| 9volt Trippin' |
[Jul. 11th, 2006|12:21 am] |
 | New music rarely excites me. Trolling various a.b.* groups infrequently yields treasure these days. However, tonight, I hit pay dirt by way of Ambitronix, a very bizarre European Jazz/Electonica group. The intensely complex sequencing on "9volt Trippin'" somewhat reminds me of Squarepusher. However, polyrhythms and delay-effect samples beat-matched to digital sequencing by British percussionist, Steve Arguelle are unemblematic of the genre. Unfortunately, "9volt Trippin'" can only be legally obtained from France. Their earlier album, "We Da Man" is available from iTMS. Both are highly recommended. |
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| Zingosphere |
[Jun. 30th, 2006|01:41 am] |
 | ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) mitya000 and I collaborated on another Top 40 hit single tonight. I expect this one to break out into the mainstream. You can place it right next to your Susie Ibarra collection once we get SACD distribution. SXSW '07, here we come. Click here for a transcription. |
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| Caldwell Shine - "Today" |
[May. 28th, 2006|03:29 am] |
 | How many are drumming videos are too many? Well, there can never be enough according to me. This one was shot out in Lakeway, Tejas. Home of good old fashioned dive bars and the Lake Travis crowd. It is like a whole other world out there. At any rate, the camera appeared to be a little too close to the bass rig. So, Silas's cabinet dominated the mic. Jaco would be proud. |
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| Hickory Street Soundcheck |
[May. 27th, 2006|05:59 pm] |
 | Here's a short video that BJ shot with his Canon S500 from the Hickory Street Soundcheck for the Caldwell Shine gig. |
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| Caldwell Shine Campfire |
[May. 27th, 2006|04:38 am] |
 | I played with Caldwell Shine tonight at Hickory Street Bar and Grill. It was a pretty neat little gig. I won four free Woodchuck Granny Smiths and a one dollar tip as a barter for hauling in the old Hipgig. There were a lot of firsts at the big rock show too. This was the first gig with Caldwell, the first time using the Hipgig at a venue, first time playing at Hickory Street, first time an Arby's employee ever gave me downtown Austin parking tips, and the first time someone tried to sell me size 13 shoes at a bus stop (Sorry, I wear a 10.5!). All of this really happened. Thanks to Ali, JQT, mitya000, and Melissa for coming out. |
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| [{(-)(*)ar_1148621321}.play()] |
[May. 26th, 2006|12:39 am] |
 | A mysterious praxinoscope expert has captured a rare performance of (-)(*) from their lair buried deep beneath Lake Bleach. Sir WJG produced a stream of emo rock so pure that it could be crystallized and sold to a programmer so they may learn to feel again. I was going to play a massive salsa cowbell solo, but it was so loud that it obscured the aural bliss emanating from ye olde TD-20. The ambience video playing is Wonder Showzen. This is the only show being broadcast in ntsc that can be picked up from the (-)(*) rf-rx unit ever since Lazlo Toth plundered the DirectTV dish. A word of warning though... You musn't watch this video too closely or you'll see directly into your own soul in the reflection of w's aviators. Have fun. |
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| Aspect Inchoative and the Blogospheres |
[May. 22nd, 2006|10:02 pm] |
 | With the addition of the infinibass, we're a four piece. Apart we could do nothing, but together there's nothing we couldn't do. It has been said that as a three piece we were bollocks, but when we got to four players, we became the dog's bollocks. That's right, Teeth, the Barbitrator, Maxton, and myself were all there. This infectious little ditty is like that piece of gum you can't get off your shoe. Mighty Max wrote it whilst sat in rush hour traffic last week, and it does kind of remind me of a Traffic song. Enjoy. |
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| The Obstreperous Fajita Blankers |
[May. 15th, 2006|11:05 pm] |
 | This is the first time that I have played in this particular configuration. The band consisted of the famous Sete Gibernau on guitar, and Mad Max on vocals and harmonious saw, and myself on the trap kit in the orchestra pit. We were originally supposed to have a bass player but I think he was passed out in a ditch on goofballs or something. The good news is, I chose to add the optional drum solo at the end of this one in lieu of this weird 15/16 theremin part that was in the Nancarrow score. Usually, I like pretending that I'm Futureman or Carter Beauford maybe while holding down the back beat with little fanfare. After drinking one can of Red Bull and a Young's Double Chocolate Stout tonight, I felt like a 12 foot tall Keith Moon. When I was done, I threw a T.V. out of my hotel window and raced my Vauxall down the motorway. Note: some of this probably happened. |
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| When the Levee Breaks |
[May. 9th, 2006|03:02 pm] |
I was working through some exercises from Stanton Moore's "Take It To The Street" book last night. One of them was the initial groove from Led Zeppelin's "When the Levee Breaks" off IV. As with any organic groove like this, there are subtle nuances that are very much overlooked by most of the drumming community. In this case, John Bonham was accenting certain hi-hat beats during most of the song. The hat trickery would have gone unnoticed had Stanton not been such a perceptive lad. Even the drum tab that I picked off the Internet for my example missed them. These beats are tough to accent because they occur in a quite unnatural position between syncopated and not. Don't mistake this for drumming erudition either as these accents punch through the extreme reverb that was applied to his kit to make the groove feel so tight. Here is the ASCII-art drum tab with the accented hi-hats beats highlighted for all the world to see.
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| Bumper and the Old Time Gingey Snaps |
[May. 6th, 2006|02:26 am] |
 | I made the sojourn out to the old seward junction tonight to participate in what the townspeople are now calling the jam of the millenium. Notice the pickups on that guitar. They were wound by Wes Montgomery himself after an unexplicable Frozen Bubble loss in 1987. This guitar has the power to make the entire earth larger with respect to whatever object lies in its crimson wake. A few measures may sound like cacophony, but rest assured this is well intentioned by the proprietor. |
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| NYC |
[Apr. 25th, 2006|03:00 am] |
 | Just shot another video at Musiclab. This is an old Interpol song that BJ likes to caterwall sometimes when he's feeling blue. We would have played the whole thing but my bass beater came loose. In addition, we played the drum-n-bass version of Romantics which was a complete mess. I'm messing with the down beat, and snuck in that old trick where I push down on the tom head with one stick to bend the tone. We also journeyed back to Gravity Test days, and broke out Redlight at a fairly breakneck tempo. Enjoy kids. |
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| Ideals |
[Apr. 13th, 2006|03:25 am] |
<td valign="top"> </td><td valign="top">I've been taking these videos basically to evaluate my own playing technique, etc. However, I'm so excited about playing acoustic drums again that I can't resist posting them here. This video is interesting because I raised the old Canon SD500 about nine feet off the ground by jamming my mini tripod into a boom mic stand and raising it up as high as it would go.</td> |
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| Hexeditting a Drum Track! |
[Apr. 6th, 2006|02:06 am] |
 | I finally did it! I can now record my drums as a midi track and map each individual pad (and rim) to any wave file that I want to, after I play it! It's absolutely the most awesome thing I've ever seen. The picture here is actual midi data from a real song that we're trying to record. This probably sounds like a lot of babble, but essentially what I'm doing is hooking VDrums into my computer via a MIDI cable, recording that data, and then replaying it with arbitrary wav files representing each note within the file. I knew it was possible, but it's cool to actually see it work in real life. Big thanks to mitya000 for hacking the infinite VST settings to allow this to go... |
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| Like anyone could even know that... |
[Apr. 2nd, 2006|04:14 am] |
 | Hmmmm, maybe I'm posting too many videos. Here's another one from tonight at music lab. Tonight was a little better than the last run because I fixed my Axis pedal, and remembered my Chinaboy this time. |
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| I bet I could throw a drumstick over them mountains... |
[Mar. 31st, 2006|03:52 am] |
 | I'm back in the acoustic game again. It felt weird playing a set of Al Foster Jr. Hip Gig drums for three solid hours tonight, but I finally got into some tasty grooves by the end of the night. This video is actually the first real song that I played on them. The christening so to speak. Enjoy. |
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| Minor Spark Alright at SXSL |
[Mar. 19th, 2006|05:26 am] |
 | Well, this was our first secret gig that Minor Spark has played for the world. The inauspicious thunder of VDrums and AM noise was heard at the first stop on the "Hell Bent for Naugahide" tour. BJ arrived on his trademark Vespa wearing a Shriners hat with some kind of animal in tow that was somewhere between a goat and a moose. We rocked out for a good hour. Then, we did a second set of old Appalachian favorites with overdubbed slam poetry. The footage of the second set was immediately locked away in the Minor Spark 3DES vault in Des Moines lest our reputation be tarnished by the heedless decision for the rest of our days. |
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| Boomerang Foo Video |
[Mar. 10th, 2006|05:02 pm] |
 | Well, at the risk of looking like Uncle Rico, I'm going to post this old boy. After Wednesday night's practice, I setup the old Canon SD500 digicam, and recorded some footage of me playing drums for a while. Looking through it last night, I found about 7 minutes that I'm reasonably proud to show to the world. Since the audio from Canon's microphone seems to be some kind of mono 16kbps stream, I replaced it with the full SPDIF track that was recorded with Adobe Audition via SPDIF through my M-Audio 2496 card (that's why do you don't here the clicks when hit the drumsticks are hit together, and the expletives that I shout when I make a mistake).
Update: I suppose I should explain the Boomerang. Essentially, all it does is play what you played right back. It's made my signal path from the TD-20 something of a nightmare. However, after two years of trying, I've gotten it sorted out now. The recording from the Boomerang is actually a separate channel into the mixer, and then an analog in to the computer (a separate track in Audition). Using a phrase sampler with drums is surprisingly difficult. You have to start the sampler, immediately start playing, and then stop it at the exact microsecond that the phrase ends. This is done live, and you can't tweak it. I'm not the first drummer to use a Boomerang, I stole the idea from Stanton Moore. I might be the first VDrummer to use a Boomerang though.
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| Bass Player Wanted |
[Mar. 7th, 2006|01:51 am] |
I posted this one to craigslist today half-jokingly. BJ kept on about me posting to their musician community page as he won't go there because he's afraid of becoming a dirty hippie by merely typing the URL. Some old boy was severely nonplussed by what I thought was a damn funny bass ad. His response read, "Wow, you guys are too clever. I mean, cheese wheels! WOW! How witty. Man, I really hope you guys find that perfect bass player who learned how to play yesterday and isn't too fat for your MySpace-savvy deluded image. Grow up." I think cheese wheels are kind of funny, because its funny to ship a lot of something in wheel form. Am I wrong?
* Oh, and for the record, the "NO FATTIES" thing in my ad was a reference to some weird thing that David Cross used to put at the end of every fake classified ad on Mr. Show. I didn't realize how offensive that was in pseudo real life. |
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| Springdale Jam Video Drums Eye View |
[Jan. 29th, 2006|11:08 pm] |
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Here's another video with me jamming with the other bassist, Ken. I put the camera behind the drumkit, so you can only see my arms. Rest assured though, it is me playing.
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| Springdale Jam Video (Quicktime) |
[Jan. 29th, 2006|09:25 pm] |
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I jammed with some guys down on Springdale and 4th Street at some storage shed over there. I had an awesome time, and they invited me back to do it again next week. Hopefully, I'll have a full camera charge and the keyboard player shows next time...
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