Former L7 bassist Jennifer Precious Finch and her current band The Shocker track vocals, guitars and bass at Bendy for their upcoming full length release “Up Your Ass Tray”, produced and engineered by Bendy Music’s Dean Menta and Andy Snavley.

Composer / Sound Designer Andy Snavley of Bendy Music and the creatives at The Designory join forces to deliver a unique audio and visual experience for the Nissan USA website Shift_ campaign.
 
“Due to the size and implementation of this site we decided to create an audio design style guide that the programmers could use for the various pages. We broke design and interface sounds into classes and built a simple Macromedia Flash sound board with working sonified buttons and controls. With this tool the web designers could easily make additions and changes to the site without the need to start from scratch with the audio. Intro pages received specialized sound design elements for each vehicle. Additionally we created custom musical elements including an audio mixer and multi zone audio demonstration. It was a blast working with the Designory team.” Says Snavley of Bendy Music.

The West Coast Chapter of the Association of Music Producers (AMP) announced today the winners of the 3rd Annual AMP Mixer Awards. AMP is made up of television commercial music producers who celebrated the work of their post production colleagues at a spirited presentation here on Saturday, April 24, 2004. The awards are given for a body of work which shows outstanding ability in mixing music, voice-over and sound effects in TV spots. This year's top honor was presented to “Mixer of the Year” Bob Gremore of Mike Recording Services in West Los Angeles.

The awards event was created by the Association of Music Producers, and this year took place in the ballroom at the famous recording studio, The Village, renowned in the recording industry as the site where Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk", the Rolling Stones' "Angie", and Smashing Pumpkins' "Meloncollie" (and hundreds other top-ten albums) were recorded. In addition, the musical event raised money for the Mr. Holland‚s Opus Foundation, which encourages public school music education and provides musical instruments to needy students across America.

Mr. Gremore took top honors for three 30-second commercials, Ford "Submarine"; Discovery Channel "Nerfertiti"; and Altoids "Guinea Pig." Two other finalists whose work was cited were Jimmy Hite of Margarita Mix de Santa Monica, who mixed spots for advertisers Kill Switch, Infinity and Chandon; and Peter Rincon from P.O.P. Sound, whose mixing skills were demonstrated on commercials for Chevy, the U.S. Army, and Ameriquest.

Bob Gremore, the Mixer of the Year winner, when asked afterwards about the honor said, “As far as I know this is the only award of its kind for the work we do. After hours spent in the studio, it’s nice to have someone notice the well-mixed TV commercial.”

The judges also presented a Special Merit Award for newcomer Craig Helmholz of Crescendo! Studios/San Francisco. An Honorable Mention for a particular spot or campaign was also awarded to Robert C. Marshall of Another Country for his work on Budweiser’s "Baseball/Moat.”

The event at The Village was attended by 200 of the advertising and entertainment world's "glitterati". The emcee for the awards show was Roger Lodge, the irreverent host of "Blind Date." Celebrity presenters included Olivia d'Abo of "Law and Order," Victor Williams of "King of Queens," Kelly Rutherford of "Melrose Place," Geoff & George Stults of WB-TV's "Seventh Heaven," actress/musician Persia White, musician/actor Leon, and Grammy award winning Latin artist, Eduardo Xol.

Liz Myers, event chairman from AMP, was asked about the event stated, "We were extremely lucky to have such a talented group of musicians and actors who banded together to bring attention to good TV commercial work and to support a charity that is essential to our children's education."

The Association of Music Producers (AMP) was founded in early 1998 for the purpose of educating its members, and the production and advertising community as a whole, on all facets of music production, from creation to final use. With its national headquarters in New York, and regional chapters in Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami and Minneapolis, AMP is the first organization to represent the commercial music industry on a broad platform of creative, business and community matters. Production guidelines, legal issues relating to rights, licenses and composer royalties, talent negotiations, industry education, public relations and industry charitable endeavors are some of the bullets on AMP's agenda. At a time when the impact of music is growing exponentially in every broadcast medium, AMP is serving to give the music community a clear voice and the benefit of its own experience. AMP is an affiliate of the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP).
 
AMP Website: http://ampnow.com

Dean Menta has been touring with the band Sparks in promotion of their “Lil’ Beethoven” release.

Composer / Sound Designer / Engineer Andy Snavley, formerly of CB+Co., launches Bendy.
 
Snavley began composing music, sound designing and mixing for advertising in 1995 at the bi-coastal “tomandandy”, having worked in the film sound business prior. In 1997 Andy was given a position at Chris Bell Music and Sound Design (hence since called, CB+Co.) where he composed music and sound design for many clients including: Lexus, Nike, Coke, Toyota, Farmers Insurance, Saturn, and San Jose Mercury News where his efforts earned a Clio award. Snavley also became deeply involved in music and sound design for interactive projects and was instrumental in the launch of the Tonedog division at CB+Co,
 
Says Andy, “Bendy is the company I have always envisioned. It’s a place were creativity is uninhibited and experimentation is a must. In other shops I have seen what has worked, what hasn’t, and combined that with my own vision and technological approach. Launching Bendy has been a natural transition for me, as we usher in a new era of advertising and business, so must we change the way we think about our creative work. This is a great time to be excited about our work and our industry.”
 
Recently Bendy has signed on collaborator Josh Sklair, who is best known for his work with artists such as: Etta James, Sofie B. Hawkins, The Blues Brothers, and others. Sklair recently won a Grammy for an album he co-produced for Etta James called, “Let’s Roll”. Josh has been involved in advertising music as both musician and composer for well over 10 years working for clients: Honda, Porsche, GM, Budweiser, Millers Genuine Draft, Coke, and many more.
 
“When Andy first told me of his vision for a new music company I got really excited, I have known Andy for a long time and we have always done great work together, his genius for music and sound is undeniable. At Bendy I am able to channel my experience, energy and creativity into an open environment of total expression.”