7 Years of Independent Music

Today is our 7th anniversary of the start of Live and Amplified. On this day in 2015, Jeffrey and I sat down with a musician by the name of Marie Manning. We recorded a handful of songs in a friend's garage in Roswell, NM. this would eventually lead to the start of the "Live and Amplified" Series. That would feature independent musicians by sharing their original music and story. Then as many things do, the format started to change, and we would shift to sharing stories and focusing on the podcast.

We wanted to celebrate by sharing seven podcasts that hold a special place in the history of Live and Amplified to clarify these aren't the 7 "best" or our favorites. These seven podcasts have a special place in the history of Live and Amplified.

Number 7:

Episode 12 - Lily Fangz

Lily Fangz came onto the podcast by chance at a music festival we got invited to by Santa Fe. This episode was important because this standalone episode opened up the opportunity for us to go to more music festivals. It opened up another avenue to work with independent musicians and build connections with festival promoters and PR agents.

Reminder, this was during the infancy of the podcast, and we didn't know what we had. Especially being 2 or 3 months into the podcast and getting invited to a music festival was a huge win. It also opened us up to artists outside of New Mexico and artists that were really doing this for a living.

This episode got us invited to a handful of music festivals until our work started speaking for itself.

Number 6:

Episode 484 - Mandy Prater

I chose this episode because this podcast helped make us a twitch affiliate that allows us to draw an incoming from our twitch streams.

Mandy had been on the podcast at the end of 2021, and at that point, we hadn't transitioned to twitch. Mandy came back on in early May, and this episode turned into our most live-streamed single episode. This episode became a more casual conversation about music and life than our usual podcast episodes.

This episode hold's a special place in the history of Live and Amplified because it was a pivotal turning point in the future of the podcast and Live and Amplified. Without this episode, we probably wouldn't be drawing an income with the podcast.

Number 5:

Episode 105 - Roger Earl

For those of you who don't know, Roger Earl is the drummer for Foghat. The behind songs like Slowride and I Just want to make love to you.

The Roger Earl episode was admittedly probably one that we didn't deserve. I think this was a moment of the right place at the right time during the early parts of the pandemic. This episode was a personal achievement because of a story I share with Roger on the podcast about my dad meeting him decades earlier.

This episode is a benchmark in the history of "Live and Amplified" not because of who the artist is. It's because of what he said to me a couple of times throughout our encounter. He reassured me that I was a natural interviewer and should keep doing it.

During a time of the podcast, where it was a life raft for Live and amplified, this episode became the catalyst for making the podcast the main focus.

Number 4:

Live from Memphis with Nia Nicholls

Nia holds the distinction of being our most frequent guest, all of our conversations have been great. This episode is special to us because we tried a new format. The format was a trial to something