Poseidon's Harmonica

This is one of the most awesome things i've ever heard of:

The Sea Organ in Zadar, Croatia.

It's like John Cage and Poseidon and Brian Eno all made love to the same idea at once!

There's video!

found via metafilter.

{update: Just hold the phone, This website is giving me a case of the thrills!}

Dancing, Mashups, and Missy Elliot's Unstoppable Kung-Fu

Last Saturday night was off the chain.

Turns out, one of my favorite Mash-up Dj's (assemblers?, synthers?, Grafters? - what is the term for someone who makes a mash-up?) DJ Freddy, The King of Pants lives in Seattle and hosts a mashup and illegal music dance party at my favorite places to go out - the Re-bar - every 3rd Saturday. This is sort of like being a new convert to catholicism, who lives in Rome, and is thinking about joining the priest-hood being informed that the Pope, in fact, lives down the street.

Dj Freddy is a a super nice sweet-heart! We got there sort of early and I went straight to the booth and let him know I was so excited and I had just put his "Badd To Me" on my latest Ugata disc, before I knew he was from here - and he immediately added it to the mix...DOPE!

So we and the crew went and danced for Approx 2 and 75/100ths of an hour. It was fantastic. But the mash-up dance party has a inherent - i don't wanna say flaw - but you know how to fly a plane has to over come the drag that the atmosphere produces? that same atmosphere that allows the plane to fly? it's kind've like that.

Mash-ups are great cause they re-contexualize the familiar, and the juxtaposition factor can be thrilling - but it can also distance from the core initial response we have to it. For example, i was struck by how well the underlying rythmn of "Come as you Are" works as a dance beat - but doesn't sound like a traditional dance rythmn. And I was boogie-ing away - but then, i realized I was thinking about the music too - so not really lost in the dance sort of vibe.

That to me indicates that, at least for me, a Mashup can be much more cerebral than kinetic, in a sense. Of course, the more seamless and alarming the juxtaposition - that is, the more skill fully the mashup is executed - the less this is an issue. But it does mean that a mashup dj needs to be on point, in a way that a regular dance music creator doesn't.

Also - sometimes it seems the juxtaposition can be a hindrance to "getting the party started" We might all be philistines, but there was a palpable surge of energy on the dance floor when a mashup had a section of song that was just a pure source from one track. There was a sense of releif and of "HEY! this is what i recognize!" feeling - when the both lobes of our brains had been furiously listening, dancing, investigating, remembering, and processing flipped over to - "YAY! this is the music AND the chorus to the same Madonna song! WOOO! let's boogie a little harder!"

Don't let this make you think that mashups aren't good to dance to. We're going back next time frankenboot drops at the rebar. It was mad fun and the experience needs to be repeated over and over again.

Seriously. It was fun and we'll be back. More to come!

Also - Missy Elliot sounds incredible rapping over Any, and Everything.

The Masterclass

This, my fellows. Is how it's done.

May The Lord Bless You, and Keep You, Mr. Rooksby

My good friend Thom hipped me to the author from britain, Rikky Rooksby.

He said he wrote some neat books about guitar. So I checked one out from the library, "How to write songs on guitar". At first I was very skeptical. But in the introduction, Mr. Rooksby got right to the heart of the matter. The gist was, you can muddle through and write some good stuff - don't forget to do that, but if you have knowledge of whats happening in rock/pop music - you can create good stuff (with YOUR distinct spin) on it faster, and easier.

I was hooked. And now I own nearly his complete bibliography. and i'm scared to give him shout outs, cause if somebody knew how much of my new songs were handed, handed to me from the good prof. rooksby - well i'd be ashamed. But while rooksby is giving me the knowlege, i'm still putting stuff together and it still sounds like a "Dr. Confusion original". I've been given our bought these books:

• How to write songs on guitar
• the songwriting sourcebook
• Melody
• Chord Master
• The Beatles Chord Songbook
  

I'm still on the fence about buying the Riff book, and the Arranging book. But If I get a fraction of the knowledge from those two as I have from the other books - that'll be money well spent.

I might break down each of these books and their strengths here. But for starters I wanted to give a hearty shout out to my new long-distance mentor. And thank him for the doors he's opened up for me in my songwriting.

Wurster on Random Rules

Jon Wurster is funny. and he plays the heck out of the drums for my favorite band. Here he is talking about what's on his iPod. I'm stunned that I care about this so much. No.

No i'm not.

Ugata Heardis update,

Y'all know about the Ugata Heardis Project right? Right.

We'll i sent off my recent discs and posted my tracklist and some thoughts about the songs here.

Build High For Happiness!
-Dr. Confusion

Music Saves Lives

Seriously.

This soldier's iPod helped slow down an AK-47 round enough to not pierce his body armor. Thanks iPod!


Ooops. Looks like this story could be a fake. Boo! if it's a fake! BOOOO!!!

MS to ditch some DRM too.

blip!

As is their wont - Microsoft saw what Apple did and thought to themselves: "well, we'd better hop on that ship before she sails!"

Still, encouraging news all around!

BTW: I've hefted and messed around with the Zune. Give it a pass. I found it to be slow, and you had to click the up and down buttons a quarzillion times to do anything. I know Apple has got the hottness locked down with their patented Click-wheel, but still - My Neuros was similar, but it had a smarter layout and you could skip ahead in the alphabet, which I couldn't figure out with the Zune. Maybe i'm dumb.

Apple Get's its Sh*t Together and Dumps DRM

Boom!

Here's some pretty sweet news:

Mr. Steve Jobs has just announced that Apple will join up with EMI to offer the entire EMI catalog on iTunes music store....

DRM free!

The announcement was made today and the new 'free tunes' will be available for download in May. The new music prices will increase 30% to $1.29 per song, but the quality offered will be upped to 256 kbs in AAC format. Interestingly, iTunes will continue to offer the DRM music as well at $.99 per track, giving music listeners a choice. (not sure about the thinking on this, but whatever...)

So the price goes up, but the quality's better and there's no DRM to contend with. The hike in coinage that it will take to buy the DRM-free music from iTunes has another benefit too, as it will give a more even advantage to smaller distributors.

Another cool little tidbit is that (as near as I can tell) full albums will remain the same price (!) and you can 'upgrade' any previously purchased iTunes DRM music in your library by simply paying the $.30 difference. That's cool. Also from what I understand DRM videos can be stripped of their DRM for free.

Apparently, back in February, Steve Jobs actually sent out an open letter to record companies encouraging them to dump DRM restrictions. Mr. Jobs stated in the letter that the only reason iTunes implemented DRM in the first place was because the major music labels wouldn't distribute music through iTunes Music Store without the DRM restrictions in place.

I know that this won't mean anything at all to many people who get their music from eMusic or elsewhere, but the fact is that this is a huge (although inevitable) step forward for the world of music. As long as the concept doesn't bomb (and why would it?), then everyone else will very quickly jump on-board and the DRM monster will be effectively slain.

Great work, Apple!

P.S.- In case you're wondering (and why wouldn't you be?) The Beatles' music, which EMI owns the rights to, will still not be released along with the rest of their catalog as of yet.

***********Dr. Confusion jumping in here********
I think this is great news. But, I worry. I'm worried that, in pricing the DRM free tracks higher, the sales will be lower. So, in the future both Apple and EMI can say "Look at the figures...there's no demand for DRM-free music." If they priced the non and the with DRM tracks the same, the ideological argument would trounce the economic for doing away with DRM. If feels weird, a a little bit galling to have to pay to remove the noose you didn't ask for. Like, how unrefined brown rice costs more than processed rice. Knamean? There's less labor involved in the process so why do I have to pay more? On the whole, this is a very encouraging sign!


****a Myku Update*****
Yes, indeed, it is a backwards way of doing things. I can only imagine that it's because they're (for some reason) trying to "phase out" DRM instead of doing away with it altogether. I truly hope that it doesn't backfire, but for some reason, I don't think it will. Maybe because there's such an overwhelming populace of people who want DRM to die. We'll see what happens. I think, though, that the new DRM-free tunes are of a higher bit-rate than those currently available on iTunes Music Store.

Another Apple update here too: I just read that iTunes Music Store will now give you credit towards the purchase of a full album if you've previously purchased tracks from that album. They'll just subtract what you've already paid from the album cost. I think that's really sweet.