Press Release: Dr. Noize Helps Apple Unveil The iPad This Saturday!

My silence — and contractually obligated lack of Noizeletters since November — is FINALLY OVER!!!

1) Doctor Noize Featured On Every New iPad!

You read that right. You may have heard about a little doo-hicky called iPad coming out this weekend. What you hadn’t heard — because I signed an agreement to stay mum about it — is that Doctor Noize is a big part of its unveiling. Many of you have asked why I have been laying low and haven’t sent a Noizeletter for months. Well, now I can tell you. This is a long crazy story, but worth the read if you’re a Doctor Noize and/or Apple fan. It’s been a long time, and is an unbelievable story, so I’ll write longer than usual…

It all started when an Apple exec went to a Doctor Noize show in Silicon Valley on my October tour and realized that I’m like a walking ad for the company — my whole stage show is based around recording loops on a MacBook Pro laptop computer. The Apple exec had heard about me from someone at the Yahoo! corporate family party I played last summer. Apparently more and more high-powered übergeeks in Silicon Valley had started noticing that I use a TON of high tech state-of-the-art gear in my showz. This lead to an invitation to perform at One Infinite Loop at Apple Headquarters.

As everyone knows, no computer company has hitched its wagon more to the musical and creative arts than Apple — with iTunes, GarageBand, Final Cut Studio, you name it. They make active use of modern art and hip independent music in their iPod ads. So I suppose it makes sense that these hipster nerds all flipped over my show at their party, which interactively encouraged kids to come up onstage with me and create music on the spot. One hip geek in particular really got the gist of this. His name: Steve Jobs.

After signing one of Apple’s famed confidentiality agreements, Jobs took me into a room and unveiled their next big creation: The iPad. It was a computer device designed, as he said, to appeal to real people who want to access media and games and computer features without needing deep computer skills or knowledge. One of the obvious target demographics of this device: KIDS. Jobs wanted to make sure this was the coolest computer ever for kids, and he viewed me as just the person who could inspire that interest. When STEVE JOBS tells you that… you’re pretty psyched.

2) Welcome To Grammaropolis!

Things moved quickly. One of the big selling points of the iPad is that it’s Apple’s new iBooks, and Jobs wanted our brand to inspire kids to use their creativity in both music and words. I was given permission to bring in my old teaching colleague and friend from Pinewood School in Los Altos, Coert Voorhees. I had become a well-known kids’ musician, and Coert had become an acclaimed kids’ author. We had a week to come up with a concept that could uniquely demonstrate the iPad’s unprecedented edutainment opportunities. Thus was born a totally new brand to launch on the iPad, a 21st-century “Schoolhouse Rock” for the interactive multimedia world: Grammaropolis.

Grammaropolis is a new high-tech multimedia educational brand to educate and inspire kids and demonstrate the limitless opportunities presented to parents, teachers, and creatives by the iPad’s revolutionary new platform. It will ultimately feature music, books, educational games, teaching tools — all to be debuted on the iPad. My theme song for the brand — Welcome To Grammaropolis — will be released as a single Saturday with the iPad’s release. You won’t be able to buy it or download it anywhere else — you can only get it with your brand new iPad as an MP3 single preloaded onto your iPad’s iTunes library. A brand-new animated video of the song, featuring our new Grammaropolis characters representing the parts of speech, will also be included on every new iPad. GET A SNEEK PEEK OF THE NEW SINGLE AND ANIMATED VIDEO HERE. The song will also start appearing on iPad television spots globally this Saturday — release day.

Each iPad also comes preloaded with a funny little Dr. Noize game called iPhineas. I won’t tell you what this game does except to say that it’s simple to learn but challenging to master, totally ridiculous, and WAAAAY hipper than Tetris. And it’s very addictive — YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. No letters of complaint from new iPhone users who can’t stop playing it, please.

3) Live Worldwide Show Streamed On Apple.com!

You also may have noticed on my Showz schedule that I’m playing shows in Silicon Valley this week. Well, let’s just say this is not coincidental. I’m playing a show Saturday in Palo Alto — Jobs’ hometown — at the Palo Alto Children’s Theatre. It’s the featured event on the Bay Area’s best entertainment site, Artsopolis.com (it’s nice to have Apple’s PR agents on your squad…). But we couldn’t list the most revolutionary show on my Showz calendar until today. It’s at the Apple Flagship Store in San Francisco on Launch Day — Saturday, April 3rd. But this show’s not just in San Francisco — it’s everywhere. That’s right…

The show will be streamed live worldwide at 6 PM Pacific Time on the front page of Apple.com, and will feature the new song Welcome To Grammaropolis. It will also feature Doctor Noize’s trademark live loop composing and recording, and the most creatively innovative use of iPads in a musical performance you could possibly imagine. The audience at the event will interactively co-mix the loops I create using a brand new Doctor Noize Live! show app developed specifically for the new iPads. Trust me, it will be WILD, like Andy Warhol and John Cage got ahold of a music application at a live performance. So pull up a chair to your computer Saturday night and let’s make history together.

4) Interactively Mix My Spring Tour With iPad!

I then immediately launch a Spring tour of Apple stores nationwide. The first few weeks are now up online on my Showz calendar. ALL SHOWZ will feature the same revolutionary Apple performance technology. iPad users in every city are invited to bring their new iPads — with their pre-installed Doctor Noize Live! apps — to the event and help magically mix my songs live on the spot interactively! You don’t have to do a thing but show up — the app is already pre-installed on your iPad. WAAAAAY cool. So be a part of history and come on down to the Apple Store when Doctor Noize is in town.

Again, my apologies for the necessary secrecy until now… Maestro Jobs is famously secretive about new products, and I was told: If Doctor Noize is gonna be a part of the iPad rollout, then no Noizeletter updates and complete silence about it until launch week. I even had to sign a document that said I couldn’t spill a word of this until Launch Week. Some of you have wondered why my calendar has been so sparse — this is why. Plus, Apple didn’t announce the iPad launch date until less than a month ago, so no communication about the shows could even be considered until then, because even Apple Store employees don’t know about release dates before the public. If we’d officially booked the tour, it would have tipped the release date. So we had to madly book the tour in the last few weeks alone. It’s been… a bit crazy, like my world had been taken over by some alternative reality. Er, sorry Steve, I mean… some virtual experience.

5) Noizemaker Of The Month!

So there you have it: The reason you haven’t heard from me in five months. Needless to say, the Noizemaker Of The Month is this guy… Let’s just call him “Steve”… I’m proud of my new association with the most creative, daring and innovative technology company on the planet. I hope you can forgive my radio silence this Winter… Now GO GET YER iPAD!!!

Love yer buddy for life,

Doctor Noize

P.S. Tell all your friends please, this is great news for Noizemakers everywhere!
P.P.S. iLuvU.