But still, here’s a minor update just because:

• Dave and I are pleased that our webcomic The Guns of Shadow Valley got nominated for a Harvey Award.
• My next album will be called Fretting The Small Stuff and will be released this fall, if I can raise enough money from pre-orders to finish it. Here’s how you can get yours.
• I’m working on a children’s book based on the lyrics to a song from my last album.

That’s all for now. I’m not sure when there will be another update here, so if you’re interested in any of this stuff you could always follow what I’m up to over on Twitter or Facebook. I guess I’m just not the type who can be bothered to think of interesting things to say in multiple spots.

Here’s a little something I want to share with you. I put this video together for a video contest.

Speaking of contests… Back in January, I entered (and won) a contest where the challenge was to write ukulele-themed limericks. I wrote several obscene ones that I was rather proud of, but this was my winning entry:

There once was a cat named Bailey
Who learned how to play ukulele.
He never chased rats
Like all other cats;
He preferred to caterwaul daily.

But the cat was kind of a putz.
And his cat friends thought he was nuts.
Did he know how they made
The strings that he played?
‘Cuz they came from a relative’s guts!

That is all.

• I made a new CD of kid-friendly ukulele rock!
• One of my songs was included on a great CD for charity.
• I wrote a Christmas song and made a video for it.
• I wear reading glasses now, which my family says makes me look like Santa.
• Also, apparently, my family tells me I’m too grumpy to be Santa so I must be Bizarro Santa.
• I recently got a oldnew car.
• I might put out a children’s storybook next year.

That’s all for now. More updates on Twitter as things happen.

My new album comes out next month. Keep an eye out for it, won’t you?

COMICS UPDATE: Comic Con was last month. Unfortunately, we didn’t win the Eisner award, but it was still really cool being nominated and attending the award ceremony. Dave blogged about it here. I had a lot of fun at the show, hung out with the family, went to Sea World, and just generally enjoyed San Diego.

Oh, and while I was at the show, I discovered a comic called Super Siblings which has a lead character named James Clark who looks just like me circa 2002. Like me, the character has a wife and two kids — a boy and a girl — and his dad even looks like mine. And he acts kinda like me, too.

It’s both eerie and cool to see myself in a comic book, especially since the comic’s creator Patrick Scullen and I had never heard of each other before. Weird.

MUSIC UPDATE: I’m about 90% done working on my album of children’s music, and maybe 80% done on my second rock/pop album. I’m hoping to finish up a bunch of those tracks in time to have a demo CD together for when I perform in LA next month. You can read about that here.

OTHER STUFF: My kids turn five this month. FIVE! Where did the time go??

I’ll try to get back in the habit of writing more often, in case anyone actually reads this thing.

The Guns of Shadow Valley — the webcomic I write with Dave Wachter — was nominated for an Eisner Award for Best Digital Comic!!

For those of you who may not know, the Eisners are the premier awards for the comic book industry. The Eisners are literally the “Oscars” of the comic book industry. It’s a very big deal to be nominated. Of the hundreds of thousands of webcomics and other digitally distributed comics available, only FIVE are accepted as nominations.

I’m incredibly overwhelmed, thrilled and overjoyed at the nomination. This is huge for me and Dave. I hardly know what to write. Dave did a fantastic job of summing up how he feels in a post he made over on the Shadow Valley website and I echo a lot of the sentiments he expressed there. I encourage you to read it — he sums up it up very well, much moreso than I am capable of right now. Plus he tells the origin story of how we started The Guns of Shadow Valley and what this journey means to us.

I’m honored to have our project included alongside the other nominees. I’m a fan of all of the other webcomics nominated in our category and it blows my mind to be in the same playing field. They’re all amazing.

Here’s the complete list of nominees for the 2010 Eisner Awards.

(It didn’t work.)

More inspiration from Mindy Gledhill. This time it’s a chance to win $50 and a free CD! Read on.

What I’m trying to do is formulate my “perfect pitch”, a phrase or slogan that describes my music in an appealing way. Below I’ve listed several adjectives in an attempt to reveal all the feelings and vibes that I am trying to create with my music:

* bright
* quirky
* light-hearted
* fun
* jovial
* emotive
* catchy
* uplifting
* nostalgic
* energetic
* hopeful

Now, let’s look at my other lists.

Singers I sound like. You said: Don McLean, Israel Kamakawiwo’ole, Jack Johnson, James Taylor, Tom Waits, Paul Simon, John Denver, Ghostwriter, Buddy Holly, Chris Isaac, Elvis Costello, Brian Wilson.

Here are some of my influences:

* Author and book: Neil Gaiman, Neverwhere.
* Film: A mostly unknown movie Fandango starring Kevin Costner.
* Composers: Vivaldi, Debussy, Mozart.
* Growing up: The Beatles, John Denver, Jim Croce, Fleetwood Mac, Linda Ronstadt.
* As a teen: Led Zeppelin, Paul McCartney, Muddy Waters, Hound Dog Taylor, John Lee Hooker, The Police.
* Currently: Mike Doughty, Jake Shimabukuro, Marcy Playground, The Beatles, Glen Phillips, Cake, Jack Johnson, Colin Hay, Rocky Votolato, Gomez.
* Poets: Charles Bukowski, ee cummings.
* Painters: Mostly contemporaries like Jeffrey Jones, Kent Williams, George Pratt.

Using these lists only as a guide, I am inviting you to have a stab at writing my pitch. If I use yours, I will send you $50 and a free copy of my album, “Ukulele Jim’s Authentic Down Home Marital Aid.” Remember, this is short and sweet. Your pitch must be posted by 10:00 p.m. MST, on Sunday night February 28.

Some examples of artist pitches are:

Mindy Gledhill – “Music that recalls the sweetness of Ingrid Michaelson and the quirk of Regina Spektor, Mindy Gledhill will leave you floating like a scoop of vanilla cream in a strawberry soda.”

John Taglieri – “If Vertical Horizon and Third Eye Blind got hit by Train!”

Devil Doll – “Jessica Rabbit meets Joan Jett.”

My music can be sampled here: http://ukulelejim.bandcamp.com

Don’t hold back. All ideas are welcome! Entries must be posted in the comments section below. Ready, set, GO. And thanks!

I’ve decided to take a cue (and an idea) from Mindy Gledhill by trying to figure out what defines me as an artist in the minds of my fans and potential fans, aka “my brand.” I haven’t done much with branding myself as a musician, aside from using the name “Ukulele Jim” — which, in retrospect, may end up hurting me more than helping. I may have boxed myself into the “novelty” arena rather than trying to appeal to the masses as a “singer songwriter.” But hopefully I can get past that “too late now” hurdle by developing a bit of branding that I can use to market myself better.

As Mindy explains: “so many artists (and people in general for that matter) are not specific enough about who they are and what people can expect from them. When people I meet learn that I am a recording artist, they almost always ask what genre I sing and who I sound like. Many artists (including me, at one time) want to believe that they don’t sound like anyone else out there, but I have learned that potential fans lose interest if they can’t walk away with a firm idea of what you stand for.”

These words are well put, and they have inspired me to try and find my own brand and come up with the perfect pitch. Like Mindy, I’m hoping that having a pitch will help me define myself to fans and important people in the music industry.

This is where I need some objective help from you. The first step is to try to figure out where my music fits.

So I ask you: What artist(s) do I most sound like? And as a bonus question: What genre would you define my music as?

(If you’d be so kind as to leave your opinion in the comments below . . . Thanks!)

I think she really captured the true essence of Courtney Love here.