Frequent readers of this blog will know that I spend a huge proportion of my time talking about computers, but every now and then I venture out into other subjects. I’ve talked in the past about Digital Rights Management (DRM) - the stuff that means that you can’t listen to the CD you bought on your mp3 player, or transfer your paid-for iTunes music when you get to your 4th iPod - and Creative Commons, the license for creative-types to release their works under to protect their authorship, but allow their works to be distributed.

Into this mix comes Jono Bacon, one of the LugRadio presenters, who also doubles as a heavy metal musician. He has just embarked on a new project called Severed Fifth, an experiment into seeing how far you can get by bypassing the existing music industry, and leveraging a little bit of internet and popular culture savvy. This will, of course, involve him releasing a load of music, but it’s about a lot more than that.

Take a listen to his introductory message over at SeveredFith.com, and, even if you’re not into heavy metal, if you’re into music at all then this is a project worth taking an interest in.

mrBen

Is it just me or does anyone else fail to understand her?

I generally dodge anything to do with popular music but I’ve happened upon Ms MacDonald a few times on the telly recently, a reason in itself to stop watching the box, and I’m constantly astounded that she seems to have some kind of musical career.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m hardly the greatest singer myself, barely able to carry a tune in a box, but surely she sounds like she’s chewing her way through a mouthful of words with every breath.

If anyone can explain to me what the deal is with her, please illuminate me…

BigAl

This one’s for Edgy.

BigAl

Much as I disapprove of embedding YouTube videos in blogs, I couldn’t resist.

BigAl

Check out the song (and interview) from Dan Le Sac & Scroobius Pip, which I found over at Phil Crissman’s site - a brilliant piece of rhetoric, and funny too

(Recent links is broken at the moment, otherwise this may have just been squandered in there)

NB: The ‘kill’ in the title refers to the phrase ‘that really kills’ rather than the act of murder, in case you were worried….

mrBen

Some links: Buy on Amazon | Skillet’s Homepage | The obligatory MySpace page

I first heard Skillet on Christian Rock.net, and in particular it was their song “Rebirthing” that caught my ear. Don’t let the “Christian” title put you off - this is proper rock (at least, as I know it) and should be judged alongside other bands. I also really liked the promo they had at the time for this album.

The album is a bit of weird mixture - as with all albums some tunes hit you straight away, and others take a while to get used to. For quite a heavy sounding band, they had more lighter sounding tracks on the album than I was expecting, and one or two of those took longer to get used than I was expecting.

The band consists of a bassist (who is the lead singer), drummer, guitarist, and a combined keyboard/guitar/singer. They quite bass led at times, with lots of good hefty guitar work going on in the background - if I had hair I’d even consider moshing to one or two of the songs in particular (assuming no-one was looking). The keyboard work tends to lend itself more to some of the quieter songs, but is used really effectively even in the heavier stuff. They also use strings in a couple of songs, which really add some depth in a couple of places (I assuming it’s “real” strings, rather than synth-ed, but I could be wrong).

I’m not one for giving ratings - I don’t really listen to enough music to give a proper, useful opinion. I really like the album - there are a couple of tracks that I skip when I’m feeling “rock-y” (namely 3 - ‘Yours to Hold’, 7 - ‘Those Nights’ and 9 - ‘Say Goodbye’), but they’re still good listening if you’re in the mood.

Check out the tunes available on their site, and their myspace page, and if you want a loan of the CD, let me know.

mrBen

Thought it was time I reviewed some of the CDs that I’ve received in the last few months (Christmas and birthday). First up, the Serenity soundtrack, composed by David Newman. (available from Amazon and other good bookstores)

I own a few movie soundtracks, and they tend to vary in quality. You generally get 2 types - movies that have used existing music, and movies that have compositions written for them. Obviously many movies do have a bit of both, but most only have enough of one or the other for their soundtrack CD. A notable exception is Romeo and Juliet (the Baz Luhrman version) which had 1 CD of both, and both of which are excellent. By way of contrast, The Wedding Singer was mostly pre-written (80s) music, and Lord of the Rings was most composed (excellent by Howard Shore).

The choice of David Newman for the Serenity music was not without it’s controversy; Greg Edmondson had so excellently scored the Firefly TV series, to the point where the fans created enough interest for Fox to release not only a soundtrack CD, but now also a copy of the score. It is fair to say that many were upset that Greg was overlooked for the film, but I believe there were studio considerations. That said, Newman has done an excellent job, and I believe that the music, as film music should, enhanced the film, without becoming obtrusive.

However, there are a few problems with the music as a soundtrack CD. While I do not regret having a copy at all, it is not the most listenable albums in my collection. Much of the music is quite short, to fit with the sections of film, and in places feels a little “un-finished”. Unlike some soundtracks, I found it quite difficult to imagine the scene of the film from which the music came. A lot of the music is also quite quiet and moody, which doesn’t make for good listening on the daily commute, which requires quite a short range of audio, with a high base level of volume.

As a Firefly fan, this is a must-have CD for your collection. As a film music fan, I would suggest that maybe it is missable. Probably better would be to buy the Firefly soundtrack, although I only have that on good word as I have not listened to it personally.

Next up will be Skillet: Comatose and Pillar: Where do we go from here?

mrBen

It’s been _ages_ since I posted, so I thought I’d better get something online, and probably a few extra things over the next couple of weeks, as I’m guessing that April might be a bit of a dry month, blogwise, what with other things happening

Firstly - my birthday party was excellent. Loads of people came (thanks) and it was a great night. Thanks to Heather for all her hard work, and to GI for his excellent DJ work, especially covering the graveyard shift. And thanks to you if you came.

The best news is that I got enough money between my birthday and my bonus to buy a new electric guitar (an Epiphone SG Special) and an FX pedal (a Zoom G2.1U). Should be getting them this weekend, I hope. Looking forward to rocking out with BigAl on bass

I’ve got a whole load of posts lined up for this month that should have really come before, including a book review on “Why Men Hate Going To Church” by David Murrow, a review of the church Men’s Weekend Away, and some more details about my trip to Mozambique.

Watch this space!

mrBen

I gave Edgy a copy of Porcupine Tree’s Deadwing at the weekend, very possibly the best album the Tree have produced yet.  I thought he would appreciate it as it’s not as “out there” as some prog.

So he’s on the phone yesterday and I ask if he has had a chance to listen to any of it.  To my great surprise (because getting anyone to listen to prog isn’t an easy thing at all) he said he had.  To my even greater surprise he liked it!

Apparently he has long laboured under a misunderstanding that prog was all about wizards (!?!) and that Deadwing was going to be more of the same.

And it’s not.

So:

Prog. Not just about wizards.

Big Al
on behalf of the Prog Marketing Board

Watch the video, and check out this article. DRM affects everyone - not just geeks.

mrBen

OK - I confess that I generally dislike the trend for posting whatever you happen to be listening to on your blog posts, mainly because the fact that you are listening to it doesn’t actually guarantee that even _you_ like it……

But at the moment I’m currently listening to, and mostly enjoying, content from ChristianRock.net - now I know that Christian rock bands have had a bad rap in the past - everyone talks about Petra and Stryper, but wishes they weren’t Not all the content on CR is good, but there is some really good stuff (if you like rock, that is). I’m particularly impressed with a piece called ‘Rebirthing’ from the band Skillet (you can listen to it on their MySpace page), but it is not by any means the only good piece of music.

Even if you’re not a Christian, then it might be worth a look (well, listen).

Enjoy

mrBen

Aye, okay. I’m willing to accept that there’s some cool stuff on YouTube.

The Gnarls Barkley link I posted earlier.

Loads of cool live stuff by Frank Zappa.

But it is filled with a wealth of crap. Still, if it encourages peeps to make daft vids for their friends the maybe there’s some good to it.

But when you can’t find a video for Labe Siffre’s “Something Inside So Strong” then we’re all just wasting our time people.

Very possibly one of the most uplifting songs ever made.

So, being denied by YouTube I go on the trusty Google hunt for any version I can stream.

And I find this sample (sorry, it’s a real media file). It’s The Celtic Tenors.

And these people must die.

I know it might seem harsh but it’s the only course of action for butchering such a classic work.

However Pop Idol wannabe made good Darius “The man, the legend” Danesh apparently did his own version. This may or may not be the case as I can’t find any concrete info about it.

Still, I know that you’re all huge Darius fans (like me) so check out his site and have a hearty laugh enjoy the great man at his best.

BigAl

I said in my previous post that I would post some additional thoughts about my new media player after a couple of weeks of usage. Overall, the experience has been very good - the player produces good quality music, is nicely built, and does what I want it to. There are a few annoyances, though:

• The Music - Hold - FM slider. The button itself feels very flimsy, which in turn makes it very difficult to operate. Even worse is that because it is a 3 stage slider, it’s very easy to slide it past hold, and onto FM, requiring that you then slide it back to Music, and then hit play. It would be better to have 2 sliders, 1 for Hold on and off, and the other for Music or FM selection. Having the sliders more robust, and more flush to the edge of the player, would be a good move too.
• Ordering - I’ve not quite sussed out how it orders the files on the player. I _think_ it’s alphanumeric, which can be a PITA if the CDDB entry for a particular album doesn’t include track numbers.
• Big files - I mostly use the player for listening to LUGRadio, which is typically about 80-90 minutes long. It would be nice if I could pause playing it, skip to listening to some music, and then return to listening to LUGRadio at the place I left off. Sadly, I don’t think this is possible (I’m not sure if any player works like this?)

Mostly, though, I can’t moan

mrBen

I’m not a big music listener, but recently I’ve been in search of some good Creative Commons music that I can use in the upcoming Camp Drama Video. And thus I have come up with a couple of gems that I thought I would share:

• Jamendo is a great source of CC music - there’s tonnes of good stuff for all different music tastes.
• Who is Elmo Blatch (aka WIEB) has a member who is part of the LugRadio IRC channel. The EP that you can download from the site is excellent - quite a variety of styles. Although be warned that there is some swearing, so it should have a big black ‘n’ white sticker on it

Listen. Enjoy. Comment.

mrBen

A performance from the 2006 MTV Music Awards.

Gnarls Barkley.

Cool band. Cool music. Cool Vid.

Nuff Said.

BigAl 

Here’s an idea for a killer product:

I really liked my Creative mp3 player - one of the best things was the small size, and built-in USB plug. It was a shame it was so small. So I was thinking - what about seperating the control elements and the battery from the storage. (In the Muvo, the battery is a little j-shaped sheath, and the controls are on a USB stick that just slides into the sheath). So you have a kind of little remote (like you can get for other players), which controls the player, but also houses a small battery. At the end of the cable, you have a USB socket, into which you can plug any USB key, meaning unlimited, expandable storage.

You heard it here first - I expect a royalty cheque in the post.

mrBen

…when the home interweb access was gone was two of my favourite songs.

Kablam and an excellent cover of Walking On The Moon.

And now, because I love you all very much, I share them with you.

You lucky people.

BigAl 

I don’t know about you, but, while I’m in some ways a massively habitual person, I also have a tendency to float between different things in life - ‘fads’ as it were. My parents vividly remember the period of time when I wanted a BMX, although I don’t remember it at all. I can, however, remember lots of things that did pass by - cub scouts, judo, skateboarding to name but a few. Which is why I think it’s interesting to think about the things that I have stuck to. Here are some:

• Playing the guitar - despite the fact that they spent huge amounts of money for piano lessons, my parents still let me borrow a guitar from a friend and teach myself. And, for some unknown reason, the guitar stuck, whereas the piano didn’t, although I still play every now and then.
• Linux - I’ve been into computers for years, and many things were on and off. To be honest, there is a part of me that is surprised that I kept coming back to Linux, but it’s certainly something that has stuck, and, beyond that, become a large part of my life, and hopefully my future.
• Christianity - although an underlying part of my life for 20 years now, I can’t say that it’s been all plain sailing, but it’s definitely something that has stuck.

mrBen

2 days to go….

Check it out.

Turn the speakers on and get down with your bad selves.

I’ve had this on for the last 15 mins while packing more boxes for the move.

I need help.

BigAl

I’ve been passed a musical baton, which is tricky, given that I don’t listen to a lot of music…. but here goes:

Total volume of music files on my computer: 80MB - probably more soon, when I get a round tuit.

The last CD I bought was:Erm - I think it was How to Build an Atomic Bomb by U2, although I think I bought it and then ended up having it given to me as a present instead.

Song playing right now: nothing. Wife is sleeping….

Five songs I listen to a lot, or that mean a lot to me:

In no particular order, other than I thought of them in this order:

1. One - U2
2. Intimacy - Matt Redman
3. Deeper - Delirious?
4. Throwing it all away - Genesis
5. Worlds Apart - Jars of Clay

Five people to whom I’m passing the baton:

1. Al
2. Guy Incognito
3. SuperGingerMan
4. Phil Crissman
5. Cheezy

mrBen