What Do These Forgotten Acts & A Vibrator Have In Common?

Another week of crowdfunding and another week being astounded at who is looking to raise money and what they're looking to raise it for.

This week we look at three bands who were once immensely popular and, while they still have their fair share of fans, they're adapting to a musical life out of the spotlight easily thanks to crowdfunding.

We also look at a new kind of vibrator, because sometimes that's just how we roll.

Name: Amy Meredith
Project: New album
Current Status: 104 pledges, 55% of unknown goal, 51 days remaining.

You couldn't walk down the street without hearing the name Amy Meredith a couple of years ago. But, as these things tend to go, the ARIA nominated pop-rock dudes have lost their label and can't afford to be a full time band anymore. They seem pretty chill about the whole thing though and have launched a PledgeMusic campaign to raise enough cash to make sure their second LP sees the light of day.

Private lunch dates or hangouts at the studio are available for $300, an acoustic show is $1,000 or you can get handwritten lyrics for your favourite Amy Meredith song for just $50. All these come with a digital copy of the LP, which is available for $10 if that's all you want.

Name: Alex Lloyd
Project: New album
Current Status: 52 pledges, 22% of unknown goal, 47 days remaining

Alex Lloyd admits he's not too sure how to approach crowdfunding but says he's pretty happy about how the system seems to work. A look at his PledgeMusic page seems to suggest he's adapted pretty damn well to this new form of funding, however.

He was once our country's favourite singer-songwriter, even taking out top spot in triple j's Hottest 100 back in 2001. That was a long time ago, but he's back and ready to put out a new record and is offering perks to those who help it happen.

These perks include original Alex Lloyd paintings for $600 a pop, the chance to have Lloydy perform in your home for $6,000, a stack of rare CDs from his Black The Sun and Watching Angels Mend periods for $60 each and the chance to have your name and photo in the album liner notes for $200.

FILTER world tour! http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/filter-world-tour from Director: Mark Racco on Vimeo.

Name: Filter
Project: Touring help
Current Status: 339 pledges, 44.14% ($17,656) of $40,000 goal achieved, six days remaining.

Well this is one hell of an earnest crowdfunding video and, honestly, it's kinda hard to know how serious Filter's Richard Patrick is with all of this “our fans mean everything” and “we wanna get closer to you” until you take a look at the perks they offer in their IndieGoGo campaign.

They're raising cash to get themselves back on the road so that they can fulfil requests to have them visit a number of countries they haven't been able to make it to for some time. Given they have just released a brand new record The Sun Comes Out Tonight we are sure they are keen to get out to as many places as possible.

They mention Japan, South America, South Africa and Europe as places they really want to go, but honestly, as if these guys wouldn't just slot right in at Soundwave…

Anyway, if you help them out then you can potentially go out for dinner with them, go record shopping with them, sing or play a song with them at soundcheck or receive lyric sheets, Skype sessions, drum skins and more. They are really trying to involve the fans in this and that has to be respected.

Also in crowdfunding this week:

After last week's discovery of crowdfunded porn, this week we've been informed about VibeEase and new “smart vibrator” looking to raise funds through IndieGoGo. Rather than your stock standard operation, VibeEase looks to be an immersive experience in which the user selects a fantasy they want to enact through their iPhone, puts on headphones and gets to business. This video below is creepy as fuck – is a culture of encouraged workplace masturbation set to sweep the world's drab office spaces? GROSS.

Ubuntu are looking to change the phone industry by working with the big players in the world of smartphones on new technologies to make phones more reliable and more powerful. For the real true believers, the company has decided to make their own phone, the Ubuntu Edge, but given the fact the company aren't looking to actually get into the phone industry themselves, it will be a limited edition project purely for crowdfunding backers. It looks pretty impressive, and it has to – they need $32 million for it to happen…

Are you looking for some cash? We'll help get your project out there.