Music

Killing Joke’s tourdates appear to be firmed up finally for the US. Stops are as follows:

10/9: House of Blues, LA (8pm)
10/11 and 10/12: Fillmore East (the venue formerly known as Irving Plaza), NYC (9pm)
10/14: House of Blues, Chicago (7:30pm)

Tickets available via TicketBastardMaster.

(nb.: Tickets for the Irving Plaza show are SRO, and are priced $25; not sure about the others, as I don’t live within striking distance of Chicago or LA)

ZBalance got me thinking. In a recent comment thread, he lamented that he hated top 20 radio, but was concerned his kids wouldn’t.

I find that the older get, the more stuff I like. But top 20? My first thought was, “hell, no”, but I figured I’d better check. So I headed over to Billboard Top 100 and had a look-see.

There was nothing in the top 10 I liked, which satisfied the music snob in me. It’s almost entirely R&B, which is not really my thing. But I continued on and, damnit, I found stuff I didn’t hate:

12. Rihanna - Don’t Stop The Music
Standard club hit, and to be honest, I’ve always liked good house music and club hits. Henry Rollins described industrial dance as house music done right. Obviously I prefer industrial, but I know catchy when I hear it.

13. OneRepublic - Stop And Stare
14. Timbaland Featuring OneRepublic - Apologize
OneRepublic is what I call “Smallville music”. Smallville uses a lot of catchy pop music and has even released two albums. Much of it is stuff I hadn’t heard before, and some of it blows up later. I’m not the only one who has been paying attention; KryptonSite has taken the time to list everything played on Smallville, by season.

OneRepublic, however, has the dubious distinction of being on the most commercialized Smallville episode ever. The entire episode was a commercial for Stride gum and OneRepublic itself - to the point where OneRepublic is shown giving multiple concerts in an abandoned Stride gum factory. I think it was a pretty shameful day for everyone involved.

15. Alicia Keys - No One
After just explaining how I’m not into R&B, I find myself liking this track. What can I say? It grabs you with a solid beat and fantastic vocals.

16. Lupe Fiasco Featuring Matthew Santos - Superstar
This is lush, slickly produced hip hop along the lines of Kanye and Jay-Z, and I do enjoy some of their stuff. Superstar doesn’t quite reach that level, but does have a great hook.

There you have it. I actually like 25% of the top 20. This was certainly a surprise to me. All I can say in my defense was that I did not like the track from “Webbie, Lil’ Phat & Lil’ Boosie”. I cannot tell you how relieved I am to write that.

However, something still isn’t settled. ZB thinks he’s old because he doesn’t like modern music. I understand this; I distinctly remember thinking that if I liked modern music when I aged, it would mean I was still cool. Now, though, it feels like I only appreciate this stuff because I’m getting old. Perhaps it’s time to remind myself that even in my younger days, I could go from Ministry to George Michael without skipping a beat.

I recently posted a rap video about proper web design and coding, and now here’s a bunch of electro songs from CSS. This time, we’re not talking about cascading style sheets.

You’ve probably heard Brazil’s CSS without having any idea who they were. I had a couple “oh, THAT’s who does this” moments while listening to them. Hopefully, you’ll be as happy as I was to solve the mystery.

The vocals of lead singer Lovefoxxx have a fantastic, Bjork-like cuteness to them, down to the occasional rasp. When that Portuguese accent comes out, she’s downright dangerous. And she curses! A triple threat. CSS is an abbreviation of Cansei de Ser Sexy, which is Portuguese for “tired of being sexy”. While they mean it in jest (it was a Beyonce Knowles quote), there’s a definite sexiness to their sound and lyrics.

Here are a few tracks I really liked, starting with the ones you probably heard already:

Music Is My Hot, Hot Sex

Let’s Make Love and Listen to Death From Above

Alala

Off the Hook (I think you can hear the Bjork-ness best here)

The Poetic Prophet, AKA Moserious, raps at ya about designing and coding your site. Yes, your web site. And yes. It is awesome.

Ironically, going to his site triggered a Quicktime update message that crashed Firefox. The message noted that the latest Quicktime fixes many serious bugs. Indeed. But even though I was in the middle of writing this very post, Firefox restored this edit page with all my text in tact. Oh Mozilla, is there anything you can’t do? (Other than not crash in the first place?)

Tip of the hat to Ray and Or.

This (or something very like it) came to the Hollywood Bowl. It’s an orchestral soundtrack to classic video games.

Tip of the hat to Or.

I was pretty blown away when I first heard M.I.A.’s (Mathangi “Maya” Arulpragasam’s) debut album Arular. The Sri Lankan supercutie creates a mix of ragga and electro funk, so it’s like a dancey, electronic reggae (and I’m not a big reggae fan). The lyrics are nonsensical (or in some dialect of slang I’m ignorant of), but that doesn’t reduce the likeability. Her award winning follow-up Kala has more of a traditional electronic dance, clubby feel. It also includes a cover of the Pixies’ Where Is My Mind? (which samples New Order to boot).

Instead of continuing this awkward description, why don’t you just check out some videos? Like I said, she’s easy on the eyes…

Galang (from Arular)

Bucky Done Gun (from Arular)

Boyz (from Kala)

20 Dollar (from Kala)
Note: fake video, real song

I thought this was hilarious. It reminded me of when MST3K provided translated lyrics for the Jet Jaguar theme song. And in looking for the lyrics for that, I found the original. Ain’t YouTube great? Here’s both:

So by now you know that Très Bien has been voted off the fantastic Agent Mystery-produced show The Next Great American Band. If you dug their 60s rock, well, you really should be listening to The Zombies or The Yardbirds. But if you’re holding fast to some weird, self-imposed rule that your 60s rock must have been created in the last decade or so, check out The Hentchmen¹. They recently re-released Hentch-Forth.Five featuring Jack White. You can enjoy it without breaking any of your stupid rules.

1. Note the T in the name. Otherwise you’ll find Henchmen, and wonder why I suggested them. [↩]

Almost Famous was the first and last movie I saw in the theater alone. I’m one of those people who believe movies are a social experience. You grab dinner, see the movie, and then talk about it over coffee¹. I’m pretty sure I’m in the majority. When Almost Famous was released, of course I wanted to see it with friends. But either everyone had seen it, or nobody wanted to see it. Normally I’d just wait for it to be released on DVD, but something told me I had to see this movie in the theater. So after meeting friends for dinner at the Santa Monica Promenade² and failing to convince them to join me, I bought a ticket and went in alone.

It was practically a religious experience.

Seeing Cameron Crowe’s journey into the world of rock and roll at the age of 16 seemed like a wakeup call. A big “what the hell am I doing with my life” kinda thing³. The film immediately became one of my all time favorites.

And the music. Just fantastic. Complementing each scene so that hearing them again allows us to invoke Crowe’s memories as our own.

Of course, I bought the soundtrack right away. But even at 17 songs it only covers about a third of the music in the film. At one time I had ambitious plans to collect all the albums the songs had appeared on, allowing me to experience it the same way Crowe did. Luckily, procrastination sometimes saves you work. Eventually I discovered Rhapsody, which saved me from tracking down all those albums on half.com. And the good volunteers at the IMDB painstakingly entered the music credits⁴. All I had to do was find the tracks on Rhapsody and play them.

Unfortunately, Rhapsody doesn’t have the best search capabilities. But eventually I was able to find all the songs or determine if they weren’t available. When faced with duplicate tracks, I chose the one that appeared on the original album if it was available. This saves you the trouble of having to track it down, if you’re a purist like me.

In addition, I have listed below all the songs that were missing from Rhapsody. The great tragedy for this soundtrack is that Rhapsody doesn’t really have any Zeppelin⁵ . Considering that the fictional band Stillwater is a composite representing Zeppelin, The Allman Brothers, and The Eagles, it is a real loss. Or a great excuse to buy a bunch of Zeppelin albums.

I hope this inspires others to do the same, as there are many movies with great music, and only one of me. However, this won’t be my last - stay tuned!

Music from the Motion Picture Almost Famous (A Rhapsody Playlist)

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1. No coffee after a movie makes me sad. [↩]
2. Back when it was cool, not just some clone of The Grove [↩]
3. Unfortunately, my powers of procrastination and laziness are still as strong as ever, but at least I know I’m capable of being motivated for short bursts. [↩]
4. As I count 48 songs, I’m not sure if it’s missing any since I heard there’s over 50 in the film. However, it does look to be very thorough. [↩]
5. They must’ve really took “get the Led out” to heart. [↩]

Just saw Flight of the Conchords (HBO show site, band site). Very funny, very creative, and great music. I guess the genre is “digi-folk parody”, but whatever you call it, it’s damn entertaining. Finally, HBO finally has something on Sunday nights that won’t give you a stress-related ulcer.

(If the animation annoys you, just hit Escape.)

I saw Front Line Assembly for the first time at BB Kings, May 3rd.
Acumen Nation and The Start, opened.
FLA’s playlist was fantastic since they were set up like a band (drums/guitars riffs) which is my favorate style for them. There’s nothing worse than watching an industrial one-man-band sit in front of a laptop while hopping and down trying to get the crowd into it.
Bill Leeb was in a sarcastic mood. He apolagized for the tour-bus-incident last time he tried to come to NY. The smoke machine ran out of fluid, so he suggested we all fart to keep the mist alive. He also voiced his aggrevation at the lack of any PA system so he couldn’t tell how they sounded, but it wasn’t that bad.
Although I didn’t recognize the other band members, I overheard someone point to Chris Peterson and someone else said Rhys Fulber wasn’t there. I can’t confirm any of this.
After performing, they came back for an oncore including Mindphaser that was phenomenal.
After the show we ate at Lucille’s restaurant, located in the same building. When we were done, we went outside to get a cab and found Bill Leeb (my idol) was just hanging out on the curb while they were loading the tour bus. He was practically alone! It figures I went through two batteries on my camera to get 1.5 gig of pictures and videos. (requests?). Even my cell phone was dead after searching for a signal in the underground club for 4 hours.
So I ended up just gawking at him like a teenager, think of nothing better to say than “duh…, I like music!” as he finished up outside and hopped on the bus.

Next time I will be better prepared.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=eqh5O9LbjhY

A Crackteam agent sent me this link from YouTube and I HAD to share it for a good laugh.

It’s a rap video montage of clips from the movies of Weng Weng [from IMDb], and music stylings from The Chuds [from MySpace]. The collaboration was edited and produced by John R. of the R Room. It’s taken a couple views to really appreciate it since my attention during the first round went to the visuals and camera tricks. But the lyrics to the soundtrack song, “Weng Weng Overture,” are equally entertaining. They can be read at The Chuds MySpace page.

I’m a little late to the phenomenon of Weng Weng [from WikiPedia], but of all the Kung Fu and spy spoofs I’ve seen his look to be the most entertaining. Films credits include “For Y’ur Height Only” and “The Impossible Kid”, which received 8/10 stars on IMDb from 50 dedicated voters. There’s even a drink named after him, called the Weng Weng. Well, that may be a false claim but it should be true.

For Christmas this year, I treated myself to a longtime object of my technolust: the Sandisk Sansa e280 flash memory MP3 player. Part of the e200 series, the e280 is the 8GB version. I paid $185 at Amazon (no blogger bribes here!). All e200 players have many features to thrash those precious iPod Nanos:

• Plays MP3, WMA, and secure WMA (see below)
• 1.8″ color LCD screen
• Image viewer
• Video player
• Voice recorder
• Data storage
• FM tuner, with record capability
• microSD expansion slot
• User replaceable, rechargeable Lithium Ion battery with 20 hours of play time (average)

That’s what everybody gets. The real kicker is if you have Windows XP [1] and a subscription service like Rhapsody-To-Go, Napster, or Yahoo! Music. This is a Plays For Sure player, so you can take subscription content with you. As long as I am a subscriber, I can transfer any track in my library, even though I didn’t buy it. Since I just got a great deal on Rhapsody-To-Go [2] I expect to subscribe indefinitely. That gives me any of Rhapsody’s 3 million+ tracks anywhere I want. It is the awesome.

That’s quite a feature list, in a very compact package. Here are the highs and lows.

Highs

• Screen is sharp, photos and videos look good.
• Sound quality is quite good, both for WMA (160K) and FM stereo
• Using Rhapsody’s jukebox software, transferring music is quite easy. You either drag and drop files, or synchronize with your Rhapsody Library. If you needed to, you could pick and choose from your Library instead of copying the whole thing. Personally, mine is a giant “best of” collection, so it’s very convenient for me to connect it to my PC have it automatically sync up. Right now I’ve got around 600 tracks that I’ve chosen over the last year, and it takes up about 2.7GB.
• The design is very nice. It’s shiny! And black. It’s not quite as compact or beautiful as the iPod, but… duh. As far as I can tell, Apple has kidnapped the best designers on the planet (minus Agent Hulagun), so nobody else can have such elegant-looking products. It’s the modern day equivalent of Ivan the Terrible poking out the eyes of Postnik Yakovlev after he built St. Basil’s Cathedral.
• New batteries are only $20 from Sandisk, compared to $60 for iPods.

Lows

• Like just about every other MP3 player I’ve read reviews on, the earbuds kinda suck. Sound quality is decent, they’re just these big round discs that don’t feel like they were designed to go in your ears. They’re too big for your ear canal (I think they’re more bellybutton sized), and I haven’t figure out a way to place them so they don’t feel like they’re about to fall out. I’m looking for a replacement, and have my eye on the Sennheiser PMX60 headphones. I’m pretty sure the larger drivers will drain the batteries faster, but at least they’ll be comfortable without messing up my incredible hair.
• The voice recorder seems to record a high-pitched whine along with your voice. It’s annoying, so don’t expect to make any podcasts from it. And you have to speak into the mic, so I don’t think you can use it to record lectures. Of course, the mic hole is about 2mm in diameter, so it’s a wonder it works at all. At least you can pause and continue the recording.
• When using the thumbwheel, your thumb rests on the left side of the wheel, which is not optimal. You scroll down, you’re turning counterclockwise, and the screen scrolls up. This is really an artifact of using a very compact device, and I don’t see a solution - that’s just where your thumb naturally rests. To make this more ergonomic you’d need to make it bigger, which nobody wants. I’m sure most compact MP3 players have this issue.
• When connecting to my PC for transfer, the Rhapsody software needs to scan the device for tracks. This takes several minutes, and I only have about 600 tracks (”only” meaning it’s only 1/3 full). In “mass storage” mode, you can’t transfer subscription content, only drag and drop files. So it doesn’t scan your tracks when you connect, but when you disconnect it essentially reboots and does this “Refresh Database” thing that also takes a couple minutes. You can’t win.
• The only way to recharge the battery is by hooking the device up to a USB port via the included cable. Not an issue - unless you want to travel with it. Luckily, there are many 3rd party Sansa accessories that solve this, and they’re even blessed by Sandisk. This includes USB charging ports for your car’s cigarette lighter, as well as wall chargers.
• The LCD stays on when the device is connected to a PC. Since you connect to charge the battery, it seems dumb to be draining it by lighting up the screen.
• Photos and videos can’t be placed on the microSD card.

I’m nitpicking a bit with the lows, but I’d rather be thorough in case one of them is a deal-breaker for you. Overall, I think the highs far outweigh them, and I’m quite happy with my purchase!

[1] And presumably Vista, but don’t hold me to that. I think it just needs Windows Media Player 10 or better.

[2] I’m afraid it’s gone now, but during the holidays they offered the to-go service for $8 month. I’d been paying $10/month for the Unlimited service, which doesn’t allow you to transfer to MP3 players, and the upgrade price was $15/month! I created another account, hoping to merge the two, but the best customer support could do was cancel the old one. I downloaded the entire library from my original account and then imported it from the new one, so I was able to save just about everything. After spending a year carefully selecting 600 tracks (out of several thousand), you don’t want to have to find them again!

This is unusual for me; I never write about music. That is probably because all of the composers on my playlist have been dead for hundreds of years (Mozart is 250 this year, woo-hoo!) and my pop music tastes tend to be Beatles-bland. The less said about it, the better.

But some days ago I attended a cool concert at a friend’s house. The venue was intimate –45 people or less—and the artist was new to me. Bob Bennett is a well-known Christian guitar player, and his folksy ballads are what I remember about that evening gathering. The guitar was expertly and sweetly played (again, I don’t know enough music-related adjectives to give a good description) but the real draw were the vivid lyrics and sheer poetry of his work. Hmmm…. I have heard the phrase ‘dulcet tones’ used, but I don’t know if it applies to the vigorous work that Bob Bennett performed that night.

Also included:our evening is graced by an iconic film actor who just happens to play a mean guitar…..

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Upon first hearing Mindless Self Indulgence (MSI), I immediately wanted to learn more about them. And when I had done so, I knew I had somehow failed. How could music this good have eluded me for 7 years? I realized it was time to stop telling people I was into industrial music, since clearly I couldn’t be without hearing of these guys.

They’re super-catchy industrial/electro/DJ/hip-hop brilliance. The lyrics are out there, kinda self-deprecating, ironic, tongue-in-cheek rambling. But I really dig the energetic vocals of frontman Little Jimmy Urine. Uh, yeah, that’s his stage name, only to be topped by other band member “Steve, Righ?” (sic). My only criticism is that they can be a bit repetitive, as there’s not a ton of variation between songs. Well, they’ve got their style and they’re sticking to it. And there’s plenty of remixes to go around, from some of the coolest industrial bands (Front 242, KMFDM, FLA, and many others).

They’re compared to… well, who cares? Thanks to the wonderous glory of YouTube, I shall regale you with hand picked videos, allowing you to judge for yourself. I’ve moved them to the “more” section, partly because they’re not safe for work (well, maybe if you have headphones), but mostly to make the page load faster (and not have your workplace think you’re visiting YouTube).

BTW, they’re touring on the east coast, including Asbury Park and Philly.

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Imagine Marc Bolan backed by Black Sabbath while Ozzy was on a bender, and you’ve got a pretty clear idea of Wolfmother. Aussie Ozborne, if you will. If you’ve got a healthy taste for classic rock, by which I mean the hard stuff, you’ll find their self titled album pretty fanstastic.

I’m ever impressed by bands these days who really capture a particular sound from years past. Interpol, She Wants Revenge - those aren’t bands that are influenced by the Manchester music scene of the 80’s - they’re the real thing. Wolfmother does the same thing for 70’s rock. I seriously doubt there’s a modern instrument among them.

And cover art by Frank Frazetta for cryin’ out loud!

Some people think embracing an era that strongly is lame and unorginal. I’m of the opinion that it’s actually way harder to pull off than anyone gives them credit for. Also, it sounds awesome. Also, my opinions count more than other people’s. Sorry, that’s just a fact.

You’ve probably heard Woman by now, and maybe Dimension if you watched Dane Cook’s Tourgasm. Here are some other tracks I thought were particularly good:

White Unicorn: Just the title is evocative of the 70’s fantasy literature and art embraced by bands like Rush (did you know they had a song called The Necromancer? And another about trees fighting each other?) and Led Zeplin (who weren’t afraid to sing about Middle Earth).

Mind’s Eye: little slower, but with a rockin’ chorus. Keyboards remind me of The Who.

Love Train: Little funk, little Latin vibe thrown in.

Masterchief submitted a fantastic video from Weird Al, rapping White and Nerdy. There have been others who’ve explored nerd-core, which is a sort of running in-joke for nerds, but in rap form. Most of it is simply OK - amusing lyrics, but mediocre skillz. The quality of Weird Al’s stuff is far superior, but let’s face it - it’s a parody. He doesn’t come up with the original music. Nonetheless, this may be considered the archetypal nerd-core track.

Variety reports that Tower Records can’t pay its bills. So labels are holding off on sending it new stuff, which will probably make things worse, since new releases are typically the only CDs Tower sells at a reasonable price.

This is really about the death of the record store. I had been noticing the dwindling of the independent record store and small chains for years: Moby Disc, Penny Lane, Pyramid Music. (While I’m pointing out cool places, I see Poobah’s is still alive.)

And you know what? I’m to blame. Since subscribing to Rhapsody, I haven’t bought anything from a record store. Because when I step into a record store now, I feel nothing. No excitement, no sense of wonderment. Pretty much any music I want I can get on Rhapsody, and if I can’t get it, I’ll just browse and find something else I want. I took my first trip to Amoeba Music the other day, which in my college years would have been nothing short of a religious experience (just ask ZBalance). But I just looked around and thought, why bother? I can get all this stuff on-demand for my $10/month. Amoeba has a great DVD section, too, but I’ve got Netflix, so that does nothing for me, either.

Here’s the tricky part. As Rob Gordon might say, I’m a better “professional appreciator” because of it. I can find cool new things much easier, and explore them in much greater depth. When I find a band or artist I like, I generally listen to their whole catalog, especially if they’re a known influencer. If it’s something I might not like, I can just take a quick listen, fast forwarding and skipping through parts or tracks I don’t want to hear. I have become the audio equivalent of Galactus: Devourer of Discs, Eater of Albums.

So what replaces the cool record store? A so-called “lifestyle store”, with cool books, clothes, posters, toys, and other geegaws? Sounds almost like Urban Outfitters, now that I mention it. Still, it’s no Vintage Vinyl (which also appears to have passed on).

If you’re in a hurry just go down to the link and watch this amazing video to a song by a group called Muse.

But if you’ve got a moment… well,

Something weird is going on.

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The North American tour is most likely cancelled.

When did I find this out you ask? When I showed up at “The Chamber” in NYC last night to see them.

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I just learned of last.fm and their Audioscrobbler plugin. Basically, if you have a compatible player, Audioscrobbler will capture everything you play and upload it to the last.fm mothership, where it will create a net radio station with stuff you should like, unless you listen to a lot of stuff you hate. It can also create you charts, hook you up with similar listeners, and offer feeds to embed in web sites or blogs like this one. Sadly, there’s no plugin for Rhapsody, but that already offers RSS feeds (see my page for an example). Rhapsody also has a radio station creator, but it’s pretty weak compared to Pandora’s, and possibly last.fm’s.

My latest work “Curing Bricks” is up on http://www.myspace.com/zerobalance.
It’s a very diverse industrial tune.
Didn’t cry this time though…
Not as good?

Catchy tune, great video, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers are showing their long term relevance like few bands seem to be able to do these days . I enjoyed this song so much when I first heard it that I went to iTunes to purchase a copy, but sadly, my account info was garbled from a recent hard drive crash, so I didn’t buy it. I am oddly glad of this though, as it seems that this great song is destined to be overplayed on EVERY station I listen to, to the point where I will likely hate it before the full album is released May 9th. Hopefully the rest of the double album will live up to this single, yet somehow not get turned into jingles and get the Phil Collins era radio saturation that can ruin even the best album.

For some reason, I like this song. Could be because of the huge “wife approved” crush I have on Keira Knightly, another chick from the UK (though that is about all they have in common). You can find more info on her website, itunes, or whatever on your own.

As an added bonus, follow the link for more Masterchief musical mayhem!
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My latest work “Thing-Kinda-Thing” is up on http://www.myspace.com/zerobalance if you’re bored.

So,…
I cried while writing this song.
True story.
It happened last Wednesday while writing the lead guitar solo. (at the end, during the song’s fade-out.)
I’m not talking about Waa Boo Hoo bawlin’ here. But I DID shed a tear in my right eye.
It’s the equivelant of watching your children on the playground and suddenly it hits you…”Wow, those are my beautiful kids (notes) right there on the swings. They came from ME!”
Although it’s the first time it’s happened during one of my OWN songs, it’s not the first time it’s happened at all.

One particular moment it occurs is during a melody from the movie The Good The Bad and The Ugly. It’s when the “Ugly” fellow first stumbles upon the graveyard.
It’s called “Ecstacy of Gold” by film composer Ennio Morricone, if anyone wants to check it out.
Anyway, there is something about certain rare songs, the way the notes fit JUST right, that turns me into an emotional little girl inside.

So my question is:

Does this happen to anyone else? With music or any other artform?
I don’t understand the reason for the feeling.
It’s pretty pointless…

I am evaluating music sequencers to use with my new E-MU Xboard 49. It came with Ableton Live Lite 4 and Proteus X LE, and my sound card (Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS Platinum) came with Cubasis VST (Cubase lite) and FL Studio 4 Creative Edition. Not one full version in the bunch. I can respect that, but the way some versions were created is very frustrating.
     Kudos to Steinberg and Proteus. From my limited usage, they seem to be true, self-contained lite editions of other products. Ableton and FL, however, did a half-assed hack job. First off, Ableton hasn’t created a Lite version of Live 5, which shipped last fall. So it’s basically Live 4 with Operator (optional software synth) running in demo mode, with an option to hide the features not in the Lite version. If you could fully hide them, that’d be great, but I keep getting messages that read, “You are trying to access a hidden feature, you need to switch to demo mode”. Hidden feature? It’s right on the menu, jackass! Sometimes I get them from trying to drag and drop things. I should never see those messages, it should just not allow the operation, or show that you can do it. Also, you can’t save or export in demo mode, making it pretty worthless to me. Couldn’t they just remove the export functions, so you could save work but not render it to an audio (MP3, WAV, etc) file? Then every time you came up with a cool song or loop, you’d have more incentive to upgrade. It has built in tutorials and a hefty manual, but neither were pared down to match the Lite version. The manual has links that read, “See the feature chart to find out if your version even has this feature.” Of course, the feature chart hasn’t been created yet. I spent a lot less time with FL Studio, because I was getting those same “This version can’t do that” messages. My patience was used up with Live.
     This is a shame, because Live seems like a cool product. And after all that bitching and moaning, I can’t find a better product for the money. Owning the Lite version allows me to upgrade to Live 5 for $200. I’ve also looked at Reason 3 ($200 academic price), Sonar 5 Producer ($420 street) and Cubase SX3 ($400 academic price). Reason is the only one that comes close price-wise, but it can’t do audio recording, which I need for recording my dulcet tones. I may pick up Reason later, as it’s considered an excellent companion to Live, which is lacking in the instrument department. I’ll let you know how it goes in an upcoming article.

My latest tune if finally available after days of “processing”.

http://www.myspace.com/zerobalance

Up6 - Exponential Tablature

Check it.

I recently signed up with CD service yourmusic.com, and so far it’s the best deal in music I’ve seen. If you’re familiar with Netflix, the concept is similar (no, you’re not renting CDs). You go through their catalog and add CDs to your queue. Every month, the CD at the top of your queue is sent to you and your credit card is charged, until you quit the club.
Here is the amazing part. Cost of the CD? $6. Oh, cost with tax? $6. Cost with tax and shipping, you ask? $6. Wanna buy more CDs? $6. Cost per disc for box sets and double albums? $6. Cost if your queue is empty at your “time of the month”? $6 (and they don’t ship you anything).

That’s it. Frankly, I don’t see why you couldn’t just sign up, buy all the CDs you want at $6 each, and then quit. At worst, you leave one CD in the queue if they require a 30-day notice (which they don’t state, I’m just speculating).
My price threshold for CDs at a store is $12 for a disc I really want, otherwise $10 because they?re gonna tax me. Half.com has some great deals, but their shipping charge is $3 per disc. So, for me, this is a pretty stunning deal. Heck, I just saw Coldplay?s X&Y at Sam Goody (yeah, I know) for $20! Who the heck pays that? Hmm, yourmusic.com doesn’t offer that CD, so perhaps that’s a bad example…

The catch? None, really. Shipping isn?t instantaneous. I signed up on a Sunday morning (1/15), they shipped it on Tuesday (1/17) and it arrived today (1/26). About average for free shipping. Their selection isn?t stellar, about 14,000 CDs, but I was still able to find a few good ones. Reviewers elsewhere pointed out that CDs sometimes disappear from your queue, so if you really want something, you might want to order it while you know you can still get it. The only issue for me is that Rhapsody fulfills most of my listening needs, so I?m only buying CDs that are great as a whole, and something I?d want to listen to in the car. When I get a subscription-capable MP3 player, my need may disappear altogether. Until then, my queue is loaded.

On a lark, I subscribed to the Rhapsody Unlimited music subscription service, lured in the by their 14-day free trial ($10/month after that). I had fun with Pandora, but wanted to try something that gave me more control over what I listened to. In this case, complete control. Rhapsody has over 1.3M songs, and gives you the power to listen to any of them in any order. That sounds like a lot, and it is, but you’ll still run across missing albums, and occasionally missing artists. At least they have a button that reveals all of an artist’s missing albums.

Listening on the go

One of the benefits of the Unlimited service is Rhapsody To Go, which allows you to download tracks to a compatible portable device (the ones that say Subscription). There are 3 catches in that statement: 1) you are a current Rhapsody Unlimited subscriber, 2) your MP3 player is Janus/PlaysForSure compatible (iPods aren’t), and 3) you’re using Windows XP. And 4 catches if you include the fact that not all Rhapsody tracks are Subscription tracks, but in my experience almost all are. The quality of purchased and downloaded tracks is 128K, in WMA, AAC, or MP3.

Since I don’t see myself dropping the service anytime soon, I’m highly motivated to get a Subscription compatible player. Because I’d like an expandable player, I’m leaning towards the Sandisk e200 with a microSD slot, removable recharbable battery, FM tuner, and voice recorder, due out in March (happy birthday to me). [Attention Sandisk: when your marketing dept. launches a product at CES, without so much as a press release on your website, it’s time to fire them.]

Listening at home

You can listen two ways, through their web interface or their dedicated client. I usually use the client/jukebox software for its interface and convenience features. If you add a track to your library, it can download it so you can listen to it even when the site is down (which happens occasionally). Assuming you’re a current subscriber, of course, and are using Windows XP (I’m guessing it’s a DRM issue). You can purchase tracks for $.89 and albums for $7.99.

I don’t know how much music I listened to before, but I find with Rhapsody I listen to about 3 albums a night. It allows me to more thoroughly explore artists and genres. I find I’ll listen to classic rock musicians from past to present, until they start sucking (which happens pretty consistently as they approach the 1980s), and indie musicians from present to past, for pretty much the same reasons. I’m generalizing, but there’s definitely a pattern there, and it’s cool to see how the artists evolve (or devolve).

They also have several pre-programmed radio stations to help you explore new stuff, and allow you to create a station based on your tastes, like Pandora. I haven’t tried the custom station feature, and would be impressed if it was as good as Pandora, but I’ve been too busy albums to check.

A while back I heard a cool song on AOL Radio called Le Monster vs. Phofo by My Favorite. I went on to check out other stuff by My Favorite, and found that while they were decent, they didn’t create the sound I liked so much: Phofo did. I’ve had similar discoveries in the past: Super Bon Bon by Soul Coughing was only a hit when it was it remixed by Propellerheads; Battleflag by Pigeonhed and Lo Fidelity Alltars, whose collaboration created a whole greater than the sum of their parts.
     In his remix of Le Monster, Phofo infuses a lounge/bossa nova sound and snappy drums. If you listen to his other stuff, you see it’s a common theme, along with prodigious sampling. Speaking of which, he is a practicing trial lawyer (and I thought I was a renaissance man) and has set up samplinglaw.com to help other artists with this issue.
     He has many of his tracks posted as MP3s in the audio section of his site, definitely worth a listen. Notable tracks include the aforementioned Le Monster, Roger 7, and I Love Happy Funball (which was also a fantastic SNL skit: “Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.”)

So heres the deal.
For those of you who don’t know (or care to remember), I have two kids. Boy-Girl twins. They are almost 5 and getting closer to a cool age where toys are fun for the both of us and video games, well, let’s just say I’m going to teach them Tetris and Street-Fighter AND BLOW THE PANTS OFF OF THEM. (I’m too immature to be one of those caring dads that can let their kids beat them at stuff.)

Soon, I will be forcing, er um, I mean hoping that they will follow the same industrial and punk influences that I do.

BUT FOR NOW it’s just non-stop nursery song stuff, which brings me to today’s rant.

We watch the Noggin channel or Nick-JR A LOT. There are a few shows that actually have decent tunes on them.
Take “Lazytown”.
All the music is written in a “I’m a Barbie-Girl” dance/pop style. It’s not bad at all. (For childrens music. Give me some credit.)
Then there’s this chick Lori Berkner who has some good jams between shows.

So what’s my problem? You want to know? Really?

It’s that none of these songs will be remembered 20 years from now! Who the f*ck made the rule that only certain songs, written 200 years ago, are allowed to be passed on through the generations.
Examples?
I got dozens and you know them all too.
“London Bridge is Falling Down.”
“I’m a Little Tea pot”
“Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” (grossly plagiarized by the ABC song, yet no lawsuit… WTF?)

THESE SONGS ARE BAD. HORRIBLE.
Some are even sung purposely off-key. Example “On top of Spa-get-teeee”
Shoot me.
No, not me.
The moron who came up with that one. Shoot him.
If I could go back and see that song as it was being written. Maybe by some lumberjack taking a break, back in 1810. I’d swipe it from his hands. Read it out loud, so that he can hear how stupid it sounds, then rip it up and tell him to get back to choppin or you’re fired.

What’s aggravating is, that you can’t stop it.

When my kids are 25, I’ll ask them if they remember a show called Lazytown and maybe, after thinking for a second, they will get a vague picture of the show BUT the music will be lost to them.
YET if I we’re to start singing “There’s a hole in the bucket, Eliza Eliza…”
They’d be slappin’ their knee and singing right along with me.

When I was in college, I was a database of certain types of music. Mainly alternative, especially industrial. I’d actually keep handy a two page typed wishlist of albums to get, if I could find it cheap/used. If you mentioned bands or songs you liked, I’d be right there with, “well, if you liked that, give this a listen.” Since college, I’ve backed off a bit (and I have a theory that most people’s interest in music peaks when they’re in college). However, with a wide variety of net radio stations available (and working on a screenplay that involves, in part, the music industry), my interest is again rekindling, especially with indie music. So I could really use a music geek to advise me, based on stuff I know I like.

Enter Pandora, a web version of said geek, but without my endearing arrogance. Give it a song or an artist, and it creates a radio station filled with similar music. It’s powered by the Music Genome Project (I hadn’t heard of it, either), which catalogs musical attributes of songs and artists, so it can find similar ones. It also accepts your feedback to help sculpt the station; if you don’t like a song it plays, it’ll never play it again on that station (but it might show up on another). You can also combine artists/songs on one station to create hybrids. For instance, I’ve combined Elliot Smith and Jon Brion to form a station I call Pop Genius. For the record, I am not a genius. Just brilliant. Anyway, I also created a KMFDM station, which has so far played Static-X, NIN, and Rob Zombie. Hmm. I wonder if I can recreate AOL’s WB channel by entering the best tracks from the Smallville soundtracks. Uh, not that I’d want to… What? No, you’re gay!

The interface is Flash, and is quite smooth and intuitive. You can pause and skip tracks, but not rewind. The sound quality is excellent! I listen to a lot of net radio, and this is probably the clearest, cleanest feed I’ve heard, even though others are also listed as 128Kbs. I have a hunch that the ones I’m accessing through iTunes are streaming 128K MP3, whereas Pandora might be using a variable bitrate format utilized by Flash. It is currently commercial free, but they warn they’ll be ramping up the advertising. I don’t know if this means radio commercials or not, but they’ll give you an ad-free version for $36/year. That seems reasonable, and well under the $10/month Rhapsody/Listen.com charges (although you can directly choose songs and albums with those services, whereas Pandora you can only “steer” the selections with feedback).

The only issue is whether they’ll be able to keep up with cataloging new and old music. Obviously, if a song’s attributes haven’t been cataloged, the software can’t really recommend it. They claim they don’t pigeonhole artists, which is good considering the range some of them have (how I miss Leeb and Fulber, who created a new band for every variation of industrial they tried: Front Line Assembly, Delerium, Intermix, and a few others). However, their catalog is 10K artists, and 300K songs, so you’ll probably be good for quite a while.

Stay tuned, I plan to experiment with some software that may complement Pandora frighteningly well, as well as necessitate that MP3 player I’ve been eyeing for a while now…

As some of you here know, I amateurishly write music from time to time.
My latest tune “Sibling Rivalry” is up on this site.

http://www.myspace.com/zerobalance

If anyone would like to add some lyrics and make us both rich….
(I don’t own a microphone, nor a singing talent.)

The title sounds like a good name for a Star Trek episode. Wait, it is. Oh well, it still captures my theme for this message: that some of the answers to our current-day dilemmas can be found in the technology of the past. Case in point: the Digisette MP3 cassette player. Better than your iPod, let me explain.

I still remember the days of the big debate between two different types of automobile CD-changers. Some folks preferred the type which mounted in your trunk and would beam the sound to your FM radio. “No fuss, no wiring muss” was the battle cry. You could just plop this product in your car and it would work instantly. Instantly, through your dopey, static-filled radio. Audiophiles rightly decried this monstrosity and preferred the wired models. Sure, they were a hassle to install, but they delivered crisp sound to your speakers, sound that was carried on shining, 12 gauge copper wire. The difference was apparent to any ear, whether refined or not.

Which brings me back to the current dilemma facing iPod owners: you now own a device that carries your entire collection of music (and more), but you can’t easily play it in your car without using an FM transmitter or some sort of cassette adapter plugged into your car radio. Either of those solution introduces a tangle of wires and a headache both aesthetic and operational. Do you dare risk a car accident while trying to find your favorite music or trying to reach your windshield wiper controls over a tangle of wires?? And how about the poor quality of FM-transmitted music ?? How easily the masses forego the high quality of car stereo sound by selling their souls to the ever-increasing capacity of the iPods of this world !

The elegant solution to this dilemma lies in a product from the past, one of the first breed of MP3 players which is now, sadly defunct. The Digisette MP3 player looks like a tape cassette that has been dipped in aluminum alloy. It is heavier than its analog cousin because its innards contain a fully workable MP3 player and a tiny amount of flash memory. Add a MMC memory card (a totally redundant name!) and you have yourself a bit less of 1Gig of memory for the road. And I do mean “for the road.” Pop this baby in your cassette player, and you have yourself a good 10-hours or equivalent CD capacity, easily accessible through your player’s FF and REW buttons. Elegant. The player pops into your cassette player (out of sight, out of mind) without a single wire in sight. And the sound: it is played directly to your car stereo’s cassette playback head. It is wonderful. If you wish to walk away from the car, you can always pop this beauty into the belt-clip holder provided with the player and plug-in your favorite headphones for a similar, portable sound experience.

Sure, the memory does not allow you to carry the Virgin Records library in your pocket. But the provided PC interface allows you load up a gaggle of MMC cards with your favorite tunes for a swappable library of surprising capacity. I use mine to listen to hours and hours of podcast material in my car; it is an invaluable ally against the poor FM reception I encounter on my way between Orange and San Diego counties.

Good luck trying to find this beautifully designed and amazingly geeky technical wonder. Although it fits my needs (and probably yours) to the fullest, it does not fit with the model that Steve Jobs and all of the iPod copycats are foisting on you: “Bigger is Better.” Don’t believe them. Size does NOT matter when you can’t use it where it counts the most: in the back of your car. The Digisette may be small, but that is its charm. It can do the job you really need, not the one you think you need. And it looks right at home in your car cassette deck. Just remember to buy a couple of spare batteries for it; you may be listening to it for hours and hours on end…….

To paraphrase Milton, if I have to hear one more Geico commercial, I’m going to blow up the building. I don’t care if I’ll save hundreds of dollars on my car insurance. If I do switch from 21st Century (who’s getting way too expensive), it won’t be to Geico. Because AOL Radio plays their commercials on every one of their stations. All. The. Freaking. Time.
     Since they only have two sponsors (Dorritos being the other), I have to drop them to retain my sanity. I previously wrote good things about them, and I’m officially taking them back. I wish I didn’t have to, because I did like the music and the easy links to AMG. Anyway, this is what I’m pimpin’ now:

SomaFM
I found these guys through iTunes, and listen to the Indie Pop Rocks station. Very few interruptions, and a good music selection. Belle and Sebastian, Guided by Voices, Elliot Smith. They also just introduced me to The Go! Team (no affiliation with The Crack Team… as far as you know!), which is next on my pickup list. Also check out the Secret Agent channel, a modern take on 60s lounge music, Bossa Nova, and Connery-era James Bond. And occasionally a little Bollywood flavor throw in. Very chill.

3wk
They have a couple indie stations, one modern and one classic (which the announced with King Crimson background music, so it must be good). More cool music, no commercials (although they do remind you they’re listener supported, but that’s way less obnoxious than an insurance commercial).

ChroniX Aggression
What’s sometimes referred to as “alternative metal”. Fear Factory, Slipknot, System of a Down. Good music to get the heart pumping, before you rip it out and wolf it down.

What I like about these stations is that they display the artist and song while they’re playing, so you can punch it into your search bar and get more info. 3wk will even tell you the album and the label its on.

Now I just gotta find a replacement for the WB station… not that I listen to any of that really catchy pop music. You can’t prove it!

I listen to a lot of net radio, since I’m on the computer a lot and a crave variety in my music. One of my main sources was Netscape Radio, which apparently is now AOL Radio. For a while now, I have experienced problems with my Radio@Netscape player, where it basically won’t start. When it was working, I saw occasional ads for unlimited listening at AOL Radio, and since they’re the same company (until Time Warner gives AOL the boot) I thought I’d check it out. Turns out AOL has the same stations and an interface that looks identical, but offers unlimited listening (Netscape cut you off after a couple hours). The new interface appears to be pure web-based and launches in a popup, unlike Netscape’s, which required a separate downloadable executable. Unfortunately for now, Firefox is not supported, but they promise it will be next month. So it’s time to dust off your IE.

I listen to it often due to the good selection of stations and the ability to rate songs. I have no idea how much my vote counts, but I like to feel listened to (hence this blog). In addition, they link the artist, song, and album to the AOL’s music page which licenses data from the All Music Guide, making it easy to learn about artists I’m not familiar with. My staples are Indie Rock Mix and Electronica, but other notable stations include Melancholia, for when your misery wants company; The WB Radio, the music of Smallville; Xtreme Alt Rock, hard but not boring; and a variety of single-artist stations for bands like The Ramones, The Doors, Yes, and others. Plus just about every other style of music you can think of, and several promotional stations for things like the Warp Tour and Live 8. Overall, a good one-stop music shop.

I read an interesting article on the limitations of DualDisc, and the short of it is that both the CD side and the DVD side have less capacity than their standard counterparts. They have only 60 minutes of CD audio, and the DVD side has a single layer like the kind of recordables you can currently buy (DVD-5). In addition, Denon has said not to use them in their players until they can do thorough testing. I was considering picking up the Keane DualDisc, then I found out the limitations forced them to drop a track on the CD side! Luckily, they also offer a SACD, so I’ll be going with that. It’s a shame there’s so much marketing behind an inferior product, they seem much better off just including a bonus DVD with CDs to avoid the mess.

On Monday I got to see KMDFM on their 20th Anniversary Tour at the House of Blues in Anaheim (continuing the industrial/metal onslaught on Disneyland - Skinny Puppy is up next!). For the uninitiated, they’re basically one of the greatest industrial bands of all time. Very hard, consistent, and fun, one of their trademarks is including their name in their songs. A lot. It’s that kind of self-absorption I can really respect. I like people who recognize how awesome they are.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp Overall, they rocked hard. The first part of the set seemed to concentrate on the later stuff; either that or I’m getting senile. I haven’t been up on the last few albums, like ATTAK and WWIII; the last I can recall was ADIOS, so it’s been about 5 years. But when they did Light, the crowd was electrified, and I found I’m definitely not the only one who thinks ANGST was their best. They followed that with Drug Against War, which also rocked the house, but the house appeared to be getting tired by then (the house is not getting any younger). However, the absence of En Esch meant a lot of KMFDM classics had to be cut. This was a serious disappointment, especially for a 20th anniversary tour, where I was expecting a great big “best of”.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp The lineup they did have was solid, though. Sascha was there, of course, the only original left. Jules Hodgson, Andy Selway, and Steve White all did a fine job. The fun, new addition, though, is Lucia Cifarelli, who does all the female vocals. From the back of the club, she looked like a white Salma Hayek. She went from sexy gyrations to tough girl stances, marching and pumping her fist to command the ground troops. Three words. So. Fucking. Adorable. Just something about cute girls trying to act tough that makes them even cuter. I wanted to take her home and put her on display in the living room. She also got the biggest cheers of the night when she walked out after the first encore. We all figured that was it, and were kinda tired, but when she asked for applause - and flashed her silver wonderbra - we all went nuts. As it should be.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp The club itself was decent, and I loved how easy it was to get to, especially in OC. But the vocals were not very clear, and if I didn’t know them already, they were very difficult to make out. Since KMFDM’s lyrics are one their strong suits, this was a letdown. DJ?Acucrack, who opened, also had muddled vocals. Maybe it’s the vocoder, maybe the equipment, but I wanted better. To be fair, I did like what they were spinning, and you can check some of it out at their site.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp One of the stranger parts of the experience was the crowd. No, not industrialites in uniform, but the lack thereof! I’m not sure who wins the “most out-of-place” award: the guy in the Cowboys jersey and baseball cap, or the nerdy Asian guy with the white and beige polo shirt, khakis, and black dress shoes. Who am I kidding, the Asian guy wins! I didn’t do much myself, but come on, this is KMFDM. Show some damn respect.

This is as much a reminder to myself as it is an invite to those interested. Here are some concerts I’m planning to attend:

House of Blues Anaheim
I like this one because parking’s a cinch, as it’s in Downtown Disney. This also makes it a somewhat ironic venue.

9-22   Ministry with My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult and Hanzel Und Gretyl
11-15 KMFDM - 20th Anniversary Tour with support DJ? Acucrack

Avalon
Never been there, used to be Hollywood Palace. Found this post on their forum about parking, should make it easier/cheaper. And weekday events should help, too.

10-12 Badly Drawn Boy

I’ll also be at Avalon for The Pixies, but that’s sold out. And I would have mentioned The Beastie Boys at Universal Amphitheatre, but all that’s left are extreme-stage-left nosebleed seats.

I’ve just been informed about a new site called AllOfMP3.com. It is a Russian site (link for English in the upper left corner) that offers digital music at a steal. What’s a steal, you ask? Well, iTunes charges $.99/song, and Listen.com charges $.79/song + $10/month. So how does 1-2 cents/MB sound? Yes, they charge by bandwidth, and their Online Encoding (OE) system allows you to choose the format and bitrate. Of course, higher bitrate = more data = more money. Some songs cost $.02/MB, so for a high quality, long song, you maybe pay a quarter, but on average it’s a nickel. And some albums are even free.<