Swingin'

Big thanx to Quaz for getting the new birdw0rks site to me. Now have a decent online template from which to build. Take a look here, even though links etc. need updating. Am always open to suggestions for improving the site, bearing in mind me novice html status, natch.

Have also set up at SoundClick, a nice site for getting toons out there, swapping songwriting & recording tips, and hearing other folks' work.

Overdue for a more meaty online presence moosackwise, birdw0rks. Also a nice opportunity to merge image and sound.

New 16-track studio has arrived & been set up. Superb toy this, although I'm still learning how to drive really. Sound quality improvement very obvious vs. old BR-8. Drum machine & sequencer mean I can compose rhythms properly from the same source; am taking much more time cleaning, compressing, & processing tracks; plus am looking forward to playing with the onboard mastering kit to actually learn how to master properly. New musical tools stimulate new ideas, always, and I'm definitely back in the flow. String fingers getting toughened up once more.

Check out a draft of the results.

Headfnuk

Whenever I dream that I'm driving, the brakes never work.

Buzzinoggin

Despite getting laid out by head-swimming changeofseasonviral ugliness, moosikal week continued in fine style with Prokofiev's Romeo & Juliet. Is there a much better piece of music composed? NY Philharmonic were stingy with no encore and could have rearranged their excerpts more effectively, but it continues to be one of my fave orchestral douffas. Sound sound.

Dead Can Dance were on form but lacked the hair-on-end impact of when I first saw them circa early 90s. Maybe both my aging & theirs? Radio City Musical Hall is an awesome place just to walk in, let alone hear dark, swirling music in, and DCD did justice to their back catalogue. Time hasn't dimmed the power of Lisa Gerrard's body-quivering vocals. Amazing range.

He is Vision He is Sound

Despite my suffering a buzzing head cold (that would be buzzed further by the end of the night with ringing timpanics), T. & I made it to Irving Plaza last night to get a dose of Uncle Bob back with a full band for the first time in yonks. A very different experience to the last couple of solo shows over the past few years, although song selection somewhat similar in places. Bob is definitely fitter, louder, and on form in his mid 40s. Puts younger psueds, posers, and deriviates in the field of noise to shame. While the sound mix was a bit murky at times (an overpowering bass muddied the finer guitar twists & turns in places early on), the power and speed of most of the set was stonking. What surprised me a little was how strongly the new work came through. Body of Song, the new long player, is a nice mix of things and when 'Circles' and 'Paralyzed' came in after a few Sugar classics on the night, their crispness, freshness, and raw emotive energy hit home nicely. Husker Du classics were wheeled out as crowd pleasers, starting with the slower, but excellently grinding 'Hardly Getting Over It' and heading to an encore that included a cracking rendition of 'Makes No Sense at All'. (T. had actually spotted a pre-gig Bob walking from Union Square a few hours previous and shouted a hello without response. "Walking around with your head in the clouds - it makes no sense at all" would have been what I would have sung to his departing back...he has a sense of humour, right?)

The Philharmonic's Prokofiev Romeo & Julient excerpts tonight and then Dead Can Dance at Radio City on Saturday continue our moosikal earlovefest for the week.

In and out of a darkened room

September and October are fab months to be in NYC. The weather cools, the sunlight is still bright, and it’s the perfect time of year for spinning around the edges of the Manhattan isle on the wheels, running through Le Park Central, al fresco dining in the last stretch of long evenings, or just sauntering through the grid. Fall film, moosak, performance, and museum schedules kick off with a culltchahhrule blitz, and yer spoiled for choice for artistic stimulation, and the baseball season comes to it’s cracking climax. I took full advantage of $5 tickets to visit the Stadium in da Bronx for almost a full week of the final Yanks homestand of the regular season in late September. Every game a one-run stonker. An excessive number of games (5 in 7 days at one point), but it’s a long off season.

A recent paternal visit shoved T. & I to dip into a few cultural delights that are on the always-there list. E.g. a visually & audibly flashy presentation of La Boheme at the Met, the surprisingly good Transit Museum in Brooklyn, interesting, ectoplasm-fueled turn of the centuary photos at the other Met, the wonderful get yer hands dirty toys at the Museum of the Moving Image in Long Island City Queens (try the film audio dubbing booth for laughs if you ever visit – oh so very easy to abuse to amusing effect), finally catching the excellent Broken Flowers, and the Philharmonic's Mahler 1 at the Lincoln Center. A progressive hop around fave Manhattan eateries & watering holes included in the parental tour, natch.

Oh, and the furrybeast has fall madness (similar to summer madness in manifestation). Galloping loon...