Archive for November, 2005

St. Mary’s and Grove Street

11/1/2005

St. Mary’s Cemetery, Putnam Connecticut

Another one from St. Mary’s

Intersection of Grove Street, Putnam Connecticut. I’m sure in years to come this will look completely different.

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Proof that youth is a bunch of inconsiderate dolts

11/2/2005

It would appear that our nation’s youth doesn’t have the first clue as how to properly be considerate. If you’re of the opinion like I am that most younger (as in below the age of twenty-four) people are rude and manner-less, you’d be right.

For a few years now I thought it was all in my head. I’d say to myself Well, maybe I’m not giving teens and tweens enough credit, maybe it’s just me. I was wrong. Most of them wouldn’t know the first thing about etiquette and manners. Now it’s been proven.

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Garmin i3 upgrade of sorts

11/3/2005

I will be taking a really long trip pretty soon but found that my Garmin StreetPilot i3 could not fit all the states (as in state travel data) I would be traveling through. The i3 comes stock with a 128MB TransFlash card made by SanDisk. Normally these tiny little cards are meant for cell phone use, but they’re also the primary means of data storage on the i3.

Granted, I will have my laptop with me which means I can load in extra states along the way via the DVD and USB, but who wants to go through that crap? I didn’t.

Before I continue: Most people would probably never run into the problem of the i3 running out of data storage. For my particular needs I had to do something about it.

So I went out and bought a 256MB SanDisk Transflash card. They were available at Circuit City fortunately. Price with tax: About forty-two bucks. Not bad. definitely worth the upgrade. I wanted a 512MB card but there was a two-week wait time. Maybe later I’ll get the 512. Either that or I’ll get the c340 which does not require any downloading whatsoever (but in the same token is twice the price of the i3).

The install of the Transflash card was super-easy. Click in, click out, vice-versa. That’s it. The card is located on the side of the i3 by the way, it’s in plain sight. When you boot the i3 afterwards it tells you it needs map data (obviously since the card was blank). Fortunately I did not lose any of my “favorites” I set in the unit - that was stored internally which was cool. I popped in the map DVD into my laptop, USB’d my i3 and loaded up the data. Took about ten minutes. Very easy all the way through.

To anyone who might perform this upgrade, the card is really, really tiny and really easy to lose when not in the i3. Make sure when you do the upgrade (if you have to) to do it in a room with plenty of light in case you drop the card accidentally, else you’ll never find it. ;-)

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Synth report

11/4/2005

I am admittedly a synth (as in synthesizer workstation) geek. When other musicians are drooling over Les Pauls (which are way overrated by the way), tube amps, signal processors and the like, I’m looking at synths.

Very few musicians I’ve ever known have any knowledge about them. After all, it’s a tech toy; A computer with playable keys.

The synth market today isn’t what it used to be. Years ago - and I’m really dating myself here - the big battle of the ages was between the Korg M1 and the Ensoniq SQ-1+. Even though the SQ-1+ did not have a floppy disk drive in it, I went with that one anyway. The reason: The strings and piano sounded ten times better and believe it or not they still hold up to this day. The floppy drive issue was fixed with the purchase of an Alesis Datadisk SQ (yeah I know, oddly enough the Ensoniq had “SQ” in its model name as did the Alesis unit).

Currently I use an Ensoniq MR-61 with the SQ-1+ as the MIDI controller. I have to do this because the keys on the MR decided to stop working. The buttons above still work, but the keyboard is dead. Some would say “Couldn’t you just get a schematic and have an electrician fix it?” Yeah, sure. I tried that. No success. I have a quirky setup but it works.

The two big names in synths today are, as they always have been, Kurzweil and Korg. I don’t count Roland or Yamaha into the fray. Those two companies seem to be forever confused with the features of whatever they release, as in “Is it more synth or more workstation?” Neither, any model does either equally crappy.

I’ve played many Korgs. I owned an N364 model once. Two months after I bought it the lowest “C” key failed. Yeah. For real. I hated that thing and I’ve hated every Korg I’ve ever played. The programming of sequences/songs is so unbelievably difficult compared to the Ensoniq straightforward method. I mean, I even found it difficult to assign a specific sound an effects bus on a Korg - sometimes that should be one of the easiest things in the world to do, right? Not on the Korg. I continuously ran into constant frustration with Korg sequencers. I’ve never found one I liked (and I’ve tried many).

I’ve also played a few Kurzweils. Wow. Unbelievably great interface. Sounds to make your heart melt. I had never seen a large LCD display on a synth workstation until I saw it first on a Kurzweil. Other manufacturers followed Kurzweil’s coattails, but they were first as far as I know. (Although, I really liked the Ensoniq TS-10’s LED display, nice and bright!) I really dig the fact Kurz’s to this day have sliders on the K series. I also dig that they stick with traditional unweighted keys that play lightning fast, reminiscent of the old Roland Juno series boards.

Something Kurz can do (and has done) is that they can keep a line of synths going more or less forever. The K series was done right the first time. There was very little need for upgrades, the interface was done proper and it’s just a joy to use. Heck, even the overall size of the unit is “just right”. It’s not flashy, it’s not the flavor of the week, it’s just a serious music making machine.

The ‘board I want from Kurz right now is the K2661. Although I haven’t been able to play one in person yet, I’m 100% sure it’s just as good as their previous models.

…and it’s the cheapest it’s been in years. The list price is under $3000. I remember back in the day when Kurz’s easily broke the $6000 mark - and they were worth it back then because they were light years ahead of anyone else.

If, God willing, I get my finances in check over the course of the next year or two I’m going to spring for the K2661. I’ll give credit to my Ensoniq’s: they’ve lasted years and years and they’re still pluggin’ away. If Ensoniq was still in business (the old Ensoniq, not the Creative Labs / E-MU thing) I’d buy from them today in a heartbeat, but alas, they’re gone. Korgs suck, so Kurzweil is my choice. I’ll just have to wait a lil’ while before I can get one. :-)

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Potpourri

11/12/2005

A few random bits…

Been surfin’ round the ‘net just checking out stuff. I personally really dig the “I kick ass” web sites like The Best Page in the Universe and The Dumpster. By the way, if you’re a Maddox fan you hate Idaho and if you’re a Dumpster Keeper fan you hate Michigan. Either way it’s all good.

I will most likely be moving back to Maine soon. The difference is that it will be with Pop this time around. I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do about a job. Last time I went not-so-long ago it wasn’t too rosy. This time it may be different, who knows.

Musically speaking I’m not really doing much of anything because my studio is apart and in boxes. I’ve been mostly twanging away on my acoustic. It’s fun; I like it. It will be nice once I get the studio back together so I can start recording again. Once I get back to Maine I’m not sure what I’m going to do. It’s too early to guess. I think I may take a different direction than what I have been doing. More on that later.

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The show goes on

11/13/2005

I don’t think Kevin will mind me yanking the above image as long as I keep it in its original state (which I did).

The Passion of the Clerks production is doing well and the cast/crew is really doing a great job according to Kev. This one should be a real bang-up job - I’m really looking forward to seeing it when it’s done.

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Something to look forward to

11/13/2005

I just got done watching Saturday Night Live in the ’80s and wow, what a nostalgia trip. While I don’t remember too much of the early years, I do remember the later from around ‘85 up. I remembered every single face, music guest, act… just everything. I was amazed at how much I knew about the show - and how cool it was (and still is).

Something that was said several times struck a real good chord with me. Several writers and actors said they really didn’t start getting in the swing of life doing what they wanted to be doing until their early-to-mid thirties. Many of them joined SNL at around that point in their lives.

It just reminded me that even though I’m thirty, I still have a long way to go and I’m still very young.

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Night Trap

11/14/2005

For those who are into Taco-Man on Ebolaworld, check out Night Trap. It’s an interactive story type thing. I liked it. You’ll need Flash Player 8 and broadband to play it - so go update your Flash first.

I give it a thumbs up. I like it because it’s different and things happen in real time, not “made time” like other Flash games. I can tell that a lot of effort went into this one. It may have a few bugs (as of this writing) but it’s still cool.

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Humbug

11/16/2005

The Christmas television commercials are getting into full swing now. Just about all of them are very annoying. There’s one I particularly loathe by Kohl’s. At first I (swear to God) thought it was a GAP commercial. It shows happy shiny dancy white, black and asian (gotta have the right mix y’know) people jumping and dancing around in full Christmas color garb with big gold boxes donning bows on them.

You’ll note I said Christmas season, not “Holiday season”. Companies these days are so frightened to offend anyone that they never say the word “Christmas” in any of their commercials, which is another way of saying “We don’t care what flippin’ holiday you celebrate, just buy from us.”

Watch tv commercials and count how many times you hear “…this holiday season” or “…your holiday season”.

It’s very corporate and cold, something this time of year shouldn’t be about at all.

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Follows up well to my last post

11/16/2005

My name is S. Claus and I’m a switcher.

You’ll need Quicktime to view this.

Small note: No, I’m not a Mac fan. The commercial is just funny and nothing to do with Macs (other than the logo) - that’s why it’s good.

One more note: I know now I will never be as cool as the Japanese. Seriously.

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