Vinyl LP day today

Started out very early today to attend the annual Stone Ridge School Book Sale. A bit of a misnomer as they sell records, cds, dvds and other collectibles in addition to records. In past years, I've scored some choice vinyl items. Prices are absurdly reasonable at one dollar a record. This year I got there at shortly after the opening time of 8 am. Pretty early for me these days. I would say the selection was about average. I picked up about 30 records that I've already set about cleaning with my VPI record cleaning machine.

This got me back into the mood of spinning some vinyl. I have a very modest Music Hall MMF 2 turntable hooked up to my upstairs computer/music studio system. I had been annoyed by some apparent background hum that I always thought was leakage of the magnetic motor field into the cartridge. Well, I really got into it today and discovered that in fact the turntable belt was not riding the crown of the motor pulley but riding up to the top of the pulley. I went about for a way to to correct this. The turntable is serviceable but a bit kludgey. The motor is suspended on a rubber band of sorts with four screw mounts. I determined that I need to pull the front of the motor back under some tension so that it would not lean forward. The solution was absurdly simple. One simple rubber band wrapped under the front of the motor and secured on the two rear screw mounts and I had enough tension to allow the belt to ride correctly on the crown of the pulley. Instant silence and sonic bliss. I wish I could have figured this out a long time ago. Now I am stoked to transfer some more vinyl to CD with improved sonics.

A New Song For Spring

So, I wrapped up my taxes yesterday and now I am free to get back to my hobbies.

I've been experimenting with the effects processor built into the Emu Emulator X soundcard I bought a while back. This card is chock full of features. Unfortunately, the device drivers have been very troublesome. I notified Emu over six months ago of a confirmed bug and they totally dropped the ball in responding to my report. I recently contacted them and Sony about the ASIO driver bug and have finally gotten acknowledgement that they are aware of the problem. No date on when I can expect a fix. Supposedly, Emu will release updated drivers in May. I can only hope they start to solve the problems so many have experienced.

Anyway, I hadn't gotten around to testing out all the onboard effects presets for guitar that are included with the Emu patchmix application. I've stumbled upon some very nice sounds. The advantage here is that I can apply the effects before I send the audio to Acid so I can record the modified signal. Acid doesn't support ASIO direct monitoring like Sonar and other apps so that you can hear VST effects in real time while you record.

I was noodling around on the guitar and came up with a minor key jazzy chord sequnce that I became enamored with. I wasn't planning on creating a song out of this but one thing led to another before I knew it I had pretty decent short tune. I call it Tax Free. It reminds me a bit of John Abercrombie's great 80's quartet. On a whim I decided to incorporate the Edirol Hypercanvas soft synth to add piano, drums, and bass. I was particularly pleased with the drum sound where I use a lot of cymbals. I'm still learning my way with MIDI drums but I like the result I got this time. The piano and acoustic bass sounds fell into place and I believe the song hangs together fairly well. I've uploaded it to Acid Planet. I hope I get a few listens and comments.

Amazingly, Acid was rock solid throughout the entire recording session. I even switched to ASIO for recording the MIDI parts in order to get better latency. I'm not sure why things worked so well this time when I've had problems in the past. I did stick to standard 44k 16bit resolution. Also, I had just rebooted after installing the latest Microsoft security updates. A puzzle, but I am not complaining as long as it allows me to be creative and not fight the hardware/software.

Cielo Norte - The very first Bill Payne solo record

Something I've longed hoped for but had pretty much given up hope on has just landed in my email box. The very first Bill Payne solo record (Cielo Norte). Bill Payne the legendary keyboard player of Little Feat. You can order it here. I just placed an immediate order.

I have a long history with Little Feat but after seeing Lowell George's last concert I seemed to lose interest in the broken pieces of the remainder of Little Feat. In recent years they seemed to have regained some momentum. I've sampled some of their albums but none of them have clicked with me.

I have always wondered what a Bill Payne solo record would sound like. One hint was the beautiful tune, Gringo, from one of the miscellaneous compilations. It will be very interesting to hear what form this album has now taken. Bill Payne, in my mind, is one of rock's most underrated talents. I can't wait to hear this.

[Listening to: Radio Free Radio - Digital Flotsam 11 - P.W. Fenton - Digital Flotsam - The One Pound Edition (24:41)]

Pat Metheny Group, Lisner, DC - Full Report

Here's my report to the Pat Metheny Group list on Yahoo! Groups:

Hi folks,

Sorry for my very curt message about the great PMG concert at Lisner in Washington, DC on 3/29. It was just so great, I was still in a post concert glow. I was speechless.

I'll just add a few tidbits that might amuse the fans out there.

First of all it was a beautiful early spring day and evening in the nation's capitol. Daytime temps got into the mid sixties and were still in the fifties at nightfall.

Lisner, the concert venue, is on the campus of George Washington University in Northwest DC. Being an active school, there were hordes of collegians roaming around seemingly oblivious to the musical maelstrom about to be unleashed in their midst.

I did miss one opportunity while hanging outside about an hour before the concert. I saw Steve Rodby walk by but he was so unassuming and I was shy enough that I couldn't bring myself to accost him. I would have loved to have babbled on with him about how much I love his duo albums with Ross Traut or his production work with Oregon but I didn't. Sigh.

Lisner is a very special concert hall. IMHO, it is the best sounding concert hall in DC. I believe it seats about 1200 so it is very intimate. I have seen Pat here at least a half dozen times. There's a reason he keeps coming back. I've lived in the DC area for 40 years and have seen so many memorable concerts at Lisner. Some of you will be interested to know that more than half of Little Feat's "Waiting for Columbus" live album was recorded at Lisner. Some consider it one of the better live rock recordings. I was at those concerts. Lisner was also the site of Lowell George's (Little Feat leader) very last concert before he died the very next day. I was in attendance as well. So many memorable moments: Weather Report, Bela Fleck w/ Danny Gatton (local DC guitar legend), David Sylvian, Chick Corea.

When PMG plays DC, I always try to go to day two of their run on the theory that they will be very relaxed since they have a day off the road and have a relatively easy day. As far as I can tell, this seems to be the case. The concert was one of my best in memory. The only concert that still competes in my memory is the very first one from about twenty five years ago. I first saw the original PMG at a now defunct but infamous club in Georgetown, DC called the Cellar Door. This 100 seat club was also the site of many great performances. I still can visualize the PMG shoe horned onto the ridiculously small stage with Danny, Mark, and Pat packed like sardines around Lyle's grand piano and Oberheim. This was a turning point for me and I've been along for the ride ever since.

Speaking of my first PMG concert leads to mention how much I enjoyed hearing PMG play Lone Jack at last night's performance. I've lost track whether this has been played much in recent years but it really hit home to me last night. While PMG has evolved so much over the years and I love every minute, it's still a tune like Lone Jack that reminds of what first attracted me to PMG in the first place. There's an airiness to the sound that is just ethereal - mellifluous as one early PMG press release once said.

Pat's solo's were all just so spot on. I had to laugh when I saw Pat's teeth shining brightly on more than one solo. I couldn't help thinking of Gary Burton's quote about his first meeting with Pat - "All those teeth".

I was also glad that "Roots of Coincidence" has stayed in the set. I may be off base, but I consider it in some ways a spiritual ancestor to TWU. I also love the garage band rock out that others have mentioned. I don't know why but I get a real kick out of seeing Lyle strap on his guitar and rock out. It's a real "Wayne's World" (SNL allusion) moment for me. Is it true that all keyboard players secretly want to be guitar players?

You probably can't believe I've gotten all this way without mentioning TWU. What can I say? It's a tour de force. I've listened to it at least a dozen times. Listened to it driving to the concert. Listened going home. I still keep discovering new things. Seeing it live just seared it into my mind. Little things like the Steve Reich "Vermont Counterpoint" repeating guitar motif impressed me when I saw both Cuong Vu and Pat playing this live. I always thought this would be some kind of guide track. Or, how I waited on the edge of my seat for the Eberhard Weber interlude that Steve just nails. It's quite a sight to see him balancing the stand up bass while playing the fretless bass at the same time. Gregoire was transcendent. I can see why Pat, in the Wash Post article, raves so much. Vu was spot on as always. Antonio just propelled every song into the stratosphere. The only curiosity was how little Nando was spotlighted. I have his solo albums and I think he is a tremendous talent. It seems every member but Nando got a solo spot. Nando certainly is up to it. I guess there's only so much time. He certainly is a team player.

Hope you enjoyed my ramblings. I am certainly a die hard fan, so my views are highly skewed.

-CB

Music events today

Tonight I attend the Pat Metheny Group at Lisner here in DC. I've been attending Pat's concerts for about 30 years now. I first saw him at the Cellar Door around 1979. It's always a great event.

I also just found out about Steve Tibbetts appearing at the Freer Gallery on 4/8/2005. It's a free event as well - except for the $4 ticketmaster tax to reserve a ticket.

Springtime seems to be here!

A new beginning

Okay, I decided to set up my own website domain today. It only cost a total of $13 for a year of hosting so it wasn't a big investment. I've decided to go with a blog based website this time. Since I hope to be moving from Comcast to Verizon Fios sometime this year, I thought it would be a good time to get my own domain. It was very painless. I'll put a redirect page on my Comcast site to get things moving over to my new domain: ctbarker.info.

Everything in life is negotiable. Ever since Verizon started installing Fiber to the curb in my neighborhood, I've been increasingly annoyed at Comcast's price gouging. I pay $57.95 a month for just cable Internet. I've called Comcast before about a price reduction and got stoney silence. Verizon is offering 15 mb downloads for $44. After speaking with 4 people today, I finally got someone in "retention". I got an immediate price reduction to $32 per month. Now we're talking. It's great for the consumer to finally have some competition for Internet access!

Considering Microsoft, Apple, Google, and OpenSource. I have written before about the shrewdness of leveraging OpenSource development by the likes of Apple (Safari, BSD, etc.) and Google (Linux, etc.). Now comes news that Google has hired a key Firefox developer it reinforces the issue. I continue to wonder how long Microsoft can stand alone and be the sole OpenSource opponent. Meanwhile, competitors leverage the OpenSource community for ideas and development resources. This blog raises issues similar to this. It will be interesting to see the impact that the forthcoming OpenOffice 2.0 will have.

Just discovered someone new on the music scene. I had been seeing the recent ads for the movie Garden State. What caught my ear was the interesting soundtrack running under the ad. I checked out the soundtrack album on Amazon and found out it was a band called Frou Frou (as in rustling silk I am given to understand) and a song called 'Let Go'. It turns out it is a front for a woman called Imogen Heap. Also, turns out Brian Eno is involved on one song. Did a quick google for the song and found a full length sample on an odd service called Radio.Blog. It's very catchy and up my alley. I've added this to my wish list on Amazon.

I now have three must purchase CDs for 2005 - Fro Frou, The Pat Metheny Group's new one, and Porcupine Trees new one due in March.

If I could only catch up with all the music I bought in 2004!

The fiber optic diggers are outside my house today. No sign of the orange covered light wire yet but it is sure to follow. It's a bloody mess but it promises great things in the future. Verizon has a fire in its belly. It's about time. I will be interested to see how long it takes for this FIOS network to be lit up?