Musicman Musings

Yahoo's Coffehouse & UK Lily

2007-08-01T11:47:00.000+08:00

I didn't realize, until of late when I checked this blog, that I haven't made a post in over four months, wow.

What have I been up to in that hiatus; not exactly on blogging hiatus as I have been terribly busy with my other blogs and other websites that I maintain.

As far as music is concerned I have been listening a lot to the Yahoo Coffeehouse radio channel, excellent music, great programming with a good mix of songs from a variety of genres.

I have found several new artists to check out on this channel, some of which have become personal favorites.

Aside from always being tuned in to the Coffeehouse channel, I have had my hands full with the band I am playing guitar for... UK Lily. It is pretty much a cover band with a group of friends, guys I have known and some I have been in previous bands... without a doubt all successful in their own right; each with their own performing and recording successes.

Which is a bit strange because all of us have had bands in the past that were all published and recorded and here we are now, doing covers of 80s songs. But not just your usual 80s songs though, these are 80s songs we grew up to... songs that probably have had a significant influence in those formative years in our lives when were discovering what music was good for us, and establishing our musical preferences.

The band does not have a website though; I mean, it is probably just a hobby band for the guys as we sometimes do not have time for rehearsals because each member is busy with work/business or whatever keeps them occupied.

But who knows, maybe one day we might start writing original music and would maybe need a website to promote it.

Blogging Myself to Bed.. Again

2007-03-01T00:35:00.000+08:00

Wasn't this something I used to do? Isn't it something you still do? Well, yeah.. after a movie, half asleep and not quite ready to doze of yet, there's the nightly blog. Sort of like the 2nd punch of a 1-2 combo, the first one just enough to stagger... the second one to put the lights out. But well, blogging... a part from starting with the same letter, is certainly far from boxing, less bloody.. and yes I admit remotely exciting, especially if its me on the keyboard.

Oh well...

Some months ago, I was seated comfortably, leaning back into the cushion as some friends of mine chattered and talked, and I just sat there spacing out; just on my second beer and already buzzing and ready to fall asleep. Gone is the formidable guzzler.

The people I am with are oblivious to the nearly passed out dope, and the music playing in the background that they are totally drowning out with their own ecstatic voices, when this song comes on and everybody just shuts up for a split second and then react... all in a unanimous affirmation that any really good song can elicit.

There are those songs which I haven't heard in like years and years, since my being out of radio for like 7 years now, sort of retiring from it back in 2000 or was it 2001. I am so not in touch with whatever is pop and on the radio, but I dont really care much too cos all you hear on the radio is piss and crap. The really good ones are those that you dont hear on the radio at all.

Anyways, going back.

About that song, we all reacted to; I finally got me a copy of the song; not that it was hard to find.. I just forgot to remind myself to go get a copy, or find one.. if you know what I'm saying.

And I finally have it...

Cry... by the Sundays, from 1997.

One Thing You Probably Didnt Know

2007-02-26T23:34:00.000+08:00

... yes you probably didn't, unless you are a client.

There's something you really don't know about me, but wait... yes actually there's a lot, but let's talk about this one thing.

For about fifteen years now, I have made quite a lucrative "hobby" off radio commercial production. Yes, it means what it means, I make... commercials/ads. What do I mean by make? I can conceptualize, write, and produce (either voice it or engineer it or both). Notice that I put the word hobby in quotations, because that's just what it is... a hobby that just happens to give me few extra bucks.

Now why did I get into this mode in the first place?

Right after work I had to rush home, to my little home studio (on the PC) and had to record something really quick, something that needed to be on the air immediately. Skipping dinner, and only getting the chance to eat when the job is done, and the client who commissioned the ad says ok, it'll do... but actually they don't just say it'll do.. it varies from good, to very good, to very nice. But personally there are those ads, especially the rush-rush ones that make me cringe when I hear them, hoping for them to just stop airing.

Anyways, going back to my story, the reason I was thinking about how many years I had been producing ads was because I spent the whole night making one, and the reason why I wanted to blog about it was because in the course of producing the ad, I had to do some internet research and found on the internet the very first album I ever had, the very first one I bought out of my own money, and I think if I remember right, that cassette cost me P40 or was it P45. Probably one of the best pop albums of all time, and it came out when i was in high school, and of course everyone was gaga over it... everyone my age that is, hehehe.

So, that album?

Songs From the Big Chair by Tears for Fears!

Well technically not my first album, because a year earlier I bought a compilation cassette which only showed the song titles and not the artists, which was quite a rip-off because one song on it which was Jump and I was expecting it to be the Van Halen song, turned out to be the Pointer Sisters' Jump. I wanted to jump and stop on the tape even. Now, what made it a rip off was, that it wasn't even the original artists, but covers made by guess who, noone knows who those freaks singing on the tape were. So total rip-off I say, which is why Songs From the Big Chair by TFF does qualify to be my first every album.

... And that's all I have to say about that.

12 Midnight & Those Wee Small Hours

2007-02-13T23:50:00.000+08:00

Just 9 minutes before midnight, officially just 9 minutes away from Valentine's day, I was about to go to bed and was kicking back to some oldy greats; Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday and then winding down with some good old slow ones from ol' blue eyes.

Then this songs comes up; a really good one and it's actually one of my personal favorites. The first time I heard it was on the soundtrack of Sleepless In Seattle; loved that movie just as much. It was a remake though by.. hmmmm I'm not sure who it was, I can easily do a google on that later to find out, if it really bothers me too much to really make me find out. But I dunno, it could have been Carly Simon, doing this old Frank Sinatra tune.

It never fails to get me...

A lot of good memories, with friends, family... and well, a few of those "the one who got away stories".

And, its now exactly, 12midnight, other than the cliched and trivial lovey dovey valentines crap we see, may we instead look at this day a little differently, and remember all those we loved in our lives, those who have been in one way or another instrumental in shaping us into who we are today, and those who have helped get us get to where we are.

Happy Valentines!

Oh, I almost forgot... the song, you might be wondering. Find it below.

----------------

In the wee small hours of the morning
While the whole wide world is fast asleep
You lie awake and think about the girl
And never ever think of counting sheep

When your lonely heart has learned its lesson
Youd be hers if only she would call
In the wee small hours of the morning
Thats the time you miss her most of all

Britney

2007-02-03T13:45:00.000+08:00

Did you know that one of the most searched words on the internet is britney? Second only actually to the more complete britney spears.

The crazy thing though is that what follows on third is britney spears no pantie, and fourth place of the britney searches is britney spears nude.

I mean, what the fudge man, why the heck are people going gaga over her m*ff???

It's probably all for free publicity though, you know what they say about publicity. Good or bad, its still publicity.

Digital Rules

2007-02-03T10:41:00.000+08:00

Oh I have seen this before and its panning out to be just like another boring weekend. Another boring Saturday. Waking up undecided whether to get out of bed or not, in fact as i write this blog, i am still in bed, and then i had a thought. I remembered some weeks ago I made a post about missing taking pictures because my digital camera was busted. Well, i just remembered, i got it back in tip top shape, ready to go with flashes a-blazing. And now i have something to do, but not before i marvel at how digital has changed the world we live in, through moments in recalled in vignette.

... last weekend i was in a conference, and i just got my camera back, but well, being without a camera for a year gets you used to "not remembering that you had one with you when you did." One of the people there was just taking pictures all over, wantonly snapping and flashing...shooting... i swear if that camera was a weapon of some sort everybody would be more than just departed... unidentifiable.

... that very night of the conference, we took the guests from out of town to a local bar, and just as today everybody has a cellphone, each one in the party seemed to have their own digital camera. You ever seen one of those scenes in a Hollywood movie premiere with the stars walking the red carpet, and there are flashes everywhere which don't seem to stop. It was that kind of scene all night. I wonder if the other bar patrons were annoyed with the flashes but, well we don't get that group together in the city that often.

Bottom line is, and i know you have done this before... just stop and think for a moment, and see yourself in one of those scene taking shots, and having to change a roll of film after 36 shots.

----

When i was in radio some time ago, part of my job was to train the new DJs how to work the machine, say stuff on the microphone, do both at the same time, and well think on their feet... making sure you got something to say when things go wrong, when all your machines don't work, and all you got is that MIC ON button and your voice. But then at the time, they didn't have a whole lot of machines to work, nope no sir, all you had was just one piece of equipment --- the computer.

Another digital marvel indeed, and one reason why man has quickened pace in creating newer and better technology. The computer, in my own little opinion, is just like any other tool man has had and used, but even better cos this think does chores for him, thinks for him and in the next few years, becomes him. Man becomes the computer. But before we get into that quasi-profound crap, lets go back to my point.

The DJ, his microphone, and his machine. The machine being, a computer which simply plays all the music, has all the commercials ready, has all your station IDs on cue, and aside from the voice you hear, the computer delivered everything that comes out of the radio.

What i couldn't get was, despite the technology at their fingertips, the comfort of just sitting almost the entire time and not running around looking for records or cartridges, these guys just couldn't avoid messing up on the air. While the old school guys did pretty spectacular shows with all those record players, cart decks, cassette decks, open reels.. analogue stuff; yet on the digital their performance was dismal.

----

A few weeks ago, i was surfing and i came across this online video demo of TiVO. It totally blew my mind. I remember back in the day when home movie entertainment was a luxury, when you had a betamax player the size of a tub (exaggeration to prove a point), then VHS, yet still like beta, you had a tape that played, and you groan and gripe when you come to a really great part of the movie and the picture and sound fuzzes and buzzes and you cant see a thing... someone who viewed the tape before you, had his beta/vhs player have a snack on the tape. And that was just a little over two decades ago.

Today you have yourself your dvd players, dvd writers, the dvd's and rock bottom priced recordable dvd's. We get the best picture quality so far on TV watching a movie on DVD. If you want TV, forget cable, get hooked up to sattelite TV, more choices, and even better and a tad expensive is TiVO, where you can choose, record, watch later, and while watching... rewind, slo mo, enlarge... well, the works. Its just spectacular.

Video quality and delivery using todays known technologies, is at its peak. It hasn't been any better in the past and in the coming years, it can only get even better. The same technologies that made it better however, are the same which cause certain industries to loss money. You have great picture resolution on DVD, and in the same breath, DVD technology, the ability to create DVDs is used for intellectual property violation and piracy.

We marvel at digital... no doubt it has made our lives easier, better, and even more. But it also has been taken advantage of and abused by many, and taken for granted.

My Music Blog

2007-02-01T20:13:00.000+08:00

Before anything else, there is a confession I have to make. I have been blogging for a little over a year, but not blogging as often as I would have wanted. Music has always been a significant part of my life, but to indulge and appreciate, the opportunities just haven't been.

I don't know, I could blame it on work, the lack of time, or maybe the pursuit of other things that are as of yet novel in my endless list of hobbies.

So, here's to my new blogspot... which don't necessarily have to be about blogs, music, or musicblogs.