Early Listening Equipment (Museum “Waalsdorp”)
The Gamage Ltd Sound Locator No 1 Mk1 (Museum “Waalsdorp”)
Greatstone Sound Mirrors (Atlas Obscura)
A Short History of Acoustic Locators (Kircher Society via. WayBack Machine)
Acoustic Location & Sound Mirrors (Museum of Retrotech via. WayBack Machine)
I don’t think I had even listened to Les Paul musically until I heard one of the old Les Paul Shows on archive.org. I knew of him because he had his name on guitars, obviously, but through my own background I was well aware of how he was also the innovator of recording techniques that paved the way for how we listen to music now. Until digital recording came along we were using versions of the techniques developed by Les Paul, and even now we’re doing the same thing but in modified ways. Multitrack recording, overdubbing, tape delay – he was at the forefront.
Les Paul & Mary Ford - BrasilThat last post reminded me of this, which I thought I’d posted long ago.
It’s a ‘unique’ way of playing cassette tapes (and floppy disks) on a record turntable.
Another inventive audio project – transcoding the audio information from a record groove into digital format using digital images of the record itself. The end product isn’t all that bad and sounds nice (to me).
Digital Needle – A Virtual Gramophone
This is quite fantastic, in the literal sense.
The city of Batman in Turkey is attempting to sue Christopher Nolan for using their name without permission.
They’re not trying to sue the estate of Bob Kane for creating the character, they’re not trying to sue DC who owns the character, and they’re not trying to sue Warner Brothers for the publication of the film series. I honestly have no idea why they chose Nolan as the target for this, and I fully expect it to get laughed out of court. It’s a bit of a shame, because it would have been hilarious to watch it all unfold/unravel.
I liked Dead Set a lot. In fact, the only bad thing I can think to say of it was that I noticed one of the more gruesome (but funny) scenes was edited away in the saturday night ‘full’ version. After films like 28 Days Later and the Romero remakes, seeing zombies run no longer irks me. It’s more of an evolution of film than of zombiekind as far as I’m concerned. Yet with films like Romero’s more recent works as well as Shaun of the Dead, the shambling zombies aren’t giving up. They’re just taking their time to get things done right.
Simon Pegg has written an article in The Guardian explaining (in true fanboy detail) why Zombies do not run, and why this spoiled Dead Set for him. While I don’t have the same loathing for the sprinting undead, I can pretty much agree with every point he makes and it’s definitely worth reading.
Article:
The Dead and the Quick – Simon Pegg, The Guardian 04/11/08
- Two patchable dual-oscillator analog synth simulators:
- Four-part drum machine that uses sounds created with the analog synth simulator
- Six-track (analog synth x 2, drum machine x 4) /16-step sequencer
- Delay, chorus, and flanger sound effects available from the mixing board
- Three note-entry modes: touch-control screen, keyboard screen, matrix screen
- Real-time sound control mode via touch-control screen
- Exchange sounds and songs and play multiple units simultaneously through a wireless communications link
The Korg DS-10 Synth for the Nintendo DS was released in Japan last month and is undoubtedly the best music-making tool I’ve seen on a handheld, full stop. Pocket Music was probably the only actual (commercially available) contender to be honest, which was actually a pretty good sample-based tracker that was sadly dolled up and packaged as a ‘you can make Eminem songs’ toy. Nitrotracker is a pretty versatile DS Homebrew comparison but it just doesn’t quite compare to, well, something made by Korg.
There’s a single short sample on the AQ Interactive site which for some reason is just a bland & basic electronica track, wasting a chance to show the actual range of output it’s capable of, but does give an example of the fantastic tone of the machine.
A far better example was produced on video – 2 x 2 serial linked machines hooked up to a mixer and played live.
Also, for some bizarre reason, one of the best features is completely glossed over… the ‘matrix screen’ mentioned in the specs is actually a Kaoss Pad. A proper one. A fully functional Kaoss Pad, controlled on the DS’ touch screen. In a promo video from the Frankfurt thing, the demonstrator mentions the Kaoss Pad as a ‘little bonus’, which I thought was quite a sweet way of understating it. You’d have thought they might play that feature up a teeny bit, but then again, the type of person excited by a Korg synth on the DS is probably already pre-ordering it regardless.
Apparently a US release is scheduled for October through XSEED, and a worldwide release to follow (although no actual dates on that….)
I want many.
The sandwich bit is my favourite.
“I’m not suggesting there’s some kind of conspiracy afoot to make us more tolerant of (and, in fact, enthusiastic about) a fascist society.
I’m suggesting that such a conspiracy probably wouldn’t be necessary.”
