! There are a few different actors that could take the character entirely different directions. But I think if I named one I would be jinxing the project.

    There are some really well known actors already on board to act in the movie, but I haven’t received permission from all of them yet to mention them on the Kickstarter page.

    Which is actually a result of hurricane Sandy. They’re busy with more important things.

    Kickstarter: We’ll keep it between us! Wait, no we won’t…

    Stephen: :)

    James Urbaniak is in to play Mr. Gracie. So that’s one person we can name. Alex Karpovsky, from Girls, has a small role.

    Kickstarter: My turn: :)

    One last question — and many thanks for taking the time!

    Stephen: My pleasure.

    Kickstarter: A lot of your work carefully balances humor and darkness, but Happy Baby is even darker than most. Were you concerned about depicting horrors that your readers are left to imagine? Did the subject matter influence your decision to launch a Kickstarter project rather than seek traditional movie investors?

    Stephen: Interesting. It is true that I didn’t want to have to convince anybody that this was a project with mass appeal. Hopefully, this will be a movie that’s unlike any other movie. I didn’t want to promise anyone would make their money back. I wanted investors who were invested in making the best movie possible. As long as that’s our goal I think everything will work out.

  4. Treasure on tape. Between 1969 and 1972, Village Voice columnist and radio personality Howard Smith recorded interviews with some of the era’s most iconic creative figures, at some of the most pivotal moments of their careers. He interviewed Mick Jagger just weeks before Altamont, Andy Warhol after he was shot, Dennis Hopper following the premiere of Easy Rider at Cannes Film Festival, and recorded Janis Joplin’s final interview. These original audio reels, numbering in the hundreds, have been stashed away in his apartment since they days they originally aired — until now. After months dedicated to sifting through and digitizing these audio files — a process described as “forensic… an enormous audio jigsaw puzzle” — they’ve been dated and pieced together chronologically for public consumption. The Smith Tapes box set will compile 18 of the collection’s most notable conversations, preserving the cultural legacy of a singular generation for decades to come. We’re archiving the whole project for 24 hours as our Project of the Day.

    Treasure on tape.

    Between 1969 and 1972, Village Voice columnist and radio personality Howard Smith recorded interviews with some of the era’s most iconic creative figures, at some of the most pivotal moments of their careers.

    He interviewed Mick Jagger just weeks before Altamont, Andy Warhol after he was shot, Dennis Hopper following the premiere of Easy Rider at Cannes Film Festival, and recorded Janis Joplin’s final interview. These original audio reels, numbering in the hundreds, have been stashed away in his apartment since they days they originally aired — until now.

    After months dedicated to sifting through and digitizing these audio files — a process described as “forensic… an enormous audio jigsaw puzzle” — they’ve been dated and pieced together chronologically for public consumption. The Smith Tapes box set will compile 18 of the collection’s most notable conversations, preserving the cultural legacy of a singular generation for decades to come.

    We’re archiving the whole project for 24 hours as our Project of the Day.

  5. Can cardboard boxes save your marriage? An interview with Christopher Abad
    1. Christopher Abad is a hacker, engineer and artist based in Portland, OR. He is currently using Kickstarter to fund 36 Dollars Magazine, an experiment in recycling his own wastepaper — and our Project of the Day. The following interview was conducted via online chat and has been edited for style, clarity and concision. Check out the project — kck.st/QTP2VG.
    2. Kickstarter: Hey Christopher! What's happening?
    3. Christopher: Not much really, just figuring out what to do today. The magazine thing is something I've been working on, off and on, since 2003, mainly just as a way to kill time and test out simple things. I just got tired of looking at all the Amazon.com boxes around the house. It just started to seem really ridiculous how much cardboard we go through ordering stuff, and then the boxes go through a long process of being broken down and made right back into more Amazon boxes.
    4. Kickstarter: This might be an odd question, but is the humor in your approach intentional? It seems like there's an undercurrent of satire in your sincerity.
    5. Christopher: Actually I try just to not come off as being angry… because I try to work on things I really care about, so it's really hard to not be emotional about it. I'm definitely sincere.
    6. Kickstarter: You mention in your current project that this might be a trial run for subsequent ideas. What happens next?
    7. Christopher: Well immediately, the next project exists because my wife always complains I'm too loud at night. First off, cardboard is already corrugated, so it's an array of channels. Have you ever seen inside a car muffler or a transmission line speaker? Well you can just think of it as a series of rooms, each with different filtering properties. So as the sound passes from room to room or chamber to chamber, engineers try to dampen different parts of the sound spectra to satisfy some acoustic properties they like — in the case of goofy things like MagnaFlow mufflers, its to make the low frequency sound loud and suppress the high.
    8. Kickstarter: OK gotcha.
    9. Christopher: Basically the idea is that you can then just take advantage of the corrugated channels in the cardboard, sandwich them together in a certain way, and cut out somewhat fractally decreasing slots in the sides.
    10. Kickstarter: Cutting out certain wavelengths...
    11. Christopher: And you should be able to come up with really inexpensive (free, basically) acoustic treatment. Which is currently a market dominated by a lot of snake oil. So my measurement for success is that my wife yells at me less for waking her up. If that happens, then I'll get that out there, and get more people thinking about cardboard uses instead of throwing it away just to buy it again.
    12. Kickstarter: Thanks for hanging in the Internet, Christopher!
    13. Christopher: Alright, well thanks a lot. I really appreciate the conversation. This is the kind of thing I wanted to accomplish, just knowing that I was able to convey a reasonably clear idea. That people have had a really positive response makes me feel like it's been well worth it so far.
    View on Kickstarter
  7. Lindsey Markel Says You Are Among Friends

    We have another success story for you today, this one about a woman named Lindsey Murkel. Lindsey’s project is called You Are Among Friends: The Book for the Little Sisters I Never Had and its goal is to produce a zine for young women with some great guest contributors, and a podcast, too. With 33 days to go, Lindsey has raised $658, when she only sought $350. Nearly 200%!

    I sent Lindsey the same questions we’ve sent our other successful project creators about her project and experience. Her response is below. (Pay close attention to her favorite band answer — it’s a good one!)

    Tell us about your project.

    I’m working on a book-length version of my adolescent-empowerment zine, You Are Among Friends, and will be publishing it this summer. I joined Kickstarter with the intention of gathering together enough money for preliminary copies, which will be sent to newspapers and magazines, as well as to publish copies to send to women’s shelters, Planned Parenthoods, and after-school programs nationwide. I gave myself two months to meet the goal, and then well surpassed it in about 24 hours, which is cause for a neverending dance party until I die.

    How many of your backers do you know personally?

    “Personally” is a little fuzzy when you’re an independent artist working primarily online! Who do I not know personally at this point? I’d say that about half of the names were familiar, and maybe 20% of my backers have been near and dear friends. For the most part, though, the project has been backed by total strangers who were either affected by the zine (or podcast), or who came across the Kickstarter page and were inspired to be generous.

    How are you going to be updating people as you go along?

    So far, I’ve been sitting with my mouth hanging open, filling an update box with silly little words that seem meaningless compared to how completely amazed and thankful I am. I’d love to make more videos, skywrite the numbers, whatever people want—it’s been an incredibly humbling experience so far.

    Have you learned/discovered anything from the experience?

    Learned that people are amazingly generous and that they are more than willing to share their money and their encouragement. Was reminded that the project I believe in—and that I sometimes falter in believing in, since it’s also something I make with my own two hands—is worthwhile and important. People have just been absolutely astounding.

    What was unanticipated about the experience?

    Ha, how much I’ve raised and how quickly people came from the woodwork to help! Also, how easy Kickstarter was to use. It’s so user-friendly, from both the project and the backer sides.

    What, if anything, would you change about your project?

    Nothing—I can’t wait to print the books in July!

    Who’s your favorite band and why?

    Right now, it’s Allison Weiss—because the girl seriously knows how to get it done. I’m away from home for three weeks right now, and while I’ve been gone I also followed her every move on a six-day tour with Lauren Zettler: daily video updates, a webcast of a house show, Twitter and Tumblr updates…her utilization of the resources available to her as far as connecting with her fans, both current and potential, is awe-inspiring. We should all—every DIY artist—be taking about a thousand pages from her manual. And she also surpassed her Kickstarter goal in less than a day!

    You can find more from Lindsey here:

    http://www.lalalindsey.com
    http://www.youareamongfriends.com

  8. Interview: darkpony and Drawing for Dollars

    Darkpony’s Drawing for Dollars was the very first Kickstarter project to be officially funded. (Currently, even when projects cross the 100% threshold, they aren’t officially launched until their time limit is reached.) He was looking for $20 from a total of three people to make some drawings like the one above. He ended up getting $35, with the reward being one of his sketches, which he shared using his project updates.

    We sent darkpony some questions on his project and experience. Here are his responses.

    Tell us about your project.

    I like drawing but I never seem to finish anything beyond a certain point.  So I thought if other people were somehow invested in the project it might convince me to finish it not just to my liking but to a greater public level of completion.  So that’s what I did. i said “hey if you guys pay me some money i will draw a picture.”

    How did you decide on your rewards?

    Well, I was a little uncertain about that. I was initially thought I would give away a couple of sketches if people contributed a certain amount. but in the end i decided i would give each contributor a digital print of the work. that seems like a decent deal. the reason i decided against sketches is i didnt have enough interesting sketches.  plus if i ever did this again, a digital copy seemed like a more scalable (per contributor) model.

    How many of your backers do you know personally?

    Just one. my buddy Joel who really put the project over the top. the other two I didn’t know. well i knew one by name. but the other was a complete stranger to me. which is a really nice feeling. hey some stranger thinks this is a good idea! wow! inspiring!

    How are you going to be updating people as you go along?

    I use the ”updates” to keep people posted on the progress. I have been taking cell phone shots of the work as i make progress.

    Have you learned/discovered anything from the experience?

    Working on this was alot of fun. i work a regular job where someone else tells me what to do and then they pay me money for doing thier stuff. then i draw pictures for myself and no one tells me what to do, but for this i dont get any money. my kickstarter project was a fun way for me to try out mixing the two where i am working for someone else who will eventually pay me money, but they will be paying me to do what i want to do. hahah suckers!  <— i’m kidding, i think everyone came away happy.

    What was unanticipated about the experience?

    LIke I mentioned above. the feeling that some complete stranger likes your idea. that can be a very big motivator. you know, with friends you can doubt thier level of interest ‘oh they are just being nice and throwing a couple of bucks my way to help me along.” but seeing someone you have no idea who they are sign on for your project really does something to make the whole endevour seem more ‘real’.

    What, if anything, would you change about your project?

    I would change the format. maybe make it cost more and get some nicer printing done? offer more smaller poster options. something like that. but luckily i did something very small and it is practically done and i can try again soon and tweak my model.

    Who’s your favorite band?

    I really like the heartless bastards i don’t know if they are my favorite band but i like the first two albums a whole whole lot and while i have a pretty varied selection of music on my ipod i very frequently would turn off shuffle and just play only heartless bastards while i worked on this project. they are very good music to draw to.