Saturday, June 30, 2007

OT: Rock $ Roll placement

Nobody thought that anyone could out do Guns & Roses in terms of greed. When the band released two albums on the same day instead of a double album and claimed this would save their fans money we on the outside laughed at the giant grunt of stupidity. No one from the underground music world would fuck their fans like that.

Flash forward...

Smashing Pumpkins has gone above and beyond by signing on for 4 different version of their new album. Each one has a "bonus" song (read an extra song that wasn't good enough) and all "special" versions of the CD will be sold by big chain stores and iTunes (which isn't any different) No special version for the indy shops, unless they are the ones who will get the vinyl version which will probably be at a fair number of places any way.

As I skimmed forums looking for reaction from the bands audience I could see a lot of people were pissed off, few were surprised. I guess when a band I like pulls a stunt, like most of The Sex Pistols branded output I just laugh it off and go "good one guys" so who am I to cast a stone?

Okay, now let's play devil's advocate...

People want their favorite musicians to keep making music and love to stay in denial that their pop stars really have day jobs. So what should a working musician do? They can either make money doing music or they can cop to having a straight job. Tough call.

A second point that some people may not have thought of... Collectors live variations on releases. Color vinyl, etc.

So only a real fan can decide what they feel is a rip off. I can't comment with any authority on Guns & Roses or Smashing Pumpkins, they really aren't bands I listen to. I can say that lot's of Punk bands have been returning in many ways, some just for the cash.

Friday, June 29, 2007

DVD Part 4 and counting

Today Alan convinced me that I had to face my fears and buy a spool of disk. I headed over the the local electronics discount place then the office supply place when the first had almost no selection.

From what I had read Sony disks were considered safe, good and generally available so I bought a 50 pack of their AccuCORE DVD-R's and headed to the testing ground.

I put together a folder that weighed in at 4.0 Gigs and dropped it in Toast. I choice burning speed as "best", began the process and waited. At the 1 second left mark, a write error appeared and Toast crashed.

Hmmm... Maybe it's something I did?

I restarted the computer and began the next burn, this time at "2x", I waited and watched and Guess what happened...

As pissed off as I was I figured the drive it's self was most likely fucked and I decided I should consider cutting my losses, pull the hard drive out and wack the fucking computer with my chain mace, which my wife apparently hid.

I networked the soon to be destroyed eMac with my Mirror Door and transferred the test folder.

Next I happily popped in a fresh disk and hit all systems are go. I leaned back in my chair and felt pretty satisfied. I imagined what I could do with the eMac's carcass to ensure it's total suffering. As the burn came to an end the same error notice appeared, crashed Toast and made me see blood red.

I now began to wonder whether these drives didn't like the dyes being used on the DVDs. I put in a CD-R and burned it on the eMac, I did another I verified that they matched the original files... 100% fine.

FUCK!!!!!

I'm now going to research compatibility issues with DVD-R brands while I debate buying another hard drive and returning this batch of disks.

Microsoft's newest toy

Having money doesn't always dictate one has taste.
This is a instance where Microsoft made a good buy on the technology market and may get to look slick for more then a minute.

As an Apple user, I am impressed.

Thursday, June 28, 2007

fuck me with a gear slut artist brush

After years of back and forth with various people associated with The Brothers Baschet, one can actually order instruments in a semi clear manner. Of course if you want the good stuff you are going to have to suffer through a trip to France.

Check this site and drool. I want a set of everything in fucking D-E-L-U-X-E!

Sunday, June 24, 2007

Prediction

Here's my prediction...

After finally installing Ableton Live 6 I suspect I am going to be up to my ass in a fury over Core Audio and it's MIDI implementation.