Here's a little background on the site. Sometime in 2003, I created AsburyMusic.com as a way to help promote my book, Beyond The Palace, which told the story of Asbury Park's music history for the first time. Somewhere down the line, the site became a sort of online community for the local musicians and music fans.

And then came Upstage... a lil' magazine I started publishing in October 2003. AsburyMusic helped get the mag off the ground and then sort of stepped into the background. It existed as its own website, but the majority of my time dealt with the magazine so AsburyMusic.com never really grew as I'd have liked it to do. Since I am no longer involved with the mag, I'm bringing AsburyMusic.com back as a hobby.

And it's back with one focus -- to promote Asbury Park's music scene.

I'm grateful to everyone who told me just how much they missed this site. I can't even begin to tell you just how many people came up to me in the last year saying that they wished AsburyMusic.com returned to the way it used to be. It's because of everyone that said they missed the concert calendar and local news that led me to bring the site back. But I didn't want to just try to recreate what the site used to be, I wanted to see if we could start really getting people to discuss how Asbury Park's music scene could get better.

We are in an area that has spawned two of the most successful artists of the last 40 years in Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi. Unfortunately, it has been quite a while since we saw someone break like that. There are a number of artists who stand a chance (Nicole Atkins, deSol , Val Emmich to name a few) but the number of people coming out to the clubs seems to be dwindling and clubs have been coming and going the past few years. In short, we need to put Asbury Park back on the map. The talent is here, great music fans are here, and the town has a history most places could only dream of. USA Weekend magazine recently listed Asbury Park as one of the best places in America to hear live original music. That kind of verifies everything I have always believed. We are fortunate to have a town like this. Even though the BEST days are in the past, our current days offer much more than most places will ever know. Our toughest critics are those in our own backyard. After interviewing musicians from around the world over the past decade, I can definitely tell you that people outside the area still view Asbury Park as a GREAT music town.

So, what do we do?

Well, I'm going to start off the debates with some message threads that I'd love to hear your responses on. If you feel the need to post anonymously or under an assumed name that's ok too. What is needed is to bring some of these issues to the forefront and see if we can't help the community find solutions to the problems. Just having the debate is a start...

Thanks for checking the site out, I hope you become a regular.