So, hey, it’s err been a while. I still love you and everything but I have been terribly busy. My first month as an examiner has been hard work, but I am really enjoying it. I am sure that will stop soon enough…

My desktop PC is dead dude, I mean really dead. I started getting the odd BSoD about two months ago, and assumed at the time that it was one of the two 80gb hard drives that I had in it. It was currently set up so that one was a system and programs drive, with the other holding all of my media and files. All good, so I took out one and swapped it with a 160gb drive that I had in the network case. Re-installed Windows and… It was worse, so I took out that 80gb drive and swapped it. Reinstalled Windows again and it was the same. (I had good reasons for believing that it was the hard drive.) It would appear that it is a problem with the either the PSU/motherboard/processor/graphics card/memory/a slight problem with the user. Either way I am going to have to gut it at some point soon and rebuild it.

I was planning a rebuild and upgrade later next year anyway, it may just mean that I have to do it earlier. Pity that I can’t afford it, oh well.

This does have one side effect, we have recorded most of the next podcast, and james is currently sourcing the SFX (audio effects for you non audio geeks out there), he uses real sounds, and has an admirable attitude to it. For example in a previous NSD we needed McDonalds ambience, he went and sat on his own in Maccy D’s with a coffee and an audio recording device, make of that what you will. We still have one thing to record, we did record it previously, but through my own stupidity I overwrote the file. Duh, but now we cannot record it. I will see if I can fix the PC, if not I will have to write a new opening that james can do on his own.

The other knock on effect is that I will not be able to do any FTL shows for a while, the laptop that I have is nowhere up to snuff for that kind of work. No music recording either. That’s the problem when you have lots of hobbies, but when they all revolve around one thing, when it goes you lose everything.

In non geek stuff, things are good, as I said my job is fun (mostly), I have some great friends, my cooker works (see previous entries - I think) and I am dancing, yes I am. Right now while I am typhkfgbksrhbg…

I am also getting exciting about writing again, although I haven’t actually done any, but as they always say at Christmas, it’s the thought that counts right?

Ta ra.

Now, we have all heard the theories that Paul dies around the time of Sergeant Pepper. There are all sorts of conspiracies about it, and there always have been. This is one of the more interesting ones. I am not saying that I agree with it, far from it in fact. It does raise some interesting points though.

Paul really is dead

Worth a look, if only for the amount of work that has been put in.

Edit: Some of the other pages of the home page get very odd, and a bit creepy. Steer clear unless morbidly curious.

I am not a huge Doctor Who fan, I used to watch it when I was a kid, and now I watch it with mine. So that is good. Anyway as I am sure you are aware I am a keyboard geek, so whilst showing some old Doctor Who clips on Youtube to my daughter, I found this:

Back in the mists of, well February, james and I made this.

• Well now have a remix of it by me. (AKA The Men in White Coats)

• With added stuff. It is not my greatest work, but its different. james wanted me to point out that the lyrics came from presets on my Novation synth that we used to play the sequenced apreggiated riff.

Based on the page that I made the other day, showing how we make the NSD, I made:

• This!
  

A page with all of our kit on it, well not really. Alright then pedants, a page with a list of all our kit on it.

It’s been a while, sorry. I am a busy boy, I have a new job that I should hopefully start soon, but as always with me, even that couldn’t be simple could it? More on that another time.

• I wanted to let you know that the next podcast, “Salvage” is almost finished, james is editing it out at the moment. Flash Ramsbottom, my latest creation has once again, miraculously failed to materialise… There will be some news on this quite soon, we are thinking of making it into a podcast on it’s own, as it has outgrown the NSD already.

• Last thing, I love this and I hope that you might too:
• http://www.robopop.tv/
• Thanks, and see you lovely people later.

• BBC Micro Live TV Programme from 1985, about making computer music
• Same programme, different episode with Synth hero Bob Moog

It really is “Look around you” isn’t it?

If you are interested in dance or electronic music.

Amen drumloop

Cardboard cutout origami synths

The sad thing is that I think that they are fantastic, and if I had a bit of spare money at the moment…

Oh, and on a more useful musical note:

Some free soundfonts

A soundfont is a sample format that was widely used on older soundcards (Particularly Creative ones from the AWE 32 onwards) and can be played my most software samplers. If not there are a few freeware SF2 players around, I am not saying that this one is better than any other, it is just the one that I use.

rgc:audio’s sfz

trev

Hello everybody, I haven’t updated this in a while as I have been very busy. Last weekend I went down to Luton, (home of culture, beautiful architecture and well closed roads) to james’ and Beth’s. While there james and I made a tune, oh yes we did. It is called bad poetry, and you can download it here.

When I get chance I am going to get the components of it from james and do a Men in White Coats remix, I have some ideas for that.

After that I have been spending the last few days preparing for my interview to become a driving examiner, which I had yesterday. I think that it went quite well, I will of course let you know whether I got it or not. *Crosses fingers*

This is a picture by a B3tan, Red Rocket, and I love it, I think that he should make posters of them, there are more in his b3ta profile.

If you use them, be nice and let him know, ta.