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Archive for the ‘Music’ Category

Hoist by their own petard (I hope)

Monday, December 14th, 2009

The recording industry has long been pushing for incredibly punitive awards against people who download music. Well, now there is a lawsuit by the artists against the music companies that has the potential to damage their earnings severely. How severely? Try between $50 million and $6 billion severely.

Janis Ian wrote a widely-read article about song downloads in 2002. She was, and is, in favor of them. You should read the whole article; it’s very informative and insightful. Her comments with respect to her personal experiences with the record companies are pertinent to the lawsuit’s claims, to wit:

Again, from personal experience: in 37 years as a recording artist, I’ve created 25+ albums for major labels, and I’ve never once received a royalty check that didn’t show I owed them money.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Via The Devil’s Kitchen.

Posted in In the news, Legal Affairs, Music | 1 Comment »

Miscellany 5

Tuesday, December 1st, 2009

Respect and courtesy can only be allowed to go in one direction.

Respect and courtesy don’t require knowledge or effort.

Hiding a relationship? Haven’t we heard that before?

Software for which to be thankful. I’ve used about a third of these applications. I use several of them daily.

I’ll have to try this when I get a little time … among other things, I’ve started my Christmas baking. I don’t do it every year, but I sometimes get a little out of hand: cookies, shortbread, rum balls, mincemeat tarts, and so on. I made mincemeat tarts and shortbread on Sunday … I’ll have to post a photo, because the cat walked on the shortbread while it was cooling. It’s a good thing I had plastic wrap covering it at the time.

Hello, I’m Capitalism …

Ummm … you know, this is not what I’d expect to see if someone meditated on me.

Pigeon: Impossible.

Some impressive card manipulations.

The first time I tried homebrewing beer, I used a recipe a friend had given me. It was a simple recipe that made about a gallon – gallon jugs from cider and such were simple to acquire and clean, and I didn’t have to worry about dealing with the quantities and equipment involved in making a “standard” five-gallon batch. It came out pretty potent, though … one bottle was sufficient to get me staggering a bit. I wonder how it would compare with this stuff.

I can remember, years ago, seeing a cat circus in a sad little building on West Colfax. Never saw a performance, just the building.

Ukulele videos (good pun in the name) and a songbook site.

This is a fun advertisement (found here):

I’ve never had a book do this for me while I was reading it:

Posted in Fun Stuff, In the news, Music, Politics, Ukulele, Why? | Comments Closed

The Al Gore Climate Song

Sunday, November 29th, 2009

Kate has found the perfect song for Al Gore and the climate alarmists:

Posted in Fun Stuff, Music | Comments Closed

Miscellany 4

Tuesday, November 17th, 2009

Lots of miscellaneous stuff here today. I actually started the post yesterday, but my browser crashed. Good thing I’d saved a copy of the article-in-progress before that happened.

First, Everything You Need To Know About Human / Cat Relationships Summed Up In One Picture.

Need a laugh track? Perhaps something more versatile?

Guns are such horrible, evil, nasty things that in England, you can now be convicted and sent to jail for turning in a weapon someone discards on your property.

I can’t say that I listen to girl groups much (Värttinä is the only recent one that comes to mind, and given that they’ve released a 25th anniversary CD, aren’t they a “woman” group rather than a “girl” group?), but there are certainly some girls in girl groups that are really cute (perky brunette alert … yow!). It would have been an attractive dress even if someone hadn’t taken scissors to it.

Worst storm of the year in England. I thought this photo was particularly impressive:

I never realized that Charles Dickens based Ebenezer Scrooge on a real person.

You say you know a couple who’ve been together a long time? This long?

I knew there was a reason I didn’t like amusement park rides. Several years back, there was a major hailstorm in Denver (baseball-sized hail in some areas), and at least two employees at Elitch Gardens abandoned their stations, leaving people stuck on the rides. I guess the lesson here is never to get onto any ride that you can’t climb down from unassisted. Think anyone will let you practice?

Sure, deck your lower limbs in pants,
Yours are the legs, my sweeting.
You look divine as you advance –
Have you seen yourself retreating?
– Ogden Nash

This makes an uncomfortable amount of sense.

An explanation of computation theory for lawyers. I remember courses described as “Physics for Jocks,” but this isn’t the same sort of thing.

This sounds like a fun game, but I imagine, based on the name, that you’re supposed to play quietly.

Posted in Fun Stuff, In the news, Legal Affairs, Music, Science | Comments Closed

I may have to watch this movie

Thursday, November 5th, 2009

I’ve been seeing previews for Pirate Radio. I remember listening to pirate radio when I was a young boy in England. I was attending Eastcote Elementary, a school for American service dependents, and the school used chartered tour buses to get us to and from the school. The usual driver on my route, a slightly-built young man with an improbably deep voice, used to tune in one of the pirate radio stations (Radio Caroline, I presume, but I really don’t remember) because the BBC was, at the time, too staid to play rock and roll.

It was an exciting time in music, and much of my musical taste was set at the time.

Posted in It's all about me, Music | Comments Closed

More notes per song

Saturday, October 24th, 2009

Tonight, I’m going to see Steve Martin in concert, playing banjo with the Steep Canyon Rangers. It should be a good time – I’ve heard some of the songs already. Actually, I’ve heard earlier versions of the songs already; I have a copy of the LP, The Steve Martin Brothers. The post title comes from the liner notes:

Dear Banjo Music Customer:

Note for note, banjo music is the cheapest music available in America today. While the average rock song has 75 to 100 notes per song, banjo music can have a full 200 to 300 notes per song, not including fade-outs. So called “easy listenin'” records may be easy on the ears, but they’re sure hard on the pocketbook at an average of 50 notes per song. It’s ok to listen to free music on the radio, but my music dollar will be spent on banjo music every time.

See you at the movies!

Steve

Should be a fun evening. I’m certainly looking forward to it. Maybe I’ll see if I can get him to sign the LP.

Posted in Activities, Music | 1 Comment »

Did you miss me?

Tuesday, September 15th, 2009

I’m back from a week at Yellowstone. Got a few hundred photos to sort through, including a bunch of wildlife photos. I’ve got a couple of a coyote trotting across the outflow of the Grand Prismatic Spring that I think are pretty good. We saw a lot of wildlife: hawks, eagles, cranes, bison, elk, pika, marmot, mountain goat, and so on.

Anyway, I have links, some that have been hanging around since before we left, so I’m just going to cram them all in here.

These people make a musical instrument I want. It looks pretty easy to use, and more versatile than shown in this video. It’s apparently not available yet, though. As an aside, the Gundam statue in the background was used as the site of a Gundam-themed wedding.

The Guitar Guy has a lot of chords and lyrics available.

I love this photo. The vacuum cleaner just adds the undefinable “touch” to the scene. I’d love to know more about what happened.

I fixed this dish before the trip. It goes onto the list of keepers.

Prior to the trip, one of the local groceries had corn on sale, ten ears per dollar. I’ve got a bunch hung up in the basement drying as the first step in this recipe.

Madison, WI, is now on my list of places that might be worth visiting.

I wonder if the kid will get his sword back? I suspect the local burglars may try to avoid him in future, though. Presuming, of course, that they’re smart enough, aware enough, and not strung out at the time.

I’ll have to watch some of these lectures; I’ve always been interested in learning to program in LISP.

Norman Borlaug has died. Shannon Love has a nice post about him.

Speaking of Shannon Love, I like her take on the ACORN child prostitution mess.

That’s all for now.

Posted in Activities, Food and Drink, Fun Stuff, In the news, It's all about me, Music | Comments Closed

Doing one or two things well is insufficient

Monday, August 24th, 2009

A pair of musicians in England have been given ASBOs for only playing two songs. I guess the idea now is to play a large number of songs badly to avoid police trouble.

I can understand the frustration of hearing the same two songs played over and over, but an ASBO to prevent them from playing completely seems a little over the top.

Posted in In the news, Music | Comments Closed

Wanna build a guitar?

Wednesday, June 10th, 2009

Lots of good links here.

Posted in Education, Music | Comments Closed

‘Nola’ as you’ve likely never heard it.

Tuesday, May 19th, 2009

I have a fairly nice rendition of ‘Nola’ performed by Bill Keith on banjo, but I’d never heard this version, either, until I ran across it today. Unfortunately, Sid Laverents died recently, but he seems to have been a very interesting individual. Dedicated, too … this video took him about four years to produce. Links to more information about him (and about this film) are at Twenty-Sided.

Posted in Fun Stuff, Music | 1 Comment »

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