BoyMeetsGirl Music Blog

December 21, 2007
Hello to all-
George and I want to take a moment here to express our sadness at the passing of one of our musical heroes, Dan Fogelberg. He touched us deeply in our early days of playing clubs as we worked out his intricate harmonies through repeated listenings to his songs, so that we could do them justice as we performed them. He wrote some of the most beautiful songs ever written, celestial melodies and harmonies, lyrics from the heartsource, and simple but elegant tracks to support his unique voice. As our friend Jim Wilson(http://www.jimwilson.net/) said, Dan left a vast footprint, one to be admired and rejoiced. We thank Dan Fogelberg for his gifted presence here, and in spirit send our love to Dan, and his wife Jean.
Go to his website or search iTunes to hear his music, especially To The Morning, Comes And Goes, There’s A Place In The World For Gambler, Illinois, Auld Lang Syne… and so many more.
We have been promising to update our BoyMeetsGirl Music website, but got a little behind on it. However, the barge is moving with a gentle downstream push, we’re working out the details with the designer, and are looking forward to presenting the new pages to you sometime in early 2008.
Wishing everyone of you Happy Holidays, however you recognize them, and a prosperous and love filled New Year!
Many thanks,
Shannon and George

(geo) We will remember the Summer of ‘07; our families have packed the days full, and the memories stream by, like the placid ripples of the Sacramento River. Hoping this finds you all enjoying your own mems.
Shannon and I have been busy as well- we have enlisted help to redo our website, and hope to have some new looks for you in the Fall. Many of you have made suggestions, thanks.
I’m starting mixes with Ian Hopkinson; we have 12 songs that we’re excited to share with you this Fall as well. More about Ian in the future!
More progress updates here soon-\- love, chocolate, and churros,
George and Shannon

Hello from a blue sky world (that would be California):
BoyMeetsGirl Music has finally entered the vast MySpace culture(about time!)
Please visit us there. The site’s in the building phase so it’s a bit pared down, but you can hear tracks from The Wonderground, view a couple of grainy videos, and poke around a little. Geo will compile a collage of our old videos for the site sometime soon, during the mixes for Ian Hopkinson’s new album. Word on that soon as well.
http://www.myspace.com/georgemerrillandshannonrubicam
We’ll be adding to our MySpace page and making changes over the next couple of months, and next time we get together to write we promise to take new photos for posting. Feel free to let us know if there’s something you’d like us to include for your amusement…we have boxes of old promo pics that we will scan for laughs someday. (Geo especially likes the 80’s cover art for a Japanese single called “Heartbreaker”- must find that!)
A number of people have asked us whether or not we are touring / planning to tour, and the answer is not at this time. We’re enjoying our writing and recording for now; thank you all for being interested enough to ask, we are able to do this only because of you.
May you thrive and be joyous!
Shannon and George
BoyMeetsGirl Music

Good news everyone…our CD The Wonderground is now available on iTunes!! You have to type BoyMeetsGirl Music in the search section(or Wonderground), and you’ll find it. I’ve requested that we also be listed under our old Boy Meets Girl as well, and hopefully they will be able to expedite that edition. It took one whole year for our music to be added, they’re a busy lot over at iTunes central, but we are EXCEPTIONALLY pleased with this progress!!
Many of you have written in to ask, and so far our albums on A&M and RCA/BMG are not on iTunes. We will get back in touch with those record company folks and reiterate our request in hopes that all our music will be available on download as soon as possible.
When we were promoting our Reel Life CD in 1988-89, we did a number of lipsync video shows across Europe. One of them has shown up on YouTube at this link:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Lc1LU-SB3sM&mode=related&search=
Many thanks to Elijah Putnam for the heads up!
George and I have recently been writing with Thom Bell, one of the originators of the Philly Sound, which some of you may recall from way back when. Thom wrote songs for the O’Jays, The Spinners, The Stylistics, a very classic songwriter. He moved to Seattle in the 70’s to start his own publishing comapny, which we were signed with as songwriters for a few years before we moved to Los Angeles. It’s been a real pleasure, and many laughs, working with Thom again and we hope to have more to say on that in the future.
Wishing you all well with multitudes of gratitudes!
Shannon and George

(george)
I have had the best year; I hope that all of you have found your nuggets of hope and joy as well. I am taking in this extraordinary time…nice reflections, and I can look into the eyes of 2007 excited, laughing at all the coincidences, and seeing an order midst the chaos…fun stuff!
Shannon and I are in the studio the first quarter of this year working on various things…we’ll give updates soon.
And let’s party for James Brown, he sure gave us his all.
Love to all of you who’ve written to us, it’s great to know we have such a cool bunch of folks who listen to our songs…you are diverse and lively, and Shannon and I are forever thankful!

(shannon) Hey hi everybody!! It’s been a while since either of us has clocked in with a new journal entry, but just to let you know we’re still breathing, and in fact life’s a flurry of one day tripping into the next- I’m saying a mighty and happy hello to all!
Good news! Even though we can’t be found anywhere on iTunes despite the kind efforts of RCA/BMG’s internet staff, you will find our three videos on YouTube. They’re slightly grainy, but you still get the effect, and I had to smile as I viewed them yesterday.
Go to www.youtube.com and search for Waiting For A Star To Fall, where you’ll see some additional treatments of the song, and Bring Down The Moon. For Oh Girl, go to page three after the search, as there are apparently quite a few Oh Girls in the world. Drench yourself in 80’s vibe for some good silly fun stuff.
Thank you to Raymond Burks for writing in with the heads up on that. Last thing we heard from RCA/BMG was that any day the vids will be available at iTunes… we’ll make an official announcement as it happens, as they say.
Wishing you well, and I’ll be writing another entry here next week, answering some song questions from fans. I figure if one of you is asking, the thoughts have probably crossed a few other minds as well. Connection.
With love,
Shannon

George and I are sad to announce that a page has turned as we say goodbye to Arif Mardin, producer of our hit single “Waiting For A Star To Fall”, who died of cancer on Sunday. He had an unparalleled music career, during which he worked with scores of classic artists, producing a myriad of timeless songs we all grew up singing along to.
He was one of the most generous, humorous and kind people I have ever met, a person of rare integrity and musical talent. I will remember his smile and the twinkle in his eyes, and am forever grateful we had the honor of knowing him. Please keep his family in your thoughts.
Shannon and George
Please, take a moment and get to know Arif:
National Public Radio (nice picture):
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5061890
New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/27/arts/music/27mardin.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
Audio Engineering Society:
http://www.aes.org/events/115/specialevents/arif_mardin_bio.cfm
All Music Guide:
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:y2jn7i28g71r~T1
Berklee School Of Music:
http://www.berklee.edu/news/2001/02/arif.html
Web (a nice pictures as well):
http://www.lightmillennium.org/summer_fall_01/mdede_arifmardin.html

Hi there…
…more interviews for you to peruse! Carl Wiser from Songfacts.com called and asked for details on BoyMeetsGirl history, little info-nuggets on a few of our songs: the Whitney Houston tunes plus Bring Down The Moon and Waiting For A Star To Fall for starters.
Go check out their site; there are oodles of links to ringtones, lyrics, sheetmusic, and a myriad of other interesting bits on songs of every kind. Thanks Carl, nice one!

Hey Hey Hi!
We are pleased to announce the availability of a podcast interview with BoyMeetsGirl, hosted by JADonnelly and Musicologist Shadoe Steele for their internet radio program at 98.5KRZ/107.9KRF. To find out more about James+Shadoe, check out the awesome website at http://www.985krz.com.
To hear the BoyMeetsGirl podcast interview go to MadPod at http://www.madpod.com. There you’ll find a promo, and farther down the page, the interview-it’s #149. We missed the actual broadcast which included our music interspersed, so you’ll be hearing us blab without the musical breaks. I suppose you could be PLAYING our music in the background…!
Shadoe has done interviews with many music celebrities of every magnitude, all of which can be accessed in the archive search at the podcast site. He is an energetic and gracious interviewer, and once George and I got over our initial nervousness we had a very fun time talking with him. I do think I sounded like I just stepped out of munchkin land or inhaled a little helium (I didn’t). George thought the same thing about himself… gonna have to work on our radio voices!! Look for news of more interviews in the future.
A macabre side note, shhhh: Shadoe happened to mention that a number of artists died shortly after he interviewed them… no kidding! Here’s a sample list of those he encountered on their way to rock ‘n roll heaven:
Eddie Rabbitt interview~ the day he died
Robert Palmer~the day before he died
Sheb Wooley (Purple People eater, remember that song?!!) ~a week before he died
Wavy Gravy, the elusive announcer of Woodstock ~shortly before his death
Wilson Pickett ~same thing
hmmmm… as Shadoe says, timing is everything-spooky!
So yikes, you take your LIFE in your hands talking with this guy, and not to be too cavalier but we’re pleased to say it’s been a solid three months since our chat and we are both alive and well!!
So, no worries.
On another note, we’ve received many beautiful emails from you and are ever grateful to be on your radar.
With love,
Shannon and George

(geo) This is a followup to the DIY Festival mention a month ago…
Email from Ian Hopkinson recently:
Now this is a story you have to hear. They have awarded me/us album of the year for an album I don’t even have. Very funny! I submitted 6 songs online as part of an Electronic Press Kit and I think they jumped to conclusions anyway…read the press release below!
LOS ANGELES (February 6, 2006)
The 2006 DIY Music Festival has named Hopkinson as its DIY Album of the Year for his “Strangers To Ourselves.”
The album, co-written and produced with George Merrill, is the fifth recording released by the Austalian ex-pat, who now lives in Los Angeles. His dreamy, sophisticated sound was tabbed by the judges as a compelling blend of influences that’s uniquely Hopkinson.
Also honored are Fire Bug, whose roiling mix of rock won them DIY Songwriters of the Year laurels; and Spookey Ruben, whose bubbly “The Office” is the DIY Song of the Year.
The DIY Music Festival is part of the fifth annual DIY Convention: Do It Yourself in Film, Music & Books, which takes place Feb. 7-12 in Los Angeles. The convention celebrates independent film, music and books with seven nights of music performances, two nights of film screenings and two days of panels and workshops. More information on the DIY Convention is online at www.DIYConvention.com.
The DIY Music Festival and DIY Convention are sponsored by Spaceland Productions, BMI, Sonicbids, ASCAP, SESAC, CDBaby, Echospin, Music Connection, Discmakers, Imagic, Alcasid.com and The DIYReporter.com.