Terry McBride's Blog

Sunday afternoon && great time snuggling with the kids. When I am home for the weekends, the kids come to Dad's for a sleepover. On Saturday, we did a bunch of chores, from the Lumber store to the Yoga studio to food shopping to the fishing dock. All along the way listening to the forthcoming Barenaked Ladies kids album, "Snack Time." My kids (Mira and Kai, soon to be 6 and 4) love this album, but so do I& Yes I know I am biased, but they have written an album that is full of great melodies, brilliant lyrics and produced to a level not heard too often from this sort of music. We look quite funny at the car wash all singing "Last night I heard the wolves, last night I heard the wolves, howling at the moon, what a wild tune, last night I heard the breeze, last night I heard the breeze, it was singing through the trees. There's music in the air and the air is everywhere". Songs like 7, 8, 9 (or better put 7 ate 9) are witty and fun with lines like. Without the number 9 the cats loose a life, Vampires cannot suck and Ronaldo is lost. The video for this will be amazing. The song that makes me warm and fuzzy is called Things and is all of 50 seconds long. It goes, "There are things that make me mad, you are not one of them. There are things that make me sad, you are not one of them. There are things that make me dad, you seem to be all of them".

On a different musical note, listening to mixes of a new Krishna Das Kirtan CD. What an inspiring and uplifting feeling one gets from such spiritual music. 2008 is shaping up to be the most amazing musical year for Nettwerk.

Time to go do some Yoga and meditate. I need an in-depth physical and mental stretch after being Dad all weekend.

t

Goals versus imagination and some thoughts on leadership

I am asked quite often what my goals are, either for Nettwerk or for YYoga. When I answer honestly and say: I have none, the surprise on peoples faces is obvious. For me at this time in my life, if I focus on goals, I wonder what else I may miss, as I am not as receptive to that what is happening around me. Does not having goals stop me from manifesting my thoughts? Not at all. For me, the key is my imagination. If I can see it within the world of my mind then, I know what it looks like and I work backwards from that point, not forward towards it. I guess that begs the question; how observant can you be walking backwards? Well for one thing, your senses are heightened, as there is a need to be more observant so that you see things before running into them&. Have I lost you yet? Going deeper down this tangent is the splitting of your conscious into multiples. The best example for me is when you are dreaming, and you are aware that you are dreaming, and thus you begin to change the dream in the conscious state. I see it as observing myself within all my interactions and having the ability to change consciously (without force of will) the outcomes of all these interactions. That, I would say, is "power", not "force". One should always lead from this perception. It allows inspiration and creatively to flourish, especially with like-minded people& now to a key point & To be able to do that you need to talk to people!! &. So stop being so e-mail, text based, these are simply tools to communicate and start observing interactions with all your senses and yes, walk backwards, even close your eyes!! LOL

Fresh off the Barenaked Ladies Ships and Dips III ... actually I am not fresh at all. I am exhausted, but what an absolutely amazing experience. Five days with an abundance of incredible music from countless artists. From BNL to Guster to Sarah Harmer to Great Big Sea, the list is endless. Imagine multi-artist jams, of every concoction you could ever imagine, ending every night with 26 musicians on stage (at 4am on most nights) and you get a snap shot of what can be simply described as a "Magical Musical Cruise". This year we stopped in the Cayman Islands, which was so beautiful, and for many a spiritual trip, especially when a stingray nuzzles right up to your chest as you rub its belly. It's then that you truly resonate with the fact we are one within this Universe. We also stopped in Jamaica, which for me personally was a dud, looked great on paper, but hmmmmmm&

A few of the highlights for me personally were

1) Seeing Griffin House play solo. His first performance saw about 20 curious folks, the second over 50 and the last show to a jammed house with a line up 30 minutes before the show with many people singing along. In the quiet songs you could hear a pin drop!

2) The meet the Managers session, where Caren, Adam, Fin and myself spent 90 minutes with 300+ fans. We started by laying out our perception of this cruise. As managers, we see this event for BNL as we used to see the Warner Brothers annual Record company convention. We view the fans as the artist's promotion, marketing and sales team. In essence, they are BNL's record label. The questions and feedback were engaging and educational for both sides, and the 90 minutes flew by in no time. As managers we gained some great insights that will re-shape many things moving forward. The fans they got an honest insight into what we think as well as how many of the different business and creative aspects work.

3) Doing Yoga every day on the boat and having people join me. I ended up leading classes, which was a change for me, as I was not used to talking while I moved through the various postures. Jimmy's class on the last day had over 120 people show up, so needless to say next year we are bringing a large selection of mats, an instructor, and a lay out of a proper program for the fans.

4) Well there are many, but I need to get some work done.... eeeeeek!

Cheers

t