I work as a composer in the film, tv and commercial world. On any given day I may be writing jingles about diapers, snack cakes and or toothbrushes. The rotating cast of characters at Jingle Punks studios is a constant source of amusement for me. Sometimes funny shit happens...this is my outlet to share these experiences with my friends, clients or anyone interested in what really goes on at a "fancy" NYC studio on a daily basis.
In the 3 days the Jingle Player has been active I have received quite a few requests for an online how to video. I figured making a series of these would be easier than taking every frantic phone call coming in about how to get rolling.
People who know me may ask "why are these so serious?". Well, you see, this one is purely informational and once I hit my stride I assure you the tone of my web pieces for Jingle Punks related products will return to its jovial state.
Without any more apologizing and excuses...here is tutorial #1...I call this gem "Getting Started"
After 8 years of composing music for TV, film and commercial projects I have finally found time to do what I said I would from the beginning...Organize the tracks in a web based searchable player.
Today, is a happy day for me. With the help of my programming team (cudos to Dan Demole and Jim Martinez for being so goddamn smart!) we are un-officially launching the Jingle Player (official release date is Oct 30th and we are having a big party at CAKE SHOP on the LES to celebrate...you are all invited...more on that soon)
Anyways, version 1.0 of the Jingle Player .. Here it is...
Try it out and let me know if this is an effective, helpful and cool tool for your production needs. This is version 1.0 and version 2.0 is going to be coming out very soon. We feature almost 10,000 cues that can be purchased as needle drops or licensed as a fully cleared library.
OK...now for some cool news. Anyone out there who watches Food Network should tune in this weekend to catch the premiere of the Chef Jeff project which is our largest Jingle project to date. This show is sure to be a hit and we were thankful to be part of this creative process. Anyone who knows the backstory on Chef Jeff is sure to be inspired. He's Oprah approved and really is a great person who I think will become a huge star. (thank you Adam Z and Mike M for bringing Jingle Punks onto this amazing show!)
BTW. this would not have been possible for me without the help of my amazing production coordinator Ricky Sanchez whom I highly recommend to anyone who will listen. He diligently entered thousands of song titles into a database and entered in reams of information that it would have taken a full team to do.
My new friends at RGA digital hired me to make some sports cues for a cool NIKE project.
In this NIKE campaign it teaches wanabee football players (such as yourself???) some super duper skills.
Below is a link to the first 4 videos (feat. James Harrison, Hines Ward, Lofa Tatupu, and Marcus Trufant). Enjoy...learn all these skills and you may or may not end up in NFL?!
I tried some of these moves in my office today and broke all my stuff by accident...oops
So, I also do VO's. Wait that sounds really cheesey doesn't it? Well, it's true. See below. I just finished my second season of a Food Network show called "Heavyweights". Like many of the opportunities I've had recently, this was yet another happy accident.
Last summer, I was editing the show Heavyweights for Al Roker Entertainment. When we delivered a rough copy to the network, my voice was the scratch audio track. Al and the network thought it worked and that was that. During my brief stint on that show as editor I also somehow convinced them to let me compose the theme song as well. Check it out...the cool thing about working on this show is that now I am a pseudo-expert on the topics of:
-Coffee
-Snack Cakes
-Cereals
-Soft Drinks
-Pizza
-Chips
Which technically makes me smarter than the current president of the US. So hooray for me!
OK. If anyone caught the premiere of The Hills last night they were probably asking themselves many, many questions. "Why is Heidi so smart?" "Why is her boyfriend so handsome?" And possibly..."Why is there a ton of Jingle Punks tracks being played non-stop during the live component of the premiere?" OK, you may not have asked yourself any of these questions...but facts are facts and we can thank MTV (specifically Amanda and Kyle at MTV) for choosing some juicy jams to include in last nights festivities.
Here are some links to the madness..I'm only putting up a few because there are like 30 scenes that used cuts from the library (including tracks from my old bands Group Sounds and Generals & Majors).
Jared Gutstadt (a.k.a. "Jingle Punks") began his career as a composer creating original music for the branding and launch of FUSE Network, and in a very short time his client list has grown to include Comedy Central, Vh1, CBS, MTV, NBC, Sundance Channel, Discovery Channel, TLC ,and Moxie Pictures. Jared has played in 2 very popular "indie rock" bands in NYC that have taken him across the world . The Izzys and Group Sounds earned Jared substantial street credibility and industry-wide attention, further inspiring him to pursue opportunities as a composer.
In the commercial realm Jingle Punks has worked with clients as diverse as Huggies, Lipton and Geico.
At any given moment one of Jingle Punks humorous and catchy theme songs are being transmitted across the 1000 channel universe and getting lodged in peoples brains. His ever growing client list includes a who's who of the TV, film and commercial industry.
