Just another Easter afternoon

Posted on in News

No, no — I’m still 27.

And I’ve got a new pair of jeans and a coat. Yeah.
Tom Tailor and Urban Republic have been gentle to my wallet, I got both for less than $150.

Nothing new in the music department, but I’ve been recording sounds around town with the Zoom H4 which I’ve bought a couple of weeks ago. Great little gadget, if only it had better microphone preamps and no "silent beep" problems, I’d be willing to pay $50 or even a $100 more for it. Good thing it has XLR inputs. All in all – it’s a $300 bargain, highly recommended.

I guess I’ll be uploading stuff to my Freesound page quite frequently from now on, so please go visit it once in a while :)

Before I forget: Zoom H2 will cost $200, fit in your hand and record in 5.1 surround. Nice.

I’ve bought a new computer too, but don’t tell my parents. ‘Rogue’ (2.6 P4, 1GB RAM, Abit IS7-V, Radeon 9800) was getting very tired, very slow, and very noisy. So ‘Fray’ (C2D 2.13, 2GB RAM, Gigabyte 965P-DS3, Nvidia 7600GS) took its place, and ‘Rogue’ is chilling on a side now, enjoying the retirement.
I’m happy with the investment, it’s damn fast and very responsive. I can go as low as 2ms (but keeping it at healthy 7ms) with latency in Reason, Nuendo and Kontakt 2 with Audigy 4 (at 48k/24bit) — and that’s quite a difference, looking back at the >40ms I used to work with. Also, the PSU that came with the case is absolutely silent, it’s almost freaking me out. I got used to ~30dB the old one used to produce :)

I’m still waiting for the first "Buffy Season 8" comic to appear in my mailbox. It’s been more than two weeks now since TFAW sent it my way, and I’m getting a bit worried here. My "Tales of the Slayers" got lost in the mail recently, but Amazon was kind enough to replace it free of charge, so I finally received it last month (after almost 8 months). I really wouldn’t want to lose this first edition like that :/

What else… Yeah, don’t try to use TakeMS 133x 4GB SD cards with the H4, the result is slow startup (some 20-30 seconds), dropping out (if recording for more than 10 minutes), and slow stopping time (also 20-30 seconds). I wonder if the Sandisk version behaves the same way.

I’m gonna have some afternoon Nescafe classic now, maybe finish F.E.A.R. Extraction Point (not bad) while sipping it, then maybe draw something, we’ll see.

Have a fine, easy, happy Easter :)

Squirrels in tubes, the inner light of atheism, and a dire need for new clothes

Posted on in News

I’m a huge fan of squirrels, they’re such lovely, cute, crazy creatures :D And they’re absolutely irresistibly cute when they’re babies.
Today, after following a link from Digg to that ‘Squirrel beneath the Macbook‘ video, I’ve ran into Elizalalala’s videos and I was just left in awe. She’s a wildlife rehabilitator and has a handful of videos of various animals she takes care of. The link will take you to the third page of her videos on YouTube, because it’s the most squirrelly page at the moment ;)

Continuing with the tubeage: try playing these two videos simultaneously: "The Picard/Crusher ‘love story‘"and this performance of "The inner light". Funny how easily they go together, sound-wise :) Also, the comments on "The inner light" are just one more proof that a big percentage of internet users are morons.

I don’t know if I’m an atheist, agnostic, or whatever — terms mean nothing when it comes to religion, but I certainly don’t believe in that one superior being that created us and everything else. And I certainly won’t take every single sentence written in The Bible (which is a really nice collection of interesting stories) — or, for that matter, any other major religion’s guidebook — for granted. Because doing that just doesn’t make any sense. Now "God’s debris", that made some sense ;)
Don’t worry, I won’t go on rambling about religion, I just wanted to post a link to "Peter of the Port", and his interesting post about "The new atheism".

BLDGBLOG points us to ‘Growing mountains of technology waste‘ — interesting read.

The last part of the title is a reminder to myself. Because I really am in dire need of new clothes.

p.s: you might notice some anomalies on the site in the next few days, I’m adding some new things, but WordPress is behaving a bit quirky.

The first kittens already know how to swim, you suckers!

Posted on in News, The rabbit hole

Eh, don’t mind the title.

I’ve decided that it’s OK if I post some work in progress music from time to time, when I’m sure it’s good enough for the general audience ;) I’ve created a new category just for that, and it’s called "The rabbit hole". For no particular reason. None at all.

So, why not begin with some recent cookies, aye? Here are three tracks that I’m working on at the moment:

"Sunken flowers and water homes" is so far still a product of one afternoon (last Saturday, the 10th, to be precise) and I’m extremely satisfied with the outcome :)

"The labyrinth" is from back in January, and I think I worked on it just one afternoon too. It’s far from finished, but it sounds decent enough.

Both are orchestral, but "Sunken flowers and water homes" has a drum track (one that I’m really proud of) and "The labyrinth" has some timpani’s and crash whooshes here and there :)

On the other hand, "A thousand sunsets across the universe" is an ambient track with a fat beat and a message of peace, love and unity at its beginning (what?). More or less, another one-day track. Why aren’t I inspired like this all the time? Pfft.

I hope you’ll find these three pieces interesting enough to write a short comment – it would really mean a lot to me.

Thanks for listening! :)

No, I never thought I’d write these words…

Posted on in News

Ahem. Dear diary or something. Yesterday was a very special day. I’ve created a myspace page.

And if that’s not bad enough, I even uploaded a work-in-progress track to that same…page. An exclusive.

Anyway, enough with the whining and guilt-tripping — it’s there, go take a look, listen to the new unfinished track titled "A thousand sunsets across the universe", write a comment. I thought it’s better if I do it myself than to wait for some impostor to steal my identity, lol :-D

I’m freaking out because of the inevitable exams, my mother is planning her retirement next year, gotta sort out my life and stuff. Earn a living. Yes, my parents still support me financially and I’m eternally thankful, but it’s not exactly the greatest feeling in the world. I’ll be 28 in April, God…

I’ve got exam in telecommunications in 7 hours and 45 minutes. Wish me luck.

To Aesqe’s myspace page!