Industry Ink Wednesday (7/13)

Reminder–Voting for the first round of balloting for the 2011 CMA Awards closes TODAY Wed., July 13, at 5:00 p.m. CDT.

Diesel Records Debuts
Founder Drew Turner has launched Diesel Records in Nashville with the Wayne Mills Band as its flagship artist. The group’s album is called Long Hard Road and the first single “She Knows the Words” impacts radio Aug. 16. The album will include guest appearances by TG Sheppard, and was produced by Grammy winner Denny Diante. Handling media relations is Heath Scott of The Scott Organization. He can be reached at 859-948-8659 or heath@scottorg.com.

DDEX Community Meeting Tomorrow
DDEX (Digital Data Exchange), the worldwide organization that develops standards for the digital supply chain, is holding an open meeting in Nashville July 14 at 8:30 AM at Belmont University’s Gordon E. Inman Conference Center. The non-profit organization will introduce local music companies to the benefits of standards implementation. The meeting is free and open to anyone who owns, produces or sells music in the digital environment. Nashville music industry representatives wishing to attend should pre-register by emailing their interest to secretariat@digitaldataexchange.com.

Copyright Forum At Belmont
Belmont University and NSAI are teaming to bring a series of events to campus focusing on intellectual property. The Copyright Forum launched last week with a press conference about the new Copyright Alert Act, and will continue July 19 with U.S. Rep. Marsha Blackburn presenting a briefing on the Commerce Committee’s anti-piracy efforts.

Publicity signings: Lorrie Morgan has inked with Music City Media; and Canadian country newcomer Drake Jensen has added PLA Media to his team.

Shane Drake of Taillight TV recently directed the debut music video for "American Idol" champ Scotty McCreery. The video for "I Love You This Big" was shot on location in California. Drake also directed six of the Ford/Idol spots featured this season.

• • • Trisha Walker Cunningham and Rusty Cunningham are booking talent for a new venue in Tyler, Texas. The Kiepersol Enterprises venue holds 1,000 people, and includes a recording studio, restaurant and B&B. One of the Cunningham’s first bookings is Gary Morris on July 23. Contact twinashvil@aol.com for bookings.

• • • Netflix is raising subscription prices. The movie rental company gave customers a 60% price hike when it separated its streaming service/DVD rental combo into separate offerings priced at $7.99 each. The previous combined rate was $9.99

• • • Watkins College of Art, Design & Film has named Gibson Guitar Pres. David Berryman to its Board of Trustees.

• • • Deirdre Chadwick has been named Director, Classical Music Administration for Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI). She will be based in BMI’s New York office.