25 posts tagged “music”

Well it's been quite a pleasant Christmas. One where I got to spend a bit of quiet time with my family and girlfriend and took it very easy altogether. The next few weeks are shaping up to be fairly hectic with work ready to hit with a vengeance. However to get me through the next little while I've received a bumper crop of music thanks to Amazon wish-lists and a last minute download of an entire month's worth of Emusic subscription.

First up I've just received my own little birthday present to myself - the Radiohead In Rainbows Discbox. So I'm looking forward to putting on the bonus disk for the first time now (as well as getting to enjoy crystal clear high-resolution versions of the first disk, not the poor 160kbps mp3's that came as a free download).

In addition to this I've got the following to listen to:

• Gescom A1-D1
• The Bonzo Dog Band - Keynsham
• Sigur Ros - Hvarf/Heim
• Brian Eno - Apollo - Atmospheres and Soundtracks
• Bjork - Volta
• Venetian Snares - My Downfall (OST)
• Ulrich Schnauss - Goodbye
• Kasabian - Kasabian
  
• Beirut - The Flying Club Cup
  
• Kutiman - Kutiman
  
• Cex - Know Doubt
  
• Martin Horntveth -
  
• Oren Ambarchi - Clockwork

So, as some of you might have heard, Radiohead have given their record label the heave-ho (as of their last album) and have opted to release their new album in a slightly different way than you might normally expect for a huge band.

You can, for the time being, only get their new album in 2 ways.

1. Go to InRainbows.com and order a download version
2. Go to InRainbows.com and order a box set with lots of stuff (and the download at the same time)

Uniquely they've opted to let you choose how much to pay them for the download. I thought this was pretty cool, but was a bit annoyed that they gave no information about what quality and format the download would take. So, assuming the worst might happen (and even though I could order the download free if I wanted), I said feck it, I'll get the box set. £40 later and I've gotten an email stating the following regarding In Rainbows download quality..

The album will come as a 48.4mb zip file containing 10 x 160kbps DRM free mp3s.

So that's it people.. 160kbps mp3's. I'm glad to hear they are DRM free, but not so happy about the 160kbps. I know myself well enough to know I won't really be satisfied with that, seeing as 192kbps bugs me sometimes.

However, I know I'll get the full package in the post at some point in about 2 months, so I'll probably be pretty happy with that.

Here's some photos from the recent outing to Rathlin Island. We did everything bigger and better this year, with a bigger rig, better marquee and a fully functioning kitchen which fed many a weary and hungry punter.

The crew were brilliant, and everyone mucked in to help out. Also, Force 10 were amazing and their hospitality was excellent as always.

Came across this highly entertaining beat boxing video on You Tube today that I thought people might enjoy. I definitely appreciated the little extra comic touches. Well done.

Remarkably I've gotten photos of this weekend's Mantua Festival sorted out much faster than Glastonbury photos.

A thoroughly enjoyable festival, which, despite some heavy rain before and on the Friday, there was plenty of sunshine over the next couple of days.

I have some amusing sumo wrestling videos to post up as well.

Can't wait for this now. For many years we've been going to the Jigs and Rigs festival on Rathlin Island. This year promises to be brilliant, with us bringing up all sorts of stuff to make lots of loud noises and tasty food. For more information keep an eye on the Force 10 website, and the Audio Terrorists website.

I've put up a video of the last festival which ran in 2004 (they took a wee break).

Here it is:

I should really be preparing but I decided to check the weather forecast instead...

I am playing at a festival in Roscommon, Ireland this Friday. It's a 2 day festival called The Mantua Festival, at which I played last year. It was a really good laugh and I'm looking forward to it this year.

However, it's been raining pretty constantly for the last week here in Leitrim, and the Mantua crowd are just around the corner, relatively speaking.

So I checked out the weather forecast... it doesn't look good.

Weather forecast for Mantua Festival

Anyway, not too much I can do about that. Here's some photos from last year if you're interested.

Reason 4

4 comments

Well, it looks like update time is just around the corner. Propellerheads' Reason 4 is entering beta testing stage and as always I'm looking forward to it immensely.

From the Sound on Sound website:

Thor, a polyphonic modular synth instrument, is one of the hottest new tools in the Reason 4 rack. It has six slots that can be filled with a variety of modules, including six different types of oscillator and four filters, as well as envelopes and effects. It is very light on CPU usage, according to Propellerhead.
Also new is the Regroove mixer, which enables the user to apply groove quantisation to sequences, using a mixer-style GUI. Reason 4 will ship with a library of Regroove templates, some of which are extracted from original records. If that’s not enough, you’ll be able to add even more spice to your sequences with RPG8, a monophonic arpeggiator that can apparently be connected to any of Reason’s sound sources.

The main GUI has been overhauled in the new version, and improvements include vector-enabled controller data, allowing for incredibly smooth automation, plus a multitude of new ‘lanes’, which can display alternate takes, automation data, and ‘folded’ information for each track.

Jinx Lennon - Know Your Station Gouger Nation - 02 - city of styrofoam cups

This is a little piece of genius. Jinx Lennon is an Irish troubadour, a poet of the streets, he's raw and he really believes what he's singing about.

He's best seen playing live, where his passion shines through. He bursts onto the stage and leaves you reeling.

I recommend checking him out.

Further Reading

http://www.jinxlennon.com/

Lyrics

I pissed around for years, was a dead loss,
I ended up in a place called Fas learning about fork lifts and inventory.
On the last day the instructors told us they'd take us out for a feed of drink.
"You're on the brink of success" they said "now lads" in a patronising voice.
I knew I was going to be back in hole yeah, back on the dole yeah,
I turned the keys in the ignition.
It was a beautiful blue and yellow winter's evening
I went up to the city of Styrofoam cups yeah

Jinx Lennon

The city of Styrofoam cups:
from faraway the city is a great big chandelier
but when you get near
the light begins to separate, and you see a different landscape yeah, a different landscape.
What's that over there? Is it Casper the friendly ghost
with a white sheet?
No it's a blanket to put over somebody's knees,

an empty cola cup staring on genuflection staring on looking up
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah.

I crashed my car in a place called Ormonde quay -
to my best recollection the person that crashed into me had a smig on his chin
not unlike that of a goat.
He was from Navan.
I knew right well when he heard a damage quote
the same individual would not be able to help but gloat.
We took each others details and went our separate ways.
My head was in a mess,
I went looking round for the bibles of pink flesh,
needed some erotic images to help me pass the test
in the city of Styrofoam cups yeah.

The city of Styrofoam cups yeah:
from faraway the city looks a great big chandelier
but when you get near
the light begins to separate, and you see a different landscape yeah, a different landscape.
What's that over there? Is it Casper the friendly ghost
with a white sheet?
No it's a blanket to put over somebody's knees an empty cola cup staring on genuflection staring on looking up
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah.

I round the corner, without warning, I looked down on the ground,
there was a young thing about 7 or 8 years of age.
She had a Elgin marble pale face.
I threw her a few coins to keep my conscience at bay hoping they would go away.
Across the street I could smell Neapolitan and Italian food.
Through transparent glass a young man had his hand on his girlfriends ass,
they looked like an ad for British Airways.
Where are you going on holidays in the city of Styrofoam cups yeah?
And they can see all the big buildings like the spire standing straight and proud
but they should be the shape of bent bananas.
There's a lot of people out there should be wearing bananas

in the city of
the city of
the city
the city
the city
the city of

The city of Styrofoam cups yeah:
from faraway the city looks like a great big chandelier
but when you get near
the light begins to separate, you see a different landscape
a different landscape.
What's that over there? Is it Casper the friendly ghost
with a white sheet?
No it's a blanket to put over somebody's knees an empty cola cup staring on genuflection staring on looking up

What were you doing?
You were standing at the old grey silver bridge.
You were moved along by a man in a blue uniform who looked like he was just fresh out of nappies.
He was doing anything to keep the government happy.
They saw you as a potential form of infection.
“We don't want transients” they said “coming up to the European presidential election” yeah.
The war is in a rut but you're no cigarette butt
you know in your heart from the start.

The city of Styrofoam cups yeah:
from faraway the city is a great big chandelier
but when you get near
the light begins to separate, and you see a different landscape.
What's that over there? Is it Casper the friendly ghost
with a white sheet?
No it's a blanket to put over somebody's empty knees yeah

moving on running on staring on looking up
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah
the city
the city of Styrofoam cups
staring on, staring out, looking on, looking round, looking down,
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah
the city
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah
the city
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah
the city of Styrofoam cups yeah