Midwest Round Up!

• I noticed that the World of Wumme site has had a lot of updates recently, sort of looking back on 2007 and the rise of Columbus, Ohio's lo-fi shenanigans.
• Check out info on the 2008 MusicNOW festival in Cincinnati courtesy of Each Note Secure.
• Here's a column in the Cincinnati University's The News Record newspaper, all about how the city's music/arts scene is thriving and needs to be unified to give the city an identity. Read the article HERE. This is good news to see a university newspaper talking about the local music scene. Normally they totally ignore it, like at Ohio State University.
• Speaking of which, here's an article from the Athens Music Network about how the Ohio University newspaper just gave the proverbial eff you to local music. Read that article HERE.
• Check out my Brooklyn Vegan link to the right, because they gave some love to Chicago's Coltrane Motion (which is playing in NYC with Cool Kids).
• Greg Kot has a nice article about Pittsburgh's Girl Talk. Read that HERE.
• Pat Radio has a new podcast up, where he speaks with Wexner Center folks about the upcoming Times New Viking show. Check that out HERE.

Quick Midwest Alert!
• Actor Jeff Daniels (a Michigan native and also a part time musician) recently made some news in the Daily Texan for a new performance tour and his work promoting Midwestern arts on the stage. Read the article HERE.
Excerpt: "I moved back to Michigan. Kathleen and I, we had a kid and we were going to have more and we just wanted to raise the kids back home, not in Hollywood. I bought a building and just said I want to do new plays about the Midwest, Midwestern writers, Midwestern actors, directors, designers and see if I can't make Circle Rep here in Michigan. And I'm happy to say, 16 years later, that there's an audience for that. When you hold up a mirror to them, not what New York tells you is the theater you need to be doing but write about them and you hold up a mirror to them and they recognize those characters and stories and places you're talking about, they turn out in droves."