My favourite singles of 2003

In no particular order:

Outkast - "Hey Ya"
Louise - "Pandora's Kiss"
Rachel Stevens - "Sweet Dreams My LA Ex"
Radiohead - "There There"
Radiohead - "2+2=5"
Blur - "Out Of Time"
Ben Folds - "Sunny 16"
Beyonce - "Crazy In Love"
Pink - "Feel Good Time"
Red Hot Chilli Peppers - "Can't Stop"

That's all I can think of for now! There is loads more, no doubt.

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 10:35:08 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Make a sentence out of the following words:

Christmas. A. Happy. Have.

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 12:34:46 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Then again....

Having listened to "Closest Thing To Heaven" about 100 times already, I've come to the conclusion that I think the chorus is brilliant - still working on the verses somewhat, though.

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 2:42:24 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Got It! (the new Tears For Fears track, that is....)

OK, so the system described below does work, with some caveats!

Namely: It seems many Mac OS X audio editors can't handle an MP3 file of, say, 600Mb or so - I mean that does expand to a file over 11 hours long!!!!

So, a tip would be to setup up your Audio Hijack program to record chunks of perhaps 200/300Mb or so, to save yourself lots of frustrating minutes trying to cut 3 minutes out on a 600Mb file, and the computer REALLY starting to piss you off with it's inability to do such a simple bloody task!!!!

Anyway, so Star 98.7FM did indeed play "Closest Thing To Heaven" last night (at about 1030EST fact fans) - what do I think? Well......

It's very Beatlesy. Not too much of a suprise really, I mean they've been known to do this one or two times before now. It has a drum fill in it though which might just be a little too similiar to the intro of "Sowing The Seeds Of Love" for some people's liking...

Not 100% sure about it yet, I should say, but then sometimes it does take me a while to go 'Oh, right, yeah, I get it now"....Specifically some of the lyrics are a little "Er....OK...." but, you know, they're much better songwriters than I will ever be so it's not really my place to mention such things!

Anyway, a succesful result, all in all!!!

(yes, there are lots and lots of !!!!!!!!s in this post, it's one of those days!)

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 1:20:42 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

The wonders of the Internet strike again....

Right, so Tears For Fears have new single coming out in January 2004 called "The Closest Thing To Heaven" and, basically, I want to hear it. NOW. ASAP. However, it's not been given to UK radio yet (strange, oh well) - still, I learn that there seems to be exactly one radio station on the whole planet, namely Star 98.7 FM - based in Orange Country, California, The United States Of America, that has a copy and is playing it occasionally [in theory no radio station is supposed to have it until Jan 6th, but there we are]

Now, in many years gone by I remember listening to UK radio when I knew/had been told that a station was going to playing a new track by my favourite artist(s) of the time, whomever that may have been [specifically, I remember waiting for a show premiering Adam And The Ants "Prince Charming" album in 1982 - Noel Edmunds show maybe? No way of remembering that! - and also the first play in the UK of Tears For Fears' "Sowing The Seeds Of Love" single in 1989 on the Bruno Brooks show.]

As it's easy to imagine I'm sure, back in those dark ice-age times the fact that the track I'm trying to at least catch a few seconds of is only being played on a local radio station in America would have caused what could easily be described as 'a problem'.

Not these days though, oh no!!

All you need to do in 2003 is set up your web browser to listen to the live audio stream coming out of the aformentioned Star 98.7 FM [which i must say sounds pretty good considering it only seems to be pumping me about 3.5Kb/sec of data] and then make sure you have a copy of Audio Hijack Pro ($30) or the cheaper Audio Hijack ($16) running on your OS X Macintosh - you simply leave it all running, recording the whole damn station (as the filetype of your choice, mp3, AIFF etc) to your hard disk as you sleep.

The final step in the process is to get up in the morning and scan through all the hours of stuff you've captured to find the track you're after!

Technology rocks, generally, doesn't it?

(no, I haven't caught it yet!)

I could worry about the artwork though, in the meantime:

(from: Zero Disc)

[Then again, it's probably obvious to mention this but once someone has found an mp3 of it and wants to share it around, all the steps above are less than necessary anyway, but this isn't quite the point . I'll suggest this way has a bit of the feel (if you will, indulge me here!) of doing it the 'old' way - it almost makes you feel like a proper fan again. Or something.]

p.s. American local radio really sucks in quite a unique way.

p.p.s. and all this after people in the UK have had little choice but to be soaking up a 21 year-old Tears For Fears track, namely Mad World, for the last month or so. Like a 100 times a day. On radio and so much TV. This after TFF, as a duo, have been 'split up' for some 13 years or so. This one month before their 'comeback'. What a funny...no, what a Mad World it is indeed.

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 12:49:11 AM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Bastard Lighter Thieves

I want to start up a band called this one day soon - in honour of all those people that 'borrow' your lighter at a party/on a night out, and never seem to remember to give it back. For some people, experience suggests, a lighter is not something you should ever buy, only steal from others....

(and it does also compress to 'BLT' which rather amuses me)

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 9:02:19 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Kids toys are great!

Been buying a few pressies for my Godson over the last few days (birthday on the 15th of December, yeah, thanks! hahaha) and, as I suppose many people find, kids toys these days are SO cool.

I want one of these NOW:

(from: Early Learning Centre)

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 4:50:40 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Thanks Eddie

Went see the The Izzard last night here in Brighton. A brilliant 2 and an half hours being entertained by a comedy genius.

Today we watched the DVD filmed on the same tour - filmed just 3 weeks previous to last night in fact. It is amazing how different every night is with him. And in a couple of weeks (the 22nd) we're off to see him again, in London. And, no doubt, much of the material will go off into different directions yet again. Yeah, sure, stand-ups "all" do that, but not to the extent to Eddie does, I would suggest.

I would love future Eddie DVDs to contain, say, 3 different shows from nights spread out throughout a single tour. It would be fascinating to be able to note the progress certain sketches take over time, or not as the case may be....

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 11:28:05 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Just a Note To Self really....for those mornings after....

For years I've totally believed in the 'Hair Of The Dog' theory, and have always bleated on at people that there is a medical reasoning behind it [not just 'cos you go all numb and fuzzy again when the new drink kicks in] but, despite my interest in all things medical - and knowing far too many long medical words - never could remember a good explanation for it....

Luckily, this months Maxim magazine (it's not quite FHM but it's still fun) has the very paragraph I need...

"Aches And Pains"

'Alcohol contains ethanol and methanol. The liver cleans in a strict order, always starting with ethanol. When it gets to the methanol you're in trouble. One of its by-products is formic acid, which is like an ant sting. 'Hair Of The Dog' works because your liver switches back to breaking down the new ethanol. Methanol breakdown will resume later, though'

(reproduced without permission, etc etc, will be online on their site next month)

[ant sting!?!? who's ever been stung by an ant then?]

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 5:57:27 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Children's View Of Love

Nope, not studio or liquidised-camel related, a moment of 'awwwwwwwwwwwww!' just for the hell of it....

What is Love (according to 4 to 8 year olds)

inc. "Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other." and "Love is when Mommy gives Daddy the best piece of chicken."

Normal rubbishy service to be resumed here forthwith.

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 2:48:01 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

I wonder which is harder....

Drinking a camel through a straw...

...or...

Drinking straw through a camel?

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 9:49:33 AM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

Oh cool, now I have a plan!

Sorry - this is more of my "I'm trying to work out my new studio" nonsense!....but tonight I have actually got to somewhere good, and now have a working (up to a point) "Studio 2" in the living room - which is great because I have already worked out how to do some new stuff I didn't know how to do before now....

I realised something tonight though, and it might be obvious to many but I hadn't grasped it yet for some reason [16 years and still learning!] - sometimes it's not JUST the newest bit of kit you add to any setup that causes the "not-seen-that-before!" type problems. The programmer in me (of the computer sort, not the music type) always goes for the "OK, you've added piece of kit X to the system and now something isn't working right, hence it must be the thing X that is causing it" theory. Tonight has proved that - simple I'll grant you - train of thought to be a little...er...lacking at times.

So, basically, my new bug-busting system is to remove any new bit of kit from the studio proper and test it out in - what i suppose could be called - a controlled environment....any problems (and there are always a couple at least!) can be pinned down so much quicker!

Not gonna keep this junk setup in the living room though - gawd blimey no! - as it looks so very ugly, as you can see below:

and don't the wicker chairs just set the thing off so nicely?

UPDATE: Oh my. PC midi timing seems to be somewhat shocking compared to a Mac of similar vintage. How ironic. When Macs started doing midi everyone was saying (with some justification!) how shocking they were compared to Atari STs!.....I know Windows XP Pro pretty well these days and I'm not really thinking it's a "setup problem" as such. VERY interesting all this.....

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 12:50:46 AM  trackback []  comment(s) []  

OK, now I've done it....

Right, so I'm trying to work out a different (better? worse? I dunno!) studio setup for myself (as mentioned here) and here I am in the process of setting up the new system to see how it feels.

However, right now I'm in the position of having, what is in effect, 2 half working studios...one at the end of the living room (classy eh?) and one in the studio room proper. I'm sure all your hearts will be bleeding at my little problem of having ProTools setups on different floors...poor old me etc

But that's not the point, this isn't about gear envy - or it shouldn't be.

The funny thing is that the 'minimal' setup (the one downstairs) just refuses to be that minimal at all! I keep going "oh well, I need to have access to that bit of kit, even though it's analogue" (the idea was - I think - to try and have a totally digital all-in-one-box [actually 2 but I digress] system).

Oh dear. Not quite going to plan....yet.....

Posted By Simon Thornton @ 11:37:37 PM  trackback []  comment(s) []