"Rockin' the Day Away" Nationally Released May 10, 2005

Color me floored! This is a tale of miracles and hope for all independent artists out there.

In 1998 I began writing children's music, because my first granddaughter liked me to sing her to sleep. After a while, I started writing them down, because I thought they had some merit, and my kids might like to have the music someday.

I had collaborated with two other people on a musical, and while they were in other states, a tape of one of the songs needed to be recorded for a person in the industry who indicated his interest.

That's when I found 25th Track Recording Studio and Walt Bowers - great guy and wonderful engineer and keyboardist. We recorded the song from the musical, and afterwards my husband asked Walt if he could buy 30 hours of studio time.

I thought Ed had lost his mind. I couldn't figure out what the 30 hours were for. It turned out, he wanted to record the baby songs I'd written.

In the interim, I had worked on four songs with my collaborators, and I asked them if they wanted in or not. They did.

Walt came over and heard all 10 songs, and said, "You don't have a demo; you have a CD."

And that's how it started. I already had a company, but ASCAP said I had to have another name for the label, and we were already at crunch time, so that's why the label is Pamela Kay Hawkins Publishing - not because I'm really vain.

I ran into a jeweler friend of mine who knew an artist, who was just getting started, and Kristen did the illustrations for the cover, and I came up with the idea of a coloring book with lyrics inside, so she did the line drawings for the children to color. Another friend of mine owned a performing arts school and complained of never having anything for her children to use for auditions, and that gave me the idea for the instrumental track for kids to use for auditions. (I've since been told that English as a Second Language - ESL - Teachers find it helpful for teaching purposes.)

Then I thought I had a deal with Barnes and Noble, and Ed informed me that the first run of 1,000 had been sold to a convenience store chain. (It turned out that neither deal was what I thought it was.) The female singer on the album, Meredith Easley, and I appeared on Tulsa's TV show "Six in the Morning." Barnes and Noble's store on 71st Street in Tulsa had a "CD Release Party" at which about 100 people showed up to hear Meredith, John Weller (you've probably seen John on "Boston Public"), and Tommy Crook - the only guitarist Chet Atkins bowed to -whose name is unfortunately misspelled on sites and the album credits - perform. We were on our way!

So I thought....

It turned out that Barnes and Noble meant I had a deal with one of their stores - not all of their stores. The deal Ed made turned out to be a PR disaster, through no fault of his. The convenience store chain has since filed for bankruptcy :-). But after trying to buy the album at all these mirage venues, people just gave up. Who could blame them?

Oh, and I had another run done, because I didn't want to let B & N down.

But then Peter Chipman of CapCan.com in Canada and Derek Silver of CDBaby.com came to my rescue, but of course there was no interest, because no one knew the album existed. Then CDBaby.com sold out and needed more stock, but had emailed the wrong person. So for six months they had no stock. I found out because I was going to cancel my account. Imagine my surprise, and theirs!

The great buying group Alliant had been excited about my album when it came out and was going to red-line it for the stores they represented, but then they went bankrupt. So...nothing. I was one person trying to sell one independent album to the world one store at a time. Very hard.

But you don't want to hear about the six years from then to now, do you? I didn't think so....

Cut to chase:

Last Thursday, that would be Oct. 6, 2005, I walked into Barnes & Noble to pick up a book I'd ordered and a DVD in the music department. The head of the music department, Chris, had been keeping my album alive for all these years. He had told his new head of "local artists" about the album and I'd met Seth, also a budding musician along with Chris, and he hadn't heard one of the songs from my CD. So we went to find the demo CD so he could listen. Nowhere. He was puzzled, because there was always a copy of my CD on top of the children's section for display purposes. There were no CDs. So he checked the backstock. Nada. Neither of us could believe we'd sold out, so I asked if the computer said anything.

Seth said: "You're a local artist. Local artists aren't in the computer." He went back to the search.

Finally he gave up and checked the computer: I was there! The album was there! I'd been red-lined!
He ran over to the kiosk where you can listen to the music? It was there! He liked it -really liked it! And then he said, "Look at this!" We looked: A note on the album said "Released May 10, 2005!"

I was so excited! I told some friends on www.Soflow.com, and in seconds the album, which was online on B & N was sold out and the picture went with it.

I called my distributor, Hapi Skratch Entertainment's Morris Beegle, and he said I'd been red-lined since May. (No one had said a word to me.) And that my album was now in Border's, Best Buy, Circuit City, Sam Goodys, and Amazon.com, besides Barnes & Noble. Shock is not the work for the state I was in.

After six years, as one salewoman at B&N said, "You're legit!"

I Googled "Pamela Kay Hawkins Rockin' the Day Away" and found not only the sites above, but a German site http://www.totalrecal/de/items/338.htm; another Megastore in Germany, England and Sweden who is carrying the album: english.megastore.se/template/next,Index.vm?@atid=10&page=9 (listed under Children/Tales). The megastore link with all the info just covers the German location.

I share this with you, not only to promote the CD which I still believe in, but to say to all of the independent producers and artists out there: "Don't give up! Miracles still happen!"

I also wanted to thank all of the people who believed in me and this album and have made this possible, Richard Bridge of Rainy Day Records, Chris Karasek of Barnes & Noble on 71st, Full Circle Bookstore in Oklahoma City, the other Barnes & Noble stores who took a chance and bought my albums, Peter Chipman of CapCan Distributors in Canada, Derek Sivers of CDBaby.com, Morris Beegle who gave me national distribution, and David Define of Alliance Entertainment, who got me red-lined! To all the companies who've since bought the album, like Best Buy, Borders, Circuit City, Sam Goody's, EBay and Amazon.com - THANK YOU ALL!

Pamela Kay Hawkins

P.S. I'm going to use the money and connections I hope to make (so far it's been a losing proposition) to help others who need a leg up, and to help get a workshopping gig for a musical that's been waiting a year longer than the CD.

PPS If they're out of stock, they can order more. I understand that orders can be filled within a week to 10 days at the outside. So please order from these wonderful people who've taken a chance on an unknown and made a dream possible. - Thank you to all my future customers!

And if you have comments, I'd love to hear from you!View this photo

Comments

[tredinertok]

Hi all!

Very interesting information! Thanks!


G'night

[panasianbiz]

I stumbled across your blog while I was doing some online research.
As a writer who knows the struggle that accompanies trying to get published, I was able to relate to all the highs and lows you went through. I'm so glad you had a "happy ending"!