“Attention all planets of the solar federation.

WE HAVE ASSUMED CONTROL.”

Tonight Palladia aired the premiere of the new Rush documentary – Beyond the Lighted Stage and it’s important for me to recognize this documentary as one of the best musical diaries I’ve seen lately.

There’s probably no other band as polarizing as this threesome from the North, but you can’t ignore their success. After watching the video and the lexicon of bands and musicians (UFO, Kiss, Pantera, Smashing Pumpkins, Foo Fighters, Black Label Society, Death Cab, Dream Theater, Primus, Jack Black and others), you gotta give this band the credit it deserves as they continue to build a soundscape that spans close to 40 years.

In the beginning, I didn’t get it either. Awakening in the eighties to rock and roll, the Canadian power trio were way above my head. The voice, the music and the cult following was hard to absorb. Their music, epic, visionary and constantly evolving is enough to revisit the work of Geddy, Alex and Neil.

In the new documentary, there are great performances that date back to their early days in Canada with late John Rutsey, interviews with bands, promoters, managers and fans along with video performances from Snakes and Arrows.

A master of percussion, a bass/vocal legend and one of the most under-rated guitarists in the history of rock, Rush still inspires and I wish there was a performance closer than Atlanta, but I sure hope to catch another tour.

There are plenty of other Rush fans who helped me along my way and they can probably share more than I – Terry McCoy, Bo Bradley, Steve Thompson and Tad Dickens – thanks for helping me see the light and hear the Spirit of the Radio.

By the way – one cool moment in the documentary is when they give props to Johnson City, TN!

The only left for me now is to open the doors to Limewire, cause I’ve gotta have a dose, but I plan on two books this year too. Neil’s Ghost Rider – Travels Along the Healing Road and Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead.

Here’s to Rush – the original geek rock band. Long live the mercurial force.

Last week, our team at Times Digital Group completed a documentary which celebrates the recent 2009 Harvard Innovation in Government Award presented to the City of Kingsport earlier in the year. This excellent presentation features interviews with city leaders and describes the ideas and passion that helped earn this recognition and we were glad to be a part of this year’s celebration.

Our guys with GoTriCities shot several videos of Slow Motion Trio at the 2009 Bristol Rhythm and Roots Reunion. These videos are using on camera mikes and do a fair job picking up the sound and we’re glad to have these snapshots of time. This performance was from Friday, September 18, 2009 at Borderline Billiards.

Heaven – A song Jared wrote about his daughter

Breathe – An original song we’ve worked with since 2008

Wash – A new original song we picked up in Spring of 2009

I Bent Down – A groovy old song from the Yukon days and one of my favorite originals from this period.

Lucky One – Another original from 2008 from Slow Motion Trio

All His Might – A new song from earlier in the year..

Virginia Creeper Trail by Iphone from David Cate on Vimeo.

This summer, one of my favorite adventures has been a regular visit to the Virginia Creeper Trail in Damascus, VA.

“The Creeper Trail” is a 34 mile bike trail that used to be a railroad path from the mountains of North Carolina to Abingdon. Back in the 1970′s they pulled up all of the railroad ties and laid down a fine gravel that makes for a perfect biking trail with uphill grades barely noticeable on the trail.

There are more than forty trestles that cross rushing mountains streams adorned with mountain laurels, open pastures and national forests. You can ridge from Abingdon, VA to Damascus and then onward to he top of White Top, North Carolina. The Appalachian Trail bisects the trail at this part of the journey and you can also pass through three states – Virginia, Tennessee and North Carolina.

The complete round trip is about sixty miles and so far, I’ve logged well over 100. I have a personal goal to travel the entire trek in one day before my birthday and recently bought a brand new Trek Navigator to take make the trip.

Recently, I took my Iphone with me on a part of the trail that leads from Damascus to Abingdon. It’s a bit shaky, but it’s probably one of the first ten-minute samples on the web using a cell phone. The video starts out in one of my favorite meadows and you can hear the crickets during the late afternoon and it crosses over trestles along the way and you may even spot cows and horses who seemed amused by my cycling through the forest.

Hope you enjoy. I’ll upload Part 2 shortly and wish me luck.

I’m very proud of some of the new commercials we have been producing with our creative staff at GoTriCities. Here are a couple of new projects we moved out of the studios last week.

The first one is a new commercial for IShopTheTri.com – a new regional Internet directory based out of Johnson City. The commercial focuses on the depth and variety of the listings in this useful Internet application and has a chic music bed to support the tech framework.

IShopTheTri Video Commercial from David Cate on Vimeo.

The second video supports a new mobile application we just launched for Town and Country Realty. Brad Smith did a great job as talent on the spot and Elaine Rinder was a pleasureable voiceover for both of these new videos.

Town and Country Mobile Video from David Cate on Vimeo.

Enjoy!

Speaking to an audience has gotten easier for me in the past several years. With 24 years of experience in sales, you get to the point where the butterflies subside, especially after you make a mountain of mistakes along the way.

There’s still a bit of anxiety though and these opportunities are always learning experiences because mastering the art of presentation is a key to business success and I had chance to speak a three gatherings recently.

We’re getting ready to launch the Kingsport Chamber of Commerce website this week. Prior to the launch, I spoke to their Board of Directors for a sneak preview at their offices in Kingsport on May 20th. A group of 50 or so people were in the room that day and I had 10 minutes to deliver the quick tour.

On Thursday, May 16th, I was invited to speak to the Tri-Cities Metro Advertising Federation in Johnson City on the subject of Social Media. Mary Ellen Miller was also speaking that day and we had a chance to present several new ideas to the area’s advertising and marketing professionals.

This was a small group, but it was a significant gathering of peers at the Bank of Tennessee Financial offices in Johnson City. This swanky conference room overlooks State of Franklin road and the board room there has some of the coolest presentation tech that I’ve seen lately.

With windows all around, I lowered the screens in the circular office and presented a 15 minute presentation before about 35 agency reps, banks, hospitals, public relations professionals and small businesses.

My presentation was a collection of social media tools from our newspaper network, a review of the tools reshaping the media landscape and review of some of the ideas our clients are implementing using Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and other tools.

My main theme was the fact that social media isn’t all that new, citing our human desire for interaction and authenticity in conversations, but the the tools have certainly changed and we reviewed those ideas together.

Some of the interesting points of conversations from the session included how to effectively separate personal and professional identities using social media and how to ensure productivity in the workplace with these tools proliferating our lives.

Mary Ellen Miller did a great job introducing a lively collection of social media public relations examples and has been very successful re-branding herself after experience in television news, magazines and leading a PR firm at a local tech company. Her discussions on Social Media will continue on WJHL over the next several weeks.

Special thanks to Sarah Clevinger with The Bank of Tennessee and Jessica Bland with The Corporate Image for organizing this event. It helped me to sharpen my Keynote skills and I enjoyed sharing the new ideas about Social Media.

I’ll continue that discussion with clients over the next several weeks including a presentation to the Kingsport Chamber of Commerce tomorrow – June 1.

My last presentation was caught on video and that gives me a chance to critique the work.

The Kingsport Chamber of Commerce sponsors a Fourth Friday Breakfast every month at MeadowView Resort and Convention Center and they had me on the agenda for their session on May 22nd.

This morning meeting is open to all Chamber members to discuss business and encourage networking opportunities (plus a free breakfast) and it was up to me to open up the new Chamber website and give another peek before an audience of 250 local business people.

We had a good session and although I felt like my presentation was 20 minutes, it turned out to be only 9 minutes and that’s good. Most resources say people have at most a 30 to 60 second attention span and considering the early meeting time it would be very easy to fall asleep.

I had a good time speaking to all of these groups and look forward to other opportunities in the future.

Here’s the video from the Chamber of Commerce presentation.

Kingsport Chamber of Commerce Web Presentation from David Cate on Vimeo.

Funnel Clouds Form on Interstate 1-81 from David Cate on Vimeo.

Friday night was kind of dull. It had been raining most of the week and I had settled into cleaning the house after the evening news – that was until the news alerts started to go across the screen.

There was a “tornado warning” out last night. That means a tornado had been spotted and the local news channel was flashing radar shots, talking high winds, hail and rightfully doing their job warning people about the fast approaching storm moving up from Greeneville.

There’s no way I could convince anyone that I have any skills as a storm-chaser, but I love a thunderstorm and the more lightening the better. Must be the wild way Nature pushes life to the limit and you might say I’m a thrill-seeker.

My father lives in Fall Branch and I called to make sure he was Ok. Our conversation was short because he was afraid lightning would run in on the telephone as the rains started to fail heavy outside his window.

The sky in Colonial Heights had an eerie golden color when I jumped into the Jeep with my Nikon camera and Flip video camera. The wind was picking up too and I could hear the thunder in the distance.

According to the radar images, my best bet to watch this storm was to drive south on I-81 toward Exit 50 near Fall Branch.

Sure enough, as soon as I got the Tri-Cities crossing exit, the rain had slowed the Interstate traffic to a crawl and my windshield wipers could barely keep up with the downpour.

Slowing down, I grabbed the small video camera and held it up to the sky as I paid attention to the road. I was surprised in just a few moments to catch what looked like a funnel cloud forming near the Fordtown/Harmony area.

It was hard to believe at first and the moment of panic gave way to thrill, but after watching the rotation of the clouds and the behavior of this fast moving wall cloud, it was clearly something news-worthy.

Throughout the night, pictures started showing up all across the web showing these strange funnel clouds and that’s just something we don’t witness too often here in East Tennessee.

Nevertheless, here’s my amateur attempt to capture this wild disturbance on Friday night, May 8th at 8.20pm around milemarker 54 on Interstate 81.

My friend Alan Sieg had some good advice after he learned of my first attempt. “1st rule of chasing tornados; stay behind them. Approach them from the West or the South. Don’t get in front and NEVER get under.

Thanks Alan. I’ll keep that in mind, but this was a thrilling Friday night drive and I’m glad noone was hurt.

I missed this a few months back when jazz siren Esperanza Spalding performed at the White House honoring Stevie Wonder. Her she performs a terrific version of “Overjoyed.”

Rick Wagner called earlier in the day and wrote this nice piece on Kingsport.tv that appeared in the Friday Kingsport Times-News. David Grace took a picture of Jared and Diane in front of the green screen and we really appreciate the spot in the paper. Thanks guys – great job!

Here’s the link to the complete article.

‘Video Anytime Anywhere’: GoTriCities launches Kingsport.tv
Published Friday, October 10, 2008

KINGSPORT — GoTriCities has launched a multimedia Web site that aims to revolutionize the way Tri-Cities residents view local video content.

The site, www.Kingsport.tv, is the region’s first Internet video resource that aggregates news, entertainment, cultural and business videos in one place, said GoTriCities Director David Cate.

It’s been online for about a month but had its official launch Thursday.

“We’ve been dabbling with video in working with the Times-News,” Cate said Thursday morning. “This is our effort to roll that video into one location.”

He called the operation a partnership including the newspaper and said he works with Managing Editor Ted Como and City Editor Stephanie McClellan on content, as well as Times-News video reporter Rain Smith. Matt Carroll and Luke Brogden also are helping with Kingsport.tv.

Cate said the motto “Video Anytime Anywhere” highlights the site’s convenient model where a viewer can access content online at their leisure, for free, without a subscription or appointment. The site works with most modern browsers and works better with broadband Internet service than slower dial-up service.

“One of the convenient things about Internet video is that you don’t have to make an appointment to watch it,” Cate said.

He highlighted the site’s nod to Internet users’ overwhelming need for flexibility and choice.

“You can do whatever you want. Out of town — no problem. Go on vacation, take a trip around the world — you’ve got Kingsport video with you wherever you go.”

The site grew from a partnership between producer and online media firm GoTriCities Network and the Kingsport Times-News, Holston Valley Medical Center, the Kingsport Area Chamber of Commerce, Move to Kingsport and Food City.

Kingsport.tv gives viewers access to several local video series, including:

• “Kingsport.tv Dailies,” the city’s only local news program. Diana Meredith and Jared Bentley host the show at noon daily, providing viewers with breaking news and information.

Cate said the show’s “quick cut” format and “green screen graphics” can keep even the most distracted online browser glued to the news. Wellmont Health System is the initial sponsor of “Dailies.”

• Times-News breaking news video content from video news reporter Rain Smith.

• “Downtown Update” videos featuring what’s new in Kingsport’s active downtown revitalization, with Jared Bentley.

• “ChamberZone,” the chamber of commerce’s local business rundown, with hosts Laura Steele and Bob Feagins.

• And “Food City Cooking School,” a weekly cooking and recipe program recorded every Monday at Food City’s Crown Point Center.

The site also includes a archival function with key word searches, and viewers can subscribe to a blog to get notice of content updates.

“That’s just kind of the beginning of where we’re going,” Cate said. “The landscape has completely shifted for all media with the continued growth of the Internet.”

He said television is no longer “the” medium for video.

“All the major networks are shifting their content to the Web,” Cate said.

Cate said plans are already in place for expanding Kingsport.tv programming to include many new ideas including the presentation of user-submitted videos from YouTube, MySpace, Google and other video sharing sites.

“It was important for us to integrate the social aspect of the Web into Kingsport.tv,” Cate said.

Other plans include adding a range of programming from history to outdoors, he said.

For more information contact Cate at dcate@gotricities.net or 392-1741.