Back in 2008, Polaris at Noon's Jason Suwito had an interesting thought on the current music industry model: completely destroy it."I read a blog by Mark Cuban (owner of the Dallas Mavericks) and he was talking about the idea of serializing music instead of releasing albums all at once."
The idea stuck with Suwito, who has been chosen as Stereofame.com's Artist of the Month for May 2010. He decided to begin writing, recording and releasing songs one week at a time over a two-month period, which he called a season. The experiment netted 11 tunes that range from high-energy, guitar-driven emo rock to slinky electronic jams.
"The season concept allowed me to release these songs that may not necessarily have fit on an album together."
No matter the genre, Suwito keeps the performances tightly produced, with polished vocals that recall the bubbling urgency of Jimmy Eat World. As mastermind of Polaris at Noon, Suwito is a musical auteur of sorts. In addition to his songwriting prowess, Suwito also plays all the instruments on the recordings. That type of control allows him be in full command of a song's potential for release under the season concept.
"It seemed like a better way to keep fans coming back for more and repeatedly visiting your site," Suwito said. "If you release all the songs in one album, these days they'll tend to forget about it in time."
With an assorted cast of live musicians, Suwito is now taking the concept of Polaris at Noon to the people. But the heart and soul of his idea remains about the songwriting, Suwito said, a point that is being nurtured by Polaris at Noon's management team, the Collective.
"They've been really great about pushing my songwriting outside of the traditional formats," Suwito said. "Whether it's co-writing or writing jingle ideas for commercials, that's another aspect to my career they're helping me with in conjunction with being a performer."
With the response Polaris at Noon has already garnered, Suwito's abilities as a songwriter can only be expected to grow with each season. For the growing legion of fans in his "new" music industry, season two can't come soon enough.
Labels: aom, contest, Polaris at Noon
