The first New Year ’ s Eve broadcast was December 31st , 2013 . It started off as a one off idea , but , like so many things I have done just to see what would happen , caught on , and people come to expect it to be an annual thing now . So the plan is to do it again this year , like the webathon and our weekly Guitar Pulls , broadcasting live with everyone remotely streaming . It will be a benefit also , but I cannot say what organization it is for yet .
In addition to the Banding Together benefits , you ’ ve presented live shows and created compilations to raise funds and awareness for many groups with the Rock Against Hate Volumes and Rock the Lup compilations . How great is it to be able to utilize your site to help causes like these ? It is wonderful to be able to combine my love of music and my love for helping good causes ! Back in December of 2001 when we celebrated our first anniversary , we did a benefit concert for Toys For Tots . Since then we have been involved with benefits for numerous small and large non-profit organizations . We usually manage to do 2-3 different benefits a year , including Banding Together . I wish we could do more but logistically it becomes difficult , and if we do too many benefits I think the listeners and musicians would get burned out ( I might too ). But whenever possible , I am happy to facilitate benefits for worthy causes , or work with others on benefits .
Just to give people an idea , how long would you say it usually takes you to put together a compilation ? Well , I normally send an e-mail out to musicians about 3 months before I plan to release the compilation , letting musicians know