Award Winning Short Film Brides of Jesus Releases “Inside Me” Video Single Tomorrow

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January 21, 2021 – Los Angeles, CA – Brides of Jesus, the eponymous band in the Blacklist celebrated feature script Brides of Jesus, and the award-winning short film, “Brides of Jesus – Inside Me,” are releasing their second video single, “Inside Me” on YouTube tomorrow here. The song was sung in the video and short by musician/actresses Kathryn Jurbala and Natalie Von Kirk who lead the titular band in the short. Drums on the track were laid down by actor/drummer Stephen Martin, the short’s band’s drummer. The rest of the track was recorded by the film’s writer/director/producer Joe Bartone who also wrote all the music and lyrics in the short.

While the short is only a small look into the world of Brides of Jesus, it’s been a fantastic proof of concept for the feature film. The short has won 18 awards at festivals including the Independent Shorts Awards, the New York Movie Awards, the Venice Film Awards, the Hollywood Gold Awards, the Indie Short Fest, the Culver City Film Festival and others. The feature script has also generated laurels with the Beverly Hills Film Festival, the Glendale International Film Festival, and the Rhode Island International Film Festival.

The film centers on the young nun led New England Punk Rock girl group, Brides of Jesus, who get sucked into dirty doings by the monsignor and the Knights of Columbus in this comic book style comedy thriller. Bandmates CC and Tigre fall in love as they fight the evil cleric and his henchman to clear their names for the Mother Superior’s murder. The movie has the grit and women led music and sexuality of the The Runaways plus the comic book vibe and action of Sin City and New England’s issues with Catholicism in as seen in Spotlight.

The lead creatives on the project are musician/composer/director/screenwriter/producer Joe Bartone, who based the film on his experiences growing up in the heavily Catholic community in Rhode Island, which he escaped by diving deeply into the state’s influential music scene that birthed artists including The Throwing Muses, The Cowsills, and Les Savy Fav. He is joined by his co-director/producer/cinematographer/editor Jose Zambrano Cassella who brings experience from directing four features, music videos for artists like Shakira, and over 600 national and international brand commercials.

While the short continues to rack up laurels internationally, Joe, Jose and their team are actively looking for financing for the full-length film, which, as Joe notes, “now is the perfect time for a film about young women fighting an unfair system while falling in love with each other, making great music and saving the day, against a backdrop of comic book influenced production design.”

Zappa Drummer Maury Baker’s Baker’s Brew to Release First Single, “Medium Cool” off of Upcoming Album New Works Tomorrow

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Los Angeles, CA – January 14, 2021 – Baker’s Brew is a Los Angeles based experimental jazz group that comes out of the vast experience of veteran drummer Maury Baker (full bio on the one sheet here) who has played with Frank Zappa, Janice Joplin, Tim Buckley, Jimi Hendrix, Carlos Santana, Ron Carter, Johnny and Edgar Winter, Jackson Browne, Van Morrison, Seals & Crofts, Judy Collins, Phil Ochs, Austin Peralta and more. They will be releasing their single “Medium Cool” tomorrow, the track is the first single off of their upcoming album New Works, set for release on February 12. The single will be available on all platforms tomorrow (including on their Spotify artist page) and can be previewed here.

New Works is a 2 CD length experimental set that features 7 tracks of new jazz works and 8 tracks of new electronic works and will be released by Los Angeles’ Psychosomatic Records, a small but respected label known for their occasional and brilliant experimental jazz and electronic releases since 1998.

The release represents Baker’s long-standing ambition to combine all of his diverse experiences through total improvisation to create compositions on the spot. The jazz tracks feature spontaneous compositions from the group. While their work ranges anywhere from ambient jazz to avantgarde, this particular collection emphasizes a spacious sound in the tradition of Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue and the ECM label catalog.

Baker’s Brew also includes guitarist Daniel Coffeng (Doug Lunn, Steve Tavaglione, Mike Barsimanto, Phil Chen, others), Psychosomatic Records principal Jim Goetsch (George Russell, Albert King, Joe Zawinul, others) on soprano sax and electronics, and Carl Royce (James Combs, Sonny Cheebah, Silvio Rodriguez, others) on upright bass and electronics.

The electronic tracks feature the group improvising in conjunction with surround sound electronic scores created by group member Jim Goetsch. These works can best be appreciated on a powerful sound system in order for the listener to be inside the large sound field.

Taken from the new jazz tracks part of the project, “Medium Cool” starts with a slow build from the trio with a focus on Baker’s smooth playing then melds into some spaced out coolness from Goetsch, Coffeng, and Royce, with Baker’s drumming holding it all together.

Chicago Photographer Noritaka Minami’s SGN Series Opens Tomorrow at Motor Row District’s Artists of Color Focused FLXST Contemporary

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Chicago, Illinois – January 8, 2020 – Born in Japan, Noritaka Minami is a Chicago-based photographer currently exhibiting his unique and thoughtful SGN photo series, an investigation of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, and the current state of the steel lattice towers first erected there by the French as utility poles during the early twentieth century to facilitate the development of the Indochinese Union. Despite the passage of time and the tumultuous history experienced in this region since their construction, these lattice towers have endured and remained a consistent presence in the built environment of the city. SGN will open on January 9 with a reception from 5:30 – 8 pm, and runs through February 14 at FLXST Contemporary, 2251 S. Michigan Ave. Suite 220, Chicago, IL 60616. Due to COVID 19 precautions, reception attendance and viewing is by appointment only and can be booked here or on the TOCK app.

The major social, political, and economic developments within Vietnamese society in recent decades have also led to these structures becoming a truly extraordinary visual sight. The number of cables now supported by the lattice towers far exceeds the original capacity of their design and has transformed each one into a unique, sculpture-like object.

The overwhelming quantity of cables that have accumulated on the lattice towers is the product of the rapid socio-economic transformations that Vietnam has experienced since reforms were initiated in 1986 with Đổi Mới (Renovation). The photographs in SGN examine these overlooked remnants of French colonialism in the contemporary landscape of Ho Chi Minh City as structures that represent the historical trajectory of the region as it evolved from one of the centers of the French colonial empire in Southeast Asia to the economic engine of an independent and developing nation attempting to merge socialism with global capitalism.

At this moment, these lattice towers and the innumerable cables they support are also starting to be removed from sight as part of the modernization of the city’s landscape in the twenty-first century. This recent tide of urban redevelopment and the decision to remove what is viewed as “blight” has only increased Minami’s sense of urgency to document these structures before they permanently disappear. With Vietnamese society in the midst of major changes, this photography series meditates on the past and considers the imminent future of this landscape through the presence and disappearance of these lattice towers.

Noritaka Minami is a photographer based in Chicago. He received a B.A. in Art Practice from the University of California, Berkeley in 2004 and an M.F.A. in Studio Art from the University of California, Irvine in 2011. In 2015, he was appointed Assistant Professor of Photography at Loyola University Chicago. He has also taught photography at Harvard University, Wellesley College, the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University, UC Berkeley, and UC Irvine.

He is a recipient of grants from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Santo Foundation, and Center for Cultural Innovation. In 2015, he published a monograph titled 1972 – Nakagin Capsule Tower (Kehrer Verlag), which received the 2015 Architectural Book Award from the Deutsches Architekturmuseum in Frankfurt, Germany. Solo exhibitions of his works have been held at Kana Kawanishi Gallery (Tokyo), SFO Museum (San Francisco), USC Roski School of Art and Design, UCLA Department of Architecture and Urban Design, and UC Merced Art Gallery. He has also shown in group exhibitions at Aperture (New York), Somerset House (London), Photo Basel (Basel), Las Cienegas Projects (Los Angeles), New Wight Gallery (Los Angeles), and Kearney Street Workshop (San Francisco). Minami’s works are held in the collections of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, UCLA Architecture and Urban Design, and Museum of Contemporary Photography Chicago.

Chicago’s FLXST Contemporary Opens Artists of Color Group Show Against Impossibility on February 13

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Chicago, Illinois – January 19, 2021 – FLXST Contemporary a young but noted fine arts and photography gallery and an arts incubator in Chicago’s historic and transitioning Motor Row District will open their first 2021 group show Against Impossibility on February 13 with a reception at 5:30 pm. The show runs through March 28 and exclusively features five artists of color, three of whom are international artists representing China – Weiyang Gao, Kuwait – Latifa Alajlan, France and Mexico – Alexis de Chaunac; two of whom are African Americans from the South, a black man – Ajmal “Mas Man” Millar and a cis-gendered black woman Siena Smith. FLXST Contemporary is located at 2251 S. Michigan Ave. Suite 220, Chicago, IL 60616. Due to COVID 19 precautions, reception attendance and viewing is by appointment only and can be booked here or on the TOCK app.

Against Impossibility brings together these five emerging contemporary artists who work across the mediums of sculpture, fibers and textiles, mixed-media, and painting who, despite their precarious positions as MFA students in their final year of studies, continue to produce work influenced by the tumult happening around them. FLXST Contemporary intentionally curated MFA students at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago to showcase how the current moment has affected this new wave of contemporary artists in Chicago working under extreme constraints because of the pandemic, new modes of learning art, new spaces to produce art outside of the academic setting, and working against impossible conditions.

As young, emerging contemporary creators, these artists had to adjust to the conditions around them and have had to ask difficult and often existential questions about their art practice and their identities as artists. Against Impossibility is about the perseverance of these artists and their work offers possible answers to the question of why art matters during these moments of crisis.
FLXST Contemporary’s gallery director and founder Jan Christian Bernabe is a Filipinx American queer person of color based in Chicago. Jan has given an extensive curatorial statement about the show:

“We ended 2020 with signs of change in the United States, a new elected President, and two promising vaccines to battle the COVID pandemic. Change seemed to be on the horizon, a transformation in American culture that many believed could move us away from the hateful rhetoric against people of color, the LGBTQ community, and immigrants unabashedly condoned by President Trump, his congressional allies, and his supporters. The breakneck speed of the development and approval of two COVID-19 vaccines in December captured the global cooperation of doctors and scientists to finally combat a virus that by the end of the year had killed over 300,000 people in the US alone. The last two months of 2020 looked as though the new year would bring back a semblance of normalcy in the US and around the world.

With the odds stacked against FLXST Contemporary’s survival in 2020, we rolled into the new year working harder than ever developing an art program for 2021 that aligned with our mission to support and exhibit the very best of contemporary art by artists of color, LGBTQ artists, and immigrant artists. Last year showed us that art matters tremendously during times of crisis. Our art programming last year offered Chicagoans a means to cope with all that was happening in the world and ways to think about and to make meaning of moments of racial and social unrest that was happening all around us through the artwork exhibited in the gallery. The insurrection that occurred during the first week of January that we witnessed at the U.S. Capitol fomented by the conservative media, Republican legislators, and the President of the United States proves to us that we continue to live in a state of precarity—a moment of impossibility that as a gallery and as artists, we continue to work against.”

Ei.Ventures Engage in Equity Crowdfund Raise to Enable Any Investor to Join The Psychedelic Medicine Revolution Early On

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Maui, Hawaii – December 17, 2020 – Ei.Ventures, the latest enterprise to be started by successful Silicon Valley and worldwide entrepreneur and investor David Nikzad, is currently running an equity crowdfund on FundMe to enable any investor to get into the psychedelic medicine revolution at the leading edge of this emerging trend. Early-stage investors are more likely to get in on “unicorns,” a unicorn is a term used in the venture capital industry to describe a privately held startup company with a value of over $1 billion. As a venture capitalist, David has invested in numerous unicorns including Betterment, Talkable, Vidyard, WeFunder, and Airbnb.

David notes, “As I’ve had such investment success with early-stage companies, I’ve long tried to figure out ways to enable smaller investors to get in on world-changing trends early, including investing in WeFunder in 2012. Now that the SEC has enabled equity crowdfunding, we are using FundMe to enable my wellness and psychedelic medicine company Ei.Ventures. I am excited that all levels of investors will be able to get in on the psychedelic medicine revolution at such an early stage, enabling all to potentially see the kinds of gains previously only available to the largest accredited investors.”

The current equity crowdfund raise has exceeded the minimum funding target in just about a week and is currently headed to 200% of the target by January 1, 2021. It is likely the company will extend the raise into 2021 to raise the full amount allowed by the SEC, 1,000,700.

Ei.Ventures is a leading life and plant sciences company focused on bringing botanical psychedelic therapies and medicinal mushroom nutraceuticals to market with a bold mission – to create the new standard of mental wellness. To this end, Ei.Ventures’ botanical psychedelic therapeutics and medicinal mushroom nutraceutical solutions are designed to radically shift mental wellness treatment protocols.

EI.Ventures are focused on developing botanical active pharmaceutical ingredients for the psychedelic supply chain, novel psychedelic compounds for various indications, unique delivery mechanisms and treatment protocols, and medicinal mushroom nutraceuticals for improving well-being and health.

Ultimately, EI.Ventures intend to create a revolution when it comes to mental health and wellness. The aim is to open the pathway to the billion+ people worldwide who need to receive these life-changing treatments and natural solutions.

Some of the exciting work Ei.Ventures are doing to create the new standard of wellness include:

  • Developing the ‘Psychedelic Farmers Market’, as the first link in the psychedelic therapeutics supply chain
  • Control of intellectual property for three botanical novel psychedelic formulations. Psilly™️, MY-D™️, MY-MDMA™️
  • A Canadian contract research organization and lab partnerships for the development of psychedelic active pharmaceutical ingredients and novel compounds like Psilly™️
  • Developing mental wellness and health app partnerships for launch in 2021
  • Launching MANA™️ medicinal mushroom nutraceuticals in Q1 of 2021 into a $15 billion a year market

The market opportunity for Ei.Ventures are enormous as:

  • 322 million people suffer from depression worldwide
  • 300 million people suffer from PTSD worldwide
  • 164 million people suffer from substance abuse worldwide
  • 1 in 5 American adults suffer from a form of mental illness
  • $1 trillion is the estimated cost of depression to the global economy
  • $6 trillion is the estimated cost of mental health conditions in 2030
  • 115 people die every day from opioid abuse

One issue that Ei.Ventures help solve is “the treatment gap” which has huge economic implications. For one, the larger pharmaceutical companies have all but walked away from researching and developing new treatments for mental health disorders. Drugs like Prozac were once hailed as “wonder drugs” when they first came to market. Now, after 30 years of use, their efficacy is in doubt. Needless to say, the world is in desperate need of next-generation revolutionary treatments focused on solving the growing mental health problem.

A second issue is synthetics vs. botanicals. Synthetic molecules and compounds created in pharmaceutical laboratories tend to be chemically pure, crystalline products. They can create highly potent and targeted effects, but the consequences of these effects are often poorly understood by medical science. Modern psychiatric drugs are among the least understood drugs on the market. With decades of study, we still don’t fully understand how many of these drugs work. Many patients experience little improvement and unfortunate side effects like weight gain, sexual dysfunction, and personality muting.

By contrast, in some applications, the use of naturally derived compounds offers distinct advantages. In some cases, naturally derived medicines – particularly those with psychoactive properties – have evolved alongside their use in humans, being selected over the course of generations to provide health benefits to the user.

Rather than isolating or synthesizing a single molecule or a simple compound, any formulation Ei.Ventures develops will start with a standardized and well-characterized natural product, manufactured and formulated to be consistent and reproducible from crop to crop and batch to batch. Our proprietary extraction process preserves the unique complex constituency of a natural product producing a broad spectrum entheogenic extract that can be combined with other complementary ingredients in our formulations enhancing positive pharmacological effects. This synergistic formulation can potentially create medicinal effects that are simultaneously more efficacious and more well tolerated with fewer side effects than many synthetic crystalline compounds prescribed today.

Our unique extraction, formulation, and clinical development process are what separates Ei.Ventures from our synthetic competitors. By working with naturally derived ingredients, our formulations are able to leverage synergies between primary active ingredients and other essential constituents which contribute an overall effect that is “greater than the sum of its parts.” This extraction and formulation process integrates an innovative blend of organic and biochemistry. The end goal is to create superior and much more cost-effective ways to produce both psychoactive and nutraceutical medicinal formulations. Psychedelic medicine is the next frontier in the treatment of mental health disorders.

Ei.Ventures plan is to address the treatment gap left by Big Pharma and create botanical psychedelic therapeutics which we define as non-synthetic derived from the whole mushroom fungi and non-psychedelic nutraceutical formulations. This positions EI.Ventures as the leader in lowering mental healthcare costs globally, while providing patients with a long-term mental health solution. It also positions EI.Ventures as a leader in the emerging psychoactive treatment space. Our compounds and solutions may even save lives. A resurgence of interest in psychedelic treatments for mental health disorders is paving the way for the third generation of pharmaceutical treatments.

The case for investing in psychedelic research and development for the treatment of mental health disorders is growing. In October of 2018, the FDA gave Psilocybin the coveted ‘Breakthrough Therapy’ designation stating that, “Preliminary clinical evidence indicates the drug may demonstrate substantial improvement over existing therapies to treat a serious or life-threatening disease or condition.”

At Ei.Ventures, we believe natural psychedelic therapeutics and botanical nootropics, and nutraceuticals are this solution.

Deal highlights for Ei.Ventures FundMe include:

  • Offering Type: Regulation CF
  • Minimum Investment: $1,000
  • Issuer: EI.Ventures, Inc.
  • Issue Type: SAFE
  • Jurisdiction: USA
  • Valuation Cap: $111 million

2020 Has Been a Surprisingly Busy Year for Revered Spiritual Artist Jai Uttal, Continuing with New Single “Time and Again” Out Tomorrow

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Fairfax, CA – Noted for his heartfelt renditions and upbeat barn burners of classic Kirtans (Sanskrit chants from ancient India), and his first instrumental album Gauri’s Lullaby, currently in consideration for a New Age Grammy, his notable summer single “Behind the Walls” inspired by his work with inmates at San Quentin, and the horrible novel coronavirus outbreak currently taking place there, as well as hosting a sold out online Kirtan camp last summer, Jai Uttal is excited to announce tomorrow’s release of his new single, “Time and Again.” The song is available in all audio formats here.

“Time and Again” is the first single release from Jai’s upcoming album, Songs of the Mystics, that will be coming out next year. “Time and Again” was composed by Jai and his wife Nubia Teixeira, based on a song of the 16th century Indian Bhakti poetess, Mirabai. Though scorned by the presiding culture of the time, Mirabai’s passionate and sensual devotion to her Lord, and her complete disregard for social mores, became a clarion call to the poor and marginalized masses. She was, indeed, a mystic revolutionary!

‘Songs of the Mystics’ will include re-imaginings of songs and poems by many of the Bhakti saints, but Jai thought it appropriate to start with Mirabai. Her message and mood are timeless and resonate even today in the hearts of all devotees. About recording this track in all the insanity that is 2020, Jai notes, “I decided to release this song now because it seems that at this moment in history, more than ever, we are being called upon to act as well as to pray, each in our own way, that spirit will come and lift the mountain of chaos and division and divisiveness and pain from the world so that we can all breathe and our hearts can freely love once again.”

As with everything, the COVID-19 crisis has affected Jai’s recording process, noting that for this single, “My entire recording process has changed during this pandemic. Here in Northern California we’re still mostly in quarantine. So, this recording used pieces from various sources. The lovely background voices by the Pagan Love Choir were from a live concert I did of this song in February, which was multitracked. The accordion was recorded two years ago over a guitar demo I had at the time of the song. The rest of it was produced in Ben Leinbach‘s little studio that is now divided by huge plexiglass walls. Awkward, but we got the job done. I couldn’t let the pandemic squash creativity. Creativity is medicine!”

Besides COVID-19, the intense fires of Northern California and the social and political strife has also affected everything Jai’s life and he notes, “2020 has, indeed, been a year full of challenges, but it has also been a year of deep healing, personal growth and more intimate family interaction. It’s also been a time of deep connecting with my extended family and greater Bhakti community. I’ve been doing weekly live stream concerts and Kirtans, that have been a great point of focus for myself in terms of preparing and creating new songs and practicing my older songs, as well as bringing our extended Bhakti family and community together over Zoom. The pandemic has also pushed us to create online Kirtan Camps. These events have been greatly appreciated, and have enabled people from all over the world, who would never have been able to attend a Kirtan Camp in person, to join us The Online Camps have also helped me organize my own thoughts, experiences and music into a much more potent and accessible way of teaching. We’re in the middle of our second camp now.”

The Hindi verse, of “Time and Again,” ‘Meera Kahe Prabhu Giridhara Nagara, Hey Govinda Hey Gopala’, calls out: ‘Oh Lord of Mira, Govinda, Gopala, lifter of the mountain.’ One might paraphrase this as: ‘Oh my Beloved, please lift this insurmountable mountain of suffering and separation, that I may be yours forever!’

Jai adds, “I hope we all can taste a droplet of Mirabai’s intense, oceanic devotion.”

ICEWIND TURBINE TO POWER EMERGENCY BEACON AT ARCTIC CIRCLE

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Straumnes Air Station, Westfjords, Iceland (Latitude 66.440607) – October 22, 2020 – Noted wind power startup IceWind is deploying its new Njord series wind turbine just nine miles below the Arctic Circle on the site of the former U.S. Air Force’s Straumnes Air Station in the Westfjords region of Iceland. The air station monitored Soviet maneuvers in the strategic Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) gap during the Cold War. The IceWind RW100 (aka Njord) turbine will power an autonomous emergency beacon operated by the Icelandic Coast Guard (Landhelgisgæsla Íslands) there.

Straumnes is known for its extreme weather. In fact, five prior attempts have been made to run the site on wind energy, all of them unsuccessful. Wind gusts break apart lesser turbines and none have lasted for an entire winter. IceWind turbines, on the other hand, are engineered to provide reliable power in the most extreme Arctic environments.

The site has a 30W emergency transmitter that needs to run 24 hours a day all year and cannot go off-line. The total power consumption of the system is around 100W. For a vast majority of its lifespan the site has been run on diesel. Solar panels were incorporated in the last ten years to power the station during summer months.

At Straumnes Air Station the wind is known to reach 157 mph – blowing from all directions because of turbulence created by the near-vertical drop on the sides of the mountain the station is on top of. Average wind speed is estimated to be well over 22 mph.

The IceWind Njord turbine installed at Straumnes is made from stainless steel, carbon fiber and aluminum. It will be placed on a concrete platform 26m away from the main power system and will be connected to location’s existing energy system of batteries, solar panels and a diesel engine.

IceWind designs and manufactures robust omni-directional micro vertical-axis wind turbines and other hybrid energy solutions to power telecom towers, and weather and seismic stations, for on-grid and off-grid applications. All products are designed and tested in Iceland, one of the windiest places on earth.

The Njord (RW-series) wind turbines are built to be mounted on commercial towers, and reduce operational costs through an increase in backup power time and reliability, as well as reduced maintenance and failures, minimizing total downtime, and carbon emissions, along with savings from the vastly reduced service and refueling calls needed by diesel generators.

IceWind USA President Daryl Losaw, a USAF veteran, notes, “We are very excited to be working with the Icelandic Coast Guard on this installation and are hopeful that it will be the first of many Arctic region installations of our robust carbon free technology.”

Noted Arctic expert Robert Gerber, the former Acting Deputy Chief of Mission at the US embassy in Reykjavik, and an IceWind advisor, adds, “With our understanding of the power needs in Arctic locations we are thrilled to be part of a critical infrastructure power solution that is also good for the planet.”

Black Women Owned Slumber Bliss Seat Covers Launches Line of Antimicrobial Seat Covers and Other Travel Safety Products During this Time of COVID-19

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Austin, Texas/Los Angeles, California – October 29, 2020 – One never knows what kind of germs, viruses and bacteria are lurking on seat surfaces of buses, trains and airplanes, especially during this time of COVID-19. The easy safe solution? Patent Pending Slumber Bliss re-usable antimicrobial seat covers! They are the simplest way to protect yourself and your family during travel from germs, bacteria, allergens, and pathogens that may be on contaminated seats that can cause illnesses or bacterial infections. Proudly made in the USA and accepted by all airlines and travel providers around the world, these universal seat covers are launching to high demand as one of the newest traveling necessities preferred by safe and savvy travelers.
Founded by Nichale Denby and Nichole Denby-Jackson, the dynamic sisters found a way to help travelers in the midst of one of the most uncertain and challenging times that the human race has ever faced. During early days of the pandemic, the sisters were informed that a family friend tested positive for COVID-19. With the fear of possibly contacting the deadly virus from sitting and touching unsanitary seats while flying, the sisters came up with a superb idea to create reusable antimicrobial airplane seat covers. Nichale and Nichole had a seamstress develop a few samples out of soft, high quality antimicrobial fabric to sell to their close friends and family members.

One of the main goals of launching a company around their popular seat covers was to gather funds to make an impact by giving back to essential workers. The sisters used some of the seat cover sales proceeds to deliver food and much needed medical supplies, including PPE, to local hospitals in Los Angeles and surrounding areas. The duo also made errands and grocery store runs for individuals at high risk for COVID-19 in hopes to mitigate their risk of becoming infected. After receiving so many compliments and praise from fellow airline passengers, friends, and family on their safety seat covers’ design, they decided to take it to the next level and mass produce the seat covers for the general public across the globe.

Moving forward, the Denby Sisters will continue their philanthropic efforts and donate a portion of all proceeds to a charitable organization selected by the public through submissions to their website each quarter.

All Patent Pending Slumber Bliss seat covers come with a clear waterproof seat cover tote. The Slumber Bliss product line also includes disposable seat covers, sanitary travel kit, plush blanket attachment, and copper infused compression socks. All seat covers can also be used on most buses, trains, automobiles, and movie theater seats.

Nichale Denby, MBA, is a HBCU graduate that is balancing her respectable career as both a tech executive and entrepreneur. Currently flourishing in a successful career in tech and entrepreneurship like her sister, Nichole Denby-Jackson was also a world class athlete – she ran the 100-meter hurdles for the USA team in the 2007 World Championships, and was an USA Olympic Team alternate in 2008. To date, there have been some high-flying sports figures who were early adopters and are now ambassadors of Slumber Bliss seat covers. These include Bradie James, former NFL Linebacker for the Dallas Cowboys, Darren Sproles, former Pro Bowl and Super Bowl Champion Running Back for the Philadelphia Eagles, and Sanya Richards-Ross, an Olympic Gold Medalist and American Record Holder in the 400 meters.

Sproles notes, “Since retiring from playing in the NFL I took on a Scout Consultant role with the Philadelphia Eagles and with all the traveling I do my Slumber Bliss seat cover has been one of my favorite traveling necessities. I never leave home without it!”

Affordable Cloud Based Production Management Solution Klio Studio Now Available in the Microsoft Azure Marketplace

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Hollywood, California – November 5, 2020 – Former US Navy officer, international talk show host, and film producer Adrienne Lunson is excited to announce that her latest production, not a film or TV show, but Klio Studio, an affordable cloud based production management solution, purpose built for film, television, and commercial productions, is now available the Microsoft Azure Marketplace and on AppSource, and the company is a Microsoft partner.

Lunson notes, “while we’ve been building Klio Studio since 2017, when the Coronavirus appeared, we launched as soon as we could to help producers manage their newly distributed teams online and effectively. Now that we are on Azure, studios and producers can feel even more confident about running their productions on Klio Studio, since their data will be even more secure with the platform now being housed in Microsoft’s Azure cloud.”

The Klio Studio system keeps producers and their collaborators on track throughout the production process starting with development, through fundraising, pre-production, production, post-production and even release. It turns the creative chaos of filmmaking into orchestrated art.

Klio Studio’s toolset unifies all aspects of production, including tasks, schedules, chat, and file sharing. Lunson comments, “Because Klio Studio is Azure cloud based, staff can work remotely on multiple productions at once, potentially getting millions of people back to work from the Coronavirus crisis sooner and everyone’s favorite shows back on the air.”

Klio Studio is also helping to increase set safety in these challenging times, Lunson adds, “With Azure, our mobile tools help keep cast and crew safer on set, with digital check ins, digitally choosing meals for catering, and electronic signatures. Additionally, our medical advisory board is aiding us to create other practical protocols to keep set life safe.”

Lunson adds, “Klio Studio is for all producers. We created a powerful project management tool. It works great for commercials, online content, or multimillion-dollar movies.” Starting at $11.99/month, Klio Studio opens up an affordable toolbox for all creatives.

Through this incredible year Klio Studio’s smart virtual tools are helping to get four million filmed entertainment workers back at it. Check out KlioStudio.com to sign up for a free trial. The show must go on!

Kirtan Leader Adam Bauer to Release Third Album Return to the Sacred and New Single “Baba (Neem Karoli Guru Bhai)” Tomorrow

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North Leverett, Massachusetts – October 1, 2020 – Noted Bhakta, bassist, and Kirtan leader Adam Bauer’s third album Return to the Sacred will be released tomorrow, Friday October 2. Return to the Sacred (on Spotify here starting tomorrow) is an inspired collection of all-original music born during extraordinary times. For a preview of the full album, please go to https://soundcloud.com/adambauer-1/sets/return-to-the-sacred/s-MqyqEu33xll.

At the end of co-leading a pilgrimage in India in early 2020, Adam landed at Depot Records in Delhi to create the core of these tracks on the cusp of the global pandemic. During lockdown in the US, the album was crafted with highly respected world music producer Ben Leinbach (Jai Uttal, Deva Premal).

The India sessions were brought together and anchored by Mohan Shyam Sharma (Ravi Shankar, Hari Prasad Chaurasia, All India Radio), one of world’s most revered players of the pakhawaj, a traditional temple drum. The Indian recording artists are an all-star team of talented musicians including Rajeev Janardan on Surbahar, Kailash Sharma on Bansuri, and Hricha Rashmi and Deepa Mishra on vocals.

The tracks were exquisitely embellished in the US, on the first single/emphasis track “Healing Song” (released September 11) by Grammy-nominated classical cellist Joel Cohen, and Ali Akbar College of Music ED Steve Oda on sarod, and on the rest of the tracks by cellist Noah Hoffeld (Phillip Glass, Natalie Merchant, Krishna Das) and lifelong Bhakta and Kirtan multi-instrumentalist Visvambhar (Vish) Sheth (The Mayapuris) playing Indian drums and percussion. Leinbach brought his trademark deft production touch, and mixed and mastered Return to the Sacred at Old Bull Studios in Marin County, California.

Return to the Sacred is dedicated to the memory of Adam’s father, Edward Bauer, and his friend and inspiration Ram Dass, who both left their bodies in 2019.

Each song on Return to the Sacred has its own story. The album’s midpoint, and second single, also out tomorrow October 2, is “Baba (Neem Karoli Guru Bhai)” a tribute to Adam’s guru Neem Karoli Baba, and noted bringer of Baba’s teachings to the west, Adam’s friend and teacher, Ram Dass. Adam explains, “this song dropped in on me in the hour after I heard that Ram Dass had left his body around last year’s winter solstice. I heard the news at 3 AM, got up and did my ablutions and prayed for him, feeling deep gratitude for who Ram Dass has been in my life, and the lives of so many. This melody and mantra spontaneously arose in those predawn moments, and I added some of the classic messages that Ram Dass brought us directly from Maharaj-ji. Love everyone, serve everyone, feed everyone and remember God!”

The album opens with “Vaidyagrama Hare Rama,” one of the three songs on this album with English lyrics along with a traditional Sanskrit mantra. Adam wrote this song in South India while on a panchakarma retreat at a healing center called Vaidyagrama—hence the title. He notes, “The simple yet evocative message has deeply moved audiences since the week I wrote it.”

On the second track, “Shri Ram Jai Hanuman,” Adam notes, “this melody first came to me in a dream, and it kept reappearing during waking hours over a couple of years, so much so that for a while I thought it must be some other person’s melody that I had heard and kept remembering! It was insistent, and I found it mesmerizing, and so I’m happy to release it here for the first time. Jai Hanuman!”

The album’s penultimate track, “Arunachala Shiva” highlights Adam’s deep connection with bass sounds both vocally and instrumentally. About the song he recalls, “it came to me earlier this year, on my first barefoot walk on the sacred mountain Arunachala, considered to be the form of Lord Shiva, above the ashram of the beloved Hindu nondual saint Ramana Maharshi. I sang it as it appeared in me during my entire walk down the mountain, until I could sit down and translate it to my harmonium. I have bittersweet associations with this mountain, as the only other time I had laid physical eyes on it was right after I heard that my beloved friend Shyamdas left his body back in 2013. It felt like I’d come full circle to finally get there with time to truly be with the mountain, and I’m grateful that it gave me this song on our first real meeting.”

The album closer, and first single, “Healing Song” was also inspired by Vaidyagrama which means a healing village, and this song of healing came to Adam at the Ayurvedic center in Tamil Nadu, South India. He says, “the English verses and melody bubbled up from within as I was lying horizontal one day during a treatment, and I sang it to myself as part of my own internal healing process, then and ever since. I hope it has the same effect on all who hear it.”

His critically-acclaimed first solo record, Shyam Lila, debuted on Mantralogy Records in 2014. His sophomore album Wonderville was released in 2017 and generated more interest in his work. Adam’s music is available on major services like iTunes and Spotify, or directly from https://iamadambauer.com/

Adam was blessed to spend many years playing bass in support of sacred chant superstar Krishna Das, and later with Bhakti Yoga legend Shyamdas, both of whom nourished his love of sacred sound and the yoga of devotion. For the past decade, Adam has been on the road offering his own perspectives, teachings, and kirtan across the Americas, Europe and India, and even Antarctica. A lifelong student of the devotional life, Adam enjoys gathering with others and comparing notes on the path wherever the opportunity arises.