Gravitas

Squall

admin — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 17:38:39 +0000

Just a short (one minute) video of the squall-du-jour, looking out onto our back yard. Music is my cover of the Tubular Bells riff by Mike Oldfield.

YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ra62wB4bpmc

Mac vs PC? Don’t Get Me Started!

admin — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 22:55:56 +0000

I’m a PC guy these days. That’s entirely a result of work-related compatibility issues and, since my retirement, budget and… well inertia I suppose.

But recent events got me reminiscing about my own introduction to personal computing. I was not a hugely early adapter to home computing, other than a brief foray into the world of the Texas Instruments TI-99/4a (a Commodore 64 contemporary I think)… but somewhere around the mid 90’s I discovered digital MIDI-based musical instruments, particularly drums and keyboards. Now I could play drums in an apartment! Exciting stuff for a guy who’d sold his ~~soul~~ drum kit in 1977 to go to computer programming school…

Anyway, I soon reached the limits of the built-in sequencer on my TD-7 drum unit, and I asked the guy at Saved By Technology, where I bought the MIDI gear, to advise me on a bigger sequencer. He suggested I just buy a computer, or I’d soon be frustrated by the inherent limitations of any hardware-based sequencer.

So I asked around amongst my colleagues, mainframe computer types like me: “Mac or PC?”

This would be somewhere around Win 95 / OS 7.1 era… Lots of hoopla about Win95… The few people at work with PC’s (most of us were on so-called “dumb terminals” ) were still on Win 3.1. I remember finding it quite interesting that while 2 out of 3 recommended the PC, anyone who had used both types would recommend the Mac. Mind you, none of them were doing MIDI sequencing, so in the end, the Saved By Technology guy’s recommendation carried the most weight, and soon I had my very own Power Mac 7100.

Almost all of what would eventually become my first (and probably only) officially-released CD was written and recorded within a few months of getting up and running on that machine, and getting my gear working with it.

While the whole Mac or PC debate has these days become tiresome and about as interesting as “Coke vs Pepsi”, I did go through a period of Mac evangelism in the Nineties, as a result of my early success and enthusiasm on that platform.

So yeah, thank you Steve Jobs.

Three more from 1976

admin — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 01:51:18 +0000

Last of these ones I think. There’s a few more, but they’re not ones that I really want out in the world….

Mental Midget (1976)

YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TqSs_d9Cf0

Time For All (1976)

YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBk7fgUu8fY

Voyage / Arrival (1976)

YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKiE996oKoo

Aftaglid (1976)

admin — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 05:18:13 +0000

R.G. Daniel: percussion, recorders
Monte Horton: keyboard
Steve Vickery: guitar

Recorded in 1976, Videos added June 22, 2011
(based on a Steve Hillage riff)

YouTube video URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcgws1cY-BM

Untitled Suite in Four Parts (1976)

admin — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 02:37:57 +0000

Untitled Suite in Four Parts – Early exercises in sound-on-sound recording

Robert George Daniel: percussion, various analog synths

Recorded in 1976
Video added June 22, 2011

YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6L9SXCyKPI

Space Blues (1976)

admin — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 20:11:38 +0000

Space Blues (1976)

R.G.Daniel: drums, Roland RE-201 Space Echo
Monte Horton: guitar
Steve Vickery: bass

recorded in 1976
video added June 22, 2011

YouTube video URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyE0CXJxLoU

Earth Blues (1976)

admin — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 17:35:09 +0000

Earth Blues
R.G.Daniel: recorder
Monte Horton: guitar
Recorded in 1976
Video added June 22, 2011

YouTube video URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcRf3m0Ld5A

Drone #1 (1976)

admin — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 04:25:31 +0000

Drone #1

- R.G.Daniel: drone, percussion
- Monte Horton: guitar

Recorded in 1976
Video track created June 21, 2011

YouTube video URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9mHnwpeFKM

Is This Your Brain?

admin — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 21:03:56 +0000

Here’s a novel little ditty that draws heavily from clips taken from the Fawlty Towers TV show, starring (both the show and this song) John Cleese. I did not include it on the CD so as to avoid running afoul of the copyright police. So mum’s the word. Or tell the world. Either way. I can take it down from here fairly quickly if it comes to that…

I post it now, because it came up in conversation, in the context of “my brain hurts” as a reaction to the rampant cognitive dissonance and, something I learned just today, the widespread Dunning-Kruger Effect in the public discourse these days…

So anyway, enjoy. Don’t hurt your brain.

Is This Your Brain?

Okay Internet, You Win.

admin — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 02:56:39 +0000

When I first put this album out there in the world, I decided it might be fun to set up a Google alert for it, to see if there was anything going on I should know about… I’d never alerted myself to anything in this way, so I didn’t really know what to expect. And at first, there was nothing, just alerts to whatever I’d posted myself. No surprise there.

But then one day, a few months ago, after the album had been on iTunes and CD Baby for a while, I started getting hits for it on various peer-to-peer download sites. Now I’m no stranger to just downloading stuff I may or may not have the moral right to download, so I’m not going to get all up on my high horse about it. And it’s not like sales were affected. But this was peculiar.

And since that day, EVERY SINGLE DAY, it shows up in my alerts. Some new fly-by-night site with a spammy domain name originating in China or Russia or some other exotic land, where the music is free but the malware and identity theft will cost you big time…

I’m of the opinion that these pirate sites had somehow “scraped” the content from one of the legitimate places out there where I had placed the album. Meaning their security is compromised. I just don’t think it was some fan who ripped it and uploaded it. The listing on the pirate sites is PRECISELY the same as it appears on CD Baby. Word for word, including the cover art.

So I give up Internet. You win. Take my life. Please.

Here is the whole album, presented as a widgetized playlist from Grooveshark.com, where I have, as the actual owner of the content, legitimately uploaded it. Requires Flash. For the Flash-challenged (iPad users for example) I can’t help you at this time. Buy the CD maybe? Just a thought… B-)