Archive for December, 2008

So, I love Madvillian but I never noticed that one of my favorite tracks “Accordion” was just sampled from an original by Daedelus called “Experience”, check the similarities below.
Futuristic Hip Hop producer Dabrye has finally shown up this year with a mighty fine remix for King Midas Sound. This track took some time to grow on me because of the vox but the instrumental is pure gold since i’ve been on a huge dubstep kick.
One track that i’ve wanted to post for some time now is this Rustie track but I always thought it might be too rowdy for the blog but the more I listen its not too rowdy, right? You need to at least let it play to around the 1:37 mark so you can hear this muted sped up vibraphone melody. This Rustie kid is pretty amazing and he looks super young though but so do I (blows on nails) I hope he keeps up with this sound. If you like this Rustie guy you should also check out Bar 9, Starkey, and the BBC famous Wiley, they’re all on this rowdy dubstep tip.

Madvillian – Accordion

Daedelus – Experience

King Midas Sound – One Ting (Dabrye Remix)

Rustie – Response

This year I had a very nice christmas, I went back to Sacramento to see my family and came home with some great stuff (5 cutting boards! Also, pants.) But, since I’m not related to or friends with any millionaires and/or billionaires, I didn’t quite get everything I wanted. The following is my dream wish-list which I am publishing here in the hopes that Jimmy Warren Buffett will read it and decide that I need all this crap next Christmas.

The Herman Miller Embody Chair

I thought I’d start out with something somewhat practical, a humble chair. Although it stops seeming so humble when it looks like a hybrid of 70’s aircraft interior design and an alien throne and costs $1,600. I have never sat in one of these or even seen one in person, but every review I’ve read is glowing and I fondly recall my brief time sitting in a Herman Miller Aeron while I worked at Adobe. As a follow up to his iconic Aeron chair, designer Bill Stumpf created the new Embody just before he passed away in 2006.

Price: $1,600

Chances I’ll ever get one: Actually quite good. I have been sitting in a $150 Office Max monstrosity for years now and considering how much time I spend at my desk, I really owe it to my backside to invest in a good seat.

Nikon D700

After a lot of thought, I finally decided my next camera, if bought today, would be a D700. The only problem is my D80 hasn’t been stolen or dropped into a lake yet. I did drop it recently, breaking the flash, but it still works and the repair would be cheap so it’s really hard to justify dropping $2,700 on a new camera. Of course, a new camera this nice would need a very, very nice lens to do it justice. Add at least $1,000.

Price: $2,700 – $3,700

Chances I’ll ever get one: Slim. By the time I upgrade there will probably be something bigger and better in this price class. Although, I will definitely be getting something on this level, one of the gear purchases I regret most was skimping on my current rig (D80 + Tamron Lens).

Solid State Logic Matrix Console

I thought I would sneak the big one in the middle. If you aren’t a total audio geek or professional engineer, you probably don’t know or care what this is, but if you’ve ever listened to popular music then you’ve no doubt heard an SSL console at work. SSL makes some of the best sounding recording equipment known to man and their consoles (basically huge mixers) have been used to record countless hit records. I use SSL plugins, which are basically software emulators of their real-world counterparts. The plugins do sound amazing, but there’s nothing like the real thing. 16 channels of SSL EQ, motorized faders, DAW control…The list goes on. Of course it’s not cheap, hint: just the legs for this thing cost $900. While it is a steal compared to it’s full sized brethren, the price puts it’s well into pros-only territory.

Price: $26,000 (yes, three zeroes)

Chances I’ll…. Let’s just stop there, it’s not happening. Ever.

Wacom Cintiq

Ok, back to something a bit more reasonable. The Cintiq is the top of the line Wacom, it’s essentially one of their tablets grafted to an LCD monitor. I got a chance to try one of these at OFFF in Barcelona and it was pretty incredible, actually being able to interact directly with the screen is a very refreshing way to work. The only problem I have with the Cintiq is that you really can’t color calibrate it properly, the touch sensitive membrane interferes with colorimeters. So essentially you would need this screen and then another for color proofing, causing a problem with desk space.

Price: $2,000

Chances: Pretty slim at the moment. This is the sort of thing I’d love to have, but it would really be hard to justify considering how seldom I would probably use it. If they came out with an LED version and dropped the price to around $1,500 I’d give it some more consideration.

AKG K 702 Headphones

Although not ideal, headphones are sometimes a necessity when working late hours on music projects. I broke the jack on my AKG K 240’s a while back and have sort of been limping along with them (have to jiggle the cord every hour or so to get stereo sound out of them). The K 702’s are the new, top of the line set from AKG and probably blow away those entry-level 240’s I’ve been using all these years. The beauty of buying high-end headphones for music production is that they also sound great for recreational listening.

Price: $450

Chances: Marginal. Headphones aren’t a huge priority for me so I haven’t done much research. When I do replace my set, if I spend anywhere near $450 I will definitely look around for some alternatives to the AKG’s before I take the plunge.

Adam Sub 8

I thought I’d end it off with something I’ll definitely be getting, though from myself. I ordered the Adam Sub 8 yesterday to complement my recently acquired Adam A7’s (pictured, the speakers closest to the monitor). I have been suffering with M-Audio BX8’s for about 6 years now. I sold my Event 20/20’s, then traded my Event Tria’s to get them for some insane reason I can’t quite recall now. They are really just terrible monitors, completely inaccurate. But I used them for so long that I got used to their inaccuracies and just sort of settled into a rut. After a very long and very frustrating ordeal mixing my latest single I decided enough was enough and got the A7’s. They’re incredibly accurate and very easy to work with, my ear fatigue is almost non-existent now. The only problem is they are small, they’ve only got 6″ drivers, so it’s hard for them to fill my studio and produce the lower ranges. So I decided to go all out and get the Sub 8 to fill in the low end. Let’s just hope it lives up to the sound of the A7’s.

Price: $800

Chances: It’s in the mail.

So that’s it, not so much to ask right? Mr. Buffett, if you’re reading, I will accept a wire transfer, at your age I don’t expect you to shlep this stuff all around town. Anyways, has anyone had any experience with any of this stuff? Any thoughts? I’d love to know about the Embody in particular, that thing is calling me in a big way.

I’ve been obsessing over Herman Miller furniture lately, spending way too much time browsing Hive. Herman Miller introduced it’s new Lifework Portfolio recently and I have to say it’s pretty clean. Included are some old favorites like the Nelson Swag Leg Desk and also some great newcomers. This Cognita is what stood out to me, I’m always a sucker for the whole wood-grain/white/stainless-steel look. The only problem is the price: $999. I can’t imagine spending a grand for something billed as a “storage bench” any time in the near future but it’s always fun to look.

I feel like if I did get a piece like the Cognita it would make everything else I have look so bad I would have to throw it all away and start from scratch. I guess it could be reasoned that buying one expensive piece of quality furniture that will last you a lifetime is a better investment than constantly buying sub-par stuff (Ikea) and replacing it every few years as it breaks or starts to look dated. I guess I just don’t have any experience with Herman Miller in particular so I don’t really know if it would hold up long enough to be worth the investment. Anybody splurged on high end furniture like this and if so, has it held up well? Was it worth it or do you regret the indulgence? Let us know in the comments

This is a pretty clever concept, a real sketchbook for web mock-ups. I think I’ll stick with Photoshop but this would probably be fun now and then. Via Paranaiv

So you lose all your music right? what are your go to albums to keep you sane during the rebuilding process? Well the first thing I went for was Arthur Russell because I knew I could grab all the songs I have on ISO50 second but what didn’t I have up here for you guys to hear was the question. My friend Fred Thomas aka City Center is suppose to get me some of the other essential Arthur Russell but this album “Another Thought” is just so refreshing when you listen to so much instrumental electronic thru the day.
I know everyone here probably has DJ Shadow’s “Endtroducing…” CD or LP but its probably not a go to day to day listening for everyone and that’s not posted on sites a lot. The key melody at 3:42 kills me every time in this song, does anyone know where he sampled it from? The album is in the Guinness World Records as being the first album created entirely from sampled sources so it has to be from something else.
One disc that I had the day I lost my hard drive was left to me by Peter Kersten aka Lawrence which had a lot of unreleased Dial Records releases. It had the new Efdemin EP on Curle which is simply gorgeous when played on a large system. One thing I noticed is this song reminds me of an Aphex Twin track, All that comes to mind is the Classics LP but nothing on that is it I don’t think.
If you ever go to a DFA party in New York you usually get the pleasure of hearing one of the 2 guys from Runaway DJ sometime during the night. I know it’s Monday but if you want to dance a bit in your sit to “Brooklyn Club Jam” its alright by me.

Arthur Russell – Keeping Up

DJ Shadow – Building Steam With A Grain Of Salt

Efdemin – America

Runaway – Brooklyn Club Jam

With all this talk of branding lately it was interesting to see Under Consideration’s Brand New blog’s picks for Best & Worst Brands for 2008. The ever-controversial Pepsi re-brand predictably made the worst list while 826 Valencia and Taca headed up the Best-of column. There were some surprising omissions as well as a few controversial picks–as the 126 comments and counting thread will attest to. Check out both full lists here.

Pepsi stepped up it’s game in my opinon and simplified their brand really nicely (Please excuse the iPhone camera photos but I didn’t bring my camera to the grocery store like usual). Not only did they change the logo, but they’ve changed the swoosh slightly a bit for each variety of (i.e. Diet, Caffeine-Free, and Max). I was pretty impressed mainly because they had the new logos sitting next to the old ones which has these blue pixel explosions in the background and so much unwanted text. Stepping back and seeing a wall of the simple new blue pepsi 2 liters all aligned was pretty beautiful even though i’m a Coca-Cola fan. One other good layout addition was the abbreviation of the 0 calorie, carbohydrates, and sugar text aligned nicely under the logo. Don’t get me wrong though, i’m not a complete fan of the Microsoft gamer X in the font. Do you think this means Mountain Dew will get a new logo? Oh my there is a graphic design god and he cares.

In celebration lets listen to Aphex Twin:

Aphex Twin – Polynomial-C

Happy holidays to everyone! Here’s hoping you get something as cool as this. Image via Breath Less

Can I redo my 2008 best of list? So my hard drive completely died this week and most of my music wasn’t backed up. Now I’m piecing back together my iTunes library with the help of a lot of friends. My friend Praveen sent me this Lone – Lemurian LP this morning and my jaw has slowly been dropping throughout the day. It’s if Flying Lotus and Casino Versus Japan had a baby, I can’t stop listening to it. Maybe I’m overly passionate because of the hard drive failure, but I think this may be the real deal. Let me know what you think, I know there are some Boards Of Canada fans lurking around on the blog from time to time but Lone isn’t as dark as BoC, at least not from what i’ve heard. How unfitting is that cover though?

Lone – Interview at Honolulu

Lone – Koran Angel

Lone – Phthalo Blue

Yes, I have been quite kind to Microsoft lately, but if you count yourself among the ranks of web designers you know that Internet Explorer is still the bane of our collective existence. At some point, long ago, when Microsoft ruled the browser universe, some genius over there decided to give a big middle finger to all of us designers and our so-called “web standards”. The result is that things just don’t look the way we as designers intend in IE: CSS elements don’t render properly and various functionality breaks down forcing us to implement IE-specific hacks and tweaks to make it all work. Well, MS, in their infinite wisdom, have finally decided to back down and have announced that the forthcoming eighth iteration of their Internet Explorer browser will embrace web standards. What a novel concept! Embracing web standards in a web browser? What will they think of next?

This certainly is cause for some celebration, no more tweaking and comparing, writing IE-specific code to make things look right across all the browsers. But wait, we’re dealing with IE here, so of course there’s a problem with this new development, sort of the last stand of IE’s stubborn unwillingness to play by the rules. Because IE8 now adheres to normal web standards, it can actually break sites that were written to accommodate it’s older versions. Thankfully the solution is an easy one and Ed Bott has a great article over at ZDNet explaining the issue and how to apply the rather simple fix (one line of code!). We’re not out of the woods yet, but at least we can look forward to a day when the IE8 install base becomes large enough that we can all but forget about making our sites look pretty for the previous, less accommodating versions.

Anybody out there done much testing with IE 8 yet? Have you implemented the fix and if so, how is it working out? Let us know in the comments…